Good Lord, Deliver Us (34 page)

It would make a long night of it, a long,
grizzly, horrible night. Longer because of Z's weakened condition.
It was just that Z couldn't see anything else to do. Not, and
follow the Zapolska code.

Get through tonight, though, and a couple of
calls tomorrow morning would wrap up the Smith part of the ghost
house case.

* * * * *

"You say you saw the gun?"

It was the following afternoon in Z's
office, Friday, the first of July. Detective Addison poised in the
client chair, black suit coat on, revolver in its holster in the
hollow under his armpit, notebook in hand, teeth flashing when he
talked. The burly black detective was balanced in his chair as if
ready to spring, his sense of humor noticeably missing.

Z had called 911 late last night to report
the murder, called from a phone booth, giving no name. After that,
he'd left an emergency message for Addison. (This was too important
to have Ted mess up.) Awakened by Addison's call early this
morning, Z had already given Addison the main facts.

Now late afternoon, the Metro squad's
investigation of the murder scene was apparently completed.

Z hadn't been all that surprised to have
Addison banging on Z's office door. Had expected it, in fact.

"Yeah. Beside her body."

"And you said you were working for the
woman?"

"Yeah. After you put me onto the fact that
she was the crazy's cousin, I checked her out. She denied knowing
Ruble. At that time, finding I was a detective, saying she was
having divorce problems with her husband, she hired me." Z's throat
hurt. More than usual.

"So you got it figured that the lady gave
room and board to her cousin Ruble and he killed the others and
took them out back, across some fields to plant them in the other
house's basement?"

"Looks like."

"Then killed the woman."

"Yeah. ... And another thing."

"Yes?"

"The loony's apt to be driving the Smith
car, American, four doors, dark brown, maybe black."

"You sure?"

"I
think
."

"We already got a make, model, and number."
But not the car itself -- Z in no mood to be charitable. Still,
they'd find it. Unlike missing people, missing cars got quick
attention from the fuzz.

"You said the woman had a
child?" By this time, Addison would know that; wanted to confirm
what
Z
knew.

"A boy."

"And that he's missing?"

"He wasn't in the house when I went to see
the lady last night."

"You had an appointment to see her? In the
middle of the night? Getting no answer, you went inside? Is that
your story?"

"I was expected. Worried."

"Had probable cause to enter the home. ...
If you were a cop."

"Or concerned citizen, like smelling smoke
and breaking in to rescue the family."

Z could hear the scratch of Addison's
ballpoint as he jotted notes in his flip-top, leather notebook.
"Back to the boy. Could he be staying with a friend?
Overnight?"

"I don't know."

"Relative?"

"The lady just hired me a couple of days ago
so I don't know anything personal about her."

"What else did you see?"

"Suitcases."

"Go on."

"Just suitcases. In the woman's bedroom.
Packed."

"You search them?"

"No."

"Then how do you know they were packed?"

"I kicked all three. Heavy."

Addison nodded. Made a note. "Find suitcases
in the boy's room?"

"No."

"What about the boy's clothing? Was any
missing?"

"I ... didn't search for any." Again,
jotting -- quick, bold strokes.

"You touch anything?"

"No." Just the gun, Z thought cynically, but
didn't say. "Except I used a wet towel in the bathroom." Addison,
jotting that down.

"Carry off anything?"

"No."

"Knife?"

"No." Z hadn't seen the knife Ruble used on
the woman, figured Ruble had carried it off with him. The police
hadn't found the knife either, apparently.

Anything else?"

"Just that there's a tractor in the garage
over there."

"So?"

"And a kind of metal wagon attachment for
it. Kind called a carryall."

"And that means ...?"

"I'd bet anything there's bloodstains on the
carryall; that they match those of the buried men."

"You figure Ruble used the tractor hookup to
transport the bodies he killed?"

"Would tie things together."

"It would. Transported the men, but not the
woman? Left her in the house?"

"You'd discovered the burial place by then.
He could have found that out, someway." Z was sweating. This was
not going well at all.

"You're saying that the Gladstone cops
messed up, that the woman was helping her cousin after all?"

"Yeah."

"So I guess that's the way it could have
gone down."

"Looks that way."

"If you're right, all we got to do is what
we had to do at the start," Addison said dryly. "Catch Ruble."

"Piece of cake," Z said, tired of being
questioned.

"One more thing," Addison added quickly, not
taking too kindly to the "piece of cake" comment -- probably seeing
it as a slur on the K.C. department's ability to catch the
criminal, "you're not planning any summer vacations, are you?"

"No."

"So I can reach you, should I want to ask
another couple of questions."

"Told you all I know." Z didn't like lying
to the law. But when a client's interests had to be protected
.....

"And Z?"

"Yes?"

"You been working minor
miracles here, particularly if the bullets in the gun match those
in the bodies in the basement,
certainly
if the gun can be traced
to Ruble. No fingerprints on the gun, though. Somebody seems to
have wiped it clean." Not a surprise to Z.

A flick, and the
detective's notebook and pen had disappeared into his jacket
pocket. Looking up at Z, there was not a glimmer of smile on
Addison's solid black face. "I'd appreciate your help even
more
if people didn't
keep getting killed." Addison's voice had turned deadly. "You could
have told me about being hired by the Smith woman. Did you ever
once think it wasn't the husband, but the cousin, who was making
the woman nervous?" Z hadn't, but felt it unwise to tell the
detective why. "You could have told Liberty. They could have pulled
her in. Staked out the place. Maybe have prevented what happened to
her. Maybe had a chance to question her before she turned up
conveniently dead."

Addison didn't like what had happened;
blamed Z for bitching things up -- and maybe he had.

"She was a client. She didn't want me
bringing in anybody else. Anyway, I couldn't be sure."

"Sure." Addison didn't
sound persuaded, not an easy task to sway others if you couldn't
convince
yourself
. "Anyway, my advice now is to walk the straight and
narrow."

"Yeah."

"No more rope."

"Yeah."

"Until we find Ruble."

And that was that. As for
Z's enthusiasm for seeing Ruble caught, Z now longed for that day
more than anyone, if for no other reason than Z liked to have
smart, black cops like Addison
with
him, rather than
against
him.

* * * * *

"Z." It was later that night -- the phone
again -- Z lying on the short couch at home.

"It's Sam Smith."

"Got
some
news." There was a flinch of
silence over the line. "The man who was after you? The man your
wife sent?"

"Yes."

"He killed her."

"Killed ... my wife?"

"Yes."

"My God!" Said with appropriate reverence,
but without feeling. "What about Sammy?" Sudden panic. "Where's
Sammy!?"

"I don't know. I went to your house -- your
wife's house. Found her dead. She was packing bags. It seems she
knew she was in danger; which served her right for dealing with
murderers. My guess is she'd already sent your son away where he'd
be safe."

"Thank God he's out of there! But ... where
is he? Where did she send him?"

"That's the bad news. I don't know. Friends?
Relatives?"

"I can't think of any."

"The important thing is he's safe."

"You're ... right. When I
think what
could
have happened to Sammy -- in that house ...! Well, just
knowing he's safe means everything to me."

"Right."

"Surely, he'll be found."

"Yeah."

"And I want to thank you, Mr. Zapolska. Just
let me know what I owe you."

"Nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Didn't do anything I want to be paid
for."

At long last, Z had told
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; he
hadn't
done anything ...
for which he should be paid.

* * * * *

Going home to sleep the rest of that
afternoon and the following night had earned Z the twenty "feeling
good" minutes he used to drive down the Antioch-Chouteau corridor.
Past the south side of the Antioch Shopping Center, across Vivion,
beyond the small K-mart shopping area, past houses, parks,
churches, and finally under the "Worlds of Fun" viaduct and into
the sandy parking lot of his low-rise of an office building.
(Although the payment from Bateman College would be coming, it
wouldn't keep Z in peanut butter forever. At the very least, he
needed to check his answering machine for the possibility of new
business.)

His office nearly twenty minutes away from
his apartment, Z was beginning to tire as he entered the badly
refurbished old complex to limp down the left hall to the
International Headquarters of the Zapolska Detective Agency at the
back. All two rooms of it.

Thank God he'd gotten out of this recent
business so cleanly. The Smith business -- husband and wife.

A chill swept over him. What Z could never
forget was what, to him, would always be the night of the little
child.

He'd seen too much of death in his life. Too
much.

Continuing down the hall, he also had to
shudder at the thought of what had been buried in the basement, all
those nights he and Jamie had .....

Fortunately, Z had prevented that college
kid from making the grisly discovery of the bodies. Some sights
should not be seen -- especially by the young.

Though the ghost house had produced its
earthly delights, Z was glad to be rid of Jamie Stewart, too. Hoped
that his little fling with her (and that was all it had been)
didn't come back to haunt him.

Soon, the cops would do
something on their own, for a change, and catch Ruble. Then, if Z
could just get well, he'd call Susan and get his life back
together.
If
Z's
condition was something that could be cured. He was still tired and
short of breath, still got that "funny" pain in his chest when he
overtaxed himself.

He'd been tired before. He'd been short of
breath from time to time. But chest pain was something new to
him.

Paused before the thin-ply door of his
office, Z debated whether or not he'd get in faster by using his
key or the plastic card he kept for slipping old locks. Decided
that -- should someone exit an adjoining office while he was doing
it -- it would look better to be opening his door with a key.

That settled -- in spite of the difficulty
of fitting an unsteady key into a shaky lock -- Z was soon inside,
Z shutting the flimsy door behind him.

Looking down at the floor beneath the letter
slot, he saw an official looking envelope with Bateman College's
return address -- the fifteen-hundred for his work on the ghost
house case. Too dizzy to do it now, he'd bend down and pick up his
check on the way out.

Since he didn't plan on staying, he wouldn't
need to fiddle with the table lamp wires. All he had to do was play
back any messages left on the grumbling old answering machine, then
.....

Without warning, Z was hit
from behind, so hard that, for a moment, he was jolted back to high
school football! Back to the times when enraged defensive backs had
blind-sided him, Z knowing the same, hollow agony that meant he'd
had the breath knocked out of him, that interminably long moment of
suspension between life and death ......................... before
he could even
think
of breathing.

Gasping in a little air at last, turning, Z
saw a big, beefy man on his hands and knees at Z's feet, even Z's
oxygen-starved brain able to register the fact that the man had
broken into the office, had waited for Z to enter, then thrown his
bulk into Z's back, Z slammed forward on the desk, the man bounced
to the floor.

It also seemed clear that the man on the
floor was in as bad a shape as Z, something Z couldn't
understand.

It was only when the man looked up -- the
guy's face burned to a scalded-scarlet, cracked skin laced with
yellow pus-patches of infection -- that Z realized who he was. Knew
him even before a further shift of the man's head caused light to
reflect from his metal forehead.

Ruble!

Z's mind still cloudy, he was only vaguely
aware that madmen were said to have supernatural strength,
something that didn't seem to be the case here. Still on the floor,
the loony was panting as heavily as Z, Z able to do nothing but
lean back on the small secretarial desk, bracing himself there with
his elbows.