Potshot

One of Spenser's rules of detection is: Never poke around on an empty stomach. So I unpacked, got my gun, and went down for a club sandwich and a draft beer at the near-empty bar in the lobby. The bartender was a slim guy with a ponytail. He was wearing a western-style shirt, and kept himself busy slicing lemons and putting them in a jar.

"I hear you have some trouble around here," I said.

He stared at me as though I had just told him I was going to shoot myself in the forehead.

"Like what?" he said.

"Like the gang from the Dell," I said.

"I don't know anything about it," he said.

"You know The Preacher?" I said.

"Nope."

"Guy named Steve Buckman got killed awhile back. You know what happened?"

"You a cop or something?"

"Or something," I said.

"I already told Dean all I know-which is nothing."

"Dean?"

"The chief of police."

"So you don't know anything," I said. "Got any guesses?"

"No."

The bartender went back to his lemons. I finished the club sandwich.

"Do you know how to make a vodka gimlet?" I said.

The bartender finished slicing a lemon and looked up at me.

"Sure," he said. "You want one?"

I got up from the bar.

"No," I said. "I just wanted to end the conversation on a positive note."

Outside, the heat was astonishing. I walked past a sporting goods store with fishing rods and nets and waders and tackle boxes in the window. I went in and felt the welcome shock of the air-conditioning. The front of the store was devoted to fishing tackle and hunting knives. In the back it was guns. There was a rack of expensive hunting rifles across the back wall. Along the side wall was an array of shotguns. And in the glass display case under the counter was a collection of big-caliber single-action western-style handguns. There were elaborate tooled leather gunbelts and holsters for sale. And ammunition and self-loading equipment and cleaning kits.

The clerk wore a red plaid shirt with a string tie held by a silver clip. I leaned my forearms on the counter above the handgun display.

"Sell many of these?" I said.

"Some."

"I'm new around here. What do I need to have in order to buy a handgun?"

"Proof of residency," the clerk said. "Like a driver's license."

"Same for the long guns?" I said.

"You bet. Care to look at anything?"

"My driver's license is from another state," I said.

"We can ship anything you buy to a dealer in your area."

"Who buys the handguns?"

The clerk frowned.

"Hell," he said. "I don't know. They got a local driver's license, I sell them a gun. I don't care who they are. Why would I?"

"No reason," I said. "I was just wondering who would want to pack one of these Howitzers."

The clerk shrugged.

"Maybe the guy who killed Steve Buckman," I said.

"He was shot with a nine," the clerk said.

"By whom?"

The clerk shrugged. "Why you asking me?"

"You're here."

"Yeah, but why are you interested," he said.

"Just a curious guy," I said.

He shook his head as if I were ridiculous, moved down the counter to another customer. His interest in me had plummeted. I didn't mind. I was used to it. When I left the store the heat was tangible, like walking into a wall. I turned left and strolled the boardwalk. No one was about in the implacable sunshine, except me. Mad dogs and Englishmen, I thought.

In all directions but west, the hills rose up from the town in slow, curved slopes until, distantly, they became mountains. It produced the odd effect of simultaneous vastness and enclosure. I felt as far from home as I'd ever been, which was an illusion. California was farther, and Korea was much farther. But the land was so different, so un-Eastern, and, maybe more to the point, Susan wasn't here. She hadn't been in Korea either, but I hadn't known her then, and, while not knowing her made a hole in my existence, I didn't know it at the time.

At the end of the main drag, across the street from a western-wear shop and next to a place called Ringo's Retreat was a small building made of beige bricks with a hip roof and a blue light and a sign outside that said POLICE. I went in.

It was one air-conditioned room. Two cells across the back. A Winchester rifle and a Smith & Wesson pump gun were locked in a cabinet behind a big oak desk with an engraved brass sign on it that said CHIEF. At the desk, wearing a khaki police uniform, was a rangy guy with blond hair and soft blue eyes.

"Good afternoon, sir," he said when I came in.

"Hot;" I said.

"Yes. But it's a dry heat," he said.

"The same thing could be said of hell." He laughed.

"What can I do for you?" he said.

"You the chief?"

"Dean Walker," he said and smiled.

"Spenser," I said. "I'm an investigator from back east."

"Boston," the chief said.

"Betrayed by my accent," I said.

"I can pick Boston out at a hundred yards," he said. "Anyone can."

"I'm trying to find out what happened to a guy named Steve Buckman," I said.

"Stevie," Walker said. "What a shame."

"You knew him."

"Oh, absolutely. Great guy."

"Ever find the shooter?" I said.

"No. Had no evidence. Still don't."

"Any suspects?"

"None."

"I heard he'd been threatened by some people from the Dell."

"I heard that, too," Walker said.

"From?"

"Lou, his wife."

"And?"

"She can't identify the people who made the threats. We even went up to the sheriff's substation in Gilcrest, looked at mug shots. She couldn't find anybody."

"So," I said. "No witnesses. No names. No clues. Just a rumor."

"Exactly," Walker said.

"Case still open?"

"Well, theoretically, but you know the score. Nothing plus nothing equals nothing."

"You have a theory?" I said.

"Stevie was a… Stevie thought he was a tough guy. He was pretty aggressive. Maybe he got aggressive with the wrong guy."

"Anything special he might get aggressive about?"

"Nothing I know about," Walker said.

"How about the wife?"

"What about the wife?" Walker said.

"When a married person gets killed, who's the first suspect?" I said.

"Hell, are you accusing your own client?"

"Just asking about standard procedure."

Walker's soft blue eyes got somewhat less soft. But his tone didn't change. Just an open, friendly guy. "Hey, Spense," he said. "You come all the way out here from Boston to tell me how to do my job?"

"You're the only cop in town?"

"Got four patrolmen," Walker said. "There's a sheriff's substation about forty miles east and if I get in over my head they'll send a deputy out."

"You get in over your head much?"

Walker smiled.

"Hell no. This is a town full of yuppies with too much dough. I feel like I'm showboating if I carry a gun. Was it Mary Lou hired you, or somebody else?"

"How about the Dell?" I said.