Рон Гуларт - Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 39, No. 13, Mid-December 1994

“Salazar?” said Tzu.

“The old Spanish gentleman, the custodian, I guess, over here from a long line of grandees back in Castile.”

“He’s not a Castilian; he doesn’t lisp,” said Jack.

“Salazar stopped assibilating his c’s and z’s into interdental th’s the day he came to America,” said Hildegarde. “When in Rome.”

“He’s still a wetback from Chihuahua, dodging la migra,” said Jack.

“He’s getting his green work card,” said Hildegarde. “Besides, he is most kind to me. And that’s that.”

“Mustn’t teach grandmother how to suck eggs,” murmured Tzu.

“Tell me more of your work at the ashram, Mr. Tzu.”

And tell her he did, in spades and with gestures, that Sunday and several more, until Jack became restive.

“Dammit, Tzu, she’s got the hots for you!”

“Tepids, Jack. Old persons get the tepids.”

“Whatever!”

“She’s really into meditation, Jack. Of course, a good mantra is hard to find, but I’ve got her chanting ‘Om Shanti’ in her search for peace.”

“She should live so long. Yin me no yangs, Tzu. We’ve got work to do, remember?”

“Lighten up, Jack,” said Tzu. “You’re too young to have a midlife crisis.”

“So I got a head start. Get on the stick, Tzu. We’re just killing time.”

There was never a question of who would do what. That had been negotiated back in the slammer.

Tzu was no good with his mitts. He was the kind of guy who, if he played the French horn, would get his fist stuck in it just at the crescendo.

Jack, on the other hand, was tactile as all get out. He instinctively felt the serrations on dimes and quarters unseen in his change pocket, never, never confusing them with unmilled pennies and nickels. Not that he thought about these things. He just fingered things that way automatically, like turning a screw cap softly to its detent, then backing it off and torquing tight as he pleased, but only just. For the Air Force he had lifted his aircraft off the runway as Saint-Exupéry had bid, “... like culling a flower.”

So guess who got elected to do the dirty work? Tzu.

Jack was to provide the means, not yet chosen.

“What do I do? Walk into Brooks Brothers Tampa and say, ‘I’d like something tasteful in Kevlar for my SWAT team. Perhaps a nipped-in tattersall vest...’ ”

“... you’re watching too much TV...”

“... and the gun? How do I get that? ‘If you have touchtone, push 2. If you want a Magnum, push 357-BANG. Have your credit card handy, and our bonded uniformed messenger will...’ Tzu, it isn’t gonna be easy!”

“No guns,” said Tzu. “And stop quoting John Wayne.”

“How about a sure-fire investment?”

“No arson,” said Tzu.

Jack parked his Jeep on a side street near Jackson’s Giant Mall. Red and green neon said, “If we don’t have it, you don’t need it.”

“How do I kill thee? Let me count the ways,” said Jack.

Blunt instrument.

Ace Hardware. Is there an Ace Software? Hammer. Two, for good measure. I’m always losing tools. Worse, I lend them. Like my leafblower to Willie next door that time. Where the hell else could he blow his leaves but back on me? Better make those ball peen hammers. Both ends blunt instruments. That’s twenty-six seventy plus six percent Florida sales tax, sir. Visa? No, that’s cash, thank you.

Poison.

Walgreen Drug. The pharmacist has a clip-on bow tie and acne, but he’s no dummy. Percodan? Sorry, sir, that’s by prescription only. Yes, even if your personal physician is Jack Kevorkian. Regroup. What do I know about poppy and mandragora and all the drowsy syrups of the world? Think. So what if I can’t buy a little deadly? How about a lot of real sick? That’s it! Let’s hear it for OD; she’ll overdose on sleeping pills. OD and DOA. Murder by acronym, as told to Agatha Christie. Dependent? No way. Accident? Yes. But, a hundred five-grain caplets? Who’s counting. Better make that two bottles, please. Miles to go before I sleep. No, I won’t be needing that discount coupon entitling me to... Thank you, sir.

Sharp object.

Schrecker Cutlery. Can this be the lovely and talented Miss Schrecker herself who caveat emptors, ‘Stainless can be hard to sharpen and may not hold an edge.’ Wonder when she gets off work. Later, later. I couldn’t care less about edge. Point is what I have in mind. This twelve-inch chefs knife looks like a winner. Yes, I see it has a full tang and three rivets in that cocobolo handle. Imported, you say? Solingen, Sabatier, Damascus and Company. Cold steel, warm heart. En garde, Hildegarde! What’s that again? A rocking motion for dicing? I see. Well, that’s certainly grist for the mill, Miss Schrecker, but I really don’t plan to do all that much rocking and dicing. What kind of man does she think I am? I mean, really! On sale this week. Lucky me. Thirty-three sixty including tax? Thank you, ma’am.

Rope.

Shop till she drops. Scrub that last transmission.

Hackenfuss Hiking. Climbing gear for your discriminating mountaineer. And for not a few of your upscale homicides, I’m guessing. This same specification nylon climbed with Hillary and Tenzing on Everest? Support your neighborhood Sherpa. Will I be needing pitons and carabiners to go with that? No, I’m not with the Sierra Club’s impending assault on K2, but how flattering of you to think so. Frankly, I have something more local in mind. Would she believe a Louix XIV rock-crystal chandelier suitable for hanging? Ah yes, your little booklet on knots, Miss Hackenfuss. Like the name of the rose, my knot merit badge is all that remains of Boy Scout Troop Sixteen: the running bowline, sheepshank, the whole nine yards. Bet she’d leap out of her L’eggs if she knew I spiritually swap lowcalorie, foolproof noose recipes with hanging Judge Roy Bean, the law west of the Pecos. Yes, your standard hundred-foot hank will do. And I’ll have more than enough left over to jump double Dutch.

“All yours, Tzu.” Jack dumped his knapsackful of deadly intent on Tzu’s bamboo glasstop.

“So much?”

“Clausewitz learned it at Waterloo.”

“Total war was before my time.”

“Overkill — the only way to go.”

“But which?”

“Your call. I’m off.”

“Oh?”

“My week with the Flying Club’s Cessna.” Jack flipped Tzu a scrap of paper scribbled with a telephone 292 prefix code: Key West.

“So call me,” said Jack, and would not stay for an answer.

Jack was doing the Stingray Shuffle when the call came through.

“Jack! Larga distancia. Un hombre.”

What a rack on that callipygian Carlotta! And what a way to have passed the week.

“Coming, Carlotta.”

Stingrays fear you more than you fear them. But if you step on one, flat there and sand-buried, he’ll get you every time. So you shuffle when you walk in the surf. That way the stingray knows you’re coming and scoots.

Jack paused at the lapping water’s edge, facing the scraggly sea grape and sea oats that anchored the sand. Here I am, he smiled, one foot arguably in the Gulf of Mexico, the other in the Florida Straits arm of the Atlantic, bestriding the peninsula like a cut-rate Colossus. Nor was the salty ambivalence lost on him, of wishing his cash cow dead but unable to pull a trigger or guide a blade himself. He shrugged and trotted into the tin-roofed lanai, hopping hard on his left heel to clear his telephone ear.

“Gracias.” Jack took the phone from Carlotta, pinched her rump, and eyebrowed her out of the room.

“Yes, Tzu.”

“Mutatis mutandis.”

“What the hell does that mean?”