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

Mickelsson would have no idea, later, how much time passed between his implicit confession and Owen Thomas’s next words. “Well,” Thomas said, “I guess it’s not likely we’ll ever find out who killed the fat man. I’ll tell you my own theory.” He glanced shyly at Mickelsson, then away. “I don’t think anybody killed him. I think he just died. The only real evidence they’ve got at all is that the door was broken down. But what if he just couldn’t find his key? Left it inside, say? Say he broke down his own door, and the excitement of it brought on a heart attack.”

Mickelsson gazed thoughtfully, still blushing, at Thomas’s chest. If he were an ancient Greek, he might have felt that some alien spirit had entered into him; at any rate, it did not seem himself that said, “But the room was torn up.”

“He died of an attack of angina pectoris, that’s what they say,” Thomas said. “From what I hear, a man can thrash around for twenty, thirty minutes with that. A man the size he was could’ve torn up a factory.”

Mickelsson said, feeling light, not himself, “But he had a gun in his hand. Why that?”

“Who knows?” Thomas said. “With angina pectoris your blood stops moving. Maybe he was seeing visions, having a nightmare. Maybe he was trying to shoot himself.”

Mickelsson could think of nothing to say.

Thomas found another misplaced bolt and put it where it belonged.

At last Mickelsson said, “What about the money? He’s supposed to have been a bank robber. That’s what Tinklepaugh says.”

“Maybe he spent it all years ago. Maybe he buried it.”

It crossed Mickelsson’s mind that the theory was not Thomas’s. Was it Tinklepaugh’s, then? Bill Cobb’s? The work of the state police?

“Strange business,” he said.

He bought a pair of pliers to explain his having come.

In the Jeep he pressed his palms into the steeringwheel and thought about the elaborate theory they’d made up to let him off. Why? The only answer he could think of was a stupid one: that they liked him and wanted to protect him, as if he were one of their own. The only alternatives he could think of were almost equally queer: that the death of the fat man was of no importance to the town; that they wanted eventually to pin the thing on somebody else.

When he glanced into the rear-view mirror, he noticed two things at once. The first was that the troll-doll was no longer there. He wasn’t sorry to have given it to Lepatofsky’s daughter, but he missed it: at the edge of his mind he’d felt that it was in some way lucky. The second thing he noticed was that the car behind him was dark green, unornamented. It had a large radio antenna. Anyone would have guessed at once that it was some kind of police car. According to diSapio-as-in-sap-but-don’t-count-on-it, it was not an I.R.S. car. In the car there were two people, but because of the clean-lined reflection on the windshield he could make out nothing of what the two might look like. Mickelsson made a U-turn and nosed toward his house. When he reached his own driveway he stopped and sat thinking for a moment. Not quite to his surprise, the dark green car came up behind him, after a while; but the car did not slow, the two occupants did not look at him. It moved on, as if on important business, up the mountain.

A little after noon Mickelsson got visitors. The world outside was bright and glittering, warmish now, a day that at any other time of his life would have drawn him out of his house. It was not even now that he resisted the fresh-laundered whiteness of the world, the clean smell in the air; he simply failed to notice, half-heartedly reading, replaying in his mind his conversation this morning with Owen Thomas. He couldn’t tell whether he was mainly frightened or mainly relieved to learn that the town thought him a murderer. He was troubled, that much he knew, and weak as a kitten, a weakness that went right to the bone marrow. Building toward something. Sometimes he would sit for an hour without moving a muscle, then suddenly get up and move around restlessly, reading as he walked, sometimes almost falling, unreached by the brightness coming in like a cry at every window.

He heard no car, no knock, but going to the livingroom door that opened onto the porch as if something had drawn him there, and happening to glance out the window for the first time in hours, he was startled half out of his wits to see there a large, outlandish figure in a bright pink overcoat and a white furry hat. When he leaned closer to the window, not quite believing his eyes, he made out a large, pale, smiling face and bright tufts of gray-white curls. The real-estate salesman Tim was behind her, grinning and waving. Mickelsson came to himself and hurried to open the door.

“Dr. Bauer! Well, hello! Tim! What a surprise!” He hoped the smile on his dried-out cheeks was not as ghastly as it felt.

“Prafessor Mickelsson! I’m so glad you’re home!” She reached out one large, white-gloved hand to seize his, closed her fingers tightly, clung for a moment, then coyly tilted her head and drew her hand back. “Oh, look!” she said, peeking around him at the room. “Isn’t this just lovely!” She allowed him to take one arm and help her in. Tim came behind her, still grinning from ear to ear, steadying her trailing elbow. He had on his cowboy hat and sheepskin coat. “Say, there!” he said.

“My, my, my,” the doctor said, “you’ve certainly been busy!” She apparently approved whole-heartedly.

“Yes, I have,” Mickelsson said. He closed the door behind them. “Let me take your coats.” To his surprise he was feeling tentatively glad they’d come.

“I can’t stay but just a minute,” she said happily, but immediately began unbuttoning