Darker Than Amber (12 page)

"When I next see Sam, I'll tell him that his Noreen Walker is quite a gal. And thanks again."
When I got turned around and headed out of the driveway, I saw her way down the dark street, saw just the swing of the arms in the long sleeves of the white blouse under the jumper dress.
A very talented old-time con man once coached me very carefully in the fine art of appearing to be very very drunk. At midnight, after having changed to an executive-on-a-convention suit, I reappeared, stoned to the eyebrows, at the bar of The Annex. I walked with the controlled care of a man walking a twelve-inch beam forty stories above Park Avenue. I eased myself onto a bar stool in stately slow motion. As I stared straight ahead into the bottle racks, I saw, out of the corner of my eye, the contented weasel approaching to wipe the spotless bar top.
"Good evening, sir," he said with that small emphasis which was in tribute to the dollar tip way back during the cocktail hour. "Plymouth over ice?"
I swung my stare toward him, without haste, focused ten feet behind him, and then on him. I spoke with deliberation, spacing each word to give it an unmistakable clarity. "I have been in here before. You have a very good memory, my man. Plymouth will do nicely. Very nicely indeed. Yes. Thank you so much. Very nice place you have here."
"Thank you, sir."
When he had put the drink down, he hovered. I stared straight ahead until he began to turn away, and then said, "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow."
"Sir?"
"What is your name, my good fellow?"
"Albert, sir."
"Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. Words of one of the poets, Albert. I made a great deal of money this month. A vulgar quantity."
"Congratulations, sir."
"Thank you, Albert. You have understanding. It is a rare virtue. My tax attorneys have arranged that I keep a maximum amount of that sum. My associates are eaten by envy. My dear wife will smile upon me. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, Albert. In one of those tomorrows, I shall pry loose another plum from the tree of life. But will it be meaningful? What is the symbolic value?"
"Well, money is money. I mean you can't buy happiness, sir, but it sure takes the sting out of being unhappy."
"Unhappy. I knew you had understanding. And bored, Albert. The days become the same." I turned on the stool and looked around at the lounge area. The brown-breasted piano player had changed to a blue gown with a V down to the navel, and evidently with some concealed device which kept it anchored just unboard of the nipple areas. When I swung back I swayed slightly, closed my eyes, opened them again, lifted my drink and looked at the cocktail napkin. "Yes. Of course. The Annex. I have been in a great many places this evening, Albert. I have talked with many many many people. Few of them had understanding. They cannot comprehend the tragic trauma of our times. Someone suggested I return here. I have forgotten who. Perhaps I was misled. A rather large fellow, as I remember. The evening blurs. That is what happens to evenings. They all blur, merge, become meaningless. Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. Albert, I know you have understanding. You have proven that. But do you have tolerance for the mistakes of others?"
"The way I see it, anybody can make a mistake, sir. Right?"
"You are also a philosopher. My mistake would be tactical, Albert. The large chap at an unremembered place implied get that word, Albert... implied that here I might find an ear, a little pussycat ear into which I could tell my tale of sadness, my need of cheer. Man is a lonely animal, Albert. And every place is a lonely place. If I have asked for some service the house does not, could not, would not provide, I am truly sorry for having offended you. I beg your pardon most humbly, my dear fellow."
He set to work increasing the gleam of an already polished glass. "Well, sir, let me say this. You won't find a nicer place on the beach. Now suppose, just suppose some girl comes in here. Now understand, I don't mean any hooker. I mean an upper-grade girl, and she's restless, and maybe something has happened, boyfriend trouble, and she's hurting a little. You understand? So she's at my bar and she has one over the limit and maybe her judgment isn't too good and some bum starts moving in on her. What do I do? When I say bum, I mean maybe he's got a two-hundred-dollar suit, a bill-clip full of money, he's still a bum in my book. What I do, I chill the bum off her, and when I get a chance, I see that she gets to be with the kind of man anybody can see is a real gentleman-like yourself, sir. That way nobody gets hurt. Nobody has any regrets. Anytime you get two nice people together, it makes you feel good."
"Albert, you continue to amaze me."
"Freshen that drink up, sir?"
"Splendid idea. But to go back to the topic again, it would mean I would have to be on hand at precisely the right moment. And so our discussion is purely academic."
"Sir, in one way it is and in another way it isn't. It's really kind of a weird coincidence you came in here tonight again and we got into this kind of a talk. It's like fate or some thing. It so happens there is this girl works cocktail waitress here. She's really a great kid. Just great. And the trouble she's been having..
I held up my hand to stop him. I closed my eyes, swayed slightly, holding on to the padded rail.
"You okay, sir?"
"I do not mean to spurn your suggestion, dear chap. I wished one moment to recollect a few names the large fellow mentioned. Doubtless they are dear friends of his and, if I have the right place, well-known here. A Miss Tami Western, a Miss Barntree, or a Miss... the name escapes me. Del something. Slender."
Albert scuttled back into his weasel hole and slammed his little doors. He wanted some time to reappraise the situation, and so he excused himself and went down the bar and served the few other customers in his section.
When he came back he said, "None of those ladies has been in here tonight." There was finality in his tone.
"Albert, we seem to be losing our rapport. Have I done something wrong?"
"Wrong? Wrong? A customer asks about another customer, so I say whether they been in or not. Okay?"
My hand was on the bar, palm up. I pulled my thumb back enough to expose the corner number on the folded twenty.
"A fellow as deft, as kindly, as helpful as you, Albert, would know how to get in touch."
Strangely, he hesitated, and then the twenty disappeared so quickly I half expected to see a little puff of smoke. He gave a cautious glance down the bar, then leaned over it toward me. His personality suffered an abrupt change. "Friend, what you just bought for the twenty, maybe you won't like. But you are getting your money's worth. Advice, you bought. I don't know if you come in here with a case of the cutes, or if somebody steered you to a busted mouth for laughs. Either way it would be the same. There's muscle don't want you poking in that direction, not those broads, not Western and Barntree and Whitney. All I know about that operation, they got no room for what you got in mind. I'm doing you a favor. Forget it. For half a bill I set you up with a good clean hardworking kid. You want to get something you couldn't forget so quick, hang around until two o'clock, for two bills you get the piano player, if after she looks you over she says okay, which she probably would because she isn't booked and what she won't take is fat or old, some kind of a thing about that, and either kid it would be for the night. But you come in here and give me the names you give me, friend, it has to turn me off, You following me?"
"Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow."
"Oh for chrissake!"
"In the vernacular, dear boy, my earlier acquaintance was having me on?"
"He was sending you to play in the traffic."
"This muscle you mentioned, is it that dangerous?"
"You better believe it. Those broads can put on the cool pretty good, but if somebody doesn't take a hint, then they get a real good hint, like a kneecap gets kicked loose out in the parking lot."
"But with no style, dear boy. Punks, no doubt." He shook his head sadly. "You don't want to believe me, sir. This is no game. Take my word. I don't tell anybody about what you asked, I'm doing you a favor."
I manufactured a shudder and some difficulty in focusing on Albert. I put a five-dollar bill on the bar. "Suddenly, dear friend, I find myself in dire need of an empty bed rather than diversion. I have foundered on the rocks. Plymouth rocks. I trust we may pursue these matters when I have a less overwhelming sense of unreality."
With an egg-sucking grin Albert said, "Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, sir?"
"Exactly. We have each made a new friend, and so the evening is not a total waste." I walked my twelve-inch beam on out the door.
Back in my hall of mirrors, spread-eagled and supine on one of my two double beds under the cave-breath of the air-conditioning, I fit together the pieces I had, and I thought of them in three colors-green for the facts, yellow for the reasonable guesses, red for the ones I had to reach for.
It puzzled me that to be totally stoned and heavily solvent did not make me attractive bait. Perhaps they could handle only so much bait at a time. If they hadn't replaced VangieTami, the other two might be diligently busy at the moment. They might both be off on cruise ships. They might be lying low until they were certain their previous ventures had not created unwelcome heat and attention. Or they could be setting up new pigeons-provided the execution of Tami had not made the group decide to suspend operations until they were certain she had not left them a little posthumous gift of trouble.
One Mack had driven the car that had stopped on the bridge over our fishing hole. One Terry had dumped her over. And her reappearance when the bartender she spoke of had evidently betrayed her trust must have come as a sickening shock to those boys. I knew there was little logic in my absolute confidence that Vangie had not identified me as the rescuer, no matter what they might have done to her. She would have to give them a plausible story of rescue. Some fishermen under the bridge. And, having her return to get her money would be an indication she had not exposed the operation. Had they broken her to the point of making her tell the hiding place? I knew why I doubted it. In free fall to what she believed was her death, she had stifled the instinctive scream just to give Terry an awkward time. Knowing that the second attempt would kill her for sure, knowing that she couldn't buy a thing with the money she had squirreled away, it seemed consistent with some inner toughness of fiber for her to deny them the money.
I was dubious about the next step. The possibility of tracing Vangie's bartender friend seemed remote. The aging shovel-jawed beach boy, Griff, would get very edgy if he should come across me again. Vangie's five minutes in that kitchen intrigued me. It was a small kitchen. It wouldn't take long to find out if the money was still there, or if Griff's thorough search had found it.
Getting into Seven B the second time would be more difficult. I could be certain of one thing. I was not dealing with a group of early risers. Sliding glass doors on aluminum tracks opened from the apartment living room onto the fenced patio area. They yield as if they were made to be opened with a tire iron.
It was five after two. I picked up the phone and left a call for quarter to five. This time I had closed the outer gate. The inner latch on the sliding doors tore slowly under leverage, made a little clinking sound as it parted. In the dark apartment, I pulled the kitchen door shut behind me, clapped shut the aluminum venetian blinds, turned the lights on and went to work. The time it had taken Vangie to get the money meant a fairly intricate hiding place, something which had to be taken apart and replaced. Stove negative. Refrigerator negative. Wall oven negative. Dishwasher negative. Some of the nuts that fastened housings on were cross-threaded, indicating somebody had been there first, but there was no way of knowing if any of the places had turned up the jackpot. I stopped and leaned against the counter by the sink. I checked the disposal unit. Removing that housing would be no five-minute job, and it didn't look as if there could be any space available inside it anyway.
There was a kick stool beside the sink, the kind that rolls on concealed casters that retract when you step on it so that it stands firm. It was to give access to some of the cabinet shelves built too high to reach easily. No clue in any of them.
I looked at the ceiling fixtures. The one over the sink was a double circle of fluorescent tubing, the kind where the base fastens against the ceiling by means of a knurled center screw. I moved the kick stool over in front of the sink and turned off the lights, opened the blinds. The day was brightening rapidly and soon there would be the first horizontal rays of orange sunlight coming in from the Atlantic. Without any particular optimism, I undid the knurled screw. The base came down and hung by the wiring, a foot below the acoustic tile of the kitchen ceiling. The wires hung from the countersunk junction box. The base was round, perhaps sixteen inches in diameter. A crude rectangular hole had been cut into the tile beside the junction box. I reached up into the hole and over to the side, away from the junction box. The first packet I brought down was two inches thick, fastened with two red rubber bands. There was a fifty exposed on one side of it, a twenty on the other. The second packet was thinner, with a hundred on one side, a ten on the other. The third was the thickest of all, with twenties on either side. The last one was medium, exposing a ten and a fifty. I shoved them inside my shirt and rebuttoned it. I fitted the base back over the threaded fixture spindle, replaced the knurled screw, got down and rolled the kick stool away. Vangie had made a shrewd selection. The hiding place was obvious and unlikely.
With a satisfying weight and bulk inside my shirt and with tire iron in hand, I went out the way I had come in.
Just as I touched the gate latch, I heard a single crunch of a step on the brown pebbles behind me, and as I tried to spin, hard metal hit me briskly and solidly over the right ear. It wasn't meant to knock me down. It was perfectly gauged to do exactly what it did. With the echoes of the first red and white explosion going off in my head, I staggered back against the gate. The tire iron clanked onto the pebbles. That kind of blow on the skull creates a wave of nausea in the back of the throat, clogging and receding, coming back in diminishing force several times as vision clears.