Power, The by Frank M. Robinson

Mother’s right in the living room.”
    It was dim on the inside, with the cool, musty smell that goes with a closed-up house. In the living room, Mrs. Olson was seated in a rocker by the picture window, a colored afghan tucked up around her fleshless limbs. Her face was furrowed and stitched with fine lines and her eyes sunken and dried.
    She and her husband were about the same age, Tanner guessed. But her husband was still very much alive and she was close to dying; a worn-out, run-down clock, just waiting for the final, fatal loosening of the mainspring. She had no more interest in life than to sit in her rocker in front of the window and watch the winds dart through the prairie grass and the occasional visitor wander up the street.
    “I’m from the university,” he said softly. “I’ve brought back some of John’s things.”
    She glanced at him and then turned back to the window, as if looking any place else but through the glass took too much effort.
    “Patricia wired us that he died,” she mumbled. “She said it was too late for us to go to the funeral. She said they buried him the same day.”
    Which hadn’t been true at all, he thought. Then he looked again at the old lady and realized she would never have survived the trip.
    “Johnny was a good boy,” the old lady said weakly. “He should have lived longer than he did … .” Her voice trailed off and her husband tugged at Tanner’s sleeve. Tanner followed him to the small kitchen and took a seat by the table.
    The old man was gruff. “You don’t want to talk to Mother too long. She’s been ailing these last few days. Johnny’s dying hit her pretty hard.”
    “John was born here in Brockton, wasn’t he, Mr. Olson? Born and brought up here?”
    “Lived here all of his life until he went away to college. Maybe he shouldn’t have gone. He came back one or twice in the summer and he wasn’t the same. Kind of unhappy, kind of moody.”
    He set a battered, tin coffeepot on the stove and lit the burner with a match. His hand was shaking. “I always told Mother he was a farm boy, that he wasn’t cut out for school in the city.” His voice was low and close to cracking. “I’m going to miss that boy, mister. I never approved of his going to school but I set a lot in store by him just the same.”
    He was going to make it painful for the old man, Tanner thought. But it had to be done.
    “His whole life was here, wasn’t it? You know, his friends and relatives?”
    “He had a lot of good friends.” The old man went to the pantry to get some thick, china mugs. “Never forget one. Fellow named Hart. Adam Hart. Older than Johnny but I always thought the friendship was good for the boy. A youngster makes friends with an older man and he gets a better view of life.”
    The coffee was boiling but he made no move to take it off the stove.
    “This Adam Hart—Johnny used to talk a lot about him,” Tanner lied. “What sort of a fellow was he?”
    “All man, son. Came from a gypsy family that had settled over on the west side of town. One of those families that has two dozen kids in the house and a trained bear in the back yard. The kids just couldn’t keep away. No grass or flowers on the lot but some cherry trees the youngsters could climb. Johnny used to hang around over there. Adam was one of the gypsy boys, a lot older than Johnny. They took to each other and Adam used to help Johnny with his schoolwork and teach him how to play sports.”
    He got up and poured out thick, black coffee that smelled burnt and raw. “Adam will be real sorry to hear that Johnny’s … dead.” It took an effort for him to say the word and the coffeepot shook a little, spilling the hot liquid on the oilcloth.
    But Adam Hart isn’t sorry, Tanner thought. Probably only a little regretful that he had to go to all that trouble to kill Olson.
    “Anybody know where Adam is now?”
    “Nope. Nobody’s heard from him since he left town.”
    “What did he look like?”