“Hostwise you’re a soft touch. That’s someone’s pet, Rafferty. If you want a cat, go buy one. Or ask around; people are always trying to give away kittens.”
“Is this a female nesting urge or something? A man slips a passing cat a quick snack, and zap! You’re pushing me into the zoo business.”
Hilda grinned. “My mistake. It’s obvious the cat means absolutely nothing to you.” In the house the phone rang.
I got up and started for the back door. “What cat?” I said.
“Exactly,” Hilda said. “And now your phone is ringing. I find the timing suspiciously opportune.”
“Cat people stick together, cookie,” I said from the doorway. Hilda made a face at me as I reached in for the wall phone. “Hello.”
A man’s voice said, “Rafferty?” The voice was almost familiar. “Is this Rafferty?” he said again, and I recognized him. It was the turkey who’d called me at the office last Thursday.
“I believe Mr Rafferty is in the card room,” I said. “I’ll have him paged.”
“What? Hey, come on! Cut the crap.” He sounded menacing, but he also sounded like he was working at it. “You’ve got something I want.”
“Charm?” I said. “Grace under pressure? A dynamite profile?”
“What’s with you? You can’t even talk—aw, shit!” He banged the phone down. Hard.
I hung up, too, and walked back to Hilda. She looked up from the features section. “What was that all about?”
“Guy doesn’t know what a t’gallant is, and it’s bugging the hell out of him.”
“Perhaps you’d care to explain that,” Hilda said.
“Certainly. T’gallant; a contraction of topgallant; one of the sails on a square-rigged ship. I looked it up.”
“Rafferty …” She gave me that look. I told her about the other phone call while I poked at the coals in the barbecue.
Hilda thought about it while I went to the kitchen for the steaks. When I came back, she was frowning. “He called your office Thursday and here today,” she said. “Do you suppose it has anything to do with that convenience store fiasco?”
I was searing steaks and dodging smoke when she said that and I didn’t give it enough thought.
“It’s that yellow pages ad,” I said. “I think I’ll change it next year. This one pulls too many weirdos out of woodwork.”
So I cooked the steaks, and Hilda put dressing on her salad and we dined, and we lazed away the rest of the afternoon and evening. The mood ranged somewhere between great and wonderful, as days spent with Hilda tended to do.
It was only much later, in the dark quiet night hours, that I found out how wrong I was.
Chapter 17
The firebomb came through the open bedroom window and landed on Hilda’s legs.
I was barely awake, returning from the bathroom, when it happened. Hilda said “Ouch!” in a muzzy, aggrieved tone. Then she opened one eye and saw the burning rag in the bottle’s neck. She screamed, scrabbled up to cower against the head of the bed and kicked out frantically at the flaming bottle.
So far only the rag fuse was aflame; the bottle had not broken and dumped out the gasoline inside. I dived onto the bed and grabbed for the bottle, trying to catch it before Hilda kicked it against something hard and turned herself into a bonfire.
I didn’t do very well; I had the bottle briefly, I dropped it, snagged it on the fly when Hilda kicked it, then bobbled and fumbled and banged it against the footboard with a clang that terrified me.
I felt like a bit player in a bad puppet show; clumsy and out of touch. I could hear myself grunt in frustration as I fumbled with the elusive bottle.
The gasoline-soaked rag fuse was burning with smoky, fierce flames a foot high. Once the rag slapped against the back of my right hand. There was a brief wet sensation, then strangely cool fire and the stench of singed hair.
I don’t know how long my hand was on fire. The next time I looked, the flame had gone out by itself.
And while I juggled the potential fireball around the bed I wondered when another one would come sailing into the bedroom. Or was this a diversion, and the real attack was still to come? How close would they get? Backyard close or leaning-in-the-window close? Handguns, shotguns, or automatic weapons?
Bobbling and burning and fumbling and trying to think. Oh, Christ, Hilda, sweetheart, please stop screaming so I can hear them if they come. And get out of the bed. Are they still outside? Come here, bottle, and, Hilda, hit the floor before …
And then, finally, I had a decent grip on the goddamned thing. I lurched into the bathroom; I must have banged my knee on the bed or something. I burned my hand again when I pulled the fuse out and threw it into the shower stall. Carefully, I put the bottle into the bathroom sink, then stumbled out to the hall closet for my shotgun.
When I returned to the bedroom, I was armed and beginning to get on top of the situation. The bedside clock blinked 2:17 at me in large red letters. I remembered seeing 2:13 when I had climbed out of bed to go to the bathroom.
Hilda had stopped screaming now. She sat at the head of the bed, her knees drawn up and her arms wrapped tightly around them. Her breathing was loud and raspy, with a quiver of near-hysteria each time she inhaled.
“It’s okay, babe,” I said, and went to the window.
Outside, the yard was quiet and apparently empty. The attacker—attackers?—might be hiding in the bushes, of course, but at least they weren’t about to come through the window right then.
I went to Hilda. “Come on, Hil. It’s all over now. No problem.” I babbled platitudes to her and tugged her arm. Slowly she unfolded and let me lead her to the bathroom. It was no fort, but it was the closest room that did not have an external wall.
Hilda clutched my arm with a hand like a claw. She didn’t speak, though her breathing seemed a little better. Only a little, though. When we got to the bathroom, she saw the still-burning fuse on the floor of the shower and wailed a high, thin sound that cut right through me.
Hilda sank slowly to the floor. I patted her shoulder clumsily. She twitched like a startled animal. “I’ll fix it, Hil. Don’t worry. I’ll fix it.”
I turned the shower on to put out the flaming rag and held my burned hand under the cool water. It helped some.
“I’m sorry, Hil. It’s okay now, really. Just stay here for a minute. I’ll be right back.”
I found my big flashlight and went hunting.
Out the front door and carefully around the house, staying close to the fence. Whoever had thrown the firebomb was probably long gone now, but I couldn’t count on that.
The straggly bushes I had cheerfully neglected were a problem now; it took twenty careful minutes to be certain the yard was empty. I found where he had lighted the fuse. There were three burnt paper matches on the ground near a bois d’arc tree. A clue. Big deal.
I checked the street. There were five cars parked on the short street. All five were familiar and empty. There were no house lights, except for mine, and even the neighborhood Irish setter had taken the night off.
I was losing my adrenaline energy; feeling the jangly downside of the buzz. My mouth tasted sour and metallic. My burned hand hurt, and my knee had stiffened up.
And I suddenly realized I was standing in the middle of a suburban street, stark naked, holding a shotgun.
I went inside.
Hilda was in the bedroom again, sitting dejectedly on the side of the bed. The bed had been stripped; only the bare mattress and pillows remained. She gestured vaguely. “The covers were smoldering. I put them in the shower.”
“How are you, babe?”
She sighed and tried to smile. “Okay, I guess. Scared. Embarrassed, a little.”
I said, “Don’t be.”
“I really screamed, didn’t I?”
“Really did. It’s okay.”
There was a half inch of water on the bathroom floor. A smoke-stained pile of bedding filled the overflowing shower base. I turned o
ff the shower and dragged the bedding clear of the drain.
The firebomb bottle was still in the sink. Better find a cap for that, or put it in the garage. Or pour it out.
Then, I realized it didn’t smell. Even the bottle’s neck had only a small whiff of gasoline. Strange. But didn’t they mix detergent with the gasoline? Maybe that would mask the smell. I poured some into the palm of my good hand. It didn’t look like gasoline, or detergent, or a combination of the two. I smelled the puddle. Nothing. I tasted it.
Well, goddamn.
Back in the bedroom, I sat beside Hilda on the edge of the bed and showed her the bottle. “Look at this. A champagne bottle. Big, heavy, and hard to break; kind of dumb, when it’s supposed to shatter and splash burning gasoline all over the place.”
Hilda shuddered and looked away. “Is that bottle a clue?” She said it in a who-cares tone of voice.
“I doubt it. Probably swiped from a restaurant garbage can. Anyway, the next part is the most interesting.” I tipped up the bottle, sipped, and handed it to her.
“Rafferty! Gasoline will …” Then she sniffed the bottle. “Water?”
“Yep. Apparently I did my three-handed shortstop routine for nothing.”
Hilda looked anxious. “I don’t understand this. I don’t understand any of this.”
“It was supposed to be a warning, I think.”
“A warning of what?”
I shrugged. “I’m not sure.”
“Well, then, a warning from who?”
I shrugged again. “Can’t tell yet.”
“Now I’m really scared,” Hilda said. “This is—”
The telephone beside the bed rang. I picked it up. “Go ahead,” I said.
It was the man who had called before. He said, “You smart-ass, are you gonna listen to me, now?
“What do you mean, now?”
“No more fucking around, Rafferty. Next time I’ll put gasoline in it. Think about that.”
“I will,” I said, “among other things. So what’s on your mind?”
His voice climbed a tone. “What the fuck do you think is on my mind? That dumb son of a bitch gave you my money. I want it.”
I felt like little kids must feel when they finally realize there’s no Santa Claus. Suddenly everything made sense. I was ashamed that I’d been so blindly, stubbornly dumb.
“You did the Krandorff hit,” I said.
“What?”
“The grocery store guy. Max.”
“Never you mind about that. You just worry about getting me my money.”
“What makes you think I—”
“I saw you!” He half screamed it. “I told you to stop trying to fuck around with me!”
“Okay,” I said, “calm down. I have the money right here. Come on over.”
“Oh, that’s cute. As if I’m gonna—”
“Pick a time and place, then. I’ll meet you.”
“Yeah …” He sounded suddenly wary. “I’ll call you. Be available.”
“Sure.”
He hung up then. So did I.
As if the phone was a switch, Hilda jumped up and began to dress. “Rafferty, I want to get out of here. Now!”
“I don’t blame you, babe.”
I kept the shotgun on the backseat while I drove Hilda home. Just in case. On the way, I explained that the hit man didn’t know about her.
“He barely knows about me,” I said. “Looks like he whacked Max; then later on he saw Dresden give me the money. He spotted my license number and got my name from that.”
Hilda sounded doubtful. “I thought only the police could do that.”
“Yeah, some cops think that, too.”
We drove in silence for a while. “Hil, honey, I’m sorry about this. If I’d paid attention, if I hadn’t teased the guy on the phone—”
She put her hand on my leg. “It’s not your fault. I’ll be all right. Just … give me a little time. Please.”
“Sure.”
We got to Hilda’s house a few minutes before four. The back of my hand had bubbled up in fat, squishy blisters. Hilda bandaged it. She frowned when I asked her not to put any tape on my trigger finger.
Hilda looked to see why her shoes hurt and found she’d been burned, too. There were dime-size blisters on her feet and ankles.
I put bandages on Hilda’s blisters, fed her more brandy than she wanted, and put her to bed. I sat on the bed with her. At first she kept opening her eyes to look at me. Then she fell asleep and burbled softly.
I dozed off, too, and slipped into a nightmare where it happened again, except this time the bottle broke, and there was burning gasoline everywhere, and Hilda was—
I came up out of it with my heart pounding, clammy with fear until I saw Hilda sleeping peacefully beside me. It took me a long time to calm down.
After that I wandered around her house, not carrying the shotgun, but keeping it handy. A little before six I made coffee, drank a cup, leaning against the kitchen counter, but the caffeine reacted with the old adrenaline and made me jumpy.
At seven o’clock I called Cowboy.
Chapter 18
Cowboy and Mimi arrived two hours later in a red, open Jeep that squeaked to a stop four inches from Hilda’s garage door. Cowboy unfolded his lanky frame from the passenger seat and stood beside the dusty Jeep. He shook his head, took off his big western hat, and slapped it against the leg of his jeans. And he grumbled.
“Woman drives this thang like a herd bull with a gut ache,” he said. “Skitterin’ all over creation lookin’ fer somethin’ to fight with.”
Mimi sat behind the wheel with a grin on her wide face. “How-do, Rafferty. You like my new play-pretty?” She proudly waved her arm at the Jeep.
I clucked my tongue and whistled and said, “Now that’s a Jeep!”
“No extra cushions,” she said, and bounced happily. The driver’s seat had been modified so she could reach the pedals. Let’s face it; Mimi is short.
Make that very short.
Cowboy settled his hat onto his head and tugged it down to rest exactly half an inch above his eyebrows. He insists he didn’t get that gesture from James Coburn in The Magnificent Seven, but I still wonder. They could be twins.
“Mimi wanted her a car that fit,” Cowboy said. “And the Little Rock job paid us a right nice bonus, so we figgered it was time.” He pronounced it “tahm.”
“What Little Rock job?” I said.
Cowboy lifted two soft sports bags out of the open space behind the Jeep’s seats. “Couple of no-goods was trying to chase off one of them big chicken farmers up that-a-way. Wanted his land, I guess. They kept burning his sheds, anyway. He lost him a whole bunch of birds.”
“I assumed you reasoned with the miscreants and returned them to the path of rectitude.”
“Naw,” Cowboy said, “we kicked their butts instead.”
Mimi giggled. “You sure can talk that fancy trash Rafferty.”
I said, “Sounds like it was fairly quick and easy.”
Cowboy hefted the bags and walked toward the house. “Yeah, I guess it was at that. We only had to shoot the one of ’em.”
When I checked on Hilda, she was still asleep, sprawled on her back with one leg outside the bedcovers. That position, and the bandages on her exposed foot, gave her a disturbingly vulnerable air. I had a sudden flash of her sleeping in my bed last night just before the firebomb came through the window. My chest felt hollow as I closed her bedroom door.
In the kitchen Cowboy and Mimi sat on stools with their hands around coffee mugs. I offered them breakfast; they had already eaten.
“Tell us ’bout the opposition,” Cowboy said.
“That won’t take very long. So far, he’s only a voice on the phone.”
But it took the best part of an hour to fill in the background of Mini-Maxi Food Barns, Carl Dresden and Max Krandorff, Kevin Noonebury’s Scotsmen, and, finally, last night’s attack.
While I talked, I made toast, smear
ed it with peanut butter and ate. I offered to share, but they still weren’t hungry.
“I’ll give you a double helping of peanut butter,” I said, “if you want it to stick to the roof of your mouth en mak ya tok fahnny.”
Mimi shook her head. “Like a big kid, I swear,” she said.
Cowboy poured himself another half cup of coffee. “On the phone you said we was gonna split up.”
“Right. I want Mimi to stay with Hilda while you and I go find the guy.”
Cowboy said, “Sure.” Mimi nodded.
I said, “Tell you the truth, I don’t think he even knew Hilda was there last night. And he doesn’t have a beef with her. But even so …”
“Question,” Mimi said. “Are we talking about a siege? You want us to really hunker down and hide?”
“No. Hilda wouldn’t stand for that, and it shouldn’t be necessary. Once Cowboy and I leave here, we’ll stay away so the hitter can’t backtrack through us.” I thought about that for a minute, then added, “Well, we won’t come back until we work out a decent cutout, anyway. Maybe a rental car and a secure changeover point somewhere; I don’t know yet.”
“Fine,” she said. “We won’t have any problems.”
“Stick with her, Mimi. Stick close.”
She nodded again.
I said, “You’ll like hanging around Hilda’s store. Lots of neat old stuff in there.”
Mimi grinned at Cowboy. “Neat old stuff everywhere you look these days.”
Cowboy smiled at her, reached out, and gently ran one knobby knuckle down her jawline. Mimi damn near purred.
I went to wake up Hilda.
“Rafferty, I’ll feel foolish, having a bodyguard, but … thank you.” Hilda leaned against her pillow, bright and alert, even though she had been awake for less than three minutes. It amazes me. She can even eat breakfast as soon as she opens her eyes. I don’t understand it.
“Mimi doesn’t look like a bodyguard,” I said. “You can tell people she’s your little sister from Abilene. Just don’t expect her to follow you through any metal detectors.”
Hilda nodded. After a moment she said, “I dreamed about last night. In the dream the bottle was burning us. We were going to die.”
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