MaxAllan Collins - Quarry's vote

The bar was still doing some business and people out in the dining area were lingering over meals. The fish from the Amazon was still travelling back and forth in his little kingdom, nibbling goldfish.

“Sorry I’m late,” I said. “Fell asleep back at the hotel.”

And that was all the explanation it took.

“Aw, no problem,” she said, and smiled without smirkiness. “Sorry I greeted ya with a smartass remark.” She was a good-natured kid. She slid off the stool and I gave her my arm. She needed a little steadying. She wasn’t sloshed, but just the same I said, “Why don’t we take my car?”

“Good idea. Let’s see how she runs.”

“She runs fine,” I said, as we strolled out into the brisk night air. “You wouldn’t sell me a lemon, would you?”

She hugged my arm. “Not to you,” she said, like we were old pals. Lovers, even.

I didn’t know if I was game for that. I hadn’t made this little rendezvous because I was looking to get laid. I supposed someday sex would interest me again, but with Linda gone, the thought of it seemed pretty abstract right now.

But I needed to get close to this lovely, lonely divorcee. She knew all the principals: Best, Freed, and (having worked for Freed) presumably Ridge, even the late Mr. Werner. I might get some information. I might get some insights. It was my best option right now.

“Sorry I look so informal,” I said, behind the wheel, exiting the Embers’ lot.

“I don’t mind,” she said, settled comfortably in the bucket seat.

“Would you like to get a bite to eat?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“Something to drink?”

“That’d be nice. How ’bout my place?”

“Your place?”

“My house. The girls are with my mom. She takes ’em on the weekend, Friday and Saturday nights, that is. Between the restaurant and the car lot, I work most of the weekend. It’s better for the girls.”

“That’d be nice. If I’m not imposing.”

“Don’t be silly,” she said.

“You’ll have to guide me. I don’t know my way around the Cities all that well.”

“Head over to Davenport and go up Brady Street. It’s a housing addition way out past the shopping malls and everything.”

“Okay,” I said, and pretty soon I looked over and she was slumped against the door, sleeping. Snoring a bit.

I didn’t figure it was that she’d had all that much to drink. More that she was just bone tired, working two jobs to support her little family. It sort of pissed me off that her husband wasn’t paying his share. There’s a lot of lowlifes in this world.

We’d just glided past a shopping center called Brady Eighty, with signs signaling Interstate 80 up ahead, when I nudged her awake.

She sat up with a start and was immediately embarrassed. “Oh, Jack, I’m sorry… really…”

“Don’t worry about it. You work hard. You get tired. You’re entitled.”

She rubbed one eye with the heel of a hand, smiled in a crinkly fashion. “You’re really very nice.”

“Yeah, I hear that all the time.”

“It’s right up here.”

“What?”

“The Hastings addition. Where I live. Just to your right.”

I made a turn into well-lit, well-tended, split-level suburbia. The houses were good size, but fairly close together. It took money to live in this neighborhood, but these people weren’t wealthy. Not, say, in the Victor Werner sense. Of course these people were alive, which is something they had over Werner.

She directed me into the driveway of a two-tone green split-level and I parked, got out, opened her door, gave her my arm and walked her up the curving sidewalk with its occasional steps. She wasn’t drunk by any means; but she was tired, and she’d had a few. She fumbled for her keys and then we were inside.

The entryway was a landing between floors; the lower floor, from what I could see of it, seemed to be a family room. I followed her up the open stairs half a flight into the plush living room. This was definitely the home of somebody who grew up lower middle-class and came into a little money. It had that would-be classy look of an above-average motel. Lots of massive Mediterranean furniture, drapes gathered with tassels, sofas and chairs of green and red with crushed velvet cushions, sculptured green carpet. Coats of arms and reproductions of Rembrandts and such on the walls. It was the home of somebody who used to bowl but now golfs.

I followed her through the living room into a smaller, stone-and-brick room; it had a warm look, lots of rusts and golds and browns.

“You know how to make a fire?” she asked, getting behind the bar.

I looked over at the stone fireplace. “Sure. You don’t have any wood, though.”

“You’ll have to go outside and get some.”

“Uh, chop it or…”

“No, silly,” she said, stirring a pitcher of martinis, “it’s piled just outside on the patio. Through those glass doors.”

I went outside into the chilly night. I breathed deep. Closed my eyes. Swallowed. Then I picked up an armload of firewood and went in and made a fire.

“What would you like?” she asked, as she poured herself a martini.

“Do you have a Coke? Diet, preferably.”

“Do I have to drink alone?”

“I don’t drink.”

That seemed to disappoint her. “Oh?”

“I got nothing against it. It’s just not a habit I picked up. You have whatever you want, however much you want. You’re a hardworking girl. You got it coming.”

“Thanks,” she said. “You’re a sweetie.” Actually, if she got a little drunker, I might get more information out of her.

She came over, in her nyloned stocking feet, the belt of the white dress gone now, and handed me a tall, icy glass of Coke.

“It’s Diet,” she said.

“Good,” I said, sipping it. “I’m trying to take some weight off.”

“That why you wear black?”

“It is slimming, isn’t it?”

“You don’t look heavy to me. Your face looks… well, actually it looks a little drawn.”

“I haven’t had much of an appetite the last few days.”

“Oh, I see.” she said, as if she did. “You make a nice fire.”

“I’ve had some experience.”

“Want to sit in front of it?”

I said nothing.

“I said, want to…”

“Sure,” I said.

She tossed some cushions on the floor-it was a shag carpet in here, very homey-and we lay on them and watched the fire.

“You must think I’m terrible,” she said.

“Why would I think that? Which I don’t.”

“Inviting a strange man to my home.”

“I’m not a strange man. I’m a good customer.”

She almost did a spit take with her martini. “Geez, that sounds even worse…”

I smiled at her. “I didn’t mean it to. I like you. I like being around you.”

It wasn’t a lie. It wasn’t the reason I was here, but it wasn’t a lie.

“I’ve had kind of a… rough time of it lately,” she said. “I wanted some company tonight.”

“Glad to oblige. Why a rough time?”

“My boss… Lonny…” Shook her head. “He’s making things tough…”

“How so?”

“I like Lonny. We were friends for years, or anyway he and Bob and Laureen-that’s Lonny’s wife, ex-wife now-well, we were all friends. Socially, and involved with the party.”

“Democratic Action party, you mean?”

“Right. And, anyway, Lonny’s been really sweet, giving me this job and all. But he’s been, well, pressuring me.”

“He getting ‘handsy,’ too?”

“I wish it were that simple. He’s asked me out. We’ve been out. I’ve… let him kiss me a few times.” She made a face. “Damn, this sounds so, so high school. I’ve never slept with him. I just don’t.. don’t feel that way about him.”