When Carver awoke the next morning Edwina was leaning over him and kissing him lightly on the lips. He stirred, gripped her shoulders, and drew her closer. Kissed the other side of her neck, her ear. Thought about other places he might kiss.
She said, “Umm,” and pulled away from him, smiling.
She was already dressed and had been kissing him good-bye, he realized. There she sat on the edge of the bed, in her tailored blue suit and with her long, dark hair pinned back, her gray-green eyes holding her smile even after her facial muscles had given up on it. She looked crisp and efficient; she was ready to tilt with the world and do real-estate business, all right. She was fierce about her career; it had given her solace and rescued her from the depression of a catastrophic marriage and divorce, and she would give it up only when they pried the condo listings from her cold dead fingers.
“Gotta go,” she said. “Beachfront property to show.”
“I’ll make it more worth your while to stay,” he told her, waking up further. The temperature outside was still bearable; the bedroom window was open and he could hear the ocean sighing beyond the swaying sheer curtains and the screen.
Edwina stood up and smoothed her skirt over her thighs. Commerce today, not sex. “I’m sure you would,” she said.
Carver had an erection. “You wouldn’t be sorry.”
“But I might be sorry later, when another agent sells the property.”
“You could afford to lose a commission.”
“It’s not the commission.”
Carver ran his palm over his bald pate, as if arranging nonexistent hair. “Yeah, I know.” There was a distant click and a low whirring sound. The central air-conditioning unit kicking in to begin its day’s valiant effort of holding the heat at bay. It was a long war that one summer would end with a burned-out fan motor or broken-down compressor; the heat would prevail. Cool air from the vent wafted over Carver’s legs.
“I just remembered, I passed Desoto’s car yesterday on the coast highway,” Edwina said. “At least I think it was his. Was he coming here?”
“Uh-huh. He wants to hire me.”
Edwina cocked her head to the side. This interested her.
“Wants me to look into Sunhaven Retirement Home,” Carver said.
“That place about ten miles outside of town? Looks like some building blocks dropped out of the sky?”
“That’s the one. Desoto’s uncle was in there for a while. He died three days ago.”
Edwina ran the tips of neatly manicured fingers along her smooth jaw line. She did that when her mind was turning over. “Does Desoto think there’s something wrong with how he died?”
Carver sat up, his stiff left leg extended straight out in front of him. He scooted forward and swiveled until he was sitting on the edge of the mattress. He reached for his cane and leaned on it. “It’s not that, exactly,” he said. “The uncle, Sam Cusanelli, told Desoto several times there was something not right about Sunhaven. But apparently he couldn’t define exactly what was wrong. Desoto didn’t take it seriously enough to look into it, even though he and the uncle were close when Desoto was a kid. Cusanelli was seventy-six and his mind played tricks on him sometimes.”
“But Desoto takes it seriously now,” Edwina said. “Why?”
Carver shook his head. “I dunno. Guilt, maybe, over something he doesn’t even remember. Grief, I’m sure. Way people’s minds work.”
“You going to look into it for him?”
“Starting today,” Carver said. “Soon as I get myself up and around.”
“You said the uncle died three days ago,” Edwina said. “We should send flowers.”
That was something that hadn’t occurred to Carver. He wasn’t good at the amenities. “I’ll find out where they should go,” he said.
“Never mind,” Edwina told him, “I’ll check the Gazette-Dispatch obituary page. You said, ‘Cusanelli’?” She didn’t ask it as if she were surprised. She knew Desoto was half Italian. She’d asked Carver about him. Women were always curious about Desoto.
“Cusanelli,” Carver confirmed.
She reversed her wrist and shot a cool gray glance at her watch. “Damn! Gotta go.”
“Good luck,” Carver said.
She was already out the door and in the hall when she called back to him, “You, too.”
Carver sat still and listened to the outside door open and shut, then the vibrant hum of the automatic garage-door opener. It sounded like a tenor with a sore throat.
The overhead door hummed closed, and briefly he heard the precision growl of Edwina’s Mercedes as she low-geared it down the curving driveway. She’d be heavy on the accelerator when she reached the highway. She was on intimate terms with speed.
After a few minutes Carver got up and limped with his cane into the bathroom, where he splashed cold water on his face to come fully alert. He slept nude, so he had only to sit on the bed again and work into his swimming trunks, and he was ready for his morning therapeutic swim.
After making his way down the rough wooden steps to the beach, he walked with difficulty over the soft sand to where the surf was fanning white, grasping hands of foam on the shore. The sea had always wanted the land.
He moved closer to the ocean and stuck his cane like a spear in the damp sand. Then he lay down on his stomach and, using his arms and good leg to propel himself, inched backward into the cool water. When a particularly large wave roared in, he scooted into it and let its ponderous reverse momentum lift and carry him seaward until he was floating free.
Carver felt exuberant in the water. His upper body had become amazingly strong since he’d been supporting his weight with the cane and had come to rely on his arms and torso. Nature’s way of compensating. And here in the ocean, kicking from the hip, he was as mobile as anyone and more powerful than most.
He swam far out from shore. Then he turned his body and treaded water, bobbing on the gentle swells and staring in at Edwina’s house with its red tile roof, perched atop the rise where the Army Corps of Engineers had built up the beach with rocks and the developer had graded the land to afford a better view. The sun was like flame on the back of his neck.
After about five minutes he stroked toward shore with his peculiar but graceful Australian crawl.
When he dragged himself back up onto the beach, near where his cane jutted from the sand, he was breathing hard, his chest heaving and each intake of breath a rasping plea for oxygen. That was how he wanted it. Almost every morning since his retirement from the force, he’d been able to swim a bit farther out, each time with a degree of added strength. Occasionally he’d find himself wondering what it would be like to continue swimming straight out to sea, into the tilted, sliding expanses of blue-green ocean and the rushing of water that sounded like the roar of mortality in the blood.
Not today.
Carver grasped the cane and used it to lever himself to his feet. Dripping water, he limped toward firmer ground and the house.
After a shower and quick shave, he dressed in light tan slacks and a black pullover shirt. He put on brown socks and his well-worn moccasins. The crown of his bald head was tanned, but he had thick gray hair curling above his ears and well down the back of his neck. He was forty-four years old, medium-size but trim and cabled with sinew. His features were more harsh than handsome. His nose was straight, he had blue catlike eyes, and a boyhood scar lent the right corner of his mouth a sardonic twist. A strong face, maybe to the point of brutality. Was that why Edwina loved him?
He had black coffee, half a grapefruit, and a piece of dry toast for breakfast. Then he stretched out an arm for the phone and called Desoto in Orlando.
“Still feel the way you did when we talked yesterday?” he asked, when the lieutenant had come to the phone.
“Same way, amigo. I know what you’re thinking, that my head’s not screwed on right at this time. But believe me, I gave the matter a lot of thought before driving there to talk with you.”
“It didn’t seem spur of the moment,” Carver assured him.
Desoto said, “You find out anything?”
“Hell, no. I just got up.”
“Hmm.” Disapproval.
“Who were some of your uncle’s friends at the retirement home?”
“You don’t keep friends very long at a place like that,” Desoto said sadly, “But I do remember one old guy. Name’s Kearny. That’s his first name. I think his last name’s Williams. He and Sam seemed pretty thick. Took their meals together in the mess hall they call a dining room, played checkers. That kinda stuff. They argued a lot, but they were friends. You could tell by watching them. I was glad Sam had somebody like that out there.”
“Kearny still at the home?”
“I guess so,” Desoto said. “If he’s still alive.”
“I’ll let you know when and if I do find out anything,” Carver said,
“I know you will.” Desoto paused. “You be careful, okay?”
“Of what?”
“I’m not sure. I got a feeling about that place. All that sadness, the ends of lives, and in so much sun and brightness. Maybe when you go there you’ll know what I mean.”
“We’ll find out this morning,” Carver said.
He stretched his arm again, leaning his weight on the cane, and hung up the phone. Then he limped out to his rusty Oldsmobile convertible, put down the canvas top, and drove through the morning heat toward Sunhaven Retirement Home.
He thought about Edwina kissing him good-morning. And about Uncle Sam, dying among hired help in a place that had made him uneasy.
It felt great to be alive and too young for Medicare.