Paw and Order (17 page)

“Forgive my denseness,” Lizette said. “I know nothing about baseball.”

“Never caught the Expos when you were a kid?”

“The Expos?”

“Montreal's old baseball team—the Nationals now, playing right here.”

“Oh, of course, of course,” Lizette said. “My family was so completely non-sporty that these things barely registered.” She touched Bernie's arm on the exact same spot where Suzie had been touching it. “Tell me all about pitching.”

“Well,” Bernie said, “it's actually—”

The porch door opened, and a man looked out. “Lizette, the general's car is here.”

Lizette hurried off.

“You can tell me all about pitching,” Suzie said.

“Stop,” said Bernie. He took a nice big sip of bourbon, maybe closer to a gulp. “Montreal's a hockey town, but it's odd she'd never even heard of the Expos.”

“ ‘Completely non-sporty,' ” Suzie said in a way that sounded a lot like Lizette, only more so.

“Don't be catty,” Bernie said.

Bernie was saying Suzie was like a cat? I gave her my hardest stare, saw nothing catlike about her. Did she have a look on her face like she was high and I was low? The farthest thing from it. Did that mean Bernie wasn't making sense? I couldn't go there.

“It's just that a powerful man pays attention to you, and all of a sudden you're on her radar,” Suzie said. “I didn't realize she was like that.”

“Maybe she's genuinely interested in pitching,” Bernie said. “It's actually a vast subject.”

“Start with the screwball,” Suzie said.

They both started laughing. What was this? They'd also both spewed some of their drinks? And then more laughter? What was going on?

The laughter died down. “Some people really are oblivious to sports,” Suzie said. “I discussed Montreal with her, and it was obvious she knows it well.”

“How so?” said Bernie.

Suzie thought for a moment. “I remember her telling me the best place to stay.”

“Which is?”

“The Château Frontenac.”

“Stayed there once myself,” Bernie said. “On a weekend pass from Fort Drum.”

“Nice?”

“Very. The only problem is it's in Quebec City.”

“Not Montreal?”

Bernie shook his head.

TWENTY-ONE

T
he next thing I remember is waking up bright and early the morning after Lizette's party, bright and early being the way I roll when it comes to waking up. The truth is that although we're alike in lots of ways, me and Bernie, how we sleep is probably not one of them. Once he falls asleep—and that can take a while, what with all the turning and twisting, plus a bit of pillow punching to get it in just-right shape—Bernie's out for the night. I'm . . . I'm exactly the opposite, opposite being a tricky thought I'm now getting my head around for the very first time! Just when you think I'm done amazing you, I—whoa! What did I almost get into? Easy, big guy. But the point I'm trying to make, if I can only get out of my own way—wow! Another amazing thought! What a life! Back to the point: I can fall asleep just like that, no problem, but I'm never out for the night. That's not how it works in the nation within, especially if you're the security-minded type, which I am, and big-time. If I'm not paying attention to what's going on around me at night, then I'm not doing my job.

So on the night of Lizette's party, did I actually mess up and sleep right through until dawn, or was I up and down and simply don't remember? Who knows? Not me, amigo, and best not to dwell on it for one more moment, except I kind of recall hearing Bernie and Suzie talking in low voices from her bedroom. Outside her door was where I first settled down, come to think of it, and where I woke up was on the cool tiles of the front hall, meaning that in the night I must have . . . something or other. Hey! Not bad: I'd just come close to figuring out another tricky one, one more reason the Little Detective Agency is so successful, leaving out the finances part.

I opened my eyes and got to my feet in this real slow stretchy way I have for waking up when there's no reason to hurry. Then I gave myself a little shake, walked around in circles for a bit, gave myself another shake, this one more vigorous. I was off to a great start, and not for the first time. Nothing compares to the start of the day, except for the end and everything in between.

I made my way into the kitchen and was heading toward my water bowl in the corner when I heard a faint
whirr-whirr
outside the window. What was this? That strange hovering bird was back, the one with no eyes and wings that didn't flap? Birds are not high on my list of fellow creatures to begin with, which you probably know by now since I've gone on about it ad nauseam, as Bernie says—and that turns out to be all about puking, one of the most fascinating subjects out there, but we just don't have the time right now. What I'm getting to is that I don't like birds in general, and especially didn't like this strange and rather shiny bird particularly. Hey! Could it be? No feathers? No eyes, no feathers, no flapping? I couldn't have been called scared at that moment, fear and Chet being like two something or others passing in the night, but surprised? I admit it. And sometimes when I'm surprised, especially in a real sudden way, the barking in me starts up. Does something like that happen to you?

“Chet! What the hell's going on with you?” I turned and there was Bernie—hadn't seen him in way too long—pulling on a pair of pants and kind of hopping along at the same time, one of the coolest human moves out there. But right now, we had a problem. I turned to the window and amped up the sound level, sending Bernie a message.

“What? What?”

And at last, his gaze went to the window—oh, no: at the very moment, when with no warning the strange bird shot straight up into the air, out of sight! But not out of hearing, that
whirr-whirr
still out there, although distant now, and faint.

“What? What? Something in the yard?”

Bernie stepped up to the window, raised it, peered out. “Don't see anything,” he said, sticking his head right out there. “Wait—unless it's that squirrel by the hedge. Gotta ease up on the squirrel obsession, big guy.”

Huh? Squirrel obsession? I'd never heard of such a thing. Maybe Bernie was still half-asleep, not quite in the picture, the picture being birds, specifically that very strange one, and not squirrels. I went closer, stuck my own head out the window. And then there we both were, bodies indoors and heads outdoors, me and Bernie side by side. What a nice moment! Why had we never done this before? I was having a lovely thought about staying right here forever—couldn't come up with a single reason why not—when I noticed a black squirrel with an enormous bushy tail standing by the hedge. Just standing there looking like . . . like he owned the place! Which he most certainly did not. I owned the place!

“Chet! Knock it off! I can't hear myself think!”

And crazily enough, I couldn't hear my own self think either. But what was there to think? That enormous bushy tail was the most annoying thing I'd seen in ages, and I'm sure you'd have felt the same. Did I mention how he was gazing right at me with his tiny squirrel eyes? Like . . . like he owned the place! Whoa! Who owned the place? I did! Chet the Jet owned the place!

“CHET! NO!”

• • •

A little later—hardly any time at all, really—we were enjoying a nice breakfast in Suzie's kitchen, me, Bernie, Suzie. Bacon and eggs for Bernie, yogurt and berries for Suzie, kibble for me, and no doubt a bit of bacon would be coming my way soon, although Bernie didn't seem in a hurry to make that happen. No way he was mad at me about the squirrel, of course. He had to know I'd done my very best to catch the little bugger, and even though I'd come up short—but I'd actually laid a paw on him, first time in my life!—no one can ask any more of you than your best, as I'd heard Bernie tell Charlie more than once, down at the T-ball field, for example, which I wouldn't be visiting again anytime soon. But that's another story. Right now, we were getting along beautifully, and Bernie's hands smelled of a very interesting special soap he'd used after finishing up with the resodding.

So: bacon, anybody? Yes, me! I'm anybody and I wanted bacon.

And maybe Bernie was finally having that exact same thought, namely that it was time for the big guy to chow down on some bacon, but at that moment, his phone rang. He glanced at the screen, and his eyebrows—can't miss Bernie's eyebrows, with a language all their own—made a kind of surprised movement, and he said, “Hello.”

He listened for a bit. Suzie watched him listen. I watched her. Her thoughts were like Bernie's in that you could sort of feel them in the air, except hers were . . . stronger in some way? What was with that? I didn't want to go down that road, so I didn't.

“Well, sir,” Bernie said, “very nice of you to ask, but, ah . . .” He listened some more. “All right, if you put it that way,” he said. “I'll just need an address.” A bit more listening and then Bernie clicked off.

“General Galloway?” Suzie said.

“How'd you know?”

“Process of elimination,” Suzie said. “I've never heard you say ‘sir' to anyone else.”

“Force of habit,” Bernie said. “And it's the rank, not the man.”

“What I don't get,” Suzie said, “is that in real life you have no respect for authority at all.”

“Real life?” said Bernie.

Suzie waved that aside with back of her hand, a cool human move you sometimes saw from Bernie, too. Meaning he and Suzie were alike in some ways? Uh-oh: another road I didn't want to go down. On top of that, none of this back-and-forth was making any sense. All I knew was that no one was paying any attention to me. Am I the type who needs attention twenty-four seven, whatever that may mean? Not at all: I can amuse myself, no problem. I glanced around and saw that the remaining bacon strips were just sitting there in a dish on the table, also getting no attention from anybody. Those bacon strips—not many, although more than two—were in easy reach, pretty much ready for the taking. What would you have done in my place?

“. . . but somehow you were a great success in the military,” Suzie was saying.

“Where do you get that from?”

“It's obvious from how all the other military types treat you.”

“I was average,” Bernie said. “Otherwise I'd still be there.”

“You would?”

Bernie glanced down—real quick, you'd never have noticed—at his leg, the wounded one. “Doesn't matter,” he said. “The point is he asked me, as a personal favor, to come out to his place in Virginia for a little chitchat.”

“About what?” Suzie said.

“He didn't want to discuss it on the phone,” Bernie said. “You coming?”

“Am I included?”

“Always.”

“I meant by Galloway.”

“He'll have to lump it.”

“Call me ‘sir,' ” Suzie said.

“I'll try to think of the best time for that,” Bernie said.

Sudden change to the feeling in the room? Check. Change in the scents of Bernie and Suzie? Check. Change in the color of Suzie's face, now pinker? Check. I missed none of that, but the meaning, if any, I'll leave to you.

“Let's just finish up breakfast,” Bernie said, his gaze moving to the table, possibly narrowing in on the bacon dish, now empty, no getting around that, “and then we'll hit the—” He looked at me. I sat up tall, alert, ready, a total pro, and looked at him right back. He blinked, gave his head a little shake. We were good to go, unless I was missing something.

• • •

We got to the car, and right away: a problem. Was this a problem we'd had before? I thought so, namely the problem of the Porsche having a driver's seat for Bernie, a shotgun seat for me, and a little shelf seat thing in the back for Suzie. No problem so far, you're thinking, and you'd be right. The problem was all about this mistake getting made every time, a mistake that led to me on the shelf and Suzie in the shotgun seat. And Bernie was eyeing me in a way that indicated we were headed for mistake territory yet again, when Suzie's phone beeped. She checked the screen, her dark eyes moving quickly back and forth, and said, “Rain check.”

Which was exactly what I wanted to hear!

“What?” Bernie said.

“Metro desk,” Suzie said. “Someone's out sick and they want me to cover the damn kitchen design show.”

“Right up your alley,” Bernie said.

Suzie drew back her hand and made a hard throwing motion at him, but of course, she had nothing to throw so nothing got thrown. But Bernie ducked anyway! What was with that?

“It's not funny,” Suzie said. “I'd like to get to know the general.”

“Why is that?”

“Because of something Lanny Sands told me.”

“Who's Lanny Sands?”

“You haven't heard of the Sandman?”

“Excuse my ignorance.”

Suzie touched Bernie's shoulder. “Sorry,” she said. “It must be one of those inside-the-beltway things, like we—journos, politicos, lobbyists—are living in a separate country. Lanny Sands is a presidential insider, one of those backroom guys with a reputation for doing what needs doing.” She took out her phone. “Here's a picture of him.”

Bernie glanced at it. “He wears a suit and a Harvard baseball cap?”

“It's a look.”

“Indicating what?”

“Something elitist,” Suzie said. “He told me that if the general was the nominee, he might have a story for me.”

“What kind of story?”

“He didn't say, just didn't want me to jump the gun.”

“What did that mean?”

“I'd like to know,” Suzie said.

• • •

Was this more like it, just me and Bernie rolling in the Porsche? You bet! But we'd hardly gone more than a block or two when a white cruiser came up beside us, blue lights flashing. We pulled over, the cruiser parking behind us and the cop coming over. Hey! Little raisin eyes? This was our pal Lieutenant Soares, although what kind of pal flashes the blue lights at you, especially when you're real eager to get going?

Soares gazed down at Bernie. “How're you doing?” he said.

“In what respect?” said Bernie.

“The Eben St. John case, what else?”

“I didn't realize I was reporting to you.”

“You're not,” said Soares. “Just thought we'd have a quick collegial get-together.”

“Traffic stops are collegial where you come from?” Bernie said.

“I piss you off, don't I?”

“What's that got to do with anything?”

Soares glanced over at me. “I piss off your dog, too.”

“What makes you think that?” Bernie said.

“Something wrong with your hearing? You don't hear that low growl?”

Low growl? News to me.

Bernie glanced my way. “It's not necessarily you,” he said. “Could be indigestion.”

“Huh?”

I found myself with the lieutenant, out of the picture. Indigestion was what, again?

“From eating too fast,” Bernie said.

Eating too fast? How was that even possible?

“I know that one,” Soares said. “My girlfriend says I gotta slow down, chew my food.”

“You have a girlfriend?” Bernie said.

“What's surprising about that?” said Soares. And then he burped, one of those real gassy burps. He'd eaten sausages, and not long ago, plus there were some Tums in there, Tums being something I knew well from once having snapped up a whole box. I came close to an understanding of what they'd just been talking about and then clouds closed off the part of my mind that was working on the problem and that was that.

“. . . let my own hair down first,” Soares was saying. It looked to me that he had hardly any at all, but I waited for him to take off his uniform hat, which he did not, so I never got to find out for sure. “We interviewed everyone who'd been on the third floor of 1643 Ellington Parkway either at the time of the attack or the break-in. An accountant across the hall thinks he might have heard the gunshot, but he put it down to some noise on the street. Several people saw the sign painter calling himself Mr. York at work and thought nothing of it. No one remembers the older woman you said was with him, and there's no professional sign painter named York in the district. We're still looking into the rest of metro. Preakness Development is bogus—” Soares took out a notebook, checked a page. “—as you mentioned, and Terrapin Exports was a dead end, as you also mentioned.”