Mystery

“That’s lucky for you, then,” Tom said. “I think you’d have a hard time getting over this fence, anyhow.”

Von Heilitz stopped moving. “Do you? Do you really?”

“Well, it’s as tall as you are.”

“Dear boy,” von Heilitz said. He put his hands on the top of the wall, hopped, and effortlessly pulled himself up until his waist met the smooth top of the wall; then he swung one leg up. In a second, he had disappeared over the top. Tom heard him say, “Nobody’s looking. Your turn.”

Tom reached up and grunted his upper body over the top of the wall. He felt his face turn red. The pad of the bandage slipped on the cement. Von Heilitz looked at him from beside a tall palm. Tom lowered his chest to the top of the wall and tried to swing his legs up. The tips of the glossy shoes struck the side of the wall. He leaned forward to get his hips over the top, lost his balance, and fell to the sandy ground like a downed bird.

“Not bad,” von Heilitz said. “Any pain?”

Tom rubbed his shoulder. “You’re not supposed to wear suits when you do things like that.”

“Shoulder all right?”

“Fine.” He grinned at the old man. “At least I got over the thing.”

Von Heilitz looked down through the palm trees and sand dunes on this side of the wall to three rows of bungalows about a hundreds yards away. The last bungalow in the row closest to the beach protruded far beyond the others. They could see straight across the terrace into a high-windowed room with leather furniture and an ornate desk. “I suppose that’s the one?”

“That’s it,” Tom said.

“Let’s wait for the mailman’s appearance behind the bunch of palms in front of the last set of bungalows.” Von Heilitz pulled back his sleeve and looked at his watch. “It’s about a quarter to four. He’ll be along soon.”

They worked their way through the sand, moving from one clump of palms to another, until they reached a group of four palms leaning and arching up out of a sturdy patch of long grass. Hairy coconuts lay around them like cannonballs. Tom sat on the grass beside the old man. He could see the table where he and his mother had eaten lunch; through the high windows, he saw the dim books behind glass-fronted cases, and the lamps burning in the study. It was something like the view seen by the person who had shot at him.

A few minutes later, a red Mill Walk mail van pulled into the parking lot, and a mailman opened the door and stepped out into the sunlight. Blue water sparkled behind him. He dragged a heavy brown bag from the side of the van, and moved out of sight, going toward the bungalows.

“He’ll go to Glen’s first,” von Heilitz said. “It’s closest.” His voice sounded different, and Tom turned to look at his profile. A pink line covered the top of his cheek, and his eyes had both narrowed and brightened. “Now—now we see.”

Maybe he won’t do anything at all, Tom thought. Maybe he’ll shake his head and scratch his fingers in his hair. Maybe he’ll shrug and toss the notes in the wastebasket.

Maybe we made it all up.

The mailman had to trudge across the parking lot, and then carry his bag across Bobby Jones Trail. Walk up the stairs and pass into the inner courtyard. Knock on the door, and wait for Kingsley to shuffle to the door. Kingsley had to go back to the sitting room and present the mail to his master. The master had to stroll toward the study, examining each letter as he went.

Finally the door at the back of the study opened. Glendenning Upshaw, a great white head atop a massive blackness, appeared moving toward his desk. He was frowning down at a stack of letters in his hand—frowning simply from habit, not with anger or displeasure. As he came nearer the windows, Tom caught the red and grey of two of their envelopes.

“He got them,” von Heilitz breathed.

Tom’s grandfather stood behind his desk chair in his black suit, shuffling through eight or nine letters. Three of these he tossed immediately into the wastebasket beside the desk.

“Junk mail,” von Heilitz said.

He pulled his chair out from behind the desk and sat. He took up one letter, slit the long white envelope with an opener, and pondered it for a moment. He set it down at the far end of the desk, took a pen from his pocket, and leaned over to make a note at the bottom of the page.

Next he took up the red envelope. He looked at the handwriting and examined the postmark. Then he slit the envelope open and pulled out the sheet of yellow paper. He unfolded it and read.

Tom held his breath.

His grandfather was motionless for a second: and then, though he did not move, gesture, or change in any way, his body seemed to alter its dimensions, as if beneath the black suit it had suddenly deflated and expanded like a bullfrog’s air sac. He seemed to have drawn all the air in the room into himself. His arms and his back were as rigid as posts.

“And there we are,” von Heilitz said.