6

Alan wore the wrinkled top of a pair of pajamas under a gray suit jacket paired with tan trousers. John had apparently dressed his father-in-law in whatever he had pulled first out of his closet. Alan's hair drifted around his head, and his wild, unfocused eyes communicated both belligerence and confusion. He had reached a stage where he had to express himself as much through gesture as verbally, and he raised his hands to his head, carrying John's hand along. John released him.

Alan smacked his forehead with the hand John had just released. "Don't you get it?" He boomed this question toward John's retreating back. "It's the answer. I'm giving you the solution."

John stopped moving. "I don't want that answer. Sit down, Alan. I'll get you a drink."

Alan extended his arms and yelled, "Of course you want it! It's exactly what you want." He took in my presence and came through the foyer into the living room. "Tim, talk sense to this guy, will you?"

"Come over here," I said, and Alan moved toward the couch while keeping his eyes on John until he had passed through into the kitchen. Then he sat down beside me and ran both hands through his hair, settling most of it into place.

"He thinks he can solve everything by running away. You have to stay in place and face it."

"Is that the answer you're trying to give him?" I asked. John had evidently told the old man of his plans to move abroad.

"No, no, no." Alan shook his head, irritated by my inability to understand the matter all at once. "I have an endowed chair, and all I have to do is make sure that John gets the chair, starting next term. I can give it to him."

"Can you appoint your own successor?"

"Let me tell you something." He gripped my thigh. "For thirty-eight years, the administration has given me every single thing I ever asked for. I don't think they'll stop now."

Alan addressed these last words to John, who had returned to set a dark brown drink in front of him.

"It's not that simple." John took the chair at the end of the couch and turned to look at the television.

"Of course it is," Alan insisted. "I didn't want to admit what was happening to me. But I'm not going to pretend anymore."

"I'm not going to carry on for you," John said.

"Carry on for yourself," Alan said. "I'm giving you a way to keep yourself whole. What you want to do is run away. It's no good, kid."

"I'm sorry you feel rejected," John said. "It isn't personal."

"Of course it's personal," Alan roared.

"I'm sorry I brought it up," John said. "Don't make me say any more, Alan."

Alan overflowed with all he felt—he had been waving his arms while he spoke, splashing whiskey onto himself, the couch, and my legs. Now he gulped from the glass and groaned. I had to get John away from Alan and talk to him in private.

Alan came out of his sulk long enough to give me a way to do this.

"Talk to him, Tim. Make him see reason."

I stood up. "Let's go in the kitchen, John."

"Not you, too." He gave me a disbelieving glare.

I said John's name in a way that was like kicking him in the foot, and he looked sharply up at me. "Oh," he said. "Okay."

"Attaboy," Alan said.

I set off for the kitchen. John trailed along behind me. I opened the door and stepped outside. What was left of the fog curled and hung above the grass. John came out and closed the door.

"Fontaine called," I said. "He wants to trade information. We're supposed to meet at two o'clock on Widow Street, across from the St. Alwyn."

"That's great," John said. "He still thinks we trust him."

"I want to get out of town tonight," I said. "We can go to the FBI and tell them everything we know."

"Listen, this is our chance. He'll hand himself to us on a plate."

"You want me to meet him on a deserted street in the middle of the night?"

"We'll go down early. I'll hide in that little alley next to the pawnshop and hear everything he says. Together, we can handle him."

"That's crazy," I said, and then I understood what he really intended to do. "You want to kill him."

Alan shouted our names from within the kitchen, and John bit his lip and checked to see how persuasive he had been. "Running away won't work," he said, unconsciously echoing what Alan had just said.

The door swung open, and Alan stood framed in a spill of yellow light. "You getting him to see reason?"

"Give us a little more time," I said.

"The rioting seems to be pretty much over," Alan said. "Looks like four people got killed." When we said nothing, he backed away from the door. "Well, I won't get in your way."

When Alan had retreated from the door, I said, "You want to kill him. Everything else is just window dressing."

"How bad is that, as a last resort? It's probably the only safe way to deal with the guy." He waited for me to see the force of this. "I mean, there's no doubt in your mind that he's Bachelor, is there?"

"No," I said.

"He murdered my wife. And Grant Hoffman. He wants to murder you, and after that he wants to murder me. How concerned are you about the civil rights of a guy like that?"

"Two more!" Alan bawled through the window. "Total of six dead! Ten million dollars in damage!"

"I won't con you," John said. "I think it's a lot more likely that Fontaine will wind up dead than on trial."

"I do, too," I said. "You better make sure you know what you're doing."

"It's my life too." John held out his hand, and when I took it, I felt my uneasiness double on itself.

Hovering near the sink when we came back inside, Alan looked at our faces for clues to what had been decided. He had shucked the suit jacket, and parts of his pajama top had worked their way out of his trousers. "You get things straightened out?"

"I'll think about it," John said.

"Okay!" Alan boomed, taking this as surrender. "That's all I wanted to hear, kiddo." He beamed at John. "This calls for a celebration, what d'ya say?"

"Help yourself, please." John waved his hand at the evidence that Alan had already been helping himself. A scotch bottle and a glass with slivers of ice floating in dark brown liquid stood on the counter. Alan poured more whiskey into the glass and turned again to John. "Come on, join me, otherwise it's not a celebration."

John went into the living room, and I looked at my watch. It was about eleven-thirty. I hoped John was going to have sense enough to keep sober. Alan gripped me by the shoulder. "God bless you, boy." He pulled another glass from the shelf and splashed whiskey into it. "It's not a celebration unless you join in."

John was going to lead Alan on until I left town, and then he'd refuse the chair. That would be the end of it. I felt as though I'd just assented to a second murder. When John returned, he raised his eyebrows at the drink before me and then smiled. "Something to calm the nerves."

Alan clinked glasses with John, then with me. "I feel better than I have all day."

"Cheers," John said, raising his glass and giving me an ironic glance. His jacket shifted far enough to catch on the handle of the revolver, and he quickly pulled it back into place.

I tasted the Scotch. My whole body shuddered.

"Thirsty, eh?" Alan took a gulp and grinned at both of us. He seemed almost half-crazy with relief.

He and Alan left the kitchen, and I poured the drink out into the sink. When I came back into the living room, the two of them were back in their old places, staring at the television.

Alan's pajama top had come all the way out of his trousers, and a bright, unhealthy flush covered his cheekbones. He was saying, "We should go into the ghetto, set up storefront classrooms, really work with these people. You start with a pilot program and then you expand it until you have a couple of real classes going."

For another thirty minutes, we stared at the screen. The family of the boy who had been killed in City Hall announced through a lawyer that they were praying for peace. A pale blue map indicated burned-out neighborhoods with little red flames and areas where gunfire had taken place with little black pistols. John refilled Alan's glass. His hair and necktie back in place, Jimbo declared that the worst of the rioting seemed to be over and that police had restored order to all but the most troubled neighborhoods. Fire fighters trained hoses on a long row of blazing shop fronts.

At ten past twelve, when Alan's head had begun to loll forward on his chest, the telephone rang again. John jumped up and then waved me off the couch. "Go on, get it, he's checking in," he said.

Alan raised his head and blinked.

"You said I should call," a woman whispered. "Well, I'm calling."

"You have the wrong number," I said.

"Is this Al Underhill's boy? You said I should call. He's back. I just saw him go into the living room."

I opened my mouth, but no words came out.

"Don't you remember?"

"Yes, Hannah, I remember," I said.

"Maybe you don't want to do anything, it's such a terrible night—"

"Stay in the house and keep your lights off," I said.