David A. Schwinghammer
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· Honest Thief, Tender Murderer, Chapter 10
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Charlie and Shirley, a woman who knows Marv, get more chummy; she tells him about Marv's friend Rip.
Chapter 11
Mr. Fix-it
‟It is hard, if not impossible, to snub a beautiful
woman–-they remain beautiful and the rebuke recoils.”
–-Winston Churchill
Old Man Bentler steered his ancient station wagon into Marv’s yard, careening sideways when he hit a patch of ice. The dirty brown Ford could be a ‛62 or maybe a ‛63; Marv couldn’t tell about station wagons. Bentler drove the beater directly into a snowbank; he had to be going blind.
Marv drew back from the kitchen window, spied the DNR calendar he had hanging next to the stove with the red circle marking the date. Damn it! He’d forgotten to pay the rent.
Bentler’d want to come in and see what Marv had done with the place. He’d lived on this farm all of his life, as a boy and a man--over seventy years.
Dorie was playing the stereo so loud the floor was quaking. Marv went to the fuse box and cut the basement electricity. He could hear her swearing down there; had to listen really hard, though. That had been a really close call when he’d let Rip barge his way in here. The ceiling down there should’ve been too high for her; she’d figured out a way, though. More power to her.
Back at the rain-streaked window--the weather couldn’t make up its mind whether to snow or sleet--Marv watched Bentler trying to get out of the car; he hit another slick spot and fell on his rear end.
Marv grabbed his coat and hat. When he opened the door, the sleet pelted his face hard, and the wind had to be blowing at least twenty miles an hour. He skated on down to the station wagon and helped Bentler up. The engine was still ticking away on the Ford.
“How many m-miles you got on this old car, Mr. B-Bentler?” Marv said, opening the door and pushing the geezer back in.
“I can’t rightly say, Marvin. The odometer she quit on me a long time ago.” Marv picked up the old man’s feed cap, repositioning it on his head.
“Sorry about the r-rent, Mr. Bentler. Put her in first. I’ll p-push.” Didn’t look like it would work. The snow was up to the undercarriage. When he pushed, Bentler spun the wheels, the Goodyears screaming like a cat with its tail caught in a door.
“Let me g-get my shovel out of the truck,” Marv said. For some traction, he grabbed a bag of wood shavings to be on the safe side. Sure enough, when he had the snow shoveled out, there was glare ice underneath.
Bentler rolled down the window. ‟Didn’t come for the rent. Wanted to know if you thought any more about church. It’s not good to live alone. ‛I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.’ That’s Psalms 120:7.”
How in the hell was he going to get rid of this guy? Belt him over the head with the snow shovel, muscle him into the trunk, drive him out to the quarry, and cover him up with rocks? The workout would be a dress rehearsal. Kind of liked him, though. Guess he couldn’t do that.
‟‛He m-maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the j-just and on the unjust.’ That’s M-Matthew 5:45.” Marv’s mother had made him memorize a verse from the Bible every day of his life, before he went out on his own.
‟Sounds like you know your Bible, son.”
‟Let m-me give you that rent, Mr. Bentler.” Marv’s nose was growing numb from the sleet and his clothes were getting wet. He leaned in and wrote the check on Mr. Bentler’s back, tucked it into the old man’s coat pocket. Then he reached over and turned the key to the ignition before Bentler could quote another Bible verse.
“I’ll be s-sure to s-send the rent on time next month. I’ve had a l-lot on my mind l-lately. Good-bye, Mr. Bentler.” He spun around and tracked toward the house, careful to stay off the slippery path.
Once inside, he hung up his coat and hat, stripped out of his wet clothes and shoes, grabbed a towel out of the bathroom and wiped down his hair. He stood nude at the window, surveying the yard. Bentler was still there, staring up at him. Slowly the ancient Ford backed out of the yard, managing to avoid another snowbank, and tooled on down the road, the wrong way, away from Mason City where Bentler now lived.
Marv went over to the fuse box and switched on the electricity in the basement. Immediately, the floor began to quake. Couldn’t deny her a little music; it must be awfully boring down there for her. Rubbing his hair vigorously, he went to the bedroom and got some new underwear, a pair of jeans, and a flannel shirt. He remained barefoot.
She was driving him crazy. She’d tried to burn down the house! What would she do next? And Detective Black was closing in on him, if Mr. three-piece suit at the bank knew what he was talking about.
He found his diary in the lamp stand next to his bed, thought for a moment, then went back to the kitchen, poured himself a cup of coffee, and sat at the table. He had to make up his mind what he was going to do with her. Rex stared up at him from the corner. That taxidermist had done a great job on him. He’d had to argue with the guy to get him to do it, though. He’d insisted that Rex’s head was beyond repair. Marv had said to do the best he could. There was no way he was going to put Rex in the ground.
Marv scrawled the word ‟shotgun” on one page of the diary. It was over there in the closet. He didn’t think he could shoot her with the pistol he’d used to kidnap her. Rip had gotten it for him from Melby’s Pawn. He didn’t even know if the thing worked. He wasn’t about to torture her with a weapon that might misfire. It would be the shotgun if he decided to do it that way.
He drew a line down the middle of the paper. On the other side of the page, he wrote ‟Take her to the Boundary Waters and let her go in the middle of nowhere.” That’s quite a drive, though, about five hundred miles, he thought. It would take him a good ten hours. He’d have to tie her up and put her in the trunk of the Trans Am. She could smother in there, and he wasn’t even sure the Trans Am would make it that far.
Marv ran his hand over his still wet hair. On the left hand side of the page, under ‟shotgun,” he wrote the word ‟suicide.” He’d never thought about taking his own life before, even during the worst of times, when his family had no money and all the kids in school picked on him.
The music had somehow gotten louder, the vibrations tickling his feet. He listened, trying to pick up the song, then went over to the closet, lifted out the shotgun, tucked the box of shells under one arm, and stepped toward the cellar door.
The stairs creaked as he descended. The music was pounding. How could she stand it that loud? He almost tripped when he got to the last step. He righted himself and crossed the few remaining feet to Dorie’s door.
The music stopped. ‟Are you out there, Marv? Marv, you son of a bitch. If you’re out there, say something!”
The screechy sound of her voice made him shiver. She always sounded as if she were on the rag these days. He’d loved the sound of her voice . . . before he’d taken her.
“Marv, if you don’t open the door this minute, I’m not going to talk to you for a week.”
Opening the breech of the twelve gauge, he selected two shells, juggling and almost dropping the box. He placed the shells in the chamber. Better let her have both barrels.
#
Charlie sat in a booth at Denny’s, having a cup of coffee. He scanned the front page of the Mason City Bugle but couldn’t really concentrate on the headlines. He was thinking about Shirley. That woman could really talk; between times, she’d told him about her twelve brothers and sisters who all still lived in the Mason City area, about her two brothers, Cliff and Warren, who didn’t get along--they hadn’t spoken in ten years. Shirley and her sisters were working on ways to patch things up. Before Charlie left, she asked him to inspect her toaster, which was on the blink. The cord was frayed; even he could fix that. ‟My hero,” she said.
“Horny sailor,” the cockatoo squawked.
He sipped his coffee. Should he take another crack at those tree contractors today? It’d go a lot faster if Angela could help, but she had to meet the Billmeyer bus and would be tied up with them the whole day.
When Charlie got back to the Hawkeye Inn, Shirley, in her little blue hatchback, was parked in the lot. They found a table in the snack bar, ordered coffee. Charlie retrieved the Mason City Bugle he’d folded up in his coat pocket, turned to the sports section, then thought better of it, tossed it aside. Charlie didn’t know what to say to her; and for once, she seemed at a loss for words. Charlie glanced out the window. Nothing was more depressing than a motel parking lot. Windblown McDonald’s wrappers, crushed Pepsi cans, oil slicks and other detritus from cars that belonged in a metal compactor.
“Met your girlfriend,” she finally said.
“My girlfriend?” he said. “I haven’t got a girlfriend.”
“Angela Martin, works for the Hydrangea Shopper. I talked to her this morning about Marv.”
“But she was supposed to be meeting the Billmeyer bus. What did you tell her?”
“Nothing much. I remembered this birthday card Marv sent me.“
”Marv sent you a birthday card and you didn’t tell me about it?”
“No last name or nothing. She thinks Detective Black might be able to find some fingerprints on the envelope.”
Two posse comitatus types in the booth next to them were discussing the educational system, how it was pissing away all their money; seems like there was a school referendum vote in the offing. One of the men reached behind him, sorted through Charlie’s discarded paper, and took the classifieds.
“Help yourself,” Charlie said.
“Don’t worry about the birthday card,” she said. “I’ve got something better. This one time I was out there watching Marv chop down this tree, Dutch elm disease he said it was, and this other fellow pulled up and asked Marv something about trees. I remember him because he had such an unusual last name.”
‟So what was it?”
She checked her face in her compact. ‟What do I get?” she said.
‟Don’t play with me, Shirley.”
‟You didn’t seem to mind last night.” She laughed. “I’ll tell you if you go with me to see my mother. It’s her birthday. She’ll be so happy when she sees I’ve got a new man.”
He’d heard about this before. The woman had gone to bed with him and now she thought they were a couple.
“I don’t see how that can hurt. What was his name?”
‟We’ll go right away then?” Posse comitatus got up and left. Two teenagers with green hair and hardware in every orifice took their place.
“I’m expecting Dennis Swegman,” he said. “He’s the reporter I told you about. I need him to find some information on Lexus-Nexus for me. A psychological profile of the type of person who stalks celebrities will help my story. We’ll go after I talk to him.”
She pouted. “Fine, I’ll tell you then.”
Shortly thereafter, Dennis Swegman’s two-toned blue and black pickup chugged into the lot.
Dennis poured coffee. ‟Got a new lead on Dorie,” he said. ‟A farmer reported what he thought was a recently dug grave on the edge of his cornfield.”
“Oh God!” Shirley said.
‟It’s not her,” Charlie said.
‟Black must think it is; he’s invited the press to be there when they dig it up.”
Beseechingly, Charlie raised his eyebrows at Shirley; she stamped her foot and scowled at him, which he took to mean no fucking way would she delay the visit to Moms.
‟Could be awfully embarrassing if she’s not there,” Swegman said. ‟Kind of like that Geraldo show where he was after Al Capone’s treasure. Nothing but old pop bottles.”
“I’ll bet you a year’s retirement it’s not Dorie,” Charlie said.
‟No bet,” Swegman said, chewing on one of his pinkies.
Shirley searched Charlie’s eyes, then Dennis’s. She shrugged, seemingly deferring to their masculine judgement. ‟You have the nicest hands,” she told Swegman, who was still nibbling on the pinkie, ‟but you need to do something about those nails. I have something you can put on them that will make them taste like tabasco sauce. You’ll never bite your fingernails again, I swear.”
They returned to the room, where Charlie had his notes strewn all over the bed. Swegman was going to try to dial up Lexus-Nexus on Charlie’s computer. ‟God this thing is slow,” he said. ‟My machine has 166 megahertz, a Pentium processor with MMX, 2.1 gigabytes of hard drive and 16 megabytes of SDRAM. We should go back to my office and work.”
Shirley lounged on the bed with her legs crossed; her dress riding up on her thighs.
‟When does Black plan on exhuming the so-called body?” Charlie asked.
‟Three o’clock,” Swegman said. ‟The medical examiner isn’t available until then.” He hit some keys, located the Lexus-Nexus profile.
‟That’s the woman I talked to this morning,” Shirley said, pointing at Angela’s photo on the lamp stand. “What’re you doing with her picture?”
“Not now, Shirley,” he said. “Why don’t you cover the exhumation, Dennis? Shirley and I will work on this other lead we have.”
‟What’s that about?” Swegman said.
‟She thinks she knows a friend of Marv’s.”
“And she’s not telling you his name until you explain that picture,” Shirley said, pouting.
When Swegman left, Charlie took his place at the computer, tapping in some of the Lexus-Nexus profile on the word processor. The kidnapper was between 19 and 35, never graduated high school, had low self esteem.
Shirley unplugged the machine. “Hey!” he said.
“The picture?”
He sighed. “Kind of pathetic, really. I took it with a telephoto lens. Thought if we went on this trip together, maybe she and I could get to know each other better, but it’s like I’m just her chauffeur.”
Shirley wrapped her arms around his neck, snuggled her cheek next to his. “Poor Charlie. She said you two grew up together, but that you were more of an acquaintance than anything. I’m being a bitch about my mother. She’ll wait. Marv’s friend’s name is Frank, rhymes with bank, Knox. I remembered it cause it was the same as Fort Knox, and anything to do with money always catches my attention.” Shirley found Knox’s number in the phone book. His wife said he was in the park, pruning trees for the city.
The foul morning weather had lifted and the shy Iowa sun smiled down on them as they approached the park, where they found Frank Knox standing next to a white truck with Mason City Park and Recreation printed on its side in blue lettering. Bleeding like a stuck pig, Frank had his hand wrapped in a big blue handkerchief. Seems he’d nicked himself with his chain saw. Frank had his coat open; the flannel shirt under the parka was too small, and Charlie could see Frank’s belly button; somehow it didn’t have the same effect as Madonna’s.
‟Aren’t you gonna go get that stitched up?” Shirley said. ‟That looks like a pretty bad cut.” Despite the cut, Frank couldn’t take his eyes off Shirley’s chest.
‟Nah, it happened before,” Frank said. ‟It’ll clot pretty soon. So you wanna know about Marv?” Frank dabbed at the wound; it was still bleeding.
Charlie wasn’t sure what to do--should he take the guy to emergency?
Frank said, ‟The only reason I know Marv is because the guy’s damn good with trees. If I want a diagnosis, I go get Marv. He’s a walking Extension office. He ain’t got a telephone that I know of, or if he does, I keep forgetting to ask him for a number. I just drive around until I find him. You can’t miss that old truck. He’s usually working at one of the apartment complexes or the tree farm around the holidays.” Frank lifted the handkerchief and the blood spurted, soaking his parka and jeans.
‟For the love of God,” Charlie said. ‟Let me take you to the emergency room.”
Frank ignored him. ‟Wait a minute! The last time I talked to him was about this parasite problem I run across. Afterwards, I bought him a beer at this dump called Rusty’s. He was with this guy Rip, short for Ripulski. You remember him, played for the Cardinals. Pretty good power hitter there for a while. This is a different one, though. Find Rip. He might know where Marv lives. That’s Rusty’s Bar and Grill.”
In slow motion, his eyes rolling back in his head, Frank sat down in the snow. Shirley cinched the handkerchief around the man’s wrist, and they hurried him to the hospital, where Shirley insisted on calling Frank’s wife.
Rusty’s was on Main Street near an Amoco station. While Shirley waited in the car, Charlie talked to Mort Janey, the owner, another fat man, with hair protruding out from under his Hawaiian shirt. Pools of beer had been left unattended while Mort watched ‟The Young and Restless.” Mort didn’t want to give it up. His motto was ‟Whatever happens in Rusty’s stays in Rusty’s.” Charlie tried to bribe him with a tenner as he’d seen Jim Rockford do on TV. Mort was offended; he told Charlie to get the hell out of his bar.
On the way to Bethlehem Senior Citizens home, Shirley told Charlie about the time Marv asked her out. ‟He was a nice guy,” she said, ‟but he smelled like marijuana and I don’t have nothing to do with drugs. Otherwise, I woulda.”
Shirley’s mother had suffered a stroke; one side of her face was paralyzed and she couldn’t talk. When Charlie went to find coffee, one of the nurses said, ‟We’re pretty sure the old lady thinks your friend is her sister.”
They stayed with Shirley’s mother for two hours, then went back to the Hawkeye Inn where Shirley jumped him, smudging his face with red lipstick. “I think I love you,” she said. ‟No other man I’ve known would have gone with me to see my mother.” He reacted like a baby deprived of its mother’s touch, nuzzling her breasts, tasting the gooseflesh of her skin, burrowing his face in her wonderful hair, smelling of White Rain. In the midst of coitus, Charlie got a telephone call. When he heard the angelic voice, his erection withered like a cucumber left out in the sun. ‟Are you finished with the Billmeyers?” he said.
‟Hardly. I heard about that grave site on that farm and I was wondering if you knew anything.”
“Swegman went to cover it. He’s the reporter from The Bugle I’m working with. Who else is with the Billmeyer party besides her mother and aunts?”
“Don’t worry, your mother didn’t come. Dottie and Babe are here, though. Would you like to speak with them?”
“God forbid! Did Black meet the bus?”
“He was here for a few minutes. Marcie, Dorie’s producer, thinks he may have had something to do with the kidnapping; I smelled Scotch on his breath.”
“When did you see Dorie’s producer?”
“Dottie, Babe, and I went to the station. I thought she might have some insights, and the Billmeyer tour didn’t look too promising. A young man named Novak is taking us around this afternoon.”
“Tom’s a good boy. Met him when I talked to Black the first time.” He felt compelled to tell her about Shirley, as if they were an old married couple and he’d cheated on her.
‟He does seem nice. I’ll be in touch with you in the afternoon sometime. Bye, Charles.”
‟Good bye, Angela.” She hadn’t mentioned Shirley or the birthday card. What else was she keeping from him?
#
Shirley was jealous of the way his voice sounded when he’d talked to Angela. “Smitten” was how she’d described it. She slammed the door to his room on the way out and spun the wheels on the hatchback leaving the parking lot. He felt relieved. After she left, he dialed Swegman’s cell phone number.
‟Snipe hunt,” Swegman said. ‟Captain Pillsbury was there. Chewed Black’s ass in front of God and everybody. Thought they were going to duke it out for a while there. You find that friend of Marv’s?”
‟Yeah, I’m still working on it. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?”
‟Right. Say, that’s some babe you’ve got there.”
‟Looks are deceiving,” Charlie said.
Finally it was six o’clock and probably safe to return to Rusty’s. He wondered whether he should call Black. Nah, Black would probably throw him in jail again.
When Charlie got to Rusty’s, Mort had been replaced by a woman who was flirting with the boys at the bar. A cloud of smoke touched off a paroxysm of coughing, hacking and wheezing, and his eyes burned so bad he wanted to pluck them out. The smokers were playing a dice game for free drinks. This guy wearing a cowboy hat insisted that Charlie play.
The waitress, whose name was Billi, shook her head no. Charlie didn’t see any harm in it. There were about ten guys playing. Charlie tossed five fives on his first roll to win a free drink. The cowboy whistled. Billi asked what Charlie wanted to drink; he had the feeling that he didn’t dare order a Seven-Up, so he asked for Coors on tap. The beer was served in jars instead of glasses; Charlie had never drunk out of a jelly jar--felt like he needed a bib.
A frizzy-haired redhead next to him asked him where he was from, and when he said Minnesota, she said, “I’m a Cardinal fan. You guys were lucky in 1987. If Jack Clark hadn’t got hurt, the Twinkies woulda bit the dust in four games. I lost a hundred bucks on that one. Buy us a beer, whydon’tcha?”
Charlie couldn’t see any future in arguing about it, so he tapped his glass on the bar, signaling the waitress.
Billi came over wearing a scowl. ‟We don’t do that in here. Makes me look like your personal servant, see?”
Damn, another touchy sucker. Billi’s pink tank top, and hot pants to match, bulged ominously. Not a wise fashion choice, those hot pants. He apologized, bought the redhead a Sam Adams. She wandered away on the make for somebody else to annoy. Billi refilled the peanut basket, lifted his glass and wiped down the bar, working hard for her tip.
How should he go about this? ‟Ah, Billi, I’m just down here for the day to see my sister, and I’m looking for my brother-in-law.”
‟And who might that be?” she said.
‟He goes by a nickname. Rip, Rip Ripulski.”
‟You mean to say you don’t know your own brother-in-law? That’s Rip right over there, losing as usual. He’s the stupid-looking one in the cowboy hat.”
‟We’re not a close family.” He gave her a dollar tip, and she told him to put it in the jukebox. He grabbed his beer and crunched over peanut shells on the way to the juke ensconced in the corner near the popcorn popper. Lots of Country Western selections. Kitty Wells, Faron Young, Johnny Cash.
Rip ambled over to the juke. ‟Billi says you said you were my brother-in-law. I ain’t got no brother-in-law. What’s up?”
The man had grey eyes. Charlie couldn’t remember ever meeting anyone with grey eyes. ‟I was here this afternoon, and the owner wouldn’t answer any of my questions, so I had to be covert.”
Rip tugged at the brim of his hat, pulling it down over his eyes. ‟Bet you don’t think I know what that means. You’re not a cop, are you?”
‟Nope. Insurance. Used to be a teacher, but I got fired.”
The getting fired part seemed to impress Ripulski, as the frown was replaced with a little grin, and he turned his attention to the jukebox, running his finger over the listings. ‟Why don’t you play Alan Jackson?”
Charlie put the remaining fifty cents in the juke and gestured for Rip to play the rest. ‟I’ve got this new house. I need somebody to do the landscaping. Frank Knox tells me you know someone.” Rip punched some numbers.
‟People get a finder’s fee these days, don’t they?”
“Not for a landscaping job, but I want somebody good. Frank said you know this guy Marv and that nobody knows trees better than him. But Marv hasn’t got a phone.”
Rip stepped into Charlie’s space, so close he could smell the mixture of peanuts and beer on the man’s breath. ‟You sure are going through a lot of trouble to find somebody to plant trees. Sure is a coincidence you showing up now. The cops traced my phone call, didn’t they?”
“Don’t know anything about any phone call. Here’s my union card. Would a cop be carrying around an NEA card?”
Rip took the card. “National Education Association.
Bunch of damn Commies, corrupting our nation’s youth. It’s gonna cost yah if you wanna know about Marv. Twenty bucks. You got twenty bucks?”
Charlie reached for his billfold, fished around, found two tens.
“How much you got in there anyway?” Rip said, reaching for the money. “Better watch yourself; you could get mugged,” he said, snickering.
“Hold on there, Buddy,” Charlie said. “I want the name and address first.”
“Marv Lewinsky. You know, like the babe that made mouth music on the Prez. Lives about a mile south of town, across the freeway at the intersection of County Roads 13 and 45. There’s a little red barn on the property with a DeKalb advertisement painted on the side facing the road. Can’t miss it.”
The clatter of pool balls in the background punctuated Ripulski’s too detailed directions. ”You play?” Rip said. “Give you a chance to win your money back.”
Charlie had supported himself playing nine ball in college. He sunk the nine on the break. Rip insisted they go double or nothing. Charlie damn near made the nine on the break again, leaving it right on the lip of the pocket. Ripulski nudged the one ball into the nine, celebrating like White Shoes Johnson when it dropped into the pocket.
#
A black Intrepid was waiting outside the bar. The passenger door opened and a deep voice said, ‟Get in, Zelnick.” A neon light from the 7-11 across the street lit the man’s face. Same black hat, same cigar, same eerie manner. Charlie couldn’t wait to check out the address, but he didn’t fancy being shot down like a dog on a sordid street in a sordid neighborhood in sordid Mason City, Iowa, so he got in.
‟How’d you find me?” Charlie said. The cigar gave off a vague rum smell.
Black’s elaborate stereo, turned down low, played Kenny G. ‟Wasn’t really trailing you, Sport. Got this anonymous call with a tip about Dorie Bendix’s kidnapper. Wanted to know if there was a reward for information about her and how he’d go about collecting it. Anyways, we traced the number. Been tailing him ever since.” The detective’s black eyes stabbed at Charlie’s, as if he knew Charlie had Marv’s address and expected him to volunteer the information.
‟Sorry about the other day,” he said. ‟We cops sometimes have to do things we’re not especially proud of. I’ve been involved in lots of press conferences where all we can say is that we can’t divulge any information right now because it might hamper our investigation. I couldn’t really blame a reporter for using underhanded methods to get a story.” Black took a puff on his cigar, the red tip glowing like a branding iron. ‟Sooo, Charlie.” Black had never used his first name before. ‟What brings you to a place like this? Rusty’s isn’t exactly your kind of bar.”
He was right about that. Charlie had been afraid to go to the bathroom, and he had to go badly after all that Coors.
‟We’ve encountered this tipster before. Spousal abuse, public drunkenness, breaking and entering. Name’s Rip Ripulski. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that he had something to do with the kidnapping. I can let you see his file if it’ll help with your story. Of course, that’s not exactly kosher . . .”
Charlie couldn’t stand it. Black trying to be Leo Buscaglia was too much.
‟Look, Ripulski gave me directions on how to find Marv. I don’t think they’re any good. I was on my way to check them out when I saw you out here.”
Black punched a button on the stereo; Pete Fountain’s clarinet blared forth. He blinked, noncommittally, as if he expected people to keep things from him, then said, “I can go take a look if you want, or you could. One of us should watch Ripulski.”
“I think we’re at an impasse, Detective. If you go look and she’s there, I’m left out in the cold.”
“Not so. I’m a cop. Cops aren’t eligible to collect the $5,000 reward, if you get my drift.”
“I don’t care about the money.”
“More for me then; if she’s there, I’ll call Rusty’s, have somebody come out here and get you. Don’t try to go back on your word, though; I’m a really spiteful enemy.”
“What about Rip? Wouldn’t he be a more likely candidate for the reward?”
“He had his chance. If it’s up to me, he’ll do time for aiding and abetting.”
“I’ll stay here,” Charlie said, handing over the address he’d scribbled in his notebook. Black grinned, lit up another stogie.
Charlie stood on the sidewalk as the Intrepid braked for a stop sign at the end of the block, its taillights flaming red, then turned left.
The wind picked up, biting at Charlie’s face and hands, so he ran down to the Volkswagen bug and backed it closer to the bar. Might as well have been outside; Volkswagen heaters sucked.
An hour later, Black had not returned, so Charlie went back inside to use the can. Ripulski was passed out in one of the booths. He wasn’t going any place, but Billi was giving Charlie the evil eye, so he went back outside into the parking lot adjoining the bar. Three cars. A Camaro, a Chevy Impala, and a Pontiac Sunbird. Ripulski would never drive a Sunbird. Charlie looked inside the driver’s side window of the Camaro. The steering wheel cover was embroidered with the initials R.R. Charlie let the air out of the back tires, just in case there was a back door.
When he got back to the VW, the front door of Rusty’s banged open and Rip came stumbling down the steps, Black close on his heels. Charlie had been right; Ripulski’s directions had been bogus, but Rip was willing to take them to Marv’s farm himself, providing Charlie would be coming. Ripulski had a mouse under one eye Charlie hadn’t noticed when they’d played nine ball.
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Web Site:
Mystery Writer
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Black is hot on the trail and got Rip by the ears to go find where Marv is. Rip is hoping that Charlie, the newspaper guy will go along and write the story in his favor.
Some good stuff. Real down-to-earth and realistic for the Midwest where I hanker from. Just wish I had time to read the whole book and give you a sterling review for your very good writing and character development.
Ron