“No. Don’t. Just listen. If I told you, Andy, even after you’d tortured me, you’d have no way of knowing if it was the truth till you got out there. And trust me, it wouldn’t be. Now think about that.”
“You think I’m gonna haul you to Wyoming?”
“How are you gonna find the cabin? My dirt road’s in the middle of nowhere. You have to watch the mileage from a certain point even to have a chance at finding it, and I’m not telling you where that is. Not here. No f**king way. You need me; I need you. Let’s take a trip.”
“I can find it on my own.”
“How?”
“I found you.”
He snorted. “That f**king cowboy.”
I considered holding the flame to Orson’s eye until he screamed exactly where in the cabin or shed I could find the paraphernalia of his obsession. But he was right: I wouldn’t know if he’d told the truth until I got out there.
I wanted to ask him about my mother and how he’d framed me, but I was afraid the rage would undermine me like it had Walter, and there were things I still had to know.
“Where’s Luther?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Luther drifts.” Discomfort strained his voice.
“How do you communicate?”
“E-mail.”
“What’s your password?” Part of me wanted him to resist. I flipped open the Zippo.
“W-B-A-S-S.”
“Pray he hasn’t touched them.” I got up and opened the door.
“Andy,” he said. “Can I please have whatever you’ve been giving me? This hurts like hell.”
“It’s supposed to hurt.”
I walked through the living room into Orson’s study and booted up the computer. His password gave me access to his E-mail account. Six new messages: five spam, one from LK72:
>From: <[email protected]
/* */>
>Date: Fr, 8 Nov 1996 20:54:33 -0500 (EST)
>To: David Parker <[email protected]
/* */>
>Subject:
>
>O—
>
>Getting antsy. Need to head north soon. Ask me about that strpt at stlns. Funny stuff! AT is still gone. As is WL. Still? as to the L. whereabouts. I’ll wait if you want. Otherwise, there’s someone I need to go visit asap up in Sas. Still all over the tube. Wow! Looking forward to OB.
>
>L
I searched Orson’s deleted, sent, and received message folders, but he kept nothing saved or archived. When I’d printed out the E-mail, I took it with me into the den.
“Decipher this,” I said, setting the cryptic E-mail in Orson’s lap. “It is from Luther, right?”
“Yeah, that’s from him.”
“So read it back to me like it makes some f**king sense.”
He looked down at the page and read aloud in a weary, crestfallen voice: “Orson, getting antsy. Need to head north soon. Ask me about that stripper at Stallion’s. Funny stuff. Andrew Thomas is still gone. As is Walter Lancing. Still no idea as to the Lancing whereabouts. I’ll wait if you want. Otherwise, there’s someone I need to go visit asap up in Saskatchewan. Still all over the tube. Wow. Looking forward to the Outer Banks. Luther.” He looked up at me. “That’s it.”
“So he’s still in North Carolina, waiting for you to tell him what to do about the Lancings?”
“Yes.”
Returning to the desk in his study, I sat for a moment, staring out the window at a woman raking her lawn across the street. As I drafted the message in my head, it occurred to me all at once what I would do—about Luther, the photographs, even Orson. It was a revelation not unlike the epiphanies I’d experienced upon finding my way out of the woods in the plotting of a novel.
As I typed, I worried that my E-mail response to Luther would deviate too conspicuously from Orson’s format and style, but I risked it:
>From: <[email protected]
/* */>
>Date: Sat, 9 Nov 1996 13:56:26 -0500 (EST)
>To: <[email protected]
/* */>
>Subject:
>
>L,
>
>Head on to Sas. I may take care of the L’s later if need be. I’m heading cross-country, too, to you know where. Want to meet somewhere en route late tomorrow or Monday, and tell me about that strpr in person?
>
>O
I walked back into the den and filled a syringe with two vials of Ativan. Then I jabbed the needle deep into the muscle of Orson’s bare ass. On my way out the door, he called my name, but I didn’t stop. I ascended the staircase and headed for the guest room, unwilling to sleep in his bed. The mattress was cramped and lumpy, but I’d been up for thirty hours and could’ve slept on broken glass. Through the window, I heard the college bell tower striking two, birds bickering, wind in the trees, and cars in the valley below—the sounds of a New England town on a Saturday afternoon. I am so, so far from that.
My thoughts were with Beth Lancing and her children as I floated into sleep. I’m trying to save your lives, but I robbed you of a husband and a father. Robbed myself of my best friend. I wondered if she already sensed that he was gone.
28
I came down the staircase at 1:30 in the morning, having slept straight for eleven and a half hours. The house was so still. I could hear only the minute mechanical breathing of the kitchen appliances as they cut on and off in the predawn silence.
After starting a pot of coffee, I poked my head into the den. Orson’s chair had fallen over. He was unconscious, naked, still awkwardly attached to the toppled chair. He looked feeble, helpless, and for a moment I let myself pity him.
Barefoot, I walked into his study and sat down at the desk. As the monitor revived, crackling with static electricity, I saw that he had one message waiting. Typing in the password, I opened the new E-mail:
>From: <[email protected]
/* */>
>Date: Sun, 10 Nov 1996 01:02:09 -0500 (EST)
>To: David Parker <[email protected]
/* */>
>Subject:
>
>O—
>
>Might be in SB Monday evng. Call when you hit Nbrsk and we’ll see about a rendezvous.
>
>L
Shutting down the computer, I walked back into the den and gave Orson another injection. Then I went upstairs to take a shower.
The hot water felt immaculate. After I’d tidied up the cuts on my face with a razor blade, I lingered in the stream, leaning against the wet tile, head down, the water cooling, watching the blood swirl under my feet into the drain.