Stuart Kaminsky - Vengeance

So I put them where even a retarded blind chimp could find them. Then I watched my tape of Mildred Pierce for the three or four hundredth time.

When I woke up in the morning after dreaming of Ann Blyth coming to shoot me, I reached under the bed and found gun and money. I needed a shave. It was a little after seven in the morning. I was hungry. I staggered into the office and plugged in the phone. It was ringing.

“Hello,” I said.

“Lewis, your phone is broken or you were out all night.”

“I unplugged it.”

“It’s me, Harvey.”

“I know,” I said, mouth and tongue dry.

“Bingo,” he said.

“Straight line or four corners?”

“Melanie Sebastian,” he said. “Found her.”

Which meant that Melanie Sebastian was ready to be found. There was no hurry. She would wait for me wherever it was. She had lived up to her word. She had let me find her just when she had promised.

There was a lot to do that Saturday. It was too early for the DQ, and Gwen’s place was only open during the week. I drove through the McDonald’s where 301 and Tamiami Trail meet across from the office of the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

The blue Buick was behind me. It was hard for him to hide on a sleepy Saturday morning.

I got a small black coffee and two Egg McMuffins. I ate the sandwiches as I drove, and when I parked in front of the offices of Tycinker, Oliver and Schwartz I drank my coffee. The street was almost deserted. A handful of cars were parked on the street, which on weekdays was full.

When I finished my coffee, I went into the office building and up the elevator to the door, which was open. There was no receptionist on duty and I could hear no voices. I moved down the corridor past the desk of the chief secretary and to Harvey’s open office.

“Lewis,” he said.

Harvey was clean-shaven, his hair brushed. He was wearing an Oberlin sweatshirt and working at his computers with a mug of coffee or tea steaming next to him.

“Harvey,” I said. “What have we got?”

“The technology doesn’t exist to find the Buga-Buga-Boo virus origin. At least I haven’t found it yet. The information superhighway does not yet have speed traps.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“I haven’t given up yet. You want Melanie Sebastian. I have her. Credit card in her name used yesterday at the Barrington House in Holmes Beach, that’s on Anna Maria Island.”

Harvey handed me the phone as he kept working. I looked up the Barrington House. It was a bed-and-breakfast. I called. A woman answered. I told her I was in from Baltimore and looking for a place for my wife and I to spend a quiet weekend at the end of the year. I said I’d like to come see the accommodations sometime this weekend. She gave me directions. I hung up, thanked Harvey and went back out past the empty offices.

I wanted to get rid of the gun I was carrying. I also wanted to get rid of the eight thousand dollars in cash. I wasn’t worried about being picked up by the police for speeding or making an illegal turn. I’m too careful a driver for that, but Detective Etienne Vivaise might be looking for me again.

I drove to Carl Sebastian’s high-rise condo building. I thought I might wake him up. I didn’t. He answered the buzzer in the lobby after a full minute and asked who I was. I told him. He buzzed me in. When the elevator doors opened, he was there in a white robe, freshly showered, a V8 in hand. He looked nervous, anxious.

“You could have called,” he said, “but if you have information about Melanie… I was up at four this morning. I can’t sleep. I can’t do anything.”

“Today,” I said as the elevator closed behind me. “I’ll find her today. I’ll talk to her. After that, it’s up to her. If she says no, the choice is yours.”

He ushered me into his apartment and closed the door.

“You’re sure you can find her today?”

“I’m sure.”

“When?”

“Before the sun goes down,” I said.

He took a sip of V8 and nodded. His hand shook just slightly.

“I suppose I can’t persuade you to tell me where she is so I can

…”

“We have an agreement,” I said.

“You’re right. You’re right. Just tell her I love her, want her back. She can make the terms. If I’ve done something wrong-”

“I know what to say,” I said. “I need another five hundred dollars to close out the case. I’ll give you a fully itemized bill for expenses.”

He looked at me and said,

“You really know where she is?”

“I really know.”

“This isn’t a con to get an additional five hundred out of me?”

“Keep the five hundred and I stop looking as of this minute,” I said.

He drained the glass of juice, thought for a second and said,

“I’ll write you a check.”

“Cash would be better,” I said.

He put down the glass on the living room table and plunged his hands into the pockets of his robe. He looked at the portrait of his wife over the mantelpiece. I looked too. Then he sighed and said, “All right. Cash.”

I stayed in the living room, standing, looking at the portrait of Melanie Sebastian, while he moved to his office.

He came back in about three minutes, a folded wad of bills in his hand.

“I’ll write out a receipt,” I said.

“No, that’s not necessary. Find her today, please.”

Sebastian was himself again. I didn’t count the money. I placed the wad of bills in my pocket and left.

The sun was out. The clouds were white and billowy and moving slowly. I drove over to Sarasota High School to watch the baseball team work out and play an intersquad game. There were about two dozen parents, girlfriends and people like me with nothing else to do in the stands.

I didn’t see my angel in the blue Buick. Maybe he wasn’t a baseball fan. The coach stopped the game from time to time to point out some problem, show the shortstop the right move for a double-play ball going from first base to second base and back to first, demonstrate to the center fielder how to throw home from the outfield so the ball could be cut off by the pitcher.

It wasn’t like sitting in the stands watching the Cubs on a weekday afternoon, but it helped keep me from thinking too consciously about the gun and the money in my pocket.

I left after an hour. I had a Chicago Bulls baseball cap in the dresser in my room, but I hadn’t thought about bringing it. If I stayed out in the sun too much longer, the top of my head would be sunburned: one of the several disadvantages of being almost bald.

Time moved slowly. So did I and so did the blue Buick. By eleven-thirty I had killed as much time as I could. I headed for the post office on Ringling.

The lot was almost full. I parked. A hot-dog cart stood on the sidewalk doing minimal business. I bought a dog from the dark, deeply tanned woman who wore an apron and a smile. She was a tall, slim brunette about forty.

The dog wasn’t kosher and the bun wasn’t steamed. I put extra onions and mustard on it and stood eating while I watched the front of the post office.

The blue Buick waited at the end of the parking lot.

“How’s business?” I asked.

“Saturday’s not the best,” she said. “During the week, working people line up sometimes. On Saturdays, you know, I catch ’em coming out of the post office.”

“Then why come on Saturday?”

“I’ve got three kids and a husband on disability,” she said. “It gets me out of the house and brings in maybe fifty to a hundred and fifty clear.”

“You want to double your business?” I asked as I worked on my hot dog and watched the door.

“No,” she said. “I want to keep living just above the poverty level.”