by Tom Corcoran
“Are you throwing me to the wolves?” I said.
“Not the hungry ones. Treat it like you face each day. Be alert to danger. Keep an open mind, especially in daylight.”
She made it sound so easy. Bob Catherman’s cash. My tush hung on the line. Doctors with Deep Wallets reaping benefits I wasn’t allowed to know about.
On the other hand, I could always screech to a halt, hand back the money. I might even get the chance to verify the mess with Sam Wheeler, perhaps feel good about helping to extract him from his undefined jam. Benefit of the doubt pushed me toward the hunt, toward finding the girl. Without direct word from Sam, I didn’t like a bit of it.
“Please pay the bill and leave first,” I said.
“You’re with us?”
“I’ll give Catherman his three days unless…”
“Unless Sam tells you to stop.”
“Just for this moment, Lisa, get the fuck out of my brain.”
“If it wasn’t a mystery, it wouldn’t be life. That’s what my daddy used to say. Can you meet me tomorrow, like this, at 5:30 in Virgilio’s?”
“Sure,” I said. “But I mean it. Go away right now.”
She began to speak but stopped. For an instant I saw true hardness in her face. She may be traveling the Atlanta high road now, I thought, but she’s only one generation removed from Appalachian tough times.
She put four twenties under her drink napkin, sniffed a couple of times but still said nothing. She strode as opposed to sashayed to the exit, disappeared into the darkness of Caroline Street.
I dug Catherman’s business card out of my wallet and asked again to borrow the bar phone. I dialed his number and identified myself.
“Mr. Rutledge,” he said. “Where do we start?”
“With that bank envelope,” I said. “Then, for a day or two, maybe longer, the ‘we’ part of it goes away.”
“I’m supposed to sit and wait for the phone to ring? No fucking way.”
“Do whatever you please, Mr. Catherman, but I won’t play tag-team. I go solo or I stay home.”
No response.
“It’s your call,” I said.
“Can you disabuse me of the thought that you’ve come aboard only for the money? I fear that you’ll go through the motions with no concern for results.”
“You came to me in the first place,” I said. “Where was your fear of my intentions this morning?”
“I’ve had all day to think about everything in my world.”
“I’ve built a photo career by giving my clients their money’s worth. This time the difference is my lack of experience. But you have your opinions on that.”
For some reason I suspected that his protracted silence was just for effect.
“I live on Cudjoe,” he finally said. “It’ll take me thirty-five, forty minutes to drive into town.”
“That won’t work for me,” I said. “Have any deputies called you back on your missing person report?”
“Nope, not a word. Like I said before, they didn’t really take a report.”
“Did you go to the substation on Cudjoe as well as the sheriff’s office on Stock Island?”
“Only the main office. That’s where I spoke with that unpleasant woman.”
“Can you meet me at 9:30 tomorrow inside the post office on Summerland?”
“I’ll have money with me,” he said.
“Bring me three grand. I’ll give you three days, then it ends. Also, bring me more pictures. I’d like to see a variety. And a copy of her car registration… Her class schedule, too, if you can find it.”
“How about four days for five grand?” he said.
“No.”
I walked back to the bar. Lisa Cormier’s drink glass was gone. The bartender held a wine bottle just above my glass.
I shook my head. “My turn to drink rum, rocks.”
“Gotcha.”
“One other small detail,” I said. “I know you didn’t send those untouched appetizers back to the kitchen. My supper plans are down the tubes. There’s plenty for both of us, right?”
5
A voice ordered me to clean out the boat. I was awakened by the stench of fish left in the sun for days in an Igloo cooler. My pillow felt crusty and stank of booze drool. The odor was my breath; the pain behind my forehead the result of poor judgment or a crappy job of counting my drinks. The upside was that I wasn’t waking in someone’s hedge, wasn’t a guest of the city. I recall feeling odd relief when Bobbi Lewis had postponed our Last, my presumption, Dinner, and half-wishing that Lisa Cormier had slipped me a motel key instead of relaying her husband’s request that I deal with Catherman. I wasn’t sure I had the balance to stand and brush my teeth. I had no choice but to get out of bed. My bladder was calling the shots.
Twenty minutes later the coffee had done its trick. My hair was contained, the clothing was no longer yesterday’s. Small matter that my eyes needed flushing, my face could have used a sandblasting.
I thought seriously about returning to dreamland.
“Rutledge? Are you home?”
The voice of Beth Watkins, a Key West detective with maybe a year on the job, stood at the screen door. I’d be happier to see her smile than she’d be to view the wreckage of Rutledge. I began to ask why I hadn’t heard her Ducati motorcycle in the lane but shut up when I saw her glum expression. Lieutenant Julio Alonzo, in his stretched-out city uniform, lurked on the stoop. Julio had pegged his gaze on an indeterminate spot about six feet off the ground and halfway to the lane pavement.
She had that look on her face. Someone close to me was hurt or worse.
I opened the door, stood aside to let them enter. “Who died?”
“What makes you think anyone’s dead?” said Watkins.
“The gloom in your eye, for starters. The phrasing of your question confirms it.”
“One of your neighbors died.”
That category included Carmen, her daughter and her parents. I wasn’t about to trivialize by guessing, popping out names.
Watkins stared at me. Her skin was pasty, her hair more brown than yellow, as if she hadn’t been outdoors in weeks. She wore a white polo shirt embroidered with a city logo, pressed dark blue slacks and a fanny pack-type pouch on the front of her belt. Alonzo now stared at the back of her neck, his eyes the tone of the ocean’s surface on a chill, cloudy day.
“Well?” I said.
“You knew someone was dead?”
“What’s with the tone, Watkins? Are you here to inform me of a passing or to question me as a crime suspect?”
Watkins kept her eyes locked on mine. “Tell me about your friendship with Jerry Hammond.”
“That’s not a name I know,” I said. “Would you like some coffee?”
Alonzo moved sideways, a macho shuffle that let him block the doorway. What was I going to do, escape the prison of my own home?
Beth Watkins stared and said nothing.
“No one named Hammond has lived on Dredgers Lane as long as I’ve been here.”
“Mr. Hammond lived on Eaton Street.”
“Another world, Detective.”
“It’s the next street.” She pointed. “You hear that truck?”
I hadn’t noticed the truck’s rumbling exhaust until she mentioned it. Had I conditioned myself to ignore vehicles droning fifty yards away? “This lane hasn’t changed in years,” I said, “which is one reason I stay. Houses on Eaton get sold and remodeled and sold and bought again. It’s a flipper’s bazaar with vultures and temporaries and part-timers who hang just long enough to cut their dream deals. I have no reason to socialize with anyone over there.”
“Over there is your back fence.”
“My side fence. I never met my side fence neighbor. Only his dog.”
“That’s a bit strange, this close, you never met,” she said.
“His taste in music sucked. I was forced to share too many loud evenings with Barry Manilow. I took that as a sampling of the man’s p
ersonality.”
“You never introduced yourself? No fence talk about bush trimming, maybe borrowing a rake?”
“Never laid eyes on him.”
“Everyone in this town knew Jerry Hammond,” said Lieutenant Alonzo, his Conch accent a reminder of past years. His put-down phrasing alerted me, told me to ignore him, to keep my attention on Watkins.
“Is this Hammond a victim or a bad guy?”
She let down her guard. “Maybe both, you never know. Could be, the bad got him killed.”
“When?” I said.
“Nobody had seen him for two days,” said Watkins. “A friend of his called and we sent in an officer. The place was unlocked.”
“Last night or this morning?”
“A few hours ago,” she said. “It was daybreak by the time we got the prelim scene crew assembled.”
I imagined a traffic snarl on Eaton with detectives’ cars and forensic vans. But I couldn’t miss it: a fast-moving Harley suggested that the street was clear.
“Why does everyone know this man?” I said.
“He worked the post office for twelve years,” said Alonzo. “He retired last summer. Then he volunteered at that Bahama Village music school.”
“He worked with Carmen for twelve years?” I said. “She never mentioned him. He was her neighbor, too.”
Watkins angled her head to check the lane toward Carmen’s house. “We’ve heard that he and Ms. Sosa did not share mutual respect. No one ever got a reprimand, but there was a history of minimal cooperation.”
“Ah, strife. That can happen in the workplace,” I said.
Watkins nodded. “We need to hope it didn’t carry over to his dining room.”
“Don’t even think she could do it,” I said. “Carmen’s so anti-violence, she once tried to hire me to kick my own ass when I’d pissed her off.”
“She may be able to give us some ideas.”
“She’s a good judge of character.”
“You never even saw him, say, through the hedge?”
I shook my head. “I heard him or some frequent guest of his sing along with Barry, but I can’t recall hearing anyone talk over there, ever. It’s crazy, I admit it. Hammond was a total stranger who lived thirty yards from where I sleep and eat.”
Beth nodded. “He’s been in that house since the late nineties.”
“I knew the woman who bought it in the early nineties,” I said. “She bought it on a shoestring and paid it down with alimony. Spent five years fixing it to resell, and when she found a buyer I never saw her again.”
“This island, it changes downhill,” said Alonzo.
Watkins and I watched him try to scowl. His fleshy face refused to play. His expression remained the same.
“I was a barefoot kid,” he said, “picking spanish limes, mangoes out of my yard, everybody know everybody. Sure as hell we know nicknames, their whole family, all the kids, their jobs. Key West is going away like a bar of soap, rubbed down to dime-size.”
“I remember when you were a beat cop, Julio,” I said, “harassing hippies on Duval. I didn’t know anyone on Eaton back then, either. A lot changed, I’ll give you that. But plenty is still the same.”
“Cayo Hueso got trampled by Woodstock refugees,” said the lieutenant. “You got another opinion, I’m sure.”
“I take a bigger view of it,” I said. “The Navy ran the island when hippies were still beatniks. Tourists came after the longhairs grew up and blended in. If you take a longer look, the spongers, cigar rollers, railroad and hurricanes, it’s been constant change for two centuries.”
Alonzo said, “The hippies may think they blended in, but they ruined it.”
He hadn’t soaked up a word I’d said.
Puzzled by Alonzo’s vehemence, Watkins tried to calm him. “You heard his complaint about part-timers, Julio,” she said. “He wants our island to stay the same.”
Alonzo’s sullen eyes became slits as he glanced back through the screening. Now that Watkins had touched the topic, truck and moped sounds from Eaton Street became more persistent.
“I’m worried about our crime scene,” said Watkins. “We need to make sure it’s not being contaminated.”
I took that to mean invaded by jurisdiction poachers from county or state law enforcement. It worked as an excuse to get rid of Alonzo.
The lieutenant shoved open the door but stopped and turned. “Lady, he’s not talking about our island. I was born here and you weren’t. He’s talking about my island.”
He stepped out, let the door slam and marched off. Ten paces away he raised his voice. “You bring the car, Detective. I’ll walk around the block like we used to do.”
Beth Watkins observed a few ticks of silence then said, “From what I know, he’s got a legit complaint.”
“It’s after-the-fact whining,” I said. “The old-time Conchs have taken the money, house by house, for twenty-five years and left town with fat wallets. I’ve wondered all that time why more of them didn’t stand up for their turf, reject the profits and defend the lifestyles they bemoan in hindsight. He can bitch all he wants, but it’s like trying to hold back the wind with a sail.”
“You’ve been saving that speech for a while.”
“Maybe he’s the only one left who bemoans the changes,” I said. “Anyway, thanks.”
“For chilling him out? It didn’t work too well.”
“For not asking me to take crime scene photos.”
She hesitated, tried to decide on her wording. “Your proximity to the deceased disqualified you.”
“In what way, Beth?” I said. “A ‘person of interest’ or just a neighbor?”
She gave me an odd look. “Who dragged you away from advertising photos in the first place?”
“I still do magazine work and brochures. It’s how I make my living.”
“You know what I meant,” she said.
“Sheriff Liska, years ago. Before he quit your desk at the city to run for office. I must have needed cash that month. Neither of us knew it was habit-forming.”
“They wouldn’t have called you back if you weren’t good at it.”
“What do you know about Bay Point?”
“That article in the paper this morning? Zip. I went to a party up there two months ago. It was dark. A year ago I observed while the county processed a crime scene… What am I saying? You were there.”
“I’m talking yesterday,” I said.
“What’s to know? If it was county crap, I’m out of the loop. When was the last time you saw Mr. Hammond’s dog?”
I shrugged and shook my head.
“Surely there’s an answer to that one,” said Watkins.
“Can I think about it and call you in a while?”
“When was the last time you heard Manilow?”
“Saturday night, around nine p.m.”
“Four days ago.”
“Three and a half days ago,” I said. “Almost to the hour.”
Beth nodded. “There was another reason I didn’t ask you to take pictures. Are you still seeing Bobbi, your deputy?”
I almost shrugged but went the gentleman route and nodded.
“I know she pisses you off every time she calls you with a police photo gig. You deserve better treatment from a woman you’re dating.”
“How does that…”
“I didn’t want to join her club.”
“Whose do you want to join?”
She started toward the street. “Call me if you think of anything helpful.”
I had less than an hour to get to Summerland, but I wanted to make sure that Carmen, if she was at home, knew about Hammond. I also wanted to meet her houseguests and check on their job- and home-hunting progress. Plus, their goal of reacquainting themselves with Key West had sparked my curiosity. I envied their search for the island life they had missed because of their parents’ decisions. After years of watching the trickling exodus, I had lost hope of seeing many, or any, departed Conchs return to Ke
y West.
I hiked the lane and found the young men loading duffels, five or six Hefty Bags and several grocery sacks into their Honda. The shorter of the two hoisted a satchel while he pressed a phone to his ear.
The taller boy gave me a suspicious look then relaxed. “You must be Alex, the neighbor.” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Jason Dudak.”
“You guys packing to leave already? Giving up on the old island?”
“No way,” said Jason. “That geek there is Russell, with his mama on the line. We’re having a glory moment because in the last hour and…” he checked his watch, “in the last eighty minutes we both got jobs plus a place to live.”
“Fast work,” I said.
“The jobs, we hustled a couple days. The apartment, some guy that works at Greenacres, the yard maintenance people who hired Russell, he said, ‘You dudes need to score a crib, I got bunks.’ His roommate split for the Ukraine owing him, like, sixty-five dollars.”
“You didn’t go with Greenacres?” I said.
“RPP Construction. Pounding nails, which will work some sweat out of me and keep me outdoors, both of which are good.”
I knew the men who had started RPP years ago. It had changed hands several times, along the way earning a negative reputation. I once heard someone speculate that its initials stood for Rape, Pillage and Plunder.
“You going to live off the island?” I said.
The other boy approached, snapping shut his phone, reaching to shake hands. “I’m Russell Hernandez. Did you know me when I was little? Everyone I’ve met the past two days knew me when I was three years old.”
“I missed you that time around,” I said.
“Our new home is on Elizabeth Street,” said Jason. “Four or five of us, we’re not sure, in two rooms upstairs from the woman who owns the house.”
I had to laugh. “Sounds like the standard arrangement when I first hit town. I would’ve put up with anything, I was so happy to be here. I didn’t know why I was so content, but I sure as hell felt it.”
