Four young guys dressed in red shirts and black pants were valeting all the guests’ cars. By the time Paul and I pulled up in his Ford Explorer, there must have been thirty cars parked all along both sides of the winding avenue. It looked like the whole town had turned out for the event.
Jilly had wanted to come. She wanted everyone to see she was back in action again, even though her Porsche wasn’t. She told me she’d already gotten a towing service to figure out if they could get her Porsche out of the ocean. I’d said fine, you can come if you can walk without assistance from here to the end of the hall. She made eight steps and drooped. But she was fine, according to all the tests Dr. Coates had done on her since early that morning. I’d asked him if he was coming to the Tarchers’ party and he’d said he wouldn’t miss it unless a set of triplets was ready to slip out. My sister Gwen, who’d had three kids, none of whom, I was sure, had just slipped out, would have slugged him.
I turned to Paul as we stepped out of the Explorer in front of the Tarcher house. “Tell me about Tarcher, Paul.”
“His full name’s Alyssum Tarcher, and don’t ask me where he got the weird name. He’s been here some thirty years and he’s filthy rich. I wouldn’t be surprised if he owns half the state. Everybody here owes him, probably without exception. Nothing happens in this town that isn’t run by him first. The mayor, Miss Geraldine, is at his beck and call. She’ll do anything he wants. Actually, most of us will.”
“Did you have to ask his permission to move back out here from Pennsylvania?”
“As a matter of fact, he helped me come back,” Paul said, all cool and formal. “No secret there. He’s invested in my current project. He sold Jilly and me our house.”
“Ah,” I said. So that’s how he and Jilly were surviving. But that beautiful house and Jilly’s Porsche were far above the survival line. “This is the fountain of youth formula?”
“Good try,” Paul said, slamming his door. “Jesus, Mac, I’m so relieved that Jilly lost control of the Porsche. If she’d tried to kill herself, I don’t know what I would have done.”
“Me either.”
One of the young valets dashed up, out of breath, gave Paul a big purple ticket, and drove the Explorer away. “Some house, huh?”
“Incredible,” I said, climbing up the deep half-dozen front steps. Lights and mellow chamber music poured out of the house. When we walked into the huge vestibule, I paused a moment, just breathing in the incredible smell of the house. It smelled like standing in the middle of a deep forest with a sliver of sunlight on your face-a hint of flowers, of water-drenched moss, of trees and light, pure air. I inhaled deeply as I turned to see a tall, hawk-nosed man walk toward us. It was, I had no doubt, Alyssum Tarcher, the patriarch of Edgerton, Oregon.
I am six feet, two inches tall, one hundred eighty-five pounds before the car bombing. He was at least two inches taller than me but not any heavier. He was probably around sixty years old, his hair thick, mixed black and white. He was a strong, vigorous man, no paunch, no softness on him. He looked potent. His son, Cotter, was standing behind him-thick-necked and dark, he looked like a thug. It was quite a contrast. He’d probably just shaved, but there was a hint of dark growth on his cheeks. He cracked his knuckles, his eyes studying my face.
“Ford MacDougal?”
Alyssum Tarcher’s voice was as deep and rich as the smoothest Kentucky bourbon.
“Yes, sir,” I said. He stuck out his hand and I shook it. An artist’s hands, I thought, slender, narrow, long-fingered. Too smooth.
“You and Jilly don’t look a thing like each other,” Alyssum Tarcher said, looking through to my molecules, I thought. This was a dangerous man. Far more dangerous than his bully of a son.
“No,” I said. “We don’t.”
“Of course you’re both fine-looking young people and your general coloring’s the same. You’ve met my son, Cotter?”