THE FOURTH WATCH (25 page)

"Sure."

The sky had gone gray, and the early stars were
out along the horizon. Porch lights had come on up and down the
shoreline. Carolyn hugged herself against the breeze and watched
the rise and fall of the lake in the moon's pull.

"Is that your dock down there?" She said after
a time.

"Yeah. I don't have a boat anymore, but you can
swim right there in the summertime, and dive off the dock. It's
pretty deep."

"Do you do a lot of swimming, Mike?"

"Nah," I said, "not so much."

She looked at me for a minute, her eyes sliding
back and forth, reading something in the vagueness of my reply. But
she didn't say anything more.

My beer was empty. I held it up in the light.
"Do you want a drink or something before we go?" I
asked.

"Actually, I'm kind of hungry."

For some reason I thought of Adam Lynch and the
way his drinking had turned her off and I wondered why I was
thinking about that - what with this just being a business dinner
and all. "Me too," I said. "Let's go."

"Where are we going anyway?”

"I don't know, do you like middle-eastern
food?"

''I do," she said.

''Do you like Jazz?"

"Absolutely!"

"Have you ever been to Club George?"

She frowned. ''I don't think I've ever heard of
it."

"Well if you like good food and good music,
you're in for a treat," I told her.

"Let's do it then," she said.

"Okay."

She paused as I moved to go back inside.
''Mike, you don't think ...I mean I hope that you don't ... that
I'm being pushy - you know, asking you out like this and
everything."

I looked at her in the moonlight, leaning
against the railing, silhouetted against the lake. My heart was
racing. After too long I said, ''No, of course not, not at all. We
have a lot to talk about." And I was wondering just what the hell
we were starting here.

*****

CLUB GEORGE IS A COZY JOINT
in the basement of an old three-decker on the
side of a hill called Wall Street. There are maybe twenty tables,
and they're packed until closing Wednesday through Sunday nights,
the only nights of the week it's open. They serve classic Lebanese
and Syrian food, and over the years have added a few Greek and
Turkish dishes. They don't have a pouring license, so most people
bring a bottle of wine in with them. The unspoken rule is that you
bring it in a brown paper bag, leave it in the wrapper and pour it
into the scarred up water glasses that are on the tables. If you
get drunk, or loud, you are gone so fast that you're not sure you
were ever there.

The dropped ceilings are spotted with
watermarks. Suspended paddle fans turn slowly in the cigarette
smoke. The wide board floors are bare and scared with age. The
occasional patron wears the fez. The small Jazz band that plays the
house regularly is stoic but wonderful. I don't know why, but I am
always reminded of 'The Blue Parrot'. The owner is a fat man who
sits in one corner wearing a soft fedora. Sometimes I think I see
Bogie going through the crowd, trailing along behind a cigarette,
his eyes squinting through the smoke, his white dinner jacket
immaculate.

Six pieces make up the nucleus of the band, and
'Jazz' is really only a part of the music they play. Blues and
swing tunes are not uncommonly heard. Club George is a well-known
spot in the local, and not so local, music scene. Guests pop up
from the crowd on a regular basis and sit in on a set, and the
walls are covered with pictures of famous crooners and musicians
who have done just that. Many of the big names that play Boston
turn up at Club George late at night. I was a witness the night
that Tony Bennett stood up and asked if he could sing a song or
two, and heard patrons tell of the night that Frank Sinatra opened
the Centrum - then showed up at Club George at two in the morning
and serenaded the tables until four.

Carolyn's ride was the green Audi I had seen
parked in front of the garage that afternoon. I drove it to the
restaurant. We got a table in the center of the crowd at about nine
o'clock. A rail thin trumpeter was playing McArthur Park on a muted
horn as we took our seats. I had brought along a bottle of Merlot
in the appropriate wrapper. I poured us each a glass as we
listened.

We ordered rolled grape leaves, meat pies and
humus with Syrian bread to share as an appetizer, and we ate it at
our table in candlelight with the music rolling over us. We had
lamb skewers over rice and salads with a lemon and spearmint
dressing. The waiter brought it to our table just as the set ended
and we dug in.

`"Mike, this is fantastic!" Carolyn said. She
was beaming.

''I'm glad you like it."

"Oh, I do! This is really nice."

I smiled at her and turned my glass in small
circles on the table. "At the risk of ruining your mood," I said,
and I really did not want to do that, "we need to talk about your
Father."

I could see her face change in the shadows. She
had her glass halfway to her mouth when I spoke. She stopped, and
put it down and said: "Okay".

''I think you were right, Carolyn, I think your
father was murdered," I told her without preamble. "I think he went
to meet someone that night, and that the person or persons he went
to meet set him up. I think he was killed somewhere else and moved
to his pool to make it look like an accidental
drowning."

She looked at me across the table, nodding,
"Okay" she said softly. She picked the napkin up out of her lap and
rolled it up in her hands. Then she said, "Yeah" and then, "Okay,"
again. Then she lowered her head into her hands and wept
softly.

Michael Knight, Esquire - what a
date.

"Why, Mike?" She finally asked, wiping her
eyes.

"Something was going on at Loading Dock," I
said. ''I don't know what exactly, but, like I said back at the
house, I think that your Father stumbled across something that
involved using the company's purchasing and import network to bring
stuff into the country, maybe here to Worcester. I think he found
out what was going on and was trying to shut it down, and I think
that whoever is involved in this thing panicked and, well ...
stopped him."

"Jesus," she whispered, and I could see she was
trembling. We sat there for a while in silence. I waited for her.
Finally she said, "I know it's what I thought .. I mean I knew he
didn't drown in the pool like that ... " she was rocking back and
forth, hugging herself without realizing it " ... but now that here
you are saying someone killed him ... Oh my God, Mike ... I think
I'm going to be sick ... "

I pointed her toward the bathrooms in a hallway
at the back, to the right of the kitchen and watched as she picked
her way through the crowd toward them. I felt helpless. When she
came back her face was alabaster white, and there were drops of
moisture in her eyelashes. She must have splashed water on her face
to try to get herself together. I reached out my hand, and she
closed her eyes, and I brushed it away gently with my
thumb.

"You okay?"

She ignored my silly question. "Mike, why
didn't Daddy go to the police with this ... smuggling thing or
whatever it was?"

I shook my head. ''I don't know. He was a man
who liked to do things himself, I guess. Maybe he figured he'd get
it all tied up himself, then bring in the cops."

Now it was her turn to shake her head. "He was
a tough guy and all of that other stuff, Mike, but he wasn't
stupid, you know? Daddy used his resources. I can't see him going
off somewhere alone if he thought it was dangerous."

"Maybe he felt safe with whoever he was
meeting, Listen, Carolyn," I said, "I'm going to tell you
something, but I don't want you to mention it to anyone else,
okay?"

"Alright," she said warily.

"I think someone close to your Father is
involved in this thing, maybe someone close to your
family."

She looked as if I'd slapped her,
"Mike!”

"No, listen to me, Carolyn" I said. "If we're
right, they had to bring your father's body back to the house that
night, right? Had to bring his car back too, so, you know, it would
look like he came home under his own power."

''I guess," she said, frowning at the
thought.

"They'd have to know the layout, wouldn't
they?" I paused to let her digest that, and then I went on. "Here's
what I think happened. I think they came on up the drive, two cars,
There are at least two people involved, one car is Red's and one of
the killers is driving it. Your Father is in the other car with the
second killer. They turn off onto the service road. This is when
your date spots the headlights going through the trees. They park
behind the garage, or the barn. They have a key or the door is open
for them. They change you father into his sleeping clothes. Someone
is there with them, or gave them to them ahead of time- someone who
knows what he wears to bed! Do you see what I'm saying?”

She looked cold and whispered, ''No,'' but I
don't think she was answering my question.

I pressed on. "Okay, they get your Father out
of the car and change him up, but in the dark and all they slide
his shorts on backwards. The shorts have a stretch waistband so its
not like they have to button or zip them on him. They carry him
through the barn, or out through the garage. It's just a short
distance across the lawn to the latch gate on the backside of the
pool. They open it up and slip him into the water." I didn't tell
her that I thought that Red was still alive at this point. He had
ingested some chlorinated water according to the autopsy report, so
he still had some dying to do once he got into his pool.

Carolyn had her head down picturing it all. I
felt awful, but I had to get through it with her.

"They come back out the way they went in, and
one of the killers drives Red's car back out the service road, up
the drive and around. He parks it in the garage; goes out the back
to the service road where his partner is waiting in the other car,
locking everything up behind him, and off they go. Or maybe the
inside guy takes the car around. Carolyn, they needed help from
someone that knew the place, that knew what Red wore to bed, that
could get them a key to the garage .. or open the barn up for them
That could tell them when it would be safe to put the body in the
pool!"

Her voice was thin. "But they didn't know that.
If I had come home a minute later we would have seen
them."

"Okay, but who knew you were out that night?
Your car was there. In the statements that everyone gave to the
police, no one mentioned you were out on a date - except you. Did
anyone know you were going out that night?"

She thought about that. "I don't
remember."

"What would you have usually done on a
Wednesday night?"

"I don't know...If I had nothing to
do?"

"Yes, if you weren't out."

"I'd hang around I guess, watch television,
read or something ... home stuff."

"Would you hang out with Teddy and his wife, or
Sam?"

"No," she said. ''If Daddy was home, I might
hang around and talk to him. Sometimes we'd play Gin Rummy." The
memory was taking her. Her eyes filled, but then she got it back.
"I wouldn't intrude on him if he was with Sam, or just invite
myself in with Teddy and Ellie. I'd just go up to my room or read
in the study upstairs or something. "

"And what time would you go to bed?" I asked
her.

She dropped her eyes and almost smiled. "You
wouldn't believe me," She said.

''I'll believe you," I promised, smiling back
at her.

''If I'm home, and there's nothing going on,
I'm in bed by ten o'clock, I read for a while, I'm usually asleep
before eleven."

"So, if I knew your car was at the house, and I
didn't know that you were on a date and I was Teddy for example,
what would I think?"

"You can't seriously think that Teddy would do
anything to Daddy!" She was incredulous.

"Carolyn ... "

"Teddy loved my Father, Mike, and on top of
that he was scared to death of him! There is no chance that ...
"

"Hey, hey, hey! I said that as an example.
Listen, I'm not saying it was anyone in the family. There are lots
of people around the edges here too. People that have been to the
house, friends, employees, business associates, neighbors even! But
someone knew what was going on that night. When Teddy took me on my
little tour today, I saw a whiskey glass in the apartment above the
garage, on the windowsill, looking out on the service road. Like
somebody was standing there, looking out. It could mean nothing.
But Teddy told me that no one has ever lived up there or even goes
up there. That the place has gone basically unused since it was
built. And there was a blanket in the closet. I don't know. Maybe
someone was waiting to let them in that night. Only a person with
close ties to your father - or to one of the rest of you, could
have been able to plan everything so precisely."