Authors: Brad Latham
“What’s wrong with it—bub?” she asked.
“I ordered this steak rare, and it’s not what the menu said—thick T-bone. This steak’s no thicker than this plate, and it’s
burned all the way through.”
The woman gave her gum a couple of clacks while she thought this through. She looked at Lockwood as if to discover if the
nut’s keeper planned to restrain him, saving her the effort. Lockwood smiled, gave a light shrug, picked up his knife and
fork, and cut into his steak, well satisfied with what she had brought him.
“Look, that’s what we serve, mister,” she said. “I heard you complain about the beer, and I
know
there’s nothing wrong with it. I seen a million guys eat that steak, and me and Joe don’t get no complaints. I don’t think
you like much of anything. You don’t like it, you don’t eat it.”
“Take it back,” Heatherton said. “Cook me one
rare
, the way I originally ordered it.”
“What do you mean,
rare?
” she asked, perplexed. “It’s cold that way. Don’t you want it cooked?”
“I’m not hungry. Take it back. I’ll eat elsewhere.”
She frowned and shot a look at the bartender, a look Lockwood interpreted to mean that she was having more trouble than she
could handle. Lockwood ate quickly, having a hunch that what he didn’t eat quickly, he might not eat at all.
The bartender—a tall man with a barrel chest and a still larger paunch—loomed over their table.
“Some problem, Patty?” he asked. He put his thick hands on his hips.
“This bozo don’t like the way Marty fried the steak,” she said. “He wants me to take it back, wants another one.”
The bartender looked down at the steak for a few seconds, long enough for Lockwood to get in a couple of bites of steak and
one of mashed potato.
“Looks all right to me. What’s wrong with it, mister?” he asked Heatherton.
“Could we not discuss it?” Heatherton asked in a voice that had gone from disdain to something like a high squeal. “I can’t
eat this—shoe sole.”
“You ordered it, ace,” the bartender said. “I can’t sell it to nobody else now. We sell lots and lots of them. I take it you’re
going to pay for it?”
“I bloody well am not going to pay for something that’s inedible,” Heatherton protested.
The bartender looked at Lockwood to see how formidable an ally Heatherton had. Lockwood gave him the same smile and shrug
he had given Patty earlier, as if to say Heatherton was all the bartender’s problem.
“You don’t pay for it, bub, you stay here till the cops come,” the bartender said. His girth seemed to expand. “You foreigners
think you can get away with murder, and you got another think coming.”
Heatherton stood up. “I’ll pay for this cold piss you call beer, but I’m damn sure not going to pay for this inedible steak.”
“Patty, call the cops,” the bartender ordered.
As Patty scurried toward the bar, Lockwood slowed down his chewing. If this were dragged out till the cops got here, then
he should have enough time to eat in peace.
The bartender and Heatherton glared at each other, neither daring to push any farther. Lockwood heard Patty talking to someone
on the phone called Mack, and gathered that she and Joe the bartender were great buddies with the local police.
Lockwood, in a highly conspicuous gesture, took out his wallet and laid two one-dollar bills on the table.
“Great lunch, Joe,” he said mildly and he stood up and sauntered over to a barstool, on which he perched and picked his teeth
and waited. At the other end of the bar, Lockwood saw that the two old guys in dirty cardigans had swiveled around to watch.
This incident would give the Eagle Bar enough conversation to fill up many a dreary week to come.
Just as Lockwood started in on his second toothpick, Heatherton broke the impasse by declaring, “Oh, all right, I’ll pay for
the bloody—the non-bloody—thing.”
He opened his wallet, pulled out a couple of bills, and flung them to the table. One hit, and the other drifted to the floor.
“Pick it up and put it on the table,” Joe said.
“I’m leaving,” Heatherton answered. “You’ve got your money.”
“Nobody throws what he owes me at my feet,” Joe said. He moved to cut off Heatherton’s advance to the front door.
“Heatherton, you’re a fool,” Lockwood said lazily. “If you’ve got any sense, put the bill on the table and let’s go.”
Through the window they saw the black and white Dodge with the aerial pull up in front. A couple of gangly uniformed cops,
hoisting their guns as they moved, got out each side of the car.
Heatherton mashed his lips together in a fury held in. He stooped and picked up the bill and slapped it on the table and stalked
out the door. Lockwood followed him with an easy gait, turning as he left to give a lazy wave to Patty and Joe, who glowered
at Heatherton’s back.
“Thanks, guys,” Lockwood said. “You did a terrific job.”
He found Heatherton sitting in the passenger seat of his Cord. The Englishman stared straight ahead. Wordless, Lockwood got
in, started the car, and drove back to Northstar. And that was the way they rode back to the plant—without a word spoken between
them.
Lockwood debated whether to push Heatherton for more information, but decided that he had all he was likely to get for now.
There was something funny about Heatherton, but Lockwood just couldn’t put his finger on it. Surely the Englishman had been
in America long enough to know how to get along here. Had the incident at the Eagle Bar been a diversion to keep Lockwood
from following the line of questioning he had been on?
By the end of that second day. none of the investigators, including Lockwood, had learned anything, and they had begun to
trip over each other’s feet.
By mid-afternoon Area C had been turned back over to Greer and his engineers, who spent the last few hours of the day putting
their tools and instruments back in the spots they considered correct. Manners, the T-man, snapped at each man who came in
to report the same thing—nothing. By now police and highway patrol in half the United States had an all points bulletin for
the Northstar Refrigeration panel truck that had carried the bombsight out of the premises, but it seemed to have vanished
after it left the front gate. Every dock on the North and South Shore from Manhattan to Montauk had been gone over foot by
foot by Treasury agents or the Coast Guard. Every employee who had been in Area C at any time during the past six months had
been questioned, and no one seemed to know anything that helped. Lockwood spent the afternoon with the three agents whom Manners
had assigned to start at the bottom of the plant and work their way to the roof to make sure that the bombsight had not been
secreted in the building. By 5:00, Lockwood was prepared to swear that the thing was not on the premises.
He called Manhattan to report to Mr. Gray.
“You find it?” Gray opened the conversation.
“No.”
“What is this thing, Lockwood?”
“I’m not supposed to say. Especially not over the phone. Why don’t you ask Mr. Gordon?”
“I did. He won’t tell me.” Lockwood could almost see the vexation on his chief’s face. In the entire history of Mr. Gray’s
time at Transatlantic (which Lockwood and the other claims investigators measured in hundreds of years) Lockwood had never
heard of an investigation in which his chief wasn’t allowed to know what was being investigated. Lockwood loved it, but played
it straight.
“Well, I’m convinced they had it, Mr. Gray,” Lockwood reported. “And I’m convinced after the search we put the place through
today it’s not here.”
“So we got a theft.”
“Definitely. But who or why—that we don’t have.”
“We have a ‘time of the essence’ clause, Lockwood. The penalty is $1000 a day.”
Lockwood sighed. “I know. I know. If you and I okay the payment and it turns out that Dzeloski or Greer or one of these guys
is in on it, or some other stockholder…. Hey! Have we investigated Northstar’s financial structure?”
“I’m way ahead of you,” Gray said. “I’ve got Steve working on it. He ought to have something for you. I’ll put him on after
we get through.”
Lockwood felt warmer toward Mr. Gray. He might not have a drop of the milk of humanity in him, but he knew his job.
“Great, thanks. But if we okay the claim and we’re wrong, we’re in trouble.”
“And if we don’t approve it and the board sees that they’ve got to pay out $1000 a day in penalties, we’re going to be in
more trouble,” Gray said.
Lockwood heard Gray’s swivel chair squeak and the wheeze of a long exhalation of English Oval. “That’s why I put you on this
thing, Lockwood. We got till Monday morning at 9:10—ninety-six hours after we were notified—to give Northstar a check for
$75,000 or face $1000 a day extra.”
Lockwood squirmed. “We don’t want to pay it and we don’t want not to pay it.”
“Exactly,” Gray said. “Old man Gordon would never have written a policy like this. You young squirts—you think you know so
much—you can beat the system, twist it—”
Lockwood cut him off. “This is getting us nowhere. What do you want me to do? There was a ‘product,’ and me and about a hundred
guys from the government are sure it was stolen—”
“I want the thing back!” Gray shouted. “We’re paying $75,000 for nothing. If it wasn’t for that ‘time of the essence’ clause,
we could stall them for a few months while we found whatever-the-hell this thing is.” Lockwood didn’t feel comfortable with
this business strategy, but it was the wrong time to say so. “I’m going to speak to Gordon about this, find out if there’re
any more surprises in his personal safe.”
Lockwood smiled and looked at his watch. He still had time to shower before he left for Myra’s. He was sure a lot of this
was bluff on Mr. Gray’s part. Gordon. Jr., was no slouch at defending himself from other shareholders and upset directors
of Transatlantic, and he wasn’t the type to take any guff from people on his payroll. He hadn’t stayed on top because of his
boyish charm and breezy good manners; Lockwood knew that for all his youth, their president knew as much about insurance as
any man in the business.
“I’ll keep hunting, and I’ll keep stalling their requests for a check,” Lockwood said. “But don’t be surprised if they put
a lot of pressure on Gordon, possibly from Washington, and don’t be surprised at heat from Gordon. You might want to send
another couple investigators out here.”
Gray’s voice whipped back across the wire, “You not man enough for this, Lockwood?”
“Mr. Gray, listen. I can’t tell you what was stolen—I’m not allowed to—but both the British and American governments are boiling
mad, and our check—for reasons that I don’t understand—is necessary to replace this ‘object.’ Why they don’t just get the
government to advance them money is beyond me, but it has something to do with politics and opposition on a congressional
committee. From what I gather, the whole point of paying our exorbitant premium was to make sure
nothing
slowed down production.”
“I’ll give you Steve,” was Mr. Gray’s answer. “You call me tomorrow. And tell me you found it, you hear me, Lockwood? I sent
you out there because you were my best. Don’t disappoint me.” Gray clicked off.
Steve had information on half a dozen of the people who worked at Northstar. For the next quarter-hour Lockwood jotted down
notes on Myra Rodman, Josef Dzeloski, Stanley Greer, and several of the engineers who worked in Area C. He filled up most
of an entire notebook, and as they worked through Steve’s information, Lockwood gave Steve other questions he wanted answers
to.
“Thanks, Steve. You’ve done a great job.”
“Not according to Mr. Gray,” Steve answered. “He wants me to tell him from these people’s bios what’s being made out there.”
Lockwood laughed. “What’d you tell him?”
“Given these folks’ background, I’d say they were building a wireless refrigerator that can navigate itself from Times Square
to Elephant Breath, Montana.”
They both laughed.
“I hope you didn’t spill this to our chief,” Lockwood said. “That’s an important government secret you’ve discovered.”
“My lips are sealed. Be glad you’re out there—for two days Gray’s been like a bear with the black ass.”
“Better you than me,” Lockwood said. “Look, suppose I call you tomorrow? I got another interview in an hour.”
“At 7:00 at night? This interviewee wear skirts, lipstick, and earrings?”
“My lips are sealed.”
“I hope they stay sealed all night. Call me tomorrow this time. I ought to have more info.”
A half-hour later Lockwood was in his silver Cord on Highway 27, on the way to Myra’s. He felt hopped-up and excited as he
thought of her. This could be the night. It was always a good sign when a woman invited you for a meal after you had taken
her out.
He stopped and bought the most expensive bottle of red wine the liquor store had, but even though the wine was French, at
$2.10, he was sure it couldn’t be much.
The night before, when she had been so difficult, he had played it cool. At one point in the evening he figured he would just
deposit her back at her place and not ask her out again. But over the course of the evening she had changed, warmed up, and
all day today Lockwood had felt her light body still dancing in his arms, as easy to move around as the lightest of down-filled
pillows. And now after all, she had invited him to her place—he would be on the home stretch if he only avoided turning her
off with a bad move.
She met him at the door in a robe of bold Mediterranean colors that flowed to the floor and billowed around her.
“You’ve never seen a caftan before?” she asked.
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Don’t just stare, come in. I got several in Paris, at the North African bazaars. Do you like it?”
“I love it. Gives you terrific freedom of movement.”
She twirled, which caused the torso and skirt of the multicolored caftan to flutter around her body.
He admired her small house, and she asked him to light the fire in the grate while she mixed them martinis. After the fire
caught, he opened the red wine and put it just off the hearth to warm and air. Myra turned on the phonograph on which sat
a stack of records, and a lonely horn warbled and argued with the orchestra.