Is Fat Bob Dead Yet?

by Stephen Dobyns

  Vikström leaves this morsel of philosophy untouched. “Are we to think Fat Bob’s the guy who was meant to be killed on the Fat Bob?”

  “Maybe yes, maybe no. Like, it’s logical, but it also might be logical that Fat Bob wanted to get rid of Santuzza.”

  Vikström gets his coat and puts on a pair of rubbers. The two detectives leave the house. “And why,” asks Vikström, “make such a display? Why do it on a busy street instead of, say, in a dark alley?”

  “It’s the TV. Everyone’s got to be an entertainer. Nothing’s subtle anymore.” Paused on the steps, Manny holds out his arms to the weather: the junipers shagged with ice, et cetera. “Isn’t this beautiful?”

  Vikström doesn’t like snow; he’s never liked snow. He didn’t like it as a kid or as an adolescent, as a young adult or a cop. Snow is one of the unnecessities of life—that’s Vikström’s word—things that exist simply to annoy, like mosquitoes.

  The detectives climb into Manny’s Subaru Forester and put on their seat belts. It’s snowing hard enough that the windshield is covered again with fat flakes. The defroster is on full blast. No plows have been down the street, and the tracks of previous passing cars are nearly invisible. Snow puts white hats on the telephone poles and accumulates on the wires. The birds are in hiding.

  “This could be a fuckin’ picture,” says Manny. “It makes everything clean. We’re supposed to get half a foot or more. Don’t you want to roll around in it?”

  Vikström doesn’t answer. He’s sure he once told Manny he hated snow. He also realizes his rubbers will be inadequate and that the only reason he didn’t wear the boots was Manny had told him to.

  Manny accelerates quickly, and the back of the Subaru fishtails a little. “Hang on to your hat!” he shouts. “Feel that four-wheel drive grab!” He steps on the brake to demonstrate. Vikström is thrown against his seat belt.

  Burns Insurance is on Eugene O’Neill Drive, which runs parallel to Bank Street. There’s not much to say about it. Office buildings, small apartment houses, and parking lots have taken the place of historic architecture, but the thick blanket of snow gives it some beauty. City trucks plow the downtown streets.

  Mr. Burns meets them at the door. He’s a plump fellow nearing middle age, and he wears a blue down jacket and a Greek fisherman’s cap. His nose ends in a flat vertical, as if the original tip had once been snipped off. “Terrible weather. I don’t know how anybody stands it. Mind you stamp your feet.”

  Mr. Burns’s dislike of winter pleases Vikström; Manny Streeter, on the other hand, thinks he’s a jerk. They stamp their feet and follow Mr. Burns into a large office with six desks. “I called everybody and told them not to come in today. No one answered at Bob Rossi’s house. He lives alone since he and his wife separated. He has his own office over here.” Mr. Burns leads them to a windowless office against the side wall. “He’s got a number of his own accounts and he does some outside work, so technically he’s only a part-timer, and he pays his own rent. Take a look at his desk. You see? No computer.”

  The detectives look thoughtfully at the space where the computer had stood. A computer-size square area is a little less dusty than the rest of the desk. Wires lead to a surge protector and a printer. Wires also lead to a pair of little speakers on either side of the cleaner area. All have been cut rather than disconnected.

  “You got keys to the desk?” asks Vikström.

  Mr. Burns holds them in his hand. “I knew you’d want them.”

  “Was his office busted into?” asks Manny.

  “I expect it was open. We’re pretty honest here. I hope this doesn’t set a bad precedent. I always tell my employees that distrust is ‘the unaffordable expense.’”

  “Very clever of you,” says Manny tonelessly.

  Vikström opens the drawers, and he and Manny poke through their contents: files, stationery, envelopes, blank insurance forms, photographs of buildings. The belly drawer has chewing gum, pencil stubs, paper clips, a stapler, notepads, and a brown apple core. Neither Vikström nor Manny knows what’s important or what’s not, so they don’t know what they’re looking for. Manny’s sorry there isn’t a .45 automatic in the belly drawer to give the desk some flair.

  “Show us the back door,” says Vikström.

  Mr. Burns seems uncertain. “Aren’t you going to dust for fingerprints?”

  “Not today,” says Manny.

  The back door opens onto a parking lot. It’s been wrenched from the frame by someone using a forty-eight-inch gooseneck wrecking bar that has been hidden under the snow until Vikström accidentally kicks it.

  Mr. Burns makes a tsk-tsk noise. “It will be impossible to find anyone to fix the door on a day like today. Darn the snow anyway.”

  Vikström can think of no appropriate response and remains silent. He picks up the wrecking bar. Manny starts to say, Life sucks, but decides against it.

  “By the way,” says Mr. Burns, “Bob also works part-time as an auditor in the casino? I hope this doesn’t get him in trouble.”

  Vikström’s and Manny’s thoughts veer off in the new direction.

  Vikström asks, “Why would it get him in trouble?”

  “Many of my clients are religious.”

  “And they don’t like gambling?” asks Vikström.

  “They frown on it. Doesn’t the Bible say, ‘Neither a borrower nor a gambler be’? Even though Bob is a part-timer—freelance, basically—if customers knew he worked at the casino, they might worry.”

  Vikström tries to recall that part of the Bible and says nothing.

  Manny thinks, That’s Shakespeare, but he keeps it a secret.

  “So Rossi works part-time for you and part-time over there?” asks Manny. “That must be a lot of hours. How come?”

  Mr. Burns assumes a gloomy look to hide his pleasure in passing on news of another’s ill fortune. “Messy divorce.”

  “How messy?” asks Vikström, recalling Angelina Rossi, her dark arms, and what he thinks of as her fiery nature.

  “His wife caught him banging a secretary on his desk.”

  Manny looks astonished. “‘Banging,’ Mr. Burns? Did I hear you use the word ‘banging’?”

  Wiping drops from his brow, Mr. Burns seems surprised that particular word rolled off his tongue. “Well, you know what I mean, and that’s what his wife called it. ‘Banging.’ I was quoting her. Her lawyer demanded a lot of money. She got the house, the cars, the children, and the beagle.”

  “You mean banging her on his desk right here in his office?” says Manny, still astonished.

  “It was after hours, way after hours.”

  Vikström says, “You got Rossi’s new home address?”

  “I’ll write it down for you.” Mr. Burns retreats to his office.

  “You could mess up your back banging someone on a desk,” says Manny. “It wouldn’t matter if you were the fucker or the fuckee. They got no give. You ever tried it?”

  “Me?” says Vikström, shocked. “Me?”

  —

  Fat Bob now lives in a small Cape Cod on Montauk Avenue a few blocks from Lawrence + Memorial Hospital; it’s a clear step down from the pretty gable-front house on the other side of town where his wife lives. The new house has all the majesty of an empty beer case. It’s still snowing, but the temperature is rising. Chunks of snow plop down from trees. A few brave souls walk dogs. Montauk was plowed earlier in the morning, but more snow has accumulated. On the drive from downtown, Manny slams on the brakes four or five times as a way of testing the efficiency of his Subaru Forester’s four-wheel drive. Will he go into a spin and hit a tree? No way! The Subaru stops as quickly as it would on dry pavement.

  “See that, see that!” Manny shouts. “What a car!”

  Manny pulls in to Fat Bob’s driveway, plowing through eight inches of snow. It seems no one has been in or out since the snow began. So either Fat Bob’s still inside or he spent the night someplace else.

  “Look at that, no prints,” sa
ys Manny.

  “How can I fucking look at something that’s not there!” Vikström puts all his pent-up frustration into his answer. Manny glances at his partner in faux surprise as he gets out of the Subaru.

  The snow rises over Vikström’s rubbers to his ankles. He can feel his socks begin to dampen; in another minute they’ll be sodden.

  “Don’t say I didn’t warn you,” says Manny.

  Vikström tries to walk in Manny’s tracks. His mind fills with hostile thoughts. Manny’s blue watch cap seems to bob up and down with each step. Vikström thinks the back of Manny’s head could make a target for a snowball. Maturity robs a person of many reasonable actions.

  Manny discovers the front door is locked. “Let’s check the back. You go that way and I’ll go this. You don’t mind the snow, do you?”

  Vikström calculates the annoyance factor of Manny’s question on a scale of one to ten as he trudges around the small house. Maybe a six, maybe a seven. The ends of his pant legs drag though the snow. But Vikström gives no sign he’s annoyed. His face is a mask of virtuous calm. Isn’t this the case with people we see on the street? This man imagines a vicious assault on someone who has offended him, this woman plans to put roller skates on the cellar stairs before her husband gets home, while their blank exteriors show all the passion of a store mannequin. No wonder people become paranoid.

  Manny stands at a window in the locked garage door. “You might want to take a look at this.”

  Vikström looks. Inside, five shiny Fat Bob motorcycles—blue, red, gray, a dark purple, and black—are parked side by side. “I wonder if he hid these from his wife when he was paying out the money. I guess he won’t miss the one Santuzza used to smack into the dump truck.”

  “Or the one that got shot up in front of his former house.”

  “Maybe they’re spares in case he gets a flat. You know Jay Leno has ninety-three motorcycles?”

  “What kind of jackass owns a hundred bikes?”

  “A rich jackass.”

  They walk to the back steps of the house. Before they’ve gone five feet, they see the door has been broken open with the same violence and efficiency used upon the back door of the insurance office.

  “This is a bad sign,” says Manny. “I bet it was opened with the same crowbar used on Burnsie’s place.”

  The detectives stamp their feet and enter the kitchen. Drawers have been pulled out and cabinets have been emptied. Their contents litter the floor.

  “This is a bad sign,” Manny repeats. “You think someone was looking for something, or is it just trashing for the fun of trashing?”

  Vikström doesn’t offer an opinion. He leans against the sink, removing dollops of snow from his left shoe with a finger.

  The living room and den have been similarly trashed. A computer has been taken, although the monitor remains on a small desk.

  “This is a bad sign,” says Manny. “It looks like—”

  “Stop!” says Vikström. “Don’t say it again.”

  “Say what again?”

  “That this is a bad sign again.”

  “But it is a bad sign—”

  “Don’t fuck with me, Streeter!”

  Manny widens his eyes to indicate astonished innocence.

  Let’s bring this little scene to a close. Suffice it to say they find nothing, which is what often happens when we don’t know what we’re looking for. The house is scantily furnished (Fat Bob only moved in a few months ago), and it’s been searched from top to bottom by person or persons unknown, which suggests that the one who trashed it didn’t find what he was looking for. Nor does anything suggest Fat Bob’s location at the present moment.

  “He’s gotta be out there someplace,” says Manny.

  “He and everyone else,” says Vikström.

  EIGHT

  It takes Connor an hour to free the Mini-Cooper from the snow, even with Vaughn’s assistance. Vaughn wears Santuzza’s leather motorcycle cap. Connor is stoical; Vaughn is having fun. Fortunately, Connor has parked with the Mini’s nose pointing down a slight hill, but he only drives ten feet before he gets stuck. He’s got another hundred and fifty feet to go. But Vaughn is like a machine, shoveling-wise; he’s a blur of white semicircles of flying white particles. Connor stares at him in fond amaze. He can’t see how a person five feet tall can turn himself into a snow-shoveling robot. Vaughn lunges forward, takes a large scoop of snow, and shouts, “That’s all for you!” Then he tosses it aside. Then another scoop, and he shouts, “That’s all for you!” and then another scoop. Over and over. “That’s all for you! That’s all for you!” He wears black cowboy boots, jeans, and a black sweatshirt along with the leather cap, but gradually he turns white. Connor drives forward another ten feet and gets stuck. Then he starts shoveling again.

  During a break, Vaughn says, “What would the extinguished gentleman be doing right now if he weren’t the extinguished gentleman?”

  “You mean the dead guy on the motorcycle?”

  “The extinguished gentleman.”

  “He’s just finished his breakfast and is drinking his second cup of coffee as he reads an article in the local paper about a guy smashing his motorcycle into a dump truck yesterday morning.”

  “Yes, that’s what I thought he was doing.” Vaughn goes back to shoveling.

  Connor thinks the effect of talking to Vaughn and the effect of smoking weed are about the same. It’s not that Vaughn is stupid or crazy; rather it’s as if Connor were a regular cube and Vaughn an irregular octahedron, while the vision of one is no better or worse than the vision of the other, except that Connor is six-sided and Vaughn is eight-sided. This gives Vaughn an edge. But no way will they ever be on the same page. Earlier Connor asked Vaughn what he wants to be when he grows up. He guesses that Vaughn wants what others want: a modest middle-class life with medical benefits and retirement.

  Vaughn said, “A soccer mom.”

  Connor digested that. “You going to have kids?”

  “I’ll get two or three rentals when there’s a game.”

  “They going to have names?”

  “Breakdown and Hellion.”

  “Sounds like fun,” Connor said.

  “And what about your parents, what are their names?”

  “Gone and Goner.”

  Connor winced and regretted his question.

  Of course, the chance exists to ask Vaughn what the hell he’s talking about, but Connor has tried that in the past and was roughly dragged into Vaughn’s irregular octahedron, where the world mystified him. No, it’s best to keep quiet.

  Connor also shovels, but he can’t keep up. His jeans and jacket are wet, as is his baseball cap with the word TROUBLE printed across the front. He borrowed the hat from Vaughn, who in his energetic shoveling gets farther and farther away.

  When they’ve finished and Connor has changed his clothes, he’s able to drive out, though Vaughn has to push him free a few times. At last he sees Vaughn disappear in the rearview mirror, waving. The windshield wipers go whap-whap. There’s only static on the radio.

  This may seem a bad idea, but Connor is driving to New London to talk to Sal Nicoletti. One lane of I-95 is clear, pretty much. Traffic is light. A few cars have slid into ditches, but Connor stays on the road. Pure luck, he thinks. When he crosses the bridge over the Thames, he can’t see the water because of the blowing snow. Gusts of wind elbow the Mini-Cooper sideways.

  In New London the streets are nearly empty. Cars parked along the curbs are buried lumps. Yellow trucks spread sand and salt. Above the street, stoplights sway in the wind and light poles shiver. At least the snow would wash away the last of Marco Santuzza, Connor thinks. Bank Street will be clean again.

  Connor turns left onto Ocean Avenue. Small late-nineteenth-century houses give way to bigger houses split into apartments. Though no two are alike, the snow lends them a family resemblance. Connor drives slowly. The closer he gets, the less he likes his plan. But if Sal’s the man who testified agains
t the casino employees in Detroit, then it’s Connor’s duty to warn him that his New London safe house has been blown. Connor, however, worries about his response.

  A woman bundled up in a red parka shovels snow in front of Sal’s house on Glenwood Place. No car is in the driveway, just indentations from snow-covered tracks. The woman’s black hair is partly covered by her ski cap. She’s tall. Connor knows exactly who she is.

  He pulls up to the curb and puts down the window. “Excuse me,” he says, “excuse me.” He shuts off the motor.

  The woman stops shoveling and looks at Connor, but she comes no closer.

  “Is Sal around?”

  “What do you want him for?” The woman has large brown eyes, a narrow face with a wide mouth and full lips. The tip of her nose and her cheeks are red with cold. Connor finds the face beautiful. It’s hard for him to look away. He wants to keep staring at it; he wants it plastered across his eyeballs.

  “I gave him a ride home yesterday after his Chevy didn’t start. I wanted to see how it was, if he needed any more help with it.”

  “The car’s fine. It’s in the garage.” The woman still hasn’t moved.

  “Is Sal home?”

  “He’s at his office.”

  “How ’bout the kids?”

  “Watching TV. Why do you care?”

  Connor worries that she thinks he wants to harm her or harm the kids. Even bundled up like an Eskimo, she’s beautiful.

  “I like kids.”

  The woman has nothing to say to that.

  “We weren’t introduced yesterday. I guess I left too quickly. I’m Connor.”

  The woman has nothing to say to this either.

  “What’s the address of Sal’s office on Bank Street?”

  She shrugs. “I’ve never been there.”

  “Haven’t I seen you in the MGM Grand in Detroit? I’m sure I have.”

  The woman shakes her head. “I’ve never been to Detroit.”

  Connor thinks he has heard a slight hesitation. “I’m sure I saw you and Sal at the blackjack table, or maybe roulette.”

  “Like I said, I’ve never been to Detroit.” She’s turns her back and again begins to shovel. The scrape of the blade on the concrete is the only sound.