Live to Regret by Terence Faherty

Author:Terence Faherty
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: owen keane
Publisher: The Mystery Company

Chapter Sixteen

I decided to make good on my promise to Hennix right away, and started off for Harry’s cottage. On the way, I stopped by the lake shore where I’d sat earlier watching for the divers. They were gone now, along with the rowboat and the rescue truck. A lone Spring Lake patrol car sat at the curb. It was manned by Archer, the patrolman who had shared my vigil. He smiled as I walked up. On a better day, I might have asked him whether he’d been influenced in his career choice by reading the adventures of Lew Archer, Ross MacDonald’s fictional private eye. As it was, I settled for a status report.

“The divers had to rest,” Archer said. “Regulations. There’s a crew coming in from Point Pleasant to take the next shift. Should be here any minute.” He checked to see that we weren’t being overheard. “I’d hold the good thought if I were you. The chief stopped by. She said there’d been some developments.”

O’Malia hadn’t shared any of the details of these developments with Archer, or he’d have known that I was now one of the bad guys. I thanked him and moved on.

I walked around the lake, avoiding the footbridge and its associations. Harry’s front door stood open behind the locked screen door. I knocked on the door frame—softly, in deference to the early hour—but there was no answer. Then I circled around to the rear of the house, intending to try the back door. As I turned the final corner, I saw Harry seated on the back steps.

He was dressed as he had been when he’d climbed from the Belmar patrol car, in black sweatpants and a T-shirt. Frank Capoletti’s story about finding Harry on the beach was supported by the physical evidence: sand on one leg of his sweats. The bottle of whiskey that had decorated Harry’s mantel was now open on the step beside him. He had a small sketch pad on his lap and he was bent over it, working away intently with a pencil.

I was only a few feet from him when he finally looked up. “Damn,” he said. “I was just having some hair of the dog that bit me. I didn’t expect the actual dog.”

“Hello yourself,” I said. “I’ve come to finish our talk.”

Harry resumed working on his sketch. “I’m busy,” he said.

“It’s me or your father, Harry. Take your pick.”

Harry grunted. “Bad news, Owen. I told the senior off yesterday. Did such a thorough job of it, in fact, that he ripped the junior off my name, like they rip the buttons off cavalry officers on television. I’m just plain Harry Ohlman now, with a little torn spot at the end.”

Harry must have been drinking since he’d gotten back. He wasn’t unsteady, and his speech wasn’t slurred, but he was flushed with the strange conceit drinkers sometimes get, the idea that they can understand the world’s non sequiturs and see the hidden joints of the universe.

“I probably don’t need to be telling you this,” Harry continued.

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