Steve Martini - Undue Influence

‘I dunno. Here a minute ago. Musta got tired waiting and left,’ he says. He gives us the government-issue shrug.

I look up the alley the other way. The courier is at the curb, standing at the open door of a vehicle, looking back over his shoulder in my direction. There’s no one else in sight, just an old lady and a vagrant walking down the sidewalk that cuts the alley at Seventh Street.

‘If he comes back, tell him to wait.’ I’m looking at Howard.

‘What am I — your messenger?’

‘I’m going back inside. Unfinished business,’ I tell him.

Howard gives me the look, the face of authority, withering like blossoms in a drought. He makes no effort to stop me. Alas, the man is not management material.

I head back through the door, wondering who could have been looking for me here. I didn’t tell the office where I was going. It couldn’t be Harry. One of those nagging things, like a ringing phone in the night, with nothing but heavy breathing on the line. An annoyance. I try to put it out of my mind.

As I clear the mail-sorting area, I am still filtering the sights from the loading dock, like light through a camera lens set on a quick shutter speed, fading images being processed, the man’s silhouette at the curb. Why, I think, would a private courier be getting into the backseat of a dark sedan?

The thought is fused in my mind by the searing blast, the flash of light followed in an instant by heat that toasts my face. The concussion sends me reeling against the wall. Splinters of wood, particles of glass spray my body like gravel shot from the barrel of a gun. In a dreamscape I find myself sprawled, supine, bathed in the warmth of glowing embers. Dazed, things move about me, over my head, white and blue butterflies.

My eyes focus. Little shards floating in the air, not butterflies, but pieces of papers, singed at the edges, drifting down. One of these settles on my nose, balanced perfectly, then teeters toward one eye. I close the lid, surprised that I can muster that much control over any part of my body.

Slowly I stagger to one knee, then two. Hands and knees, I feel for the wall, warm sweat running down my face. I can hear nothing but the ringing in my ears. People are moving about me now, soundless emissions coming from agitated faces. One of them takes my arm. He says something in my face, but I can’t hear. I shake my head, motion with my hands, like speak up. Only the ringing in my ears. He steadies me against the wall and moves toward the door, the office where Marcie is.

I’m holding my head with one hand. Wet warmth. I look at my palm, glistening with blood. It is not warm sweat that is trickling down my cheek.

The door to the office where Marcie is has disintegrated. The glass blown out of the upper portion. The lower panel of wood is a fringe of splinters. What is left of the chair that I had been sitting in has been blown through the door.

Two guys kick out what’s left of the lower panel. One of them steps through.

Mouths are moving, people trying to shout, but they have all lost their voices.

‘Somebody call 911,’ I say. But I don’t hear the words.

Two of the clerks have come from the front counter.

I steady my legs and push myself forward to the doorway. My head is ringing. The pounding in my ears. A wave of nausea. I turn toward the wall like I am going to retch, but force it down. I fight for control.

From the doorway I can see nothing of Marcie. The chair where she was sitting has been blown over backwards. It rests partially embedded in the wall behind the desk. One of its wooden arms splintered. No sign of Marcie.

I move inside the room and steady myself with my hands on the desk, little droplets of blood forming with the dust and shards of paper on its surface.

Then I see her. On the floor, sprawled on her back. The clothing gone from her upper body. Only her bra, which is singed, and a few strings of fabric from one sleeve remain to cover her frail torso.

I look at her face, singed and burned, even more innocent and childlike now, gripped in the sleep of death. One man at the pulse of what is left of her thin wrist, looking up, shaking his head, a universal message requiring no words.

People are beginning to congregate at the door. I see my briefcase, flattened against the wall, its surface scarred like a pistol target, a half dozen nails through its thick latigo.

Then I see it on the floor, near the chair and my briefcase. The little envelope. The note that Marcie pulled from the drawer of the desk. The one sent to her by Kathy Merlow. Its edges are charred.

I move in a world of ringing silence. People are milling toward the desk, at once curious and recoiling. Their thoughts for the moment fixed on the fragile form on the floor. Tiptoeing over to look.

I slip behind two of the women who have pushed their way to the edge of the desk. I reach for my case, tattered, its cover imploded by the force of the blast, studded with nails.

In as fluid a motion as I can manage, I reach down, trapping the little envelope on the floor between two bloodied fingers. As I rise up, no one seems to notice that there is one less scrap of paper on the floor. Another wave of nausea. I catch the bile in my throat and swallow hard. My hand to my mouth. Bloodied prints on the little envelope. Slowly I back from the room. I can see over the front counter, two federal cops in blue uniforms and shiny badges. They’re headed for the door that leads back here.

I walk, stumble, pick up my pace, try to make a straight line to the rear of the building.

On the loading dock I am alone. Everyone is inside. I manage to get down the stairs, tripping and dripping as I walk, moving as quickly as I can toward the safety of my car, clutching the little envelope in my hands, my only link to Kathy Merlow and what she knows.

‘I need your help,’ I tell her.

I’m in the office with Harry, picking at one of the bandages on my forehead. There are three stitches and a score of lacerations on the right side of my face. A young doctor picked glass out from under the skin at a surgicenter, one of those walk-in doc shops where with enough plastic you can have anything from your tonsils out to your tubes tied, no questions asked. My face feels like hamburger pounded into shape on a gravel driveway.

I’m talking to Dana Colby on the phone. It’s a little after six in the evening. The city is beginning to die, surface streets emptying. I’ve caught her just coming through the door from work. She’s a soft voice on the phone and I can’t hear her.

‘You gotta speak up,’ I tell her. ‘The blast got my ears.’ I’ve told Dana that the trail of George and Kathy Merlow led me to the post office and the deadly letter bomb. She’s heard about the explosion. It’s a hot topic on the news — every channel and the local radio stations are laying it on thick to the commuting crowd. Dana now senses she’s on the cutting edge, listening to everything I say, eyes and ears to what happened.

Harry’s shaking his head. He thinks I am being foolish to involve her. To Harry, gender and good looks notwithstanding, Dana is just another prosecutor. He’s trying to talk in my other ear.

‘Big mistake.’ Harry writes this note on the pad on my desk and slides it under my face to read.

We’ve been over all this, Harry and I. He thinks I did the right thing by running, not staying to talk to the cops. Now he thinks I’m blowing it.

I ran because I wanted to avoid the police and their questions. Lama alone would hold me for a week for questioning. Cavorting with the feds would be bigtime for Jimmy. And to Lama the opportunity to spread pain my way would be better than sex. They would want to know why I was there talking to Marcie Reed. One thing would lead to another, Kathy Merlow and her note, which the cops would want. It is my only lead to the Merlows and what they know about Melanie’s murder.