Deadly Dues (24 page)

I slumped back. What sort of criminal was he, anyway? A total failure, a big whiner, spends way too much time in front of the tube and with absolutely no standards in the romance department. Although looking at him, I could see he maybe didn't have much reason to be choosy, between the whine, the Crocs and the slight whiff of eau de bee-eau.

I took a large swallow of wine and stared at him.

“Who sent you? What do you want?” Of course I suspected it was the key, but I wanted to hear him spit it out. Anything to keep him from singing Doggie Doggie again.

He was staring at me again.

“Nice pajamas. But don't you think that somebody in your position, famous and all, should wear something, like, more . . . uh . . . dignified?”

I fought the urge to bash him a good one.

“Forget my damned pajamas. Who sent you?”

Now he was squinting at my lovely, multi-hued eye.

“Shouldn't you cover that up with something? It looks pretty gross. I mean, somebody like you . . . people are going to notice and wonder—”

In an inspired moment, I leapt to my feet and emitted a good snarl, raising the rolling pin over my head, ready to swing it down on him. I had already figured out that I was going to hit the carpet instead, but he didn't have to know that.

“Who sent you?”

“Okay okay okay!” he squealed. “That woman.”

“That's not precise enough!” I shouted. “What woman? What's her name? Describe her! How do you know her?”

“She blonde. She's beautiful!”
Oh no, not Gretchen!
“She has enormous boobs.”
Not Gretchen.
“And the most awesome pink lips!”

Pink lips. I sat down and stared at him.
Sherilyn.

“And her name?”

“Shelley?” He scrunched up his face. “Shauna? Marilyn?” He broke into his broken smile again, pleased with himself.
God, this guy was a cheap drunk.

“Sherilyn!” he squealed triumphantly.

I forced myself to speak calmly. “And did Sherilyn tell you why she wanted you to kill me?”

He looked at me reproachfully.

“Geez, you're jumping to conclusions. I'm not supposed to kill you. I'm just supposed to really, really scare you.”

We sat in silence for about a minute. It was not lost on either of us (although perhaps I was being generous in terms of his thought processes) that his mission wasn't really working out.

“And then what? Scare me?” I tried not to roll my eyes at this. “And—?”

“Then I'm supposed to say—” he put his wine glass down clumsily and rummaged in his windbreaker pocket.

“Hey, watch the carpet.”

“Lady, this rug has seen better days. Don't get so snippy.”

“It's an Aubusson.”

“I don't care which animal it came from. I tell you, it is not in its prime.”

I ground my teeth while he searched his pocket, then tried the other side. He pulled out a crumpled piece of paper, unfolded it and squinted at it.

“You should turn on more lights. How do expect me to read this?”

“Holy Mother!” I shouted. “If those were your instructions, how in hell were you expecting to read them in the dark?”

“I would have figured it out!” he shouted back. Man, he had attitude for somebody lying on the floor on a pile of marbles.

“Okay,” he said, frowning at the paper. “Give it to me.”

I was tempted to take him at his word and slug him, but I didn't. I am mature.

“And?”

He turned the paper sideways. “There was more.”

I snatched the paper from him and squinted at it myself. Good grief, no wonder he couldn't read it. He had the worst handwriting I had ever seen.

“Is this your writing or is it code?”

He looked at me. His mouth went down a little and he actually looked hurt as he poured the rest of his wine into his mouth.

I sighed. “I guess penmanship wasn't one of your priorities at school.”

“School? I got kicked out of the sixth grade. It wasn't my fault—”

“Stop! I don't want to hear it!” I peered at the note. Sure enough, there was a
k
and then some squiggles.

“Could this spell ‘key' by any chance?” I asked him in my Sweet Voice, the one from the children's theatre tour where I played the good fairy.

“Yeah, that was it,” he smiled at me happily.

Now what was I going to do? Call the police? More precisely, Ryga? Call Sherilyn? Give Sherilyn the key? If I called the police, it would bring more attention to me and my life and times, and that might lead to an examination of Stan's disappearance. Oh why, oh why hadn't we just called the police when we were in Stan's office? Why did we think we could get away with just running? This was real life, not a TV movie where people do impossibly stupid things and it is believable.

And what would happen if I gave the key to Sherilyn? Well, technically it was sort of my key now, as Stan had handed it to me, inadvertently. Or was it inadvertent?
Note to self: call lawyer, check on legality of ownership of key handed to one in dirty handkerchief.
I wanted to see what was in that safety deposit box—like maybe a clue about my royalties. Maybe even my royalties, but I couldn't see Stan stashing actual cash. He had somehow hidden my money in union paperwork. Or spent it on pedicures and tropical getaways for Sherilyn.

“That's a really awful noise,” said the kid, “your teeth grinding like that.”

“What's your name, anyway?” I said to him.

“Alphonse. Call me Al.”

Poor guy. Alphonse. It suited him, in a sadly funny way.

I looked back at the paper, trying to decide what to do before he ran away again. Which might be okay. He grabbed at the bottle of wine and poured what was left of it down his turkey throat.

His blue Crocs were very distracting, especially the flashing thing on one side. I took another look. My sulphide! The rare sulphide marble with the clown inside! The one I had been planning to sell on eBay if my royalties didn't show up soon. The marble I had thought was stowed away safely. It was embedded in one of the holes in his left Croc.

I grabbed at it.

“Hey, what are you doing! No funny business!” he squealed.

“Oh give me a break,” I crabbed. “My sulphide is in your Croc.”

“What?”

“My best marble is stuck in your stupid shoe, which you should clean, by the way. And you shouldn't wear cheap imitations. If you spent a few dollars more, you could get the real thing. Wouldn't smell.”

I stuck the rolling pin under my armpit and tried to get a grip on the marble with both hands. Damn. It was stuck. I would have to push it out from inside the shoe. I tried to get the Croc off, but his foot was wedged inside. He had fastened the Croc strap with a piece of twine, presumably to keep it from falling off while he bumbled and burgled.

“Stop that!”

“Oh, shut up!

I managed to work my fingers inside and tried to wiggle the marble out.

“Stop that! I'm really ticklish!” He started to giggle hysterically.

“Heeeeeeheheheheheheheeeeeeeeee!”

“Stop that! It's very annoying!” I was bent over, getting red in the face from the exertion, and starting to breathe heavily. Alphonse was not leaving here with my clown in his shoe.

“Doggie Doggie Bow Wow! Heeeheheheheee!”

“Stop that, you're driving me crazy!”

“Doggie Doggie Bow Wow! Heeeeheeeheeeeheee!”

What an annoying drunk this kid was. No wonder he couldn't get any action.

It didn't help that the light in the room faded slightly for a second and I had to contort myself to get a better look at the marble. Finally, my finger forced the marble out into my other hand, and I sprawled back onto the floor, clutching it, knocking the contents of my wine glass onto my Donald Duck pajamas (not the carpet, thank goodness).

“Hot damn. That was hard work.”

“Doggie Doggie Bow Wow,” sang Alphonse.

I opened my eyes to see Ryga standing in the open patio door, staring at the scene.

We were a rather beautiful marble tableau, Alphonse lying on the floor, still giggling, with the famous Lulu Malone sprawled beside him, and Ryga standing very still, taking in the marbles, the rolling pin, the wine and the Donald Duck pajamas.

“Mrs. Lauterman called. She said you had an unwanted visitor.” I could see him looking at the wine bottle and two glasses.

Alphonse's eyes were wide with terror. His shaking giggles had turned into anxiety. Apparently he had had some experience with plainclothes detectives. If I introduced him to Ryga as Alphonse the Home Invader, the key would no doubt get mentioned, and that would lead to conversations about Stan. Yet I knew I must tell the truth, no matter the consequences.

“Oh, hi,” I said pleasantly from where I lay. “This is my nephew Alphonse. He decided to drop in, and we were rehashing the last family reunion. Alphonse has lost his key again, silly boy.”

Alphonse started to say something, and I pinched his ankle. Amazing—the kid had enough brains to take a hint. He shut up.

“It was so nice of you to come around, though. Thank you,” I said quite formally. It would have been more courteous of me to stand up as I said it, but it had been a tough day.

Ryga looked unconvinced. When Alphonse asked for more wine and started to giggle again, his shoulders relaxed a bit.

“Good night, then.”

“Nighty-night.”

“Nighty-night,” warbled Alphonse in a terrible echo.

• • •

I didn't get much more out of Alphonse, except that he had met Sherilyn when he cruised her building, looking for bottles.

I helped him up and told him to find another line of moonlighting. After I cleared a path for him through the marbles and gave him a few dollars for bus fare (he obviously never thought ahead), he scuttled out the patio doors with a belated, “Thanks for the wine! Maybe you could get some beer for next time?”—which made me want to run after him with the rolling pin. Instead I hauled the patio doors shut and carefully deposited the clown sulphide in a velvet bag, which I put at the back of a drawer so I couldn't possibly lose it again.

I looked out the patio doors at the night sky and realized that dawn was about to happen, something I hadn't seen for years.

I sprayed some lavender room-purifier over the area formerly occupied by Alphonse, then took a long shower. By that time, it was rise and shine with the rest of the world. I was wide awake and not inclined to try to get any more sleep, so decided to go to McDonald's to collect what I suspected would be my very last paycheque, even if it meant facing the bitterness of my fellow workers over the shifts I had missed.

My co-workers had barely noticed my absence. But Habim, the manager, handed me an envelope.

“There you are, Lu. I have to let you go. I docked you some for the inconvenience when you didn't show up.”

“I'm sorry.” And I was. At my age, I recognized the value of keeping commitments. And I knew I hadn't been reliable. Or faithful to the chain. You have to pay your dues, no matter where you are.

Habim looked at my eye, opened his desk and handed me a card.

“Hotline for domestic abuse,” he said. “You should call.”

“I live alone, except for a sheep dog,” I said. “I was hit by a handbag.”

“That's what they all say,” said Habim.

The mention of Horatio reminded me that I should be checking my phone for messages from the dognappers. I looked at my cell. Nothing.

At the counter, I stopped for a coffee and said goodbye to the gang. Thug wasn't there. He had figure skating practice. Robyn was sympathetic.

“I never felt you were right for this place anyway, Lu,” she said, her carrot orange and green spikes shaking slightly as she leaned over the counter and handed me my coffee. “My cousin is the assistant manager at Wendy's. I can put in a good word for you. If you clean up your act a bit, he might hire you.”

“Thanks, Robyn.” I smiled at her. She was a sweet girl, even though her twenty-five ear and nose piercings made her look a little frightening. “I might do that.”

She leaned over. “And Lu, like, don't get this wrong, but when you go to see him, maybe you could try to look a little younger? You know, do something with your hair, or maybe get something happening on your face”—she gestured to her own metal accessories—“instead of that black eye?”

Geraldo actually had a tear in his eye. He hugged me goodbye, even though he came up to my shoulder and consequently was interacting significantly with my right bosom. I forgave him, because it was touching that these kids were going to miss me.

I told them all I would drop in from time to time and drove away, my pitiful cheque in my handbag and my thoughts dwelling on how perhaps I was a small fry instead of a big cheese, working at McDonald's. But I had met some sweet young people who had kindness in their hearts.