It was ten at night. Frannie was downstairs eating Mongolian barbecue takeout and watching a Jean-Claude Van Damme video he had rented earlier. I wrapped my thumb in toilet paper and called down, asking if he had medicine and bandages. When I explained what had happened, he raced up the stairs with a gigantic orange first-aid kit. He looked at my finger and wrapped it up like a pro. When I asked where he'd learned to do that, he said he had been a medic in Vietnam. Surprised he had spent his time as a soldier doing that and not flame-throwing people, I accused him of not telling me much about himself. He laughed and said I should ask any questions I wanted.
"How come you keep calling David Cadmus?"
"Because the fucker's father killed Pauline Ostrova."
"The fucker's father is dead, Frannie."
"But the crime isn't. Turn your hand over so I can get the other side."
"I don't understand what that means."
"It means I want someone besides Durant to admit killing Pauline."
"Why? Why's it so important?"
He held my bandaged hand in both of his while he spoke. I tried to pull it away after what he said next, but he wouldn't let go.
"What do you believe in, Sam?"
"What do you mean?"
"Exactly that. What in your life do you believe in? Where do you worship? Who would you give a kidney to? What would you go to the wall for?"
"A lot of things. Should I list them?" My voice went way up on the last word.
"Yes! Tell me five things you believe in. And no bullshit. Don't be cute, don't be clever. Say five things right out of your heart, and don't think about it."
Offended, I tried to pull away. He held tight, which made me even more uneasy. "All right. I believe in my daughter. I believe in my work, when it's going well. I believe in . . . I don't know, Frannie, I'd have to think about it some more."
"Wouldn't do any good. Listening to you talk, all that cynicism leads you to one big fucking wall of nothing. You know the saying, 'The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing'? The difference between you and me is I have at least one big thing that matters and gives me direction. I'm sure Edward Durant didn't kill Pauline. One day I'm going to prove who did.
"Even with all your success, you've got a fox's eyes, Sam – nervous and edgy, they don't stay on any one thing too long.
"I think you're back here because you're trying to get away from your life. Trying to return to some old part that's dead and safe. But maybe there'll be something in it to save you. That's really what attracts you, because where you are now is some Sunday in the middle of your life and the rest of your week looks pretty grim."
He let go of my hand and left the room. I heard him go down the stairs and then the sound of the television again. What was most interesting was the calmness of my heart. Normally bells and whistles would have been going off in there. I have a quick temper and an even quicker emergency defense system that throws up the walls in my soul whenever it is attacked. This time, however, my insides were as calm as the truth because that's exactly what he had spoken and I knew it.
We didn't see each other again that night. Around two in the morning, after rolling over and over the phrase 'one big thing,' I gave up hope of sleeping. I went downstairs to do whatever I could find to do in someone else's house after I'd just had my skin peeled off.
In the kitchen, the McCabe cupboards were an explosion of circus-colored junk-food boxes and a vast array of bottled hot sauces. The fridge had a hodgepodge of nasty-looking survivors from various takeout joints. When it came to food, Frannie called himselt a "gourmutt" and seemed pleased about it.
There was nothing else to do but turn on the Van Damme video for a few minutes and spend time with the Muscles from Brussels. I went to the machine to put in the video. Lying on top of it was a porno film titled Dry Hard. It starred Mona Loudly and from her picture on the box, Mona looked like better company for the midnight hour than Jean-Claude, so I put it in, figuratively speaking. A little porno now and then is good for the soul, and mine could have used a spicy diversion.
Before the film started, the company advertised some of its "Come – ing Attractions!" A few minutes of sleaze to rev up our appetites for another trip to the dark corner of the video store. I laughed at the clip of the first one, settling into the mood. Then the second preview came on, Swallow the Leader. Veronica Lake opened a door to a hunky-looking repairman. My Veronica Lake. One and a half minutes of my lover doing guess what with a Jeff Stryker look-alike.
I bet you've never had that experience: The woman who is charmingly modest about undressing, always closes the door when she goes to the toilet, and likes to wear simple white nightgowns to bed is suddenly in front of you on a television screen, doing things only prisoners and misogynists dream of women doing.
My Veronica Lake.
What is the decorum for asking your lover why they didn't tell you they acted in porno movies? Where is Miss Manners when we really need her?
The next morning I called a friend who is a movie buff and also happens to be plugged into every Internet station in the galaxy. I asked him to find out how many movies Marzi Pan had made. Two. Swallow the Leader and The Joy Fuck Club.
While I was sitting in a semi-coma, trying to think of what to do next, Veronica called. I tried to be normal but my voice must have sounded like it was coming from the other end of the Alaskan Pipeline. She picked up on it immediately.
"What's the matter?"
"I found out about Marzi Pan, Veronica."
Whatever I was expecting, what she said next wasn't it.
"Oh that." Her voice was dismissive, uninterested.
"What do you mean, 'Oh that'? For Christ's sake, Veronica, why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I was afraid you would react like this. What do you want me to say, Sam, I'm sorry? Sorry for once being a person I no longer am? Sorry you had to find out before you cared, or knew, enough about me to understand? Which sorry do you want?"
"I'm spinning, Veronica. I feel like I'm inside a clothes dryer."
Her voice became very small and hesitant. "Do you want to hear about it now? The whole story? That's what Zane meant in L.A. when she told you to ask me about Donald Gold. It was his fault, but I went along because I wanted him to love me. I would have done anything and that's what he wanted. He even thought up that name for me.
"But it's over, Sam. That was years ago. You're not ashamed of anything in your past? Something you can't do anything about, so you just have to be sorry and move on? I'm proud of myself now. Proud of who I am and what I do. I'm proud that you want . . . ," her voice faltered and she took a quick breath, ". . . that you want to be with me." She had begun to cry and it was clear why.
Shit that I am, I could think of nothing to comfort or console her. Instead, I whispered I would call her back and hung up.
The cemetery in Crane's View is wedged between the Lutheran Church and the town park. It's nondenominational and some of the gravestones date back to the eighteenth century. Ironically, both Gordon Cadmus and Pauline are buried there, not far from each other. It's a small place where you can have a good look around in less than an hour. When I was a kid we'd go there at night to mess around, sneaking up on each other, or making noises that were supposed to be scary but fooled no one.
I got out of my car and climbed over the low stone wall that enclosed the grounds. It was a beautiful morning, warm and still, the air full of birdsong and the smell of flowers.
I found Pauline's grave first. The stone was a small black rectangle, engraved only with her name and dates. The plot was well tended: Clearly someone spent time there bringing fresh flowers, weeding, keeping a candle burning inside a small protected lamp. I stood above it, thinking not very original thoughts – what a tragedy, what would she be doing now if she had lived, who killed her. I remembered the time I saw her at school bent over a drinking fountain. She was wearing a white blouse and long red skirt. Her hair was in a ponytail that she held to one side while she drank. Passing by, I had purposely veered so as to pass within inches of her. For one instant I was the closest person in the world to Pauline Ostrova. Her hair was shiny, her fingers so thin and long on the silver knob.