Charles Willeford - Sideswipe

by Unknown

  "You don't know that. They must be working on it. They don't always tell you everything they're doing."

  "I don't know about that, Sergeant. But stuff is disappearing. People are gone for a few weeks, or months, and when they come back paintings and other valuables are missing. We've got a security man on the gate twenty-four hours a day, so who's taking the stuff?"

  "There's no guard back here," Hoke pointed out, "on the beach side. I could climb those steps to the pool, walk into the lobby, and take an elevator right up to your apartment. This is a public Florida beach. Anyone can walk or jog all of the way up to Niggerhead Rock and back. In fact, when I get settled, that's what I plan to do every day." Hoke edged away.

  "I'd like to talk to you again about these burglaries sometime."

  "I'm not a detective any longer. I was in Homicide, not Robbery. Was. Now I'm an apartment manager."

  "Take my card anyway. Some evening, if you've got nothing better to do, stop up for a drink. If you're not interested in the burglaries, we can talk about something else. I have two martinis every day at five o'clock."

  Hoke read the card he was handed. E. M. SKINNER. CONSULTANT. "What's the E.M. stand for?"

  "Emmett Michael, but most people call me E.M. My wife used to call me Emmett, but she's been dead for three years now."

  "Hoke Moseley." The two men shook hands.

  "Any relation to Frank Moseley?"

  "My father. You know him?"

  "I know his wife. I only met him once, but Helen has an apartment here in the Supermare. I knew Helen before they got married. She still owns her apartment here."

  "I didn't know that. With the big house they have, why would Helen still keep an apartment here?"

  "As an investment, a tax write-off, probably. Some owners live here for six months and one day to establish a Florida residency, just because we don't have any inheritance or state income tax. They might make their money in New York or Philly, but legally they're Floridians."

  "That's not my family, Mr. Skinner. We go back a long way in Florida. The original Moseleys lived here before the Revolutionary War and then went to the Bahamas during the war because they were Loyalists. Then, after the war was over, they came back to Riviera Beach."

  "Not many families in Florida go that far back."

  "I know. There are still a few here in Riviera Beach, and even more down in the Keys. That's why we're called 'Conchs,' you know. Originally, we were conch fishermen, both here and in the northern Bahamas. The term's been corrupted now, because they call any asshole born in Key West nowadays a Conch. But the Moseleys are truly Conchs in the original sense."

  "What's the difference between a Conch and a Cracker?"

  "Crackers are people who moved to Florida from Georgia, from Bacon County, Georgia, mostly. Farmers and stock people. So they're called Florida Crackers instead of Georgia Crackers. I don't know how the word 'Cracker' got started. All I know is there's a helluva difference between a Conch and a Cracker."

  The phone rang, and Skinner picked it up. Hoke moved away down the beach, and Skinner waved. Hoke nodded back and headed for his apartment. The guy loved attention, Hoke concluded, and would have talked all morning.

  Hoke was mildly curious about E. M. Skinner. The old man had everything, including a penthouse overlooking the Atlantic, but he was obviously lonesome as hell, looking for adventure or something. All the guy needed was a phone and a pencil, apparently, and he could sit under a beach umbrella and make money. Lots of money. Old Frank Moseley was like that, too, but his father's knack for making money hadn't been passed along to Hoke. Frank had once owned the land now occupied by the Supermare condo, and he probably still had a few points in the building as well, though Hoke didn't understand exactly how points worked. Hoke knew the difference between being alone and being lonely, however, and he knew he would never be lonely as long as he stayed on Singer Island.

  Hoke showered, slipped into slacks and a sport shirt, and walked to the Tropic Shop in the Ocean Mall to see if his jumpsuits were ready yet. He had ordered two yellow poplin jumpsuits when he bought his surfer trunks, but had asked the shop owner to have the sleeves cut off and hemmed above the elbow. This was Hoke's first positive step toward simplifying his life. He would wear one of the jumpsuits one day, wash it at night, and then wear the other one the next day. That way he wouldn't need any underwear, and he could wear his sneakers without socks. He had selected the jumpsuits because they had several pockets, including zippered pockets in the back. He had wanted the long legs, however, instead of cutoffs, because they could be Velcroed at the ankles. Insects were not a big daytime problem on the island, because of the prevailing breeze from the ocean, but when the direction changed and the winds came from the 'Glades, it usually brought in swarms of tiny black mosquitoes at night.

  The woman at the Tropic Shop told Hoke that she hadn't got the jumpsuits back from the tailor yet, but would send them over to the El Pelicano when her daughter came back from the mainland.

  "She doesn't have to do that. I don't know where I'll be, so I'll check back later this afternoon or tomorrow morning."

  "I could call you when they come back."

  "I don't have a phone."

  Hoke left the shop and crossed Blue Heron Road to the Giant Supermarket. He picked out potatoes, onions, celery, carrots, summer squash, and two pounds of chuck steak. He bought a dozen eggs and three loaves of white sandwich bread. He added a bottle of Tabasco sauce, and a jar of peppercorns for seasoning, and carried the two bags of groceries back to his apartment. His new plan was to eat two meals a day. He wanted to lose at least ten pounds, so he would eat two boiled eggs and a piece of toast for breakfast each morning, and skip lunch. At night he would eat one bowl of stew, and he had enough ingredients to make a stew that would last for five days. Then, the following week, he planned to make enough chili and beans to last for five evening meals. This would solve his cooking problems, and he could eat two slices of bread with each bowl of stew or chili. On the other two days, when the beef stew or the chili ran out, he would just eat eggs and bread for breakfast, and perhaps go out at night for either a hamburger or a fried fish sandwich. With a plan like this one, he wouldn't get bored with his meals, because when the stew started to bore him, it would be time for two days without stew, and then the following week he could look forward to chili and beans.

  Hoke was taken with the simplicity of his plan. He chopped the vegetables for the stew while he browned the cut-up chunks of meat in the cast-iron Dutch oven. Then he dumped in the vegetables, added water, and turned the electric burner to its lowest setting. He threw in a handful of peppercorns, then sat at his dining table to examine the account books Al Paulson had brought him last night.

  Three units were rented on one-year leases: to a schoolteacher, to a salad man at the Sheraton Hotel, and to a biology professor from the University of Florida who was on a one-year sabbatical. Hoke, of course, had 201, so there were only four other apartments. Two were already rented to two elderly couples from Birmingham, Alabama, who were vacationing for two months on the island. So two units were still unrented. The sign on the bulletin board in the lobby said that there was a two-week minimum, but the sign hadn't deterred a few people from coming up to Hoke's apartment and asking about weekend rentals. All he could do then was to repeat what the sign said, but that hadn't kept one asshole from Fort Lauderdale from arguing with him about it. There would be more assholes like that, Hoke suspected, from his experience in living at the Eldorado Hotel in Miami Beach for two years. The Eldorado had also been a hotel for permanent or semi-permanent guests, and it didn't take overnighters or weekenders either. Poor old Eddie Cohen, the day and night manager of the Eldorado, must have had a hundred arguments with transients who just wanted an overnight stay. The best thing to do, Hoke decided, was to try and get all permanent residents for one-year leases, if he possibly could. If he could manage that, he could just collect the rent from everyone once a month and hang out a NO VACANC
Y sign. Perhaps the best way to start was to change the policy from a minimum rental of two weeks to a two-month minimum? Hoke went downstairs, crossed out "weeks" and wrote in "months" above it. His father might not like the new policy, but then he wouldn't have to tell him about it--not until he had the empty units rented, anyway.

  Paulson had also given him a list of people to call when things went wrong--a plumber, an electrician, a handyman, and a phone number for Mrs. Delaney, a widow who lived in a private home two blocks away. She cleaned apartments when they were vacated, and was paid a flat rate of thirty-five dollars, no matter how dirty or clean the apartment was when the tenants left. Hoke recalled her name vaguely from when he was a boy, but couldn't remember what she looked like. Perhaps, when the time came to clean the next vacated apartment, he could do it himself and pocket the thirty-five bucks. He could see already, from the cost of the groceries at the Giant Market, that a hundred bucks a week wasn't going to go very far.

  When he resigned, he could either take his retirementfund money in a lump sum, or leave it and wait until he was fifty-seven, and then draw a small monthly retirement check. He didn't know which one was the best course to follow. He didn't like the idea of living on one hundred dollars a week for the next fourteen years. But he didn't want to think about money right now. He didn't want to think about Ellita and her baby, Sue Ellen, or Aileen. He didn't want to think about anything at all.

  Hoke stripped down to his shorts and went to sleep on the Bahama bed, with a warm, damp wind blowing over his body from the window facing the sea.

  CHAPTER 6

  When Stanley saw Mr. Sneider standing beside his tow truck waiting for him, he involuntarily put the fingers of his right hand to his cut lip and considered darting back inside the jail.

  "Everything's all right, Mr. Sinkiewicz," Sneider said, holding up a hand. "I'm here to drive you home."

  Sneider opened the door to the cab, and Stanley climbed into the passenger seat. After Sneider got into the cab, he sat for a long moment with both hands on the wheel, staring through the windshield. Sneider was a hairy, ursine man, who had grown a bushy black beard after retiring from the service. His fingernails were black with embedded grease, and Stanley could smell beer on Sneider's breath.

  "This whole thing's been a damned farce, Mr. Sinkiewicz, and I want to apologize. I had no reason to hit you, even though I thought you were going to run. I just wasn't thinking clearly, that's all, after talking to my wife and Mrs. Sinkiewicz. Besides, I had a bad day. A bastard in a blue Electra stuffed me for twenty bucks' worth of gas. He filled up at self-service and tore out of there at sixty miles an hour. But that's beside the point. I'm still sorry, but that's what happens when you listen to two hysterical women talking at the same time."

  "I--I didn't do nothing bad to Pammi."

  "I know that now, but I didn't know it at the time, you see.

  "After I got back home from here I had a long talk with Pammi in her bedroom and managed to get the truth out of her. I know now you didn't instigate anything, because Pammi has been carrying on with a couple of old geezers in the park in the evening. We've been letting her go out after dinner, because she was supposed to play with her friend Ileana down the street. Instead, she's been meeting one old fart or another in the pinochle shed in the park. Apparently this has been going on for weeks. She's still a virgin, however. I checked that out myself, and her hymen's still in one piece. But she's been doing some other dirty things with these old men that I'd rather not go into just now. I think you know what I mean."

  "I was asleep, and she stuck her tongue in my mouth and asked for a penny."

  Sneider sighed. "I know. She told me. You're off the hook, Mr. Sinkiewicz, and I'm sorry if I caused you any trouble. But that fucker in the blue Electra had me going to begin with--well, what difference does it make? Did you get any dinner? If not, I'll spring for a Big Mac and a shake before I take you home." Sneider started the engine and put the stick into first gear.

  "I'm not hungry. I had a piece of corn bread, and my lip's too sore to eat anyway."

  "You could probably use a stitch or two, but if you've got some adhesive tape at home, I can put a butterfly stitch on it for you, and it'll be good as new in a day or so."

  "There's some tape in the medicine cabinet. It's old, though."

  "That don't make no difference. Adhesive tape, unless it gets wet or dried out in the sun or something, is good for years."

  On the drive to Ocean Pines Terraces, Sneider told Stanley about a kid he caught breaking into his Coke machine a couple of weeks back. "He didn't get anything, but when I took the kid home to his father, I told his old man that the kid had stolen about ten dollars' worth of Cokes from me during the last month or so, and the guy came up with ten bucks." Sneider laughed, relishing the story.

  When Sneider pulled into Stanley's driveway, Stanley noticed that his Escort wasn't in the carport. "Is Maya still with your wife, Sergeant Sneider?"

  "No. My wife went off to one of her meetings, and I made her take Pammi along. I don't know where your wife is. Let's go inside, and I'll fix up your lip."

  Stanley found the roll of tape and got a pair of scissors from Maya's sewing basket, and Sneider put a neat butterfly bandage on Stanley's lip. "Just leave it there for two or three days. Shave around it, and the old lip'll be as good as new."

  The two men shook hands at the door, and Sneider apologized again before driving off down the street in his tow truck. Stanley looked around the house for a note, but didn't find one. Then he stopped looking, realizing that if Maya knew that he was in jail, she wouldn't leave a note for him because she wouldn't expect him to be coming home to read it. Stanley went next door to the Agnews' and rapped on the front door. The jalousies on the door opened slightly, but not the door.

  "Go away!" Mrs. Agnew said.

  "Is my wife in there with you, Mrs. Agnew?"

  "No, she isn't, and if you don't go away, you pervert, I'll call the police!"

  "Do you know where she went?"

  The jalousies were cranked closed. Stanley could hear Mrs. Agnew's tapping footsteps as she walked across her terrazzo floor toward the kitchen. Stanley returned to his house and sat in his recliner. He knew he was too restless to watch television. After a few moments, he went into the bedroom and took off his bloodied shirt. As he threw the dirty shirt into the hamper beside the open closet door, he noticed that the Samsonite two-suiter wasn't on the closet shelf. He looked through the clothes in the closet. There seemed to be a few things missing, but he wasn't sure. He looked for Maya's photo album, where she kept the family snapshots, including the ones of the grandchildren Junior sent down from time to time. When he couldn't find the album, he knew that Maya was gone. Her checkbook was missing from the little corner desk in the living room where she worked on the household accounts, and so was her little recipe file box.

  She was gone. No question about it.

  Stanley looked up the number and direct-dialed his son in Hamtramck. Junior's voice was a little garbled at first because his mouth was full of food.

  "It's me," Stanley said, "and I'm calling long distance from Florida. Have you heard from your mother?"

  "Just a sec, Dad." Junior finished chewing. "Are you calling from the jail?"

  "No, I'm home. I'm calling from home."

  "Mom said you were in jail when she called me. How'd you get out? She said you were arrested for molesting some little kid."

  "It was all a mistake, son. Maya didn't see what she thought she saw, and that's all been cleared up now."

  "Is Mom still there, Dad? I'd like to talk to her."

  "No, she isn't here. I just wondered if she called you. I don't know where she is."

  "In that case, she's already left, Dad. She said she was coming back here to Detroit, that's what she called to tell me, and that was that. Now, I realize you own the house up here and all that, but I told her we didn't have any room for her. Christ, Dad, we've only got two bedrooms and one bath, so
where'll we put Mom?"

  "She's driving up, then? I don't think she can find her way to Detroit, and the Escort's due for an oil change, too."

  "If she's already left, there's nothing we can do about it, I guess. But when she gets up here, I'll send her back after a couple of days. We really can't put her up for more than one or two days. Maybe I can make reservations for her at the Howard Johnson's, or some motel near the house. Too bad you didn't get out of jail soon enough to stop her from leaving. A woman Mom's age shouldn't be driving all the way across the country by herself."

  "She'll get lost. There's no doubt about that."

  "No, I don't think she'll get lost, Dad. She can always ask the way to Michigan at a gas station. D'you want to talk to the kids while you're on the phone?"

  "No. Did you call the jail, Junior, and try to get me out?"

  "I didn't call anybody. I was trying to talk Mom out of coming up here, and then she hung up on me. I'm trying to eat dinner now. I've really had a bitch of a day. Mom was in a hurry and told me she'd give me the details when she got here. What happened, anyway?"

  "Nothing happened. When your mother gets there, she can give you her version of the details. And you can also tell her for me that I won't take her back. Tell her to keep the damned Escort and look for a job. You can also tell her not to cash any checks with the checkbook she took with her either, because the account is now closed!"

  Stanley hung up the phone. His face was flushed and his fingers trembled. He went into the kitchen and heated water to make a cup of instant coffee. Before the water boiled, the phone rang. At first he wasn't going to answer it, figuring it was Stanley Junior calling him back, but when it kept ringing he finally picked it up on the eighth ring.

  "Listen, Dad," Junior said, "and please don't hang up. If the trouble's all cleared up, and if Momma calls me again from wherever she is on the road, I'll just tell her to go back home. Okay? Of course, she knows what she saw, and all that, but I think I can talk her into going back, especially now that you're out of jail. I'd like to see her, of course, and so would the kids, and all, but we really don't have any room here for her--and that's a fact."