Pale Kings and Princes Read Online Free Page A

middle name," I said.
    "I'd always wondered," Susan said.
    "So far," I said, "I have found out that people don't want me to find out anything."
    "Not a new treat for you," she said.
    "No, I'm getting kind of used to it. You want to come out Friday night when you're through seeing patients?"
    "To Wheaton?"
    "Yes, "we could share a Polish Platter at the Reservoir Motel Hunt Room, and afterwards stroll down Route Thirty-two and look at the automobile salvage yards."
    "That's enticing," Susan said,"but maybe you'd rather come home and have some of my legendary takeout from Rudi's and go see the Renoir exhibit at the MFA."
    "You city kids are like that," I said, "always putting down the country. Out here is what America used to be."
    "Mmm," Susan said.
    "Besides," I said, "I can't come home-unlike you slugabed shrinks I work weekends."
    "Okay, you honey-tongued spellbinder, you've talked me into it," Susan said. "Everything except the Polish Platter."
    "There must be an alternative," I said.
    "I should hope so," Susan said. "I don't want to be corny, but how far will people go to keep from talking to you about the Valdez thing?"
    "They might try to kill me," I said.
    "How comforting," Susan said.
    "Easier said than done," I said.
    "I know," Susan said. "I count on that."
    "Me too."
    "I'll be there by eight Friday," Susan said.
    "I'll be there," I said. "Tell me one thing; though, before we hang. Do you admire my restraint even more than you admire my sinewy body?"
    "Yes," Susan said.
    "Let me rephrase the question," I said.
    Susan's laugh bubbled. "Ask me if I love you," she said.
    "Do you love me?"
    "Yes, I do."
    "Do I love you?"
    "Yes, you do."
    "What a happy coincidence," I said.
     
     

Chapter 6

     
     
    It is hilly country around Wheaton. No mountains but a steady up and downness to the terrain that makes a five-mile run in the morning a significant workout. Susan had given me one of those satiny-looking warmup outfits for Christmas and I was wearing it, with a .32 S&W zipped up in the right-hand jacket pocket. I'd brought two guns with me. The .32 and, in case the culprit turned out to be a polar bear, a Colt Python .357 Magnum that weighed about as much as a bowling ball and was best left in the bureau drawer when jogging.
    My new jogging suit was a shiny black with red trim. I felt like Little Lord Fauntleroy chugging along. I had on brand-new Avia running shoes, oyster white with a touch of charcoal that understated the black jogging suit. I didn't have crimson leg warmers. Maybe for my birthday.
    Back at the motel, loose, warm, full of oxygen, I did some push-ups and sit-ups in my room and took a shower. At quarter of ten I was in my car heading into downtown Wheaton. I had my Colt Python in a shoulder holster under my leather jacket. Since I'm a size 48 and so is the Python, I'd had to shop extensively to find a leather jacket that fit over both of us.
    I stopped at a Friendly's restaurant on the corner of Main and North streets in Wheaton for breakfast, listened to the other diners talking about weather and children and what they saw on the Today show, picked up no clues, paid the tab, got a coffee to go, and sat in my car to drink it.
    The cops were no help. Valdez had filed no story and whatever notes he'd kept were missing. I needed someone to talk with, anyone who would mention someone else and lead me to talk with them and they would mention someone else and so on. I put the car in gear and cruised up Main Street. Kyanize paints, the District Court of Wheaton, the Wheatoxi Fire Department, the Acropolis Pizza, the Wheaton Cooperative Bank, the Olympic Theatre Two Dollars at all times. At the head of town, clustered around a narrow-gorged, deep-cut river, were four or five red brick nineteenth-century textile mills. Now they were factory clothing-outlets, and woolen and yarn shops. An attempt had been made to gentrify the mills, by painting windows and doors with contemporary pastel trim, and putting some green