“She’s right,” Pete said. “In fact, I remember an old case in Las Piernas where somebody used an iron like that. I wasn’t on that one, though. I’ll have to look up one of the guys that worked it when we get back.”

I stood up, reluctant to leave my little refuge. But I was anxious to get back home to Las Piernas as well.

“I’ll take you back to your car,” Rachel said. “We can talk on the way.”

Pete told me that Mr. Tannehill and the Owenses had been contacted. Everybody was safe and nobody knew why anyone would want to kill Elaine Tannehill or her maid.

“Did you mention Jennifer Owens to them?” I asked.

“Yes,” Rachel said. “At first they were kind of high and mighty about her, but when I told them what had become of her, they changed their tune. They even talked about getting in touch with Jennifer’s mother. They didn’t have any ideas about who got Jennifer pregnant. Maybe this guy you call ‘Hawkeyes’ was just trying to find out what Elaine knew.”

“It obviously isn’t a problem for him to go around murdering people on the off chance they know something about this case,” I said.

“That’s what’s bugging me,” Pete said. “I think Irene’s right. We need to keep searching the Tannehill place, looking for something that connects Elaine to the guy who got Jennifer pregnant. Son of a bitch is really stupid. You know, if he had left things alone, we probably wouldn’t have been able to get much farther than identifying the Jane Doe. It’s an old case; nobody would have spent much time on it.”

“Maybe he has a lot to lose,” I said. “And maybe he got worried about people who might be persistent enough to figure it out, like O’Connor. You know he never would have let it rest. Well, I won’t either. Maybe he knows that.”

“He’s going too far, too fast. He’s bound to screw up.”

“I hope you’re right,” I said, looking out the car window. I wondered if this Mr. X would screw up before I got killed or had my feet ironed. I didn’t feel like talking about it and tried not to think about it. I let my mind go away from it all again. Sensing my mood, Pete and Rachel chatted about other subjects.

When we pulled in at the police department, I decided to give them some time by themselves, and myself some time to myself, so I offered to follow them back to the airport in the rental. Pete immediately approved of this idea, thanking me as he handed over the keys. Subtle guy, Pete.

I drove like a zombie, just keeping the back of the police car in front of me at a polite distance. If another police car had come along, I might have followed it anywhere. Before long we were back at the airport.

We checked Pete’s gun in again and made our way over to the gate, stopping to buy him a pack of gum at the gift shop. Rachel sat with us until they called our flight. I noticed Pete wasn’t powering down any gum.

I went over to a pay phone and called the paper. Lydia was gone by then, but Morry, the city editor, was still on the desk. I gave him what I could by way of an update.

Pete didn’t have to tell me this time to wait to get on, even though none of us believed Hawkeyes would be taking a flight out of Arizona.

When they made the final boarding call, Rachel stood up and gave me a big hug. “You can handle it, Irene. Anyone who can survive a day with this meatball can handle anything.”

“Hey, don’t I get a hug?” Pete asked.

Rachel walked over and grabbed his face, pinching his cheeks and shaking them. “No, you don’t,” she said, laughing, and walked off with a wave.

“Nobody’s done that since I was nine,” he said, watching her go.

We boarded the plane. I fell asleep before Pete had his first stick of gum, and slept all the way to Las Piernas.

28

YO, RIP VAN WINKLE! They’re gonna want to clean this plane. Come on, wake up, I’ll buy you a cup of coffee.” Pete was nudging me. Drowsily, I sat up and followed him off into the terminal. He led me into the airport coffee shop, sat me down and ordered two cups of coffee. I looked out the window into the dark until the waitress brought it. He watched me take a few sips, then said, “Are you ever going to speak to me again?”

“Sure I will. I’m sorry. I’m just…I don’t know, Pete. I don’t even know how to describe it anymore.”

“Then don’t try. Just drink your coffee. You up for a visit to Frank? Or do you want me to take you straight home?”

I thought about it. “I’m tired, but I’d like to see Frank.”

He smiled at this, so I thought I’d do a little prying of my own.

“So what’s with you and Rachel?” I asked.

“Ah, she is gorgeous, isn’t she? I admit it, I like her. But she’s in Phoenix and I’m in Las Piernas.”

“At least for now.”

“You done with that coffee?”

“Hey, don’t dish it out if you can’t take it.”

“All right, all right, I get you. How ’bout we make a pact-we’ll avoid the subject of-for want of a better term, I’ll say ‘romantic interests’?”

“Sounds good to me.”

We left for Frank’s place. I realized that I had no idea where he lived. He had looked me up when he first moved down this way, but I had never been to his house. Pete drove us down near the beach, along a crowded row of little bungalows. He parked in front of one that was about a block from the water. I couldn’t see much of it in the dark, but it looked fairly typical of the small wood-frame houses that were built along the beaches in the late 1930s.

It was about eight-thirty by the time we got there, and I wondered if Frank would still be awake. The lights were on, but that could be Sorenson, the officer who would be guarding Frank while he recovered. We pushed open the gate of a low white picket fence and walked up to the front porch. We knocked and waited. The porch light came on. A shadow covered the peephole in the door, as Sorenson peered out at us. He let us in, and told me that Frank was in the living room, which was toward the back of the house. Pete and Sorenson stayed behind to trade insults with one another in a manner that made it seem to be a long-standing tradition between them; I was anxious to see Frank, and made my way down the hallway.

I was surprised to see him sitting up on the couch, dressed in a gray sweat suit and white running shoes. “Don’t tell me you’ve been out jogging,” I said, “I wasn’t expecting to see you up and around.”

He grinned. “Good to see you. No, I haven’t been jogging. These were just the most comfortable things I could find to wear.” As I got closer I could see that the swelling had gone down from his lip, and his face was less puffy, though he still had the two black eyes and plenty of other bruises. He was pale, but all in all he looked a thousand times better than the day before. He started to stand up, and winced in pain.

“Don’t push yourself,” I said. “Go ahead, sit down, you almost had me convinced you’d been to Lourdes before you tried to stand up.” He didn’t argue and I took a seat on the other end of the couch.

“Ribs and head are still sore, and I look like I lost a fight, but at least I don’t feel like I’m in a fog.”

“I’m glad to see you looking so much better,” I said, and smiled.

Pete and Sorenson came noisily into the room. “Hey, will you look at this guy?” Pete said, seeing Frank. “Hercules, I tell you. Why, he has the strength of ten men!”

“Shut up, Baird,” Frank said, grinning up at Pete.

“Goddamn, Frank, I can’t believe it. And here I was, all set to inherit,” he said, looking around. The room was simply furnished, but felt very livable, not Spartan in any sense. The house had lots of windows, woodwork and built-in cabinets and shelves of the type so common in houses built in its time. In that way, it was not very different from my own.

Mike Sorenson turned to me and said, “Would you like something to drink, Miss Kelly? How about a beer or a Coke?”