He swivelled his head as far as the mask would let him and let his gaze settle on me. “Nooooo!” he said, which was pretty clear.
“Let go of my neck, Johnny honey,” his sister said. “You’re confused.”
“I’ll get someone,” I said, sliding out of my seat as he took a swipe in my direction. I edged out of the room and headed back to the nurses’ station. But one of his machines must have alerted them already because two of them were bearing towards me at the fastest clip possible without a walk turning into a run.
“He’s awake,” I said. “A bit distressed, but definitely awake!”
The nurses brushed past me and on into John Worth’s little side room. I shifted from foot to foot, swithering on which way to go. Back to see what was bothering John or home to the Last Ditch to find out what Todd had grubbed out of his bin?
Then a red light went on above the door to his room and one of the nurses came flying out, tugging an alarm hanging from a cord around her neck. I pressed myself back against the wall to let her pass and then scurried away.
Todd was sitting in my living room when I finally, finally, finally got back, after the Uber ride from the seventh circle of hell. I sneaked in round the back of the Skweek, battling an extra twenty feet of oleanders so I didn’t have to pass Della’s room, to find him sitting in my armchair staring at a black plastic bin bag resting on a white plastic sheet in the middle of the floor. He had an aerosol container in each hand, caps off, trigger fingers on nozzles, ready to go.
“Where have you been?” he said. “I thought the sister was only coming from Reno.”
“Uberland,” I told him. “I’d have been better on the bus. Have you just been sitting here the whole time?
“Sorry. Kathi wouldn’t let me take it into one of the rooms and I didn’t want to do it in the parking lot.”
“That’s not what I meant,” I told him. “I’m just amazed you’ve managed not to open it.”
“Open a garbage sack?” said Todd. “Are you crazy? I have no idea what’s in there. You open it, you skanky ho, and I’ll zap the critters before they escape.”
“What critters?” I said. “Did you feel it moving when you brought it over?” Todd shuddered and I saw a rash of goose pimples pop up on his forearms. He had pushed his sleeves back in case they interfered with his quick-draw aerosol action. I took a closer look at the cans. “Todd, is that the stuff from Costa Rica? You can’t spray that in here. Or at least let me open the window.”
I opened the window then, pulling on a pair of latex gloves—there were always latex gloves lying around anywhere Kathi spent time—I undid the orange ties on the sack and folded it back.
“Well!” I said.
Todd was pressed back in his chair with both arms held straight out in front of him. “What is it?” he said, sounding strained.
“There’s nothing in here for you to worry about,” I said. “Lay down your weapons and have a look-see.”
Todd narrowed his eyes at me, but he knows I would never ambush him with fruit flies or maggots. He set the canisters down, rose warily up onto his tiptoes, and peeked over the rim of the bag. Then he whistled, stood back down on his heels, and came closer.
“That is very interesting,” he said, whipping out his camera. “You take it out and I’ll photograph it.”
“Or,” I said, “we call Mike to come and take it away.”
“Right, right,” Todd said. “You unpack, I’ll snap, then we put it back and call Mike.”
“Deal,” I said. “Okay.” I snapped the blue gloves to make sure they were snug on my wrists and plunged my hands in. “Item one,” I said, pulling them out again. “Jimmy wig.” I turned it inside out. “No visible staples.”
“Check,” said Todd.
“Item two: kilt. Not a real one. Cheap costume quality.”
“Kilt,” said Todd. “Check.”
“Item three: leather-effect waistcoat. Aka vest. Not a real one. Cheap costume quality.”
“Village People biker vest,” said Todd. “Check.”
“Draught excluder,” I said, pulling out a long sausage of fabric stuffed with straw. “Home-made. And another draught excluder. And a huge draught excluder. And a—why are you not saying check?”
“Because I’m speechless at how dumb you are,” Todd said, watching me pull another one out of the sack. “Draught excluders?”
I was rootling in the bottom of the bag for the last item. “And a severed head,” I concluded. “Oh! They’re not draught excluders, are they? They’re arms and legs.”
“And a torso,” Todd. “To put the kilt on.”
“Ew,” I said, pulling a tiny little draught excluder with two round supports out of the bin bag’s last corner.
“So … that’s true?” Todd said. “Scottish men don’t wear anything underneath?”
“It’s true,” I said.
“But they do those dances with all the swinging around.”
“They do,” I said. “But on a real kilt—not this thing, but on a real one—the pleats are stitched down to hip height and the sporran chain adds a bit of battening too. And remember it weighs nine pounds.”
“What does?” said Todd, round-eyed.
“The kilt, you pig!” I said. “It’s really hard to get it to fly up from Scottish dancing. Now, a Scottish-Jewish wedding, on the other hand? When they lift the groom up on a chair?”
Todd was quiet for a minute, imagining. And I was quiet for a minute revisiting some happy memories. Then we shook ourselves back to attention.
“So this fake Mel Gibson dude was dressed up and sitting on John Worth’s porch over Halloween?” Todd said. “And then all of a sudden, when the Voyager publishes Tam’s identity, Worth dismantles the display, like it’s some big emergency.”
“With his sister’s help. But even with his sister’s help it’s so stressful he has a heart attack. Oh, he came round by the way. He heard me talking to his sister about the reunion and he pretty much willed himself awake. It was like Moby Dick breaking through the waves, Todd. You should have seen it!”
“But how does draft-stopper-fake-guy relate to real dead Tam?” Todd said.
“A decoy? Only, that just raises the question … ?”
“Where was Tam?” said Todd. “The non-fake dude, in the fake-nude suit.”
“Presumably with a kilt of his own on top,” I agreed. “Isn’t there a big spread in the Voyager the day after Halloween? Porch-decorating finalists?”
“There is,” said Todd. “And I bet the photographer has five thousands shots of porches all over town that didn’t make the grade.”
“Do you know him?” I said. “Any chance you could bat your eyelids?”
“Her,” said Todd. “And no. I tried to get her to delete a pic of me in a fun run one year where I looked as fat as a blimp and she got really weird about it. Photographers, you know.”
“We should hand this over to Mike,” I said.
“Not yet,” said Todd. “Not before we put this back in John Worth’s garbage can for Mike to find.”
“You’re right about that,” I said. “But I didn’t just mean the stuff, I mean the lead. Mike could get a search warrant for the photos. We really need to hand over what we know.”
“We do,” Todd agreed. Technically. But his voice was as dead as a dude who’d been ripped up into five draught excluders. “Or, even if we can’t get the photographer to cough up, we can check out all the photos that made it onto the website.”
“There’s something I’d like to do too,” I said. “After dark, I’d like to go through the Moes’ wheeliebins.”
“Wheeliebin!” said Todd.
“Garbage carts, whatever,” I said. “See if they’ve just shoved everything in there for the dustmen on Monday.”
“Dustmen!” Todd said.
“Sanitation engineers, whatever.”
“But why?” said Todd.
“Because I think John Worth killed Tam and stashed him on someone’s porch and that someone found him and chucked him in the slough. But if they didn’t unstaple his hat, they might have skimped on all the other clean-up too.”
“But unless it’s one of the Moes,” Tam said, “it could be anyone. It wouldn’t even need to be someone from the class of sixty-eight, would it?”
“No,” I admitted. “But we could try cross-referencing porches with the yearbook. We might get lucky. Mind you, the library shuts in twenty minutes so we’re going to have to hustle up there and speed read.”
“Or,” said Todd, “wear that coat with the kangaroo pouch. Twenty minutes isn’t enough.”
“Téodor Mendez Kroger, MD,” I said. “Are you suggesting I steal a library book?”
“For a good cause? For the weekend? Absolutely.”
Sixteen
This time, I knew where the yearbook was to be found and didn’t need to alert a librarian to our presence. I strode to the shelf, slipped the book under my arm, went round the corner, jammed it into my pouch pocket, and sashayed back to Todd in New Mystery. I had to sashay instead of striding because of the way the four pounds of book made my poncho swing. If it swung on its own while I marched along behind, it would raise suspicions. This way, it looked as if my Marilyn Monroe wiggle was the source of it all and the only question to pop into an onlooker’s head would be why someone channelling Jessica Rabbit when it came to gait was wearing a poncho.
“What are you doing?” said Todd as I sidled up. “You might as well carry a sign saying I’m filching a book.”
“It’s wanging about. What am I supposed to do?”
“Don’t say wang. Give it to me and I’ll stick it down the back of my jeans.”
“You’ll never be able to walk with something this heavy in your jeans,” I said.
Maybe it was all down to his marvellous posture, and maybe I should go with him to one of these yoga classes he was always nagging me about, but with that solid slab of yearbook tucked in the back of his waistband he strolled out of the library like a Cold War spy crossing Checkpoint Charlie. He might have tensed a bit going through the security gate but evidently a fifty-year-old high school yearbook wasn’t worth a magnetic strip and no alarm went off as Todd passed the sensors.
“Where to?” I said, when we were back in the Jeep. “Home?”
“Way to fail to hustle like a dying European monarchy, Lexy,” Todd said. “No way. We need to get on this. I’m going to drive back to the Moes’ houses to check their garbage cans while you cross-check porch tableau finalists on the Voyager website with graduates of the class of sixty-eight. And if you find any matches, we’ll check their garbage cans too. We’ll be done in time to take the evidence to Mike if she’s working as late as yesterday. Can you read in a moving vehicle without barfing?”
“In an automatic doing twenty-five in a forest of stop signs?” I said. “I think I’ll be okay.”
By the time we stopped at Mo Heedles’s house—or rather, around the nearest looping corner on Lassen Avenue, so she didn’t see us—I had confirmed that there was at least one more Jimmy-bewigged porch zombie and he was slumped at the front door of one Lampeter family.
“Look for Lampeter in the yearbook,” Todd said. He was turning a blue latex glove inside out leaving the fingers on the inside.
“What are you doing?”
Todd leaned over me into the glove box and took out a Mars Bar. He unwrapped it, broke half off, and dropped it into the glove.
“Does that look like dogshit?” he said.
“Totally. How many times has it melted, and can I eat the other half?
He tied the glove shut. “Does it look like a poop bag?”
“Yip. Can I eat the other half?”
Todd took his belt off and attached his titanium pitcher’s necklace to the buckle end.
“Does that look like a dog’s lead?”
“Not bad. Can I—”
“Didn’t you know Roger keeps candy in the glove compartment?” Todd said. “In case of diabetic hitchhikers.”
I was speechless. I had been in a car with a melted Mars Bar all these times and never knew.
“Look for Lampeters,” Todd said again and let himself out of the driver’s door. His disguise was perfect. He was, to a T, a dog walker with a turd to get rid of. And this being Cuento’s second-poshest neighbourhood, the wheeliebins were at the kerb nice and early for Monday’s pick-up. I didn’t understand it—back home, wheeliebins lolling kerbside was the mark of the ghetto—but I’d seen it often enough not to question it anymore.
I was bent over the yearbook, Lampeter-hunting, when Todd threw himself back in to the driver’s seat, started the engine, and peeled away, still with the makeshift poo bag dangling from one hand and the makeshift dog lead dangling from the other.
“Shit, did she see you?” I said.
“No,” said Todd, taking a corner on two wheels. “I’m just enjoying myself. Did you find anyone? Want me to take a turn?”
“Not yet,” I said. “I take it you didn’t find anything in the bin?”
“Nothing Halloween-related,” Todd said. “More used Q-tips than I ever wanted to see, but no plaid and no ‘draught excluders.’” I ignored his air quotes. “Are you nearly finished?”
“I keep getting distracted,” I said. “It’s all so mysterious. Junior Varsity, Sophomore Metro League.”
“I can’t imagine school life in Dundee,” Todd said. “Is it just rows of little barefoot kids scratching on slates with pointed sticks?”
“Invitational Track Meet. What does it all mean?”
“Quit goofing off, Lexy. You’ll only find half the student body back there in 1968, years before Title IX.”
“Eh?”
“Flip to the senior class and do it methodically.”
I flipped. I actually flipped too far. And then I flipped out.
“Oh. My. God,” I said.
“Join them up,” Todd told me. “You sound insane.”
“Pull over,” I said, clicking the overhead light and holding the book up. “Here she is. Joan Lampeter. Here they all are! John Worth gets a whole page spread of his own and there they are, facing page. Maureen ‘Mo’ Tafoya, Maureen ‘Mo’ Heedles, some kid called Patricia ‘Patti’ Ortiz, and Joan Lampeter! Like a backing group.”
Todd whistled. “President, Secretary, Treasurer, Class Councilor, and Class Councilor,” he said.
“And I’ll tell you something else too,” I said. “Becky Worth told me today that someone called Joan is missing. The only one who stays away from the reunions.”
Todd whistled again.
“Is there any way this is a coincidence?” I said. “There they all are, as cosy as cosy can be. All but one of the names that came up as soon as we scratched the surface of this inquiry.”
“It’s a stretch,” said Todd. He was driving again. Gagging to get into Mo Tafoya’s bins, I reckoned. “Who’s the vice pres?” he asked, as we turned into 14th Street. It was even darker than Lassen Avenue, Cuento-ites loathing light pollution so much they might have been vampires. I held the book up closer to the light. There was some writing in the centre of the page in the bit of space between the girls’ pictures.
“Oh. My. God!” I said again. “And don’t tell me to join them up because … Oh.”
“My?” he supplied.
“God. Vice President, not pictured. Guess who?”
Todd didn’t so much park as just stop in the middle of the road. “No way,” he said.
“Thomas Oscar ‘Tam’ Shatner,” I said.
“Oh,” Todd agreed.
“My,” I added.
“God. Well, well, well. Looks like what Becky said might be true.”
“John Worth was no knuckle-dragger if he made the only gay in the village his deputy?” I said. “Or is it voted on?”
“Nope,” Todd said. “President is voted on, but the deputy is the president’s pick. This keeps on getting weirder.” He opened the door. “Get online, Lexy, and see if this Patti … ”
“Ortiz,” I said.
“Yeah, see if Patti Ortiz still lives in Cuento. Or at least see how many Ortizes live in Cuento and then we can try them all and see if they’ve got an Aunt Patti somewhere.”
“Are you going to go up the path to where the bin’s stashed?” I said.
“Can’t think how else to rake through the garbage, can you?”
“What if someone sees you? They won’t buy the dogwalker act if the bin’s not kerbside, will they?”
“Nope,” said Todd. He tossed the glove with the half Mars Bar into my lap. “Help yourself.”
But there are limits. I flicked it onto the floor. “So … what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to do my Drunk with a Full Bladder,” Todd said. “Even if one of the neighbors sees me and challenges me, they’ll wait till I’m done.”
“Ew,” I said, but as I watched him I thought he was probably right. He weaved along the street then made a wide tacking turn into the shrubbery separating Mo Tafoya’s garden from the house next door. He was fumbling at his zip as he disappeared into the shadows. I wouldn’t have followed him.
Minutes later, he came lurching back out again. Empty-handed. Just in case anyone was watching, I clambered over the drinks holders into the driving seat. Cuento-ites might not be uptight enough to call the cops because a drunk took a leak, but they would surely dial it in if he drove off afterwards.
“Well?” I said, as Todd got in the passenger side.
“Nada. Wherever Also-Mo put her zombie, it wasn’t in her garbage. Did you find Ortizes?”
“You find them,” I said, starting the engine and moving off slowly. “I can’t phone them anyway, with my memorable accent. Oh!” A sudden thought had struck me. “Remember Also-Mo saying You? that weird way when we rocked up on her doorstep? Do you think it was me? My voice? Maybe? Because she didn’t know either of us, did she? So what was she reacting to?”
Scot & Soda Page 15
