"He left halfway through making those," I said. "What do you think-about two or three days ago?"
Allison shuddered, put the pan down. "Something like that. So the bastard's alive."
She sounded less than thrilled. She gave me a tentative smile. "I guess I figured that.
It's just-"
She hooked her thumbs in her borrowed Banana Republics, looked around at her feet where men's clothes were strewn around as if somebody had walked through a laundry pile. Then she kicked one of Les' shirts with a vengeance.
I went into the bathroom. A man's toiletry bag was in the sink, next to a propanepowered Destroilet with directions on the lid about how to avoid a house fire when you flushed.
I got out my Polaroid and took a picture of the toilet. Nobody would believe me about it, otherwise. Then I took some pictures of the rest of the cabin-the eggs, the laundry, the scattered CDs.
I went to the kitchen counter and picked up the phone. The line was active. I set the switch from touch tone to pulse and pressed redial. I was pretty sure I got the number on the first listen but I hung up before it rang, then tried it again. I wrote the number on my hand and let the phone ring. No answer on ten, no answering machine.
Allison said, "Tres."
I turned. She was looking at me reproachfully, holding the frying pan with the eggs. As quietly as possible she said, "Well? This or the Mace?"
"Wha-"
Then I heard the creaking, from outside, like someone trying to climb the old porch steps with at least some semblance of stealth.
38
A shadow moved across the yellow curtain into the doorway and became Frank the Bubba, my courteous shakedown deputy from the night before. He scowled and smushed his nose against the screen door, trying to see into the interior gloom. He was wearing jeans and an orange Hawaiian shirt. More advanced surveillance techniques.
I looked at Allison. "You're a lot of fun. But right now I want you to put down the frying pan, okay?"
"Are you crazy?"
"Put it down."
Frank's eyes adjusted to the dark. He focused on me. I smiled and waved. He looked at Allison. Slowly, she lowered the pan and waved too.
"If we had a gun," she speculated quietly, "we could've shot him five or six times by now."
"Shut up," I told her. "Please."
Frank opened the door and came inside.
His face was lyescrubbed red and his eyes were bleary. His blond moustache whiskers spiked at weird angles. He looked groggy and irritated but not particularly surprised.
"That's right," he said. "You two really need to be here."
The walkietalkie on his belt made a click, then a metallic crackling sound. He kept his eyes on me while he picked it up. "Never mind, Garwood. False alarm."
The garbled response sounded vaguely like Elgin's voice. I couldn't make out what he said but apparently Frank could.
"Yeah," he said. "It was nothing."
Frank turned the volume knob down to zero.
"False alarm?" I asked.
Frank scanned the room, tapping the walkietalkie against his thigh. "Elgin has some ideas what he might do if he ever sees you again. I don't want him to get too excited."
Frank looked around for a place to sit, opted for the bed. He sank into the foam mattress, hesitated, then crossed his legs and began to pry off his left boot.
"Got to excuse me," he grumbled. "Feet are killing me."
Allison said, "You want us to rub them for you?"
She was leaning against the kitchen counter, head on her hand like she was bored.
She glanced at me and said, "This guy managed to get you on the pavement?"
Frank's ears turned the same colour orange as his Hawaiian shirt. He raised his eyebrows at me. "New woman?"
"Allison SaintPierre. She's charming, really."
The name registered, maybe the reputation, too. Frank gave me a weary look of condolence. He switched legs and tugged off the other boot. His socks were two slightly different shades of blue.
" I didn't like what happened last night, Mr. Navarre. I didn't like it worth a damn."
"Try being the one with your nose in the gravel."
A smile flickered underneath the moustache. "You don't get what I'm saying. People bother Mr. Sheckly, I got no problem pushing them around a little. That's not my beef."
"Reassuring."
Allison sighed. She fiddled wistfully with the Mace on her key chain, picking at the little plastic tab.
"Sheck takes care of his people," Frank continued. "It's a closeknit county out here.
P.I. s come around all year long, sticking their noses into the Paintbrush's business, looking for paternity suits, blackmail photos, you name it. I don't have any problem dissuading them."
"Planting guns in their cars," I said.
Frank sat quiet for a long time, then apparently decided something. He sat forward, reached into his wallet, and pulled out a photograph.
"Look at this."
I took the photo. It showed Frank in white shorts and a different Hawaiian shirt, his arm around a similarly dressed plump blond woman. The woman was holding a white bundle that was either the world's largest QTip pad or a wellswaddled baby.
"Got a family now," he said.
I smiled politely.
I handed the photo to Allison, who gave it the same bored onceover she'd given Frank.
"That means something to me," Frank insisted. "Gets me thinking in a different way.
Taking care of friends, looking after people that've been good to the department- that's one thing. But throwdowns, and with a lady in the car-"
"Yeah," I agreed. "You really know how to draw the moral line."
He spread his hands. "All right. Maybe you don't want to hear it. I just wanted you to know-"
"That your partner didn't share his plans with you," I supplied. "Doesn't make me feel any better."
Frank stared into his empty boots, then sat up and began pulling them back on. "You don't understand how it is these days, Mr. Navarre."
"I understand two people have been murdered. I understand Tilden Sheckly's got some illegal business going on which he's very anxious not to have uncovered. I understand he's playing you for a fool, giving you the pissant jobs of shaking me down, doing surveillance on the least important places, where Les has already been scared away from. What am I missing?"
"He's chicken," Allison said.
Frank stared at her coldly. "You don't know me to say that. You don't know Sheck or what he's dealing with."
Allison laughed. "Like he's a victim?"
Frank's fists closed up and his eyes became unfocused. Something about his response bothered me. His anger turned into something more like embarrassment.
The walkietalkie on his belt clicked.
He and I exchanged looks.
"I see two options, Frank. First is you help me out, tell me what's going on, maybe I can help you get to some people who will listen to your problems. The second option is you let Elgin in on this party and we see where it takes us. Which can you live with easier?"
Allison straightened up, smiling slightly, indicating that either option was just fine by her.
Frank stood. He looked around the tossedup cabin one more time, then decided on a third option.
He picked up the walkietalkie and turned on the volume. "Yo, Elgin, I'm trying again. I thought I saw something."
He took his finger off the button.
"You folks got one minute."
Allison pouted. It took a look of absolute steel for me to persuade her away from the kitchen counter and out the door.
As we walked past Frank his eyes stayed fixed on the back window. When I turned around in the doorway he was still standing like that, like a soldier at attention.
39
Allison and I hardly spoke on the boat ride back.