Bonne Femme

Chapter 21

Invasion

6:50 PM, September 19

        He started the car again to clear the windows.  Then he lit a third cigarette and leaned on the headrest, resuming his surveillance in the rearview just as they came down to the car.  He slid down and listened until they drove past.  When they reached the corner he slipped the car into gear and followed.  When he was sure of their destination, he turned around on a side street, came back, and parked to wait.

        What he was doing was reckless, more reckless than anything he had done.  The smart thing to do was leave before he attracted more attention, but he could no more leave than stop breathing.  He lit another cigarette and cracked the window.

        The Cougar came back sooner than he expected.  Marta was in the back.  He followed them out to the cinema, and on impulse drove past when they stopped to study the marquis.  Light glowed from Jill's cheek, and he clenched his fist, shivering in anticipation.  When they parked, he lingered at the edge of the lot until they were inside.

 

       

358.

         The entrance lock was a snap, but he couldn't get enough leverage with the picks to budge the deadbolt.  The back was easier.  Before going in, he went back to his car for the graphite.  He didn't like using it because it exponentially increased the chances of leaving useable fingerprints, so he slipped on latex gloves before he went back.  He sprayed only the front deadbolt, and then carefully wiped away the excess from the keyhole, reminding himself to dispose of the gloves when he left.  He could burn them when he burned the clothes and tape.  

        The interior door from the laundry room opened with an irritating creak.  He almost decided to take care of it later, but that was the way details got overlooked, and on an op, there was no such thing as an unimportant detail.  Among the household products neatly lined upon a shelf above the washer, he found a small can of Three-In-One oil.  The less one imported to a scene, the better.  Had he known it was there, he wouldn't have used graphite on the deadbolt.  After applying oil, he worked the hinges until the door swung silently.  Then he wiped down both the oil and graphite cans and placed them on the shelf.

        Once inside the living room, he stood still in the darkness to absorb their aura.  The thrill of home invasion was as strong now as when he had first done it as a child.  Of course it was infinitely better when someone was there.  As his eyes adjusted to the dim light, he noticed the pallet on the couch.  He laughed aloud at the absurdity of it.

        All this time, and she's still teasing you with it.  I'll show you how to deal with her.

        He imagined how humiliating it would be for Richard to wait all that time just to be beaten to the punch.  Intoxicating images ripped through his mind, each better than the last.

It's got to be tonight, he thought as he continued his recon. 

        A walkthrough familiarized him with the layout enough that he could find his way without bumping into things.  Although he tried to imagine all the contingencies, he knew unexpected things almost always came up and had to be managed.

        "Bathroom off the hall, kitchen back there, the back room, idiot on the couch there, and untouchable virgin in here," he said as he entered the bedroom.

        Leaving the bedroom door ajar, he engaged the lock, and pushed a pick into the hole on the outside eliciting a loud click.  It would wake her up, so he would have to immobilize Richard quietly which was what he intended anyway.  He pulled the curtain closed and shut the door before turning on the light to search the room for surprises.  The gloves were getting uncomfortably hot, so he stripped them off and put them in his pocket before continuing his search.  In the nightstand he found the pistol.  After removing the clip, he slid the slide back to eject the round in the chamber.  Shaking his head in wonder, he flipped the rounds out of the clip and then slammed it back into the grip.  He pocketed the rounds, wiped the gun clean, and replaced it in the drawer precisely the way he'd found it.

 

359.

        Just in case, he reprogrammed two numbers on the house phone.  Wiping it also, he searched the other drawers, feeling carefully for other weapons, but careful not to disturb anything.  Finished, he wiped down the drawer pulls, the top of the nightstand, the doorknob, and the light switch.  He thought he had wiped down the phone, but wasn't sure, so he did it again.  After turning off the light, he reset the curtain to the precise position it had been, and retraced his steps through the kitchen toward the back room.

        As he went through he felt a spongy spot and heard a floorboard squeak softly.  He noted its exact position and carefully tested the floor without finding more of the same.  It worried him.  Where there was one creaky board there were probably others.  A thorough examination of his intended route failed to turn up one, however, so he went to the back room and sat on the floor to wait.

 

The kitchen door rattled in response to a pressure change, waking him.

He glanced at his watch.  Eleven-thirty.

"Marta," he heard Richard say.

The rest of what he said was too faint for him to hear.

What the hell is she doing here? Mic thought angrily. 

He heard footsteps coming into the kitchen.

"I think she enjoyed it a lot.  Thank you for thinking of her."

Good.  The snooty whore isn't going to mess everything up.

        A sudden creak told him that Jill was just outside.  He stood and shrank back into the corner behind the door.  As he pulled a switchblade from his pocket, he heard something fall to the floor

The damned gloves!

        "I thought we could all use a little light entertainment like that," said Richard, coming into the kitchen.

        "I was afraid that she would leave college, but the security system reassures her so maybe she will stay."

        "Alberto told me to get the best available.  The keypad can't be bypassed without alerting the company, and they've got a direct line to the police.  All the doors and windows have . . . I forget what you call them, but they're these continuity strips.  If a glass gets broken or a window forced open it breaks the circuit and sets off the alarm.  There's a battery backup in case the electricity goes down.  As far as I can see, it's foolproof."

 

360.

"I wish you had let Alberto pay for a similar system here."

        "I told you.  We can't keep anyone out who knows how to pick a lock, but with the deadbolts and chains, no one is going to get in while we're here without giving us plenty of warning.  Not even Mic would be that foolish."

"I suppose you are right."

He heard the water running in the kitchen.

"I have school work to do, but I'm so tired.  I did not sleep well last night."

        "You ought to be able to sleep better now that things are turning our way," said Richard.

        He swung the door back to check the locks in the utility room.  When it bumped into something he mistakenly thought was the washing machine.

        Mic squinted as the fluorescent lights flickered on.  Standing upright in a thin wedge of space bounded by the washer, the wall, and the open door, he held the switchblade ready for the inevitability of Richard seeing the gloves on the floor. 

        Seeing the deadbolt secure, Richard switched off the light and closed the door.  He turned in time to see Jill tiptoeing to reach something in the top shelf of the cabinet.  She popped the cap on the aspirin bottle.  As she took the aspirin she noticed his expression.

"You are staring at me," she said self-consciously.

        "Sorry.  The last thing you need is to start worrying about me.  I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"You are a transparent man, Richard."

"Is that good or bad?"

"Transparent is honest."

Mic didn't know whether to be sick or laugh.

"Like I said, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable."

"You did not.  Under other circumstances it would be flattering."

"Well circumstances are everything I suppose."

"Yes.  Yes they are."

It was all Mic could do to keep from laughing aloud.

 

361.

        After they left the kitchen, he sat in the dark thinking about the bizarre situation she had maneuvered Richard into.

        How could you be so stupid, Ricky?  They live to be looked at.  "Look, but don't touch," or "Look and touch, but not now."  "I'm not it the mood."  And you take it because you're "in love!"  Idiot!

        He had decided long ago that love was probably nothing more than mutually reinforced lust with a shiny coat of pretence applied to make it seem less biological.  Like marriage and monogamy, it was a woman's invention.

       "If they weren't split tails there'd be a bounty on them," he whispered, as he lowered himself to the floor to wait with the silent patience learned through long predawn hours of still-hunting squirrels as a boy.

Then as now, he filled the time daydreaming. 

        At daylight the hickory trees suddenly came alive as if the tree rats had hatched full-grown from the nuts upon which they were feeding.  He drew down on one and blew him from the tree.  The rest scattered for cover, but he picked them off one-by-one, catching the second as it ran along a branch, the next peeking around the trunk, and another leaping from limb to limb.

        Their little bodies were satisfyingly warm and wet with blood as he stuffed them in the pillowcase to "give" to Mrs. Hollida on the way home.  He settled down on the hill above her house and her light came on.  As she came from the shower, he scanned her naked body in his scope.  He held her right in the cross hairs, slipped off the safety, and slowly increased the pressure on the trigger.

 

A sudden thump startled him.

        Just the sound of the refrigerator compressor kicking off, he told himself as he pushed the button to light his watch dial.

        It had been nearly an hour since the sliver of light at the bottom of the door had winked out.  He stood slowly, careful not to knock anything over.  Turning the knob slowly, he managed to open the door without the slightest sound.  He listened for movement anyway.

Nothing.

        Careful to detour around the creaky board, he crossed the kitchen, caressing the sap in his pocket.  The house was too quiet.  Each tick of the electric clock sounded distinctly as he made his way through the kitchen on tiptoes.  At the doorway he stopped, held his breath and listened warily.

 

362.

No one was on the couch!

        He dropped into a crouch, swiveling his head in case Richard had slipped into the kitchen to ambush him.  The light coming in from the window was meager, but enough to reassure him that no one was there.

        The bathroom of course.  Okay.  It happens.  Change of plans.  He'll probably go to the kitchen for a drink before settling back down.

        Rising, he moved quickly across to the couch and squatted behind it.

        After ten minutes without hearing anything, he stood.  Inching along warily, he crossed to the hall, and then paused once more to listen.  Hearing nothing, he went down the hall to the bathroom.  The door was open.  A night light over the lavatory was on.  No one was there.

        Frowning in surprise, he went back to the living room.  He approached the bedroom door.  Carefully he turned the knob.  It was locked.  She was still holding out on him.

You're in there . . . and the door's still locked.  What's going on?

        He didn't know if it was a trap or just some more weirdness.  Whatever it was, there were too many unknowns.  Richard could have checked the .45 and found out that he had unloaded it.  There was only one thing to do.

 

"Richard?"

"Something wrong?"

"I heard something I think.  Maybe it is only my imagination."

"I'll check it out," he said, unwinding from his blanket.

        Richard went through the house without turning on a light.  The only thing he found amiss was that the front security chain was unfastened.  He had been in the habit of setting it since Jill came, but had never done so before, so he decided that he had just forgotten.  The deadbolt was set, so he fastened the chain and went back to the bedroom, deciding that he didn't need to tell Jill.

"It was probably just the wind.  You know how old houses are."

 

363.

September 20

        Jill went up to get Marta, but her friend came out before she reached the door.  She locked both the entrance and the deadbolt and then armed the security system.  Then the house phone rang.

"That must be Alberto," she said, as she punched in the code.

Jill signaled to Richard that it would be a moment, and then went inside with her.

"Hola?" she said brightly.  "Hello.  Hello?"

Jill saw her frown.

"Was it him?"

"No, only the dial tone."

"Is something wrong?" asked Richard when they got in the car.

"The phone rang as we were leaving.  It was a wrong number," said Jill.

 

        As soon as they were gone, Mic crossed the street, and strode to the door.  Holding a small flashlight at an oblique angle, he peered through a magnifying lens looking for disturbances in the thin smooth coating of Vaseline he had applied to the keypad before dawn.  As soon as he had established that she had touched only two buttons, he turned to leave and immediately saw an old lady giving him the fisheye.  Improvising quickly, he turned back and waved toward the door as if saying goodbye.

        He had breakfast at a pricey coffee place that offered free Internet access.  Logging on, he quickly found the website for the manufacturer of Marta's system, and called up a user's manual.

 

364.

"Four digit arming code," he muttered.

        She had only touched the zero and the five keys.  Knowing the most people used numbers that had a personal meaning, he called up Word and began playing with the combinations

Fifty-fifty?  The odds that I wring your neck like a chicken?

        He decided to go about it logically, and was delighted to find that there were only fourteen possible combinations.  Using four different numbers would have yielded twenty-four possibilities.  The manual said that three wrong entries in a row would deny access for half and hour.  With only fourteen possibilities, punching the combinations at random would get him inside in no more than five sessions at the keypad, but he couldn't hang around punching numbers without being noticed.  He needed to gain quick entry.

Studying the numbers, he suddenly laughed.

 

Preperations

7:00 AM, September 21

        He parked the van across the street, and scanned the block before getting out.  Seeing no one, he gathered his toolkit and was about to get out when an old lady inexplicably appeared in the yard next to Marta's and began tottering around the lawn.

        "There's frost on the ground, you dried up old hag!" muttered Mic, his breath fogging the glass.  "Get the hell back in the house!"

        Old people infuriated him.  He hated their hobbling gait, shaky hands, and wheezing breath.  They were always in the way, in traffic, at the checkout line.  Worst of all, they were always awake and watching.  Irritated, he wiped fog from the glass just in time to see the old woman dodder back up the steps.

"About damned time!" he said as he opened the door.

        Dressed in the dark coveralls of a city worker and carrying a clipboard as well as his toolbox, he crossed the street and walked straight to the front door as if he had a job to do there, which he did.  He punched in zero-five-zero-five, and smiled when the keypad's green light winked.

 

365.

       "Cinco de Mayo," he said in a deliberately bad accent.  "Who could guess a Mexican girl would pick that number?"

        He quickly inserted his picks, savoring the tightly precise feel of it.  New ones yielded easily when he applied pressure to the right spots, and he had the knack of negotiating the inside of one as surely as a blind man making his way through his own home.

"You sweet thing," he muttered when he felt the lock give way.

        Once inside, he went to the master keypad and put the system to sleep.  He reprogrammed the phone in the living room and then went to the bedroom to change the speed dial on that one before getting down to work.  He opened his toolbox and took out a roll of fine copper wire, solder, a soldering pencil, and a tube of epoxy.  Then he carefully removed the curtain rod and curtains from the bedroom window.

        Forty-five minutes later he had finished.  Unless a person were looking for it, he would never notice that the window strip of the system had been by-passed.  He rearmed the security system and opened the window to make sure.  As he knew it would, the alarm remained silent.  While it was open, he leaned out to note the location of the phone service entry.  Before replacing the curtain, he unscrewed the old-fashioned window latch and pocketed the screws, leaving the pieces in place, however, so that a casual inspection would make it appear securely locked.  Then he did a thorough search of the house to make sure there was no gun but came up empty.  After a last walk-through to make sure nothing was out of place and a quick inventory of his tools, he checked to make sure the old woman wasn't back outside.  On the stoop he quickly reset the deadbolt and rearmed the security system.   Just in case the hag was watching, he paused halfway to the street, turned to smile, and then waved.

 

At the mall  

        Richard sat in a corner booth munching crumbly pastry as exorbitantly priced as the café americano half-listening to the animated conversation as the women talked fashion, describing elements of design that were as incomprehensible to him as they were uninteresting.  No matter, his input was not required.

        The women had spent the morning browsing clothing stores to get ideas for Marta's wedding while he tagged along to keep an eye on them.  It was heartening to see Jill lose herself in her friend's plans.  He listened without comprehending as the women flipped from English to Spanish to French finding words to describe the details of what he finally understood must be the ideal wedding dress.  He had known from the beginning that Jill was smart, almost startlingly so, but until he heard them conversing effortlessly in three languages, he hadn't realized that he had grossly underestimated Marta.

 

366.

         I misjudged her because of her less than perfect accent, and I don't even speak one language well, he thought.  I wonder how dumb they think I am?

        He decided that Jill wasn't overly impressed with his intelligence, but she trusted him.  He couldn't call that an accomplishment because he had done nothing worthy of it.  Yet she did trust him, and that was no minor miracle.

        No doubt I'm the dumbest of us sitting here, but I'm the one who has to think our way through it.  What did Kevin say?  Something about thinking too much?  "You have this habit of weighing all the consequences before you act.  That could get you dead."

        "Richard?" said Jill.  "Marta and I are going back to one of the shops.  We may be there a while."

        "Do you mind if I curl up here with a book?  I'll buy some more coffee to keep them from throwing me out.  You can meet me here when you're ready to go."

        As they departed he watched until they disappeared into the throng.  It reminded him of the times he waited trying to catch a glimpse of her on campus before he even knew her name.

        None of this would be happening to you if not for me, he thought.  But I think it's going to be over soon.

        As Richard turned toward the bookstore, the import of what he was thinking sounded a cautionary alarm.

        It was just that sort of short-timer's attitude that got soldiers killed.  Thinking it was nearly over could lead down either of two deadly paths:  a guy could begin to relax and get careless, or he could get too careful and timid as he started counting down the days.  Either way, he tended to forgo the habits that had carried him safely through so far.

Assume nothing but danger.  Nothing's over until you're on the plane out.

Mistake!  Don't let her out of your sight!

        It was the middle of the day, and they were in a public place.  It was ludicrous to think that Mic could separate the two women and then abduct Jill, yet he was suddenly certain that it was happening.

 

        Marta traced the delicate lace of a gown on display.  She was only considering ideas to discuss with her designer; she wouldn't think of buying a wedding dress retail.

 

367.

"This is a beautiful bodice."

        "Yes," agreed Jill.  "Modest, but very elegant.  Your wonderful complexion would make that lace shine."

"You must come, Jill."

"Of course.  How could you get married without me?"

Marta embraced her impulsively.

        "I will attend your wedding also, Querida," she said.  "Have you decided when it will be?"

"We cannot think about the future yet," said Jill soberly.

        There was nothing else she could tell her.  Even if she were really engaged to Richard, it would be thinking too far ahead.  It would be like giving Mic something else to take away from her.  Not that it mattered.  Richard had neither asked nor had she considered the possibility of marriage.

"You must not let him steal your dreams, Jill."

"I worry more about you.  I know he frightens you."

        "He has stopped calling, so perhaps he is not interested no more.  Still I am a prisoner here.  I go nowhere without you and Richard.  That is why I go back to Merida at the end of the semester."

"If you were not my friend he would never have bothered you, Marta."

"La culpa no es tuya, hermana.  Only that awful man is to blame."

She smiled weakly.

        "I am so grateful that Richard installs the security system.  I feel safe now.  I can sleep again because if someone disturbs the doors or windows it warns me and it calls the police.  I am very safe in my house now.  Nothing can happen to me there." 

Marta frowned before continuing.

"You and Richard should leave this place."

"This is Richard's home, and we cannot afford to go anywhere else."

"I will give you the money."

 

368.

"I know.  We cannot accept it."

        "Pun de honor," sighed Marta.  "Tell your man that I lend him the money.  There is no loss of pride in that."

        Jill was tempted to tell her the truth, but where could she start?  A better question was where it would end.  Her relationship with Richard was too complicated to understand from the outside.  She didn't understand it herself.

"Let us talk about your wedding," she said.

        "I know!" cried Marta.  "A vacation!  You must come to Merida for Navidad.  You will love the decorations and the posada.  Or perhaps you come during Carnival.  You will stay with my family, of course."

"It would be difficult, and the trip---"

"Let me pay for it.  My friend needs a holiday.  Please come."

        Jill had to smile.  Her usually reserved friend could plead and sound like a little girl when she was enthusiastic.  She was tempted to overlook the difficulties.  Just the thought of having a definite time to look forward to heartened her.

"I will speak with him," said Jill, "But he will not let you pay."

"Then it is settled," said Marta confidently.  "Richard will do anything for you."

 

369.

"What makes you think that?"

"Because I have never seen a man more in love, not even Alberto."

        Richard finally spotted them at the back of the shop, but instead of going in, he settled at a bench across from the entrance.  He was being paranoid, but it was a time for paranoia.  Mic was about to do something.  He could feel it.