5
That evening he drives down to Newmarket Plaza and has a meal at the Thai restaurant. Mrs. Buramuk serves him personally. “Haven’t seen you long time, Officer Hodges.” It comes out Offica Hutches.
“Been cooking for myself since I retired.”
“You let me cook. Much better.”
When he tastes Mrs. Buramuk’s Tom Yum Gang again, he realizes how sick he is of half-raw fried hamburgers and spaghetti with Newman’s Own sauce. And the Sang Kaya Fug Tong makes him realize how tired he is of Pepperidge Farm coconut cake. If I never eat another slice of coconut cake, he thinks, I could live just as long and die just as happy. He drinks two cans of Singha with his meal, and it’s the best beer he’s had since the Raintree retirement party, which went almost exactly as Mr. Mercedes said; there was even a stripper “shaking her tailfeathers.” Along with everything else.
Had Mr. Mercedes been lurking at the back of the room? As the cartoon possum was wont to say, “It’s possible, Muskie, it’s possible.”
At home again, he sits in the La-Z-Boy and takes up the letter. He knows what the next step must be—if he’s not going to turn it over to Pete Huntley, that is—but he also knows better than to try doing it after a couple of brewskis. So he puts the letter in the drawer on top of the .38 (he never did bother with the Glad bag) and gets another beer. The one from the fridge is just an Ivory Special, the local brand, but it tastes every bit as good as the Singha.
When it’s gone, Hodges powers up his computer, opens Firefox, and types in Under Debbie’s Blue Umbrella. The descriptor beneath isn’t very descriptive: A social site where interesting people exchange interesting views. He thinks of going further, then shuts the computer down. Not that, either. Not tonight.
He has been going to bed late, because that means fewer hours spent tossing and turning, going over old cases and old mistakes, but tonight he turns in early and knows he’ll sleep almost at once. It’s a wonderful feeling.
His last thought before he goes under is of how Mr. Mercedes’s poison-pen letter finished up. Mr. Mercedes wants him to commit suicide. Hodges wonders what he would think if he knew he had given this particular ex–Knight of the Badge and Gun a reason to live, instead. At least for awhile.
Then sleep takes him. He gets a full and restful six hours before his bladder wakes him. He gropes to the bathroom, pees himself empty, and goes back to bed, where he sleeps for another three hours. When he wakes, sunshine is slanting in the windows and the birds are twittering. He heads into the kitchen, where he cooks himself a full breakfast. As he’s sliding a couple of hard-fried eggs onto a plate already loaded with bacon and toast, he stops, startled.
Someone is singing.
It’s him.