Nelson Algren - The New Black Mask Quarterly (№ 1)

She turned right out of the driveway and headed toward Vermont, but two blocks up she suddenly pulled over to the curb, so I had to drive past her and park in the next block. I watched through my rear window as she got out of the Porsche and went to the curbside mailbox. Her body looked spectacular in a red tube top and tightfitting jeans, but my eyes were on the businesssized envelope she pulled out of her purse and dropped into the box.

She got back into her car and I waited until she had turned on Vermont before I got the fifteen colored blotters from the trunk of my car and walked back to the mailbox.

The pickup time marked on the box was 4:15, two hours away. I opened the mailbox, dropped in the blotters and went back to my car. 1 stopped at a nearby greasy spoon and killed some time downing a tuna fish sandwich and four cups of coffee, and was back at the mailbox by quarter to four.

The mail truck pulled up at 4:21, by my watch, but then my watch may have been a little fast. The mailman was opening the box when I trotted up, wearing my most worried expression. “Excuse me—”

He looked up, startled. “Huh?”

He was young, with shoulder-length dark hair and a beard. I hoped his attitude matched his appearance. What I needed was a little hang-loose flexibility, someone who would be willing to bend the rules a little to help out a fellow human being in distress.

I pointed up the street, and tried to put urgency in my voice. “I just live up the street here at 1015. I mailed a letter this afternoon and I’m sure I sent it to the wrong address. It’s a check, and Jesus Christ, if it gets into the wrong hands and gets cashed, I’d be up shit’s creek.”

He shrugged. “I don’t know what I can do about it—”

“If I could just take a look at the letter and see, I’d know whether to cancel the check or not—”

He frowned, his mouth following the lines of his mustache. “I can’t go looking through all this mail—”

“You won’t have to,” I assured him. “After I mailed it and realized what I’d done, I took some blotters and dropped them in the box. The letter should be right below them.”

He looked doubtful. “I don’t know...”

“Look, I don’t have to touch anything. I know that’s probably against the postal regulations. You can read me the address. I don’t want the letter back or anything. I just want to know whether I should call the bank and cancel the check. I mean, if the check gets into the wrong hands, man, I’ll really be screwed.”

He bit his lip and made a sloughing motion with his shoulders. “I guess it’d be okay.”

“I really appreciate this,” I said truthfully.

The blotters were near the top of the pile of mail. He took the letter directly below them and picked it up, holding it away from me so I couldn’t see it. “Charles Albertson?”

That was probably it. For some reason, they always seemed to use their own first names or the same initials. The lack of imagination of the typical criminal mind never ceased to depress me. “That’s the one.”

“Two thirty-four Montvue Road,” he read. “Old Towne, Montserrat.”

“That takes a load off my mind, thanks,” I said. “That’s the right address.” He handed me back my blotters and I thanked him again and jotted down the address in my notebook on the way to the car. I called my travel agent from a pay phone down the street and booked the first flight out of Miami, with connections to Antigua and Montserrat. Then I called Barbara Phalen and filled her in about her husband’s affair with Rhonda Anixter. I figured I might as well have something nice to think about on the plane.

Montserrat was a green and rugged island paradise of forested mountains, manicured fields, and black sand beaches. Old Towne was a collection of affluent hillside houses overlooking a golf course and the sea. Two thirty-four Montvue was a pink house with a white shingle roof, surrounded by a white wrought iron fence festooned with flowers. I told my cab driver to wait for me and went up the walk to the front door.

The day was hot and sunny and the front door was wide open to let in the cool breeze that blew steadily from the ocean. I stepped inside and called out: “Hello?”

I heard his thongs slapping the tile floor before he appeared around the corner dressed in a pair of swim trunks. He had the unintelligent good looks and the lean, tanned body of a bid who surfed a lot and played volleyball on the beach and little else. His curly blond hair was wet.

“Hello, Chip.” I looked around the place. It was light and airy, with whitewashed walls and rattan furniture. A swimming pool was visible out back through the open louvered doors. No wonder he needed money. “I can say one tiling for you; you set yourself up well. What’s the rent like?”

He stared at me, open-mouthed. The words were barely audible. “Who are you?”

“A detective hired by your father.”

His expression turned to disgust and he threw both hands into the air and let them fall to his sides. “Shit. Dear old Dad. He even had to fuck this up—”

He was reverting to form — a whiner. “You’re lucky he did. Rhonda had no intention of bringing that $300,000 to you. Why should she when she could have it all? You’re legally dead and if you suddenly turned up alive, you’d be prosecuted for insurance fraud. By that time, she’d be long gone. She only agreed to send you money because she wanted to keep you placated and underground.”

“How did you know about the money?” he asked, surprised.

“I got a look at the envelope it’s being sent in. I knew that if the insurance settlement was held up long enough, you’d more than likely run out of money and have to send for some.” I paused. I wanted to savor the look on his face when I told him. “She got it from Arnie Phalen.”

His eyes widened. “Phalen?”

“He’s in for a piece now. He found out what the scam was and cut himself in. She’s even using his attorney. They’ve been having a good time together since you’ve been gone, by the way.”

His hands clenched into fists and he stepped toward me. “You’re a liar—”

I wasn’t going to stand for any of that stuff; I figured I could handle him one-handed if I had to. I sidestepped him and put my good hand on his chest and shoved him back, hard. His foot hit the bottom of one of the rattan chairs and he lost his balance and sat down. I moved forward so that he couldn’t get up without being hit. He didn’t try.

“Don’t be stupid,” I said. “You were had, boy, from the moment she set her sights on you. Your old man was right. She was only after the money.”

He stared up at me hatefully, like a beaten dog.

“Shit.”

“That’s what you’re in.” I turned and started toward the door.

“Hey!” he shouted after me. “Where are you going?”

I stopped and turned around. “To find a beach somewhere. I’ve been in the Caribbean twice in a week, and I don’t even have a tan.”

He jumped up out of the chair and his hand jerked up. “Wait. What about me?”

I shrugged. “I was hired to find out what happened to you, not babysit. I don’t think I’d care for that job.” I held up my cast. “You’re not my favorite person, boy. It’s because of you I have this.”

I started to go, then turned back.

“My advice to you would be to get your tail back to ‘dear old Dad’ as fast as you can and start doing some serious brown-nosing, because you’re going to need his money to pay for your lawyer. If you lay it out for the insurance company now, you might just get off with probation.”

I left him standing there and took the cab to the airport, where I called John Anixter. The phone connection was lousy, but it was good enough to get the message across. He sounded very happy at first to learn his son was alive, then he just got plain mad. He told me to “let the snot-nosed little sonofabitch find his own way back,” and informed me I could expect a bonus when I got back.