Long Fall from Heaven. George Wier
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“You want information. I knew you’d be hunting me up anyway, that’s why I left the message.”
“I want to buy you breakfast too. It’s my duty in life to make sure you eat at least once a week.”
“Naw,” Homer shook his head slowly. “Nope. Your duty is to find the man who killed Jack Pense. That’s what you’re about. Ain’t it?”
Micah looked at the old man, gauging him. A slow smile spread across Micah’s face. He couldn’t help it. “Yeah,” he said. “I can’t fool you, Homer. But you asked me to look you up.”
“It’ll cost you,” Homer said. “We just left downtown Small-change-ville and we’re headed for C-note City. Ain’t we?”
Micah pulled out his wallet, opened it, fished for a hundred and handed it to Homer. The old man took it, studied it for a minute, then handed it back to Micah.
“What’s the matter?” Micah asked.
“I changed my mind about taking your money for this. I think I’ll take that breakfast instead.”
• • •
Nell’s had gone through a number of conversions over the years. To hear Cueball tell it, it had been the island’s first coin-op laundry back when he was a kid. A nickel a wash, if you could believe it. Sometime back in the seventies it became a seashell and surfboard shop: a true tourist trap. For the last ten years or so, it had enjoyed the distinction of being first a doughnut shop, then a sandwich place, and most recently a plain old-fashioned diner. There were four tables inside and two small, salt-air weathered tables of wrought iron and gray wood outside under the short overhang. Whenever Micah fed Homer Underwood at Nell’s, they ate outside. Nell wouldn’t hear of having the old varmint sit and eat inside her establishment. He wasn’t exactly right for the image she wanted to convey.
Homer wolfed his food and Micah tried not to watch. When he was done, Homer wiped his mouth with his weather-stained shirttail and sighed deeply.
“Got a cigarette?” he asked.
“Nope. Sorry, old buddy.”
“That’s fine. That’s fine.”
“So what do you have for me?”
Homer Underwood looked off for a few moments, seemingly in deep thought. Then he turned back and fixed Micah with his bright old eyes. “I do know something,” he said. “And let’s just say I know more than is strictly healthy for me, or you, or just about anybody.”
“I’m listening to you, Homer. I’m hangin’ on every word.”
“Harrison Lynch.”
For a moment Micah felt like he’d been hit in the head with a big rubber hammer. “What makes you mention that name?”
“I may be an old fool, but sometimes I do read the paper. I’ve got newsprint in my blood, if you didn’t know. Last week I read about Lynch’s upcoming release.”
“Go on...”
“Micah, how old would you say I am?”
“Oh, I don’t know, Homer. ‘Bout fifty-five? Sixty?”
Homer leaned back in his chair and put his hands up on his balding, sun-baked pate. “Almost seventy. I was born in 1917. I’ve lived on this island all my life. I’ve ridden out every hurricane that’s come along. Never evacuated a single time no matter what those assholes at the weather service said. I was here back when World War II ended. I remember that every fire truck in town, every police siren, every church bell and every car-horn was wailin’ or ringin’ or honkin’ on VJ-Day. But before that, in the late fall of ‘43 something hit this town and it wasn’t no hurricane.”
“Fall of ‘43?”
“You ain’t old enough to remember. Let me tell it and don’t steal my thunder.”
“Sure, Homer,” Micah said.
“As I was saying, late fall of ‘43. November and December. There was a big bunch of killings here on the island. Eleven deaths that are known about, and that was in a month’s time. One every three days on an average and there could have been more.”
“Eleven.”
“Like I say, there could have been more. There was some evidence that a few of the victims were hacked up and fed to the crabs off the South Jetty. There were some transients and winos and what-not who turned up missing, but you know how that goes. Eleven were found for sure, mostly women. The killer started by cleaning out a whole bordello, all the girls including the owner, then began picking off the odd Post Office Street whore now and again. Not too long after that he started killing wholesale. Now you might find it hard to believe that a bunch of killings like that never made the national headlines. But please remember that, first, we were at war. With the war on, the whole country was looking the other way, you know. Second, Galveston at that time was the Riviera of the Gulf Coast. The town needed the business and that kind of press wasn’t welcome. It’s amazing to me that it still never got out, even though I—well, I was a reporter back then.”
“Yeah. I remember somebody telling me that. They said you used to be something.”
“I’m still something, although I don’t know what. Anyway, those killings would have made a good story. It sure would have.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Homer Underwood paused in his eating for a moment. He leaned back and looked out the plate glass window to the deep azure blue of the Gulf beyond. The old man had a somber look about him, as if he were looking for something he’d lost.
“And?”
Micah found that he was leaning forward—straining, in fact. He purposefully took a deep breath and leaned back in his chair and waited.
“I was thinking of someone from back then. It’s someone you’ll have to look into.”
“Who was it?”
“Denny Muldoon. He was an FBI agent back in the day.”
“Muldoon. All right. I’ll remember.”
“While you’re checking into him, there was another fellow around back then. A Texas Ranger named Bonaparte Foley. Mean as a rattlesnake, that one.”
“I’ve heard of him,” Micah said. “I’m pretty sure Foley is dead.”
“Yeah. Foley’s dead, but I don’t know about Muldoon. He...he might be. So by now you’re asking yourself what a serial killer from forty plus years ago has to do with a warehouse killing from a couple of nights ago. That’s exactly what you have to find out.”
Micah laughed and Homer flicked a look at him and smiled. Micah realized Homer must have once been quite a handsome man.
“You wouldn’t want me to make things too easy for you, now would you?” Homer asked.
“Of course not.”
“Well, I think I’ve said enough.”
Micah nodded.
Homer prodded his remaining bits of food with a fork then set the fork down. “You know, I’ve worked this island. I’ve lived it. I’ll die this island. And I’m telling you this just once. Little Jacky Pense didn’t die over money or drugs or nothing stupid like that. Now in your mind you’re looking for a born loser named Harrison Lynch because he was Jack Pense’s stepbrother, or so the story went.”
“But Homer, how do you—”
“All I’m saying is, you take the less-traveled path and you might get somewhere. But finding Harrison Lynch and not going any further is the broad highway straight to hell and nowhere. You find out who Harrison Lynch really is. That’s your ticket, old son. Because if I’m