Trophies And Dead Things

was entitled to throw an occasional fit.

As I punched the Down button at the elevators, I wondered why I'd allowed Leo McFate to enrage me. The man was petty and mean-spirited; why couldn't I just ignore him?

Because, I told myself as I brutalized the button some more, the man's an asshole. When you're dealing with someone who suffers from that altogether-too-prevalent malady, it's very often catching.

I made two detours on my way to All Souls: first to pick up a pizza, so I wouldn't have to sponge off the folks who lived there (and probably have to eat some god-awful health food), and then to my house to pick up my gun.

The strongbox where I keep my.38 is actually an ammunition box that my father pilfered from the navy years ago. The box sits on the floor of the linen closet in my bathroom, hardly an original hiding place, and one that it wouldn't take a competent thief two minutes to find. However, its lock is a good one, and when I had the closet built while I was renovating the cottage, my clever contractor put a bolt straight through the bottom of the box and into the floor joist. Any thief who wants to make off with it will have to take part of the cottage along, too.

I went into the bathroom, pushed aside a jumble of cleaning supplies, and flattened myself on the floor so I could work the lock. I hadn't had the.38 out in so long that it lay beneath the velvet pouch containing my grandmother's garnet earrings that I'd last worn on New Year's Eve. The sight of them gave me a flash of bittersweet nostalgia. I'd met George Kostakos on December 30; he'd called me for the first time at a few minutes after midnight on New Year's.

So much had happened since then: we'd come so close, only to move apart. George had said he cared deeply for me, that when his estranged wife's mental condition stabilizedhe'd come back and see if I'd still have him. But months had passed, and I'd heard nothing; now I wasn't even sure I wanted to. Maybe it was better to go through life alone, protected from its hurts and disappointments. Maybe people who only indulged in casual, short-term relationships were the ones with the greatest chance at happiness.

But casual, short-term relationships had never worked for me. And I wasn't sure that happiness was a reasonable goal, anyway. At times it seemed a myth-something an advertising agency had dreamed up to sell more toothpaste.

'Enough!' I said aloud. 'You've got things to do.' I took out the gun, locked the box, and got up off the floor.

That was another thing: I found that I talked to myself more lately. People always talk to themselves, particularly those who live alone, but with me it was, as if the sensible, self-sufficient side of my personality was trying to tell the other, vulnerable side to shape up. And I suspected that the sensible McCone was losing the debate.

Before I left the house I checked my answering machine in case Wolf had tried to reach me at home. The first message was from Jim Addison, sounding angry because I hadn't returned his call. I fast-forwarded through it, unwilling to allow my uneasiness about his potential for violence to compound my tension about the sniper. The only other message was from my mother, complaining because I hadn't called her last week. I should have, but I'd let it go because I really didn't have anything to say. And now I couldn't, because Ma is very sensitive to undertones in my voice and would catch on quickly to the fact that things weren't right. Then she would worm it out of me about the sniper and about my friends being in danger, and finally, because she was way down in San Diego and couldn't have done anything to help even if she were right here, she'd worry. When Ma worries about one of her children, she calls the other four and tells them all about it, and soon she has a big McCone worryfest going. The only family member who doesn't feed into it is my father; Pa just stays out in his garage workshop, playing the guitar and singing dirty folk songs in a voice loud enough-because he's getting deaf-to scandalize the neighbors.

No, I decided, I can't call Ma back until this whole thing is over.

At quarter past eleven Rae and I sat cross-legged on her brass bed playing what seemed like our thousandth game of gin rummy; we'd been at it since nine. Initially we'd discussed the snipings and the Hilderly case, but then we'd fallen silent. Now the only sounds were the slap of the cards, the distant bellow of foghorns, and small moans and sighs of contentment from the trunk under the dormer window, where Ralph and Alice curled together in luxurious sleep. Rae was baby-sitting them tonight, since Ted had gone to a memorial service for their former owner.

I had to admit how tranquilizing the presence of a sleeping cat could be. And Rae's room-which she'd created herself at the rear of the Victorian's unfinished attic, after she'd lived in her office for months and none of the regular rooms had become available-was lovely. A snug aerie full of plants and white wicker furniture and splashed with yellows and golds and greens, it revealed her heretofore unknown flair for interior decorating on a small budget.

I picked up a king and discarded a trey. 'Gin.'

She glared at me. 'I've been waiting for one card since the deal.'

'Them's the breaks.' I didn't even bother to write down the score, just let my hand gravitate toward a stainless-steel bowl containing the dregs of a batch of popcorn. Comfort food is what I call things like popcorn and macaroni-and-cheese and milkshakes and butterscotch pudding-food that is reminiscent of childhood and reduces the world to simple terms when it becomes too complicated to bear.

Rae said, 'What's the matter-you feeling gruffly?'

I smiled at the word, one of those that I've come to consider Rae-isms. 'Yes. I'm sick of gin rummy, even if I am winning. Is Hank ever going to go home?'

'He's turning into a workaholic. I guess it keeps his mind off the possibility of being shot at.' Rae gathered up the cards and score pad and set them on the nightstand. She wore an old gray-and-red-plaid flannel bathrobe and had conditioner on her hair; it stuck up in greasy-looking points. As she flopped back against the pillows, I noticed she seemed tense and faintly depressed.

'You look kind of gruffly, too,' I said.

She shrugged.

'Worried about Willie?'

'Not really. He was settled in for the night when I left there. Had an adult western-the sexy kind, you know?- and a twelve-pack of Bud. That'll hold him.'

'Things not going well with you two?'

'They're fine. The relationship's not complex enough for us to have problems. No, what it is, I need to talk to you about my job.'

Uh-oh, I thought. 'Go ahead.' I leaned back and whacked my head on one of the bed's brass posts. Rae saw my predicament and tossed me a pillow.

'Okay,' she said. 'I'm not complaining, you understand. You're a great boss. It's just that… the other day when I was out in the field? It really felt good. And it made me realize that I'm not sticking to my original game plan. Shar, I'd like to take on more work, build up my hours to the point where I can get my own license. And I want to get firearms-qualified. I think it's time.'

I felt a wrenching: chick leaving the nest. In Rae's case getting the license would surely motivate a departure. For one thing, she was too bright and talented to remain at All Souls doing my scut work; for another, that was the game plan she'd referred to. I couldn't blame her for wanting more than a relatively small salary, a pile of debts, a room that wasn't really a room, and a bathroom one flight down that she shared with numerous other people. And I certainly wouldn't stand in her way.

'I think you're right,' I said. 'I haven't really been giving you as much responsibility as you're capable of handling. Tomorrow we'll look over what we have on tap, and I'll assign more to you.'

She smiled, pleased and relieved. Then she studied me over her bent knees. 'You don't look too happy about this.'

'I'm glad that you've progressed so far in such a short time. In a way, it's a compliment to me. But I'll miss you. I've come to rely on you. Besides, who am I going to play gin rummy or take long lunch hours with?'

'Miss me? I'm not going anywhere.'

'I thought you'd want to go to a better firm.'

'Shar, that was before, when I had Doug dependent on me for everything. I don't need as much money anymore. And I love All Souls as much as you do. In a way, it's like the family I never had.'