“The whatchamacallit should be right behind this panel. How about we pry it off like so? Voilà!” Good news! I hadn’t heard a voilà in ages. When Bernie said voilà we were starting to cook. “See those wires? The yellow one means caution so we stay away but the green one means go. Stands to reason, right?”
Of course it did! Bernie reached for the green wire.
* * *
We have lots of buddies in the fire department. We were happy to see them and they were happy to see us. They smothered the odd little flame or two no problem, and that whole idea of fire spreading to the Parsons’s house turned out to be a complete nonstarter, all the shouting and hosing totally unnecessary. The only bad part was that Iggy got to ride on the hook and ladder truck and I did not. In the lap of the driver—no reason to leave that out. The lap of the driver! They went around the block way more than once or twice, Iggy eyeing me out the window on each pass. All sorts of bad thoughts about things that could happen to Iggy went through my head. It hit me for the very first time: life can be cruel. But oh, no, that couldn’t be true!
I was still going back and forth on that a little later, when things had settled down, just me and Bernie. He was opening a bottle of bourbon when he paused and looked at me, perhaps actually pacing back and forth in the kitchen, as a way of accompanying my mind, if that makes any sense.
“Right you are,” he said. “That’s enough of taking it easy.” He put the bottle back on the shelf and we were out of there.
“Phew,” Bernie said, as we backed out of the driveway and hit the road. Which was exactly what I would’ve said if I could’ve. Then he said it again, yes, for me. How great is that! Say adios to taking it easy, all you perps and gangbangers! Here comes the Little Detective Agency! And we even had a client! A number of them, in fact. I went over the clients in my mind, Felicia and those other two—all women, all sporting gold watches and yoga pants, all former wives or girlfriends of Wendell, all quick-tempered—and got a bit confused.
* * *
“Oh, I’m so glad you found him,” said Lois, rising from her desk and taking off her glasses. She came over and gave me a pat, a very nice pat but slightly higher up the neck would have been better. I twisted around a bit as a sort of hint, but she didn’t get it. “Where was he?”
“Actually not that far from here—when he turned up,” Bernie said. “But how long he was gone and where he went are mysteries.”
Lois shook her head. “I just don’t understand. Can he open doors?”
“Some,” Bernie said. “Which is why we’re here—I’d like to take another look at the room.”
This visit was about rooms and doors? Good to know. I prefer to be in the picture, although it’s fair to say I can handle being out of the picture if necessary. The Little Detective Agency isn’t successful by accident, amigos. Except for the finances part. I don’t mean the finances part is by accident. What I mean is … Or maybe that is why …
By then we were down the hall and entering Bo’s room, now just an empty room, bed stripped, no sign of anybody’s belongings anywhere. It was no longer Bo’s room. I was a little surprised at first. Then certain events of the night—maybe not events but more like feelings—came back to me, and I stopped being surprised.
“All I can think,” Lois said, “was when Bo died—sometime in the night—Chet got upset and … and let himself out.”
“Who found the body?” Bernie said.
“Me.”
“Was the door open or closed when you came to the room?”
“Closed. But maybe a breeze…”
They both turned to the window.
“It was closed, too,” Lois said. She squeezed her hands together. “I feel awful about this. Dogs have stayed overnight, as I mentioned, but we’ve never had a situation where a resident passed during one of those periods. We’re going to have to change the policy.”
“I hope you don’t, Lois.” Bernie closed the door. “I have a feeling this was a onetime event.”
“You do? Why?”
“Just a feeling, like I said.” Bernie tapped his finger on the doorknob. “Chet? Open.”
I trotted over to the door. Open it? Was that the idea? We’d been working on this for some time, me and Bernie, me in charge of the opening part, Bernie in charge of the treats. The lever types were easy-peasy. Knob types were harder. I had to get both my front paws on the knob and then push one up and pull one down, a lot to remember. But I’d been getting pretty good. This was the knob type, not too big and not too small, and also not shiny, the shiny ones being harder to grip. I liked my chances.
I rose up and got my front paws on the knob. It practically started turning on its own. But then came an important thought. What about my treat? There was not the slightest treat smell in the air, meaning Bernie had no treat on his person—on his person being law enforcement lingo.
“Chet? You okay?”
Well, yes and no. Yes, I could open this door. No, I wouldn’t, not without a treat. Whoa! I was saying no to Bernie? How shameful! All at once I felt very bad about myself. I was going to do my job—meaning turn this doorknob—and pronto. And not only that, I was also going to put everything I had into it, do my job with all my heart. I pressed down on that doorknob, good and hard, so that doorknob would know what’s what. Nothing happened. I pressed even harder, and got more nothing out of the doorknob, a doorknob I was starting to hate, by the way, and then remembered: push and pull! So I pushed and pulled, pushed and pulled, then tried pulling and pushing, pulling and pushing and got all mixed up and went back to—
But nothing worked, even though I knew how to do it. I just couldn’t turn that doorknob.
“That’s all right, big guy,” Bernie said softly. “Not a problem.”
Oh, but it was. A huge problem. My tail drooped right down to the floor. I tried to raise it back up. At first it didn’t want to. I made it.
“So how did he get out?” Lois said.
Good question! How the hell had I gotten out of this room? You’d think I’d be able to remember something like that. After all, it’s not every day that—and then it all came back to me! Whoa! Bad guys were in our lives right now, even if Bernie didn’t know it. At that point I had the strangest thought, a thought that made no sense: maybe it was a good thing that I’d failed to turn that doorknob. Made no sense, but my tail sure liked it. It stiffened and stood straight up all on its own, tall and proud.
“Can he have a treat?” Lois said.
* * *
A Rover and Company treat! There was a lot to like about Lois. But eventually we had to move on. We’re good at moving on, me and Bernie. He says we’re going to roam the whole great West before we’re done. Hey! Was that our business plan? I understood it at last, all except for the part about being done.
We said goodbye to Lois and went outside, but then came a surprise. Did we hop in the Porsche and blast off into the whole great West? We did not. Instead we walked around the building—small hospital or big house? I still wasn’t sure—and had a look at the back. This building had all its fanciness out front, the back being pretty plain. A sort of flower bed ran along the base of the wall, but hardly any flowers grew, even though the ground was kind of damp.
Bernie shook his head. “Irrigation system irrigating nothing,” he said. “Over irrigating nothing. You know that expression, vast carelessness?”
I did not.
“Fitzgerald, big guy.”
Fitzgerald? A new one on me. A perp? I had no reason to think otherwise. I hoped he looked good in orange.
Bernie stopped at one of the windows. “This should be it.” He peered through the glass. I rose up on my back legs, got my front paws on the window, took a peek myself. Hey! Bo’s old room, seen from the outside, bare and empty, just how we’d left it. An interesting sight? Not really. But if it was interesting in Bernie’s eyes then that was that. I was trying to make the room look interesting—not easy even knowing where to start—when Bernie stepped ba
ck, meaning I did, too. Then he put his hands on the frame and pushed up. The window slid open.
He turned to me. “Ring a bell, Chet?”
I listened and yes, heard a distant bell, one of those bicycle-type bells. Was this the first breakthrough in the case? I had a real good feeling.
Bernie crouched down, gazed at the flower bed, damp but flowerless. “Is it true that nothing is completely bad?” he said.
Yes! I’d never been so sure of anything in my life.
“Take the waste of all this water, for example,” he went on. “Without it, we wouldn’t have that.” And he pointed to a footprint in the dirt. “Cowboy boot. Size eleven, maybe?”
Sounded good to me.
Bernie got out his phone, took a picture of the footprint, showed me the screen. Then he rose and gave me a grin. “Whoever it was, you outfoxed ’em, didn’t you, big guy?”
Excuse me?
Eleven
“How’s it going?” Bernie said.
“How the fuck do you think?” said Florian Machado.
Maybe we weren’t off to the best possible start. We sat at a table in one corner of the chow hall at Central State Correctional, a metal table with metal benches, all bolted to the floor. Because it wasn’t mealtime, we had just the three of us in the big echoey space—Florian sitting on one side and Bernie on the other, me beside Bernie until that moment. Now I got up and moved around the table, sat nice and close to Florian. He gave me one of those double takes. Sometimes they lead to a change in tone, sometimes not. Perp tone is a huge subject that maybe we can get to later.
“Within the obvious limits, is what I meant,” Bernie said.
“Limits?”
“Sure,” said Bernie. “Just look around. Doing time is about limits.”
Florian leaned forward, pointed his big, thick finger at Bernie. “But that’s the whole thing. I’m not doing time.”
“No?”
“Ain’t been convicted yet. Any justice in the world, I’d be out on bail.” His hands balled into fists. “Know what I’d like to do to that judge?”
“Tell me.”
“Pound his goddamn head to a pulp.”
“Had much experience in that line?”
“What line?”
“Pounding someone’s head to a pulp.”
Florian’s brow wrinkled up. “You lookin’ to try me or somethin’?”
“We already did that, Florian. It’s time to face a fact or two. Yes, you’re a big dude—”
“Six three two sixty!”
“But not particularly strong for your size.”
Florian glared at Bernie in a way that made me think he didn’t like him at all! Imagine that—not liking Bernie at all. Bernie didn’t seem upset, just gazed back at Florian in a calm way, not in the least threatening. Once you’ve taken a guy down, there’s no need ever to threaten again. That’s something I learned in our work, although I knew it going in, from how we roll in the nation within.
“The toughest guy I know is LeSean Stiller, over at Stiller’s Gym,” Bernie went on. “Weighs one fifty, tops.”
LeSean Stiller—a fan of me and my kind, and a very good patter, in his way. His hands were gentle, no doubt about that, but there was also something in their touch that scared me. Well, not scared me, me being who I am. Forget I mentioned that.
“If this works out,” Bernie was saying, “you could take some lessons from him.”
“If what works out?” said Florian.
“We’ll get to that,” Bernie said. “The problem right now is that there are plenty of men in here who have pounded heads to a pulp, practically live for it.”
Florian glanced around. Way down at the other end of the chow hall, a dude in an orange jumpsuit was mopping the floor. A guard leaned on the wall, watching him. The mopping dude looked our way, then shaded his eyes—like he was outside in the sun. Humans can be very entertaining.
“Hey!” he called. “Chet? Zat you?”
He was too far away for me to make out his face, but I remember every voice I’ve ever heard. This one was easy—it belonged to Zdeno “Big Z” Zdeniev, who’d gotten hold of some submarines and was selling them to—well, I don’t recall the details, and we brought him in more or less by accident, our actual case at the time being about a Russian hockey player who’d been smuggling something or other inside pucks, a case I’d solved pretty much by myself—if you don’t mind me throwing that in here—and all because of my longtime hobby of chewing on pucks whenever possible. No time now to describe the wonderful feeling my teeth get from puck chewing. Just try it, if you haven’t already.
Down at the other end of the chow hall, Big Z had a huge smile on his face. “Will you look at zat tail off his!” he said to the guard. “Can I quick go over, say big hello to my puddy, Chet?”
“No,” said the guard.
Florian was watching all that go down, a thoughtful look on his face. Bernie was watching Florian. He looked thoughtful, too, but thoughtful Bernie and thoughtful Florian were different kettles of fish. Don’t get me started on fish: those tiny bones, stuck in my throat, each and every time! Why were they even called bones? I know bones. Fish bones are something else.
Florian turned to Bernie. “All’s they got is the wallet,” he said.
“And the receipt from behind the RV,” Bernie said. “Which puts you at the scene of the crime.”
Florian nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “She keeps bringin’ that up.”
“Who are you talking about?” Bernie said.
“What’s her name, my attorney.”
“From the public defender’s office?”
“Kinda.”
“What does that mean?”
“She works with them once in a while, or something like that. On loan, type of thing.”
“A law student?”
“Maybe too old for that. Point is we’re makin’ a deal.”
Bernie has very nice posture. Have I mentioned that? Even when sitting, like here in the chow hall at Central State Correctional, he always sits up good and straight, but not at all stiff, if you see what I mean. The only stiffening that ever happens is when something really gets his attention, like now.
“What kind of deal?” he said.
“Guilty to lesser charges,” Florian said. “Like manslaughter or even maybe aggravated something or other. Instead of murder one, which is what the DA’ll go for if I say no.” He glanced around the chow hall, bit his lip. “Could be out in three years, even less, what with the overcrowding situation.”
Bernie gave Florian a very direct look. “But Florian,” he said, “did you do it?”
“Did I do what?”
“Slit Wendell’s throat from ear to ear.”
Florian looked down and sighed. “I just don’t know.”
“How can you not know something like that?”
“It happens,” Florian said. “Some kind of syndrome.”
“Your lawyer told you that?”
Florian nodded. “Like the mind makes new memories—to give you a break, you know? But then you can’t sort them out from the real ones. Or maybe the real ones are gone forever—can’t remember exactly what she said.”
“Leaving Wendell aside for the moment,” Bernie said. “Ever slit anybody’s throat before?”
“No. Well, not that I remember.”
Bernie smacked his hand on the table. “Yes or no?”
Down at the far end of the chow hall, Big Z and his guard turned to watch us.
“No,” Florian said. “If it has to be one or the other.”
“It does,” Bernie said. “Have you ever killed anybody?”
“Not that I—” Florian caught the look in Bernie’s eyes. “No.”
“Ever seriously hurt anyone?”
Florian thought. “Only in football.”
“You played football?”
“Just Pop Warner. I got tackled on the sideline and fell on some old lady’s leg. Busted it in three places—she scream
ed something awful.”
Bernie rubbed his hands together, always a sign we were getting somewhere. Were we about to close the case right here and now? If so, would that mean I’d have to grab Florian by the pant leg? He was already locked up in Central State Correctional and wearing an orange jumpsuit. I got a bit confused.
“So,” Bernie said, “on one hand we’ve got the wallet and the receipt.”
Florian nodded.
“Not to mention,” Bernie went on, “the phone and the laptop, lurking out there somewhere.”
“Phone and the laptop? Why the hell does—” Florian jammed on the brakes, but too late—I could tell from the look on his face. Have I mentioned Bernie’s not-to-mention technique? One of his very best—he ends up mentioning whatever it is anyway! Who else could have come up with something so brilliant? There’s only one Bernie.
“You sold them to a fence?” Bernie said.
“I got a right to remain silent,” said Florian.
“That ship has sailed. I’ll need the name.”
Even I knew that! The name of the ship was Sea of Love, once Florian’s and now ours. I was a little surprised Bernie had asked the question. And also that Florian couldn’t come up with the answer. He just sat there silent, with an expression that reminded me of Rummy, a mule I dealt with in an earlier case.
“What is wrong with you?” Bernie said. “Are you on your own side or against? We’re talking about bargaining chips here—to sweeten your deal with the DA.”
Florian did that frowning thing again, even more than before. And the lip-biting thing. Not a pretty picture. “How come you want to do that? You’re who busted me.”
“I’m not Inspector Javert,” Bernie said.
“Who’s he?” said Florian.
I was totally with him on that. Bernie had never spoken that name before. Inspector Javert—a perp, perhaps? But at the same time an inspector? Heads up, Chet. I took a careful look around. Big Z and his guard were gone. We were alone, safe for the moment.
“He’s the type I’m trying to protect you from,” Bernie said.
Of Mutts and Men Page 9
