Liar: An Irene Kelly Mystery Part 20

We moved to the living room. "I tracked down Richmond," I said. "I'll tell you the whole story in the morning. We're going to pay him a visit."

She smiled.

I looked back toward Travis. "I was afraid the dogs would wake him when I came in."

"Naw, that's why he left the door to his room open. He knew they'd come out to greet you. They come out here to check on me every once in a while, but most of the time, they've been with him. Even Cody's in there with him."

"I hope they aren't bothering him."

"Like I said, he isn't aware of too much after he takes one of those pain pills."

"You okay here on the couch? You could have the bed-I'll sleep out here."

"I'm all settled in-you go ahead and take the bed, catch what sleep you can."

"Thanks." I looked at my watch. It was just past four-thirty. "I hate to call Frank at this hour."

"Irene..." she chided.

"Okay, okay."

"See you in a few hours, then. Once you're up, I'll run home and shower and change. Then we can talk."

For all my trepidation before making it, the phone call to Frank was a good one. He had been worried, but apparently Rachel had calmed him down during one of his previous calls.

"Do me a favor," he said. "Think about staying somewhere else. The house in the mountains, or Pete and Rachel's place. Or a hotel."

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

There was a brief silence, probably while he regained his temper. But after that, all the talk was devoted to catching up on his news, and a little of that brand of conversation lovers cherish but others find disgusting, boring or just plain silly.

Because of it, I slept well.

I couldn't sleep much past nine, but discovered that Travis had already awakened.

"He hasn't eaten anything yet," Rachel said drowsily, sitting up on the couch. "He was in a hurry to see Jack."

"Why?"

"Didn't really say. He's been there quite awhile." She yawned. "He's over there with the dogs."

I have this worry that one day Jack will sell his house and I'll be left trying to explain to the new proprietors that regular visits from my dogs are part of the joy of home ownership.

"He also mentioned something about going shopping," Rachel added.

"I can understand that. If he hadn't brought the 'Cosmo' trunk inside the house, nothing from that camper would have been spared."

"Oh, yeah," she said, waking up a little more. "He took that over to Jack's place, too."

"The trunk?"

"Yeah. That upsets you?"

I shrugged. "Maybe he's decided he wants to stay at Jack's place instead."

I called Mary to let her know we had found Travis. She told me to try to take better care of him over the next few hours I spent with him than I had during the first twenty-four, but on the whole she was pleased. She wanted to see him, and I told her I'd call her again later to set up a visit.

I walked next door in time to see Jack leaning over an official-looking doc.u.ment, writing on it as Travis stood by. I saw them exchange a look as I came nearer.

"What are you two up to?" I asked.

"Nothing much," Jack answered. "Your cousin just bought my van."

"Just bought-"

"Yes, and we've agreed that the particulars are entirely between the two of us, Your Royal Nosiness."

"Jack-"

"Everything's fine, Irene. I'll get around on my bike until I decide to buy something less fitting for my image."

I'm now so used to Jack, I don't really notice the black leather outfits, or the scars, tattoos and earrings that frighten most of our other neighbors away from him. Jack, I thought, fit into McCain's scenario of a person of wealth living a simple life-Jack owned a fortune in local real estate, but was happiest riding around on his Harley, or sailing. He's the most generous of friends, but I couldn't allow him to give my cousin his almost-new van, which was completely outfitted for camping.

As if reading my mind though, Travis said, "It's not a gift."

"Strictly business," Jack agreed.

It didn't make me happy, but they were both adults, and I really didn't have any say in the matter. And if I was honest with myself, I had to admit that money wasn't the only reason I was unhappy about the van. "You're going home?" I asked Travis.

He frowned, then shook his head. "Not right away."

"Where is home?" Jack asked.

"Right now, its probably sitting in the police impound yard. What's left of it, anyway."

"You lived in that camper full-time?" I asked.

He nodded, then turned to Jack. "You're sure you don't mind taking care of that other matter for me?" "Not at all," Jack said.

"He's taking care of your trunk?" I said, mostly to let him know I was on to him.

"Yes, but that's not what I meant."

Perhaps because he knew the limits of my patience better than Travis, Jack said, "I'm picking up a cellular phone for him."

"I could have taken you to do that," I told Travis.

"It will be better this way, I think. But thanks."

Back at my house, I changed the bandage on his wounded hand and watched him as he struggled to eat breakfast left-handed.

"Bring back memories?" Rachel asked.

It did, but I said, "Let's not talk about that."

"About what?" Travis asked.

"Last November I had my right hand in a cast," I said quickly. "Rachel helped me out a lot then."

She folded her arms and raised a brow, but didn't say anything. He looked between us, but apparently decided not to pursue it.

"I'll be back in a little while," Rachel said.

After she had left, he asked, "Where did you go last night?"

I told him.

"I know Richmond," he said.

"You do?"

"Sure. He's hounded us for years. Part of the reason he got demoted from detective was because he hara.s.sed us, but he still didn't let up. Mr. Brennan-my dad's lawyer-eventually got a temporary restraining order placed on Richmond. He couldn't come near me or my dad. My mom wouldn't let my dad put her name on the order. But because I was on it, that pretty much kept Richmond away from both me and my mom."

"Was he threatening you?"

He shook his head. "No, just hara.s.sing us. He'd follow us around. He was sure my folks were going to get back together." He paused. "But let's not start that death-certificate argument again."

"I don't know much about what your life has been like since ..."

"Since Gwendolyn was murdered? Actually, you don't know much about what my life has been like since I was about a month old, right?"

"Right."

He was silent.

"You can punish me like this for another twenty-some-odd years, if that will make you happy," I said. I stood up, started to clear dishes.

He reached over with his bandaged hand, lightly touched my wrist. "No. It won't make me happy. I'm sorry." When he spoke again, there were sharp breaths between the words. "I'm not usually-I guess-everything-that happened yesterday-it's just been a lot to take in, all at once."

I sat down again. "I know."

He wiped at his face, embarra.s.sed, not looking at me. We sat in silence for a few minutes, listening to the kitchen clock tick. He grew calmer.

"I want to go with you and Rachel when you talk to Richmond," he said.

"Okay."

He seemed surprised.

"You were expecting an argument?" I asked. "I guess so." He was silent again.

"I'll take you shopping if you like, but before we go I need to take the dogs for a walk," I said. "Want to go down to the beach with me?"

"Sure."

The air was cool and misty, the sky was low and gray. A typical June morning; by noon the clouds would burn off, the day would be warm. The crowds would show up then. At this hour, the lack of morning sunshine cut down on the number of beachgoers; other than a surfer here and there, we didn't pa.s.s many people as we walked along.

Maybe being out in the salt air made a difference, or maybe the Pacific stretching gray and endless soothed him as it did me.

"I was just thinking that you were only about ten or eleven when you stopped having contact with my father," he said.

"Yes, I guess I didn't know him very well at all. After what you told me last night-I realize I've had these childhood impressions that were wrong."

"You couldn't have known that he couldn't read," he said. "Last night, I told you I'd tell you more about that."

We walked a little farther, then he said, "My father didn't begin to learn to read until he was over forty. He never learned to read very well; his type of dyslexia made it very difficult. When he was in grade school, in the late 1940s and early '50s, no one correctly identified the cause of his problems with reading. He was very bright, but he was always put in the 'slow' groups. Success in school was almost entirely dependent on being able to read and write. He couldn't do either. It was a.n.a.logous to trying to force deaf students to learn from tape recordings. He had to learn in other ways-you couldn't get through to him with the written word."

"You taught him to read, didn't you?"

"To the extent I could," he said. "It took me a long time to convince him that it was worth trying. He never would have gone back to school. He was too ashamed to let other people know he couldn't read."

"He had dropped out of school?" I asked, remembering the questions I had when I saw Arthur's death certificate.

"Yes," he said. "He wouldn't go to adult school, no matter how hard I tried to convince him it would be different now."

I noticed that he seemed embarra.s.sed about this.

"Who could blame him?" I asked. "I admire him for even trying to learn privately, from you. From what you've told me, school must have been a miserable place for him, a frustrating place, a place where he was made to feel ashamed of something he couldn't help. Becoming an adult wouldn't allow him to suddenly forget that misery, or decide that school might be a wonderful place after all. You shouldn't blame him, either. You know that, don't you?"

He hesitated, then said, "Yes. And the truth is, I do admire him. He had to do so much to compensate for his illiteracy; he came up with all of these tricks and ways to keep other people from guessing the truth. Most people never knew he couldn't read."

"Tell me about him," I said.

After a long silence, he said, "It isn't easy to describe him. When I think of his good qualities, well, he was smart and funny and very generous. He was hardworking. He was good with numbers-they didn't seem to cause him problems in the way letters did. He couldn't write checks or read ledger entries, or he might have been a bookkeeper. My mom paid the family bills, but if I said a group of numbers aloud, he could add them in his head as fast as she could with a calculator.

"If he had been able to go to school to study it, I suppose he might have been an artist-he was very creative. I have some of his drawings and paintings.

"But he liked being outdoors, and loved making things grow. So that was the business he went into. As you know, he was very good at it. He also had-I guess you'd call them 'people skills'-he made other people feel at ease. He was a great storyteller. One reason I never questioned his ability to read was that he could tell these wonderful stories. Who needed something out of a book when Dad could make up a better story?

"Sometimes the stories were on a grand scale-made-up fairy tales of knights and dragons, but mostly they were family stories, or just little tales about someone he had met that day, or something he had seen or done. I loved listening to him."

I remembered that about Arthur, thought that perhaps I had liked that in him before I took up my father's self-righteous anger against him. I said nothing, though, and after a moment, Travis went on.

"On the other hand, there was always a false front. Even simple things involved deception. When I was very young, if my mother wasn't with us, we ate at places like Denny's and Howard Johnson's-because they had photographs of the food on the menu, and he could get something besides a burger, which is what he usually ordered if there was no Ho Jo's nearby. That was a safe order.

"I started reading at an early age, so by the time I was seven, I helped him without realizing it. He used to make me feel very important when we ate out together, because he'd say to the waitress, 'This young man is going to pick out something for me. What do you think I'd like best, Travis?' I felt flattered-my father was trusting my judgment.

"There were other tricks he'd use. For example, if a note came home from the teacher, he'd watch me, a.s.sess my att.i.tude. He could tell if it was good news or bad news based on my nonverbal cues. He had incredible abilities as far as that went-he might not have learned to read books, but he could read people."