CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR.

1.

The stone sphinx and harpy flanking the entrance to the Flowers estate dripped rain. It looked like the creatures were weeping.

As Caroline drove up the winding way through the grounds towards the big house, Jack noticed in the wet, jade green undergrowth huge concrete turtles with waffle-patterned backs, one of the Flowers company's big sellers thirty years ago for playgrounds and school yards.

Yellowing vines climbed up trees and covered the branches like giant spiderwebs.

Low clouds scudding across the sky looked like curdled milk.

Through the car windows came the reek of chicken shit-sharp, a yellow stink, more unpleasant than the maroon odor of cow or horse manure. Worse than skunk.

The smell made Jack's eyes water.

They parked on the circular gravel drive in front of the chipped and cracked stone staircase leading up to the house.

You'd think a family in the concrete business could keep the staircase patched, Jack thought.

Withered rolled-up morning glory blossoms, looking like joints, littered the ground near the entrance.

"What's that?" Caroline asked.

She was looking at the left side back panel of the car.

Jack walked around to her and followed her gaze.

In the metal was a round hole.

Jack touched it with his forefinger.

"Someone shot at us?" Caroline asked.

Jack didn't answer.

"When?" Caroline said. "Not while we were in the car. We would've noticed."

Jack was silent.

"And why would they shoot when we weren't in the car?" Caroline said.

Jack walked away from the car. Up the chipped stone steps.

"It's probably not a bullet hole," Caroline said, following him.

"It's a bullet hole," Jack said.

2.

Someone shot at him? At Caroline? At the car?

Jack assumed it was to discourage him. Them. From trying to find out who killed Frank.

But that question ramified into questions Jack couldn't even frame. A constellation of unknowns and uncertainties.

Don't get distracted, Jack told himself. Keep it simple. Who killed Frank?

But how could he untangle that from who killed Jean? Who killed Stickman? And why?

And what all that had to do with Robert and his father?

Caroline watched Jack charge up the steps and throw open the huge, heavy, oak front door, which was half again their height, as if designed for a generation of giants.

Jack's face was pale, drawn, his eyes narrowed. A vein throbbed in his forehead. Not the good-looking, battered face she'd gotten used to, but fierce. She felt a stirring in her belly and realized she was getting wet.

Inside the gothic front hall-its vaulted ceiling disappearing into shadows-was the double staircase like calipers curving down to measure the stone floor on which they stood.

The right staircase was rigged out with an Easy Climber, a track with a seat driven by a cable, so Keating-Caroline assumed it was Keating-wouldn't have to climb the steps.

Keating hadn't seemed that infirm to Caroline.

"Mr. Flowers!" Jack called, his voice echoing. "Robert!"

Jack strode from one side of the hall to the other, glancing through doors, calling: "Mr. Flowers! Robert!"

Jack froze.

In a corner, on a chair, sat Jack.

Or rather, one of Keating's simulations.

Keating had used the photograph he'd taken of Jack to make a duplicate.

Jack took the left-hand stairs two at a time. Caroline followed.

At the top of the steps, Jack vanished down the hallway. Caroline faintly heard a song-a CD? Radio? TV?

A big band swing sound. Lots of brass.

Hoagy Carmichael? she thought. Johnny Mercer?

Under the music was another sound coming from an open door. A bestial noise. A growl, snarl of anger, followed by a grunt-a second voice-and a cry, a whimper, also the second voice.

When she got to the door, she saw-inside the room-Robert half sitting, supporting himself on one elbow on the floor, his white terry-cloth bathrobe splayed open, revealing his pale belly, an almost hairless crotch, and a flaccid fat cock. His lip was split. His tongue, pink and quick, licked the blood dripping down his chin.

Jack stood, humpbacked, like a werewolf, above Robert.

"I've been suspected of murder, I've lost my job, I've been beaten up, I've been shot at," Jack said very softly to Robert, "and far as I can tell it's got something to do with your family."

Robert was wiping the blood on his face with the back of his hand.

"I want to know what's going on," Jack said.

"Jack!" Caroline said. Horrified at his violence.

But the flutter in her belly didn't go away.

3.

Caroline helped Robert up.

Jack glared at her.

Robert shook off her hands, cinched the bathrobe, tight, around him, crossed to a mirror, and examined his wounds.

"What the fuck's the matter with you?" he asked, catching Jack's eye in the mirror.

"Where's your father?" Jack asked.

"Some political event," Robert said. "The Van Buren Testimonial Dinner." Robert dabbed a forefinger on his lip, blinked with the pain. "He's on the Eleanor Roosevelt Legacy Committee. The governor's there. The attorney general ... Maybe you should go over there and punch Dad out, too."

"Jean called here three times the night she died," Jack said.

Robert crossed the room and opened a window wider, closed his eyes as he let the breeze hit his face.

"I keep telling Dad, we should get central AC," he said.

"Why did Jean call?" Jack asked.

Robert kept his back to Jack.

Behind Jack, Caroline could see Jack's shoulders, still hunched.

Robert's shoulders, pulled back, looked like the stubs of emerging wings. Robert's head was erect, his chin raised-reminding Caroline of a history book photograph of Mussolini on a balcony posing for the crowd below.

Robert pulled his bathrobe belt tighter.

He's embarrassed, Caroline thought.

The rain had stopped.

Beyond Robert, through the window, the sky was lurid. Just above the treetops, the clouds momentarily parted. The moon was huge, as if it had moved close to the Earth.

Too close.

The lawn, which looked black, not green, in the night, extended the length of a football field on this side of the house. And it was filled with an army of ... children? Right arms stretched forward in a ... Hitler salute?

No, Caroline thought, not children.... Midgets? Dwarves?

She moved closer to the window, crowding Jack who stood with his fists balled at his side.

Not people, Caroline realized. Not humans.

The lawn was filled with plaster jockeys, arms out to hold missing lanterns. White faced. An army of concrete mimes.

More of the Flowers company products.

Were they being stored on the lawn? Caroline wondered. Or did Keating like the display?

Or Robert?

Robert turned to face Jack.

Jack's right hand shot out-as if he'd become one of the plaster jockeys-and grabbed Robert by the throat.

"Why?" Jack asked again.

Robert gargled in Jack's grip.

Caroline realized she was backing up-until she was now half a room away from the two men.

"Why?" Jack whispered, relaxing his hold.

"Who knew you were such a violent man," Robert croaked. He looked over Jack's shoulder at Caroline. "Did you?"