Johnny was laughing at Charles, and I turned the little portable down so I could make out what was coming. Already I could hear her fist pounding on the front door. She paused and then pounded some more.
Finally the door opened and yellow light poured out around the tall figure of her husband, in his maroon terrycloth bathrobe.
As before, voices carried in the crisp, cold air as if from a stage to a theater’s audience.
“Darling!” he said. “What a wonderful surprise!”
“It was terrible spending Christmas without you,” his wife said. “I can stay till New Year’s if you like!”
“That would be wonderful!”
He sort of seemed to be shouting, and of course I knew why. Anyway, the prof was now enfolding his wife in his arms and they were kissing, fairly passionately considering he was a philandering prick and she was the wronged wife seeking a divorce, not to mention solace by having sex with innocent young boys like myself.
With an arm around her, and considerable concern, he ushered her into the house and shut the door. He’d hardly done that when Annette, naked flesh and a dark pubic thatch flashing under her unbuttoned white leather coat, a pile of clothing in her arms, went running in her bare feet on the snowy ground along the side of the house just at the edge of the gravel driveway. She scrambled around to the driver’s side of the Corvette and fumbled unlocking the door, but then was in and behind the wheel and taking off quickly though not peeling out or anything, no burned rubber to attract the attention of the professor’s new house guest.
Now I might have found this amusing if I hadn’t noticed something beside clothing in her arms as she scurried out from around back in French farce fashion. She also had a box, the kind of box a ream of typing paper comes in, and this she held as preciously as the items that would cover the pale flesh under the white leather.
Was that the book? The book?
My job here wasn’t just eliminating the professor, after all, but getting rid of the non-fiction novel that would embarrass and expose Annette’s father back in Chicago.
I quickly exited the split-level and ran down to the garage next door and got in the Maverick and took off after Annette. I admit to having no plan. The last thing I wanted to do, or for that matter that our client would want me to do, was harm this girl. But the possibility of me dealing with Professor Byron tonight, with his loving wife around, was nil; and maybe I could find some way to pry that manuscript away from Annette without blowing my cover or having to kill her lovely ass.
Confused as hell, feeling like I was in way over my head, I made sure at least one car was between me and the brunette’s Corvette as I tailed her. Hell, it was no secret where she was going. And, sure enough, before long she was pulling into her slot at the little apartment building in Coralville. She had taken time to button the white leather coat, so no major flashes of skin or bush were on display as she got out of the vehicle and trotted up the stairs to the second level and sealed herself in her apartment.
I pulled into the Sambo’s lot again.
Christ, I had no idea what to do. Would I really be reduced into breaking into that girl’s apartment, subduing her somehow, and stealing that manuscript? What, wearing a ski mask like the Broker suggested? What was I, a second-story man now? A burglar? Didn’t I have some goddamn dignity?
I sat for maybe fifteen minutes trying to think, but when my stomach began to growl-all I’d had for supper was a bowl of soup-I thought, Fuck it, and went on in to the Sambo’s.
This was still winter break, and fairly late at night, so the garish, brightly illuminated orange-and-white restaurant was underpopulated, enough miserable kids in orange caps and orange-and-white uniforms for every customer to have a personal waiter or waitress.
I damn near laughed, though, when I saw two big black guys, who looked like they’d wandered off the set of Cotton Comes to Harlem, sitting at the endless counter. One wore a green hat with a gold band, tilted rakishly, and a green long-sleeve shirt and green-and-brown plaid bell bottoms. The other wore a similar hat, but black with a leather band and a red feather, and a red shirt with pointy collars and deep-brown corduroy bells. Both had major Afros and Groucho-wide mustaches, and each had folded a leather (one black, one brown) topcoat carefully over the free stool next to him. They were drinking coffee and having pancakes and every side you can imagine. Tiger butter and all.
Call me a racist if you like, but this urban pair sitting in a Sambo’s made a wonderful sight gag.
Anyway, I found a booth and ordered my own big breakfast, and I sat by myself, thinking about how fucked-up this job had become and seriously considering risking the wrath of the Broker and bailing. Every time I turned around, some new wrinkle, some new conflict, presented itself. Whatever happened to Wait till he’s alone, go in and pop him and leave?
Of course this had never been that kind of job. It had always had that little extra “challenge” (as the Broker put it) of destroying a certain manuscript, and wondering what to do next had my head swimming.
I was well into my late-night breakfast when Annette came into Sambo’s, a green pants suit and ruffly blouse taking the place of naked skin under her white leather coat. She saw me at once, and smiled, and came over.
“Nice to see a friendly face, Jack,” she said, and slid in across from me. “Mind if I join you?”
Kind of hard to say no when she already had, so I said, “Sure,” and asked, “Rough day?”
“Don’t ask! Horrible. Simply horrible.”
I touched a napkin to my lips, then asked, “Want to order something?”
“Oh yes, I’m starved.”
A waitress came over, and the “starved” girl ordered a dinner salad with oil and vinegar, and a cup of coffee.
I was almost done with my food, so I shoved it to one side and asked, “Trouble with your book?”
“Kind of.” She shook her head and dark brown hair danced on her shoulders. “It’s tough, collaborating.”
“Is that what you’re doing? Collaborating?”
“…Not exactly.”
“Your book, your non-fiction novel-is Professor Byron co-writing it?”
Again she shook her head. “Not really. I think of it as a collaboration because he’s given me so much advice, so much support. We’ve become very close.”
“Really. Doesn’t he have a kind of reputation for…if I’m out of line, just say so, but…”
Her salad came.
She said, “I’m not in love with Professor Byron or anything. We’re just good friends.”
I could use a good friend who looked like her who would blow me.
“But I won’t deny,” she said, “that he’s something of a satyr.”
“A what?”
She smiled, more to herself than at me. “He is known to hit on his female students.”
“A letch, you mean. Dirty old man.”
She smiled, maybe a tad embarrassed; she forked some salad. “He’s a wonderful, talented writer, and I’m glad to have a relationship with him. He’s mature but young at heart. Anyway, I’m not looking for a…a husband, or any kind of serious relationship. He’s a virile, charismatic man, and I’m single right now, and we are very close, very, very close friends, so…what’s the harm?”
“Nothing, I’d say. You have your eyes open, anyway.”
“Yeah, but…” She shook her head yet again, and those big brown eyes really were open-wide. “…tonight, out of nowhere, his wife showed up. God, she’s a crazy person. A shrew. Just a horrible monster.”
“How long have you known her?”
“Oh, we’ve never met. But K.J. has told me about her.”
“Oh.” I sipped iced tea. “Listen, I’m interested in this non-fiction novel concept. I’ve fooled with writing since I was in grade school. I mean, I know I’m not in your league, but I am interested in pursuing it.”