Bill Pronzini: Crazybone

“You can listen to what she has to say, can’t you? It’s not like you’re under any obligation to her.”

“I didn’t mean I wouldn’t listen. I only meant—”

“Keep an open mind and then do what you think best,” Kerry said. “She really is upset about whatever happened to Captain Archie. I could hear it in her voice. And Cybil is more level-headed than either of us, you know that. If she thinks something funny’s going on, then something probably is.”

“Okay, okay. If there’s anything I can do for her, you know I will.”

We took our drinks into the living room and settled into our Mom and Pop chairs. But I didn’t get to enjoy the rest of my beer. Kerry saw to that.

“There’s something else we have to discuss,” she said.

“Uh, what?”

“Friday night. The cocktail party at Bates and Carpenter. I told you about it last week, remember?”

A little worm of premonition began to crawl slimily among the hairs on my neck. “I remember,” I said warily. “What about it?”

“I know how much you hate large social gatherings, but—”

“Oh God.”

“—but I need you to go with me.”

“No,” I said. “No way.”

“It’s important. To me, to the agency, and to Anthony DiGrazia. I wouldn’t ask you if it wasn’t.”

“DiGrazia?”

“Don’t play dumb. I told you about him, too. My new account — DiGrazia’s Old-Fashioned Italian Sausages. The party is in his honor, to celebrate his signing with B and C.”

“All right, so?”

“He’s as old-fashioned as his sausages. Family values and all that. Married couples are supposed to attend social functions together, get acquainted with one another’s spouses — especially when the function is business-related. Plus, he knows who you are, he’s read about you in the papers. He wants to meet his ‘fellow paisan.’ Jim Carpenter thinks — I think — he’ll be offended if you’re not at the party, no matter what the excuse.”

I didn’t say anything. Shameless jumped up on my lap and began digging his claws into my knee. I glared at him and said to Kerry, “How about if we take the cat along, too? One big happy family for old Anthony to get to know.”

“Oh, cut it out,” she said. “It’s one evening out of your life. Do I ask things like this of you very often?”

“All right,” I said.

“Well? Do I?”

“No. I said all right. How many people will be there?”

“Seventy-five or so.”

I managed not to cringe. “How long will it last?”

“Just a couple of hours. Five to seven. And dinner after that, but it’ll only be six of us — the DiGrazias, Jim and his current lady, you and me.”

“Sounds like fun,” I said. Sounds like a slice of hell, I thought.

“Don’t be sarcastic.”

“I wasn’t being sarcastic,” I lied. “Don’t worry, I’ll be on my best behavior and I’ll try to have a good time. Anything for you, my love.”

“Mmmmm,” she said. One of those sounds women make that call to mind the warning rattle of a diamondback. Meaning I’d better be on my best behavior and I’d better try very hard to have a good time. Or else. Just what the “or else” might be, I preferred not to speculate.

Tamara was twenty-five minutes late on Wednesday morning. When she showed up she wore a quirky little smile and a satisfied, cat-in-the-cream expression. I knew that look: I’d had it myself on more than one occasion.

“That Horace,” she said as she hung up her favorite grungy coat. “Have to be changing his name to Mr. Sun pretty soon.”

“Mr. Sun?”

“Up bright and early, just keeps getting hotter and hotter. Too many mornings like this, I’m gonna have to start wearing sunblock to bed.”

“Tell me something. Ms. Corbin,” I said. “Why is it young people feel compelled to discuss their sex lives in such great detail?”

“Why not? Sex is cool, man.” She grinned. “ ’Specially when it’s hot.”

“It’s also private, or should be.”

“Well, we don’t have hangups about doing the nasty.”

“Who’s ‘we?’ Generation X?”

“Lot more open than yours, right?”

“Too open, if you ask me.”

“No such thing. Better to call it sweet and clean than pretend it’s dirty. Besides, don’t you remember how it was?”

“How what was?”

“Bein’ my age. Horny all the time instead of every once in a while.”

“What does that mean? Every once in a while?”

“You know, now and then.”

“Define ‘now and then.’ ”

“Birthdays, holidays, like that.”

“Is that what you think? People in their fifties and sixties only have sex on birthdays and holidays, if they have it at all? Seven or eight times a year?”

“That often? I figured maybe two or three.”

“... Are you putting me on?”

“No, sir. Horace’s folks don’t do it at all anymore. That’s what his daddy told him and he’s only fifty-two.”

“That’s too bad. But for your information, Ms. Corbin, some of us old codgers still manage to indulge regularly. Not as regularly as you and Horace, God knows, but as often as once or twice a week.”

“Lordy.”

“In the morning, the afternoon, and sometimes even more than once a day. Not always in the missionary position, either, contrary to what you probably believe.”

She made a “tsk” sound and shook her head. “Tell me something, boss,” she said, deadpan. “Why is it middle-aged people feel compelled to discuss their sex lives in such great detail?”

I stared at her for about three seconds and then burst out laughing. She’d been putting me on, all right, playing me the way Horace, her symphonically inclined boyfriend, plays his cello. Score another one for Tamara. Trying to win a point, any point, with her was like going one-on-one against Michael Jordan. You didn’t stand a chance; she had too many moves and too much quickness, and every time you ended up feeling outmaneuvered and overmatched.

“Okay,” I said when I got my face straight again, “let’s do some work here. You can start by explaining that cryptic note you left me yesterday.”

“About the Hunters? Very interesting stuff, so far.”

“So you said. Interesting how?”

“Mr. Jackson Hunter in particular. Seems the man was ten and a half years old when he died.”

“What?”

“Intercoastal application says he was horn in Harrisburg, P.A., in I960,” Tamara said. “I checked the Vital Stats Bureau there. No birth record for anybody named Jackson Hunter. Not that year and not any year between fifty-five and sixty-five.”

“One of the nearby towns...”

“Uh-uh. Pennsylvania’s not a big state, so I checked all the counties. A few Jackson Hunters and Jack Hunters, but they’re all the wrong race, deceased prior to two weeks ago, or still living in P.A.”

Frowning, I said, “Sheila Hunter is supposed to be from Harrisburg, too. Twining told me her maiden name is Underwood.”

“Yeah, I got that from the daughter’s birth record. No Sheila Underwood born in Harrisburg during that same ten-year span. And there be no record of a Hunter-Underwood marriage.”

“All right. But that doesn’t make Jack Hunter ten and a half years old when he died. How’d you come up with that figure?”

“Man’s Social Security number,” Tamara said. “Can’t get any information out of the Social Security Administration — be easier to back into the Pentagon files — but the number itself tells you some things. First three digits, where it was issued. Other digits, approximately when.”

“And Hunter’s was issued ten and a half years ago.”

“Yep. In New York City.”