“Now, let’s go see Looey,” he said, a tic jumping around his face.
“First, the call to Glendora,” I told him. “Just to make sure, I’ll use the pay phone on the corner.”
Arnie shook his head no. Schmettler put his hand on my shoulder like a jail door slamming while Arnie explained.
“You call from the phone in the car, and I listen to every word. You’re supposed to be tricky, and I’m taking no chances.”
The black limousine was parked in a tow-away zone, but no tickets fluttered under the windshield wipers. I got in back while Schmettler locked all the interior doors from the driver’s seat. The locks were child- and people-proof, which was not reassuring. Schmettler started up and Arnie handed over the phone. “No tricks, Frisbee.”
“I found Looey and I’ve played all my tricks already,” I said. Glendora came on immediately, and I felt better. I was sure she’d set up a phone trace. I can always count on her to show initiative.
“I found him, right where I thought he’d be,” I said.
“And I’m still here,” she said coolly. I had a sudden feeling something was very wrong. Arnie was connected everywhere, maybe even in the YWCA.
“What was I going to fix for supper last night?” I asked. If anything wasn’t right, she’d give me a wrong answer.
“Jambalaya,” she said and broke the connection.
Arnie inspected his fingernails. “We told her to hang up quick because you might have some idea of having the call traced. You’re playing in the traffic again, Frisbee. You took dirty money to finger Looey Flowers. Where is he?”
Glendora was safe, so I told him. As Schmettler moved us back to the military reservation rapidly, Arnie began unzipping the golf bag. He was ready for anything — pistols, a carbine, a deer rifle, and what looked like a rocket launcher next to a machine pistol. There were even a couple of grenades. Arnie rubbed his jaw as he contemplated his armory. “Where’s his cell?”
“I don’t know, but he has the exercise yard all to himself from two till three every afternoon.”
I went over my plan as we drove out to the brick buildings on the edge of the reservation where military delinquents put in hard time. About eighty yards off the roadway, his face a pale blob in the afternoon sun, a huge man leaned against the wall holding an orange Frisbee across his chest like a target. Even though it wasn’t necessary, I pointed. “Looey Flowers. That takes care of my part of this.”
Schmettler glanced at me through the mirror. I was the last pork chop on the plate. Arnie took my arm for emphasis. “That’s a dummy stuffed with pillows.”
Looey did look like a dummy, a fat scarecrow. “You’re right,” I said. “But I told you he had a serious weight problem. It’s an effort for him just to breathe. Look, he moved.”
Looey had dropped the Frisbee.
Arnie had reached the heights of his organization by being careful, which I had counted on. He told Schmettler to drive on.
“Frisbee,” he announced, “I don’t like not having a string on somebody who works for me, which is what you’re doing from now on. We’re going to shoot that loudmouth into pieces. But before we shoot, you shoot. That way, you’re using a firearm during the commission of a felony, as guilty as we are.”
I didn’t have to search my memories of first-year law school to know he was right. I figured if Arnie didn’t want a handle on me, I’d be dead by now, so I was glad he wanted a longer relationship.
After our stop at a turnaround for final instructions, we came back for the money run. Looey still looked like a sloppy bundle of clothes, just as I’d planned. After the fireworks, Arnie and Bruno would be arrested on the spot for all sorts of gun-law crimes and attempted murder. Since I wasn’t a policeman, I hadn’t entrapped them. Also, I wouldn’t have compromised my pacifist principles. The plan was complicated, but it was working nicely.
The dummy leaned against the brick wall as if looking at cloud formations to the west. Schmettler readied the rocket launcher while Arnie nudged me out with his machine pistol. His instructions when he gave me the deer rifle were clear.
“You fire one round. Otherwise, we leave you here. To make sure, we don’t fire till you do. Fire within the next five seconds or you get the first pill.”
I drew a bead on a ventilation pipe sticking out the roof and squeezed off. Then the noise commenced. Arnie emptied a magazine into the target and nodded to Schmettler, who took his time and fired the rocket. There was whoosh and a giant slam! A hole appeared in the wall where the dummy had been leaning. Arnie took the deer rifle from me. I noticed he was wearing gloves.
About this time, a sufficient number of police of various jurisdictions were scheduled to rise out of the weeds and solve all my problems.
But nothing happened.
We drove off in silence. I missed the company of the law-enforcement types, but that wasn’t the worst of it. Just as I’d put a hole in the steel ventilator, the dummy had raised an arm to make an international gesture at us.
I’d earned ten thousand the hard way. Looey Flowers was dead and Arnie had a hook in me. Things were very bleak indeed. I wondered how Arnie expected to get away with all that shooting, even on a military reservation. We drove back to the scenic turnout. As we parked, Arnie carefully put the deer rifle on the back seat, along with the rocket launcher and the machine pistol.
“We leave the guns here, especially the rifle with your prints on it.”
We got out of the car and Schmettler started waving his tent-sized coat. Then I heard the flat! flat! flat! of a helicopter coming in. I felt really bad when Arnie punched my biceps.
“Sweet, hey? I reported the car stolen this morning right after your call. Us? When all this happened, we were riding over scenic Lake Pontchartrain in a helicopter you rented. The wise money will know what happened, but our story is Bruno and me flew down here to pick you up. You need me now, Frisbee.”
I felt an unimprovable fool. I build a trap like the Taj Mahal and then put my own foot in it. Before I could feel sorry for myself, a loud hailer came on from overhead.
“Don’t move! Federal agents! You’re under arrest!”
Two other helicopters were coming up from other points of the compass. It was about time. Arnie started to break for the car, but I caught his collar and slammed him down. While I reached in to get the money, Schmettler looked at me, waiting for advice from Arnie.
I kept my foot on Arnie’s neck while I explained things. “Bruno! Listen hard! You tell people Arnie hired you to kill Looey Flowers. If you turn state’s evidence, you’re safe. If you don’t, it’ll be Old Sparkie. Plus, for a limited time only, I give you this ten grand, tax-free.”
As soon as the first chopper landed, I let Arnie up. He watched in disgust as Schmettler, his pockets stuffed with money, started telling his story to the first uniformed person who walked up.
“I want my lawyer!” Arnie shouted, but without much conviction. “When Glendora got out of the last bird, he turned purple.
“There was no way you could get a message to that broad. What’s she doing here? You didn’t tell her a thing on the phone!”
Glendora was on the arm of Ralph David Luna, the special agent from the Plaquemines District across the river, a handsome devil with silver hair and a great tan. Arnie was being a bad loser. “There was no way you could trace that call!”
Glendora gave me an I’ll-get-around-to-you-in-a-minute wave as she turned to Arnie. “We didn’t have to trace calls, Mr. Buttons. As soon as my beau here told me Mr. Flowers had avoided a solid cordon of your people who were watching every possible exit on the base, I knew where he was.”