he’d finally condemned us all.
After that final condemnation, as I supposed at that moment, it had been only a matter of working out the technical details. Perhaps he’d considered various weapons for a time, carefully weighing the advantages of knives, guns, poisons, before finally deciding on the shotgun for no better reason than that he’d bought it years before, that it rested quietly in the green metal cabinet in the basement, that it was ready-to-hand.
“How long had he been planning it, do you think?” I asked Swenson, coaxing him forward, as one might nudge a man, ever so subtly, toward the edge of a cliff.
Swenson shrugged. He started to speak, but stopped abruptly, and returned the mask to his mouth. He took in a long breath, then let it out in a sudden, hollow gush. “If he planned it early, then he must have changed his plans,” he said.
I said nothing, but only waited, as it seemed to me I had in one way or another been waiting all my life.
“Did Rebecca think he had a plan?” Swenson asked.
It was odd how far she seemed from me now. I saw her poised over her black briefcase, withdrawing papers in her usual methodical manner, showing me only what was relevant at that particular moment, concealing all the rest. I could recall the tension of my lost desire, but only as something remembered by another man, a story told by someone else, so that now when she came forward in my mind, it was as little more than a messenger sent to me by my father.
“I think so,” I told him.
He looked vaguely surprised to hear it. He stared at me quietly, his breath coming in long hard pulls and quick exhalations. “Well, maybe he did,” he said. The mask lifted, lingered for a moment at his mouth, then fell again. “But maybe he didn’t.” He tried to go on, but his breath could not carry the weight of another sentence. He took a quick inhalation, then added, “He got away, that’s for sure.”
“All the way to Mexico,” I said.
Swenson nodded. “Using nothing but back roads,” he said, “or we’d have picked him up for sure.” He coughed suddenly, a hard, brutal cough, his face reddening with the strain. “Sorry,” he said quickly, then returned to his story. “He left all his money in the bank.” He looked at me pointedly as he drew in another aching breath. “Does that sound like a well-thought-out plan?”
I looked at him, puzzled, my eyes urging him to go on.
Swenson shifted uncomfortably, the large head sinking and rising heavily, its little wisps of reddish hair floating eerily in the veiled light. “He left the house at around six o’clock.”
In my mind I could see him go almost as clearly as Mrs. Hamilton had seen him, a figure in a gray hat, carrying nothing with him, not so much as the smallest bag.
“He went downtown to the hardware store after that,” Swenson said. A short cough broke from him, but he suppressed the larger one behind it. “Several people saw him go in, but since he owned the place, nobody made anything of it.”
“What did he do in there?” I asked.
“He cleaned out the cash register,” Swenson answered. “Took every dime.” The mask rose again, then fell. “Then he went to that little store near your house.”
“Oscar’s?”
Swenson nodded. “He bought a lot of food and stuff for the trip.” He stopped. The mask climbed up to his mouth, settled over it for a long, raspy breath, then crawled back down into Swenson’s lap. “And he made a phone call.”
“A phone call?”
“From that little phone they had out front,” Swenson said, without emphasis. “We don’t know who he called,” he added, “but the kid that was standing behind him, waiting to use the same phone, was sure that he never got an answer.”
“Someone else,” I said in a cold whisper, “he was calling someone else.” The face of Nellie Grimes came toward me, lifting slowly, gently, as if offering a kiss.
Swenson’s great head drifted to the left. “Someone else, that’s right.”
“Rebecca told me that you spoke to Nellie Grimes,” I said.
Swenson returned the mask to his lips, sucked in a long breath, then let it drop unceremoniously from his mouth. “It wasn’t her.”
“Then who was it?”
Swenson wagged his head wearily. “I don’t know.” He brought the oxygen mask to his mouth again, took in a long, noisy breath, and let it fall back into his lap.
I could feel a tidal fury sweep over me as I imagined him at that phone, still working feverishly to carry out his escape. It was a rage which Swenson could see in its full, thrusting hatred, and it seemed to press me back roughly, like a violent burst of wind.
“You’re looking for him, aren’t you?” he asked.
I stared at him icily, but did not speak.
“You want to kill him for what he did that day,” Swenson said. He seemed neither shocked nor outraged by the truth he’d come upon. By then, no doubt, he’d slogged though a world of death. His only word was one of caution.
“There’ll be more to do after that,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
He lifted the mask to his face, leaned into it, and took in a long, rattling breath. “Someone else,” he said when
