Carl Hiassen - Basket Case

"He's been dead since early this morning," Detective Hill adds informatively. "What would you know about that, Mr. Tagger?"

"Not a damn thing." My voice is a dry croak.

"Really?" Hill is holding something inches in front of my eyes, something pinched between his thumb and forefinger. It's a business card from the Union-Register. My name is printed on it.

"Burns had this in his pocket," Detective Hill explains, "when his body was found."

"Now, why would that be?" his partner inquires.

"And what happened to your face, Mr. Tagger?" Hill asks.

Me, I don't panic.

"Officers," I say, "I wish to report a burglary."

Emma's couch is too short for my legs.

She tugs down the sheet to cover my feet and fits a pillow under my head. She informs me I've suffered a mild concussion, a diagnosis based on the fact I got dizzy, vomited and fainted on her doorstep. She tells me she went to nursing school for two years before switching to journalism, and I say she would have made an outstanding nurse. She appraises my rubescent schnozz guiltily, so I assure her that somebody else punched me harder than she did.

It's one in the morning and Radiohead is playing on Emma's stereo, a neat surprise.

In her wire-rimmed reading glasses she sits cross-legged in an armchair, the calico cat on her lap. She's wearing tennis socklets so I can't scope out her toes. I squeeze my eyelids shut and wish for this murderous headache to abate. In the meantime I'm telling Emma about my scuffle aboard the Rio Rio with Jay Burns, who seven hours later was found dead behind a tackle shop on the Pelican Causeway. A bait truck loaded with finger mullet backed up over the ex-Slut Puppy, whose ponytailed gourd had been resting inopportunely beneath the vehicle's right rear wheel. How his head had gotten there was the question that brought detectives Hill and Goldman to my apartment. Hill believed that Jay Burns, being clinically intoxicated, probably passed out in that fateful location. Goldman, however, speculated that an assailant might have clobbered Jay Burns and purposely placed him beneath the truck. The medical examiner offered no insight; so pulverized was the keyboardist's skull that it was impossible to discern if he'd been bludgeoned prior to being run over.

Emma is pleased to hear how I cooperated with the detectives, recounting my visit to the boat (though omitting the substance of my questions, and Jay's tantrum) and providing the precise times of my arrival and departure from the marina. Both Hill and Goldman seemed to buy the idea that I was interviewing Burns for a posthumous newspaper profile of his best friend, the late James Bradley Stomarti.

"Then you're not a suspect," Emma says.

"Try to sound more relieved."

"The guy who broke into your apartment, what do you think he was after?"

"Who knows. My Chagalls?"

"Jack, I'm not the one knocking on doors at midnight."

"Yes, well, you are my editor. I felt you should be notified of what happened."

A feeble lie. The fact is, I'm not sure why I came to Emma's apartment. I don't clearly recall driving here. Gazing at the varnished pine beams of her ceiling, I hear myself say: "I had nowhere else to go."

Cat in arms, she leaves the room. Moments later she returns with ice cubes wrapped in a washcloth, which she lays across my eyes and forehead.

"Is that too cold?" she asks.

"Why won't you sleep with Juan? Everybody sleeps with Juan."

"Do you?"

"I'm talking about the ladies, Emma. Is it because he's a sports-writer?"

"No, it's because he's your best friend."

"Juan is a gentleman. He never talks about his love life."

"Then how do you know we haven't slept together?"

"I pried it out of him."

"Really," says Emma. "Why?"

I peek from under the washcloth to see if she's miffed.

"You're my boss, he's my friend," I say. "You two get serious and it's bound to affect my pathetic little universe. That's the only reason I cared if you and he were—"

"Having intercourse?"

"What is this, ninth-grade biology?"

"Fucking, then," Emma says pertly. "Is that better?"

I sit up, pressing my knuckles to my ears to keep the brains from leaking out. "Don't worry, I didn't ask Juan for the juicy details. You got any Excedrin?"

Emma brings me three aspirins and a glass of water.

"Lie down. You'll feel better," she says.

Stretching out, I announce: "You should go back to nursing school. You were born for it."

"How about you, Jack? Are you sleeping with anyone these days?"

"Excuse me?" Again I start to rise but from behind I feel Emma's hands lock on my shoulders.

She says, "It's only fair, since you know all about my sex life."

"Wrong. I only know you're not sleeping with Juan. And you know I'm not sleeping with Juan, so we're even."

"Don't think so, Tagger."

I like the way Emma laughs, I must admit. I like being in her apartment, as opposed to the emergency room at Charity. I even like the way she's holding me down ...

Christ, Jack, snap out of it. Saving Emma will be impossible if I don't soon revert to the irascible prick of her newsroom nightmares. But when she apologizes for socking me in the nose, I tell her I deserved it.

"I'm not a well person," I submit. "I saw those sparkly toenails and was riven with envy. Obviously something inside of you rollicks carefree and fanciful. I've completely forgotten what that's like."

"Doesn't it hurt to talk so much?" Emma asks.

"I can't believe Jay Burns is dead. I can't fucking believe it. Listen, you wanna go for a ride?"

"Jack, it's late. You need to rest."

"Put on some shoes. Hurry up."

The cops had been there first, followed by persons unknown. I show Emma where the yellow crime tape strung around the dock pilings had been broken, then clumsily reattached. I yank the tape down, roll it into a wad and toss it in a bucket. Then we board the Rio Rio.

Whoever sacked the cabin was smart enough to wait until the detectives had come and gone. The place is in shambles now, but it wasn't much neater thirty hours ago when I'd arrived to interview Jay Burns. The porn, pizza cartons and music magazines have been restrewn across the floor and the berths. Add to that mess the unlaundered contents of assorted drawers and cabinets, plus several unappetizing containers from the refrigerator.

Emma and I are poised in the narrow companionway, contemplating a path through the ripening debris. I lead the way, stepping cautiously. Exhilarated, Emma keeps a grip on my arm. The first priority is turning on the air conditioner because the cabin smells like piss, beer and old sneakers.

"What are we looking for?" Emma whispers.

"Something the bad guys didn't find."

I'm guessing it took more than one man to deal with husky Jay Burns. Later, after the boat was searched, the bald intruder was sent to my place on the chance that I'd conned the mystery stash out of Jay, or stolen it outright.

For forty-five minutes Emma and I root through the cabin and turn up nothing but a Baggie of sodden pot, undoubtedly discarded as worthless by the previous searchers. In fact, every hatch, panel and storage bin appears to have been opened and emptied ahead of us. We step back up to the deck and, employing one of Jay's flashlights, check the bait well and the engine compartment. On the console above the wheel is a sprout of loose wires where the bad guys removed some of the Contender's electronics—probably the VHF, depth finder and Loran. This gesture was intended to make it look like a common boatyard burglary, which it most definitely was not. I show Emma the disconnected wires, then flick off the flashlight.

She says, "Now what?"

"Write his obituary, I guess."