Pity Him Afterwards

Broad Avenue was deserted. It was now six-twenty in the morning. The sun was behind him, glistening on the street, casting long shadows of the occasional slender trees along the sidewalks, making it difficult to tell if the two traffic lights he came to were showing red or green. He turned left at Circle South, and headed out around the lake toward the Lowndes estate five miles from town, two miles short of the summer theater.

Still not six-thirty, and he arrived at the estate entrance, to see the blue-and-white prowl car parked just inside the now-open gates. A black Mercury was parked next to it. Sondgard turned the Volvo in, left it with the other two cars, and walked over to the group beside the road.

There was Larry Temple, looking very young and fragile in his brave blue uniform. And with him were two older, tougher-looking men in dark gray uniforms with badges on their left breasts. Coming closer, Sondgard could see that the badges each had a number, and surrounding the number the legend: Trans-Continental Protective Agency.

They saw him coming. One of the private guards stepped forward, saying, “You’re the captain, right?”

“That’s right. I’m sorry I didn’t get here sooner, but I wasn’t notified till twenty minutes ago.”

“Then you made good time. Come on over, and take a look at this.”

It was ugly. Thrown away on the ground was another uniform like the ones worn by the two private guards. But this one was streaked and stained and torn, and inside it were the broken parts of a man.

“Edward Cranshaw,” said the guard. “That was his name. I notified the home office already.”

“Identification,” Sondgard started, and then he had to stop. He turned away and swallowed, glad he hadn’t had time to eat breakfast before coming out here. His mouth was full of a brackish taste, but nothing more solid than that was coming up. After a second, he tried again. “Identification can’t be easy,” he said.

“Yeah, the face, I know. I didn’t identify him by the face. Last two fingers of the left hand, see? Gone. Blown off in the war.”

“Oh. Yes, I see.”

Sondgard drifted back away from the body toward the other two men, and the guard trailed along with him, saying, “At first, I figured it was an animal got him. I don’t know what you get around here, maybe mountain lion or bear, I don’t know. I figured maybe that’s what it was, but it don’t look right. No bites. He’s pretty broken up, but he hasn’t been bit at all, so I figure it must be a man.”

“Yes,” said Sondgard.

“This rape-killing you had out to the theater yesterday. You figure this connects?”

“I suppose it does. And it was the other way around.”

The guard looked puzzled. “What was the other way around?”

“Not rape-killing. Killing-rape. He killed her first.”

“Christ on a crutch.” The guard looked back toward the body, shaking his head. “It didn’t figure to be a personal thing,” he said. “Eddie wasn’t from around this neck of the woods at all. Nobody knew him but Frank and me. Oh, yeah, by the way. I’m Harry Downs, and that’s Frank Reilly.”

“Eric Sondgard.”

They shook hands all around. Larry Temple said, “I don’t know if I did the right thing, Dr. Sondgard.” He wasn’t used yet to the new title, still spoke to him as a student speaks to a professor rather than as a patrolman speaks to his captain. “I didn’t know your number, and it isn’t in the book, and Miss Ravenfield was the only one I could think of.”

“You did fine, Larry.” Sondgard was thinking he really should get his phone number listed. The company didn’t list the numbers of the summer residents, whose phones were only in operation three months of the year, unless the resident paid an additional fee. Sondgard hadn’t ever thought the fee was worth it, since everyone who might want to call him already knew his number or could get in touch with him through the office, but now he was no longer sure. He’d talk to Walter Ravenfield, the Mayor, this afternoon; maybe he could get the town to pay the fee for him, as a necessary police expense.

Harry Downs, the talkative guard, was saying, “Eddie fired off one shot, but I can’t tell if he hit the guy or not. There’s blood all over the place, but it could all be Eddie’s.”

“No one heard the shot?”

“Nope. Frank was in the car most of the night, checking the property on the other side of the road there. That’s where we get the most trouble with neckers and kids looking to raise a little hell. They know better than to come in on this side of the road, toward the lake, but they figure anything over on the other side is just left alone all night. So Eddie was on foot, sticking close to the gate here, and Frank was over on the other side in the car, and I was back in the house, asleep.”

“What time did you find him?”

“Frank found him about five-thirty. That right, Frank? Five-thirty?”

“Five thirty-two,” said Frank. He was lighting a cigarette, cupping the match though there was only the faintest of breezes.