La Brava

by Elmore Leonard

"I don't know..."

  LaBrava didn't wait. The flash went off as he triggered the camera tight to his right eye, cocked it with his thumb, shot the second time, cocked and shot again.

  "Set it lower and get another one."

  "That's enough," LaBrava said.

  "I want to be sure we got something."

  "We got it," LaBrava said. "Take her out the front and I'll bring the car around."

  There was another girl in the office now who seemed only a few years older than Pam but more grown up, in charge. Coming into the room again LaBrava heard her tell Nobles she was the supervisor and wanted to see some identification or there would be nothing to discuss. Right away LaBrava liked her confidence. He liked her slim build in jeans standing with long legs apart, arms folded, brown hair waved to her shoulders. A good-looking girl who knew what she was doing.

  Nobles dug a wallet out of his back pocket, turning sideways and brushing his silver jacket open so they would see the checkered walnut grip of a revolver stuck in the waist of his jeans. Saying, "Boca police brought this lady here happens to be a friend of mine. See, I checked with them and they said it would be okay to release her to my custody. They said fine, go ahead." He flipped open the wallet to show a gold shield on one side, an I.D. card bearing his photograph on the other. "See what it says there? Palm Beach County."

  The slim girl took a half step, extending her hand and he flipped the wallet closed. She said, "Palm Beach County what? If the Boca Police said it was okay, they'd have called to let us know. That's how it works."

  Nobles shook his head, weary. "Look, I'm doing you a favor. Lemme have the lady and we'll say nighty-night, let you all go on back play with your nuts."

  "No one leaves without authorization," the slim girl said, standing right up to him.

  "I'm giving you authorization. Jesus Christ, I just now showed it to you."

  LaBrava said, "Excuse me. Would somebody like to open the front door?"

  Nobles gave him a look, cold, with no expression, and the slim girl said, "Show me identification or get out. That's the way it is. Okay?"

  LaBrava watched Nobles sigh, shake his head--not so drunk that he couldn't put on an act--and flip open the wallet again. "What's that say? Right there? Palm Beach County authorization." Giving her a flash of official wording and flipped the wallet closed.

  He's not a cop.

  LaBrava would bet on it. He heard the girl say, "That's not PBSO or any badge I've ever seen before."

  Nobles shook his head again. "Some reason you got your ass up in the air. Did I say I was with the Palm Beach sheriff's office? You don't listen good, do you? See, long as I got credentials as to who I am and Boca PD says it's fine with them, then tell me what your problem is, puss, cause I sure as hell don't see it."

  Sounding drunk, but with a swagger that was part the guy's brute nature and would not be contained for long; his size, his eighteen-inch neck giving him permission to do as he pleased. LaBrava had known a few Richard Nobles.

  The guy was no cop.

  He might've been at one time; he had a service revolver and the official off-duty look of a small-town cop taken with himself, but he wasn't one now.

  The slim girl had already assumed as much. She was looking at Pam, telling her, "Get Delray Police, 276-4141."

  Nobles said, "Hey, come on," watching Pam dial. "Look, this lady you got happens to be a friend of mine. Officer at Boca name of Glenn Hicks says they brought her in here. See, I was even with her earlier tonight, having some drinks." He watched the slim girl step to the side of the desk and take the phone from Pam. "Ask her. Go on..."

  The slim girl said into the phone, "This is South County on Fourth Street. There's a gentleman here who's been asked to leave and refuses. I'd like you to send somebody to escort him the fuck out of here, right now... Thank you very much." She looked at Pam again. "Unlock the back door."

  Pam edged around the desk, all eyes as she looked at Nobles standing in front of her, in the way. She said, "There is a Boca officer named Glenn Hicks. He's been here before."

  The slim girl said, "I don't care who he knows or if he's with the FBI. This guy's got no business being here."

  LaBrava was falling in love with her. He watched her look directly at Nobles again.

  "You've got about two minutes to get out of here or you're gonna be in deep shit."

  Nobles said, "All I need, puss." He reached for her. The slim girl pulled her arm away without giving ground, glaring at him.

  LaBrava said, "Let's take it easy, okay?" Trying to sound reasonable, an observer, but knowing he was getting into it.

  Nobles, close to where the drunk and the rigid man sat watching, turned to LaBrava, raised a fist with a finger pointing out of it. A clot of blond hair hung down in his eyes. He said, "I'll put you through the wall you fuck with me, you little son of a bitch."

  An ugly drunk. Look at the eyes. Ugly--used to people backing down, buying him another drink to shut him up. Look at the shoulders stretching satin, the arms on him--Jesus--hands that looked like they could pound fence posts. LaBrava, with the camera hanging from his neck, did not see anything close by to hit him with.

  The slim girl picked up the phone again. Nobles reached for it as she started to dial, yanked the phone out of her hands and gave her a shove. The slim girl yelled out. Nobles raised the phone over his head, as a threat or to club her with it, LaBrava wasn't sure.

  He stepped in, said, "Hey--" as he raised the camera with the flash attached, put it in Nobles' face and fired about a hundred thousand candles in the guy's eyes, blinding him, straightening him for the moment LaBrava needed to hit him in the ribs with a shoulder, drive him into clattering metal chairs, close to the drunk and the rigid man. LaBrava got Nobles down on his spine, head hard against the wall to straddle his legs. Worked free the bluesteel revolver stuck in his jeans, a familiar feel, a .357 Smith. Held him by the hair with one hand and slipped the blunt end of the barrel into his open mouth. Nobles gagged, trying to twist free.

  LaBrava said, "Suck it. It'll calm you down."

  They got him into a room, Nobles rubbing the back of his neck, looking around before they pulled the door closed, saying, "Hey, who the hell you suppose to be?"

  LaBrava said, "The asshole photographer," and locked the door.

  They locked the gun in the desk. He told the slim girl he hoped the guy didn't try to bust the place up before the cops came; he'd stay if she wanted him to. She said it had been busted up before, look at it. God. She said thanks, really, but he'd better get out of here or he might be hanging around all night, the cops playing games with him. They might be the guy's buddies. She said she wouldn't be surprised if they let the guy out and all laughed their ass off. Cops really thought they were funny. Some of them anyway. Talking, nervous now that it was over. She was some girl. Supervisor here, but forced to work all hours, the slim girl's name was Jill Wilkinson.

  He asked her what she thought Nobles did. She said he was probably a rent-a-cop, he acted like one.

  That's what he was, too. LaBrava checked the dark-blue Plymouth sedan parked out in back before going to the Mercedes. There was a gold star on the door and the inscription STAR SECURITY SERVICE, PALM BEACH COUNTY, FLORIDA.

  He drove around front to see Pam and Maurice coming out with the woman, Jeanie Breen, the woman with her head lowered but as tall as Maurice and as pale as her dress, letting him help her with his arm around her waist. They got in back, Maurice saying to him, "What were you doing, shooting the drunks?"

  Maurice told him they were going to stop in Boca, pick up some of Mrs. Breen's things. Mrs. Breen was coming back to South Beach with them, stay at the hotel a while.

  After that Maurice's tone was soft, soothing, and LaBrava would look at the mirror to be sure it was Maurice back there. The little bald-headed guy, his glasses catching reflections, the woman a pale figure curled up in his arms. Maurice calling her sweetheart, telling her a change would be good... talk to your old pal... whate
ver's bothering you. Get a new outlook. LaBrava heard the woman say, "Oh, shit, Maury. What's happening to me?" Worn out. Still, there was an edge to her tone. Life in there. Anger trying to break through the self-pity.

  What was her problem--living in a luxury condominium on the ocean--if her hair wasn't falling out or she didn't have an incurable disease?

  Maybe living in the luxury condominium on the ocean. By herself.

  It did not occur to LaBrava until later--cruising at seventy, the dark car interior silent--that the woman in the back seat could be the same one Nobles had tried to take out of there. A woman he'd been drinking with earlier in the evening.

  Chapter 4

  LaBRAVA DID HIS PORTRAIT WORK in an alcove off the Della Robbia lobby that Maurice said had originally been a bar: the area hidden now by a wall of cane screening nailed to a frame and clay baskets of hanging fern.

  This morning he was working with the Leica, wide-angle lens and strobes, shooting the young Cuban couple, Paco Boza and Lana Mendoza, against a sheet of old, stiff canvas that gave him a nothing background. Paco sat in his wheelchair wearing a straw hat cocked on the side of his head, one side of the brim up, the other down, cane-cutter chic. Lana stood behind the wheelchair. She wore a cotton undershirt that was like a tank top and would stretch it down to show some nipple in the thin material. Pretty soon, LaBrava believed, she would pull the undershirt up and give him bare breasts with a look of expectation. The two of them were fooling around, having fun, stoned at 11 A.M.

  LaBrava said, "Don't you want to look at each other?"

  "At him?" the girl said. "I look at him and wish I never left Hialeah."

  "Why don't you go home then?" Paco said, looking straight up over his head.

  The girl looked down at him. "Yeah, you wouldn't have nobody to push you. He sit in this thing all day."

  LaBrava released the shutter and went down to his knees, eye level. "Come on, this's supposed to be young love. You're crazy about each other."

  "Like The Blue Lagoon, man," Paco said, looking bland, cool, not reacting when the girl punched him on the back of the neck.

  "He's crazy all right," she said.

  "That Blue Lagoon, man, you see that? Why did it take them so long, you know, to get it on? Man, they don't do nothing for most of the movie."

  The girl punched him again. "They kids. How do they know how to do it, nobody tell them."

  "I knew," Paco, the lover, said, grinning. "It's something a man is born with, knowing how to do it."

  "You the creature from the blue lagoon," the girl said, "tha's who you are." Stretching now, bored.

  LaBrava got it, the girl's upraised arms, the yawn hinting at seduction.

  But he was losing it, hoping for luck. He had begun with a good feeling and it would be in the first two head-on shots if he got it. Now he was moving around too much. He felt like a fashion photographer snicking away as the model throws her hair and sucks in her cheeks, getting split moments of the model pretending to be someone who wanted to go to bed with the photographer or with the lights or with whatever she saw out there. He didn't want Boza and Mendoza to fall into a pose unless he could feel it was natural, something they wanted to do. But they were showing off for him now.

  LaBrava said, "I think that'll do it."

  Paco said, "Man, we just getting loosey goosey."

  The girl said, "Hey, I got an idea. How about... one like this?"

  In the Della Robbia lobby, close to the oval front window, the old ladies would nod and comment to each other in Yiddish, then look at the young, frizzy-haired girl again to listen to her advice.

  "It saddens me," the girl said, and she did sound sad, "when I see what neglect can do to skin. I'm sure you all know there's a natural aging process that robs skin of its vitality, its lustre." If they didn't know it, who did? "But we don't have to hurry the process through neglect. Not when, with a little care, we can have lovely skin and look years and years younger."

  The girl was twenty-three. The youngest of the ladies sitting in the rattan semi-circle of lobby chairs had lived for at least a half century before the girl was born. But what did they know about skin care? Rub a peeled potato on your face, for sunburn.

  She told them that extracts of rare plants and herbs were used in Spring Song formulations to fortify and replenish amniotic fluids that nourish the skin. The old ladies, nodding, touched mottled cheeks, traced furrows. They raised their faces in the oval-window light as the girl told them that women have a beauty potential at every age. She told them it gave her pleasure to be able to provide the necessities that would help them achieve that potential. It was, in fact, this kind of satisfaction, making women of all ages happy, proud of their skin, that being a Spring Song girl was all about.

  She gave the ladies a pert smile, realigned the plastic bottles and jars on the marble table to keep moving, busy, as she said, "I thought for this first visit I'd just get you familiar with the Spring Song philosophy. Then next time I'll give a facial, show you how it works."

  A voice among the women said, "You don't tell us how much it is, all this philosophy mish-mosh."

  "We'll get into all that. Actually," the girl said, "I came to see the manager. What's his name again?"

  "Mr. Zola," a woman said. "A nice man. Has a cute way."

  There were comments in Yiddish, one of the ladies referring to Maurice as a k'nocker, Mr. Big Shot. Then another sound, in the lobby, tennis shoes squeaking on the terrazzo floor. The girl turned to look over her shoulder.

  "Is that Mr. Zola?"

  "No, that's Mr. LaBrava, the loksh. He's like a noodle, that one."

  "He's a cutie, too," a woman said. There were more comments in Yiddish, voices rising with opinions.

  "Listen, let me give you an exercise to start with," the girl said. "Okay? Put the tips of your fingers here. That's right, in the hollow of your cheeks..."

  LaBrava checked his mail slot on the wall behind the registration desk. Nothing. Good. He turned to see the girl coming across the lobby. Weird hair: it looked tribal the way it was almost flat on top, parted in the middle and frizzed way out on the sides. Pretty girl though, behind big round tinted glasses...

  She said, "Hi. You don't work here, do you?"

  Violet eyes. Some freckles. Smart-looking Jewish girl.

  "You want Maurice," LaBrava said. "He should be down pretty soon. He's visiting a sick friend."

  "You know if there's a vacancy?"

  "I think somebody just moved out."

  "You mean somebody died," the girl said. "I want a room, but I don't plan to stay that long."

  "You want a one-bedroom or a studio? The studio's only three and a quarter." LaBrava looked over at the women, their mouths open saying "ohhhhh," as they stroked their cheeks in a circular motion.

  "Studio, that's a hotel room with a hot plate," the girl said. "I've been there. In fact I just left there. I'm at the Elysian Fields and I need more space."

  "What're they doing? The ladies."

  "Working the masseter. That's the muscle you masticate with."

  "You think it'll do 'em any good?"

  "Who knows?" the girl said. "They're nice ladies. I figure those that weren't raped by Cossacks were mugged by Puerto Ricans. It won't do them any harm."

  "You're the Spring Song girl," LaBrava said. "I've seen you on the street, with your little kit. How you doing?"

  "I'm up to my ass in cosmetic bottles, nine kinds of cream by the case. Also, I've got tubes of paint, sketch pads, canvases all over my room, I've got shitty light and I need more space."

  "I was at the Elysian Fields for a week last summer," LaBrava said. "This place's much better. Cleaner."

  "Are you saying there no roaches?"

  "Not as many. You see a loner once in a while. Think of it as a palmetto bug, it doesn't bother you as much. You paint, uh?"

  "Some oil, acrylics mostly. I'm getting ready to do Ocean Drive, figure out my views before they tear it all down."

&nbs
p; "Who's tearing it down?"

  "Progress. The zoners are out to get us, man, cover the planet like one big enclosed shopping mall. We're getting malled and condoed, if you didn't know it. Gray and tan, earth tones. The people that designed these hotels, they had imagination, knew about color. Go outside, all you see is color and crazy lines zooming all over the place. God, hotels that remind you of ships..."

  "I'm glad you explained that," LaBrava said. "I've always liked this neighborhood and I never was sure why." She gave him a sideways look, suspicious. Really weird hairdo but he liked it. "I mean it. I feel at home here and I don't know why."

  "Because it's cheap," the girl said. "Listen, you don't have to know why. You feel good here, that's reason enough. People always have to have reasons instead of just feeling." She said, "You're the photographer, aren't you?"

  Recognition. LaBrava leaned on the cool marble-top counter: artist relaxed, an unguarded moment. "Yeah, I guess so."

  "Aren't you sure?"

  "I'm just starting to get used to the idea."

  "I saw your show over at the Emerson Gallery, it's dynamite. But all the color here--why aren't you into color?"

  "I don't know how to use it. I feel safer with black and white."

  "You selling anything?"

  "A few more street shots than portraits."

  "Well, what do they know. Right? Fuck 'em. You have to do what you do."

  "You have to get mad?"

  "If it helps. Why not? It's good to be hungry, too. You do better work."

  She had a healthy build, tan arms, traces of dark hair. She would go about one-twenty, LaBrava judged; not the least bit drawn, no haunted, hungry-artist look about her. Gold chain. Rings. The white blouse was simple and could be expensive. But you never knew. He said, "You want some lunch? We can go across the street, the Cardozo. They got a nice conch salad, good bread."

  "I know, I've seen you over there. No, first I have to see about new digs. I'm not going back to that fucking cell I've been living in. You have to go in sideways."

  LaBrava looked up at the sound of the elevator cables engaging, the electric motor whining. He said, "You may be in luck," staring across the lobby at the elevator door, a gold sunburst relief. The door opened and he said, "You are. That's the manager."