Cold Night

He awoke in his bed, in daylight. The light was off, making the room nearly dark, but the door was open and the long windows downstairs filled the doorway with sunlight.

His uncle sat at the foot of the bed, in the dimness, staring at him. His face was blackened with cork, a camouflage cap was pulled low over his brow. Only the whites of his eyes stood out madly from his face.

His uncle spoke quietly, in horrible contrast to his appearance. 'I want to tell you something, Jerry,' he said. 'I heard a copter this morning. It won't be long before they find you. Before they do, I have to tell you something.'

Tear tracks intersected the cork markings on his face.

'I could have gone longer,' he said. 'I want you to know I could have gone as long as I had to. I have the will, Jerry. I've had it for a long time. I wanted to prove that to you.'

Uncle Martin sat rigid and military as stone, a weeping statue. 'That first time was the only time, Jerry. It never happened again. Never. It never happened in the Army, or the Green Berets, not anywhere. I saw what I was, and I beat it, Jerry.' He sobbed, a tight gulping sound. 'I beat it.'

His uncle rose and stood stiffly beside the bed. His hands were straight at his sides, like dead things. He stared down at them. 'I don't know why I touched you that time, Jerry. You meant more to me than anyone in the world. You still do. If I had known that touching you would make you actlike that, I would not have done it. But I loved you, Jerry. And I had such feelings. . such strong feelings, that I thought it was right to do what I did.'

A great sob sought release, but his uncle held it back.

'I didn't know it was wrong. I learned it, though. That's what I want you to know. I learned, and it never happened again. All the time I was in the Army, and all the men and boys I saw, the feelings that went on inside me, I never let them out.'

His uncle turned and looked at him earnestly. 'I had to prove it to you. To make it right between us.' Tears rolled down his face. 'You were my little brother, Jerry! You were all I had in the world! What you did to me, the way you shut me out, it nearly killed me. God, I was only fifteen, Jerry. If only I could take that one time back. .'

His uncle sat stiffly down on the bed, wiping a hand across his face.

'So I thought I could make it like it was again, show you that what I did meant nothing. I wanted to take it back.

'And now I have. Oh, God, please, Jerry, tell me it never happened. . '

His uncle wept into his hands.

When the state troopers came through the door a half hour later, he hadn't moved. As they pulled Uncle Martin from the bed he saw his pleading eyes and he said quietly, 'It never happened,' and his uncle's last look was one of deliverance and peace. .

'That's my most painful memory,' he whispered to Rebecca Meyer. Somewhere he had begun to cry, and he let her hold him, rocking the poison out of him. 'Oh, God,' he wept, 'he never touched me, Uncle Martin never touched me, oh, Dad. . '

The night continued. She rocked him, and, sometime near dawn, she whispered to him, 'You're well.'

He laughed and said, 'You're right.'

He moved against her, and for a time they didn't talk. Paine fleetingly thought of the sounds of the tape in Barker's office.

'What about Gerald?' he whispered.

'Gerald can go to hell.'

When they had finished, the sun was rising and she said, 'What are you going to do today?'

'That depends on whether it means anything to you that I don't work for the Barker Agency anymore, and don't have a contract to find out who killed your father.'

'My sister can go to hell, too,' she said. She looked deep into his eyes. 'Here's a contract of your own,' she whispered, kissing him.

He smiled. 'Then I'm going to see someone who knows more than he told me.'

He tried to hold her but she got up. 'I have to go. Call me later.'

'I will,' he said.

'Call me,' she whispered to him, and suddenly sleep overtook him, and her face stayed with him, and, for a time in his sleep, he knew who she was.

TWENTY-ONE

In the morning he felt whole. He awoke alone, but for the first time in two days he felt like a live man. His ribs ached, but it was a dull, inconsequential hurt he could live with.

He dressed and went out of the bedroom, down the long stairs and out through the front door as Gerald, in his tennis togs, came in.

'Well, well,' Gerald said. 'Look who's returned from the dead.' His voice was mock sweet. He pointed with his racket to the far end of the driveway. 'Rebecca had your car brought up here from. . wherever it was.'

He turned to go but Paine stopped him.

'Why do you hang around here?' Paine asked him.

'Two reasons,' Gerald answered. 'Money, and money.'

'Cute answer,' Paine said. 'Does Rebecca know anything about your coke habit? You're pretty stupid to leave the stuff in the bathroom upstairs. I found it next to your cheap aftershave.'

Gerald's face clouded. 'She doesn't know about it.'

Paine nodded. 'I didn't think so. I've got a friend in the police department who grew up Irish poor and loves to bust rich jerks like you. Should I give him a call or would you like to get lost?'

He watched Gerald's face as the options dropped away from him.

'I'll leave,' he said finally.

'Don't look so sad,' Paine said. 'There are plenty of other tennis courts in Westchester.'

The keys were in the ignition of Paine's car. He pulled out of the driveway, feeling like he'd been away from the world for a year. His ribs were telling him that a year off might not be a bad idea.

He drove down to Croton. The blue Chrysler was gone from the front of Hartman's house. In its place was a white Mercedes. It looked like the car that had followed him to the funeral home.

Paine went to the front door, tried the lock, which was engaged.

He stepped off the stoop and walked to the small bay window fronting the living room. He heard a television set, a baseball announcer laughing, the rise of the crowd noise and the announcer's laughter turning to excitement.

'Holy cow!' the television said. It sounded like a Yankee had hit a home run.

'Holy cow,' Paine muttered to himself, shaking his head at the bad luck of the man sitting in Hartman's chair smoking a cigarette and watching the baseball game. It had to be Childs. It would be his bad luck to lose his teeth before Hartman did.

Paine walked calmly back to the front door and kicked it in with the flat of his right foot. The bolt splintered out of the jam and Paine pushed the door the rest of the way open. He walked in. Childs was up, his cigarette still in his hand.

'Shit,' he said, dropping the cigarette and running to the back of the house.

Paine went after him. He kicked the television off its stand as he went by. The sound stayed on, increasing in volume. 'Holy cow!' the announcer shouted.

Childs turned from the kitchen table, leveling a.44 at Paine as he entered. It was a wide miss. Paine ran at him and drove him into the refrigerator. Childs dropped the gun and tried to drive his fist into the back of Paine's head. He struck at Paine's rib cage. Paine groaned and loosened his grip. Childs scrambled away. Paine straightened