And, Tony thought, it's also an absurd place in which to die.
They walked through the dining area and looked into the small kitchen. It was a mess. The refrigerator door and a few of the cupboards were standing open. Cans and jars and boxes of food had been pulled off the shelves and dumped onto the floor. Some items appeared to have been thrown down in a rage. Several jars were broken; sharp fragments of glass sparkled in the garbage. A puddle of maraschino cherry juice lay like a pink-red amoeba on the yellow tiles; the bright red cherries gleamed in every corner. Chocolate dessert topping was splashed all over the electric stove. Cornflakes were scattered everywhere. And dill pickles. Olives. Dry spaghetti. Someone had used mustard and grape jelly to scrawl one word four times on the only blank wall in the kitchen:
Cocodrilos
Cocodrilos
Cocodrilos
Cocodrilos
They whispered:
"What is it?"
"Spanish."
"What's it mean?"
"Crocodiles."
"Why crocodiles?"
"I don't know."
"Creepy," Frank said.
Tony agreed. They had walked into a bizarre situation. Even though he could not understand what was happening, Tony knew there was great danger ahead. He wished he knew which door it would pop out of.
They looked in the den, which was as overfurnished as the other two rooms. Bobby wasn't hiding in there or in the den closet.
They moved warily back down the hall toward the two bedrooms and two baths. They didn't make a sound.
They didn't find anything out of the ordinary in the first bedroom and bathroom.
In the master bedroom, there was another mess. All of the clothes had been taken out of the closet and strewn about. They were piled on the floor, wadded into balls on the bed, draped over the dresser where they had fallen when thrown, and most if not all of them were badly damaged. Sleeves and collars had been stripped off shirts. Lapels had been torn from sports jackets and suit coats. The inseams of trousers had been ripped open. The person who had done all of that had been functioning in a blind rage, yet he had been surprisingly methodical and thorough in spite of his fury.
But who had done it?
Someone with a grudge against Bobby?
Bobby himself? Why would he mess up his own kitchen and destroy his own clothes?
What did crocodiles have to do with it?
Tony had the disturbing feeling that they were moving too fast through the apartment, that they were overlooking something important. An explanation for the strange things they'd discovered seemed to be hovering at the edge of his mind, but he could not reach out and grab it.
The door to the adjoining bath was closed. It was the only place they hadn't looked.
Frank trained his revolver on the door and watched it while he spoke to Tony. "If he didn't leave before we got here, he has to be in the bathroom."
"Who?"
Frank gave him a quick perplexed glance. "Bobby, of course. Who else?"
"You think he tore up his own place?"
"Well ... what do you think?"
"We're missing something."
"Yeah? Like what?"
"I don't know."
Frank moved toward the bathroom door.
Tony hesitated, listening to the apartment.
The place was about as noisy as a tomb.
"Somebody must be in that bathroom," Frank said.
They took up positions flanking the door.
"Bobby! You hear me?" Frank shouted. "You can't stay in there forever. Come out with your hands raised!"
Nobody came out.
Tony said, "Even if you're not Bobby Valdez, no matter who you are, you've got to come out of there."
Ten seconds. Twenty. Thirty.
Frank took hold of the knob and twisted it slowly until the bolt slipped out of its slot with a soft snick. He pushed the door open and convulsively threw himself back against the wall to get out of the way of any bullets or knives or other indications that he was unwelcome.
No gunfire. No movement.
The only thing that came out of the bathroom was a really terrible stench. Urine. Excrement.
Tony gagged. "Jesus!"
Frank put one hand over his mouth and nose.
The bathroom was deserted. The floor was puddled with bright yellow urine, and feces was smeared over the commode and sink and clear glass shower door.
"What in the name of God is going on here?" Frank asked through his fingers.
One Spanish word was printed twice in feces on the bathroom wall.
Cocodrilos
Cocodrilos
Tony and Frank swiftly retreated to the center of the bedroom, stepping on torn shirts and ruined suits. But now that the bathroom door had been opened, they could not escape the odor without leaving the room altogether, so they went into the hallway.
"Whoever did this really hates Bobby," Frank said.
"So you no longer think Bobby did it to himself?"
"Why would he? It doesn't make sense. Christ, this is about as weird as they come. The hairs are up on the back of my neck."
"Spooky," Tony agreed.
His stomach muscles were still painfully cramped with tension, and his heart was thumping only slightly slower than it had been when they'd first crept into the apartment.
They were both silent for a moment, listening for the footsteps of ghosts.
Tony watched a small brown spider as it climbed the corridor wall.
Finally Frank put his gun away and took out his handkerchief and wiped his sweat-streaked face.
Tony holstered his own revolver and said, "We can't just leave it like this and put a stakeout on the place. I mean, we've gone too far for that. We've found too much that needs explaining."
"Agreed," Frank said. "We'll have to call for assistance, get a warrant, and run a thorough search."
"Drawer by drawer."
"What do you think we'll find?"
"God knows."
"I saw a phone in the kitchen," Frank said.
Frank led the way down the hall to the living room, then around the corner, into the kitchen. Before Tony could follow him across the threshold from the dining area, Frank said, "Oh, Jesus," and tried to back out of the kitchen.
"What's the matter?"
Even as Tony spoke, something cracked loudly.
Frank cried out and fell sideways and clutched at the edge of a counter, trying to stay on his feet.
Another sharp crack slammed through the apartment, echoing from wall to wall, and Tony realized it was gunfire.
But the kitchen had been deserted!
Tony reached for his revolver, and he had the peculiar feeling he was moving in slow-motion while the rest of the world rushed past in frantic double time.
The second shot took Frank in the shoulder and spun him around. He crashed down into the mess of maraschino cherry juice and dry spaghetti and cornflakes and glass.
As Frank dropped out of the way, Tony was able to see beyond him for the first time, and he spotted Bobby Valdez. He was wriggling out of the cupboard space under the sink, a spot they hadn't thought to investigate because it looked too small to conceal a man. Bobby was squirming and slithering out of there like a snake from a tight hole. Only his legs were still under the sink; he was on his side, pulling himself out with one arm, holding a .32 pistol in his other hand. He was naked. He looked sick. His eyes were huge, wild, dilated, sunken in rings of puffy dark flesh. His face was shockingly pale, his lips bloodless. Tony took in all of those details in a fraction of a second, with senses sharpened by a flood of adrenaline.
Frank was just hitting the floor, and Tony was still reaching for his revolver when Bobby fired a third time. The bullet whacked into the edge of the archway. An explosion of plaster chips stung Tony's face.