Chapter 19
Nineteen
MAYBE A LOT
Goldie told Peter about her train ride, an attraction he was very familiar with, as well as starting a first draft of her article.
But she didn’t tell him about Evie Hines and Midland School.
She didn’t believe he was mixed up in anything his father was, but Charles was Peter’s dad, and she felt like she had to tread very carefully.
As their meal was wrapping up, Peter slipped off his frameless glasses and asked if Goldie would like to see his house and perhaps have a nightcap.
She smiled with her red lipstick glistening from one of the few lights in the place, and tossed her brown hair playfully. Then she picked up and took a final swallow of her second whiskey on the rocks.
“So, now we’re down to it at last, huh?” she asked. “Are we gonna have a fling or not?”
“It’s just a nightcap, Goldie,” he replied innocently.
“Yeah, and Harvey Weinstein wanted just a back rub,” she noted.
“Who’s Harvey Weinstein?”
“Doesn’t matter. You know what I’m talkin’ about.”
“Okay,” he admitted, “I’m not going to lie to you. I like you. Maybe a lot.”
“I like you too,” she shared. “Maybe a lot. But there is no possible way we can have a relationship. I’m not gonna fall into bed with you just because you’re cute and it’s the holidays.”
“I’m cute?” he asked, pleased.
“You know you are, so let’s not bullshit each other.”
“Okay,” he agreed. “I’m cute and you’re timeless. I don’t want to make you feel cheap by suggesting anything temporary and tawdry, but I don’t want a maybe once-in-a-lifetime chance to slip away, either. I wasn’t kidding Goldie when I said I’ve never met anyone like you. I really wasn’t.”
“Look, Peter—” she started to say.
“I hear about soldiers falling in love with girls overseas all the time,” he cut in.
“Men are fighting and dying, yet some still find a way to fall in love with women on the other side of the world and plan a life. If they can be brave and say: ‘Screw the odds’—if you’ll pardon my language—why can’t we?
I mean, unless you don’t see the same potential. ”
She smiled appreciatively at his sincerity, reached across the table, and took his hand. “Peter, it’s not just that you live in Colorado and I live in Ohio. There are other factors that complicate things.”
“Like what?” he asked.
“I-I don’t wanna get into it.”
“Please, Goldie.”
“Well… frankly… your father. Yes, he’s the one who brought me here, but now that I am, I see his controlling nature and snake-oil-salesman personality. Honestly, I don’t like it. I need to separate that from the article—and I will—but you and me gettin’ involved only muddies things.”
“Welcome to the club,” he replied, unfazed.
“I don’t like him much either. I suppose in the end, he and I both want the same thing: for Sparkledove to be a sought-after tourist location and a great place to live.
But we’ve got very different ideas on how to accomplish that.
You’re right. He’s got more than just a controlling nature.
He can sometimes be an out-and-out bully.
He grasps things so tightly that he chokes the life out of ‘em, like he and I having a good relationship. So, don’t think your perceptions about him create an obstacle with me.
If anything, they only reinforce to me how smart you are. ”
“Thank you,” she said sincerely.
“So, what else do you have that complicates things?” he asked, wanting to meet things head-on.
“I think that’s enough for now,” she said, reaching for her jacket sitting next to her.
“Wait, you’re not leaving, are you? It’s early.”
“I need to walk and get some air. I spent all afternoon hunched over a typewriter.”
“Me too,” he said. “I’ll go with you.”
“No, I need to think things over,” she said. “You just said some pretty heavy-duty things. If you were lookin’ for a fast lay, that’s one thing. But if you’re speakin’ with your heart and not your crotch, then that’s somethin’ else, and I should give it the consideration it deserves.”
“Fair enough,” he agreed. Then he raised an eyebrow. “But maybe you could consider both?”
She smiled and rolled her eyes. “Jesus… men!”
“There’s no women without men,” he reminded impishly. Then, he got more serious. “Just remember, Goldie, I am not my old man.”
Ten minutes later, she was strolling alone down River Street, chewing a fresh piece of gum.
She was taking her time to carefully peruse the store windows, which was something she really hadn’t done before.
The idea of truly trying to have a relationship with Peter was something akin to driving his Ford Super Deluxe Station Wagon.
It was beautiful, intriguing, and even fun, but it didn’t have much to do with reality.
Or at least, what she knew as reality. She came to the window of a bookstore, and a coffee table book caught her eye.
The book was called The Architecture of New York City, and on the front cover were pictures of the Empire State Building, the Chrysler Building, and the Flatiron Building.
“They’ve hardly changed,” she sighed, simultaneously feeling comforted and lonely by things that were familiar yet distant.
She cracked her gum and felt herself becoming emotional, then she gazed down the street toward city hall, which was in the opposite direction from her hotel.
She noticed the lights were on in the sheriff’s office next door, and Eli’s police cruiser was parked out front.
Making a decision, she decided to walk down and pay him a visit.
Like most of the stores and businesses in town, the sheriff’s office used to be something else.
It was somewhat long and narrow, with a squeaky wooden floor, and was originally built to be a law office for two attorneys, with one office being downstairs and the other being up a narrow flight of stairs on the second floor.
Since 1919, however, it had been the sheriff’s office, and the upstairs had been converted into a two-cell jail with a bed, toilet, and sink in each cell.
As she came through the front door, Eli Johnson was just coming down the stairs to her far right, carrying a tray with some used dishes and an empty glass on it.
As usual, he wore his tan sheriff’s uniform and carried no gun.
He looked at her, somewhat surprised. “Howdy, Goldie.”
“Sheriff,” she acknowledged.
She took off her gloves, unzipped her jacket, and looked around while chewing her gum.
There was a chair and a desk, two chairs in front of the desk, a filing cabinet with a radio sitting on its top, a locked, glass gun case, and a half-bath. The only decorations on the walls were a calendar, a wall clock, and a photo of FDR.
Eli cracked a faint, polite smile, then set the tray with the glass and dishes on the corner of his desk.
Besides the tray, the desk held two law enforcement textbooks, a typewriter off to the side, and a phone.
He turned and limped over to the stairway he had just come down, then shut the door that separated the upstairs from the downstairs.
“If you’ve come to interview Horace Mason, I’m afraid you’re a little late. He just finished supper, and I’m buttoning things up for the night.”
“No, I didn’t come for that,” she said.
“Oh? I thought, with your penchant for the big scoop and sensationalism—” he stopped himself, knowing this direction of discussion wouldn’t be productive. “What can I do for you?” he asked, somewhat formally.
“Mind if I sit down?”
“Help yourself,” he said. “So long as you don’t mind if I rinse out these dishes.”
She shook her head, stuck her gloves in her jacket pockets, then slipped off her jacket while he picked up the tray and went into the half-bath to use the sink.
“So, off the record and out of curiosity, what’s goin’ to happen to Horace?”
He began rinsing things off while the door was open and his back was to her.
“Well, Alice has decided she doesn’t want to press any charges.
I suppose because she feels guilty about carrying on with Benny Hudson.
So, Horace is only going to face charges of discharging a weapon in a public place and property damage.
He may get a fine and spend a little time in jail, but that’s a whole lot better than five to ten years for attempted murder. ”
“Absolutely,” she agreed.
“I’m taking him over to the county jail tomorrow, and from there it’s a circuit court matter. But I’ll remind the prosecutor of his clean criminal record.”
“I don’t know if you heard, but somebody had your back with a rifle pointed at Horace while you were tryin’ to disarm him.”
“I didn’t hear that,” he said, leaving the dishes to dry on a small table kiddie-corner to the sink. “Who was it?”
“Paul McCaw.”
“What was he doing in town? Wait—” he remembered, “Christmas trees for the Boy Scouts.”
“Yeah. And Stu Frey tried to come to your rescue, too.”
He came out of the bathroom, wiping his hands on a paper towel.
“Well, people can’t take the law into their own hands,” he said, tossing the paper towel into a wastepaper basket. “Still, I appreciate the consideration.”
“Yeah,” she agreed.
He stepped over to the chair behind his desk and sat down. “So,” he said, rubbing his bad leg, “if you’re not here to interview Horace, what can I do for you?”
“I saw what you did on the street. How you approached Horace and disarmed him. What did you say to him?”
He gestured to one of the textbooks on his desk. “Just used what they call Empathetic Psychology.”
“I thought what you did was really brave, and believe me, I don’t compliment cops.”
“Aw—it wasn’t as brave as you think,” he downplayed. “Horace was riled, but he’s no killer.”
“If you say.”
“Hey,” he said, changing subjects, “did I see you driving around earlier in Peter Banyan’s car?”
“Yeah. He lent it to me so I could do some explorin’ of the area.”
“You two seem to be hitting it off pretty good,” he observed.
“Yeah, we’re friends.”