“You didn’t go by her place to give her your own kinda root-canal treatment, did you?” McGregor asked. “There ain’t nothing wrong with that undernourished kinda cunt; put her on your prick and spin her like a propeller, hey?”
Carver said, “You’re sick as Raffy Ortiz.”
McGregor grinned, showing the pink tip of his tongue between his widely spaced front teeth, “Sure, and you’re as upright a guy as Jerry Falwell. I mean, girl young enough to be your daughter and all that. Is that what you’re gonna tell me? Don’t mean diddly, Carver. Birdie’s not that young. She was probably popped years ago. You could have good sex with her and then lay around and talk about the new Whitney Houston album.”
“Maybe you’re even more messed up in the head than Raffy.”
“You don’t like Whitney Houston? Fine black stuff. Like to put it to her and listen to her sing her best.”
“You know my meaning.”
“Yeah. I know something else, too. Your cock’s got no conscience. Not really. You’re no exception to the human race.”
“I am to the human race the way you see it.”
McGregor took a long pull of beer. Some of it spilled sideways out of the can and dribbled down his chin onto his shirt. “Naw. Difference is I do see it and you don’t.” He grinned again and stretched out his long, workable legs and crossed them at the ankles, wriggling both feet, as if rubbing it in that he could walk and Carver needed the cane. Actually stared hard at the cane leaning on the cushion beside Carver; still grinning, trying to get to Carver. No mistaking what he was thinking. Doing. Some guy.
He said, “Tell me again about this morning, Carver. Lay it all out for me. And yesterday, too. Sure. What the fuck, why not yesterday?”
It was three-thirty before Carver finally got out of there and drove toward the coast highway and then north.
When he opened the door of his cottage the phone was ringing.
32
Amos Burrel’s voice on the phone sounded faint but vibrant with frustration. “He snatched her right away from here, Carver! Drove right up and dragged her into his car and screeched to hell and gone outta here with her! Damn!”
Something inside Carver grew cold and sank. “Slow down and tell me the who and what of it, Amos.”
“Nurse Rule’d have a cow if she knew I phoned you,” Amos said. “But there comes a time for a man not to give a shit-I believe that, Carver.”
“And maybe you’re right, Amos. What happened?” Carver wanted to get the story out of the old man before he was discovered on the phone at Sunhaven and the conversation was terminated.
“I seen it only five minutes ago. That Latin thug in the white Cadillac; he’s the one talked to Nurse Rule that night. He drove up and parked right near the front entrance. Little later I seen him walk back out with Birdie at his side. At first I thought the poor little thing was going with him willingly, though that sure didn’t strike me as right. Then I seen that as they got closer to the car she started trying to hang back, dragging her feet. He had her tight by the elbow then. When he had the car door open she tried to jerk away but he laughed and wouldn’t let her. Laughed, goddamn him! Having himself a good time!” Amos began to cluck his tongue; Carver could imagine him shaking his head.
“Go on, Amos. Then what?”
“She tried to kick him but he shoved her into the car on the driver’s side, then across the front seat while he climbed in himself. I think she tried to open the door on the other side and jump out, but it looked like he slapped her one and yanked her over close to him while he started the car. Slapped her hard! Then he gunned the motor and sped outta the lot. Nurse Rule, along with one of the attendants, came running out after him, but all they did was stand and watch him drive away with Birdie. Useless as tits on a boar hog. Jesus, Carver, it ain’t right, what happened. You shoulda seen it!”
Carver stared out the window at the vast blue plain of the ocean and the gulls circling above it, wings flashing white in the sun. “Anybody out there call the police?”
“I guess so, but hell, I dunno! I ain’t the only one seen what went on. What they’re mostly doing here’s running around trying to convince people nothing outta the ordinary happened. Like they think they can smooth things over and nobody’ll get upset and their heart give out. But I tell you, Carver, it won’t take them long to see that won’t wash. Birdie didn’t leave here of her own free will, and I don’t give a hot damn who says otherwise.”
The old guy had his fighting blood up, all right. Carver was glad to hear the spirit back in the cracking voice. “I’ll call the police, Amos. You did the right thing, but you better get back to your room. Keep a low profile, you understand?”
“I don’t feel like keeping no low profile. Feel like grabbing that Cuban punk by the throat and giving him a shake. Teach him some civility. Goddamn, that’s what I’d do if he was here now!”
Carver said, “Don’t grab anybody’s throat, Amos. Go on back to your room. Okay?”
“I’ll do that knowing you’re calling the police,” Amos said reluctantly. “And that’s the only way I will.”
Carver understood why he didn’t want to return to his room and a nonactive role. Big things were happening and he wanted to be part of them. Fuel that fed life.
“I can’t call the police while I’m talking to you, Amos. Now, don’t start anything else out there; wait for the law.”
Amos slammed the phone down. Hurt Carver’s ear.
Carver depressed the cradle button, then called McGregor at Del Moray police headquarters.
There was a lot of hissing and crackling on the switchboard, and then half a minute of the Muzak version of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” before the phone rang in McGregor’s office.
“No time to talk,” McGregor said, as soon as he learned it was Carver. “Squeal just came in about an abduction at Sun-haven. Your little twist Birdie. Sounds like Raffy Ortiz took her.”
“Who called?”
“Sergeant said it was Nurse Nora Rule. He checked the call for authenticity before he had a unit dispatched.”
“You going to Sunhaven now?”
“Not actually. Instead I’m wasting my time talking to the jerkoff mighta caused all this.”
Carver said, “I’ll see you there,” and hung up.
There were four Del Moray squad cars parked at haphazard angles near Sunhaven’s main entrance. Red and blue roof-bar lights still rotated and flashed on two of them, but weren’t making much of a showing in the bright early evening sun. A door was hanging open on one of the cars, and a radio was squawking loudly and intermittently. Just outside Sunhaven’s tinted-glass entrance, a uniform stood slouched with his arms crossed, talking to a bespectacled blond man in a brown suit. Another uniform stood with his foot propped on the front bumper of the nearest patrol car. His head was bowed, as if he were thinking deeply. Or maybe the heat had gotten to him.
When he heard Carver approaching he looked up. His face was flushed and shiny with perspiration, but his marksman-blue eyes were calm and alert. He said, “Yes, sir?” in a neutral tone that meant who the hell are you and what are you doing here.
The plainclothesman in the brown suit heard the uniform and swiveled his head to stare blankly. He was a small man with a narrow, wise face. Studious-looking. The kind of guy who years ago had learned devious ways of dealing with the class bully. “You Fred Carver?”
Carver said he was.
“Lieutenant said a bald guy with a cane’d be out here,” brown suit said. He smiled, shifting position slightly. The round lenses of his glasses blazed as twin reflected suns. “Said he’d be a little younger than the others. Go on in.”
Carver didn’t return the smile as he limped inside.
The bright lobby had been cleared of residents. The checkerboard on the table across from the desk held half a dozen checkers, including three red kings. A game had been interrupted. Black was probably glad. In a far corner was a line of chrome-spoked wheelchairs, collapsed in on themselves and stacked neatly against one another. They looked too frail to support the burden of years and human experience.