Squinting, she made a visor of her hand, shielding her eyes from the gray midmorning haze as though she hated it more than the interruption itself.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” I began to say.
“What do you want?” she asked, wafting rancid eighty-proof breath over me.
“I’m looking for Elizabeth Gage,” I replied. I tried my best to look harmless and nonthreatening something I’m told I can do fairly well. It’s all in the reserved but engaging smile I can muster on demand, or so Sammy tells me. And then there are those other qualities some my friends often refer to as being some of my best; things like my tanned, rugged boyish good-looks, all of that attractiveness sitting on top of my youthful looking physique, all my two-hundred and twenty-five-pounds stuffed into an aging body that struggles every day to keep as fit and trim as time-decay and Advil would allow.
“You people are all the same.” She pointed at the sign and wearily pushed herself away from the door frame before continuing. “What’s wrong with you?” she snarled. “Why can’t you respect people’s privacy?”
Done with me, she reached for the door with her free hand, but she misjudged the distance. Badly. With nothing to hold on to, she stumbled and, unable to regain her balance, went down face-first onto the grimy Mexican-tiled floor with the hard dull thump of bone and flesh suddenly encountering an unforgiving surface and feeling the impact. I had tried to stop her fall but couldn’t reach her in time. She moaned and tried to turn over onto her side. Her eyes were closed, and a thin line of spittle stretched across her left cheek.
As she rubbed the right side of her face, I entered the relative darkness of her living room and approached her. The stale air reeked of cigarette smoke blending with the sweet tang of mildew. I heard movement and looked at her: a sad figure lying in a fetal position against the red and gray floor. She turned her face to the side and got sick, then didn’t move after that. Her breathing became quieter, deep and rhythmic. I couldn’t believe what I saw: she had passed out right where she laid, a sorry mess of grime, vomit and spit.
I gently turned her so that she could not aspirate and drown in her own bile, and then examined the bump on her forehead. I examined her pupils next. They were both the same size and not overly dilated. I had seen my share of head injuries before; she would survive this.
In the messy kitchen, I found paper towels and a plastic bag. I mopped up the vomit on the floor and used a wet towel to wipe her face and lips, then dumped the soiled towels in the bag and knotted it. I called Sammy on the cell and asked him to join me inside.
Sammy entered the house and reluctantly took the measure of the cool, stale air. He pinched his nose and shot me a look that said,
Really?
But in the end, neither of us had any real choice. We needed to help this woman.
Sammy closed the door and grudgingly gave me a hand. We gently lifted Elizabeth off the floor and took her down a long, narrow corridor that must have once been painted in some version of white. We saw a bathroom to the left, and two small bedrooms to the right. The door at the end of the hallway led to a room dominated by a cherry-stained queen-size four-poster bed. Treading carefully over the mess on the floor, we placed Elizabeth on the bed. I told Sammy to canvass the neighbors, ask if there was someone living nearby who could stay with her tonight. Also, he would see if he could find someone we could pay to clean up the house. Sammy left, and I went quickly through every inch of the house. It was dirty and littered with empty cigarette cartons, greasy pizza boxes, and countless small white Chinese food boxes, some encrusted with old, stale food and fuzzy green growth. The kitchen trash can overflowed with empty vodka and rum bottles, and filled ashtrays and dirty dishes and pans lay strewn over every horizontal surface. There were no pictures or art anywhere, not so much as a photograph. It was as if the person who lived here had no prior life or simply didn’t want to be reminded of it. From the looks of things, it was obvious she lived alone, drowning her sorrows in gallons of booze, surviving like a sick animal, somehow trapped in an open-door prison of her own making.
I found the map of Florida and the Caribbean islands her brother Ham had mentioned in one of the two smaller rooms, which had been set up as an office. This seemed to be the only space in the house that received any measure of care. It was cluttered, but everything was laid out in neat piles and off to the sides. Below the map sat vintage battleship gray Steelcase desk. The map looked like a pincushion; its face cluttered with clumps of red, yellow, and white pushpins scattered on its creased surface. Most were clustered in the southeastern tip of Florida, but there were also large clusters of pins in and around Nassau, Exuma, Abaco, Bimini, and Turks and Caicos. A few white pins marked islands as far south as the Cayman Islands, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Vieques, Tortola, Virgin Gorda and St. Barts.
While I didn’t know the precise significance of the colored pins, if Elizabeth had indeed tracked Baumann to the places marked on the map, it appeared almost certain I might be going on holyday after all.
Fifteen
Sammy was dwarfed by a woman wearing a blue and white striped apron that clashed mightily with her gaudy floral muumuu. Her wide chubby feet were stuffed into pair of old green rubber sandals that had seen better days. Sammy introduced her as Louise Mullen, a retired nurse’s aide and Elizabeth Gage’s neighbor.
Mrs. Mullen had been blessed with one of those large rotund frames linebackers everywhere only dream about. Her considerable size and heft made her face and head look too small for her size. She was a fairly tall woman and seemed to be in her early sixties. She had short gray hair that covered her small thick ears and she wore gold-toned wire rimmed glasses. I explained the situation and Elizabeth’s condition to Mrs. Mullen, who looked more like a retired prison guard than a nurse. She remained silent and regarded me, then Sammy, then me again with a skeptical glare.
“And who are you again?” she asked, crossing her huge, jiggling arms over the ample shelf of her chest. Her voice was raspy and flat and there was a small but palpable southern drawl to her vowels.
I told the truth: I was a lawyer out of Palm Beach, working for a client who may have been wronged by the same man who had swindled Elizabeth, and Sammy was my associate, a retired cop and private investigator. We were here to ask Elizabeth a few questions and tell her that perhaps we could help her recover some of what was taken from her.
Louise looked me up and down before saying anything else. “So Elizabeth doesn’t know who you are? No relation to her or her brother?”
I shook my head.
“What happens if you don’t recover nothin’? Who’s gonna pay your fancy Palm Beach lawyerin’ fees? It ain’t gonna be her, that’s for sure.”
“If I don’t recover, she doesn’t owe me a dime the risk is all mine.”
Her semi crooked smile said she wasn’t buying my story.
“So you’re doing this because of what the goodness of your heart? Please.”
I smiled. This woman was nobody’s fool. “Nothing of the kind, ma’am,” I replied, turning the charm up to medium-high. “Yes, I am a lawyer, but, improbably as it may sound, I am also one of the good guys.” I really needed to convince her to help us clean up and sober up this unconscious woman who just might be my only hope of locating Baumann before he went completely off the grid. “And my motives here are not especially noble.”
She glanced at me sideways.
“Mrs. Gage here is possibly the only person I’m aware who can lead me to this man we are looking for. I really need her to be coherent enough so I can ask her a few questions. And who knows? If I can get some of the property this crook stole from her, then she benefits and so do I. Win-win for both of us. “So you see, Mrs....?” I placed my tanned hand on her pale skinned arm and went for the closing. Her skin felt cold and clammy. The fact that she was not repulsed by my touch and she did not much mind my hand remaining on her arm was a clear indication I was getting there.
“Mullen,” she answered dryly.
“Mrs. Mullen, I do want to help Elizabeth as much as I can. What happened to her shouldn’t happen to anyone. And as you can see...” I glanced about at our disordered surroundings. “She could use a helping hand. Ultimately, my intentions here are what you would expect from a typical lawyer: neither honorable nor dishonorable but simply economical: I take a fee from whatever I recover. Her situation improves by what I recover, and so does mine. We both benefit. It’s all about money.” And I gave her my best closing simile.
That did it. The need to make money; it was something she could understand. Mrs. Mullen agreed to help and to look after Elizabeth Gage. She would feed her and bathe her, get her in clean clothes, and keep her away from the booze. She would spend the night with her. We settled on a price and I paid her in cash. Next, she called two women she knew who cleaned houses for a living. They agreed to come over that afternoon and tidy up. By the time Elizabeth Gage woke up tomorrow she wouldn’t recognize herself or her home. I then sent Sammy off to the closest grocery store God only knew when she last had a solid meal.
By the time we got squared away with the house cleaners, groceries, lunch, and Mrs. Mullen, it was past four in the afternoon. A light rain was falling, easing the heat considerably. Elizabeth would not be of much help until at least tomorrow morning, maybe longer. She was not in good shape. We made plans to stay at a hotel in nearby Ponte Vedra. Sammy and I would return in the morning, and try to get a bead on Baumann.
***
We arrived back at Elizabeth’s home by midmorning the next day. Mrs. Mullen said her patient had a rough night, tossing and turning, restless sleep, but she had kept her dinner down and she had a light breakfast. She was experiencing the typical symptoms of alcohol withdrawal, including sudden mood shifts and bouts of aggression. Compared to yesterday, though, at least for the moment, she was rational and as emotionally stable as could be expected from someone in her condition. She told me Elizabeth was expecting me. She knew who I was and what I wanted. She had reacted negatively at first. She refused to talk to anyone about that man, she had said. Especially to a stranger. She also informed her that I had been hired by another victim and that I was after her ex-husband. She also told Elizabeth that I looked like a person who could extract a measure of justice in the process.
“She’s agreed to see you,” Mrs. Mullen said. “Don’t push her, though. If she doesn’t want to answer something, move on and ask it again later in a different way. You’ll get further that way, I guarantee it.” I could not argue with the large woman. Her advice was solid. Mrs. Mullen stood aside and allowed me into the relative comfort of the house.
Inside the home, the air no longer reeked of smoke and sweat; it now bore the distinct antiseptic aroma of disinfectants and cleaners. Small lamps were on and radiated a warm, almost inviting glow. The view of the hallway and the small kitchen was not as I remembered; the floor was no longer cluttered with garbage and grime. The place now seemed entirely different. Better. Livable.
Elizabeth Gage was dressed in a clean blue robe, and her hair was clean and pulled back in a neat ponytail. Her eyes seemed alert and clear although there were some fairly large dark circles under them. She sat on the dark green couch in her living room. I introduced myself.
“Have a seat,” she said in a raspy voice.
Sitting down in the overstuffed chair that had seen too much use, I thanked her for seeing me and asked if she felt up to talking.
“What would you like to know?” The tone and tempo of her voice was slow, almost like a slur.
“Whatever you can tell me that might help me find this man.”
She looked down at her hands and sighed. “He moves around a lot, you know?”
I nodded. “So I hear.”
“It’s not gonna be easy pinning him down.” She looked at me with a sad little smile. “I’ve been trying for so long.”
“Maybe I can help.”
Her demeanor suddenly changed. She looked me square in the eye and said, “Help me do what, exactly?” Her voice had lost its earlier somnolent quality and had a certain edge edge sharp, ready to spar.
Despite Mrs. Mullen’s warning to expect emotional swings, I wasn’t quite ready for it. I needed to respond with tact and charm. “If you help me find him, maybe I can recover some of what he took from you.”
She lay back on the couch and looked up at the texture-coated ceiling.
“Don’t fool yourself, Mr....” she had forgotten my name already. It happened so often I wondered if I should perhaps consider a name change; maybe go with something more memorable like “Sting” or “Prince.”
“Please call me Jason.”
“Even if you do find him and beat the living shit out of him and he tells you where he’s stashed everything, you will still have failed.” The edge was gone from her voice. Her voice was back to the way it had been; sorrowful, soft.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “But why would it be a failure?”
She gave a little sigh and said, “Okay. How about this: can you also recover my dignity?” She sat back up, her big eyes boring into mine. “How about my reputation can you get that back, too? And my life... my friends... my father’s business? How about my dignity?”
I said nothing.
“Yeah, that’s right you can’t.” She sobbed. There were plenty of tears streaking down her pale cheeks, her eyes displaying a deep pain that only she could understand.
I let her vent.
“No one can! Don’t you understand that?”
She was right. Even if I recovered every red cent Baumann had taken, her life had been forever changed in ways I could not begin to fathom and nothing I did would ever change that.
“It’s too late for me,” she said. “He screwed me big. I have nothing left
nothing
!” She sat back and placed her arm heavily over her forehead. “So just leave me the hell alone and go back to wherever it was you came from.”
The plain reality of that remark seemed to catch us both by surprise. A sense of tragedy and finality reared up in my mind as I realized the grimness conveyed by those words. I suddenly understood how people were sometimes driven to desperate acts. Faced with a nightmare they desperately wanted to end, some drank to forget, or resorted to drugs. Others did the unthinkable. It becomes easy to explain why some seek to escape the harsh realities of life by any means. Even extreme means. Elizabeth needed help.