Yet as the unfortunate case too much of the time, I met the unsupervised Spike in the hall. “Don’t you dare,” I said, holding the four boxes above my head. “Get down. No,” I shouted when he reared on his hinds legs and snatched one of the boxes from my hand. “Give it back. Give it—” As if in a game of keep-away, he dashed through the opened door of the fire escape and descended the enclosed stairs. I shrugged off that Psycho Dog had taken the box with that horrid goat pictured on the front. I felt certain it’d be chewed to pieces in no time.
Now, upon the good riddance of bad rubbish, my mind reverted back to Harry. His leniency toward the DVD incident, as well as his willingness to accept blame, had astounded me. But for whatever reason and the time being, I was grateful that he was not quite himself.
Averting Disaster
Again in my apartment, I accepted that Wolf’s exorcism was a flop and that I needed to try something else. Harry was adjusting to his new identity, maybe even enjoying it somewhat, but not me.
With Harry now in the shower, I worked fast to set the scene with seduction props. Then when he, dressed in his skivvies, entered the room, I was in bed wearing a red nightie that barely covered the thong up the crack of my ass.
Wolf still naked and in a black slicker was sitting in the chair across from us. Though buried in the shadows to keep Harry from tossing a sheet over him, his merry face was in plain sight because his hat was off, tied to a string attached to the raincoat’s collar. I had positioned him there as part of my scheme to finally put an end to Harry’s reassignment.
“Here,” I said to Harry, handing him a flute of champagne.
He sipped from the glass with a look of delight and nibbled on a hunk of mozzarella I’d brought in from the kitchen.
“Darn. I forgot my glass.”
Harry held his glass out for me but I’d already leaped from the bed and headed for the kitchen. There, I snatched the rope I’d set out earlier, returned to the bedroom’s double doors, and casually pulled them closed.
“Hey, aren’t you supposed to be in here?” Harry asked.
“I’ll be there in a minute, honey,” I said from the other side of the door.
In less time than that, I tied the levers to the double doors together. For further security, I added another loop to the handles, pulled the rope taut, and tied the opposite end to the leg of a side table off the entryway. The bedroom doors opened inward, so if Harry pulled, separating them by even an inch, he could get a razor from the bathroom, cut the rope, and free himself.
“Judy,” he called, pounding on the door. “Let me out. You hear me? Open this door.”
“I can’t, Harry.”
“I’m afraid to ask why.”
I hesitated. “It’s like in that old movie when the wolf man changes. Even a man who is pure at heart / And says his prayers at night / May turn to wood when the dogwood blooms / And the moon is full and bright.” I’d invented my own version of the ditty on the spot. “You have to be confined so you don’t hurt anybody when you transform.” I didn’t bother to explain that I’d locked Wolf in with him for the same reason.
For a long time, Harry was quiet. He then said, “Okay, if that’s the way you want it.”
His overly compliant response again disturbed me. Then I worried that when I opened the doors, I wouldn’t be able to tell them apart.
I pressed my ear to the door and was met with a terrible silence.
I stood there, confounded, and then heard a car horn beeping outside. Glancing down from the living room sliders, I recognized the handyman’s battered red pickup parked across the street. But I couldn’t figure why its spotlight aimed at the balcony off our bedroom window. We hardly used that area. Nothing was out there, other than Wolf’s purloined shopping cart.
I opened the sliders and stepped into the frosty November air, my bare flesh struck by the icy chill. I looked at the adjacent balcony, shocked to see Wolf illuminated by the spotlight.
Harry had evidently placed him on the railing that surrounded the balcony. He was perched vicariously with his naked wooden body visible through the black slicker opened in the front.
“Hey, it’s a jumper,” someone on the street yelled. A series of voices rose from the small, gathering crowd. “Don’t jump! Hold on! Don’t do it!”
A vision of Harry in splinters on the sidewalk exploded in my brain as I turned back into the apartment. I hurried to the bedroom door and struggled to unknot the rope.
“Harry, don’t do anything rash,” I cried, rushing for a butcher knife in the kitchen.
Back at the door, I cut the rope in several places, yanked the pieces away, and worked the door handle. The door was locked from the inside.
“Open the door, honey.” I thumped it with my fist. “Please, the moon isn’t even out, let alone full and bright. So just stop playing games.”
“I will, if you will,” Harry said in a distant voice as if moving away from the door.
“Get Wolf off the railing. Okay?”
I heard the slider in the bedroom open. A few minutes later, the spotlight went out and the street below grew quiet. I felt shaky; my skin kept switching from hot to cold. A disaster had been averted. Yet, as the bedroom door creaked open, and Harry emerged, holding Wolf by the waist, I felt my hand tighten around the butcher knife.
I knew that I was looking at Harry and that he now had the advantage. Was this all part of it? But someone knocked at our apartment door before I could make sense of the situation, and I moved to answer it.
“It’s the manager,” I called to Harry in a cheery voice. I stood in the doorway, freezing in my skimpy nightie and holding the butcher knife behind me.
“Lisa, what brings you up here so late,” I said, seeing she was bundled in a quilted robe.
“Is Harry all right? He’s not depressed or anything like that, is he?”
“Oh, you know Harry when he’s had a few. We were just goofing around.” Cripes, the whole building must think my husband just tried to commit suicide.
Lisa lingered, gazing into the dimness behind me. “Well, okay. Long as you’re sure.”
“I’m sure. I appreciate your concern though.”
I closed the door, the word suicide resounding in my brain. Maybe Wolf was the one who’d gotten the upper hand. If so, the action on that nasty goat DVD—that’s the kind of thing I could be in for.
Snatching Wolf
For the next few days, I stopped playing games as I had promised Harry. To assure him of my intention, I dressed Wolf in his Italian sailor suit, put him on his stand, and closed him inside the entryway closet.
Around dawn that Friday of the same week, I awakened long enough to hear the elevator’s opening ding and its descending swish beyond my apartment door. Thinking nothing of it, I again fell asleep, though the faraway cry of a small voice haunted my ensuing dreams. Arrivederci, Judy, the voice said, dwindling.
Hours later, careful not to wake Harry, I got out of bed and tiptoed into the living room to check on my manny.
“Wolf,” I whispered, groping in the shadows of the closet. “Are you in here?”
I left the empty space and began searching for him in room after room.
“Don’t be naughty. Come out; come out, wherever you are. Wolf, if you’re scamming me…” I walked around, switching on lights.
My heart racing, I dashed back into the bedroom and shook Harry.
“Whasa—” He lifted his head as if weighted with concrete. “I thought we planned to sleep late.” He glanced at the clock. A hazy beam of sunlight had begun to fill the room.
“My manny’s missing. I can’t find him anywhere. He’s gone and so is his wheelie-stand!”
“Impossible,” Harry said, dropping his head back in the pillow. “He’s here somewhere.”
I pinched his arm, and he sat up, rubbing the spot.
“Hey, that hurts.”
“This is serious. Something’s happened to Wolf, something awful.”
“Not
unless he just got up and went out for an early morning hike.”
I nodded. Wolf had not on a whim decided to bail on his own. Someone just wanted it to look that way. And I suspected that someone was Harry.
“I left him right out there on his cart.” As I slipped into jeans and a pullover, I recalled that shortly after Harry had gone to bed, I turned off the TV and crawled in next to him, though he was too deeply asleep to have noticed. “When I got up, he was gone.”
I glared at Harry, maybe only pretending to have been asleep, and that sometime during the night, snuck out of bed and committed some deed against the helpless manny.
“Maybe one of his girlfriends has him,” Harry said, now sitting up.
“How do you figure?”
Harry rolled his eyes. “They were willing to pay for his time.”
It became clear to me that Harry’s input was a diversionary tactic. He’d already shown a predisposition to destroy Wolf and had both motive and opportunity.
“That would mean he’s still in the building,” I said, playing along with the idea that one of Wolf s former girlfriends abducted him. “We’ll search the premises. But first—”
I jumped to my feet, ran for the phone, and punched the speed-dial button for the manager’s office.
Lisa answered on the second ring. She right away denied having seen Wolf that morning. She doubted Ruthie had, either. Only a short while ago she’d passed Ruthie, heading out with Spike for his morning walk.
“You ask me,” Lisa then lowered her voice, “Somebody stole him, considering how valuable he is.”
“That could be it!” I slapped my forehead. “He’s been kidnapped.”
“You didn’t find a ransom note, did you?” Lisa asked over the phone.
“I haven’t looked.”
“Well, you’d better get on it. I’ll call the cops,” Lisa offered.
“The FBI, too,” I added. “They’re in charge of kidnapping cases.” The threat of involving the feds should have moved Harry, yet he didn’t flinch.
I hung up the phone and resolved not to interrogate him. In a missing-manny’s case, as with a missing-persons case, time is of the essence and wasting it with tricky accusations lowered the odds of recovering my manny intact.
“Oh, my poor manny,” I cried, wringing my hands.
Concern swept across Harry’s face. “Don’t worry. I’m sure he’ll turn up.”
Yet I was worried. Now with news of Wolf’s disappearance out, so might the sordid details of my defunct rent-a-manny business. My reputation would be ruined.
While Harry dressed and I searched for a ransom note, we debated how much we’d be willing to pay for the safe return of the manny. Just as he slipped on his shoes, the phone rang and he answered it. It was Lisa. A plainclothes detective and a uniformed policeman were in the office. Harry told her we’d be right down.
An Investigation
While Lisa and Ernie served coffee, I did my best to give the two police officers a complete, if somewhat rambling, description of Wolf and a timeline as to his last known location. I told them that if they’d just take a good look at Harry, and then picture a comical body double, they’d have all the information they’d need. As both officers jotted notes in their spirals, I anxiously glanced around at the neighbors who’d started gathering in the lobby when the squad car had pulled up out front.
“You say he’s a sailor?” asked the plainclothes detective.
“Correct, but an Italian sailor.”
“Maybe you should notify Shore Patrol,” said the uniformed cop, who turned to Harry when he moaned, “Damn it, not the SP.”
“Why are we discussing jurisdictions when Wolf could be in danger, maybe even dumped in a ditch off a deserted highway somewhere?”
“You suspect foul play?” the detective asked.
I nodded vigorously.
Ruthie then back from her walk came through the front door with Spike in the lead. Just as she pivoted to stow her shovel and plastic bags in the umbrella stand, Spike fixed on me and lunged, almost pulling her off her feet.
“No! Bad dog. Bad, bad, bad.” Ruthie struggled to hold Spike back. He’d reared on his hind paws, snapping and salivating as if wanting a chunk out of me.
The plainclothes detective turned to his partner. “I suppose we should get a team out here to dust for fingerprints up on the fourth floor, and spray for possible bloodstains.”
“Wolf doesn’t bleed,” I told the officers, relieved that Jason, newly arrived on the scene, took hold of Spike’s leash.
The uniformed cop gave me a suspicious look.
“Who’s Wolf?” asked the plainclothes detective.
Jason, breaking into a run to keep up with Spike bounding down the hall, called over his shoulder. “The hired gun in the Panama hat, that’s who.”
“But he can’t go missing because he’s not alive,” I added.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you guys,” the handyman said to the cops. He emerged from among the onlookers in the lobby and stepped through the office entryway.
“No, no…you don’t understand,” I cut in. “He’s not a guy; he’s a dummy.”
The police officer released a frustrated sigh and lowered his spiral. “Is this some kind of prank?”
“There’s more,” the handyman said. “I saw her out behind the garages, with a claw hammer in her hand, kneeling on the ground building a coffin.”
“That was the crate Wolf came in.”
The handyman wore a smug expression. “See, she admits—”
“Hold on,” I interrupted, afraid he’d next launch into a report on Harry’s aborted leap from our balcony. “I admit I bought a manikin from Gippo’s off a side street down at Pike Place. But you can’t check it out because the shop’s no longer there.”
All eyes on me, I felt helpless, nailed on circumstantial evidence and eyewitness testimony, all of which could inter me for…who knows how long. As I pondered my situation, my imagination ran wild—a future behind walls topped by loops of razor wire, overseen by armed guards, working in a steamy-hot laundry next to women with tattoos on their muscular arms.
“He did it. He’s the perpetrator,” I said, jabbing a finger at Harry. “First he tried to choke Wolf. Then he attempted to drown him. When that didn’t work, he caused him to somehow disappear.”
“Oh, no, dear,” the elderly Sarah Crumble said. “Wolf hasn’t disappeared.”
Sometime during the group discussion, she had entered the office and fiddled with the tagged keys hooked on the pegboard. I figured she must have locked herself out of her apartment again.
“I have a confession to make.” The old woman lowered her eyes. “Wolf spent the night with me. He’s the most charismatic man…eh…manikin I’ve ever met. And I’m eighty-five come December.”
“But how’d you get hold of him?” I asked.
“By stealth, as always,” Sarah said, before explaining in greater detail.
Rumors about my manny-mate business had aroused her curiosity. But, both her age and her budget discouraged her from buying a few dates for herself. She instead took advantage of her access to the apartment house keys on management’s pegboard in the office.
“But I did pay you once,” she said.
“Then it was you going in and out of my apartment?”
The officer winked at his superior. “Hear that, Chief? Breaking and entering.”
“I entered, but I didn’t break anything.” She tapped her chin. “Except that hurricane lamp. Oh, and I made a mess with that stuff from Wolfs crate. And I’m sorry about the roast beef. I parked the wheelchair outside the elevator—” The old woman broke off and faced the officers. “I didn’t always use the chair. Wolf had his own set of wheels.” Turning back to me, she said, “I opened your door and Spike bolted right on by me. On his way out, he had an entire roast in his mouth.”
She explained that she’d meant to bring Wolf back sooner, but they got wrapped up watching a ver
y interesting movie. “I’ve heard about the advances in the field of genetic engineering, like using animal parts in human beings. I never before knew how they got them.”
Harry and I locked eyes as I asked, “Did the movie come in a box with a goat on the label?”
She nodded. “Have you seen it, too?”
“No, but I’d love to borrow it.”
“You can have it. I found it in the alley.”
“But Mrs. Crumble, where’s the manny now?” I asked.
She gazed at the ornate design in the rug.
A minute passed before I realized the old woman must have found another image of Jesus.
“Mrs. Crumble.” I started to feel frustrated. “What did you do with my manny?”
Her eyes lifting, Sarah vacillated as if coming out of a daze.
“Well, dear, when I saw the police arrive, I thought you’d reported a burglary. So I hustled Wolf out to the back garden. Then I pretended I wanted to see what was going on. With management busy, I hoped to sneak back into the office and replace your door key on the pegboard.”
“Then he’s in the back garden?”
Before the old woman could respond, Jason rejoined them, saying, “Hoo-boy, that’s where Spike is.”
“You know dogs aren’t allowed out there,” Lisa said, looking irritated.
“What can I say? Someone opened the door as we passed by and out he went.” Jason shrugged, and most in the crowd nodded, aware he wouldn’t dare leave the building and go after Spike.
Shoes clattering, I along with everyone else hurried down the hall toward the back exit.
Harry caught up with me and said, “Where do you get off blaming me for Wolf’s disappearance?”
“Later, Harry. We’ll deal with it later.”
Outside, the pool area was deserted due to the cool November weather. We made it to a small patch of grass some yards from the pool and started for the lawn chairs by a table with a collapsed umbrella in its center. Wolf’s wheelie-stand was evident, but he was nowhere in sight.
Me and My Manny Page 17
