"Yeah," Alex said, "and even if The Gold Cabaret knew her, they probably wouldn't come forward. Just the nature of the people who run those places. They're basically just pimps with some vestige of a conscience. And like any pimp, even if they don't think they've done anything wrong, they act like they have just in case."
"It's worth checking out," Gage said.
"What, you think they'll talk if you flash that picture around?"
"I'll be more creative than that. In the meantime, if you could dig up what you can on those foster kids, I'd appreciate it."
"I'll do what I can," Alex said. There was a crunching on the gravel outside, and he looked out at the parking lot. "Ah, here comes somebody we both know."
A yellow Volkswagen Beetle pulled off the highway and parked next to Alex's van, kicking up a cloud of dust. Eve, dressed in a white cardigan and a powder blue dress, climbed out, a wicker picnic basket slung under one arm. From a distance, Gage always thought she looked like a Mediterranean Michelle Pfeiffer, with jet black hair and a natural tan. Up close, he knew for a fact that she was prettier.
"What do you think she's got in the basket?" Gage said.
"Oh, lunch I'm sure," Alex said. "She claims the reheated hot pockets I dig out from the little fridge in the back aren't the best thing for my health."
"Too bad you've eaten."
"Oh, I'll eat again."
"Really? You've got a bigger appetite than me."
Alex gave Gage a wry look. "It has nothing to do with appetite. You do remember what it's like to be married, don't you?" Then, when he realized what had come out of his mouth, he immediately looked regretful. "Oh, man, I'm sorry. I didn't mean—"
"Don't be," Gage said. "The truth is, I have forgotten."
He tried to make the comment sound nonchalant to Alex, but he knew there was a lot of truth in it, and he felt a twinge sadness. Forgetting wasn't hard. Knowing you were forgetting was.
* * *
On the way home, the bright sun lit up the asphalt like a mirror. Mattie wasn't back yet, so Gage hobbled around the perimeter of her house, checking to make sure there was nothing wrong. Ever since Mattie had fallen ill, it was something he did once a week. Her black cat, sitting in her bedroom window, alternated between cleaning itself and watching him with the same level of intent it'd focus on a mote of dust. The tall grass dampened the hem of his trousers. He made a mental note to call the yard maintenance company; in the winter, they only came out upon request. He also noticed that a gutter on the north side was coming loose from the house, and told himself to remember to bring a hammer next time he came down.
When he came back around to the front, Zoe was pulling into the carport in Mattie's beat-up red Cherokee. Plumes of black smoke spitted out of the jeep's exhaust. Mattie herself was asleep in the passenger seat, chin on her chest, but when the car rattled to a stop, she jerked awake. Gage opened the door for her.
"What are you doing skulking around my yard?" she said.
"Madam," Gage said, "I'd suggest you be more precise with your language. A man with a cane is incapable of skulking."
"I thought so, too, until I saw you. That was skulking as sure as rain."
He offered her his arm, but she ignored it, struggling out of the vehicle with one hand on the door handle and the other on the edge of the seat. Her tattered gray sweater looked like the lint pulled out of the dryer, balled up in some places, full of holes in others. Zoe, as aloof as ever, didn't even ask; she simply grabbed Mattie under the arm and guided her toward the house. Gage hefted her suitcase out of the back.
He usually stopped by a couple times a week, but entering the little cottage, he was never fully prepared for the stifling sweat-odor, the stale air, and the lingering scents of the hundreds of incense candles Mattie had burned over the years. The furniture looked like it had been rescued from the dump, but the walls were covered with expensive prints by local artists. She insisted on taking refuge on the plaid recliner in the living room rather than setting up in her bedroom again.
Her face was flushed and she was breathing hard. Zoe got her some pillows and asked her if she wanted anything else.
"No," she said. "You've done more than enough, dear. Didn't you say you wanted to go to the outlet mall and get some jeans?"
"Aw, that can wait, Gram," she said.
"No, you go ahead. You been fussing around me for days. Garrison here can make sure I have what I need. Isn't that right, Garrison?"
"Your wish is my command," Gage said.
"See now? Go on."
Reluctantly, Zoe headed out in the Jeep, insisting she'd be gone only an hour. Gage told her he'd be glad to wait around longer than that, and she returned this offer with a look that would have grown icicles on the sun. After she was out of the driveway, he looked at Mattie.
"You told her," Gage said.
"I did no such thing," Mattie said. "She's just generally inclined to hate you."
"Well, that's a relief."
Two cats, a gray one and a calico, had already taken up their stations on her lap, both of them purring. She scratched them behind the ears. "Don't feel bad. She's generally inclined to hate everyone."
"Except you, of course."
"Oh, no, she hates me, too. Just not all the time. You thought any more about what I said?"
"About Zoe? I've tried not to."
"The clock's ticking, pardner."
"I try not to think about that, either."
Mattie leaned back against the green afghan draped over the headrest, closing her eyes. "Can you do something for me? Bring my suitcase over here."
He fetched it from the bedroom, where he'd put it, and placed it on its side next to the chair. She leaned over and cracked it open a few inches, dug through the top pocket and pulled out a plain yellow manila envelope, placing it on her lap. The effort appeared to drain her.
"Is this what I think it is?" Gage asked.
"I don't know," she said, "what do you think it is?"
"I think it's trouble."
The envelope wasn't sealed. She pulled out a dozen sheets all stapled together and handed them to him. One glance at the first page was enough to confirm his suspicions.
"Power of Attorney Questionnaire," he read.
"It's from my lawyer."
"Jesus, Mattie."
Now her eyes were open again, but they had a glazed look. "You can fill it out without saying yes. It's not official until you sign the actual power of attorney and get it notarized. This is just to help my lawyer get the process started."
Gage shook his head. "I don't know."
"Hey, it's okay. I'm not asking you to leap yet. It's just . . . I got to get the ball rolling so it's ready when you do. If you do. I can give you custody of Zoe in my will, which I'll do if you say yes, but these things can get sticky. I've heard horror stories. I've already signed a DNR, but who knows? If I linger on like a vegetable, or my thinking starts to change all of a sudden—it is brain cancer, you know—I don't want nothing undone. I can't leave it to chance."
"Mattie—"
"Nah, nah, it's all right. You don't have to give me an answer now. Just fill it out, okay? This really is the best way to give you custody, and I trust you with all my other stuff, too. What little there is. I just . . . I got to do my part while I still can. So it's all got to be good except for your say-so. I'm sorry if that's putting pressure on you. I don't mean to. I know you're scared."
"Scared! I'm not scared."
"Sure as shit you are. You'd be out of your mind otherwise. You'd be out of your mind even if Zoe was the sweetest little thing in the entire universe. This ain't no small thing I'm asking you. I know that. I also know you can do it, or I wouldn't have asked."
Gage looked at the paperwork. All those blank boxes literally put her request in black and white, dispensing with any hypotheticals. It made him feel queasy just looking at it. "I'll fill it out," he said.
"Thank you."
He slipped the paperwork into th
e inside pocket of his leather jacket.
* * *
Just as she said she would, Zoe returned an hour later. After swinging by the house, Gage headed to The Bugle. An unruly breeze buffeted him from every direction, and the strip of clouds along the horizon was an angry black. There was going to be a hell of a storm that night.
Climbing the stairs in the sheltered alcove, he heard the rhythmic clicking of a manual typewriter coming from within the Bugle's office. The door was cracked an inch and he pushed it open. Carmen, sitting at a folding table behind a typewriter in a different corner of the room, looked at him over the rims of her glasses. She wore the same black turtleneck as before. It didn't reveal an inch of neckline, but there was something about the way it molded to her curves that made it seem like it revealed more than a string bikini.
"A manual typewriter?" he said.
"You have something against manual typewriters, Mr. Gage?"
"It's not exactly modern technology."
She shrugged. "I'm addicted to the sound. There's nothing more satisfying to me than the clickety-clackety of my little Remington Portable. So, to what do I owe the pleasure? Twice in one day. A woman starts to feel special."
Gage closed the door. His knee throbbed, but he tried to hide his limp as much as possible as he made his way over to her. He realized he was doing this and felt foolish. What was he doing? He was a man with a cane. What could he hide?
"I need some information," he said.
"Ah."
There was no chair near her, but there was a metal filing cabinet, and he perched himself on this. "You've been in Barnacle Bluffs what, six months?"
"About. Why?"
"You think you know the seedier side of the town pretty well by now?
She smirked. "Seedier. What a nice fifties pulp way of putting it. But yeah, I suppose as well as anyone around here. What are you after?"
"I'm wondering who runs the sex trade around here."
Her eyebrows went up. "Why, you getting a little lonely? Facebook not enough for you?"
"I tried Facebook," Gage said, "but no one wanted to be my friend."
"Hard to believe, with your sparkling personality."
"I know. Actually, I want to know if there's an operation behind the sex trade here or if it's all just freelance stuff."
She took off her glasses and placed them upside down on her typewriter, then leaned back in her chair. "You think she was working as prostitute?"
"Did I say that?"
"You didn't need to."
He shrugged. "It's just one avenue I'm exploring. You can't tell me you didn't think of it."
"Of course," she said.
"So?"
"So . . . Barnacle Bluffs isn't New York, Garrison. If there's prostitution going on, it's small time. Heck, some of the prostitutes have even been caught advertising on Craigslist. That's how small it is."
"That's what I figured."
She held up a finger. "However . . ."
"I was hoping for that, too."
"There is somebody you could talk to. He won't tell you anything, but you could try."
"Who?"
She smiled. "Oh, no. You won't get this information for free. I want to know what you've learned about this girl so far."
"Hmm. Soon."
"Ah, so you have learned something?"
"Soon," he repeated.
"Mr. Gage, I'm getting the distinct feeling you don't trust me."
"Miss Hornbridge, it has nothing to do with trust. I'm just not quite ready for everything to be public knowledge. But you'll know before anyone else. Is that good enough for you to give me the name of the person I should talk to?"
"Nope. You'll have to do better."
"Like what?"
"You can't think of anything?"
"I'm racking my brains."
"Well," she said, "I guess you'll just have to take me to dinner tonight so you can rack your brains some more."
She said it with laughter in her eyes. It caught him off guard.
"Oh, don't do that," she said.
"What?"
"Go away like that. You're retreating back into your shell."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"It's just dinner, for God's sake. You have to eat. I have to eat. You tell me some interesting stories, and I'll give you the name of the person who might be of some use to you. I've been wanting to try the restaurant in that new hotel on the south end, The Tidepool. Need to write a review and I hate eating alone. Plus they mostly serve seafood and I hate seafood, so I could use another opinion."
"You moved to the Oregon coast and you don't like seafood?"
"Crazy, huh? So what do you say? Meet me at seven?"
He hesitated. "I don't know if that's a good idea, Carmen."
The wry grin didn't leave her face, but he saw the hurt in her eyes. "What, you have a hot date?"
"No, I just . . . need to stay focused on this case."
"Uh huh. And eating in some way impedes your focus?"
Her tone had turned brittle. He sensed that the conversation was going downhill, and he didn't quite know how to bring it back. "Look, do we really have to make this more complicated?"
"Not really."
"Okay then."
"Fine. How can I help you, sir? Did you want to place a classified ad?"
He shook his head. "Now who's retreating into their shell?"
Just for a moment, the look was there on her face again, the one he'd seen right before she'd left his house that morning. The vulnerability. This was a woman who had been hurt, and she wore her grins and her smirks and all her witty remarks as an armor that kept people from seeing the bruises.
It was there and then it was gone. She put on her glasses and squinted at the page in front of her.
"I've really got to get this done," she said.
"Gotcha," he said.
She started typing, the tapping of Remington as loud as thunderclaps. He headed for the door. When he had his hand on the knob, the typing stopped.
"His name is Jimmy Lourdenback," she said.
He looked at her. She was still staring at the page.
"I don't know where he lives," she said. "I don't even know if has a regular place to live. But you'll find him playing poker almost every weeknight at the casino. He has . . . connections. If you want something, he can usually get it for you. You know the kind of stuff I'm talking about. He wears suits so bright they're practically radioactive. Hard to miss."
"Thank you," Gage said.
Without looking at him, she started typing again.
Chapter 9
The rain started as a mist wetting his cheeks. Leaving The Bugle, the windsocks hanging outside the shops whipped back and forth in the gusts like mad pythons. By the time he pulled the van onto the highway, he could barely see the road through his whirring windshield wipers. Passing his house, heading for the outskirts of town, the downpour became a raging flood falling from the sky, slowing the busy weekend traffic to a crawl.
It was nearly four o'clock when he reached The Gold Cabaret, a stone block building with no windows and a neon orange sign proclaiming LIVE NUDE GIRLS; the place was right after a gravel pit and before an out-of-business boat repair shop. The gravel and mud parking lot, pock-marked with puddles, was half-filled with dented pickups, bumper-crumpled sedans, and other vehicles that looked like the castoffs from a used car lot.
The crackling on the roof of his van sounded like falling acorns. He slipped the pictures of the girl inside his leather jacket. Clamping his fedora against his head, he bobbled his way to the red metal door. His cane splashed in the puddles. He heard—felt, even—the pulsing beat of a rock song coming from the other side.
When he squeezed inside, a muscular bald white man in a tight black T-shirt was there on a stool. Gage paid him the five dollar cover charge. Led Zeppelin thundered from speakers in each corner of the room, the thumping bass hitting Gage like punches to the chest. A Latino woman
in garish purple make-up danced on the stage, naked except for a leather outfit that revealed rather than covered. She gyrated her hips in front of a couple twenty-year-old guys who were hooting and hollering and generally making asses of themselves. A few other guys sat a little farther back, tables immersed in shadows. There was no cigarette haze, but the smell still clung to the place.
Gage recognized the attraction of strip clubs, porn films, and the skin magazines. He understood the animalistic urges as well as any man. But for him personally, these things never held much appeal. A woman in a bikini was far sexier than a woman in nothing at all, and a woman in a well-cut silk dress was far sexier than a woman in a bikini. Give him the smoldering look across a crowded room over the fake lip-licking lust of a woman making love to a metal pole any day. Sex appeal was confidence and mystery and allure, none of which had anything to do with clothing—or the lack of it.
The bartender was a broad-shouldered man with a big handlebar mustache and a bad combover, dressed in the same black T-shirt as the bouncer. He was bent over, murmuring to the only person at the maple counter—a middle-aged woman with a face like dried-up yellow play dough and a bright perm of orange hair that made him think of Ronald McDonald. Gage took a seat on a stool one away from the woman.
The bartender sidled over to him. "What'll it be?" he said. His breath stank of pretzels and beer.
"Actually," Gage said, "I was wondering if I could talk to the manager."
"What's that?"
Gage raised his voice. "Could I talk to the manager?"
"About what?"
"About somebody who may have once worked here."
The man looked like he'd swallowed a lemon. When his face crinkled, his mustache bowed like an inverted V. "Man, it's just hands-off dancing. You want a friend, try one of those 1-900 numbers you see on your TV when you're watching the shopping network."
"Hey, thanks," Gage said. "You think that up all by yourself, or did you get that from the bartender book of one-liners?"
The man stared at him with the intensity of a pit bull. "Who the hell are you?"
The Gray and Guilty Sea Page 8
