Cat Chaser

by Elmore Leonard

  “Yes, we’ll do that,” de Boya said.

  “I wondered, the cops say who called ’em?”

  “They don’t know,” de Boya said. “What I don’t understand is what Moran was doing there. What was it he said? That you want to take me?”

  Corky moved ahead of them to unlock the door.

  “That’s what it sounded like,” Jiggs said. “Only thing I can figure out, he was trying to confuse you, General, get your head turned around so he could run off with your wife. You want me to I’ll go pay him a visit.”

  “That would be all right with Jimmy Cap?”

  “Jimmy said help you out anyway I can.”

  “But I learn he’s out of town, uh? Has been gone for a week or so.”

  Corky held the aluminum screen door for both of them, de Boya first, Jiggs saying, “General, I hope you’re not doubting my word,” his tone offering a strong measure of injured pride as he gave the place a quick look: a living room that had the flavor of a hunting cabin, knotty pine walls, maple furniture, a poker table, Indian blankets. Jiggs pulled his shirttail out to wipe off his glasses. “I’ll give you a number you can reach Jimmy Cap or they’ll tell you exactly where he is. You don’t mind, I’d like you to talk to him and get this straightened out.” Very serious about it.

  “Yes, I would too,” de Boya said. “Let me have the number.” He handed Corky his briefcase.

  Jiggs put his glasses back on. His hands went to his breasts in the loose seersucker jacket and gave them a pat, then touched his right hip. “Yeah, I got it. In my wallet. General, let me go the can and take a leak first, I can almost taste it.” He moved off toward the hall where he saw the bathroom door open, green tile inside.

  De Boya watched until the door closed, then extended a hand toward Corky and snapped his fingers, twice.

  Corky was opening the briefcase on the poker table. He brought out a Walther P.38 automatic and handed it to de Boya. Now he took off his suit coat. From a shoulder holster snug beneath his left arm Corky drew a revolver, a Colt .38 with a stubby snout, and followed de Boya to the hallway. There was a bedroom at each end, doors open to empty rooms, neat twin beds with chenille spreads. The bathroom stood in between, its door closed.

  They waited to hear the toilet flush, raised their pistols and began firing point-blank into the center of the door, the reports earsplitting in the confined area. Then silence. Corky turned the knob carefully, opened the door a crack, stepped back and used the sole of his foot to bang the door completely open.

  Jiggs came out of the shower stall arms extended, holding a blue-steel automatic in both hands, ignoring Corky to level it straight at de Boya’s face. He saw those ice-water eyes wide open for the first time.

  “Something I learned a long time ago, General, never take your joint out with guys you don’t trust. Specially you hot-blooded fellas like a lot of noise, shoot the place up. Come in here. Come on,” Jiggs said, stepping back on broken glass and bits of porcelain to let them come in past him. “Drop the guns in the toilet . . . That’s the way. You too, Corko. What’s this a truss?” He snapped the elastic strap of Corky’s shoulder holster. “You got a hernia? That’s it, in the toilet. Now I want you to take your clothes off. That’s what you do, right, General? Strip ’em down bare-ass.”

  As he began to undress de Boya said, “I pay for my life, uh? How much I have to pay you?”

  “Gonna make it easy,” Jiggs said, edging past them to sit down on the toilet. “Only take your suitcases. Corky, gimme the car keys. I’ll get ’em after.”

  “I begin to think it’s what you want,” de Boya said, “but I don’t see how you know about it.” He paused unbuttoning his shirt, occupied with his thoughts. “Unless it was my wife?”

  “You told me yourself,” Jiggs said, “talking to Jimmy Cap, that day out at Calder. All the rest of the bullshit is just bullshit, way to get you here.” He said to Corky, “What’re you looking at? Come on, get your clothes off.” He raised the automatic in Corky’s face. “Can’t figure out what this is, can you? Looks like your standard nine-millimeter Smith Parabellum except for that hickey sticking out.” Jiggs dug into his side coat pocket, brought out a five-inch gunmetal tube and screwed it onto the threaded stub, the “hickey” that extended from the muzzle of the automatic. “Factory-modified. They call it a Hush-Puppy. Come on, General, take it off. Take it all off—like the broad says with the shaving cream. You too, Corko, drop the Jockeys, but keep an eye on the general there he don’t try and cop your joint . . . Shoes, everything.”

  He seemed proud of his gun and showed them the profile with the silencer attached.

  “Got a slide lock here on the side. You fire once it doesn’t eject, so you don’t hear the slide click open. You don’t even hear that poumpf you get with a silencer. You know why? I use a subsonic round, very low muzzle velocity. Take the lock off you hear the slide jack open and close as you fire, but that’s all, just that click-click . . . You guys ready? Leave your clothes on the floor there.”

  De Boya said, “You’re going to take our clothes?” He stood straight, shoulders back and seemed to be in good shape, heavyset but not too much flab.

  “I’ll see they don’t get wrinkled,” Jiggs said. “Now get’n the shower. Go on, move.”

  “Both of us?” de Boya asked.

  “Both of you the same time.” Jiggs stood up now and motioned them into the stall. “Corky, watch yourself. Don’t drop the soap.” Corky was skinnier than he looked in clothes; chewing on that pussy mustache like he was going to cry. “Okay, turn the water on. Get it how you like it.”

  De Boya said, “What is the need of this?”

  Jiggs said, “Just turn the water on, will you, please?”

  He shot de Boya high through the rib cage with his arms raised to adjust the shower head, lung-shot him and shot him again in near silence as de Boya flattened against the wall and began to slide, smearing the tile. Corky was screaming now, hunching, holding his hands out protectively. He shot Corky twice in the chest through one of his hands, Corky’s body folding to fall across de Boya curled up like he was trying to keep warm. He watched their heads jump with a final twitch as he shot them each again, watched the stream of water cleanse them, then pulled the shower curtain closed. He’d let the water run while he went out to get the suitcases.

  20

  * * *

  THE BAR JIGGS HAD PICKED OUT for Nolen was on the corner of Atlantic and SW Sixth Avenue on the west side of Pompano, about thirty seconds from the freeway.

  Nolen was wearing sunglasses and an old raincoat, creased with wrinkles, his cowboy boots hooked in the rung of the barstool that was as close to the phone booth as he could get: sipping scotch with a twist, fooling with the swizzle stick that was like a little blue sword. Four swords on the bar plus the one he was playing with. The bartender had tried to take them and Nolen told him no, he needed the swords to keep score. He was allowing himself six, no more than that. Just enough to keep his motor responses lubricated, idling. He didn’t count the pitcher of sours; that was breakfast. It seemed a long time ago—still there in Moran’s house sipping when he got the emergency call from Jiggs, Jiggs saying he was in de Boya’s garage and the starting time had been moved up to right now, he’d call him at the bar when they got to Boca; only it might not be Boca, the general wasn’t being very cooperative. All that at once while Nolen was trying to ask him what he was doing in the garage, for Christ sake, and what were all the sirens.

  The place was dark and had a nice smell of beer, the bartender down talking to the one other customer that looked like a retiree with his golf cap.

  They both looked up as the phone rang in the booth and watched the weird-looking guy in the raincoat and sunglasses almost kill himself getting off his stool, the seat of the stool next to him spinning, throwing him as he leaned on it to get up. The bartender said, “I sure hope that’s your call.”

  Nolen waved at him, went in the booth and closed the door. As soon as he hea
rd Jiggs’s voice he said, “The hell’s going on?”

  Jiggs’s voice sounded calm. Nolen listened, holding back on all his questions as Jiggs told him where to come, not Boca, but a place west of Lau-derdale and not too far.

  “Just tell me how it went?”

  Jiggs’s voice said it went fine, no problem.

  “You got it?”

  Jiggs’s voice said he was going to get it out of the car right now.

  “Where’s de Boya?”

  Jiggs’s voice said he was in the bathroom. The voice stopped Nolen then. It said, “Nolen, you want to talk on the phone, shoot the shit, or you want to get over here and help me count?”

  Moran said to Jerry, “Mary’s gonna be staying with us maybe a few days. Oceanfront Number One.”

  Jerry took a moment to adjust before coming on full of cordiality. “Why sure, that’s the one with the view. Except today. But the paper says it’s gonna clear up by tomorrow.” He got the key and said to Mary, “You like to register now? Or you can do it later if you want.”

  Mary held back. Moran said, “Jerry, she’s not here. Okay?” He took the key and handed it to Mary. “If anybody asks.”

  “I never saw this young lady before in my life,” Jerry said.

  “I mean even if it’s the police. All right?”

  Jerry sobered. He adjusted his golf cap, resetting it in the same position, cocked slightly to one side. “Yeah, well I don’t see any problem.”

  “We won’t take any guests for a few days. Not that they’re breaking down the door.”

  “Turn the No Vacancy on?”

  “No, let’s not tell anybody a thing. I appreciate it, Jerry.”

  “I know you do,” Jerry said. He gave Mary a wink, getting the feel of his new role.

  Moran opened the door to the courtyard and closed it against the rain coming in. “Jerry, how about Nolen? Is he around?”

  “Got a phone call about an hour ago and left right after. Smashed as usual. I hope he don’t get in a car wreck.”

  Moran went out with the bags.

  Mary said to Jerry, “Nice seeing you again.” Amazed at this natural response, her voice not giving her away. Outside, hurrying to keep up with Moran moving fast with the three bags, she said, “I don’t believe it.” Her voice raised in the wind. She said, “Remember how you kept saying that? When I called your room in Santo Domingo—‘I don’t believe it.’ Remember?” Talking out of a compulsion to hear herself and know she was in control. “ ‘Come on, I don’t believe it.’ You said it about five times.”

  Moran said over his shoulder, “I believe it now,” not stopping till they got to the end apartment off the beach, Moran hunching his shoulders against the rain coming in sheets off the ocean, Mary trying to hold her tote out of the way and get the door open.

  They were soaked by the time they got inside and Moran let the bags drop. Mary closed the door and came to him, pressed her wet face against his wet shoulder, felt the familiar comfort of his arms come around her. It seemed late, so dark for afternoon. She pressed against him, hearing the wind moan out of the gray mass of ocean and felt an excitement that was hard to keep down. She said, “I’ve done something else you’re not gonna believe,” raising her face to his.

  Moran saw her expression, the grin she was trying to hold back. He looked at her with the innocence of a straight man waiting for it and said, “Are you serious?”

  She said, “Wait till I show you,” and saw his expression change, starting to grin but not sure he wanted to.

  Nolen found 84 and turned off the freeway at the peak of his whiskey rush, the glow carrying him along with a feeling of effortless control, gliding in the high excitement of a rainstorm, clouds hanging close enough to touch. (He had come out of the bar with his sunglasses on and thought it was midnight.) Now it was that colorless nothing kind of time, the eye of the storm. He found the New River Canal Road, not another car in sight and kept pressing, riding the wind, the black overcast his cover, until he saw the stand of pines off to the north. He touched the right-hand pocket of his raincoat and felt the hard bulk of the .45. Here we go . . . turned in and rode the Porsche through pools formed in the ruts, hearing the wake washing aside, saw the house and two cars in the yard now, the wipers giving him quick glimpses. He rolled to a stop on the off side of the Cadillac and now considered—in spite of the charm he felt—the tricky part. Walking from the car to the house. He felt his mouth dry and wondered why he hadn’t brought a bottle with him.

  Well fuck it, he’d gone into houses on the east bank of the Ozama with cotton in his mouth and automatic weapon fire popping away and one place had found beer inside, not cold, but beer all the same and he hadn’t gotten even a scratch in anger during that war and was subject to serious gunfire nearly every day and you know why?, because his life was being spared for something big if not fame that would come to him with more money than he could count on a rainy afternoon in Florida. You’re goddamn right. He got out of the car and walked up to that house . . . saw the door open a crack . . . hesitated the moment he needed to clear the .45 and kicked the door in with a cowboy boot.

  Jiggs sat in an easy chair that faced away from the front windows and the door, so that Nolen came in almost behind him. He saw Jiggs look him up and down, Jiggs just sitting there. Nolen looked past him at the two suitcases lying closed on a round card table. He turned and looked toward the hallway.

  “Where’s the general?”

  “In the bathroom.”

  “Still?” Nolen looked at the suitcases again. “How come you haven’t opened ’em?”

  “They’re open.”

  “Well, why don’t you say something, for Christ sake?”

  “I want to hear you,” Jiggs said.

  Nolen went over to the card table. He reached up to switch on the hanging fixture that was like an oil lamp with a glass chimney. He saw the suitcases were unfastened, unzipped, and looked at Jiggs again.

  “Go ahead,” Jiggs said.

  Nolen lifted the flap of a suitcase and let it fall open. He saw newspapers. He saw the front page of the Miami Herald telling him Haitians had drowned in the surf at Hillsboro. He felt down under the papers. He threw back the flap of the other suitcase and saw more newspapers and felt through them all the way to the bottom. He looked at Jiggs, squinting at him.

  “The general see us coming?”

  “Nah, it wasn’t the general.”

  “Well, did you have a talk with him? Christ!” Nolen whipped around, cocked his weapon as he stomped toward the hallway.

  “I said it wasn’t him,” Jiggs said.

  He waited, a clear picture of a rainy afternoon in his mind: Moran throwing the same kind of luggage into the back seat of a beat-up Mercedes, girlfriend who was way ahead of everybody behind the wheel of the getaway car. He heard Nolen scream:

  “Jesus Christ!”

  And waited for him to appear: barely moving in his shroud raincoat, gunhand hanging limp, like he’d been hit over the head and was now about to fall.

  “It was your buddy,” Jiggs said. “Son of a gun beat us to it.”

  “My settlement,” Mary said, on the floor next to the open suitcase. “Now do you love me?” She had taken off her wet clothes, chilled, and held a cotton bedspread around her like an Indian blanket; a young girl at a pajama party eager to have fun. She said, “What’s the matter, can’t you say anything? You’re looking at it, but you still can’t believe it, huh?”

  “I believe it,” Moran said without emotion.

  He sat in his shirt and Jockeys on the edge of the sofa, hunched over in lamplight to look at the stacks of currency, packets of brand-new hundred-dollar bills, rows of them filling the suitcase, remembering Scully telling him about the Igloo coolers and a hundred thousand stacking up to less than a foot high. He felt vulnerable and wished he had run across to his house to change first. He’d brought Mary here because of the three suitcases, because he thought she’d need more room for clothes than his house
could offer.

  He said, “All three are full of money?”

  “No, two,” Mary said. “I brought a few things, but I didn’t want to load myself down.”

  “How much’s in there?”

  “I don’t know exactly. It looks like a million one hundred thousand in each bag. But anything over two million Andres gets back. I only want what I have coming.”

  “You didn’t count it?”

  “George, this’s the first time I’ve even seen it. I made the switch while Andres was downstairs in his den.”

  “The switch—you sound like a pro.”

  “No, it’s my first job. I was gonna call a cab and then I found out you were on the way. My hero.” She looked at him curiously, smile fading to a slight frown. “Does money make you nervous? What’s the matter?”

  He was looking at the scene on Arvida, flashing lights reflecting in the rain. “Andres and Corky came out with two suitcases, just like these.”

  “He has at least a dozen Louis Vuitton,” Mary said. “I think he must have stock in the company. He kept two bags packed with his traveling money, always ready.”

  “Where’d he hide them?”

  “You guessed it the other day and thought you were kidding. Under the bed.”

  “Come on—just sitting there? Not locked up?”

  “Under two hundred and fifty gallons of water and inside a marble safe that looks like the pedestal of his bed. There’s a tiny hole at the foot you can barely see. You slide in a magnetic key that’s like a long needle and part of the marble slides open.”

  Moran said, “He trusted you?” and sounded surprised, thinking of her with Andres now rather than in the beginning.

  “Why not?” Mary said, thinking of herself with Andres in that time before. “Something to impress the bride, a fortune under the marriage bed. Vanity, George. And if he hasn’t trusted me lately, well, a cheater isn’t necessarily a thief. He tends to sell women short.”