The Alpine Menace (14 page)

A
FTER
V
IDA LEFT
, I felt lost. I sat in the passenger loading zone for a couple of minutes, vaguely watching the motley crew that plied Aurora. A patrol car slowed down as it came by, and I assumed the officers were going to check out the pimps and hookers. Instead, they all but stopped to stare at me. Then they picked up speed and drove on. Apparently, a well-dressed middle-aged woman in a new Lexus wasn't considered a threat to the justice system.

At last I headed off to cruise the bars of Greenwood. Ronnie had mentioned Freddy's, which was on a corner at a major intersection. There was parking in back, but I decided to find a spot on the street. The Lexus might be a magnet for rowdy drunks staggering out of the bar.

Freddy's was also a restaurant, the kind where you could get a tough steak and a shriveled baked potato after you'd managed not to pass out in the bar. They served hard liquor as well as beer and wine. I sat down at a table slightly larger than a silver dollar and ordered the first brand I could think of. Which was, naturally, Bud-weiser. This was no place for Seattle's famous micro-brews or exotic foreign imports. If I'd asked for a Harp's, they would have probably brought me a ukulele.

Naturally, I felt conspicuous. And nervous. To give my hands a task, I went to the cigarette machine and bought a pack of Winston Ultra-Lights. If Vida had been with
me,
depraved
would have been the least of the adjectives she'd have used to describe me.

At going on nine o'clock, the large, utilitarian bar was about half-full. Twenty years ago Freddy's had been some kind of Masonic hall. I didn't know how many metamorphoses it had gone through since, but I doubted that any of the subsequent owners had spent much on decorating. Except for the usual neon beer signs and a couple of scenic paintings that looked as if they'd been done by the numbers—but not necessarily in order—the bar was strictly minimalist. I was already depressed, and I hadn't yet been served.

My waitress came toward me, walking as if her feet hurt. She was a dishwater blond on the plump side, probably about my age. The lines in her pale face showed the usual road marks of a life lived hard and unhappily. I took advantage of her mild expression of curiosity.

“Do you know Ronnie Mallett?” I asked, hoping I looked friendly.

She frowned. “Is he the guy who offed his girlfriend?”

“Allegedly,” I replied. “I'm his cousin Emma. Who did he hang out with around here?”

The waitress glanced around the room. “See that guy with the long red hair sitting with the older bald guy? That's Morrie. He and Ronnie bowled together sometimes.”

“Good,” I said, spotting Morrie at a table near the jukebox. “Anybody else?”

“Mmm… I don't think so. Wait—there's a guy at the bar—I can't think of his name. He's the one with the obvious butt crack.”

Great. “Great,” I said, trying to sound enthusiastic. “You've been a real help. I think I'll mingle, okay?”

“Sure. You running a tab?”

I shook my head and went for my wallet. Leaving a
hefty tip, I decided to start with Butt Crack. Fortunately— I guess—the bar stool on his left had just been vacated.

He had an extra chin and no neck, but his face was pleasant enough when he turned to stare. “Got enough room there, little lady?” he inquired.

It wasn't a great opening line, but given the circumstances, it sufficed. “I'm good,” I said. “How would you like to be interviewed?”

“Huh?” Butt Crack's broad face looked startled. “Like on TV?”

“Not quite,” I replied. “I'm a newspaper reporter.”

Butt Crack chuckled richly, then motioned at the bartender, a tall, reedy man with half glasses. “Hey, Jack. This little lady wants to put me in the paper. What do you think of that?”

“I think she's crazy,” Jack shot back. “Humor her.”

“I sure will.” With effort, Butt Crack turned to sit sideways on the bar stool. “What do you need? My opinion of the war in wherever it is? What I think of Clinton and those broads in the White House? Who's going to win the pennant?”

“Let's start with a name,” I said, dutifully taking a pen and notepad from my handbag.

Butt Crack grinned, revealing a chipped front tooth. “Avery. Rhymes with savory. Avery McMillan.” He reached out a big paw, clutched my hand, and almost sent me to an orthopedic surgeon.

I tried not to flinch. “I'm Emma,” I said again, putting the mangled hand behind my back and wiggling my fingers to make sure they were still functioning. “I heard you're a friend of Ronnie Mallet's.”

“Damn,” Avery said with a shake of his head. Up close, he looked as if he was in his early forties. There was a small scar etched in one eyebrow and another on his chin. Avery would have fit in nicely at the Icicle Creek Tavern. “Poor bastard,” he muttered. “Whatever he did
to that Carol broad, she probably asked for it. She was one mean bitch. Excuse my language. I meant witch. They rhyme, see?”

“Yes, I do,” I replied with a straight face. “Did Ronnie and Carol come here often?”

“Quite a bit,” Avery replied as some of the other patrons began to edge closer. I figured the notebook was the drawing card. Most of the writing at Freddy's was probably done on cocktail napkins. “The last time they were here, about a month ago, Carol and that redheaded gal who used to go with Ronnie really got into it.” He turned to the bartender. “Hey, Jack, you had to throw those two broads out, right?”

“You bet,” Jack said with a solemn nod. “They were busting up the glassware.”

“Do you mean Maybeth?” I asked, beginning to think that the Icicle Creek Tavern had nothing on Freddy's.

“Beth,” Avery said with emphasis. “Rhymes with…” He stopped and scratched his head. “Never mind.”

“Were they fighting over Ronnie?” I asked, remembering to scribble a note or two.

Avery glanced at Jack. “Was that what started it? Or was it something Beth's boyfriend said to Carol?”

“Roy?” Jack responded. “I don't know. It was a real mess.”

“Roy,” Avery repeated brightly. “Beth's Roy friend. Get it?”

“Yes,” I said, and forced a smile.

“I think that's right,” Avery went on. “It was Roy, only maybe he said something nasty to Ronnie. Anyway, the two girls got into it. Carol had a real bad temper, and you know what redheads are like. Va-va-vroom!” One hand shot up toward the ceiling, apparently in imitation of a rocket launch.

The man called Morrie had gravitated to the bar.

“Hey, Ave,” he said in a good-natured tone, “did I hear you bad-mouth redheads?” Morrie shook his own long carrot-colored locks.

Avery laughed, the hearty chuckle that almost made him endearing. “How come nobody calls you ‘Red’? You know—rhymes with bed.” He leered and chuckled some more.

“Because my two older brothers were both called Red,” Morrie answered with a smile. “Our mom never knew who'd come when she called.”

Avery nodded as if this was one of the wisest statements he'd ever heard. “Can't blame her. Hey, the little lady's interviewing me about Ronnie and Carol. You jealous?” He nudged Morrie, who almost spilled some of the beer in the schooner he was holding.

“I might be,” Morrie replied pleasantly. “What gives?”

I decided to get to the point and looked at Jack to include him in the conversation. “I'm trying to find out if Ronnie has an alibi for the night of the murder. Did any of you see him two weeks ago Friday late in the evening?”

Avery shook his head. “I came in early after I got off work. I went home around eight.”

Jack gave the bar a swipe with a damp towel. “Ronnie was here, though. He came in before nine, had a couple of beers, and said he was going on to the Satellite Room down the block.”

“Do you think he'd been drinking before he got here?” I asked.

Jack shrugged. “Could be. He wasn't drunk, though.”

“I remember,” Morrie said. “He was alone. He seemed kind of down.”

“That's right,” Jack agreed. “He was upset because his dog, Buddy, had gotten into a fight and come out the worse for wear. He'd had to take him to the vet's.”

I remembered that when Ronnie had been arrested, he, too, had been suffering some wear and tear. “How were his spirits?” I inquired. “Did he look as if he'd had some kind of row?”

The men all exchanged glances that bordered on smirks. “You bet,” Jack said with one of his solemn nods. “Poor Ronnie was all banged up. He didn't say anything, but my guess is that Carol went after him again.”

“Again?” I feigned innocence.

Avery chuckled, but there was no mirth in the sound. “I said she was one mean… witch. She was always beating on Ronnie. Hell, she beat up Roy, too.”

“Yeah,” Morrie put in. “I heard once that was what broke up her marriage to some guy a long time ago. She'd whale on him while he was asleep. Jeez, you hear all this crap about men beating women, but there's two sides to that story. Women can be ornery as hell. Ornerier, maybe. They don't need to be drunk to get mean.”

A sudden silence fell over the little group. Jack smiled for the first time. “Present company excluded, naturally.”

“No offense,” Avery hurriedly added.

“None taken,” I said, smiling.

I, however, was more reasonable than some members of my sex. A raven-haired Hispanic woman and a frosted blond begged to differ.

“If men weren't such assholes, women wouldn't have to defend themselves,” the blond asserted.

“That's not defending yourself,” Morrie retorted, “that's going on the offensive. It's different, Terri.”

“It's bullshit,” the Hispanic woman snapped. “You men got to be so damned macho all the time. You think hitting women proves you got cojones. I spit on all of you.” She spat not on them, but on the floor, only an inch from my Joan & David suede shoes.

“Knock it off, Nita,” said Morrie, still trying to be
good-natured. “You're just pissed because that last loser of yours punched out a couple of teeth.”

“Why shouldn't she be pissed?” demanded a tall black woman with imposing dreadlocks. “That's her whole point. You bastards always start it.”

“Bullshit!” roared the older bald man who had been sitting with Morrie. “The only way you can get through to a woman is—”

“Men are scum! Listen to what Larry did—”

“Larry was on crack. He's okay the rest of the—”

“I had one old lady who—”

The argument was underway. I finished my beer, grabbed my cigarettes from the bar, and slipped away. Nobody seemed to notice.

I could see the sign for the Satellite Room from Freddy's entrance. It was midway down the block, across the street. I was waiting for the light to change when Terri, the frosted blond, came running up to me.

“You were asking about Ronnie?” she said, out of breath.

“Right. Do you know him?”

“Sure. Ronnie's a sweetheart. He didn't kill Carol.” She glanced over her shoulder, as if she expected someone to follow her outside. “The night Carol was murdered, I sat with him for a while. She'd knocked him around, and he was really down.”

“Do you remember when he got to Freddy's and when he left?”

Terri nodded. “I showed up around eight-thirty. Ronnie was already there. He left a little before ten. He was going to the Satellite.” She pointed across the street. “He was meeting someone. It wasn't a date, it was sort of like business.”

“Did he say who?”

“No. I got the impression it was a man. But not a buddy.”

“Did you tell the police about this?”

Terri shook her head. “They never talked to me. I think they only talked to Jack, because he's the bartender. But Jack gets busy with his drink orders and doesn't always see what's going on. Unless there's trouble. He's good at spotting that.”

Some noises were erupting from the vicinity of the bar. Terri whirled around. “I've got to go.”

She dashed inside. I wondered if a full-fledged brawl was under way. Seattle and Alpine weren't so different after all.

The Satellite Room was in a restaurant that was a cut above Freddy's. Most of the diners seemed to be sober. I could almost imagine that the menu featured more than rib-eye steak.

The bar had been around in its present incarnation for a long time. The neon satellites looked like they came from the space-race era. There were plenty of customers, however, and I had to adjust my eyes to the dimness before I could find an empty table. Then, just as I was about to sit down, I decided to go straight to the bar itself.

A buxom woman about my age was on duty, her dyed platinum hair pulled back in a not-so-tidy chignon and her face heavily made up to cover old acne scars.

“What'll it be, honey?” she asked in a husky voice.

Wisdom dictated that I should stick to beer, so this time I got exotic and ordered a Heineken. Then I introduced myself, explaining what I wanted to know about Ronnie's presence in the Satellite Room on the night of the murder.

“Ronnie.” The name slipped like Jell-O from the bartender's red lips. “I'm Honey, by the way.” She put out a hand. “Nice to meet you. You don't look like Ronnie's cousin. Is he the family black sheep?”

“Sort of,” I admitted. “At least he's the only one who's been charged with homicide.”

Honey smiled. “Well, he was here that night. He came in a little after ten, I think. He had a shot of bourbon here at the bar”— she nodded toward the end where the cash register sat— “and then some guy came in to join him and they sat at a table over there by the Sputnik. They got into something really deep—I've never seen Ronnie so serious. He only had one more drink before the other guy left about eleven-thirty. I served Ronnie one more, then he took off a little after midnight.”

“Did the police question you?” I asked.

Honey shook her head. “They came in on a Tuesday when I was off. They never came back. Walt—he's the other bartender—couldn't tell them anything.”

I did some calculations in my head. Ronnie's alibi was solid from eight-thirty on. According to Terri, he'd arrived at Freddy's even earlier, which was well before Maybeth said she'd heard him slam out of the apartment. Either Maybeth was wrong about the time, or someone else had been with Carol after Ronnie left, but possibly before she was killed. Kendra had found the body around ten-thirty, while Ronnie was drinking in the Satellite Room.