Called by a Panther

by Michael Z. Lewin

“What?”

  “In. Can we go in now? It's not very comfortable out here, is it? And I have been waiting for you. It's only been twenty minutes, but I was ready to stay all night if I had to. See, I knew you were out. It was the only humane explanation and if there's one thing that I know about you it is that you are humane.”

  I said, “I don't mean to be inhospitable, but what is it that you want?”

  “I left messages when I called. But you haven't gotten them, because you've been out! Of course I didn't explain anything on the phone. I find I can't bare my soul to an answering machine. But I did call three times.”

  Ah.

  “Ah,” I said.

  “Please. Can we go in?” We went in.

  “It's just like I thought it would be,” she said immediately.

  I pointed to my Client's Chair. “Have a seat,” I said. “Miss . . .?”

  “Seals,” she said. “Monique Seals. Of course Monique isn't the name my parents gave me.”

  “Of course,” I said.

  I looked at my watch. I looked at Monique Seals. I sat down. I said, “Now, what was it that you wanted me to look into for you. Miss Seals?”

  “It's Mrs. Ashworth.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I'm married. My married name is Ashworth, but Monique Seals is how I think of myself.”

  “I see.”

  “No, you don't,” she said, “but I see, very clearly.” She leaned forward.

  “Excuse me?”

  “What I am about to say is going to embarrass you,” she said.

  “Then please don't say it.”

  “No, honestly. It will!”

  “Miss Seals. Mrs. Ashworth. I think—”

  “I saw you on television,” she said. “And I knew, just knew, that you were different”

  “Different from what, ma'am?”

  “I could tell it by the eyes. And by the way you moved your little head when you seemed uncomfortable. You're not like other men, are you?”

  “Uh, I'm not sure I exactly—”

  “And so attractive! But you must get tired of women telling you that, I bet.” She grinned at me.

  I couldn't think of anything to say.

  “How old do you think I am?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “How old do I look? Take a guess. Don't be shy.”

  “I couldn't begin . . .”

  “Thirty-nine years old. But I don't look more than twenty-eight or twenty-nine, do I? Do I?”

  “Uh . . .”

  “No, I know I don't. That's because I take care of myself, always have. Even when I was itty-bitty I stayed out of the sun and ate all my vegetables. I have an instinct for things like that.”

  “Look . . .”

  “And so when I had an instinct about you, I just knew I was right! You see, I saw you on TV. So human and frail and yet so overpoweringly capable and come-hither. And I knew that if anybody could help me, you could. And you can. I know you can, can't you? Why so silent?”

  “I'm afraid,” I said, “that at the moment my caseload is very heavy. Miss Seals. I don't know exactly what it is that you would have liked me to do for you, but—”

  She stood up abruptly. The friendliness on her face flipped to hostility. “You're not going to, are you? You won't help me. You won't even try!”

  I stood up and began to move toward the door. The idea was to open it for her.

  But as I moved around the desk, she stretched out one hand to restrain me by the arm. “Don't!” she said. With the other hand she opened her cape.

  From the waistband of dark blue slacks she pulled out a gun.

  I stopped where I was.

  “Don't do anything foolish now,” she said.

  “I . . . I . . .”

  She beamed. “Surprised you, huh?” I nodded.

  “You bastards are all alike,” she said.

  “Miss Seals,” I began.

  “Mrs. Ashworth,” she said.

  “Mrs. Ashworth—”

  “I told you!” she shouted. “I think of myself as Monique Seals.” I lunged for the gun.

  Chapter Fourty Four

  I READ ONCE THAT PEOPLE trained in close-quarter combat laugh at cowboy and cowboy movies where people stick .45s in each other's backs or ribs. The point is that if the gun is that close, a sudden move with an arm will knock the weapon's aim away more quickly than the weapon-bearer can pull the trigger. Of course trained people also know what to do next. Twist, grunt, lever. Bad guy on the floor cringing for mercy; good guy shoving the barrel up the bad guy's nostril and saying. “Make my quota.”

  And then, because the bad guy's read the book too, he makes a quick move with his arm, because up the nostril is close, like the back or ribs.

  Me, I just went by instinct.

  I pushed the gun away with one hand and grabbed at Seals-Ashworth's wrist with the other.

  She didn't resist. I got the gun out of her hand and pushed her away. She dropped to the floor in a heap.

  I stood over her and my body caught up with what I had done. I began to pant, to feel faint.

  I edged back and sat on my desk.

  We stayed like that in silence—apart from heavy breathing—for a long time.

  When I got my breath I called the police.

  The first patrolman arrived about ten minutes later. He pounded on the door.

  I carried the gun by the barrel and opened the door for him.

  He was about six feet six and twenty years old and he said, “I got a call there was an incident with a firearm here but that it's over. That right, mister?”

  “Yes,” I said. I held the pistol up for him to see. “The woman on the floor pulled this on me. I took it away from her.”

  “Hey, buddy,” he said. “We don't like to get involved in domestic disputes where people end up dropping charges.”

  “This is not a domestic dispute,” I said. “I've never met this woman before tonight.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Until you decide to kiss and make up.”

  Then Miss-Mrs. Seals-Ashworth said, “He tried to rape me.”

  “What?” the patrolman said.

  “What?” I said.

  “I came here to hire him and he pulled that gun he's holding and he tried to rape rape rape me.” She began to cry.

  The young cop turned my way. He frowned. “That's a serious charge, fella.” His hand went to his holster. “You better give that gun to me.”

  “My pleasure,” I said. I held it out. He took it by the barrel. Then he wasn't quite sure what to do with it.

  “He tried to rape me,” Seals-Ashworth said again.

  “What you got to say about that, buddy?”

  “I say it's a load of bull,” I said. I felt tired.

  “No it isn't!” Seals-Ashworth said.

  The officer looked at her and then looked at me.

  I said, “ I was the one who called the police.”

  “It was to cover what you did,” she said.

  “I'm afraid the poor woman is not very well,” I said.

  Seals-Ashworth did some more tears. “And I said you were humane!” she said. “How young and innocent can I be?”

  The young and innocent patrolman turned back and forth between us.

  Then we all heard footsteps running up my outside stairs. We looked at the door and a second police officer, a sergeant, jumped into the room.

  “Wise, what the hell are you doing coming into the scene of a gun incident before your goddamn backup has arrived?”

  The tall young patrolman said, “Dispatch said the caller said it was over.”

  “So you walk up to the front door like a bit of target practice before you know”

  “But it is over, Sarge. Only I can't figure out what happened.”

  The sergeant looked at me. Then he looked at Seals-Ashworth on the floor. “Oh fuck,” he said. “I take it all back.”

  The patrolman said, “What?”

  The sergeant said, “Hello,
Cola.”

  Seals-Ashworth sat up and said, “Hello, Jack.”

  Jack turned to me and said, “You must have been on TV for something recently, right?”

  “Uh, right,” I said.

  “So Cola pulled a gun on you, right.”

  “Yeah.”

  “What did she make you do? Stand on your head? Take your shoes off?” He turned to her. “What was it this time, Cola?”

  “Nothin',” she said.

  “I took the gun off her.”

  “Ooo, big tough guy,” Sergeant Jack said.

  The young patrolman was still holding the gun gingerly by its barrel.

  Jack said, “That it?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Give it to me,” Jack said. The patrolman gave it to him.

  Jack glanced at the gun and then pointed it between my eyes.

  “Hey, come on!” I said.

  He pulled the trigger.

  I twisted to the side, but I was miles too late.

  However, there was no explosion. No sudden death. No meeting with St. Peter to present my lame excuses.

  All that happened was that I cricked my neck.

  Jack said, “Replica. If you don't know anything about guns, they're pretty frightening. We must have taken six or eight or ten of these things off her in the last two years alone. I don't know where the hell she gets them.”

  “I got my sources,” Cola Seals-Ashworth said.

  “Price of fame,” Jack said.

  Chapter Fourty Five

  “THE PRICE OF SEX APPEAL,” my woman said.

  “It was not funny,” I said.

  “No, I suppose it wasn't.” She laughed.

  I moved to the other end of the couch. I said, “Come on! I was on TV once a few years ago and nobody noticed.”

  “I can't help that. This time you radiated that special pheromone. Even I felt it. I reacted to it. And if anybody should know better . . .”

  “Thanks.”

  She laughed again.

  “Look, kid, I've got problems,” I said.

  “Whether to hire a social secretary?”

  I said nothing. That's how she knew I had something serious to talk about.

  She said, “Is it about that picture?”

  Bobbie Lee's drawing. “Partly,” I said.

  She waited.

  “I'm in an extremely difficult position. I don't know what to do. Whether I should go to the cops, or what.”

  My woman and I don't talk about details of work.

  Because I was breaking the rule with intent, she knew it was important.

  “Come on,” she said. We retreated to her bedroom where I we wouldn't be interrupted.

  She listened as I explained how I had come to be involved with the most wanted criminal organization in Indianapolis.

  “You? With the Scum Front?” She couldn't help herself.

  “Me.”

  “But why did they come to you? ”

  “They said it was because I work alone.”

  My woman frowned. “How did they know that?”

  “I don't know. Maybe my ads in the paper. But they tried me out before they revealed who they were.”

  I described Kate King's first visits and how they had led to visits by the Animals and how I'd been told that if I didn't look for the missing bomb, nobody would.

  “Well . . .” my woman said. Code for “I sort of see why you did it, but I think you're nuts to have gotten involved.”

  I told her how I'd tried to protect myself by insisting that they leave no more bombs anywhere while I was on the case.

  “That's something, I suppose.”

  Then I told her what I'd done and how I'd found Cecil Redman and how that information had led me to the Frog.

  “You know who one of them is! You're sure?”

  And I explained about Dancing Girl and her description of the woman who had followed the Frog.

  “And that's what this is about?” she said, pointing at the drawing.

  “Yep. That's almost certainly the person who picked up the bomb.”

  “Hmmmm.”

  I told her about the chance identification of the dress in the picture. And I began to talk about my bar meeting with Charlotte Vivien.

  “Hang on, hang on,” my woman said.

  “What?”

  “Let me see that picture again.”

  I held it up for her.

  She looked at it for a moment. Then at me.

  “What's wrong?” I asked.

  “You saw this and you're trying to identify the dress?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You're a jerk,” she said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You are doing exactly what your dancing witness did. You're only looking at the clothes. I know it's nicely drawn and all that, but what's the interest?”

  “Well, it's the only thing I have a detailed description of.”

  “So what?”

  I shook my head.

  “You're a nice man, Albert. Open, accepting of people and unusual because of that. But you forget where you live sometimes.”

  “I don't understand what you're saying.”

  My woman said, “Get back to basics, gumshoe. What is it that you really have here?”

  “Tell me.”

  “You have a witness who saw the woman in the picture follow your Frog when she was planting a bomb.”

  “Right.”

  “And people don't just follow other people for the hell of it, so you deduce that the odds are good that the woman in the picture picked the bomb up.”

  “Yeah.”

  “But how did the woman in the picture know your Frog was worth following?”

  “I don't know yet. I need to identify her first.”

  “And you're trying to do that through the clothes she wore.”

  “The clothes are supposed to be unique.”

  “But Al! Your Frog turns out to be a well-off suburban Indianapolis housewife!”

  “Yeah.”

  “Come on, man! You live in the northernmost southern city of America. Forget the damn dress. Forget Charlotte Vivien. How many black women does your white Indianapolis Scum Front housewife know? And how many of those black women could conceivably know enough about your Frog to work out that she plants bombs? Your Frog's the one who can tell you who this woman is. Talk to her!”

  Chapter Fourty Six

  OF COURSE, THAT WAS MORE or less what I had planned to do at my Front meeting in the morning. I just hadn't quite gotten the situation in focus.

  “You're tired,” my woman said.

  “Yeah.”

  “Too much is happening too quickly for you.”

  “Yeah. And you're right about something else too,” I said.

  “What's that?”

  “I'm a jerk.”

  But it was too late to call Mrs. Morgason/the Frog without blowing the whole thing wide open in her household. First thing in the morning would have to do. But no way would I wait for the eleven o'clock meeting.

  However, I was not good company during the night. By two-thirty A.M. we decided that I should go home if I wasn't going to be able to sleep without tossing, turning and disarming intruders.

  Social workers need their z's.

  Naturally, once I was in my car I wasn't sleepy at all.

  I drove to 23rd Street. There was a chance that the Rubble Belt Think Tank would be working late and the HQ would show a light.

  But the place was dark and quiet.

  Elsewhere in the city there were sirens calling in the darkness, but their charms did not work on me.

  There was nothing to do but go home. There, eventually, I slept.

  The telephone woke me at ten past eight. It was the police. A woman's voice.

  It didn't make sense to me.

  “You want what?” I said.

  “I said, I need to take your statement this morning.”

  “Who did you say you were?”

  �
�Sergeant Ivory Frisco.”

  “Do I know you?”

  “No, sir, I don't think so.”

  “Well, what kind of statement are you talking about? My philosophy of life, or what?”

  “Please don't be facetious, Mr. Samson. I'm only doing my job.”

  “Please continue doing it to the extent of telling me what you're talking about.”

  “Just how many involvements with the police have you had in the last twelve hours?”

  “Twelve hours? That seems like a lifetime.”

  “Does the name Cola Lowis mean anything to you?”

  “Nothing whatever.”

  “Welsey Avenue?”

  “Nothing.”

  “But I understand that she threatened you with a replica revolver last night.”

  “Ah,” I said.

  “Am I beginning to get through to you, Mr. Samson?”

  “You are, Sergeant Prisco.”

  “We've decided to try to have Ms Lowis committed for treatment, but to do that we need a formal statement describing exactly what she did to you.”

  “I see. And if all she did was make a god-awful nuisance of herself?”

  “I need the details. Can we fix a time for me to come by this morning?”

  I hesitated.

  “Mr. Samson?”

  “Will it take long?”

  “No sir, I wouldn't think so.”

  “Well, how about nine o'clock. Sergeant Prisco? My office is only five minutes from your office.”

  “That'll be fine,” Ivory Prisco said.

  Nine o'clock. Done by nine-fifteen. I could be with the Frog on 91st Street by quarter to ten.

  I called her.

  Nobody answered. O.K. So Sick wasn't so sick today. And was being taken to school? Try again in a few minutes.

  I put coffee on and did some abluting.

  I called the Frog again at eight-thirty. And at twenty to nine.

  I was getting dressed when I heard the doorbell. The time was eight forty-five.

  But it was not Sergeant Prisco. There was nobody there when I opened the door. But “nobody” had left me an envelope.

  Before I picked it up I stepped out to the edge of the porch to look up and down the street. But I saw nothing that attracted my attention.

  I brought the envelope inside and opened it. And pulled out a sheet of paper stuck with words and letters cut from newspapers.

  The message read: “Our missing package was recovered last night. Your services are no longer required. Do NOT contact any of us or reveal ANY information to police or you put what you value at GREAT risk. Repeat: GREAT risk. Keep all money. Forget us.”