The Disappearance of Penny

by Robert J. Randisi

  “Right, thanks.”

  I watched her walk down the hall, a little girl who made a living riding animals many times her own weight.

  As I turned around Eddie Mapes came walking out of the jockeys’ room. His lined face had a few bruises on it, but it didn’t look too bad. He could still attribute them to the fall if he wanted to.

  “Nice race, Eddie,” I called out.

  He looked around and when he saw me eyed me suspiciously He walked over to me and was about to say something, but I got my two-cents’ worth in first.

  “I came down to see Brandy Sommer,” I told him, pointing down the hall. “I was hoping she could get me some information.”

  He was wondering whether to believe me or not. He was suspicious that I might be hanging around, poking my nose into his business again.

  “What kind of information?” he asked.

  “I need to know if Louie Melendez had any mounts day before yesterday,” I told him.

  “Friday?”

  “That’s right.”

  “No.”

  “No, what?”

  “He didn’t have any mounts.”

  “You remember?”

  “Louie is a pain in the ass, Mr. Po. He’s always hanging around, looking to pick up mounts. When he’s not hanging around, you notice. I haven’t seen Louie since early Thursday. He was around in the morning, for workouts, but that was it. He didn’t have a ride that day, and I haven’t seen him since.”

  “You’ve got a good memory, Eddie. Maybe you should be the detective.”

  He frowned. “That’s your bag, “he said and started walking away.

  “Thanks a lot,” I called out to his retreating back.

  He turned and muttered, “Don’t mention it, “and continued on.

  No mounts, I thought.

  If he didn’t have any goddamned mounts, then how did he get so dirty?

  Where was he hiding out, and why?

  Were he and Penny off somewhere together? Willingly?

  Or otherwise?

  If this turned out to be a lover’s tryst between those two — but no. From what I’d learned about the two of them, that didn’t figure to be the case.

  Then what did figure?

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Hopkins appeared totally unconcerned when I told him that I had removed the only picture of his daughter I found in is house.

  “No problem,” he assured me. “How did you like my gallery of great thoroughbreds?”

  “Fine,” I told him, feeling that he had his priorities all fucked up, but keeping my opinion to myself.

  “I’ll try and get your picture back to you.”

  He waved his hand and said, “Don’t worry about it. Have you found out anything so far?”

  I shook my head. “Only that the last time she was seen she was in the company of a jockey named Louis Melendez.”

  “That queer? Do you think he has something to do with my daughter’s disappearance?”

  “I don’t have enough facts to make that kind of a determination, Mr. Hopkins. All I know is that no one has seen Melendez since Friday, either.”

  We were in his office on the track grounds, which is where I had found him. Seated behind his desk since our conversation began, he now rose and demanded, “Have you spoken to Lassiter, yet?”

  “Paul Lassiter?” I asked innocently.

  “Of course. She wasn’t with him?” he asked, narrowing his eyes at me suspiciously, as if I were covering up the fact that she was.

  I was beginning to get a clear picture. He wasn’t so much worried that she was missing as he was worried that she might have gone to Lassiter.

  Truly, competitors in every way Lisa Lassiter had said it, “like little boys.”

  “No, sir, she wasn’t with him that I could see. He claims not to have seen her for some time. Why didn’t you tell me right off that your daughter had strong feelings for Lassiter?”

  “Because it’s preposterous!”

  “You refuse to believe it, or to accept it?”

  “Damnit,” he snapped.

  “Okay, okay, forget it,” I told him. “I’m working on some leads. I’ll let you know the moment I come up with something.”

  I had to restrain the urge to walk up to him, pat him solicitously on the shoulder and say, “Try not to worry so,” but he might have noticed the sarcasm.

  “Mr. Hopkins, Penny doesn’t have any brothers or sisters, does she?” I asked before leaving.

  “None. She’s an only child.” He sounded quite bitter about something.

  “Cousins, any other family she might have gone to?”

  He shook his head. “I’m afraid not. Look, Po, I want you to understand something. I am not saying that my daughter is a runaway, or that she left of her own free will. She’s missing, damnit, and I want you to find her!”

  Phony fuck, was all I could think.

  “That’s what I intend to do, sir, but I also intend to keep an open mind about the situation. I can find out the reason she’s missing, or has run away, but if you don’t like it, I can’t change it.”

  He sat down heavily in his chair and said, “Just find her, Po, just find her.”

  “Sure.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  Shukey arrived at my apartment at eight sharp.

  “What happened to you?” she asked when I opened the door.

  “I took a fall,” I told her, touching the bandage on my head. “C’mon in, Shuke.”

  Shukey is about five-five, slim, green-eyed, with hair somewhere between brown and blond, cut very short and worn with bangs, so that it sometimes looks like she’s wearing a helmet.

  “You look great,” I told her.

  “Thank you.”

  She was wearing tight designer jeans and a purple silk blouse with puffed sleeves. The shoulder bag she carried matched the color of the blouse, and she swung it off her shoulders and onto the couch.

  “Sit down. Can I get you something?”

  She settled down on the couch. “A drink, perhaps. Some pop, if you have it.”

  “I was just going to ‘pop’ a frozen dinner into the oven. Would you like one?”

  She made a face. “A frozen dinner? Is that what you eat?”

  She got up and purposefully headed for the kitchen.

  “Where are you going?”

  “I’m going to fix you — us — a hot meal, Henry Po. I happen to be an excellent cook, you know.”

  Boy, was she in for a surprise when she opened my refrigerator.

  In a couple of seconds she came walking back out.

  “It’s empty,” she said.

  I smiled. “I know.”

  She put her hands on her hips and screwed her lovely face up in an I-don’t-understand-this expression.

  “How could you leave your fridge empty?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing ever goes bad.”

  “I don’t believe you. I’m hungry, Henry. I thought you might ask me to dine with you, but I didn’t expect frozen dinners.”

  “Or empty refrigerators?”

  She started for the door and I called, “Hey, Shuke, c’mon, wait a minute, don’t leave. We’ve got business.”

  She turned and said, “After I’ve eaten, I talk business. I’m going out to get some groceries.” She turned for the door again, then stopped short and turned back. She stuck her hand out in front of her.

  “Money, please.”

  I reached into my pocket and came out with a ten, a five and three ones. She took the ten.

  “When I get back I’ll cook. After we eat, we’ll discuss business. Wait here.”

  As she walked out the door I asked, “Where would I go?”

  Shukey is not a feminist, but she is independent. She was cooking because it was her idea. If it had been mine, I’d be waiting for my frozen chicken to thaw.

  That was Shukey.

  My bell rang and I checked my watch. How could she have gotten back so fast?

  As I ope
ned the door I was saying, “How the heck” and then stopped short.

  “Did I get your address?” Brandy asked, completing the sentence she thought I had started. “You are in the book, you know.”

  “Hi,” I replied lamely.

  “Surprised to see me?” she asked.

  “In a word, yes. I thought you were going to call me on the phone?”

  “I decided to bring the information over in person. I didn’t think you’d mind. What’s that on your head?” she asked, pushing my hair aside so she could see the small bandage the doctor had put on me in the hospital.

  “I took a fall,” I told her, moving her hand so my hair would fall back over it.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, genuine concern etched on her face.

  “I’m fine, Brandy, but I’m sorry I made you go through all this bother for nothing.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked, sitting on my couch exactly where Shukey had been only minutes before. I hadn’t even noticed that Shukey had taken her bag with her. It was such a natural gesture on a woman’s part that it hadn’t registered.

  Lucky for me Shukey remembered, but now I had to get Brandy out before Shukey returned.

  I don’t know why I was so concerned about the two of them seeing each other at my place, except that I was involved with Brandy and I think I always hoped that, maybe sometime, I’d get involved with Shukey.

  “Well, after I saw you today I ran into Eddie Mapes. He remembered that Louis Melendez had no mounts on Friday.”

  I half expected her to blow her stack, but she didn’t. “Is that important?”

  “It would be, Brandy, if I knew what it meant.”

  “It means he didn’t ride in any races — ”

  “I know that much, but I don’t know what bearing it has on Penny Hopkins’ disappearance — if it has any at all. Look, on Friday Melendez was seen covered head to toe with dirt, as if he had ridden a full day’s races, only now we know he didn’t have any mounts all day.”

  “Okay, but what’s that got to do with Penny Hopkins?”

  “He was with Penny the last time she was seen, and now he’s missing, too. He hasn’t been seen since Friday.”

  “Penny Hopkins and Louis Melendez?” she asked, surprised. “They don’t mix.”

  “It doesn’t compute for me, either,” I admitted.

  “I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” she said confidently. “Have you eaten?”

  “No, I just sent out for something,” I replied, trying to figure out how to get her out before Shukey came back.

  “Well, that’s great, then. I’m sure you won’t mind sharing your dinner with me, will you?”

  “Sharing? I don’t mind sharing — ordinarily. I mean, I only ordered a small portion. Maybe tomorrow night — ”

  She got up and walked up to me. “Hank, are you trying to get rid of me?” she asked, putting her arms around my neck.

  “No, of course — ” I began to deny it when the doorbell rang.

  It had to be Shukey with the groceries.

  Great?

  Actually, why should the situation have made me nervous? Neither girl had a claim on me, or vice versa. Shukey was a friend, Brandy was a new — intimate — friend. Hey, if they couldn’t get along that was their problem, right?

  I disengaged myself from Brandy, opened the door for Shukey and waited for the explosion.

  “Hi, Shukey,” Brandy said.

  “Brandy, hello,” Shukey replied, handing me the bag of groceries and walking to Brandy. The two girls embraced lightly.

  “You girls know each other?”

  Brandy answered.

  “Shukey did a story on me a couple of years ago — a very complimentary story, I might add.”

  “Well written, too,” Shukey added, and both girls laughed.

  “Hank, is this why you were so jumpy?” Brandy asked.

  “Who was jumpy?”

  “He actually thought we’d fight over him if I was still here when you got here,” Brandy told Shukey.

  “Cheeky devil, isn’t he?” Shukey asked her.

  “Oh, to say the least,” Brandy answered.

  “C’mon, Brandy, let’s feed this gift to the women of the world,” Shukey suggested. They took the groceries from me and vanished into the kitchen. In half an hour we were seated at my dining table, eating a perfectly delicious meal of beef and noodles. I let them continue to chat while we ate, but when we were seated in the living room with coffee, I asked Shukey for a report on Aiello.

  “He’s a nasty little boy. From what I understand, he’s very talented, but he’s got a lot to learn about getting along with people. He propositioned me five minutes after we met, in no uncertain terms, and he expected me to accept.”

  “That just shows what excellent taste he has,” I told her, and caught a look from Brandy I shut up and told Shukey to continue.

  “I didn’t get much, Henry. He seemed to say quite a lot without saying very much, if you know what I mean?”

  “I do,” Brandy assured her. “He gave me the same pitch, and when I turned him down he went around telling everyone how he had scored with me.”

  “Did you notice a tall man, dark hair, kind of slim, anywhere around Aiello today?”

  She thought, then answered, “Not that I can recall.”

  “How about you, Brandy. Does that description ring a bell with you? Someone you’ve seen around the stables maybe?”

  “Sorry, no. Why?”

  I told them both about the man I had seen with Aiello before and after the fight with Mapes.

  “Aiello has it in for Mapes for some reason,” Shukey said. “He kept putting him down every chance he got.”

  Why pick specifically on Mapes? I wondered. Was it because Mapes’ name had been mentioned in Donero’s testimony? It couldn’t be that. Donero had mentioned so many jockeys’ names that the question still remained the same.

  Why Mapes?

  Had Aiello been put up to picking fights with Mapes?

  By the tall, slim, dark man?

  If so, why?

  And what about the two mugs who had attacked Mapes on the street? What was their story?

  Why had Mapes looked so frightened when I mentioned his accident in the sixth race?

  “Believe me, if they could set that up — ” he had begun to say before catching himself.

  If who could set that up?

  “What about Penny?” I asked Shukey.

  She shook her head, making her bangs bounce around. “He hasn’t seen her.” She turned to Brandy and added, “He did indicate that she was also one of his many conquests, though.”

  “He’s probably spreading the same rumor about you, now.”

  “Oh, my aching reputation,” she moaned.

  “You know, I’ve gotten so many different pictures of this girl. Brandy, you say she’s a tease, somebody else says she’s a nice girl — ”

  “Nice girls have been known to tease,” Shukey observed. “One doesn’t necessarily preclude the other.”

  “Don’t confuse me,” I pleaded.

  “Then on that note, I shall take my leave of you,” she offered, rising. Brandy and I also stood up. They hugged again and I asked Shukey, “How did you leave things with Aiello?”

  “I didn’t let him know what I really thought of him,” she assured me. “I thought you might need me again.”

  “I’ll let you know, Shuke. Thanks a lot.”

  “My pleasure, Luv,” she said, touching my arm fleetingly. “Ta.”

  When she left I started to clean up the cups.

  “She’s a nice girl,” Brandy remarked.

  “Shukey. She’s the best.”

  She followed me into the kitchen.

  “Did I interrupt something?” she asked.

  “Interrupt something? No, of course not. Shukey and I work together, but we’re also good friends. She came by to give me some information, as you did.”

  “Ah, but I came over with an ulte
rior motive in mind. Couldn’t she have done the same?”

  “No, not Shukey,” I told her.

  “You and she were never … as close?” she asked.

  “No, never,” I said, putting up my right hand.

  That seemed to please her, although it never thrilled me too much.

  “Not that I wouldn’t mind …” I added, letting it trail off.

  She punched me in the stomach lightly. I doubled over, playing along, and she kissed me on the mouth. Suddenly, her mouth opened and it developed into a long, deep kiss.

  Then it developed into a long, pleasant evening.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Brandy slept soundly, but I had too much on my mind to be able to sleep, period.

  I got up at four in the A.M. and put on a pot of coffee. There was some beef left over and I warmed that up. When they were both done I took them into the living room with me and set them down on the coffee table. Next I took out Penny Hopkins’ diary and tried to force the lock with my hands. When that failed I fetched a steak knife from the kitchen and jimmied it open with that.

  I settled down to what I hoped would be some very informative reading.

  The handwriting was a childish scrawl, barely legible at best, but after a few pages I seemed to get used to it and the reading went fairly swiftly.

  The entries began when she was seventeen, about two years ago. It started with: “I had such a crush on Paul as a child, but now that I’m a woman I realize that I love him.”

  A lot of it was about her love for the track, the horses and the racing people, specifically the jockeys. She lamented in several entries that she had grown up too big to be a jockey.

  There was a segment, just a couple of months old, that read: “Little Louie gave me flowers again today. I know he loves me, and he is sweet, but Paul would never understand.”

  I put the book down in my lap and shook my head. Paul wouldn’t have given a shit, you dumb broad.

  There were continued references to the on-going rivalry between the only two men she loved, Lassiter and her father.

  “If only Paul and Daddy could become friends again, like they used to be.” The thought was repeated in different words throughout the last pages of the diary.