Lights Out Read online

  “I was referring to his crime,” Karen said, noticing the photographs of Messer posed with dead fish on the walls.

  “Killed a liquor-store clerk in a robbery,” said Messer. “Or was with the guy that killed him. Or drove the getaway car. Can’t remember. It was a long time ago, Miss de Vere. Now how can I help you?”

  “I’m looking for a former inmate of yours.”

  “Name of?”

  “Eddie Nye.”

  Messer went still.

  “What is it?” Karen said.

  “Nothing.”

  “You recognized the name.”

  “Oh, sure,” said Messer. “I was thinking, is all.”

  “Thinking what?”

  “Thinking-that was quick.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Ol’ Nails’s been gone hardly more’n a week and he’s screwed up already, otherwise you wouldn’t be here. Not a record, fifteen minutes is the record, but quick just the same.” Messer glanced at the closed office door. “I take it you don’t know where he is.”

  “That’s why I’m here.”

  “You think we know where he is?”

  “Any information might help.”

  Messer nodded. “What’s he done?”

  “Nothing that I’m aware of. Why do you call him Nails?”

  Messer smiled at some memory. “It’s a long story,” he said. “If he hasn’t done anything, why are you looking for him?”

  “The investigation concerns his brother.”

  “Didn’t know he had one.” Messer swiveled around to a computer, tapped at the keyboard. “He a jailbird too?” Words popped up on the screen. Messer scrolled through them. “Here we go. Nye, J. M. Residence: Galleon Beach Club, Saint Amour, the Bahamas. Fancy-dancy. One visit and one visit only, and that was fifteen years ago.” Messer looked up. “What’s he done?”

  “He’s suspected of various securities infractions.”

  “Can’t picture Nails involved in something like that.”

  “Why not, Mr. Messer?” Karen said, realizing as she spoke that she was coming to Eddie’s defense in some way, and not stopping herself.

  “Doctor, if it’s all the same to you,” said Messer. “I’ve got a doctorate in psychology.”

  “Doctor,” said Karen, very distinctly, not mentioning her law degree from Harvard or her Ph.D. in economics from Penn.

  “Thank you,” said Messer. “See, Nails is a criminal, all right, but not the white-collar type.” He glanced at the computer screen. “He got himself in here on a dope-smuggling conviction, five to fifteen, should have been out in three and a half, four, but then he killed three inmates and ended up pulling the full load. Not the white-collar type, if you see what I mean.”

  “He killed three inmates?” She’d known about the dope conviction ninety minutes after Eddie had first knocked on Jack’s door.

  “Not that we could ever prove in a court of law. No one’s going to talk for the record, right? Or he would’ve been here forever. But we didn’t need that shit to deny parole. Excuse my language.”

  “Of course, doctor. Could you tell me more about these killings?”

  “Like what?”

  “The motives, for example.”

  Messer turned to the screen, scrolled through. “The usual initiation thing, I guess you could say. Only he took revenge. Successfully, you might say. That hardly ever happens.”

  “Initiation thing.”

  “This isn’t summer camp, Miss de Vere. How specific do you want me to be?”

  “They raped him, is that what you’re pussyfooting around?”

  “One way of putting it,” said Messer. “You’ve got to look at it in context.”

  “Context?”

  “It wasn’t an attack on Joe or Joanne Normal. Ol’ Nails is a violent guy.”

  “I’ve seen no sign of that.”

  Messer leaned forward. “You’ve met him?”

  “More than once.”

  “In New York?”

  “That’s right.”

  There was a silence. “But you’ve got no idea where he is.”

  “That’s why I’m here,” Karen said. “As I mentioned.”

  “No idea at all.”

  “That’s what I said.” Karen got the odd idea that Messer shared her interest in Eddie’s whereabouts.

  Messer shot her a quick, angry glance from under his Santa Claus eyebrows. Then he heaved a deep sigh. “Sorry if I’m a little distracted today. These executions are a nuisance, if you want my frank opinion.”

  “You’re against them?”

  “Against capital punishment? Just the reverse. For all the usual reasons. Plus it just feels right, morally speaking.”

  “To whom?”

  He yawned, stretched. There were sweat stains under both arms of his short-sleeved white shirt. “I’m sure you didn’t come all this way for a philosophical discussion, Miss de Vere. Have you got any other questions relating to Mr. Nye?”

  “I could use a list of all his visitors over the fifteen-year period, but if that’s too much trouble, the last two or three will do.”

  Messer turned to the computer. After a moment or two he said, “You’ve already got it.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “There was just the one visit. His brother, two months after processing day.”

  “That can’t be right.”

  “It’s all in the computer,” said Messer. He checked his watch. “Now, if there’s nothing else …”

  Karen rose, extended her hand. That took some effort. He shook it. “Good luck,” he said.

  She was almost at the door when she had a final thought. She stopped, turned.

  “Did Eddie know Willie Boggs?”

  “All those longtimers know each other, more or less.”

  “Did they spend time together?”

  “The death-row boys don’t do much circulating. About the only place they might have run into each other was the library. That’s where Mister Willie Boggs went when he wanted to play lawyer.”

  “And Eddie Nye spent time in the library.”

  “Oh, yes, he was quite the reader.”

  Karen drove away from the prison in her rental car. A crowd of people stood in a dusty field by the side of the road; a woman in black held up a sign: “Stop the Murder of Willie Boggs.” Karen pulled over and got out.

  She walked through the crowd. She saw a priest, a nun, a Buddhist monk; a woman in business dress, a leathery man wearing nothing but cutoffs, a baby in a stroller; a cameraman, a soundman, a reporter fixing her lipstick. She didn’t see Eddie Nye.

  That didn’t mean he wasn’t coming. She glanced in her bag, saw the red fragment of the Monarch. Maybe Eddie and Willie Boggs had had long discussions in the library. Maybe he would want to be here.

  The sun was setting, but the air was still warm. In the middle distance, the prison rose like a castle in the kind of bloody fairy tales that have been dropped from the anthologies, its stone walls reddened by the last rays of the sun. A breeze stirred, raising dust off the field. When a vendor came by pushing a cart, Karen ordered a diet soda, just to wet her throat.

  “I’ve got beer too,” said the vendor. “And wine coolers.”

  “No, thanks.”

  The leathery man bought a can of beer with change dug from the pockets of his cutoffs and sat down cross-legged to drink. Night fell. Lights shone on the walls of the prison, as though a son et lumiere show was in the offing. A few more people arrived, none of them Eddie. The reporter interviewed the nun and a man with a bottle sticking out of his pants, then went into the TV truck with her crew. Karen could see them passing around cartons of food.

  She found herself standing next to the woman with the sign. The woman had a milk-white face, bony arms, hair as black as her dress.

  “They don’t interview me anymore,” she said.

  “Did they use to?”

  “Every time. Now they say they want a fresh point of view. Jus
t when it’s most vital that I bear witness.”

  “Aren’t you bearing witness anyway?”

  “It’s hardly the same if the camera’s not running.” The woman, who had been gazing at the prison, glanced at Karen. “Everyone knows that.”

  “What’s special about this time?”

  “Willie Boggs.”

  “I don’t know much about him.”

  “Willie Boggs is a great man,” the woman said. “I’ve written him hundreds of letters. I mean that literally. Hundreds. He’s a wonderful human being, and now they’re going to murder him, when they should be setting him free at last. He could do so much good, out here in the world.”

  “Did he ever write back?” Karen asked.

  The woman closed her eyes. “Once,” she said. “He wrote me a beautiful letter.” Her eyes opened. “He writes like an angel, you know. If he’d written a book, it would have been published. I guarantee.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Say?”

  “In his letter.”

  The woman reached into the pocket of her dress, pulled out an envelope. “I’ll let you read it, if you want.”

  “Not enough light,” said Karen.

  The woman had a pencil flash. She stood close to Karen, aiming its beam. Karen could smell her breath. She read:

  Dear Luanne:

  Thanks for your letters. It is good to get letters in here as you can imagine-or maybe you can not. Of course it is not always easy to anser every one. My time for such activities is limited and most of it I spend on my case, as I am sure you understand.

  Sincerely,

  W. Boggs

  “Very sensible,” Karen said, handing back the letter.

  Luanne shone the pencil flash in her eyes. “But doesn’t he write beautifully?” she said.

  Karen shielded her eyes. “He writes well,” she said, “based on this sample.” But she’d noticed the single spelling mistake in the letter, like the flaw that had made him kill the liquor-store clerk, or be present at the killing, or drive the getaway car for the killer.

  Luanne snapped off the light, said, “He’s a great man,” and moved away, holding up her sign.

  Three or four more people appeared; but not Eddie. The vendor returned, sold another beer to the man in cutoffs, a hot dog to the nun, coffee to the TV crew, another diet soda to Karen. The air was dusty and her throat dry.

  The reporter approached her.

  “Are you going to be here till the end?”

  “When’s that?”

  “Midnight,” the reporter said. “They always do it at midnight, for some reason.”

  “Like Cinderella.”

  “That’s good,” said the reporter. “You’re articulate. We need someone for a short interview after it’s over.”

  “Try Luanne,” Karen said.

  As midnight approached, the priest led most of the vigilants in prayer, while the Buddhist monk and a few others went off by themselves to chant. Karen participated in neither ceremony.

  The distance to the prison, so brightly lit in the night, seemed to have shrunk, and it kept shrinking all the way to midnight, the prison seeming to come closer and closer. “Give us a miracle,” said a man, raising his arms to the sky like Moses in a painting.

  After that there was silence. Plenty of lumiere, Karen thought, but no son.

  Midnight brought son. “No, no,” someone screamed at the prison walls. The baby in the stroller awoke and started to wail. The man in cutoffs hurled a beer can in the direction of the stone walls and yelled, “You fucking no-good faggot butchers.”

  “I beg of you,” the priest said to him.

  The reporter said, “Remember to edit that out.”

  The woman in business dress began to cry.

  Someone turned up a portable radio. At twelve-fifteen it passed on the official pronunciation of death. Then there was more crying, more praying, more chanting.

  Ten minutes later, the TV truck was gone. The Buddhist monk soon followed, and after him the priest, the nun, the others. The vendor sold one more beer to the leathery man in cutoffs, then locked up his cart and pushed it away. The leathery man wandered into the night.

  That left Karen and Luanne. “He’s a martyr now,” Luanne said, still holding up her sign.

  “To what cause?”

  “You’re pretty cynical, you know that? Why did you even bother coming if you don’t care?”

  Karen looked around, saw that the only car still there was hers. “Can I drop you somewhere?” she said.

  Luanne shook her head. “I’m not going anywhere till he comes out. I always stay till I see them free.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They’ll be taking him to the county after the show’s all over. You’ll see if you stick around.”

  Karen stuck around. The night was pleasant, the moon was up, the prison glowed like an anti-Xanadu. Karen found herself thinking about Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” Eddie Nye. Jack had got his hands on a bundle; it would probably take her months to discover how. Then he and Eddie had taken off; she might never find out where. Coming here had been a long shot. What next? She had no idea. She searched her mind for one; Luanne stood beside her, silent, holding up her sign.

  An idea did come to Karen, but it was fuzzy. Something to do with bananas. Before she could bring it into focus, headlights appeared, and Luanne said, “Here he comes.” She hurried to the side of the road. Karen followed.

  The headlights came closer. An ambulance. It wasn’t sounding the siren or flashing the light display. It wasn’t even going fast. There were two men in the front; Karen thought she recognized the one in the passenger seat. As the ambulance went by, Luanne stepped onto the road and cried, “Willie Boggs. Willie Boggs.” It almost hit her.

  The ambulance drove on, rounded a bend, disappeared. Luanne dropped her sign where she stood, turned to Karen. “That’s it,” she said. “There’s nothing more I can do.”

  They got into Karen’s rental car and drove off. They passed signs in the night: Motel 6, Mufflers 4U, Lanny’s Used Tires, Bud Lite, Pink Lady Lounge, All the Shrimp You Cn Eat $6.95, XXX Video, Happy Hour.

  “Where can I drop you?” Karen said.

  “There’s a Dunkin’ Donuts up ahead.”

  Taillights shone in the distance, shrank quickly and vanished; someone going very fast. Then Karen noticed a second set of taillights that seemed not to be moving at all. They grew bigger, sharper. Karen sped up a little. She saw a car parked on the shoulder of the road at a funny angle. Not on the shoulder, actually, but in the adjacent field; and not a car but an ambulance.

  Karen pulled off the road, got out of the car, walked toward the ambulance. Lights on, engine off, no sign of an accident. She looked in the front. The driver was alone, slumped forward on the wheel, as though he’d grown too tired to go on. Karen opened the door. The interior light went on, illuminating the bullet hole in the left side of his head.

  Karen walked around to the back, tried the handle on the big door. It turned. The door swung open. No interior light went on; she saw shadowy forms.

  “Luanne,” she called.

  But Luanne was right beside her. “I’m here. What’s happened?”

  “Give me your flash.”

  Launne handed her the flash. Karen switched it on, shone it into the back of the ambulance. There was a man-sized bag on the floor, of the type the bodies came home in from Vietnam. A man slouched against the wall beside it, a piney-smelling man who was staring at nothing.

  “Mr. Messer?” Karen said. No answer. “Doctor?”

  She climbed up, bent over him. Messer had a hole in his head too, but in the back. She felt his neck for a pulse. There was none.

  Karen knelt by the body bag, found the zipper, pulled it down, shone the pencil flash inside. The body bag was empty.

  “Oh, God,” Luanne said. “He got away. He’s free, free, free.” She reached in for the bag, held it to her face.

&nbs
p; “Don’t be stupid,” Karen said, moving into the front of the ambulance to call the police.

  Luanne wasn’t listening. She was standing by the road, peering into the night for some sign of Willie Boggs, the body bag trailing behind her.

  A few hours later they found Willie’s body, singed on the temples, wrists, and ankles from the electrodes, jammed into a locked supplies closet in the prison infirmary. The inmates were rousted and counted. All present, except for the occupant of cell 93 on the third tier of C-Block: Angel Cruz, known as El Rojo. The picture of the boy in the cowboy outfit that had been taped to the wall of C-93 was gone too.

  Outside: Day 9

  29

  Eddie parked Jack’s car outside 434 Collins Avenue. He remembered the address, remembered word for word the letter that had lain in his locker for almost fifteen years. One third of his accumulated correspondence: not hard to remember.

  Wm. P. Brice

  Investigation and Security

  434 Collins Ave., Miami

  Dear Mr. Ed Nye:

  As I informed your brother, all our best efforts to locate the individual known as JFK have to this point in time been unsuccessful. Lacking further funds to continue, we are obliged to terminate the investigation.

  Sincerely,

  Bill Brice

  Four-thirty-four Collins Avenue was a faded-pink office building with a Space Available sign on the roof. Eddie got out of the car, taking the backpack with him. The sky was blue, the sun gold, the air hot. Hot to Eddie, at least, still wearing Jack’s wintertime clothing. He went inside.

  The lobby was small and dark. There was a single elevator with graffiti scratched on its steel door, and a black office-directory board with white rubberized letters and numbers, some missing.

  Brice and Colon Security, he read, number 417. Eddie took the elevator to the top floor.

  “Ring and Enter, Pujar y Entrar,” was written on a plastic strip taped to the door of 417. Eddie rang and entered.

  A brassy-haired receptionist looked up from her magazine. She raised what was left of her eyebrows.

  “I’d like to see Mr. Brice,” Eddie said.