“But did you also know that there’s gross stuff all over these things?”
“Gross stuff? Is that the scientific term?”
“Like blood and skin and goo and stuff.”
“Goo?”
“Fluids.”
“Gross.”
“Like I said.”
“From the girls?”
“Some. Some from a guy,”
I didn’t mean to, but I dropped the phone.
“Dally! Come here!”
She was in the kitchen.
“What? I’m chopping onions.”
“Come in here.”
She appeared with a knife in her hand, shaking it at me.
“What?”
“This is Paul on the phone.”
“Uh-huh.”
“He’s got goo.”
“Sorry to hear it.”
“No, you’re not. It’s very, very solid evidence that Lenny killed the girls.”
She shoved the knife back on the counter in the kitchen and came over to the phone.
I picked up the receiver again. “Paul?”
“I’m deaf, Flap. What was that noise?”
“Sorry. I dropped the phone. Are you sure about this?”
“Yeah. This was easy. It was all over. This must have been kind of a…messy scene. These things were out in the elements and cold and rain and all — and the stuff’s still there. No doubt. Is it a big deal?”
Dally leaned over to the receiver. “I’ll marry you anytime you say.”
Paul hesitated. “Flap? Is that Dalliance? If it is, tell her a week from Sunday. I’ll fly my folks in.”
I looked at her. “He says Sunday, week.”
She nodded.
I shifted the receiver to the other ear. “Paul? You gotta document all this to beat the band. We’ll be over to pick it up, like, right now.”
“Okay. Remember, though, you gotta have another sample from the guy for me to say who it is…and all.”
My shoulders sank.
Dally saw the look on my face. “What?”
I told her. “Well, you know, we gotta have another sample of Lenny’s to say that the goo comes from him.”
She closed her eyes. “Tell Paul good-bye.”
“Gotta go, Paul.”
“Okay.” He hung up.
Dally was already going for her coat. “We go now. We get to Lenny’s house. There has to be something there.”
I hung up. I’d have to say I was a little excited myself. “It doesn’t take hardly anything. It could be any item of clothing…”
“Could be a Kleenex.”
We were out the door and on our way before I could even put on my coat. It was a dark night, coming on Christmas, and the streets were deserted. Dally drove.
“Later than I thought.”
“Dally, what if everything’s gone?”
“What, like Brigadoon? Like the house and everything?”
“Yeah, I mean, what if everything’s gone?”
“It won’t be.”
***
But it was. The house was empty and for sale. Not a stick of anything to be seen through the windows.
“I’ll bet it’s been cleaned within an inch of its life.” We could smell disinfectant even through the thick oak door.
She nodded. “So…that really is that.”
The moon was high and her breath was silver like a ghost all around us in the night air. We spent a little while peeping in windows and looking around and generally acting suspicious, but we knew it was no good. There was nothing in the house to even remotely get the fiber evidence we needed to nail Lenny. The only thing we were likely to find there was some kind of a ghost or other. We knew it.
Finally I took her arm. “What would you say to a little something to drink right about now?”
“I’d say, ‘Why aren’t you a little bigger?’”
“Okay, I could use a big old drink my own self.” I drove this time. Easy was already closed, but Hal the bartender and a few regulars were still hanging on to the last few notes of the night. After hours it’s quiet: Everything is a little like music.
We busted in the front door like refugees.
“Dally. Flap.” Hal set us up.
“Hey, Hal.”
“This is your last glass of the good stuff, bud. You better bring me one of those extra bottles you got stashed.”
I sat. “Sad to say, I overestimated. It’s all gone. This is, in fact, the final dram.”
He was very sympathetic. “It’s a sad moment for us all: the end of elegance and sophistication here in our little world.”
Dally broke the mood. “Yeah, well, gimme a pigfoot and a bottle o’ beer, barkeep, and keep ’em comin’.”
Hal nodded calmly. “‘Pigfoot,’ that’s a great song. I like Teresa Brewer’s version best.”
I shook my head. “Nobody beats Billie Holiday.”
He raised his eyebrows and conked a beer down in front of Ms. Oglethorpe. She hoisted it.
“So, Flap — I’m guessing you’re never gonna get paid. How’re they ever gonna verify those checks? And it’s a mean old world: The rich get richer and the poor get nothing. But congratulations anyway on finding what I asked you to.”
Hal stood up straight. “Hey, good deal: You found Lenny’s wife!” He thought for a second. “Lenny really had a wife. Is this a strange world or what?”
Dally took a slug of beer. “Oh…it’s a strange world.”
Then Hal reached up under the bar and brought out a dark bundle of something. “So if you guys see him, maybe you could give him back his little jacket and cap. Look. They’re attached. He left it on the bar a month ago or more. I don’t think he even remembers it’s here. You know Lenny.”
We just stared at it, blinking.
I couldn’t believe it. “I’ll get it over to Paul’s first thing in the morning.”
Finally Dally said, “Well, ya see how easy life is?”
“Yeah.” I finished off the last of my Cantenac Brown ’86. “But I happen to know evil is still abroad in the land.”
She nodded and took another slug; looked down at the dark bundle of Lenny’s clothes. “Well…maybe we can do a little something about that.”
*
So, when all is said and done, what do you do if the phone rings in the middle of the night? Say it’s 3:00 A.M. — could be a wrong number. But it could be your best friend, so maybe you should answer. Maybe they need help. And maybe you can do a little something about that. Otherwise it’s a mean old world indeed, and it doesn’t matter what your experience is, because your faith isn’t worth a bum check.
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Easy (A Flap Tucker Mystery Book 1) Page 22
