Stand-up

by Robert J. Randisi

  9

  I started down the stairs and stopped at the door of the apartment directly beneath Ray’s. I was about to knock to ask the couple if they’d seen him recently. Considering what I had seen them doing through the window, I decided not to. They wouldn’t be very receptive at the moment to my questions.

  I tried the other apartment on the fourth floor, then the two on the third. No one was home. It was only about three in the afternoon, and they were probably still at work.

  I went to the second floor, where I knew at least one of the apartments was occupied because I had seen the guy watching TV.

  When he answered my knock, I asked him if he had seen Ray Carbone around.

  “Who?”

  “One of the tenants on the fifth floor?” I pointed up so he’d get the idea. “Carbone?”

  He was a Hispanic man in his fifties, wearing a tank-top T-shirt and badly in need of some deodorant.

  “I ain’ seen nobody.”

  “Do you know Ray?”

  “I don’ know nobody.”

  “Is your neighbor across the hall home, do you think?”

  “Her? She’s almost always home . . . and available, if you know what I mean.” He wriggled his eyebrows.

  “I think I know what you mean,” I said. “She’s good for some action, huh?”

  “All kinds of action.”

  “You, uh, getting any of it?”

  “Sure,” he said. “I get it when I want it. She loves havin’ me come over there.”

  “What about her and Ray?”

  He frowned.

  “I tol’ you, I don’ know no Ray.”

  “Maybe you can tell me—”

  “I don’ know nothin’!”

  “Look, I’m not a cop.”

  “Good,” he said, “me neither,” and closed the door in my face.

  I’d had to breathe in his b.o. and had nothing to show for it.

  I went across the hall and knocked on that door. I was willing to take what he’d just told me about the tenant with a grain of salt.

  When she opened the door, I could at least believe that she liked some action. She was about five seven, a big girl with heavy breasts inside a tank-top T-shirt that hid very little. She had dark hair that was rather lank at the moment. She was holding a beer can in a hand with a cigarette between the first and second fingers. She looked to be in her mid-thirties, with some crinkle lines around her eyes. Her mouth was puffy, and I wasn’t sure if she had thick lips or if she’d been hit lately. Also, the way women are injecting stuff in their lips these days, who knew? It did give her a sort of overblown sexy look, though.

  “Whataya want?”

  “I’m looking for Ray Carbone, one of your neighbors.”

  “You a cop?”

  “No, I’m not a cop. I’m a friend of Ray’s, and I’m worried about him. Nobody’s seen him for a few days.”

  “Ray can take care of himself.”

  “I know he can. Can you just tell me if you’ve seen him?”

  “Naw,” she said, “I ain’t seen him since—well, since the last time he was here.”

  “Here? In his apartment, or do you mean yours?”

  “Here, right here in my place.”

  “Does Ray come down here a lot?”

  She gave me a slow smile and leaned her hips against the door. She was wearing a pair of faded jeans and filled them to bursting.

  “Yeah, he comes down once in a while. We got it on, ya know?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  Suddenly she stood straight up and asked, “Did you talk to the asshole across the hall?”

  “Your neighbor? Yeah, I talked to him.”

  “What’d that sonofabitch tell you about me?”

  I answered her truthfully. What did I owe the guy after he’d slammed his door in my face?

  “He told me that you and him get it on a lot.”

  “That scumbag? I wouldn’t let him lick my vibrator. Hey, Martinez, you lying asshole!” she shouted, taking one step into the hall. “Come out here.”

  Martinez was apparently not as dumb as he’d looked. He stayed where he was. I think if he had come out she would have hurt him. She had a couple of inches and about twenty pounds on him.

  “When was that last time you saw Ray?”

  “I dunno,” she said, still snarling at her neighbor’s closed door. “Few days ago.”

  “Two days? Three?”

  “Naw . . . I think it was four days ago. Yeah, it was Sunday, ’cause I didn’t have to—I mean, I was home.”

  “Are you home a lot?”

  She took her eyes from the door across the hall and looked at me again.

  “Are you sure you’re not a cop?”

  “I’m sure.”

  “Well, yeah, I’m home a lot. I work at home . . . sometimes . . . ya know?”

  “Yeah, I know.”

  “Hey,” she said, cocking her hip again, “wanna come inside for a while?”

  “Sorry,” I said, “but I’ve really got to find Ray. Thanks for the offer, though.”

  “What offer? You think I was offerin’ you a freebie? I only do freebies for my friends.”

  “Like Ray?”

  “Yeah, like Ray. What’s it to ya?”

  “Nothing,” I said, “nothing at all. Thanks for talking to me.”

  “Get fucked!” she said, and slammed the door.

  Not today.

  I went back up to the fourth floor and knocked on the apartment door I hadn’t tried yet. Maybe they’d finished doing what they’d been doing.

  Then again, maybe they hadn’t.

  Nobody answered.

  I put my ear to the door, but I didn’t hear anything. They couldn’t have gotten past me on the stairs. Maybe they had finished and fallen asleep; I doubted they’d finished, dressed, and left while I was in Ray’s apartment. I knocked again, louder this time, but there was still no answer.

  I’d have to make a point to come back and try again. I left the building figuring my next step was to check with Ray’s girlfriend, Joy.

  10

  Joy White lived in a brownstone on Horatio Street just west of Ninth Avenue, similar to the one Ray lived in. Technically speaking, the area is the West Village, although most of what’s happening in the Village—the shops, the bookstores, the clubs, the funky bars, and the galleries—are south of there.

  I’d met Joy several times. She was a bleached blonde who sometimes dressed as if she belonged in the sixties. There were times when she wore tight pants and sweaters, and although she certainly had the body for them, they’d looked more timely when they’d been worn by Jayne Mansfield. Also, I often wondered about Joy—as I have wondered about many other women—why when they bleach their hair blond they leave their eyebrows dark. In addition, she wore so much makeup you almost couldn’t tell that she was pretty underneath it all.

  I’d accompanied Ray to Joy’s apartment once, and that being the only time I’d been there—at night, in a cab—when I reached Horatio Street this time, on foot, I had to walk up and down the block twice before identifying her building.

  Joy worked as an aerobics instructor in a small gym in the Village, and Ray said her hours were her own because she was so good at it. I found her doorbell beneath her mailbox and pressed it once.

  “Who is it?”

  “Joy, it’s Miles Jacoby.”

  There was a moment when I thought she wasn’t going to let me in, but then she buzzed me in.

  She was on the second floor, and as I remembered, she had the front apartment overlooking the street. When I knocked on her door, I heard at least three locks snap open. She cracked the door as far as the chain would allow, then slammed it when she saw me, removed the chain, and opened it again.

  “Miles?”

  She recognized me, but the question in her voice had to do with why I was here. Why would her boyfriend’s friend be showing up at her door in the middle of the day?

  “Hi, Joy.”
<
br />   “What are you doing here?”

  I tried to look past her into the apartment, but there wasn’t much to see from this vantage point.

  She stood in the doorway, looking better than I’d ever seen her. Her hair was pulled back in a long ponytail, and she was wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants. I knew that underneath the baggy clothes she had an aerobic instructor’s body, and I liked her dressed this way better than when she wore skintight clothes.

  I was surprised, too, at how young and soft she looked without all the makeup. The woman I’d talked to in Ray’s building had been sexy in a slutty, slumming sort of way. Joy, however, exuded pure sex appeal in waves—even though she dressed it wrong sometimes—and I wondered what Ray would be doing with the semi-pro who lived in his building when he could be here.

  “I’m looking for Ray, Joy. Is he here?”

  “No, he’s not. In fact, I left a message on his answering machine earlier this week. I haven’t seen him in a few days.”

  I knew that because I had the tape with her voice on it in my pocket.

  “I’m getting worried.”

  “Can I come in, Joy?”

  “Sure,” she said, and backed away to let me enter. She closed the door behind us and engaged all the locks. Now we were standing in the kitchen.

  “Is Ray in trouble, Miles?”

  “He might be if I don’t find him.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “Joy, do you know what kind of work Ray does?”

  “Sure,” she said, “I know he . . . does favors for people sometimes. I know he’s not always, you know, on the up-and-up.”

  “Well, then, that’s the kind of trouble he might be in. The kind you can get into doing the kind of work he does.”

  “Is Ray dead, Miles?” She held her breath after the question.

  “No, Joy, Ray’s not dead.”

  “If he was, would you tell me?”

  “Yes, I would.”

  She studied me for a moment, then said, “Okay. Do you want a beer? I was just doing some exercises.”

  On the floor in the living room I could see a step, the kind they used for step aerobics. Also, there was some music on the stereo that she must have turned down when she answered the door. Now that I was inside I could smell her. It was a mixture of her perfume and her sweat.

  “No, no beer, thanks,” I said. “I just want to ask you some questions.”

  “All right.”

  “Are you sure you haven’t seen Ray in a few days?”

  “Positive.”

  “Have you heard from him?”

  “No. Like I told you, I left a message on his machine. You could check.”

  “I will,” I said, so she wouldn’t know I already had.

  “The last time you saw him, how was he?”

  “He was fine. He spent the night here—it was Sunday night, I think. He left Monday morning and said he’d call me. He still hasn’t.”

  Today was Thursday. Sunday was also the day the woman in Ray’s building had said he’d spent time with her. Either Ray slept with both women on the same day, or one of them was lying.

  “Did he say what he’d be doing Monday?”

  “He didn’t—wait a minute.”

  “What?”

  “Before he left he called his own phone, you know, to check messages?”

  “And?”

  “When he hung up, he said he had to go see somebody.”

  “That day? Monday?”

  “Yes.”

  “Joy, when did you leave your message?”

  “Monday night, when I didn’t hear from him.”

  So the messages on the tape I had were from Monday on.

  “Have you been to his apartment?”

  She made a face.

  “No, he knows I hate it there, that’s why he always comes here. I want him to move out of there.”

  “I don’t blame you.”

  “I want him to move in here.”

  “How does he feel about that?”

  “Oh, you know,” she said with a shrug. “He doesn’t want to lose his freedom.”

  “Look, Joy, this is important. If you hear from him, will you do two things for me?”

  “Sure. What?”

  “Number one, tell him I’m looking for him and second, call me right away.”

  “Okay.”

  “Listen to me. If he’s in trouble, he’s going to want to handle it himself. He’ll tell you not to call me, but you have to do it anyway. Understand?”

  “But if he tells me not to—”

  “Tell him you won’t, and then do it.”

  “Lie to Ray?”

  “Joy? You’ve never lied to a man?”

  “Oh sure,” she said, and then added, “but not to Ray.”

  I took hold of her shoulders and said, “This is about murder, Joy. You’ve got to call me if you hear from him.”

  She bit her lip and then nodded shortly.

  “Okay, Miles, I’ll call you.”

  “Thanks.”

  She opened the door for me and leaned on it. “Ray says you’re one of his very best friends.”

  “I am, Joy,” I said, “that’s why I’m trying to help him.”

  “Will you call me when you know something?”

  “First thing,” I said. “I promise.”

  She closed the door behind me, and I heard the locks snap into place. I thought I had made an impression on her as to the importance of calling me. I only hoped that if she did hear from Ray, he didn’t make a better one against me.

  11

  Between going to Heck’s office, and then to Ray’s place, and then Joy’s, it felt like a long day. From Joy’s apartment it was a healthy walk to Packy’s. When I entered, I was pleased to see that we were doing a brisk business. Marty and Ed were behind the bar, and Geneva was waiting tables. Usually whichever one of us was free waited tables, because I was still resisting hiring a full-time waitress. I thought again about how being partners with Walker Blue could save me from having to make those kinds of decisions.

  “Hi, Boss.” Geneva greeted me with a big grin.

  “Nice crowd.”

  “Yeah, and everything seems to be flowing real smooth.”

  Which meant there were no demanding customers making it hard on her.

  “Need some help?”

  “No, not unless you feel like it.”

  “I’m going to go into the office for a while. If it gets bad and you need me, come and get me.”

  “You got it.”

  I went in the back and sat down at my desk. It had been Packy’s desk, and if I hadn’t had the top completely covered with ledgers, bills, newspapers, and other junk, I would have been able to see the scarred, pitted surface. It was over fifty years old and had tons of character. It deserved to be sanded and refinished, but if I’d tried to do that sort of work I would have hurt myself.

  I was tempted to call Heck, but he wouldn’t have the answers to a lot of my questions until he saw Danny Pesce. I wondered if I should call Walker and tell him that I had taken on two new cases, but we weren’t really partners yet—not unless some papers had come from a lawyer while I was gone. I skimmed the very top of the mess on my desk and there were no legal papers in sight, so no, we weren’t partners, yet.

  I thought about Stan Waldrop then. I felt guilty that I hadn’t done any work on his problem. Before he’d left, along with his personal info, I had gotten the names of some of his fellow comedians who he thought might be behind the loss of his material. I wasn’t sure how I was going to proceed. What would I do—see them and ask if they had stolen his act?

  I decided that the first thing I should do was go and talk to his agent tomorrow. Maybe the guy would tell me that Waldrop was paranoid and was always accusing people of stealing his jokes.

  I took out the notebook I’d written everything in, a little spiral job I keep in one pocket or the other. I was about to go through it when there was a knock on the do
or and Marty stuck his head in.

  “Hey, Boss?”

  “Yeah, Marty?” I wondered what we were short of now. Vermouth?

  “You know that fella you asked me about earlier today?”

  “What fella—oh yeah, the sitcom guy.”

  “He’s outside, sitting at the bar. You wanna talk to him?”

  I thought a moment. Could he really help me? But where was the harm in just talking to the guy?

  “Yeah, I do, Marty. Thanks.”

  I followed him back out to the bar and he pointed the guy out. He was a typical yuppie, wearing a short-sleeved pullover shirt with a little pony or something on the chest. Now that I saw him, I realized that I knew him on sight. He usually came in for lunch, dressed in a suit. I didn’t know he came by in the evenings, though.

  He was talking to two other guys, so I didn’t hesitate to interrupt him. They were either talking about women or sports.

  “Excuse me, Frank Silvero?”

  He turned his head and looked across the bar at me.

  “Hey, Jack, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “H-e-e-e-y,” he drawled, putting his hand out. As he pumped my hand enthusiastically he said to the other two, “This is Kid Jacoby, guys. He owns this place, and he used to be a promising middleweight.”

  “I don’t know how promising I was,” I said, but the other two weren’t listening. Maybe they’d seen me fight.

  “Frank, can I talk to you a minute?”

  “Sure, Jack, sure,” he said, as if we’d known each other forever. “Excuse me, guys.”

  We moved to the far end of the bar where we could speak a little more privately.

  “Frank, I understand you work in TV.”

  “Hey,” he said, holding his hands up, palms out, “you’re not gonna tell me you wanna be on TV are you, Jack? I mean, I know George Foreman got his own show, but you know how that turned out.”

  “No, no,” I said. “I don’t want to be on TV. In fact, I have another, uh, profession. I’m a private investigator.”

  He paused a moment, something clicking in his head, and then he said, “I knew that. I knew that, I did.”

  “I was wondering if you could help me with something.”

  “You working on a case I can help with?”