"I just used to help Walter out with things," she said. "I guess I will again if he gets up out of that bed." As she spoke, her eyes detached from mine, without seeming to focus on any new object, and her voice grew dimmer and dimmer.
"You and Walter are close," I suggested.
She said yes, but it was mostly just a sigh. I realized that she was like the desk or the phone; what happened a week ago had put the three of them out of business, and they'd been gathering dust ever since.
"I really need to see him," I said. "Why don't you take me there yourself, make sure he's all right. You don't need to stay here."
Her eyes brightened somewhat. "No one ever calls," she said. "It's like they already know."
"Yeah," I said.
"I might as well be with him," she said, but she was talking to herself. Then she looked up at me. "He's not good."
"I understand." I let things get quiet for a minute, waited while she blinked away her tears, and then I said: "Listen. Walter was doing a very important job when he got hit, trying to help someone who really needed it. Still does. If I can talk to him—just for a few minutes—maybe I can pick up where he left off." It sounded nice, but it was a little inaccurate. Angwine was already frozen, and it was stretching the truth to imply that Surface's involvement, as I understood it, anyway, had been doing anyone the least bit of good. But it was certainly what his girlfriend seemed to want to heat.
I went and got her coat off a hook on the wall, then took a step towards the door. "I'll follow you in my car," I said.
"It's just a few blocks," she said softly, and got up from behind the desk. She was careful not to brush up against me as she slid her arms into the coat. I got my license off the desk and wiped the dust on my pants leg, then we went down in the elevator together.
I parked half a block behind her, and watched as she went up the porch of a shabby green clapboard house. She turned and looked back at me from the steps, and I waved her in. When the door shut behind her, I got the mirror from the glove compartment and tapped out a line of make and sniffed it up.
I finished the make, put away the mirror, and went up the steps to the door. Surface's girlfriend hurried over when I came in—I guess she would have put my coat on a hanger if I'd taken it off. Instead she just sort of hovered. When my eyes adjusted to the gloom, I wished they hadn't: the place was a sty. There wasn't any comparable delay for my nose, which had begun picking out the acrid components of the smell the moment I inhaled. Surface or his girl kept an animal of some kind, and they hadn't done too good a job of cleaning up after it the last week or so. The house badly needed an airing. I could forgive them, but my nose couldn't. It was all opened up from the fresh make, and I was afraid I wouldn't be able to carry on a conversation with Surface without making faces. So I got out my cigarettes. The woman saw what I was doing and dug a blackened ashtray out from under a pile of soggy newspapers and handed it to me.
"Thanks. Where's Surface?"
"In there." She pointed. "He was asleep again." She didn't say anything else, but she didn't have to.
I went in. It was a big room full of a chair and a dresser and a big double bed. The only light was the television. It was tuned to the Muzak station, where aquamarine triangles did an endless soporific dance against a translucent, watery background. The white blue light of the tube glowed over the dark form stretched out in the middle of the bed.
I stepped up closer. The body in the bed seemed awfully small. When he turned his dark face up from the pillow, I realized Walter Surface and I didn't have as much in common as I'd hoped, or feared. The animal in the house was Surface. He was an evolved ape. The surprise of it took my voice away for a second, but at the same time I didn't doubt for a minute that this was the guy I was looking for. His face was human enough to look weary with trouble, creased with the contemplation of things most humans, let alone most apes, never see. If he were a man, I'd have said he was a tired fifty years old. For an ape I couldn't or didn't want to figure it out.
"You're Surface," I said when I located my voice.
"Right." His thin lips barely moved, but the voice purred out of him surprisingly loud.
"My name's Metcalf. I'm working in connection with the Stanhunt case." I didn't extend my hand because I didn't really want to hold his, even for the duration of a handshake. The smell was coming from him. I could tell when he rustled the bed sheets. I guess his girlfriend was used to his stench the way she was used to questions. Love is sometimes more than just blind.
Surface closed his eyes. "Nancy let you in."
I said yes.
"She said you wanted to ask me some questions." He pursed his mouth and blew air through his nose. "You got to understand, Mr. Metcalf. I don't know you. I don't know what you want." The television flickered out, and we were thrust into darkness. I thought he'd accidentally dropped the remote control, but when the light came back on, he had a gun in his hand. It was a nifty stunt.
"Move and I'll make you breathe funny," he said, his leathery mouth all stretched out at the corners. The gun looked pretty comfortable in his little black paw. "I'd be pleased to teach you how to blow red bubbles out of your shirt," he went on. "It's a little trick I learned last week. I can dish it out as well as take it."
"And you ought to," I said. "Only I'm the wrong guy. I didn't dish it out, and I don't want to take it. Lay off the heat."
"Sit down, put your hands in your lap, and shut up. I heard enough to tell me I don't want to hear no more. I've got the gun and I'll ask the questions. I've got a license for both."
I sat down, set the ashtray on the arm of the chair, and put my hands in my lap like he said.
"Where's the kangaroo? He's the one I want to plug."
"That makes two of us, Surface. I wouldn't be seen walking around with the kangaroo unless somebody cut his hide into a nice pair of shoes."
His ape face squinted into some kind of bitter smile. His teeth were yellow. I thought about apes killing kangaroos, and maybe kangaroos killing sheep. Dr. Twostrand's evolution therapy was a real hit. He'd really lifted the animals out of the jungle.
"All right," said the ape. "What can you say to make me think you don't work for Phoneblum?"
"Probably nothing," I said. "Let's, forget it." The door behind me opened. It was Nancy, carrying a couple of glasses, playing hostess. She'd put herself back together while she was away, but when she saw the gun in Surface's hand, she got teary again.
"Jesus, Walter."
"I don't trust him." The ape pushed himself up in the bed, the covers bunching at his waist. He had a big patch on his ribs, white cotton stained yellow with Mercurochrome. Nancy just stood there with the glasses in her hands.
"I want him out," said the ape. "You're too fucking trusting, Nancy."
"He could have come in with a gun at my head," she said.
"Listen to her, Walter. I'm on your side."
"Oh, fuck." Surface let the gun drop to the bed. "Gimme that." Nancy brought him the drink, and he tossed half of it back in a gulp. She gave me the other one and then leaned against the wall and crossed her arms.
It was a big glassful of gin, just barely haunted by the specter of tonic. I didn't mind. My cigarette had gone out in my mouth; I laid it in the ashtray and took a big drink of the gin. It was another way to deaden the endings in my nose.
"Phoneblum's boys want me dead, they'll find a way," said Surface, working his logic out loud, reminding me of myself again. "You wouldn't come walking in here and let me pull a gun on you."
I didn't say anything, just sipped my drink.
"What's your racket?" he said. He scratched gingerly at his bandage with the nail of his thumb.
"Same as you," I said. "I was the guy you were hired to replace. I balked at the job I was asked to do and was shown the door, same as you, maybe. Only I didn't end up with a bloody lobby."
"Lucky fucking you."
I took another sip, slowly. "I'd like to bring Phoneblum down, Surface. Maybe
you can help me."
"And maybe you can help me get killed. No thanks."
"Nobody knows I'm here. Besides, you said it yourself. They want you, they got you. Why not talk shop with me for a few minutes? Get it off your chest."
Surface's intelligent eyes glistened in their worn, pouchy sockets. He ran them back and forth across my face for most of a minute.
He sighed, looked down at the gun and the drink in his hand.
"Shoot," he said finally.
I could see Nancy relax her posture against the wall. She obviously liked to see the ape sitting up and talking.
"Phoneblum said he hired you to watch Celeste," I said. "You ever have contact with her husband?"
"Dr. Stanhunt?"
"Yes," I said. "Maynard Stanhunt."
"Never laid eyes on him. Seemed like that was the point."
"With me it was the reverse. I was hired by the doctor, and never met Phoneblum. I guess Maynard didn't enjoy working with me and asked Phoneblum to take over the arrangements."
"I guess." Surface put the gun down on the windowsill beside the bed and poked at the curtain. A beam of sunlight flicked across the bed, disappeared.
"How long did you tail her?"
"A week"
"Learn anything?"
"Only what Phoneblum obviously already knew."
"What was that?"
Surface made an impatient face. "The boyfriend." Then he saw the look of nonrecognition on mine. "You knew about the boyfriend, right?"
"No."
Surface squinted into my eyes.
"That's what Dr. Stanhunt was looking for," I said, "but I never saw a thing. Are you sure?"
He wrinkled his brow, skeptically. "Of course I'm sure."
"Where?"
"That motel. The Bayview. The place Stanhunt got bumped off at."
I was baffled. "Tell me more."
"She went up there twice or three times, spent a long time in a room, came out with a mussed-up hairdo. Standard stuff." He looked at me like I was crazy, and I felt crazy. Either he was lying or I'd missed it completely.
"You see the guy?" I asked.
"Once. I couldn't pick him out now."
I thought about it a little. Suddenly there was a gaping hole in my picture of things, a hole shaped like a third party in a love triangle, a hole shaped like a prime suspect in the murder inquisition that should have been. It didn't completely rule out Angwine, except that the image of Angwine and Celeste as lovers was laughable. She'd eat him alive.
I tried to think of who that left, and couldn't come up with anyone.
"How'd you get in so bad with Phoneblum?" I asked.
Surface emitted a short, shrill laugh. "He wanted somebody to play the tough guy, which I sometimes do. Only this time it looked more like fall guy than tough guy, and I said no. He didn't like that." He grimaced, and it reminded me I was talking to an ape. Then he put his hand over his bandages. "We tossed some threats around. I guess he made good on his."
"I guess. They wanted you to hurt Celeste?"
Surface gave me that sour look again. "That what Phoneblum told you he wanted from me?"
"Phoneblum didn't say. But I took my orders from Stanhunt, and he asked me to poke Celeste a couple of times and send her home."
"That's nice." Surface's voice was grim. He looked over at Nancy. "You hear that?"
Nancy didn't say anything.
"I might have considered that," he said, turning back to me. "Hell, I probably would have done it. Only in my case it was a little different"
"Different how?"
He sighed. "When Phoneblum told Stanhunt about loverboy, the doctor had an attack of jealousy," he said. "Phoneblum got back to me with an offer of five thousand dollars to take the boyfriend permanently out of the picture."
"A killing."
"That's right. Only I said no."
"And Phoneblum panicked. He thought you knew too much."
"I guess so."
The Muzak on the television changed colors, and the room went from pale blue and green to white and gold. Surface switched on the lamp on the windowsill and turned off the television with the remote. Nancy took away my glass and left the room.
I was used to Surface's smell by now, and I guess he must have gotten used to whatever it was that most grated on him about me. He put away the gun and slid back down into the big bed. When he spoke again, his voice was softer.
"What did you learn about Celeste?"
"Not that much, really," I said. "I spent a lot of time up on Cranberry Street learning she doesn't close the blinds when she changes clothes."
"I could have told you that."
"I was first, smart guy."
I'd made the ape smile, almost laugh, but as soon as he opened his mouth, he grimaced from the stress on his ribs. I watched while he swallowed the pain away.
"I'll tell you what I've got," I said. "You fill in the gaps."
He nodded.
"She's a hard one, or she was once. Knew Phoneblum in a business way. About two and a half years ago she has a change of heart, and leaves town for a while—or maybe she's asked to leave. At which point she has her past customized, slimmed down, and her prospects lifted and firmed up. When she marries the rich doctor, the job is apparently complete. Except Phoneblum still has his strings on her. He won't let go."
"That sounds about right," said the ape.
"Tell me what you know about Phoneblum."
He narrowed his eyes. "Tell me what you don't know."
"Just about everything. What's his racket?"
"Racket? Sex. Drugs. Karma. What isn't his racket?"
"I get your point," I said.
"You know the club called the Fickle Muse? That's his place. Get into the back room and ask for a guy named Overholt"
I repeated the name.
"What he sells is what Phoneblum's got," said Surface. "Meaning anything you want."
"Phoneblum must have the Office in his pocket."
Surface smiled again, closed his eyes. "Yeah. I think so."
I got out of my chair. It was almost five o'clock, and the light outside was fading. I wanted to go see Pansy, and Celeste if she was home. It sounded like I might want to visit the Fickle Muse too.
I moved a little closer to the bed. Surface's eyeballs were trembling under their dusky lids. His skin, where it showed in all the hair, was fine, like an old woman's.
I stepped back again. "Thanks, Walter," I said. "You've been a big help. Someday I'll return the favor."
He spoke without opening his eyes. "No problem."
"Thank Nancy for me."
"Yeah."
He was the battered professional to the last, and I felt more than a little admiration for him. I might have offered him some of Angwine's money if I didn't think he'd throw it right back in my face.
I laid my business card on the dresser and went out into the dying minutes of the day.
CHAPTER 22
I WAS TIRED OF THE HOUSE ON CRANBERRY STREET. I drove up there in time to see the sunset reflected brilliantly across the bay windows, but the sunset didn't do the trick. I knew too much about the house and the people in it to like it very much. Yet for all of that I still didn't know enough. I was back banging on the door.
Pansy Greenleaf answered it. She stood there for a moment, wide-eyed and tentative, and it was like we'd somehow started over with each other. As if we forgot that the last time I was here she'd risen out of a drug-induced torpor to swear an end to my life if I ever came back. The moment went on long enough that I began to wonder if she did remember that last encounter. Then the soft flesh of her cheeks tightened, and her eyes narrowed, and her fist clenched on the edge of the door.
"Hello, Patricia."
She didn't say anything.
"You look better," I said. "That's nice to see. We have to talk."
"I'm busy."
"Somebody here?" I stood on tiptoe to look past her into the house. "Celeste? I need to talk to Cele
ste too."
"No. No one's here."
"I see. You're busy like yesterday, you mean. That's bad stuff, Pansy. I had somebody look at that stuff under a microscope. It eats you alive."
"That's my business."
"That's Danny Phoneblum's business, princess. You're just the customer." I went into the house, and had to shoulder her aside to do it.
When I turned the corner into the living room, I was greeted by the sight of three babyheads lined up in a neat row on the couch. They didn't go with the house, to put it simply. Their existence seemed absurdly literal, like the punch line of a joke someone misunderstood and took seriously. Sasha the kitten—who was nowhere to be seen—belonged in this house more than the babyheads ever would. She was more human.
Barry sat at one end, a little apart from the other two, his loud yellow wig still jutting at an idiotically jaunty angle on his head. The babyhead in the toga who'd taken me upstairs in the hotel sat at the other end, twisting his sheet into a dirty gray rope around his fingers. Between them sat another one I didn't recognize, wearing a little red Spiderman outfit, dark glasses, and a baseball cap on his oversized bald head.
"Barry," I said. "Long time no see."
"Mr. Asshole," said Barry. "Have a seat."
Pansy came in behind me. I turned and smiled at her, and caught an eyeful of daggers.
"My apologies," I said. "You've got visitors. Go ahead with what you were saying. I'll be quiet as a mouse."
Pansy didn't say anything. Barry wrinkled his forehead and said: "Quiet as a mouth." The other babyheads snickered.
Pansy retreated behind an empty chair. "A man named Kornfeld was here looking for you," she said. "He told me I should call him if you bothered me again."
"Office boy," I said. "No big deal. He owes me some karma, probably wants to pay up."
"You're in trouble," she said. "I don't have to hate your guts. I get to feel sorry for you."
"Thanks, Pansy. Think of me next time you roll off the bed onto your needle."
"Why don't you get lost, big man," said Barry. "You're butting in."
"Butting in is my life," I said, turning to face the babyheads. "Indulge me."
Gun, with Occasional Music Page 14
