Never Street (5 page)

“I said I wanted to hang on to my watch,” I said. “This is the Grand Hotel.”

“I know. I used to climb on the roof.”

They charged you just to step onto the porch; it was the longest in the world, the sign said, and your life wasn’t complete until you’d walked it. The fellow who took the money, a distinguished-looking black in his fifties in a red coat and white gloves, glanced at my companion and waved us on through.

“Stab in the dark,” I said as we whisked past the line waiting inside for a table. “You’re the governor’s bastard son.”

“Close. Hi, Henry. Snake pit taken?”

The man behind the reservation desk, also black and edging into old age in the same uniform, smiled, but only with his eyes. “Hello, Tommy. No, today I’m feeling kindly toward my fellow creatures. Does your friend have any objection to crab cakes?”

I said I didn’t. There must have been a bright answer to that one, but I couldn’t find it.

Tommy led the way unassisted to a table the size of a corn plaster, jammed between the bandstand and the swinging doors to the kitchen. We were almost behind the backdrop. My view of the entertainment was blocked by an amplifier as big as a refrigerator.

“Nothing to see anyway.” My companion took off his hat and stuck it under his chair. “They don’t play till dinner, and then you can’t hear your fork hit your plate.”

“What’s the story on the crab cakes?”

“Price of a free meal. You can order anything you like as long as the chef forgot and salted it twice.”

“Or dropped it.”

He shook his head. It was a good head without the hat, broad across the brow and tanned evenly below the white streak where the band rested. His eyes were blue and clear and smiled at the corners, even when his mouth did not, like the headwaiter’s. “Not at the Grand. Gerald Ford dined here when I was twelve.”

“What were you at twelve, besides the apple of Henry’s eye?”

“Same thing I am now; an island brat. My parents were caretakers of one of the summer houses here. Every Friday night the owners were away, they drank. Every night they drank, I ran away. Here’s where I ran. The hotel staff practically adopted me. Did I mention the owners of the summer house were away most of the time?”

“I figured it out.” I waited. I wondered how long it would take him to get around to offering to show me the island for a fee. I doubted he just didn’t like to eat alone.

A waiter came and went with our drink orders: Chablis for me, to show I knew what went with shellfish; mineral water with a twist for Tommy. He wouldn’t be a drinker.

He got to it. “You said you’re not staying at Balfour?”

“No, I shrink my own.”

“Checking out the place for a relative?”

“I’m fresh out of those.”

When he realized I wasn’t going to add anything he sat back. “Good thing it isn’t clams. That would make you a cannibal.”

“I’m a private cop on a case,” I said. “That doesn’t mean I don’t want to take in any of the sights while I’m here, if the tariff isn’t too steep.”

He thought about that for a second. Then he rose.

“Enjoy your lunch. I hope you fall off the ferry on your way back.” He pushed in his chair and started around the bandstand.

I kicked the chair back out. “Sit down. I said I was a private cop. Invitations to dine in the linen and silver joints don’t come my way every day. You look for strings.”

He stood with his tongue bulging one cheek. “If that’s an apology, I’ll consider accepting it.”

“When will you know?”

He grinned then and sat down. Our drinks came, and right behind them another waiter unfolded an aluminum stand next to the table and set a tray on it and served the crab cakes and steamed vegetables, arranged artfully on the hotel’s simple china plates.

“I wanted to warn you about Balfour, in case you were thinking of putting someone in there,” Tommy said when we were alone. “Don’t.”

The crabs weren’t salty at all, just heavy on lemon. They tasted better than anything I’d eaten that year. “The place looked respectable enough.”

“The place may be. Naheen isn’t. Parks and Recreation have been trying to shut him down for years. You know Mackinac’s a state park.”

“The only one in the country where automobiles are prohibited. I picked up a pamphlet when I bought my ticket for the boat.”

“Naheen’s got a friend or something in Lansing; otherwise he’d be back on the mainland writing self-help books. Did he tell you he videotapes his sessions with patients?”

I said he hadn’t. I put down my fork. I didn’t want to miss anything under the sound of my own chewing.

“He doesn’t even tell them he does it. As far as they know his little spiral pocket notebook is the only record of their relationships with their mothers.”

“If he doesn’t tell them, who told you?”

“I’ve been delivering books and equipment there for years. Handymen talk.” He shoveled down the last of his crab cakes and chased them with mineral water. There wasn’t too much lemon for him either. “What do you figure he does with those tapes?”

“
America’s Funniest Home Videos
comes to mind.”

“They don’t pay enough. Place like that, on an island like this, the patients’ average income’s got to be up around the president’s. Conservative estimate. They’re executives, politicians, sons and daughters of captains of industry. People in trouble with money to spend and appearances to maintain.”

I drank some wine. “Where’d you go to school?”

“Mackinac Island Post Office. I was too busy running away to graduate the regular way, so I did it by mail later. Also I read a lot. Not much else to do when you spend most of your time waiting for passengers and cargo. You don’t need a Ph.D. to guess what Doc Ashraf’s got going after hours.”

“Blackmail’s not the kind of charge you guess about,” I said. “What’ve you got?”

“I got a job and a two-room gatehouse I rent off a lawyer from Alpena who can’t bring himself to tear it down. If I had anything more than that, so would the law. I love this place. I don’t like to see these downstaters come up here and piss in my lake.”

“I’m not investigating Naheen. Sorry.”

His face fell, but he caught it. He tipped up his glass, found it empty, and pushed it away. “Well, that’s that. I got my hopes up when you said you were a detective. I thought maybe the family of one of the crazies had hired you to turn him upside down and see just what kind of heel he is. I should know by now things don’t work out that neat. Just a dumb island hick.”

“Not.”

His eyes smiled back. “I don’t suppose free irregular goods from the kitchen buy me what you
are
working on.”

‘This one’s no secret. I’m looking for a bird named Neil Catalin. His wife wants him back in the cage.” I took the posed portrait shot out of my inside breast pocket and handed it to him.

He studied it a moment, then gave it back. “Never saw him. I don’t see everybody who comes and goes. We recycle a couple of million tourists a summer.”

“It wasn’t summer, and he wasn’t here to look at the fort. He was at Balfour House in February of last year.”

“Not even the governor comes here then. It’s colder than a bitch in February. I must have been working on the other side of the island. Winters I shovel out driveways. What’s he do?”

“His company produces videos.”

After a moment he plucked a roll from the basket on the table and began buttering it elaborately. I had a feeling he didn’t want a roll. “That’s interesting, considering what I just told you about Naheen.”

“Interesting is all it is. If he hamstrung horses on the side, from time to time he might treat a patient who breeds trotters. It doesn’t mean there’s a connection.”

“It would be worth looking into.”

“It’s worth filing away until I hit a wall. Right now I’ve got a couple of better leads.”

He put down the roll untasted and tugged back one of his lacy cuffs to consult his Casio. “I’d better load some crates. You ought to check out Pontiac’s Trail while you’re here; it offers the best view of the lake and the Big Mac bridge. Then there’s high tea here at the hotel at four. Finger sandwiches and sherry.”

“I may give the trail a look. One glass of sherry and I’m wrapping myself in a tablecloth and reciting Marc Antony’s speech from
Julius Caesar.”

“Yeah, I believe that. Sure I do.” He stood and stuck out his hand. “You never told me your name.”

“Amos Walker.” I rose. He had a strong grip and didn’t feel any need to crush knuckles to prove it.

“Tom Balfour.” A slow grin spread over his angular face as he watched it sink in. “That’s another reason I want Naheen’s wings clipped. Great-Great Grandfather wouldn’t take kindly to having the family name taken in vain.”

T
HE EIGHT-FIFTEEN
to Detroit took off promptly at nine forty-seven. Ninety minutes earlier, having strapped ourselves in and made our separate peaces with God, fourteen passengers including me were asked to get off and walk back to the terminal when the starboard engine quit on the runway. The wait would be no longer than fifteen minutes. After half an hour of tinkering, the maintenance crew off-loaded the luggage and towed the plane to the nearest Mr. Goodwrench. Much later, over Detroit City Airport, another storm kept our replacement ship circling until the pilot checked the fuel gauge, pushed his cap forward like Errol Flynn, and plunged down a black funnel chased with streaks of lightning, bringing us in at a sixty-degree angle that cracked an axle and shook loose all the overhead oxygen masks. I didn’t expect to experience another case of hiccoughs that year.

My telephone was ringing when I got home around midnight.

“Mr. Walker, this is Gay Catalin. I wasn’t sure if your phone was working.”

“It wasn’t this morning. You’re my first call. Any sign of your husband?”

“No. I wanted to find out what you’ve learned.”

“I don’t like flying; but then I knew that before. I went up and talked with Dr. Naheen today.”

“And?”

“He’s a clam, like you said. Do you know if he and your husband ever had any business dealings aside from doctor and patient?”

“No. I never heard his name until the police found Neil at Balfour House the last time. Neil wouldn’t discuss him with me afterward, or anything else that went on up there. Did Naheen say something?”

“Not about that. Just an island rumor. I’ll report when I have something.”

“Are you still planning to talk to Vesta?”

“More than ever. Naheen’s a clam, but a clam can be opened if you know the trick. It might comfort you to know Neil didn’t make it a habit to skip around on you. The Vesta thing bothered him a lot. I want to ask her why.”

There was a pause on her end. Then, “I’d like to think it was his conscience.”

“So would I. If it wasn’t, I’ve got another haystack to look under.”

There was another silence. I wondered if she was sitting in the room full of flowers. “Something else has happened. It might not mean anything, but I feel I should tell you about it. Brian didn’t come home last night. I haven’t seen him since I sent him to talk to you.”

Brian was the brother in the rolling boom box. I’d forgotten he existed. “He told me he was on his way to Cherie’s. It’s a strip joint in Ypsilanti. He might still be there. Sometimes the help forgets to sweep under the tables.”

“He goes there often. I called and spoke to the manager. He was there last night. Nobody saw him leave, and they haven’t seen him since. I’m not alarmed. Brian’s not like Neil; he stays away days at a time sometimes. He has his own income, from a trust fund our parents set up. Probably he’s shacked up with one of his teenage tramps. I just thought you should know, in case you think the disappearances are related.”

“Right now I’m not sure how the Marx Brothers are related. So far it’s a puzzle without any pieces. If I see Brian I’ll shoo him on home.”

“Thank you.” Her tone lifted. “How’d you find the island?”

“Easy. I just followed the smell of fertilizer.”

When we were through talking I dialed Vesta Mannering’s number. I didn’t get Ma Bell’s scratchy apology this time, but on the other hand I didn’t get Vesta either. I fixed myself a nightcap and went to bed.

Over coffee and my second cigarette of the day I called Gilda Productions. The same air-conditioned female voice treated me to a medley of Billy Ray Cyrus’ greatest hit and then Leo Webb came on. He spoke in clipped, executive-issue tones with no accent at all; he’d been in Michigan a very long time, if he hadn’t actually been born here.

“You said you’re a detective? I hope you’ve got something more for me this time than just questions. I’m out better than twenty grand.”

“Oh?”

“It’s all in your report, for chrissake. Why do you bother to write them up if nobody reads them? Some of that equipment was still in the box.”

“Video equipment?”

“Video
and
sound: four cameras, two sound mixers, a seven-channel equalizer, a laser disc player, and eight speakers. Not to mention half a mile of copper wire and I don’t know how many gold-plated connectors. All studio quality, none of that Radio Shack shit. Twenty thousand
wholesale.
I can’t tell you what all that’s worth on the street. That’s your job.”

“Is it?”

He started to say something else, then broke off. When he spoke again, the guards were up. “Who did you say you were?”

“Amos Walker.”

“My secretary said you were with the police.”

“If she’s a good secretary, she said I’m a detective. That’s what I told her. Gay Catalin hired me to find her husband. I understand you’re partners.”

He came back at me from another channel entirely, courteous and jovial. He had some pretty impressive sound equipment of his own. “Oh, I wouldn’t worry so much about Neil. He’s always been the creative half of our association. I imagine he’s off on one of his intellectual benders. Probably show up bright and early tomorrow morning, spewing French phrases and working his hands like an old-fashioned crank camera.”

“His wife says this only happened once before.”

“From home, yes. Around here we’re used to his missing meetings and not coming back from lunch. Neil’s a dreamer. I’m not knocking it; it was his dream that started Gilda. I’m what keeps it going. I do all the scutwork.”