Vengeance

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “It’s …” I said.

  “Gothic, haunting,” he said. “Yes.”

  “I was going to say melancholy.”

  “Yes. I’m sorry, Mr. Fonesca, but I’m going to have to get right to your questions. I have a patient waiting.”

  “I understand. Melanie Lennell Sebastian …”

  “I can’t give you any information about why she was seeing me or what was said,” he said softly.

  “What can you tell me about her?”

  He sat back, picked up a well-sharpened pencil, put it down, looked out the window and made a decision.

  “Melanie Sebastian is a remarkable woman,” he said, choosing his words carefully. “She’s been through a great deal in her life. The town where she grew up—”

  “Ogden, Utah,” I said.

  “Ogden, Utah,” he repeated. “Her mother was sick, recurrent brain tumors from what I understand. Melanie took care of her. Every day from the time she was about ten she came home and relieved her father, who worked evenings. I think he was a carpenter. Melanie just took care of her mother, didn’t play with other children much, just read and took care of her bedridden mother. When she was fourteen, her father had a heart attack and had to retire. Melanie went to work in a restaurant waiting tables after school till ten at night. No boyfriends. No close friends. It was Melanie’s idea to move to Florida with her father and mother. They moved to Gainesville while she earned her degree while continuing to work. Then, about four years ago, just after her parents died within a week of each other, she met Carl Sebastian.”

  “And what’s she like?”

  “Complicated,” he said, playing with his pencil. “Dedicated herself to her husband and to helping children. She worked long hours for not much pay at a Catholic agency. She fought the system, the courts, the psychiatrists, to save children. When Melanie Sebastian gives her love, she gives it with a conviction, compassion and ferocity I’ve never seen before.”

  “You know this from experience?”

  “I know it from observation. I’ve told you more than I probably should.”

  “You haven’t told me why she was seeing you and what you make of the story of Melanie Sebastian you just told me,” I said.

  “And I won’t,” he said, putting down the pencil and looking at me.

  “Do you know where Mrs. Sebastian is?”

  “No.”

  The answer had come slowly.

  “Any ideas?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Want to share them with me?”

  He didn’t answer.

  “This one may get me kicked out, but we’re both in a hurry,” I said. “Mr. Sebastian thinks you and his wife were having an affair.”

  Green cocked his head and looked interested.

  “You’ve already more than hinted at that. And if we were having an affair?”

  “Or are,” I amended. “Well, it might suggest that she would come to you. Her husband just wants to talk to her.”

  “And you just want to find her for him?”

  “That’s it,” I said.

  “First,” he said, getting up from his desk chair, “I am not and have not been having an affair with Melanie, Mrs. Sebastian. In fact, Mr. Fonesca, I can offer more than ample evidence that I am gay. It’s a relatively open secret, which, in fact, hasn’t hurt my practice at all. I get the gay clients, men and women, and I get women who feel more comfortable talking to me than they would a straight male or female. I don’t get many straight men.”

  “You can somehow prove that?” I asked. “Or do I just take your word?”

  “The truth is,” he said, looking at his watch, “I don’t have the time to prove it nor the desire, but I’m sure if you ask in the right circles, you’ll get the confirmation you need.”

  The chair was comfortable. I was tempted to lean back.

  “Okay, let’s say you’re gay.”

  “Let’s say.”

  “You could still be a friend of Melanie Sebastian. She was, or still is, a patient. She might be inclined to confide in you.”

  “She might,” he said, standing up and smiling. “In which case, I couldn’t tell you.”

  “Dilemma,” I said.

  “It would appear.”

  “I told Sebastian that when I found her I wouldn’t tell him where she was if she didn’t want to be found. When I find her, I’ll do my best to persuade her to talk to her husband or tell me why she won’t.”

  “When,” he said. “Not if. You don’t look like a terribly confident man, Mr. Fonesca.”

  “About most things I’m not. About finding people, I am.”

  “You’ll have to excuse me,” he said, checking his watch again.

  “If she gets in touch with you, please give her my card or my number. I just want to talk.”

  He took the card and gave me a sympathetic smile.

  “May I ask a somewhat personal question, Mr. Fonesca?”

  “I don’t think I’m your type, Doctor.”

  He chuckled. It sounded sincere.

  “No, I’ve seen a great many people with severe depression. I’ve learned to recognize some of the signs, and—”

  “I’ve already got a shrink,” I said. “And I couldn’t afford your rates.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Friend told me,” I said. “Besides, I’m straight. You don’t take straight males.”

  “I said I don’t get many of them. I didn’t say I turned them away. Normally when a patient leaves I ask them to go out that door so patients don’t run into each other, but since Dorothy has already seen you—”

  “And I’m not a patient.”

  “And you’re not a patient. You can go out the front through the waiting room.”

  He ushered me to the office door and opened it, saying,

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t have been more help.”

  “I’m used to it,” I said. “I’m patient. Time is one thing I have too much of. Too much time and so little to do.”

  “Spoken like a true depressive,” he said. “I don’t expect to be talking to or seeing Mrs. Sebastian, but if I do I’ll give her your message. I don’t think she’ll talk to you.”

  “I’ll be in touch,” I said.

  “Take one of my cards on the way out,” he said, and then, looking past me, addressed the nervous young woman with “Come right in, Dorothy.”

  Dorothy waited till I was clear of the door, pressed her lips together and entered the inner sanctum. The door closed.

  I stood for a few seconds watching the fountain in the small courtyard.

  With two hours till I had to pick up Beryl Tree for our appointment with Sally Porovsky, I headed for the legal offices of Tycinker, Oliver and Schwartz. I had served papers for all three of the partners in the past and had gotten to know Harvey. Harvey did the computer work for the trio and was well paid for his expert services. He had a small, well-equipped room down a corridor near the washrooms where the secretaries could watch him. Harvey had a drinking problem. The secretaries were under orders to report all of his arrivals and departures. Harvey knew this, agreed to it and wanted it. It seemed to help him cut back on his drinking. Harvey did not want to lose this job. The question was whether he needed computers or alcohol more.

  Harvey’s drinking, which had slowed considerably since I first met him, was tolerated because Harvey was a genius. I was on a straight retainer with the firm of T, O & S. I served papers at no fee. My retainer came in the form of access to Harvey whenever I needed him, provided I didn’t abuse the privilege.

  Some of what Harvey did bordered on the illegal. Part of his unwritten and unspoken agreement with T, O & S was that he would solemnly swear that all the information he obtained on the Net was legally obtained.

  Harvey could access information from the police— any police with a computer—credit agencies, banks, hotels, almost every major corporation, the Pentagon, the FBI and probably even the shopping lists of the wives of every member
of the Israeli intelligence community.

  I found Harvey in his windowless office drinking club soda and studying something on the computer screen in front of him.

  Harvey looks more like an ex—movie star than a computer hacker. Harvey is tall, dark, wears a suit and tie, and sports short hair of gold. He’s MTT but you wouldn’t know it from his looks.

  “Harvey,” I said.

  He grunted something and then made an effort to pull his attention from the screen.

  “Lewis Fonesca,” he said. “Looking as happy as ever. Here for work or a sports tip for the week? If it’s a sports tip, go with Duke over North Carolina if you can get three-two or an even bet with a six-point spread. The screen tells me.”

  “Work,” I said, handing him the folder on Melanie Sebastian. He opened it and went through the documents slowly.

  “Who prepared this?”

  “Her husband.”

  “Good job. You want the Tuesday special or …”

  “She left, pulled the money out of their joint accounts. You have the numbers of the accounts, the list of credit cards and numbers, GTE calling card, whatever else you can turn up. He wants her found.”

  “Take me about ten minutes if I don’t hit any problems. You want to wait?”

  I said I did and took a seat while Harvey hit keys, moved a mouse, moved to another computer, hummed something that sounded like a busy signal and said things to himself like “Uh-uh-uh-uh” and “Here I come. Here I come.” Fifteen minutes after he started, Harvey turned to me and said.

  “She hasn’t used any of her credit cards for the last week. She hasn’t rented a car or taken a plane out of Sarasota, Tampa, Fort Myers, Orlando, St. Pete, Miami in the last four days, at least not under her own name. She did come into Sarasota from Raleigh-Durham Airport last Monday. Early morning arrival. Can’t do much if she’s using cash and a different name, but I can run all kinds of variations on her name or any others she might use. People tend to stay with something they can remember.”

  “Middle name is Lennell,” I said.

  “Yep, see it right here. Mother’s maiden name was Fallmont. Let’s see … plenty to go on. Take some time. Bank accounts are cleared out. She doesn’t have any others in her own name.”

  “How much did she pull out?”

  He turned to the screen, moved the mouse, pressed a button and said: “Forty-three thousand, six hundred and fifty. Took cash. Left three dollars in that one. Another twenty-eight-two in cash from this one. Left fifty dollars and nine cents.”

  “See the description of that jewelry?” I asked.

  “Nice list.”

  “Can you see if she sold any of it?”

  “I can play a would-be buyer, go on-line offering more than market, but jewelry … It’s hard to market price. Still, the descriptions are good. I’ve got her Social Security number. I’ll get the numbers of her relatives, friends–if you can give me names and …”

  “Can you see if Geoffrey Green, the shrink, has rented a car, bought an airline ticket. The works.”

  “Yep,” said Harvey. “I saw Green three or four times when I came here and was, let’s say, recuperating.”

  “And …?”

  Harvey shrugged. “Didn’t hurt. Didn’t help.”

  “Why’d you stop seeing him? Big fees? No help?”

  “Sometimes a shrink who charges a lot of money is good. Green is good, but I think he started to come on to me,” said Harvey. “Hard to tell. I know what computers are thinking but I have a problem with people. He was careful. I wasn’t interested. Got uneasy. You know. Rapport between shrink and neurotic was deleted.”

  “Any way you can talk to your computer to find out if …?”

  Harvey nodded.

  “Credit-card use. Organizations. Magazines he subscribes to. I can look. I’ll be a little curious myself.”

  He took a drink of club soda. The bubbles were long gone. What I was asking him to do was illegal, not just on the border. I was more interested in what was right than what was legal. If I got caught, I would take what came. Ann Horowitz, who charged considerably less than Geoff Green, said I wanted to be punished, to be righteous and punished. A short, tarnished Lancelot in recycled Levi’s jeans.

  “I’ll call you,” Harvey said. “I’ve got something else to finish, take me an hour and then I’ll go back on the trail of the missing Melanie. I’ll check every day to see if I can find anything till you tell me to stop.”

  “Thanks, Harvey,” I said.

  “My pleasure,” he said. “My meditation. My therapy. My answer to AA. My work. Anything else?”

  “Are all the computers going to crash and the world to face disaster when the millennium begins?”

  “You hoping yes or no? I get the feeling that, if you don’t mind my saying, you’re a little suicidal.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “A few minor glitches,” he said. “No planes falling out of the sky, blackouts, nothing like that. If you have friends thinking of loading up on gas, water and automatic weapons and heading for cabins back up in the Georgia hills, don’t try to talk them out of it. The Net tells me that they won’t listen.”

  “I’m reassured,” I said. “And I’m late.”

  Harvey had already returned to his screen.

  I was back at the Texas Bar and Grill ten minutes later.

  The windows of the Texas are painted black with only a neon Budweiser sign to serve as a beacon. The name of the bar is printed in big white letters on the blackened window. Inside, the Texas, which had all the comforts of Judge Roy Bean’s Jersey Lily, was lit with ceiling bulbs and muted yellow spotlights in the corners. The yellow walls were decorated with steer horns and old firearms. The tables were heavy, round, solid oak and surrounded by hard-hatted construction workers, garbage disposal men, cops, firemen, people on the edge of coming back from oblivion or sinking into it, and a handful of longtime Sarasota businessmen and women who know that the best chili and burgers in town were in the semidarkness of the Texas.

  Beryl Tree and Ames were at a table in the back near the bar. Ames was watching the door. Beryl was nibbling at a giant chili burger. Ed Fairing, the proprietor and chef, was talking to Ames. Ed sports a big flowing mustache and wears string ties with turquoise or Petosky stones. Ed probably would have enjoyed pulling unruly customers out into the street for a public execution. Ed, though born and raised in the good part of Sacramento, California, lived the role. He had even developed a Texas accent.

  “Fonesca,” he said, giving my hand a more than hearty shake. “Happy as ever.”

  “Happy as ever,” I said.

  “Burger and chili? Chili or burger? Beer?”

  “Burger, thick, cheese, tomato, no onion,” I said, sitting. “You pick the beer and put it in a mug.”

  “Gonna see a lady?” Ed said. “No onion, no chili. You always have onion and chili.”

  “You should have been a private eye, Big Ed,” I said. He loved to be called Big Ed.

  Ed left and I turned to Beryl Tree.

  “Everything’s quiet,” said Ames. “I called Flo. She said she’d welcome the company.”

  I nodded and said, “Mrs. Tree …”

  “Beryl,” she said.

  “Beryl,” I continued. “I’m going to eat fast and we’re going to see a therapist who might know how we can find Adele. Just tell her who you are, why you want your daughter found, about your husband, everything. If she asks for identification, give it. Her name is Sally Porovsky.”

  “A therapist? They think Adele is crazy? Dwight’s the crazy one,” she said, pushing away her half-finished burger.

  “Your daughter’s been through a lot,” I said. “My guess is the police or a court or her school referred her to the counseling service where Ms. Porovsky helps kids. You don’t have to be crazy to need help.”

  She nodded, though I knew she was still not convinced.

  “When we finish talking to Ms. Porovsky, Ames and I will take you to a
friend’s house where your husband won’t be able to find you,” I said.

  “If Dwight comes looking, he’ll find me. He’s mean, rotten even, but he’s not a fool. He’s smart in some ways. You know, like a animal, sharp teeth. I think he means what he told me. If I don’t go and call you off, he’ll do his best to kill me and maybe you, too.”

  Ed came back with the steaming burger and a mug of beer. The foam curled over the side as it was meant to. I thanked Ed, who ambled over to another table, looking as if he had spent a lifetime in the saddle.

  “You want to call it off?” I asked.

  “No way on earth or in heaven,” she said.

  Ames sat quietly watching the door, hands in his lap. I hoped he wasn’t carrying the gun I had seen him with earlier.

  I ate fast. The burger was great and Ed had topped it with blue cheese and a thick tomato. I drained the mug of beer and got up.

  “Let’s do it,” I said in my best imitation of William Holden in The Wild Bunch. Considering the surroundings, it seemed like the right thing to do. Considering who I was and how I probably sounded, it was a bad mistake.

  John Detchon was at the reception desk reading and talking on the phone at the same time. He recognized me, smiled and examined Beryl Tree. He had probably seen a lot of Beryl Trees from behind his desk. Ames was waiting in the car. I wondered if it would be worth asking Detchon if he knew Geoffrey Green or anyone who might know him. Sarasota isn’t that big and I didn’t think the gay community, if it was a community, would be hard to keep track of. I decided against it, at least for now, and led Beryl to the elevator.

  She clutched her purse and looked straight ahead.

  When the doors opened and we went into the office of Children’s Services of Sarasota, I saw more people sitting in the cubicles than I had before. They were making notes, phone calls, faces. Sally Porovsky looked as if she hadn’t moved. Whatever it was about her kicked in and I decided to make a call to Ann Horowitz in the hope of finding some way of dealing with a feeling I couldn’t deny but wasn’t sure I wanted.

  “Mr … . ?”

  “Fonesca,” I reminded her, disappointed that she hadn’t remembered, and annoyed that I was disappointed.