“No,” I said, “you were right, it’s a dull report. Thanks a lot, I’ll see you.”
He looked relieved. I felt relieved.
It was twelve-forty-five and I knew I couldn’t sleep now even if I wanted to. I wanted to think, but I wanted it to be easy, not filled with panicky speculation over the dangerous risks I was taking. So I decided to break my silent vow of abstinence and drove out to Silverlake, where I knocked on the door of an old buddy from the orphanage.
He was mildly glad to see me, but his wife wasn’t. I told them it wasn’t a social call, that all I wanted was the loan of his golf clubs. Incredulous, he turned them over. I promised to return them soon, and to repay him for his favor with a good restaurant dinner. Incredulous, his wife said she’d believe it when she saw it, and hustled her husband back to bed.
I checked the clubs. They were good Tommy Armours, and there were at least fifty shag balls stuffed into the pockets of the bag. I went looking for a place to hit them, and to think.
I drove home and picked up Night Train. He was glad to see me and hungry for exercise. I found a few cold pork chops in the ice box and threw them at him. He was gnawing the bones as I attached his leash and slung the golf bag over my shoulder.
“The beach, Train,” I said. “Let’s see what kind of Labrador you really are. I’m going to hit balls into the ocean. Little chip shots. If you can retrieve them for me in the dark, I’ll feed you steak for a year. What do you say?”
Night Train said “Woof!” and so we walked the three blocks down to the edge of the Pacific.
It was a warm night and there was no breeze. I unhooked Night Train’s leash and he took off running, a pork chop bone still in his mouth. I dumped the balls onto the wet sand and extracted a pitching iron from the bag. Hefting it was like embracing a longlost beloved friend. I was surprised to find I wasn’t rusty. My hiatus from golf hadn’t dulled that sharp edge my game has always had, almost from the first time I picked up a club.
I hit easy pitch shots into the churning white waves, enjoying the synchronization of mind and body that is the essence of golf. After a while the mental part became unnecessary, my swing became me, and I turned my mind elsewhere.
Granted: I had passed myself off as a detective twice, using my own name, which might cost me a suspension if it were discovered. Granted: I was going strictly on hunches, and my observations of Maggie Cadwallader were based on her behavior during one evening. But. But. But, somehow I _knew_. It was more than intuition or deductive logic or character assessment. This was my own small piece of wonder to unravel, and the fact that the victim had given me her body, tenuously, in her search for something more, gave it weight and meaning.
I whistled for Night Train, who trotted up. We walked back to the apartment and I thought, Wacky was right. The key to the wonder is in death. I had killed, twice, and it had changed me. But the key wasn’t in the killing, it was in the discovery of whatever led to it.
I felt strangely magnanimous and loving, like a writer about to dedicate a book. This one’s for you, Wacky, I said to myself; this one’s for you.
8
It was strange to be sitting in a bar looking for a killer rather than a woman.
The following night, free of the obsession that usually brought me to such places, I sat drinking watered-down Scotch and watched people get drunk, get angry, get maudlin and pour out their life stories to perfect strangers in alcoholic effusiveness. I was loking for men on the prowl, like myself, but the Silver Star on that first night held nothing but middle-aged desperation played to the tunes of the old prewar standards on the jukebox.