“Neal,” Karen said, “if she’s pregnant, she’s pregnant, whether you want her to be or not. Believe it or not, you can’t control it.”
“Do you want to ask her?” Neal asked.
“Ask her what?”
Neal stared at her.
“Ask her if she thinks that photography is an art or not,” Neal said. “Ask her who the father is.”
The phone rang.
“That’s none of your business,” Karen said.
“Oh, you don’t think so?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
The phone rang.
“It’s Jack,” said Polly.
“On the phone?” Neal asked.
“The father,” Polly answered.
The phone rang again.
Neal picked it up and said, “What?”
“There’s a guy sniffing around,” Brogan said. “I was worried he’s looking for… your houseguest.”
“How do you know…” Neal began. He turned his back away from the living room and asked, “All right, what does he look like?”
“Like he’s from the East.”
The East, meaning New York or Moscow, which were pretty much the same to Brogan.
“Okay, I’ll check it out,” Neal said, then added, “Thanks.”
“Let me know if you need me,” Brogan said. “The shotgun is loaded and the dog’s awake.”
“Thanks.”
Karen and Polly were hugging when Neal turned around.
“Oh, please,” he said.
Karen looked over Polly’s shoulder and said, “This is an important moment to a woman, Neal.”
Her eyes were teary and her nose was getting red. Neal was afraid she was going to cry. The last time he’d seen Karen cry was when a mechanic told her that her jeep was going to need transmission work.
“We don’t even know if she’s actually pregnant yet,” Neal said.
“I just feel it,” Polly said.
The women hugged again.
Neal took Karen by the elbow and guided her away, saying, “Could I talk to you for a second?”
In the kitchen, he said, “That was Brogan on the phone. He’s hinky because there’s a stranger in the bar. And he knows about Polly.”
“Neal,” Karen said, “Brogan’s is the only bar on a state highway for a hundred miles in either direction. Strangers go in there.”
Neal smiled and said, “Paranoia is not only a character flaw; it’s my business. I’m going to go check it out.”
Karen sniffled before she asked, “Why don’t you pick up one of those home-pregnancy tests until we can get to the doctor?”
A doctor, Neal thought. Great. That means a receptionist, too, and maybe a nurse. Throw in a few lab technicians, some hospital orderlies. Maybe we can just save time and go on the nightly news.
He heard Jack Landis’s mellifluous voice say, “Folks, we’ve been under attack lately. You know, there are people out there who are so afraid of our family values, they’d resort to just about anything to destroy us. And I don’t know about you, but I just can’t think of a better way to show them that they just ain’t going to get it done than to dial one-eight hundred-CAN-DICE…”
I’ll give you a time-share, Neal thought. You can share some time in a little cell with a lonely guy named Bubba-yearly, monthly, even on weekends.
“Make her do her Shakespeare,” he said to Karen.
“Aww, Neal…” Karen whined.
“Make her do her Shakespeare.”
Neal took about three minutes to walk down the hill to Austin’s Main Street, which also happened to be Route 50. A car came through at least once every four hours or so.
A rumpled-looking guy in an old suit was coming in his direction up the sidewalk. Brogan’s right, Neal thought, he looks like the chairman of the English department at a New England prep school circa 1956.
And he’s headed right for our place, too.
Neal stopped in front of the man.
The man looked at him curiously.
“Mr. Withers?” Neal asked.
Withers blinked a few times, then said, “I know you, don’t I?”
“You’re Walter Withers, right?” Neal asked.
Withers studied Neal, then his eyes brightened.
“And you are… at least you were… Joe Graham’s puppy,” Withers said. “I remember you.”
They shook hands awkwardly, then Walter Withers’s face fell.
“Oh, Lord,” he said. “Is Graham working this thing? Is he looking for her, too? You’re the competition, aren’t you? Well, of course you wouldn’t tell me, would you? Joe Graham trained you. You were trained by the best, my boy, the best.”
Neal remembered a time when Walter Withers had been pretty damn good himself, back when Withers had been with one of the big agencies and they couldn’t help bumping into each other on some of the larger jobs. Joe Graham had pointed Withers out to Neal as an example. Rumor was in those days that Walt Withers, Loomis- Chaffee old boy and Yale alum, had learned his craft in the CIA, then gone to the private side for the money and the New York nightlife. Back in the fifties, New York had style and so did Walt Withers. Walt had dressed exclusively from Brooks Brothers and Abercrombie, and one of Neal’s enduring adolescent memories was when Mr. Withers had flipped open a Dunhill cigarette case and offered him a smoke. Neal had politely declined, admitting he needed to cut back himself. Walter Withers was a gentleman.
But the nightlife had stretched into the mornings and then became an all-day affair and the big agency dropped Walt, who started the sadly predictable descent down the ladder. His fifties style went out of style, he was woefully unsuited for undercover stuff, and the jobs that Graham threw him when he needed an extra man were mostly backup stuff. But even backup guys needed to be sober to back you up, and after a couple of no-shows, Levine put the kabosh on any freelance hiring of Walt Withers. Neal hadn’t seen him for many years, and by the look of him, Walt hadn’t spent many of the intervening nights drinking coffee in a church basement.
But here he was in Austin, so was Neal, and so was Polly Paget, and neither man believed in that kind of coincidence.
“Maybe we can work something out, Mr. Withers,” Neal said.
“Call me Walter, please, my boy. It’s Neal, isn’t it?”
Neal nodded.
“Work something out… Share the kill sort of a thing, I see… Interesting…” Walter said. “Sporting of you.”
I’m a sport, Mr. Withers. And you’re standing here trying to figure out a way to beat me. Share the kill… right.
“It depends on who your client is,” Withers said.
I’m not proud of this, Walt, but here we go.
“Mr. Withers… Walter… I’m just a little thirsty,” Neal said. “Why don’t we go in and discuss this over a drink?”
The smile returned to Walt’s face.
“Joe Graham did train you well,” he said.
Uh-huh. And I hope he forgives me, Neal thought as he led Withers into Brogan’s.
‘ “The shotgun is loaded and the dog’s awake,’ ” Charles Whiting repeated. “What does that mean?”
