One Grave Too Many

by Ron Goulart

  CHAPTER 8

  “…WHEN HE TOUCHED ME, you know, there, I felt absolutely, well, giddy,” the car radio was saying. “I mean, here I was a married woman in her early thirties being turned on by the man who came to reseed the lawn. And yet I must confess …”

  Easy jabbed on another station.

  “… being a hopeless bedridden cripple all my life I think has enabled me to see what God’s purpose is, Norm. That’s why I want to tell that listener in Downey with the tumor not to …”

  The next station he found was playing unobtrusive string music.

  Easy rolled down his window further, yawning.

  It was a few minutes short of midnight and he was driving across the flat Southern California desert.

  “Hope these gentle sounds are lulling you into the right mood to drift off to dreamland,” said the radio. “Remember that we bring you nothing but relaxing mood music from dusk to dawn. So whenever …”

  Easy turned the radio off.

  On his right, surrounded by fuzzy-armed joshua trees, a road sign told him he was two miles from Manzana.

  Manzana was the desert town where Gary Marks’ aunt lived. After Danny’s visit Easy had put in a quick call to Gay Holland. She told him she’d already called her aunt and the old woman had said she hadn’t seen Gary. Easy wanted the old woman’s address anyway, figuring she still might be the old witch in the desert the two hoods had talked about in front of Danny.

  Nearing Manzana he passed a covered wagon on the wide flat highway. He looked back at it and the driver gave him the finger.

  The town was all lit up, its adobe and brick buildings festooned with strings of colored lights. A huge oilcloth banner suspended over the main street proclaimed: Golden Pioneer Daze Festival.

  Most everyone in town was pretending to be someone else. The streets were thick with bearded cowboys, Spanish soldiers, Indians, señoritas and dueñas and a few trail scouts and seamen.

  Easy guided his VW through the festivities. The festivities and the lights ended three blocks before the town did. He parked his car on the very edge of Manzana.

  As he was edging out of the car something exploded behind him. Easy wheeled, his hand flashing toward his shoulder holster. It was fireworks, blossoming yellow and violet and green in the crisp black night above the town.

  According to Gay her aunt lived a half mile beyond the desert town. Easy had decided to approach the house on foot.

  Slumped in the arched doorway of the last building at the town’s edge was a chunky man in a US Cavalry uniform. He held a half empty bottle of pineapple wine in his gloved hand. Noticing Easy, he sat up and asked, “Got a quarter for a vet?”

  Easy kept moving and the man sank back down.

  The desert was cold, the ground hard underfoot. Easy put his hands in his pockets.

  The house was a low ranch style thing with slanting tile roofs. It sat alone, surrounded by a Cyclone fence. Lights still burned behind most of the windows. Parked in front yard was a Camaro with a dented front fender.

  Easy was a hundred feet from the wire fence when he heard the scream.

  It was a man screaming.

  CHAPTER 9

  THE FIRST WINDOW HE looked into Easy saw the old woman. The room he saw through a slit between the drapes was a dining room and Mrs. Marquetti sat alone at the head of a long oaken dinner table. All the flame-shaped bulbs but one were burning in the gilded chandelier. The old woman was fat, wearing a flannel nightgown and a pale blue terry robe.

  She was tied to the chair with brand new clothes line rope; several strips of surgical tape covered her mouth. Her head was hanging far to the right, her eyes were shut. Easy decided she was asleep and not dead and moved on.

  He eased along the side of the house. In his hand now he held his .38 revolver. Far off in the night desert a dog barked, over and over.

  In a bedroom a young man, very long and very thin, was sprawled out face down on the floor. The shades had not been pulled quite completely shut. The color scheme of the room was pink and peach. A pink-shaded bedside lamp threw pink light down on him. His hands were tied behind him, as were his feet. White tape had been wrapped generously around the lower part of his face.

  “Looks like he’s still alive,” Easy said to himself. “Must be the aunt’s companion. If that’s his bedroom, he’s very sweet.”

  Another cry of pain came from inside the house.

  Easy moved to the kitchen window and carefully glanced in. There was only a fraction of glass not masked by white shade. He saw slices out of the middle of three men. One was small and wiry, sleeves rolled up, freckles on his arms. Behind him stood a large black with a fold of stomach hanging over his wide silver-buckle belt. The fat black had a .45 automatic dangling from his left hand.

  The third man must be Gary Marks. He was tied to a white wooden chair, with more of the fresh clothes line. He was wearing only a pair of striped shorts.

  One freckled hand held a lighted cigar. It moved close to Gary’s bare chest. There were five raw red splotches on his chest and stomach.

  “Come now, love,” said the wiry little man. “Give.”

  “I don’t know, I don’t know.” Gary’s voice was dry, weak.

  “Shit, Chatto,” said the black, stroking the big automatic, “this is getting tedious, very tedious.”

  “So complain to this bloke, not me.” Chatto puffed on the thin cigar, brought the glowing end to within an inch of the bound man’s skin. “You really must tell us, love.”

  “Shoot him in the leg a couple times, he’ll talk and talk.”

  “We don’t need such violent tricks, McBernie.” Chatto’s other hand drifted over to the formica-topped kitchen table and returned holding a wrinkled half sheet of lined paper. “Now then, love, if you’ll just tell us what this here cryptic message means.”

  “I don’t know what the goddamn thing means.”

  Chatto slapped him across the face with the hand that held the paper. “Don’t talk back, love.”

  McBernie said, “I think it’s time we did something to the old lady, Chatto.”

  Easy left the window, moving toward the rear of the house. He could still hear them in the kitchen.

  “I’m saving the old dear. When my patience runs out we’ll get to her.”

  “My patience run out a long time ago. Day ago at least.”

  “Look at the paper, love. No, don’t look away from it, look at it.”

  Gary screamed again.

  There was a plastic cat’s dish just outside the back door of the ranch house. Several cross-shaped pieces of dry catfood were scattered around it and a cluster of ants was attempting to haul one away. The door opened onto a wash room. Easy could make out a white dryer and two porcelain sinks in the room. A little light spilled into the narrow room from under the far door.

  He took hold of the knob with his left hand and turned it slowly and silently. The door was locked.

  Easy frowned down at the keyhole, fished a skeleton key out of his jacket pocket. The key worked.

  The washroom smelled of bleach and some subtler scent. “Pine cones,” Easy decided while he crossed the room.

  “Why prolong this, love?” Chatto was asking Gary on the other side of the door.

  “I don’t know, I don’t know.”

  “Shit,” said McBernie.

  Easy pushed the kitchen door open and shot the black man in the left arm.

  “Jesus,” cried McBernie as the .45 automatic spun out of his grasp.

  “Over against the wall with your hands up over your heads,” ordered Easy. “Both of you.”

  “Not bloody likely, love.” Chatto suddenly ducked behind Gary’s chair.

  Easy was surprised to see the chair and Gary come flying straight at him. It took him in the chest and slammed him back flat out on the yellow linoleum.

  He lost track of the next thirty seconds. When he got himself and Gary upright the other two men were gone from the kitchen.

  Easy
ran and got outside just in time to see the lightless Camaro go roaring out of the yard.

  CHAPTER 10

  “THE SHERIFF,” REPEATED THE long thin young man. “I very much think we ought to call the sheriff at once.” He tilted himself to the right to see around Easy and Gary Marks and into the bathroom mirror. “Vida may never fully recover from the shock of this awful interlude, poor pet.”

  “Vida is my aunt,” said Gary.

  Easy finished applying Vaseline and a gauze pad to the last of the burns on Gary’s chest. “I know a discreet doctor in LA,” he said. “Or do you have somebody out this way you can trust?”

  “We better use your man.” Gary winced as Easy helped him into his shirt.

  “Why, may I ask, do you want a discreet doctor? I don’t intend to keep this awful incident quiet. No, quite the contrary, I intend to shout it from the …”

  “Shut up, Jordan,” said Marks as he carefully pulled on a pair of pants.

  Jordan Crossen said, “Don’t talk to me like that, Gary Marks. If it weren’t for me your Aunt Vida would long ago have perished from loneliness out here in this awful desert. Because you and that sister of yours never so …”

  “We’re going to keep quiet about what happened here,” Easy told the old woman’s companion. “Nobody is going to call the cops or the sheriff or the country doctor.”

  Crossen swallowed once before speaking. “I must say I don’t quite fathom the reasoning behind …”

  “Our family’s had enough mention in the papers,” said Gary, “to last us a lifetime. I told Easy I didn’t want any cops while he was cutting me loose. So that’s the way it’s going to be, Jordan.”

  “Ah, I’d forgotten your unfortunate father for the moment.” Crossen edged around them to open the medicine cabinet a bit further. “Not that your … um … friends didn’t mention him enough during their enforced stay with us.”

  Easy rested a foot on the edge of the bathtub. “You feel up to driving back to LA now?” he asked Gary.

  Gary rubbed at the sooty yellowing skin around his left eye, which was half shut. “I think so. Though I’m going to want to see that doctor of yours when we get there. Those bastards worked me over pretty good.”

  Crossen picked up a stick of pine-scented deodorant. He rubbed it behind his ears and in the hollow of his throat. “At the risk of sounding inhospitable, Gary, I do think it would be best if you did go as soon as you can. I’ve got an awful lot of cleaning up to do.” He patted Easy briefly on the right hand. “I haven’t even seen the damage you did in the kitchen when you shot off your gun.”

  “My bullet stayed in the spade. You won’t have to worry about the woodwork.”

  Crossen edged to the door. “I really ought to air the whole place out right away. All those sweaty men here for such a great long time …” He drifted away.

  “My aunt likes him,” said Gary.

  Easy asked, “Does she know anything about what those two guys wanted to know?”

  “I sure don’t think so. She seemed as surprised and puzzled as I was. My aunt is one of these sweet old Italian lady types. She can lie when she has to, but it always gives her a shifty look around the eyes.”

  Crossen was back in the bathroom doorway. “I just got the poor pet to sleep,” he said. “You’re not going to ask her anything until she’s had a good long sleep.”

  “What about you?” said Easy. “Ever seen either of those guys before?”

  “No, they’re a little too rough for my … um …” He brushed back his hair, touched the tip of his tongue to the center of his upper lip.

  “Something?”

  “It just occurred to me I may have seen the little one before,” said Crossen. “Yes, about a week ago. I do a great deal of our shopping at a delightful little gourmet shop in Manzana. I have the impression that he was in there, pretending to browse around … and, yes. When I left he did, too. In fact, he followed me out of town in his car. At the time I didn’t think too much of it.”

  “Just another conquest,” said Gary.

  Crossen kept his eyes on Easy. “I’m certain it was the same little man.”

  “So they’ve been thinking about this for awhile,” said Easy, “looking things over, out here and in LA.”

  Crossen backed out into the hall again. “Now I really believe, if you’re able, Gary, that you ought to leave. I’ve got a busy night ahead of me.”

  “Yeah, I’m ready to go.”

  Easy said, “You’ll have to wait here till I get my car. It’s parked in Manzana.”

  “I’d offer to run you in,” said Crossen, “but I really don’t think I dare leave poor Vida.”

  Gary nodded at the 24-hour drive-in which seemed to be floating in the darkness up ahead to their right. “I haven’t eaten for awhile,” he said. “That may not be the best place to resume my eating career, but could we stop?”

  “Sure.” Easy flipped his turn indicator and guided his VW off the wide black road and onto pink gravel.

  The name of the place, according to all its neon signs, was Another Fat Ed’s. Two lesbians in black motorcycle jackets were the only other customers. It was a few minutes past 3 A.M.

  The waitress was a greying woman with a propeller beanie atop her head. “Fall off your cycle?” she asked Gary when she came to the chill formica and pseudoleather booth they’d taken.

  “Little accident around the house,” said Gary, taking the green plastic menu she handed.

  “Wife lower the boom?”

  “You’re very perceptive,” said Easy. “Why the propeller?”

  “It livens things up,” she said.

  “I’d like a glass of skim milk,” Easy said, not looking at his menu.

  “Health freak?”

  “Right again.”

  “All we got is regular milk. How about, since you’re concerned for your health, a glass of orangeade.”

  “That should hit the spot,” said Easy.

  “How about you, Battling Nelson?”

  “Can I get the #2 breakfast?” Gary asked.

  The waitress leaned down, took the menu from him, flipped it over and tapped it. “Can you read that?”

  “Breakfast Served Round The Clock!” Okay, I’ll take the #2 breakfast.”

  “White or whole wheat?”

  “Whole wheat.”

  “Another health freak,” she said and left them.

  Gary sighed out a breath. “I don’t know if I can actually eat or not.”

  Easy asked, “What’s that piece of paper about?”

  Closing his eyes, Gary leaned back against the tufted red imitation leather. “The paper they kept showing me? It’s about … money,” he answered. “I never saw it before those bastards found it in one of dad’s archeology books.”

  “One of the books you had at your cottage?”

  “No, it was in between the pages of a book stored in my aunt’s basement. That’s why they hauled me out there in the first place, to look for the paper.” He opened his eyes, noticed the big clock dangling above the counter. “We ought to call Gay, let her know you found me.”

  “I already called her. When you were first in the John.”

  “I didn’t know that.” He shook his head. “Only just thought of her now. I guess I’m groggier than … so she knows I’m okay?”

  “Yeah,” said Easy. “I also called an operative I use now and then. Put him and a buddy of his to watching your sister’s place in shifts.”

  “Gay? You think …?” He shook his head again. “What do you think?”

  “That Chatto and his spade sidekick may try to lean on your sister next.”

  “Who gets the #2?” asked the returning waitress.

  “Right here.”

  “And here’s your juice, sourpuss.”

  When she was gone Easy said, “Let’s get back to what those guys were after. What’s the paper, a map?”

  “No, not exactly.” He picked up a half slice of buttered toast, then set it down.
“They acted like it was, though.” He took the toast up again and took a bite. “It had some numbers on it and some words, in my dad’s writing.”

  “Remember what it said?”

  “I ought to. They’ve been after me to explain it for … how long has it been?”

  “We’re into Thursday morning.”

  “Holy Christ,” said Gary. “Well, the whole damn message was … PD Angelo-S15W4. That was it, PD Angelo-S15W4.”

  “What did Chatto think it was for?”

  “You know about my father?”

  “He stole some money.”

  “He sure did, about six million dollars,” said Gary. He took another bite of toast. “Now a couple million of that dough never showed up again. Well, this Chatto seems to have worked in the prison hospital. My dad didn’t die for a couple of days after he had his stroke. He wasn’t in complete control of himself by then. He told Chatto he’d had some money hidden. And he also told the bastard … you know, confiding in him because he knew he was dying and he wanted me to get this last message from him. Anyway, he told Chatto he’d left a paper for me explaining where the money was.”

  “How much money?”

  “A million at least.”

  Easy said, “Why’d Chatto wait so long?”

  “He just got out of prison himself last month. Since then he’s been watching me, finding out everything he could. Monday he decided to make his move. Are you going to drink that juice?”

  “Nope.” Easy slid the tiny glass across the tabletop. “You really didn’t know about the dough?”

  “Nothing, no,” said Gary. “Not that a lot of people didn’t ask us about it back when dad was first arrested. I figured, you know, he’d spent it. There was some woman out in the Valley … well, no, I didn’t know he had hidden a million bucks someplace.”

  “The paper’s supposed to tell where the money is,” said Easy. “But it doesn’t mean anything to you?”

  “I spent the last two … three or whatever it is days telling Chatto it doesn’t. I wasn’t lying. Believe me, if I knew I’d have told him a long time ago.”

  “Chatto had no idea what the message was supposed to mean,” said Easy, “or whereabouts the dough was hidden?”