Ask for Me Tomorrow

by Margaret Millar

  “Yes.”

  “Please.”

  “Please.”

  “Please. Hasn’t that word got a nice ring to it? I can’t recall ever hearing it around this office before.”

  “You’ve put a very funny act together, Miss Nelson.”

  “There’s more.”

  “Spare me. Double please.”

  “Okay.” She consulted a piece of paper which she took from the top drawer of her desk. “It’s signed ‘Scorpio.’ That sounds like a code name. In fact, the whole thing sounds as though it might be in code. You’re not a spy, are you?”

  “Yes.”

  “No kidding. Whose side are you on?”

  “What sides are there? Pick one and read the letter.”

  “ ‘Swiss connection reports penetrating paper doors at the stone quarry’—I think that’s what the operator said, ‘stone quarry.’ Does that make sense?”

  “Yes.”

  “ ‘Records indicate Byron James Lockwood was released three years ago by Magistrate Guadalupe Hernandez. Exact circumstances of Lockwood’s release unavailable and current whereabouts unknown. Hernandez contacted by phone but refused to give additional

  information. Home address, Camino de la Cima. Try Mordida.’ Who’s Mordida?”

  “It’s not a who, it’s a what. A bite. A bribe.”

  “What a shame. I thought it was a girl, some gorgeous brunette who’s a double or triple agent—you know, the usual thing.”

  Smedler came out of his office to pick up his mail. He appeared a little too perfectly groomed, as if he’d just been given the full treatment in a beauty salon or a mortician’s prep room. “Good morning, Aragon. Great weather, isn’t it? On these crisp fall days you can feel the old corpuscles moving right along.”

  “Yes, sir. It’s nice to be back.”

  Smedler looked surprised. “Have you been away? . . . Has he been away, Miss Nelson?”

  “Yes, Mr. Smedler. On a personal mission for Mrs. Decker.”

  “Ah yes. How’d it go, Aragon?”

  “Fine.”

  “Fine. Now that’s the kind of answer I appreciate. Pour him a cup of coffee on the house, Miss Nelson.”

  Smedler returned to his office while Charity put fifteen cents in the coffee machine and extracted a cup of semihot, semicreamed, semicoffee.

  “Oh, you shouldn’t, Miss Nelson,” Aragon said. “This is too much, it’s beyond the call of duty. You really shouldn’t.”

  “Okay, I won’t,” she said and drank the coffee herself. “I can type this letter up for you, if you like. How many copies do you need?”

  “One.”

  “One? Nobody ever needs just one. Since this concerns Mrs. Decker, you’ll want to give her the ribbon copy and keep a few others for your private files.”

  “Why will I want to do that?”

  “It’s standard practice,” Charity said. “Don’t fight it.”

  “I have no private files.”

  “You shouldn’t admit anything like that. You’ll never get to first base in this business without the basics. Rule one: always have plenty of copies made of everything. The less important the matter is, the more copies you ask for.”

  “But I only need one. In fact, I don’t really need that. Mrs. Decker probably hasn’t any files either.”

  “As a businesswoman I don’t know how to deal with people who won’t obey the ordinary commonsense business rules.”

  “I’ll tell you how,” Aragon said. “Leave us alone. Forget the night letter. It never happened.”

  “You’re getting weird, Aragon. I don’t think being a spy agrees with you. Maybe you should try some other line of work, something that keeps you out in the fresh air and sunshine, like a forest ranger. I can picture you ranging the forest in cute little green shorts to match all those leaves . . . Don’t dash off. I have lots of other suggestions.”

  “Make twenty copies of each and file them.”

  The week since he’d first arrived at the house and seen Reed cleaning the pool seemed like a month, and the patio itself was a world or two away from the squalid streets of Rio Seco. Camellias were starting to bloom, pink and perfect in their marble tubs, and the nandina leaves were already tipped with autumn bronze. Reflections of royal blue princess flowers moved back and forth in the sky blue water, rippling the outlines of the ceramic mermaid and softening her tile smirk. She looked real, like a child playing a game of drowning.

  Reed was sitting at a glass and aluminum table that was set for two. He wore his working uniform, slacks and a short-sleeved cotton jacket buttoned at the throat. As usual, he wasted no time on amenities. “Sit down. You’re early. I can guess why. After a week of the food you get down there, you’re half starved.”

  “I was brought up on that kind of food.”

  “Yeah? You’ll probably have ulcers by the time you’re thirty. Do you know how those terribly hot spices came to be used? They were meant to cover the smell and taste of putrescent fish, fowl and animal flesh.”

  “You’re a bundle of information, Reed.”

  “I know . . . The old girl will be out in a few minutes. She’s getting herself all dolled up. What did you tell her? She hasn’t fussed like this about her appearance for months. I hope she’s not building up to a letdown. Her letdowns are rough on the hired help.”

  “Are you classed as one of the hired help?”

  “Not for long.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Nothing lasts forever. Right? Sit down, be cool. I made the lunch myself so you wouldn’t have to eat the local swill, an austere little casserole of artichoke hearts and eggs in a Ceylonese coconut-milk sauce. I had to break open four coconuts to get the right amount of milk. Violet Smith is having fits about what to do with all the coconut meat. I told her what she could do with all the coconut meat, but she didn’t buy the idea. Some people aren’t open to suggestion.”

  “I can see why.”

  Reed laughed, a bubbly mischievous sound that might have come from the mermaid at the bottom of the pool. “Violet Smith and I are on different wavelengths. To be frank, she doesn’t fit into the household. I want Gilly to fire her.”

  “Gilly?”

  “Everybody calls her by her first name—behind her back, anyway. You can’t behave the way she behaves and expect to be treated like Queen Elizabeth. Queen Elizabeth doesn’t get looped and loud, or exchange insults and jokes with the staff. I don’t intend this as criticism of Gilly—it’s just her way of dealing with the tremendous emotional strain of Decker’s illness.”

  Feathery scraps of pampas grass drifted across the flagstones and caught in the spikes of the firethorn bushes. The berries were ripe and ready for the winter birds.

  Aragon said, “What brought you here in the first place, Reed?”

  “I worked in the private hospital where Decker was a patient after his stroke. He took a fancy to me.”

  “And Mrs. Decker?”

  “She also took a fancy to me. Women do. Strange, isn’t it, since the fancy can hardly be called mutual. Gilly’s a nice old girl, if you like nice and old. And if you like girls.”

  “You reassure me.”

  “How come?”

  “I’ve had the notion of something going on between you and Mrs. Decker, that you might even be thinking of marriage after Decker dies and providing B. J. doesn’t turn up.”

  “Oh, come now. Why would I want to get married?”

  “To enjoy an early retirement.”

  “I don’t believe in early retirements or marriage. That puts two holes in your theory, enough to kill it, right?”

  Aragon brushed some scraps of pampas grass off the tablecloth. They shone in the sun like golden feathers. He said, “I’m beginning to doubt very seriously that B. J. will turn up, either because he can’t or
because he doesn’t want to. As for Decker, I gather he’s not going to survive.”

  “None of us is going to survive, amigo. Decker’s number is coming up sooner than most, is all.”

  “What do you expect will be the actual cause of death?”

  “Kidney failure, cerebral hemorrhage, heart congestion, who knows? He’s in bad shape in every department. He has only one thing going for him. Gilly. She works her tail off to keep him alive. She won’t give up and she won’t let him give up. He doesn’t really want to live. She’s making him do it.”

  “Why?”

  “She’s a very loyal woman. Stubborn, too. She thinks fate handed Decker a bum deal and she’s fighting back. She’s a great believer in fair play, justice, all that kind of crap.” Reed got up, straightening the jacket of his uniform as if he were going on duty. “I’d better check the casserole. What did you tell Gilly on the phone?”

  “That B. J. was released from jail three years ago by a magistrate named Guadalupe Hernandez.”

  “So at least he didn’t leave feet first.”

  “Not according to the records anyway. Hernandez wouldn’t give Miss Eckert of the consulate any details, so she suggests trying a little bribery. Or a lot. No sum was specified, but a great many officials lead high lives on low wages, so somebody must be paying.”

  “And now it’s Gilly’s turn.”

  “If she’s willing.”

  “She’ll be willing, bet on it. I told you she has this thing about justice and fair play. Well, all her money—except what she gets from Decker—was B. J.’s to begin with. She’ll spend every cent of it on him if she has to, the way she spends every ounce of her energy and will on Decker. Probably with the same result. Zero.”

  The artichoke hearts and eggs lay untouched on Gilly’s plate.

  “How much?”

  “I don’t know,” Aragon said. “I’ve never bribed a judge.”

  “You claim a lot of them live high. How high? Like this, for instance—this house, the servants?”

  “I think so.”

  “Offer him a thousand to start. Be prepared to raise the price as much as you have to.”

  “You assume I’m going back.”

  “Of course you’re going back. Don’t you want to?”

  “No.”

  “You’re quitting,” she said. “Just when the case is beginning to open up, you’re quitting.”

  “No, I’m not. You asked if I wanted to go back and I said no. I have the feeling someone is following me around down there, watching every move I make.”

  “You’re getting paranoid.”

  “If you prefer to use that word, fine. I’m a paranoid with someone following me around, watching every—”

  “You must admit it doesn’t sound reasonable, Aragon. I expect a lawyer, even a novice like you, to have a certain objectivity. Someone who’s behind you and headed in the same direction as you are isn’t necessarily following you. Now, are you going back or aren’t you?”

  “I am.”

  “Right away. This afternoon or tonight.”

  He shook his head. “Sorry. I need a day off to catch up on my mail, my laundry, some—”

  “Laundry, mail, all that can wait. You’re not helpless. Can’t you rinse out your own socks?”

  “Yes, dammit, I can rinse out my own socks.”

  “Then do it. And please try to work up a little enthusiasm for your job.”

  “I’m trying,” he said grimly.

  “As for the business about someone tailing you, it’s probably a mistake. He may think you’re someone else.”

  “I’m beginning to think the same thing.”

  “In any case, the solution is very simple. Next time it happens, all you have to do is turn around and confront him—or her—and identify yourself. That ought to solve the problem.”

  “Or create new ones.”

  “Please try to take a more positive attitude. I’m trying. I’m trying very, very hard to keep my—well, we won’t go into that. You’ll need extra money.”

  “Not yet. Wait until I talk to Hernandez.”

  “All right.” She glanced down at her plate. “What’s this crud taste like?”

  “I can’t describe the taste exactly, but it feels kind of slippery.”

  “Slippery. Christ.” She got up and dumped the contents of her plate in one of the marble tubs containing a camellia bush. The leaves covered the evidence. A dog or cat might smell it out or a bird discover it while searching for insects, but Reed would never see it.

  When she returned to the table with the empty plate she looked suddenly old and sick, as if the dumping of the food had been a symbolic gesture, a rejection of life itself.

  “You shouldn’t go without lunch,” Aragon said. “Let me take you out for a burger, guaranteed not slippery.”

  “That’s nice of you, Aragon. I really appreciate it, I’d love a burger and fries, a whole bunch of nice greasy fries. But I can’t leave Marco. He’s not used to the new nurse yet. I can tell by his pulse that she makes him nervous. It’s too bad. Mrs. Morrison has excellent references and Marco has to get used to someone else besides me and Reed. Reed could quit any time. He has no contract, and I have no guarantee that I’ll last longer than my husband. It’s likely but not certain. I must prepare for every contingency. I promised him he’d never be left alone.”

  Mrs. Morrison’s voice was as crisp and starched as the small pleated white cap which sat on top of her head like a crown. No matter how vigorously she moved her head, the crown remained firmly attached as though she’d been born wearing it and entitled to all the privileges it bestowed.

  “I have studied your charts with some care, Mr. Decker,” she said regally, “and I have reached the conclusion that the amount of brain damage you have sustained will not prevent us from communicating with each other, at least on an elementary level. Such communication can be arranged in a fairly simple manner. Have you ever played twenty questions? Of course you have. Very well. I will ask you only questions which can be answered by yes or no. You will then raise one finger of your right hand for yes, and two for no. Or if you prefer, blink your right eyelid instead, once for yes, twice for no. Think you can do that?”

  He didn’t move. He had so much to say that the sheer bulk of it overwhelmed him. His fingers were icicles inside their warm blanket of flesh, and his eyelid felt as though someone had sewn it shut.

  “Come, come, you’re not going to be uncooperative just because we’re strangers, are you? I am your nurse. You should trust me to practically the same degree that you trust your

  doctor or your wife. I am with you, Mr. Decker, with you. Let’s try a few basic questions for practice. Wait now, did I say one finger or one blink for yes, and two for no, or was it two fingers or two blinks for yes, and one for no? We’d better start over. I think we’ll say

  two fingers or two blinks for yes, and one finger or one blink for no. Ready to begin?”

  He opened his right eye and gave her a look of such terrible loathing that even Mrs. Morrison, who was not noted for sensitivity, felt a certain coolness in the air.

  “We must communicate, Mr. Decker. I’m not a mind reader and you’re not a vegetable, appearances to the contrary. Let’s make that a test question: Are you a vegetable?”

  He wasn’t.

  “There, that’s better, you are not a vegetable. Is your name Marco Decker? No? Are you being deliberately perverse or are you just stupid? This is a serious matter. Is the sun shining? Yes, it is, so I want two, two for yes. Do you understand me? Another yes, two fingers or two blinks.”

  All of his powers of concentration and will were gathered now to move his hand.

  “Why, you old goat, I do believe that’s an obscene gesture.”

  He blinked twice.

  17

  Aragon ha
d been half hoping he wouldn’t be able to find it, but he could hardly have missed. It was the only house on Camino de la Cima, an oiled dirt road southeast of the city. The long winding driveway that led up to it was lined with silver-leaved eucalyptus trees that tossed and trembled at the slightest hint of wind.

  The whole hillside was enclosed by hurricane fencing with half a dozen rows of barbed wire along the top. At the entrance the double iron-grilled gates were open, and so was the door of the gatehouse itself. The small building had been constructed like a miniature mission with sand-colored adobe walls and red tile roof. It reminded Aragon of the abandoned church in Bahía de Ballenas where the padre lived, but there was a couple of hundred years’ difference in age. Another and more important difference quickly became apparent. Instead of a kindly old padre coming to the door, there were two young men wearing uniforms and holsters. One of them also carried a rifle.

  They watched with polite interest as Aragon parked his car and approached the gatehouse. Then the man with the rifle nodded and his companion went over to the car. He opened the right front door and looked through the glove compartment and under the seat. Then he took out the ignition keys, unlocked the trunk and searched it. He closed it again and replaced the ignition keys. Hernandez was taking good care of his past mordidas.

  Aragon said, “Is this the residence of Magistrate Guadalupe Hernandez?”

  The man with the rifle did the talking, in a professional monotone. “You have business with the magistrate?”

  “Yes. My name is Aragon.”

  “It is Saturday afternoon, surely not your ordinary business hours, Mr. Aragon.”

  “This was the only time I could get here. I just arrived from Los Angeles and I was hoping Mr. Hernandez would give me an appointment this afternoon.”

  “The matter you wish to see him about must be of grave importance.”

  “No. I simply thought if I could contact him now, I’d be able to go back home tomorrow.”

  “You don’t like our city?”

  “It’s fine.”

  “Very fine, I think.”