trying to impress his student. 'If you come on to her about Bekker, she'll know. She'll know we're trying to manipulate her. You'll offend her right down to the soles of her feet. What you do is, you never mention Bekker. You do what all divorced guys do-talk about your ex-wife. Pretty soon she'll start to hint. Wanna know about Bekker? No. You don't want to know about Bekker. You want to talk about you, your ex-wife, her, and how miserable it is to get a relationship going with anyone decent. You say, Fuck Bekker, I don't wanna hear about that shit, that's work. Take her out a couple of times, and she'll start talking about him all on her own. She won't be able to help herself. Just don't push.'
'Don't push,' Del said. His eyes were like marbles.
'Don't push,' Lucas confirmed, nodding.
Del leaned back in his chair, studying Lucas as though he were a felon, and one he'd just met. 'Jesus Christ,' he said after a minute, 'you are a cruel sonofabitch, you know that?'
Lucas frowned at the tone. 'Are you serious?'
'I'm serious,' Del said.
Lucas shrugged and looked away. 'I do what I've got to do,' he said.
He met Anderson on the way out to the car.
'I sent Carpenter down to the library after you called,' Anderson said. 'He found a book on this Redon dude, and that's the picture all right, but the library's picture was bigger than the one we got. He could only find it in one book, and that hasn't been checked out for two months.'
'That's something,' Lucas said.
'Yeah? Exactly what?' Anderson asked.
As Lucas drove home, a hard rain began to fall and lightning crackled overhead. A good night for trolls, he thought.
Bekker, God damn it.
CHAPTER 16
The rain was steady and cold, driving, slicing through his headlights, the wipers barely able to keep up. Miserable night. A half-dozen black beauties gave him the edge he needed, a couple of purple egg-shaped Xanaxes cooled his nerves.
Not enough, maybe. The flapping of the windshield wipers was beginning to grate on him, and he had to bite his tongue to keep from shouting at them. Fwip-fwip-fwip, a torture…
Red light. He caught it at the last second, jammed on the brakes and nearly skidded through the intersection. The driver of the car one lane over looked at him, and Bekker had to choke down the impulse to scream at him. Instead of screaming, he went into his pocket, pulled out the cigarette case, tongued a yellow oblong Tranxene and snapped the case shut. He no longer tried to track his drug intake: he was guided by internal signals now, running with his body…
And he was all right; he'd eaten half a handful of downers over the day, and they'd held him together like the skin of a balloon, containing the pressure. But only for a time. The snake was waiting, off in the dark. Then, when it was time to meet Druze, the black beauties pulled him up, out of the downers. He'd be afraid to drive with those downers in his blood. But with the black beauties, driving was a snap…
The traffic light changed and Bekker went through, gripping the steering wheel with all his might.
They'd agreed to meet at an all-night supermarket on University Avenue, a place where the parking lot was usually full. Tonight there were only a few cars in front of the store, and one of them was a baby-blue St. Paul police cruiser. When he saw it, Bekker nearly panicked. Did they have Druze? How did they get him? Had he and Druze been betrayed? Had Druze gone to the police…? No, wait; no, wait; no, wait; wait-wait-wait…
There he was, Druze, in the Dodge, waiting, the windows steamed. No cops near the squad car. Must be inside. Bekker parked on the left side of Druze's car, killed the engine and slipped out, watching the lighted entrance of the supermarket. Where were the cops? He opened the back door of his car, got the shovel off the floor, locked the door. He was wearing a rain suit and a canvas hat, and had been out of the car for no more than fifteen seconds, but the water poured off the brim of the hat in a steady stream.
Druze popped the passenger door on the Dodge as Bekker stepped over. He was breathing hard, almost panting. He scanned the rain-blasted lot, then hurled the shovel on the floor of the backseat, on top of Druze's spade, and clambered into the car. With the door shut, he took off the canvas hat and threw it in the back with the shovel. Druze was shocked when Bekker turned toward him. Bekker was beautiful; this man was gaunt, gray- faced. He looked, Druze thought, like a corpse in a B movie. He turned away and cranked the starter.
'Are you all right?' Druze asked, as he put the car in gear.
'No. I'm not,' Bekker said shortly.
'This is fuckin' awful, man,' Druze said. He stopped at the curb cut, waiting for a stream of traffic to pass. His burned face was flat, emotionless, the scarred lips like cracks in a dried creek bed. 'Digging up the dead.'
'Fuck it-fuck it,' Bekker rasped. A bolt of lightning zigzagged through the sky to the east, where they were going. 'We gotta.'
'I can't get the tarbaby out of my head,' Druze said. 'We can't shake this guy, Philip George.' In other people, anger, fear, resentment flowed like gasoline. In Druze, even the violent emotions moved like clay, slowly turning, compressing, darkening. He was angry now, in his muted way, listening to Bekker, his friend. Bekker picked it up, put his hand on Druze's shoulder.
'Carlo, I'm fucked up,' Bekker said. He said it quickly, the words snapping off after the last syllable. 'I'm fuckin' crazy. I can't apologize for it. I don't want it. But it's there. And honest to God, I'm dying.'
Druze took it in, not understanding, took the car onto the entrance ramp for I-94. 'I mean, have you tried Valium or whatever?'
'You stupid shit…' Bekker's anger burst through like napalm, but he instantly backed off, humbling himself. 'I'm sorry. I tried everything. Everything. Everything. There's only one way.'
'Dangerous…'
'Fuck dangerous,' Bekker shouted. Then, quiet again, straining to see through the rain as they accelerated off the ramp and into traffic, his voice formal, that of a man on an emotional seesaw: 'A snake. There's a snake in my brain.'
Druze glanced sideways at Bekker. The other man seemed to be sliding into a trance, his face rigid. 'We were supposed to stay away from each other. If they see us…' Druze ventured.
Bekker didn't answer. He sat in the passenger seat, twisting his hands. Six miles later, coming back from wherever he was, he said, 'I know… And one of them's no dummy. I had him in for coffee.'
'You what?' Druze's head snapped around: Bekker was losing it. But no: he sounded almost rational now.
'Had him in for coffee. Found him in front of my house. Watching. Lucas Davenport. He's not stupid. He looks mean.'
'Tough guy? A little over six feet, looks like a boxer or something? Dark hair, with a scar coming through his eyebrow?' Druze quickly traced the path of Lucas' scar on his own face.
Bekker nodded, his head cocked to one side: 'You know him?'
'He was at the theater after you did Armistead,' Druze said. 'Talking to one of the actresses. They looked pretty friendly.'
'Who? Which one?'
'Cassie Lasch. Played the maid in… you didn't go to that. She's a second-stringer. Good-looking. I could see this guy coming on to her. She lives in my building.'
'You work with her much?'
'No. We're both part of the group, but we've never talked much or anything. Not personally.'
'Could she pipe you into what Davenport's thinking?'
'I don't know. She might pick something up. If the guy's smart, I don't need him checking on me.'
'You're right,' Bekker said, looking at Druze as the Dodge's interior was swept by the lights of an oncoming car. 'What was her name again? Cassie?'
'Cassie Lasch,' Druze said. 'A redhead.'
