Last Ditch (40 page)

He
opened his
mouth to speak, but I beat him to it.

"Don't
bother with a denial. You don't need it for me. I could give a shit.
Just take
my word for it that Brennan and I have reached a point of . . . what
did they
call it back during the Cold War . . . mutual deterrence. Nothing about
that
night is ever going to see the light of day."

He
reached over
and patted me on the shoulder. "Must have been that blow to the head."
On his way past the towel girl, he slung the towel in through the door
without
stopping. "Pat," I called to his back.

With
a show of
great reluctance, he stopped and turned back my way. "I thought you
were
quite through," he said wearily.

"You
still
run every morning?"

"Why?"

"Well
. .
. lately . . . with all that crap going on with the judge, I've been
running Greenlake
in the mornings. I thought maybe some morning you'd like to . . . you
know . .
. take a lap."

He
thought it
over at length.

"I'll
bury
you," he said finally.

"I
know."

"What
time?"

"Six?"

"Five-thirty."
You cur.

"Tomorrow?"

"Where?"

"By
the
Shell House." 'I'll be there."

Before
he
turned the comer, he looked back over his shoulder.

"Don't
be
late," he said. You cur. "No fuckin' way."

The
movement of
my sneakers rippled the newly fallen willow leaves, sending dry yellow
waves
puffing out from my feet in all directions as I walked. About halfway
down the
path, I moved off the pavement, pushing my way through the web of
weeping tendrils,
over toward the rear of the sagging boathouse.

As
I emerged
into the sunlight, I found myself brushing at my arms and shoulders,
trying to
stem the tide of hitchhiking leaves now attached to my blue
windbreaker. At
least one soldier had found his way down my collar and rested cold and
crisp
against my neck. I reached back to get it out but squeezed too hard and
sent
the shattered pieces skittering down my spine like a colony of ants. I
silently
cursed and pulled the jacket tighter about me.

I
cursed again,
this time out loud, when I saw the twisted wooden walkway which wound
around
the front of the abandoned shack. At least a third of the treads were
missing.
Another third were cracked or broken. This early in the morning, this
time of
year, a dip in Lake Union was pretty much
gonna ruin my day.

I
heaved a sigh
so big I noticed it, spread my feet wide, and began stepping lightly,
moving
from intact section to intact section, stopping after each movement,
peering
down into the dark water, waiting for the quivering structure to come
to a
momentary rest before moving on.

I
kept at it
until I reached the front of the shed. What had once been a gentle ramp
down to
the water was now nothing more than a half dozen decaying pylons poking
up from
the shallows like bad teeth. The rolling door which had once spanned
the
building lay broken and piled upon itself, leaving the little shack
agape,
yawning out at the lake through a narrow tunnel of trees.

He
was sitting
in the doorway with his feet dangling over the water . . . checkin' his
eyelids
for holes ... an Old English forty ouncer clutched tightly in his mitt.

He
didn't look
up. He left his chin on his chest.

"That
you
Georgie?" he gargled.

"It's
me,
Ralph," I said.

Without
looking
up, he waved the bottle in my direction.

"Gwaaan.
.
. ." he mumbled. ". . . getouttahere."

I
stepped over
into the doorway and sat down beside him. A mile away, over on the far
side of
the lake, across Westlake
Avenue,
nearly at the top of the hill, the brick gables of my family manse
stood dark
and sentinel among the trees. Although I'd always been able to pick out
my own
house from across the lake, today it seemed more exposed to the eye
than I
could ever recall. Must have been all that trash we'd cleaned up. Ralph
pretended to snore.

When
I pulled
the fifth of schnapps from my sagging jacket pocket, his eyelids
fluttered. I
took my time removing the him from the bag and then, with even greater
deliberation, wadded the sack into a tight ball. When he still didn't
move, I
picked the botde back up, unscrewed the top and took a long pull.

"Ahhhh,"
I enthused.

Ralph
hcked his
lips and shot me a look from the corner of his eye.

"Here's
what happened," I said.

And
I told him
damn near the whole story. The only things I left out were Tim and
Frankie,
'cause I didn't want to end up in a crate, and Pat, 'cause I didn't
figure it
was any of his business.

Forty
minutes
later, the sun had slipped behind a cloud and the breeze carried the
season's
first hint of blue northern ice. By then, Ralph was sitting up,
clutching the
remaining schnapps between his thighs like a fireman's pole. His empty
beer him
had rolled over the edge and now bobbed about on the surface of the
black
water.

"Jesus,"
he said when I stopped talking. He took a long pull on the him and then
wiped
his mouth with his sleeve. "We're born naked and hungry," he slurred.
". . . and then things go bad."

I
reached for
the bottle.

Leo
Waterman is
the kind of guy you want around in a pinch. He's tough when the time
calls for
it, but cool—oh so cool. Leo may not, however, be the kind of guy you
want to
bring home to mother. He's got a heart of gold, but he doesn't wear it
on his
sleeve. Leo Waterman is a man of few words—though he's always good for
a couple
of zingers—but his humanity is written all over his actions. A guy like
Leo is
a guy you want to count among your friends. And if you enjoyed the time
you've
spent with him in LAST DITCH, you won't want to miss seeing him again
in THE
DEADER THE BETTER, available now in hardcover from Avon Twilight.