Dark Specter - Michael Dibdin

Sam shook his head decisively.

“Next time, you’ll call me.”

I edged out of the booth, gathering my things around me, asserting my separate existence.

“What are you doing here anyway?” I asked.

“I came to see you, Phil.”

This time I couldn’t ignore him.

“You came all this way just to have a beer with me in a bar?”

He said nothing. Never underestimate the power of silence. It made me lose it completely.

“You should have told me you were coming! We could have had dinner, gone out somewhere … You should have let me know.”

His supercilious smile reappeared.

“That’s not the way I operate.”

And with that he walked away, across the bar, out the door. I left some money on the table and went after him, feeling resentful that he had somehow managed to gain the upper hand, despite all my efforts. But when I got outside, the street was empty. Downtown Minneapolis had changed since the old days. The street life which had flourished then had been exterminated, but nothing had replaced it. Consumers drove in from the suburbs, like me, had their fun and went home. The sidewalks were empty, the concrete slabs decorated with a faint flurry of snow.

I got my car from the parking lot, jammed a tape of the Brandenburg Concertos in the stereo and drove home, seething internally. I felt intolerably nauseous, as though I might throw up not just the beer I had drunk and the pretzels I had nibbled but my very brains and being. The whole weight of my misspent youth rose in my throat like a greasy, undigested feast. The evening had been a disaster from start to finish, a farcical misalignment of intentions and personalities. It was futile to try to revive old friendships.

I had tried to be polite and positive to Sam, praising his refusal to compromise and apologizing for having settled for less. This was hypocrisy, a strategy for sending him away happy, for getting him off my back. The fact was that I had come to terms with life. I had accepted its conditions, signed the contract and was now enjoying the modest but solid rewards. Nothing else was real, and anyone who went on trying to pretend that it was would end up like Sam, marginalized and crazy, someone people shied away from in bars.

The whole episode seemed an irrelevance, a freak occurrence of no relevance to my present circumstances. If it hadn’t been for that chance meeting with Vince, it would never have happened. As I drove up to our modest tract house, identical to all the others in our neat, convenient suburb, I made a vow never to let chance interfere in my arrangements again.

5

Bonnie Kowalski drew up to the curb and yawned loudly. It was OK, she was on time, in spite of the traffic. The guy would most likely be late, anyway. He’d phoned in the day before to check the time of their appointment, even though she’d sent him a confirmation in writing. Your typical academic ditz, thought Bonnie. She’d had lots of dealings with them, the campus being so close, and she’d yet to meet one who didn’t seem to be a few dishes short of a combination platter.

She pried the plastic lid off a cup of coffee which read “The beverage you’re about to enjoy is extremely hot.” Bonnie remembered reading something where some woman had scalded herself and sued the company for half a million bucks. She sipped the coffee cautiously and stared out through the windshield at the big trees in the parking strip, gaunt and bare in the morning sunlight.

When she’d started up the car that morning, to take Nathan to the orthodontist and then on to school, the windshield wipers had started too. Their painful scraping across the dry glass had brought it all back to her: the evening which had started so promisingly and ended so brutally, the suddenness with which everything had gone wrong, their inability to turn it around again, Ed’s cold words and unyielding silences, the fit of anger and despair which had forced her out into the rain-sluiced streets, the fact that he hadn’t come after her. The fact that he hadn’t come after her.

And she hadn’t even gotten laid. That’s what it had all been about originally, and even now, after all these months, Ed had only to give her a certain look, and put one hand on her breast and another on her leg, and everything else fell away. That’s what had always held them together. She’d never known a lover so masterful, so greedy, so sure of what he wanted and how to get it. His occasional moods and sulks had seemed a small price to pay for such ecstasy, plus he’d always been at his best in that way after being at his worst in others.

If anyone had told her, six months before, that she’d fall for a man like that, Bonnie would have dismissed the idea with contempt. She’d always thought she liked being in charge in bed, setting the agenda, controlling the pace and the progress. Now she wondered what had made her waste so much time dating men who bought-into that kind of micromanagement. With Ed she’d known from the get-go that she was in safe hands. Sex with him wasn’t a matter of consultation and compromise. He took what he wanted, turning her body this way and that, having his way with her. And she loved it. For a couple of days she’d worried about betraying her principles, then she thought, fuck it. No one need ever know, anyway.

She glanced at her watch. Still five minutes to the appointment. She’d give him fifteen after that, just to be safe, then head back to the office. A wave of depression hit her like a blow, forcing a sigh from her. She suddenly felt that men were standing her up, ignoring her feelings and needs. Even Jerry had been cool and distant when she got back the night before. Maybe he’d guessed. Maybe her pain had showed in her face. It was easier to conceal a happy affair than an unhappy one.

As usual, her alibi had been that she’d had to show a home. Her work was useful that way. Many people could only view a property at night. Bonnie had gone into great detail about the listing, a young contemporary colonial on Indian Ridge, five beds, four and a half baths, boasting a gourmet kitchen, a butler’s pantry and a cathedral ceiling. She’d even described the clients, a gay couple from out of state. Maybe she’d said too much. She wouldn’t have bothered if the story had been true, or even if things had gone better with Ed. She would have felt confident and relaxed, and Jerry would never have suspected a thing. He never had before, she was sure of that.

She took a gulp of the coffee, which had cooled considerably by now. Sherman was late, God damn him. She’d tried to get him to meet at the office, but he’d claimed his time was too valuable. The same apparently didn’t apply to hers. At the office she could have buried herself in her work and joked around with the others instead of sitting moping all alone in her car. Plus, although she tried not to think about this too much, it was safer. There’d been a couple of horror stories involving female realtors recently, rapes, even a murder. But that was some place else. There were neighborhoods where she wouldn’t have shown up alone, but Evanston wasn’t one. Anyway, it was broad daylight, and the guy was a professor. He’d probably be so scared of ending up in a harassment case he wouldn’t make eye contact with her without a witness.

A couple of joggers passing by glanced at the house with its immaculately tended lawn. A metal sign embedded in the turf displayed the logo of the firm along with Bonnie’s name and the hot line number in red. This one was hot, all right. $600,000 was the asking price, although Bonnie was pretty sure they’d go down to the low fives for a quick sale. The seller had been transferred back east and needed cash fast. As for Samuel Baines Sherman, recently appointed MacSomebody Distinguished Professor of Something at Northwestern, he’d already sold.

The joggers passed by again. Bonnie looked them over as they padded along the sidewalk. In their twenties, one a little taller than the other, clean-cut student types. That’s the kind of place Evanston was-college kids, professors, yuppies and rich businessmen, espressos and French bakeries and fresh pasta. Far enough from the city to be safe, near enough to be convenient.

Then there were the properties themselves. This one was a classy Victorian, maybe a little rambling-or “spacious,” as the ads said-but definitely tony. Ten rooms in all, five bedrooms, two fireplaces, hardwood floors, leaded glass, you name it, this baby was loaded. It didn’t have a lake view, but Maple was a very nice street tucked in between Ridge Boulevard and the CTA tracks, quiet and leafy but still only half an hour from the Loop and a five-minute commute to the Northwestern campus. Sherman could bike it, even walk there, or run if he was the type. It was a perfect home for him. Everything looked good, and Bonnie stood to clean up on the deal. These North Shore places sold themselves. It had been dumb to let herself get thrown by what had happened. It was only a lover’s tiff, every couple had them. As soon as she got back to the office she’d give Ed a call and fix up a time to see him again. Then they would talk everything over, get it all worked out.

A car came up the wide, tree-lined street and pulled in right in front of Bonnie. It was a bright red Impala, but the man who got out of it didn’t look like the Impala type. He was of average height and build, but gave the impression of occupying more space than he actually did, and being entitled to it. His hair was dark and curly, his beard grizzly gray and neatly trimmed. He wore a double-breasted astrakhan coat over what looked like a tweed suit, with well-polished oxfords and those Italian-framed glasses that don’t make you look like a nerd. The Impala had to be a rental. The family Volvo or Audi, or whatever distinguished import the Distinguished Professor drove, would be in storage with the rest of his stuff back in New Hampshire. Lifting her purse from the passenger seat, Bonnie Kowalski switched on a smile and got out to greet him.

Ten minutes later, she knew that it had all been a waste of time. Less than ten, in fact, but she’d tried to kid herself for a while there. However the sale went, Bonnie normally got along really well with her clients. That was one reason why she was such a successful realtor. Maybe that was also one reason why Jerry didn’t ask too many questions about her being out so much in the evening, seeing as she had been paying the bills ever since his job with a marine brokerage turned out not to be recession-proof. Real estate is a people business, and Bonnie liked to think of herself as a people person. Plus there was always a little buzz in the air when the client was a man. Men had always gravitated toward her, drawn by her looks and a sense that they could relax around her. She enjoyed this for its own sake, and knew how to turn it to her practical advantage. And if the guy happened to be gay, she could work that room too, with her sassy sister act.

So it kind of shocked her to discover there was no way she could relate to Professor Samuel Baines Sherman. Not only did Bonnie’s social firepower fail to make the slightest impression on the Sherman Tank, as she privately dubbed him, but it turned out that he had no intention whatever of buying. For a while she thought he might be trying to work some leverage on the price, but when she hinted that there could well be some flexibility in that area, he just carried right on enumerating all the defects of the property. After a while she gave up. It was like the guy was giving a lecture on whatever the heck he was Distinguished for. There was no way to stop him short of walking out, and she couldn’t afford to do that. Losing the sale was bad enough, but if the client complained to Jack Capoccioni she could be in deep shit. Marine brokerage wasn’t the only job description where there were more applicants than positions these days.

Sherman’s basic bitch was that the property had been willfully misrepresented in the description he had been sent, describing it as a “gracious and immaculate rehab in move-in condition combining sophisticated family living and oodles of charm.” OK, so it was a bunch of bull, but Bonnie didn’t write the copy. Plus everyone knew that was just a come-on, feel-good stuff. All that really counted was the location and the price. After that you had to go look. But Professor Sherman evidently felt he’d been deliberately conned out of an hour of his valuable time, and wasn’t going to leave until he’d made damn sure that Bonnie never tried to pull a fast one on him again. As a result he led her through every room in the goddamn house, pointing out at great length why it was totally and utterly inappropriate for a man of his status.

“These rooms have been insensitively remodeled at some stage, probably the late forties or early fifties to judge from the moldings. The whole rationale of the original ground plan has been destroyed thereby, creating an architecturally psychotic ambience. Just look at the shape and dimensions relative to the height of the ceilings! It’s like a rat maze designed by Piranesi. No claptrap about graciousness and sophistication can change that.”

They had reached the bedrooms by now. Bonnie Kowalski figured she had to eat shit for about another ten minutes, then he’d be through. Give him satisfaction, she told herself. Keep him sweet for the future. Nevertheless, she felt a huge surge of relief when she heard footsteps on the stairs. Jack Capoccioni had told her he would drop by if he got through with the Schlumberger deal in time, see how she was doing, maybe work a squeeze play if the client was hard to close. This way he’d get to see for himself what an asshole the guy was, and she’d be off the hook.

“I must confess myself stupefied by your inability to grasp the nature of my requirements, Ms. Kowalski,” Sherman was saying. “I think it would be fair to say that I boast a certain renown as an effective communicator in academic, civic and political circles throughout the country. I am therefore mortified and dismayed to discover that in this instance I have evidently been unsuccessful in enabling you to grasp something as straightforward as the type of house I am looking for. Whether the responsibility for this failure is mine or yours is unclear, but at all events it is something we must rectify momentarily if we are to continue to do business.”

Behind them, the door creaked on its hinges.

“Hi, Jack!” said Bonnie, turning.

But the man who stood there wasn’t Jack. He was younger and fitter, wearing some kind of sports outfit and holding something in one hand, a personal stereo maybe. There was another guy behind him, standing in the shadows. Then they came into the room, and she recognized the two joggers who’d passed by while she was sitting outside waiting for Sherman.

“Don’t do anything stupid, you won’t get hurt,” the first man said.

It was an uneducated voice, sullen and constrained. He was about twenty, twenty-five, with a face that tapered to a protuberant jaw. He had meaty lips, slightly buck teeth and evasive, widely spaced blue eyes. He raised his hand, and Bonnie realized that the thing he was holding wasn’t a Walkman.

“Yeah,” said the other man, moving forward into the room. “That’s right.”

This was the shorter one. He had bleached blond hair and a little slit of a mouth, and he was also carrying a pistol. He reminded Bonnie of one of the other realtors called Randy who’d been pink-slipped a couple of months back, and for a moment she thought of those news stories you see where some guy who’s been fired comes back to work and starts shooting at random. But she knew it wasn’t Randy.