Tim Dorsey Collection #1 (13 page)

T
HE AFTERNOON WAS A SCORCHER
. A hundred and five by one o’clock, 80 percent humidity. Not a single customer on the lot at Tampa Bay Motors.

Six salesmen sat around the break table playing Trivial Pursuit. Rocco stormed back in the showroom.

“What’s wrong with you?” asked Vic, shuffling trivia cards. “I thought you were having a good day.”

“Fuck off!” said Rocco, throwing a bent golf club in a trash can and phoning a stereo-repair shop.

The salesmen went back to their game.

“Sorry, John. Time’s up,” said Vic. “Answer is
Flipper
. I can’t fuckin’ believe you missed that one.”

“Hold it,” said John. “That’s a flawed question. Flipper was a dolphin.”

“Same thing,” said Vic. “Stu. Your turn.”

“It’s not the same thing. The question was ‘TV’s famous porpoise.’ ”

“Right…Stu, your turn.”

“Flipper wasn’t a porpoise. I get to go again.”

“Of course Flipper was a porpoise. Your turn’s over….Stu?…”

“Hold on! Flipper was
not
a porpoise. The question’s bad!”

“Hey Rocco! John says Flipper wasn’t a porpoise!”

Rocco turned a page in a
GQ
article. “John’s a fucking wimp.”

“There. It’s unanimous,” said Vic. “Stu, go.”

“Stu, don’t go,” said John. “Flipper was a dolphin.”

“I see bars all over the place called The Purple Porpoise,” said Dutch, “and their signs have Flipper.”

“Isn’t it like Flippers are both dolphins
and
porpoises?” asked Rod. “But we call them porpoises so we don’t confuse them with dolphins, the fish, which are now called mahimahi at restaurants so tourists won’t think they’re eating Flipper?”

“No, no, no!” said John. “It’s finite biology. Dolphins the mammal are not porpoises the mammal and vice versa. They’re mutually exclusive. Dolphins the fish just muddy the water. Stay away from them.”

“John, you’re the only person in the whole country who would have missed that question,” said Vic. “So what are you saying? It’s because you’re
smarter
than everyone?”

“I just explained it,” said John. “I’m taking my turn again.”

“We go by the cards,” said Vic. “Stu, pick a category.”

John jumped up from the table and his chair fell over. He slammed down his playing pieces. “I knew Flipper was the obvious answer, but I didn’t say it because I also knew for a certainty that she’s not a porpoise. She was a dolphin! I don’t care what the fucking cards say!”

“She?” said Rod.

“The first Flipper was a female. And
she
was a dolphin, not a porpoise!”

“John, you know we always go by the cards.”

“Smooth conical teeth, not triangular and serrated!” said John. “Pronounced, cylindrical snout, not blunt!”

“What are you talking about, John?”

“I’m talking about basic ninth-grade marine biology! It’s not very hard to grasp. I’m talking simple cetaceans, not a time port to the fourth dimension!”

“Cetaceans?”

“I used to be a teacher! A good one!”

“Easy, John.”

“Don’t you ‘easy’ me!”

“John, all I know is what the card says. Let’s not have any trouble.”

“It’s that kind of attitude that gave us Hitler.”

“John, what do the Nazis have to do with this?”

“Sit down, John, you know we always go by the cards.”

“Yeah, John, sit down!”

“Who says the cards are right?”

“We have to go by something, John. There has to be some kind of order.”

“But what if the cards are wrong? Did you ever think of that? Huh? What if the cards are wrong? And if we don’t question the cards, we don’t question the government! And if we don’t question the government, some poor peasant in the Amazon ends up with a CIA bullet in his fucking skull!”

“John, are you on some kind of medication we should know about?”

“Calm down, John, this is just a friendly little—”

“I will not calm down! Not for some fascist board game! Is this what we fought and died for?”

“You didn’t fight for shit, John! Now sit down!”

“I will
not
sit down!”

“John, it’s only a game!”

“No, that’s where you’re wrong. It’s not only a game—it’s a point in time and space. It’s the exact point where an individual has to stop and take a stand and say, ‘I will not be
boned up the ass anymore!’ It’s about our school system! It’s about the banks! It’s about exploitation! It’s about Nurse Ratchett at Kash ’n’ Karry on register five with her coupon cop mentality! It’s—”

“Relax, John!”

“Don’t tell me to relax! Did I tell you to relax that time your wife threw you out after finding you in those panties?”

“Jesus, John! Not in front of the guys!”

“Look, John, I know you’ve been through a lot lately. We’ve all been a little tense—”

“Don’t you dare condescend to me, you fuck!”

“I’m a fuck?
I’m a fuck!
Why, you little cocksucker!”

“Look! A customer!”

Everyone turned. A man came through the glass doors. A sophisticated gentleman, mid-seventies, three-piece charcoal suit, briefcase. Fine jaw, firm, thin mouth, good eastern establishment bloodlines.

Everyone turned again, this time to the far side of the showroom. They watched to see what Rocco would do.

Rocco put down his magazine and got up slowly and headed for the man.

The other salesmen sagged in disappointment and went back to Trivial Pursuit.

Except John. He took off running for the front door. Rocco saw him and took off, too. But nobody had ever challenged Rocco before, and he was slow getting off the starting line. John arrived first, introducing himself and shaking hands.

Rocco stood behind him and whispered over his shoulder: “You’re dead.”

John smiled at the customer and jabbed his elbow into Rocco’s stomach, knocking the wind out of him.

“Let’s take the golf cart,” said John, leading the customer out the door.

JOHN’S HANDS BEGAN
to shake as he drove the golf cart. The customer had asked to see the most expensive cars on the lot. This could be the mother lode.

Once in a great while Tampa Bay Motors got in a Ferrari, an Aston Martin or maybe a Lotus, and they usually went fast. This was one of the rare times the dealership actually had a Rolls in stock, and it had remained on the lot a month, probably because of the color. A soft tangerine. It was the same color the Buccaneers football team used to wear. The Rolls had belonged to the middle linebacker, who decided to get rid of the car when the team changed to its more menacing crimson-and-pewter uniforms and he started to take a lot of grief from the interior linemen.

John and the customer exchanged business cards as the golf cart cruised across the lot. John looked down and read the fine white-satin card stock:
H
.
AMBROSE TARRINGTON III
,
TARRINGTON IMPORT
. There were phone numbers for offices in Tampa, New York, Beverly Hills.

“Watch out!” said the customer.

John looked up and swerved to avoid a wandering homeless man wearing a hat full of pinwheels. The cart went up on two wheels, then slammed back down.

“Thanks, Ambrose. That was close,” said John. “It’s okay if I call you Ambrose, isn’t it?”

The man shook his head no.

They arrived at the high-end cars, and Ambrose immediately pointed at the Rolls. “That one.” He got out and walked around the car and kicked the tires. John had always thought it was just a figure of speech.

“I’ll buy it,” said Ambrose.

John’s heart raced. He began to see little spots around his field of vision.

“But I’ll need a test drive first.”

“Sure thing,” said John. “I’ll just need to Xerox your driver’s license…”

Ambrose stared at him. John played his own words back inside his head, and they made a clutch-grinding sound. John cringed. At the Rolls-Royce level, the license Xerox was way too gauche.

“Forget it,” said John. “Wait here. I’ll get the keys.”

John zoomed back to the showroom in the golf cart.

He stuck his head in the secretary’s office and handed her Tarrington’s business card. “Call those numbers. Quick!”

“What’s this about?”

“I need to verify a customer.”

“What about his driver’s license?”

“Do it!”

“Yes, Mr. Milton.” Damn, she thought, this was a different John.

John walked briskly across the showroom to the pegboard of keys. He passed the Trivial Pursuit table.

“Dolphin!”

“Let it die, John.”

He snatched a set of keys off the board and went back to the secretary’s office.

She put down the phone. “Yep, they all check out. Tarrington Import. Tampa, New York, Beverly Hills.”

“Yesssss!” said John, signaling touchdown. He ran out the showroom door.

“Did he just take the keys to the Rolls?” Vic asked the others. They looked over at the pegboard. The hook for the Rolls was empty.

They all got up and went over to the window. “Lucky bastard!”

Then they looked across the showroom at Rocco, steam coming off the top of his head.

“
SORRY TO KEEP
you waiting, Mr. Tarrington.” John handed Ambrose the keys with a conspiratorial grin. “Shall we?”

Tarrington knew his way around a Rolls. He handled it with obvious familiarity as they pulled onto the highway. John could smell the kill. Tarrington’s suit was clearly tailored, probably Manhattan, East Side. And the accent: Providence? Tarrington’s nostrils flared at the leather scent.

“Was Flipper a dolphin or a porpoise?”

“What?”

“We had an argument back at the dealership,” said John. “Was Flipper a dolphin or a porpoise?”

“I don’t know. A fish?”

“Close enough. The argument really wasn’t about Flipper. It was a metaphor for individuality. When do you take the path less traveled? Know what I mean?”

Tarrington looked at John a moment, then back at the road.

“Of course you do,” said John. “I felt a kinship the moment I saw you. We’re a breed apart from the herd. You don’t just accept what the cards say, do you?”

Tarrington opened his mouth. “I—”

“Of course not!” John exclaimed. Ambrose jumped. “I used to be a teacher. Bet you didn’t know that. They don’t pay teachers. Then I was a bank teller. They don’t pay them either, even with all that money lying around, like they’re going to miss it. They say the economy’s overheating. You know what I say? Good! Let it boil over for all I care! People like you and me don’t need the economy. Never have.
Twenty thousand years ago there was only one job. You went out in the morning with your shitty little spear and you chased the woolly mammoths and ran from the saber-toothed tigers. That was your fucking economy!…”

Ambrose pulled over to the side of the road.

“What are you doing?” asked John.

“Would you mind if I drove alone?”

“You want me to get out?”

“No offense.”

John stood waving on the shoulder of the road as the Rolls pulled away. “Happy trails.”

WHILE JOHN WAS
gone, Rocco did what any tough guy would do. He went to the owner and tattled. Not Xeroxing a license was a major infraction.

They were waiting at the front door when John walked back on the lot.

Oh, this was too good to be true, thought Rocco. No Xerox and now no
ROLLS
.

The owner let John have it at a range of thirty yards. “Where’s the car!”

“Everything’s cool,” said John. “Ambrose is just finishing up the test drive.”

“Ambrose?”

“Yeah, great guy,” said John.

“First you don’t copy his driver’s license, then you just let him drive off with a two-hundred-thousand-dollar car!”

“He said he’s going to buy it.”

“You’re fired!”

“Fine,” said John. “And one word from me, Ambrose walks. We’re like this…” John held up two fingers together. “…We’ve made a connection.”

The owner stewed as he remembered the massive markup on the Rolls. “He better buy it, or you’re outta here!”

“Don’t worry. It’s a done deal,” said John. “Just gotta dot the
i
’s.”

I
T TOOK THEM LONG ENOUGH
, but Consolidated Bank’s board of directors finally wised up. They had to do something about Pierre before he caused any more damage. They couldn’t fire or demote him, because of all the glowing evaluations he’d received and the potential for an age-discrimination suit. So they promoted him.

Pierre was bumped up to senior vice president, the one in charge of taking top clients to lunch. Pierre boxed up his belongings, stacked them on an intraoffice trundle cart, and moved one office down.

Pierre hung the inspirational rowing poster on the new wall and took a seat behind his new desk. He stared off into space, unconsciously picking at the corner of the desk blotter. He let out a heavy breath. The previous VP had been killed in a freak spelunking accident, and nobody had cleaned out his office. Pierre started playing with a set of swinging, clacking metal balls. On the corner of the desk was one of those birds that bobs its head in a glass of water. Pierre got it bobbing, but for some reason it made him depressed, and he grabbed the bird by the neck to stop it. He noticed the twin pen holder with an engraved plate:
BERT WELCH
, 1989
INTERBAY BLOOD DRIVE
, 3
RD PLACE
.
He took both pens out of the holder, scribbled on a notepad, replaced them. He grabbed the sterling business-card holder and dumped Bert’s cards in the wastebasket, replacing them with his own and tapping them into alignment. He leaned back in the padded leather chair and began to swivel with a rhythmic squeaking. Paranoia started its creep. Pierre got up and went over to the window and closed the blinds. He sat back down and began to swivel and squeak again in the dark.

H. AMBROSE TARRINGTON
III had Sinatra on the radio. He swayed with the music as he drove down Bayshore Boulevard and pulled up the circular brick driveway of the largest mansion in town. He grabbed a Polaroid camera from his briefcase and got out of the car. He set the camera on automatic and placed it atop a stone ledge. Then he ran back and posed with the Rolls in front of the estate. He got back in the car.

THERE WAS A
knock on Pierre’s office door. He jumped. He ran to the blinds in terror and peeked out and felt an immediate wave of relief. He opened the door.

“Ambrose!”

“Pierre!”

Vigorous handshake.

“You free for lunch?” asked Ambrose.

“Only if I get to pay.”

“If you insist.”

Pierre grabbed his coat.

“Whose car?”

“Let’s take the Rolls.”

“What happened to the Bentley?”

“Getting up in miles.”

Pierre nodded. He couldn’t believe his luck. Ambrose was one of the richest men in Tampa, rumored to be worth twenty, maybe thirty million, one of the bank’s top clients. Or rather, top
potential
clients. Nobody had ever quite been able to persuade Ambrose to put any of his millions in Consolidated’s hands, and Pierre was now determined to change that. This might be his only shot at redemption.

Pierre knew that when dealing with a man at Ambrose’s level, the trick to talking money was not to mention money. Too crude. Instead, you ate and drank and played golf and got prostitutes. Then the next day you had your people call their people.

Ambrose unlocked the Rolls, and Pierre sank into the passenger seat. “How about the club?”

“The club it is,” said Ambrose.

The valet at the Palma Ceia Country Club parked the Rolls while Ambrose and Pierre cut through the men’s shower room, past the polished-wood lockers, and into the men’s grill with a painting of the Royal Troon golf course.

As the pair crossed the lounge, heads turned. They all knew Ambrose, and Pierre felt his stock rise. He scanned the room for his rivals. There was Nelson from Florida Fidelity, Walter from Tampa Savings, and Jacob from Chemical Bank. Pierre patted Ambrose on the shoulder and smiled back at them. He had a right to feel possessive. How many times had he been in the grill and endured their smugness as Ambrose tucked in his napkin at
their
tables?

The waiter topped off their ice water as Ambrose and Pierre flipped through burgundy menus. “I’ll have the swordfish on English muffin,” said Ambrose.

“The chef’s salad.” said Pierre “Hold the croutons. I’m on the Atkins Diet.”

“Who isn’t?” said the waiter, collecting the menus but
thinking about the screenplay he was writing that would show everyone.

Nelson, Walter and Jacob were on their cell phones, directing secretaries to get a meeting with Ambrose.

An hour later the check came and Ambrose took out his wallet.

“Remember? On me,” said Pierre, intercepting the bill.

They returned to the Rolls, and Ambrose headed across town to drop Pierre off at the bank. He took a shortcut down Triggerfish Lane. He waved out the window to Gladys Plant. Gladys waved back with pruning shears. Then he waved at Jim and Martha Davenport, sitting on their porch.

They returned unsure waves. “Do we know him?” asked Martha.

Pierre was let off at the bank and waved from the curb. “Don’t be a stranger.”

Ambrose checked his watch and headed over a small bridge to Davis Islands, the exclusive enclave in the bay. He pulled up the drive of a waterfront home. The real estate agent was already waiting at the front door. Fifty years old, a touch on the plump side, her natural blond hair in a seventy-dollar cut that hung down to a three-hundred-dollar mauve scarf covered with parakeets.

Ambrose came up the walkway with his briefcase. “Pleasure to meet you, Jessica.”

“Call me Jessie.” She opened the door.

Jessica Hollingsworth, Junior League, Tampa General charity fund-raising chairwoman and Real-Tron Ten-Million-Dollar Club member. Move this home and it was a whole new ball game. Ambrose had called her directly, which meant she wouldn’t have to split the 7 percent commission with a buyer’s agent. And he wanted to close immediately with cash, so she didn’t have to worry about the
usual tantrums during escrow. The rich were the worst! She was staring down the barrel of a $420,000 payday. She had already done the math ten ways.

Ambrose walked in, stared up at the cathedral ceiling and ruffled his eyebrows.

“Don’t like the color?” said Jessica. “You can always paint. Shoot,
I’ll
paint.” She chuckled, then kicked herself. Too eager!

Ambrose set his briefcase on the marble coffee table. “You like martinis in the afternoon?”

“Do I like what?”

“Martinis in the afternoon,” said Ambrose, walking over to the stocked wet bar and deftly shakering extra-dry cocktails. House shoppers generally weren’t supposed to help themselves to the owners’ liquor cabinet, but Jessica had learned long ago that all bets were off with the wealthy.

“How many olives?”

“Two,” she said.

She sipped Beefeater and saw Ambrose open his briefcase and take out swim trunks. She glanced out the sliding glass doors at the pool.

“Where’s the nearest bathroom?” asked Ambrose.

She pointed.

As Ambrose changed, Jessica decided she should probably say something. Ambrose reemerged from the bathroom in a Speedo.

“Uh, I’m not sure you should—”

“If I buy this place, I’ll have to dump the house on Bayshore,” interrupted Ambrose. He showed her the Polaroid. “I’d like you to handle it for me, if that’s not an imposition.”

Jessie looked at the photo: Ambrose and the Rolls in the
mansion’s driveway. “I know that house.
Everyone
knows that house. That’s yours?”

Ambrose nodded. “I’m sorry. I interrupted you. You were saying something?”

“Don’t forget sunscreen.”

Ambrose floated in the deep end on a Styrofoam lounger, eyes closed, a tranquil grin on his face. Jessica sat inside reading magazines for two hours.

Ambrose finally climbed out of the pool and dried off. Jessie heard rummaging from the next room. She peeked around the corner. He was in the refrigerator. Ambrose closed the door, and Jessie jumped back before he could catch her. She heard the microwave start.

Five minutes later, Ambrose came back in the living room, barefoot, wearing a bathrobe with the owner’s monograms. He sat down on the couch with a tray of snacks and propped his feet on an ottoman. He picked up the remote and clicked on the seventy-inch home theater.

“Cool.
It’s a Wonderful Life
,” said Ambrose. “And it’s just starting.”

It was getting dark outside when the movie ended. Ambrose dressed as the credits rolled. “Love the place,” he said, snapping his briefcase shut and heading for the front door. “I’ll sleep on it.”

THE OWNER OF
Tampa Bay Motors was about to call the police, but he put down the phone when the Rolls pulled onto the lot. Everyone rushed out of the showroom as Ambrose parked and got out.

John smiled with expectant eyes.

“I’ve changed my mind,” said Ambrose. “Don’t like the color.”

“What?” said John.

“Clashes with the house.” Ambrose produced the Polaroid.

“I know that house,” said the owner of the dealership. “It’s the biggest one on Bayshore. That’s
yours
?”

Ambrose nodded and walked away.

The owner looked at John and pointed. “Hit the road!”

GLADYS PLANT CLIMBED
up the steps of the Davenports’ porch with a tray of key lime tarts.

“You can tell real key limes because they’re yellow,” said Gladys. “Anyone tries to sell you green key limes, they’re running some kind of racket.”

“Did I mention I had to call the police to tow away another stolen car?” said Martha.

“What did I tell you about the grid streets?”

“But that’s two and we just moved here.”

“I’ve had four.”

A public bus stopped at the corner of Triggerfish Lane. Ambrose Tarrington III got out.

Gladys looked around the porch. “You know what this place needs? A flag.” She pointed at the various pennants hanging from the neighbor’s porches. College emblems, unicorns, sports teams, smiling frogs, manatees, Persian cats, bowling balls. “If you don’t put something up, it looks like you don’t stand for anything.”

Ambrose walked by on the sidewalk and waved. He continued up three more houses, opened a picket gate and went inside the tiniest home on the street.

“I think that’s the same guy who waved to us earlier,” said Jim. “But he was in a Rolls-Royce.”

“That’s H. Ambrose Tarrington the Third,” said Gladys.

“What is he, a chauffeur or something?”

“No, he’s slightly insane.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry. Gentle as they come. One of the best neighbors on the block.”

“That’s what you said about Old Man Ortega before they linked him to those skeletal remains.”

“He’s harmless—just thinks he’s a millionaire,” said Gladys. “He lives in this imaginary world.”

“But that was a
real
Rolls-Royce.”

“No kidding,” said Gladys. “He’s so thoroughly convinced he’s a millionaire that he convinces others. He spends all his time test-driving luxury cars, getting free meals from banks and lounging around mansions that have just gone on the market. He has this ability. He knows exactly how millionaires walk and talk. All it takes is one nice suit and a good haircut. Their greed does the rest. He showed me his business cards. He’s got phone numbers in New York and Beverly Hills.”

“He has offices there?” said Jim.

“No, just phone numbers,” said Gladys. “It’s a free Internet service.”

“They don’t catch on?” asked Jim.

“Not only do they not catch on, they fight over him. I brought him tea one day at his house and the phone didn’t stop ringing.”

“So he’s a con man.”

“Yes and no. He never takes anything except free food and drink. Mainly he just cons them out of quality time.”

“Where’d he learn how to pretend to be a millionaire?”

“He really used to be one.”

Jim pointed down the street at Ambrose’s modest house.

“It’s a heart-wrenching story,” said Gladys. “Ambrose was born dirt poor on the edge of the Everglades. I mean no-indoor-plumbing
poor. He clawed his way up and made his millions in the import business. A bunch of import outlets. Early on he married his wife, Sylvia, and they were together forty years. He never strayed. You should have known her—a real doll. About fifteen years ago, Sylvia is diagnosed with a rare lymphoma, and Ambrose’s insurance company pulls some kind of crap and refuses to pay for treatment. Ambrose tried absolutely everything. Took her to specialists in Paris, Geneva, the Mayo. He started with about seven million, but what he didn’t spend flying her all over the world for experimental treatment went to home health care and his team of lawyers fighting the insurance company. She went into remission twice, lasted ten years. By the time she died, they were living here. He developed a heart problem and couldn’t return to work. Barely gets by on Social Security.”

“So he became unstable?” asked Martha.

“He’s lonely,” said Gladys. “He misses his wife. He wants people to like him the way they used to when he had money, even if it’s for the wrong reasons. He just wants someone to talk to. When he’s out pretending, it’s the high point of his day, God bless ’im.”