Thoroughly
confused now, she picked up the crook and clutched it to her chest.
Mouth-breathing, transfixed by the gun barrel, she gingerly
began to edge her way past me toward the door. Once out, she turned
left and hustled down the arm of the U the short way. The pantaloons
had a drop seat, which was still open. Yessir, a real trouper.
I
turned my full attention to my two remaining friends. "Get out,"
I said.
The
break in the action had given the door kicker a chance to regroup.
"Wadda you gonna do, shoot us? Huh, right here, motherfucker?"
I
didn't want to give this guy a chance to get his courage all the way
back up. He was just dumb enough to be dangerous.
"You
got it, friend," I said. "Unless those are pictures of his
family that your partner keeps reaching for in his pocket, I'd say I
can waste the two of you and walk." It was time to end the
snappy dialogue.
"Put
your hands on your heads and walk out of here. Now. Leave the
camera." Shorty started to object. Not just persistent, but
cheap.
"You
can steal another one later. I'm not telling you again."
I
backed to the far corner between the window and the bed. They were
walking.
"We'll
find you, asshole," mumbled the big one.
"I'll
live in constant fear," I promised.
I
followed them out, folding my arms over my chest, hiding the gun
under my arm, down the steps and over to a blue Ford Galaxie. They
got in, backed out into the lot, and drove out onto Pacific Highway
South. Someone, years before, had ripped the vinyl top off the car.
The back third of the roof was a uniform rust. Somewhere in the past,
a spring had broken. The hook of Bo Peep's crook protruded from the
right rear window. The car had a thirty-degree list to starboard.
They headed south on Pacific Highway, looking like some sort of
depraved Christmas ornament.
Tony
had staged a major recovery. He was still the color of old custard,
but he had managed to get dressed. He was stuffing the last of his
paraphernalia into his suitcases when I got back. A remnant of
shocking-pink lace was mashed in the crack of the smaller brown
suitcase. It was obvious from his expression that he wasn't at all
sure that I was any improvement on the other two. I decided to let
him go on worrying about it. I picked up the phone and called him a
cab.
"Get
out of here," I told him. He had a blue pinstriped business
suit on, collar buttoned, tie in place—and yet, amazingly, there
was still hair sticking out from under his collar. I'd almost
forgotten what he-'d looked like in half a Viking costume. I was
beginning to feel sick.
"Just
go home, partner. This is your lucky day."
He
was confused, but smart enough to know a gift horse when he saw one.
He picked up all four bags and started for the door. He didn't fit.
He had to put them outside two at a time and then follow them out.
"How'd
you know they weren't the police?" he asked, as he picked up the
bags. "Even the police dress better than that." "Come
on, seriously."
"The
tattoos on the big one," I said. I let him carry his own bags
down the stairs. I guessed he was in training. It didn't bother him a
bit.
"Cops
have tattoos too."
He
wasn't going to let this go.
"Not
those ball-pointed pen specials, they don't, buddy."
The
cab arrived. The driver opened the trunk and began to load the bags.
Before getting in, Tony grinned at me sheepishly.
"I
suppose I should explain what was going on in there."
I
opened the cab door. -
"If
you do I'll shoot you right here in front of the driver," I said
without a smile. Tony took me at my word.
I
Started to put my wet slippers into the trunk, had an unexpected
spasm of lucidity, and instead lobbed them into the conveniently
located trash receptacle. Better safe than sorry. As I packed the
Fiat with the rest of my gear, I inventoried the positives. My
calendar was clear. Rose Moldonado's check would keep me going for
some time. The king salmon run was just getting started on the
peninsula. An extended fishing trip was in order. The ground fog was
just starting to burn off. The weather, for fall, was truly gorgeous.
I was depressed. Goddamn that Tony.
I
coaxed the Fiat into life and headed back to my apartment. I don't
have an office. Waterman Investigations, such as it is, is just
me and the answering machine in my apartment. When I'd first started
in the business, I'd gone for the whole nine yards, office,
secretary, the works, but it didn't work out. Now it's just me and
the machine. Most of the time, the machine and I get along quite
well.
By
the time I crested the interstate, the black glass of the Colombia
Tower wore the last of the ground fog like a bad toupee. I wheeled
through the cars and construction and thought about a feature spread
I'd seen in the Times a few months back. If the pictures could be
believed, the women's lavatories in the Colombia Tower were both
larger and considerably
more
elegant than my apartment. At the time, I had dismissed this
incongruity as a rather dubious link to lasting fame. It occurred to
me now that maybe this wasn't as out of line as I'd once imagined.
After all, back around the turn of the century, when my dad was a
boy, the entire downtown section of the city had been regraded for
the express purpose of getting the newly fashionable flush toilets
high enough above the rising tide to prevent them from becoming
sewage fountains every time the tide came in. This was, historically
speaking, the town that toilets built. Maybe this helped in some
small way to explain Tony Moldonado.
I
stowed the 9mm in my desk, the cooler in the closet, and its contents
in the garbage. The suitcase could wait. What I needed now was a
beer. I decided to splurge and opened a Chimay for myself. Chimay is
an ale brewed in Belgium by Trappist monks. I found it a bit pricey
for day-to-day swillage, but for special occasions it provided just
the right festive touch. It also provided a reasonable explanation as
to why Trappist monks were silent. If they consumed much of this
stuff, they were probably unable rather than unwilling to speak.
I
made my way to the living room. The light on my machine was blinking.
This was something of a problem. If I listened to the messages
before arranging a fishing trip, I was probably going to find
somebody who wanted me to do something. If I left town without
listening to the messages, I'd spend the whole damn trip wondering
what in hell was on the tape and how in hell I could be so
irresponsible. I already knew the answer to the last part.
On
the surface, I was still a great believer that there was absolutely
no sense in working if you already had money. I was, after all, going
to come into a pretty fair inheritance when I turned forty-five. My
old man,
locally
renowned as an impeccable judge of character, had seen something in
me even when I was a child that had inspired him to reach from the
grave to save me from myself. His efforts had not been in vain.
Despite the best efforts of my ex-wife's team of lawyers, the
draconian complexity of my trust fund had managed to thwart even
Washington's hellish community-property laws. To Annette's
everlasting chagrin, my prospects remained intact.
In
spite of this, however, some compensatory function of impending
middle age was beginning to worm its way into my consciousness. I was
starting to have visions of spending my declining years with the
Boys, down in the vicinity of Pioneer Square, debating the body and
bouquet of fortified wine with the other denizens of the district.
Fortunately,
I was spared this moral dilemma. The phone tinkled. I swallowed half
the schooner of Chimay, wiped off my upper lip, and picked it up.
"Leo,
jew chit. I seen you come in. How you doin'?"
It
was Hector Guiterrez, the superintendent of my building. Hector
looked out for things around the apartment when I was gone. An
expatriate Cuban whose attitude toward the regime had earned him
several years in one of Castro's more colorful prisons, Hector
harbored a deep, abiding distrust of all authority figures. As my job
tended to bring me into constant conflict with a wide assortment of
officialdom, Hector had unilaterally adopted me as a fellow
conspirator. I'd never been totally clear as to whom we were
conspiring against or to what ends, but it seemed to make Hector
happy, which was good enough for me. Off the pig. It was us against
the world.
"Glad
to be home, Hector. Thanks for watering the plants."
"No
problem, Leo. The people we got to steek togeder. Jew know what I
mean?" I offered that I did.
"How'd
eet go? Jew was gone a long time."
"You
don't want to know," I said.
"Somebody
been looooking for jew." He hesitated. "A wooooman."
He breathed. I was supposed to guess now.
"Rebecca?"
I ventured.
"A
beeg woooman. Muy . . . muy . . ."
What
followed was a series of rough glottal noises, the origin and timbre
of which made me yearn for a hot shower. He sensed my impatience.
"She
come back tree, four times, Finally I took a note from her. Tole her
I geev it to jew when jew get back. Eets on toppa de fridge."
"Thanks
again Hector. Anything else?"
"Jour
lawyer, he called me looking for jew. Said jew gave heem my nomber
for 'mergency. Two maybe tree days ago. And"—favoring his
flair for the dramatic, he let it hang ominously—"a couple of
dose bums of jours was around. The one wid da wood coat and the real
dumb one. Jew got to keep dem away from here, Leo. The odder tenants
dey go batshit eberytime dey see dose guys. De Harrisons, in 4C, dose
fokkers, dey called the corporation and beetched. You tell 'em to
stay away, okay, Leo?"
"I'll
tell them again, Hector. Sorry about that."
Hector
was referring to what I affectionately call "the Boys."
When I need a couple pairs of extra ears or eyes, I hire the Boys.
Rebecca occasionally groused that referring to a group of grown men,
none of whom was under sixty, as the Boys was a slur, but I knew
better. The Boys didn't mind. In one capacity or another, they'd all
known my old man and, as such, had been counted among my many
"uncles."
Twelve
terms on the city council had ensured that my old man was among the
city's most well-known characters. Three half-hearted runs at the
mayor's office, particularly the one when, clad in a red tuxedo, he'd
campaigned from atop a spewing beer wagon, had lifted his status to
legend. Through it all, however, he'd never lost the common
touch. He never forgot his old friends—that collection of drunks
and reprobates he'd started out with down on the mud flats,
those who sobered up every four years or so for just long enough to
vote for him again. Wild Bill Waterman always kept a place in
his heart and a little cash in his pocket for a guy who was down on
his luck.
Among
my most cherished memories are those of being awakened late at night
by muffled conversation and laughter, of sneaking down the back
stairs that led to the kitchen, my mother's threats humming in my
ears, of finding ragged, red-faced men who smelled of dust and
desperation sitting around our kitchen table, dripping water on the
black-and-white tile floor, dipping snuff and sipping whiskey. Even
then they'd been relegated to the back kitchen. Unlike my father, my
mother took her social position quite seriously and had, in stages,
eventually banned these so-called "uncles" from her house.
The
Boys were the last remnants of another era, my last tie to my old
man. When sober, they made excellent operatives. The old and poor are
invisible. They can hang around forever without attracting attention.
They operate inside their own little force fields, which direct the
regular citizenry away from them like incompatible magnetic poles.
Of
the originals, only George, Harold, and Ralph were still around.
Buddy Knox had gotten himself killed on what I'd foolishly presumed
was a routine surveillance. I was resigned that guilt was a major
reason why I always tried to keep the Boys busy, even when I didn't
particularly need the help.
To
everyone's amazement, Buddy had left the other three enough of an
insurance settlement for them to put a down payment on the rooming
house in which
they'd
all shared a single, large room. Combined, their meager pensions
provided just enough cash to pay for booze and utilities. No problem.
They took up the slack with a combination of money they made working
for me, panhandling, and an artful collection of insurance scams.