“Funny. Not that I would mind a drink.”

“None for a while, I’m afraid. The worst blows were to your head.”

“Thank God. What if they had injured something I use every day?”

“If you can crack jokes with a cracked skull, I suppose you’re going to be all right. Eventually, anyway. If I showed you a mirror, you’d scream like a little girl.”

“Given how I feel, I may just start screaming on principle.”

“Sorry, Jack,” O’Connor said, his voice no longer teasing. “It’s inhuman, but they can’t give you anything for the pain for a little while yet. Something to do with the head injuries.”

Jack was silent for a moment, then asked, “What about the eye?”

O’Connor hoped the truth wouldn’t lead to some sort of setback, because he had no practice at trying to lie to Jack. “Don’t know yet. Old Man Wrigley came by earlier, when you were still out cold. He told me he’s going to bring in a specialist for you.”

“Kind of him.”

“Don’t give up hope, Jack. They really don’t know.”

“Might as well tell me the rest.”

“Not sure I should…”

“Damn it, Conn! Have I ever, in the last twenty years-”

“All right, all right. Settle down. For God’s sake, don’t kill yourself just getting pissed off at me. You’ve three broken ribs, four broken fingers, and plenty of cuts and bruises. The cuts and scrapes wouldn’t be so much of a worry if you hadn’t decided to go for a swim in a swamp.”

“A swamp?” He looked puzzled.

“Okay, not exactly. You were found in one of the marshes by an egg farmer, and you were half-drowned and so cold he wasn’t sure you were alive. If you don’t become feverish from that, it will be a miracle.”

“I remember a farm…eucalyptus trees…feeling where my damned keys cut me when somebody kicked me.”

“Do you remember who did this to you?”

But Jack was caught up in other thoughts. “Listen-this sounds strange, but I swear it’s true-someone was burying a car on that farm. In the middle of the night, or sometime after midnight, anyway. Doesn’t that sound strange to you?”

“Yes,” O’Connor answered truthfully.

“But I’d swear I saw it, Conn. I woke up in a eucalyptus grove, a wind-break, probably. A dairy on the other side of the road. And I saw a farmer burying a car.”

“Well, I’ve always been a city boy, so I couldn’t tell you why farmers do what they do in the wee hours of the night or any other time. So let’s talk about before the farm.”

“You don’t believe me.”

“I believe you, Jack. I do.”

Jack fell silent.

“Who did this to you, Jack?”

He frowned, winced at the pull on his stitches, and said, “Big guy at a party. Never saw him before. Thought I was making time with his floozy and coldcocked me. One punch. Wasn’t expecting it.”

“How big a man?”

“Three inches shorter than the Titanic, if you stood them back to back.”

“Hair?”

“Blond. Crewcut. Blue eyes, I think. But that might have been the dame. I’m a little confused about him.” He put a hand to his head. “Someone else joined the fun, but I didn’t get a good look at him. He was behind me most of the time.”

He fell silent again.

O’Connor waited a bit, then tried again. “You were wearing your good suit when you ended up in the marsh. Or what was left of your good suit-”

“Where is it?”

“The ER nurses showed it to me, and told me they’ll bring the remains of it up here once it’s dry. If I had any fear that you could get out of that bed and put it on, I’d have them burn it. So-you were wearing your good suit. Where’d you go last night?”

“Lillian’s place. Katy’s birthday.”

O’Connor couldn’t hide his disbelief. “Katy’s birthday party? Lillian invited you?”

“No. Katy did.”

He was wearing down, but fighting it, O’Connor thought.

“Conn, something was eating at her. Really bothering her.”

“Bothering Katy?”

“Yes…” Jack’s thoughts seemed to drift, then he looked back at O’Connor. “She kept saying she wanted to talk to me, but she obviously didn’t want the family to hear what she had to say. You know she’s never serious about much of anything, but tonight…I mean, last night… she was troubled.”

“If you’re worried about her, I’ll call her tomorrow. Maybe she’ll come and visit you.”

“Go by their place tonight.”

“Tonight? Jack, it’s almost midnight.”

“She’s a night owl.”

“And I suppose Todd Ducane won’t mind my calling on his wife in the dead of night?”

“Guess again.”

“What are you saying?”

“He has a mistress. He’s home maybe three nights a week.”

“First of all, maybe that’s what’s troubling Katy. And second, what if I happen to luck into one of the three nights?”

“Katy doesn’t care. I offered to pound him so flat she could use him as rug.”

“This being when you yourself hadn’t been made into a carpet.”

Jack ignored him. “She told me not to bother. She doesn’t want him. She’s known about this for months. Old news.”

“Okay, to everyone but me, I guess. All the same, maybe Todd will be a dog in the manger and still not take to my showing up on his doorstep at midnight. People have been shot for less.”

“He drives an old heap, it will be parked in the drive.”

“Not the garage?”

“No. He likes to irritate the neighbors. Hopes it will get him a gift from Lillian.”

“I think I understand. Lillian owns the house, right?”

“Right.”

“And his parents won’t buy him a new car, so he figures he’ll embarrass Lillian into coughing up the dough for something worthy of the neighborhood.”

“Yes.”

“Why did she marry the Toad?”

“Ask her.”

“When I see her tonight.”

“Yes.”

“And who’s going to keep an eye on you? I don’t want to risk having someone come in here and finish what they started.”

“I’ll be fine. See Katy. Go over and find out if she’s okay.”

“Why don’t I just call her from the pay phone downstairs?”

“You’ll wake the baby and everyone else.”

O’Connor sighed. “It’s that important to you?”

“Please.”

“I’m on my way,” he said, grabbing his coat and hat. He paused as he reached the door. “Jack, where are your hat and coat?”

“I don’t know. Lillian’s? I’m not sure.”

“I’ll make a note to ask her about it before Hastings gives it away to charity.”

“The butler? He’s probably pressing it as we speak.”

“Get some sleep.”

“Can’t seem to avoid it…Hey, Conn?”

O’Connor waited.

“Thanks.”

“Just rest. I’ll let you know what the princess has to say.”

O’Connor drove his Nash Rambler through the rain, his window down a crack to keep the windshield from fogging up, allowing the rain to pelt in. He talked to himself over most of the distance, calling himself a sap to do the bidding of someone in Jack’s condition, a man who had been beaten so badly, he believed that he saw a car being buried on a farm.

Then again, O’Connor thought, maybe Jack really saw it. O’Connor was inclined to believe he did, but it made so little sense, he had to question Jack’s condition at the time. If not dazed by the beating, perhaps by the booze. Jack wasn’t usually one to see visions while drinking, but he had been a hard drinker for many years, so perhaps he had reached that stage where he had downed enough martinis to bring on the pink elephants.

O’Connor’s thoughts moved quickly to his bigger concern: that someone had been out to murder Jack. This big blond man he spoke of had knocked him out cold with one punch, Jack said. So why did he keep on beating an unconscious man? If he had done anything like that at the party itself, people would have intervened. So he had to have taken Jack away, and in full sight of witnesses. O’Connor began to feel more anxious to talk to Katy-perhaps she’d be able to tell him what had happened. Best of all, she’d know who was at the party.

He turned the corner to the Ducanes’ street, and braked hard to avoid hitting a police barricade.