Mickelsson's Ghosts by John Gardner (guided reading books .TXT) 📕

Before Mickelsson could speak, Thomas said. “It wasn’t Tim. I don’t say he’s perfect, but I can tell you it wasn’t him. Some people will tell you that now and again Tim and his friends will get drunk and break into some house, somebody from New Jersey, or undermine some back lane so the first lovers that drive in there, the car’s suddenly sunk to the windows. I’ve heard such things said. But don’t you believe it. It’s those kids from up in New York State that do that. They’re crazy up there—anybody will tell you. I’ve had truck drivers tell me they hate to pass through, up there. The law’s crazy, the citizens are crazy. … You should see the salesmen a storekeeper up there has to deal with!” He rubbed his nose, looking down, as if saddened that an influence so pernicious should lie so close. “Anyway, I know Tim. He wouldn’t do anybody damage, not even a stranger. That house up there, it was like a bomb went off in it. Plaster everywhere it shouldn’t be. It was like what the old-timers say witches used to do when they decided it was time to really fix somebody’s goose. They’d set their minds on it—focus the curse like sunlight through a reading-glass—”

“Is that what you think happened?” Mickelsson asked.

Thomas shook his head. “It’s a mystery, that’s all,” he said. He smiled, tentative, and looked toward Mickelsson. “Old Sprague was a witch. I guess you knew that? Or thought he was. Thought he could fly, thought he could cast spells …”

“Must not have been much money in it,” Mickelsson said, and grinned.

“Never is. Mostly all it does is make the rest of the witches your enemies.”

Mickelsson said nothing, thinking about it, uncertain whether Thomas was serious or joking.

“Anyway,” Thomas said, “somehow another somebody made a devil of a mess up there.” He smiled and moved his eyes away again, preparing to mosey down the aisle.

Mickelsson said, “Tell me this, though. What do they mean when they say everybody knows who did it? They said it about the murder of the fat man, too.”

“Depends on who said it,” Thomas suggested, one eyebrow raised.

“Tinklepaugh, Tim …”

Thomas pushed his hands into his trousers pockets and looked at the floor for a minute. “Well,” he said at last, “it’s hard to tell.”

It was clear that he was being less than forthright. “Come on,” Mickelsson said. “I’m a good customer.” He gave Thomas his intense grin. “I’m a stranger, I admit, but I throw myself into it. I saved that old house. I care as much about Susquehanna as anybody else does, you know that.”

Thomas stared at the floor, quiet as a statue. At last he said, “I suppose some of ’em when they say it they mean they think it was you.”

“They think—” Mickelsson began. His tongue was suddenly thick, and his heart was beating fast. No doubt he was blushing. “They think I killed the fat man?” Quickly, no doubt showing his fluster, he added, “They think I tore up my own house?”

Thomas shrugged, gently. It was clear that he was sorry to have this conversation—clear that in fact he liked Mickelsson and was not speaking for himself, had been forced into the position of speaking for the town. “I don’t know,” he said. “I guess when you’re really a townsman you’ll forgive it for its foolishness.” He was unable to meet Mickelsson’s eyes. “Every town’s got its ways,” he said. “Susquehanna’s no different. There’s a lot of good here. People are friendlier here than most places. Maybe it’s because they’re all so poor here, I don’t know. But it’s a good place, that way.”

As if hardly aware that he was doing it, Thomas picked up a bolt from one of the trays on the counter and moved it to the tray it belonged in. “On the other hand,” he said, “Susquehanna’s got its faults. I guess we’re a little hard on strangers, one thing.” He looked at the trays. “I guess there’s a certain amount of superstition. And I guess when you come right down to it, law and order aren’t exactly the -same in Susquehanna as in, well, most places. You can get away with a lot here if Cobb and Tinklepaugh know you, or if the town likes you—which comes to pretty much the same thing. It’s not so much the laws on the books that people care about, in Susquehanna. That fat man, for instance. I guess they knew pretty well who he was, and what he was. It wasn’t that people knew him—nobody knew him, come down to it. But he was never trouble. You take those boys that come down off the mountain and park their pickups across from Milly’s. I guess you’ve seen it. They get out of their trucks and walk out into the middle of the street and open up their flies and take a piss, arms thrown out like they were dying on the cross. I guess most places you’d throw a man in jail for a thing like that.” Thomas blushed, smiling, still looking down, doubtful that Mickelsson would understand. “But what harm is it? When they’re finished they button up and walk on in to Milly’s and have their drinks, play their three or four games of pool, maybe locate some girlfriend. …”

Mickelsson asked softly, conscious of a certain professorial stiffness, “Do you think I’m the one that tore up my own house?” His smile, he knew, was a grotesque wince.

“No,” Thomas said, and gave a headshake.

Still more righteously, Mickelsson asked, “Do you think I killed the fat man?”

The evasion in Thomas’s eyes was instantaneous and brief, though his answer was casual. “If you say you didn’t, I believe you.”

Mickelsson blushed violently and knew that his guilt was revealed. He thought of saying, with wonderful indignation, “Well, I didn’t!” But he said nothing. Owen