Small Bytes

by Robert Germaux

  * * *

  Following an early run, I was at Starbucks by eight the next morning. Irv was already there, and he came over to my table as soon as he spotted me.

  “Hey, Jeremy, good to see you,” he said. “Where’s this magic disc?”

  “Right here,” I told him, as I fished it out of the pocket of my lightweight jacket.

  “What am I looking for?” he asked.

  “Whatever’s on the thing,” I said.

  “I assume this is connected to the case you’re working on, that murder.”

  “Maybe,” I said, “but I honestly don’t know. I’m hoping you’ll be able to tell me once you’ve broken into the thing. Incidentally, I do have permission for you to try to get in.”

  “Whatever,” he said. From the look in his eyes, I could see that Irv was already thinking about ways to attack the disc.

  “I know your workload right now must be pretty heavy,” I said, “so if you need to put this aside for a while, it’s okay.”

  “Thanks, Jeremy,” he said. “I appreciate your not rushing me. I’m gonna put in an extra-long shift today so Eleanor can take a break. She worked some double shifts while I was away. As soon as I get home tonight, I’ll slip this baby into my computer and see what happens. If I come up with anything, I’ll give you a call.”

  After thanking him again, I left and walked over to my office, where I spent a couple of hours checking my mail. Some bank in Nebraska wanted to lend me fifty-thousand dollars. It was the third such offer from the same bank this month. I decided to hold out for the one-hundred-thousand dollar offer. No sense selling myself cheap.

  When I got home early that afternoon, I did a few things around the place until about three o’clock, when I decided to walk over to Mrs. Pendergrass’ place and take her up on that homemade apple pie offer. As I went out the front door of my townhouse, my mail carrier was just leaving. I waved to her and grabbed the mail from the box beside my front door. Today’s offerings included several pieces of junk, my electric bill, the engraved announcement of my brother’s one-man art show in Maryland and a party invitation. It was one of those little invitations that elementary age kids give to each other at school. I noticed that the return address label had Laura Fleming’s name, and that the envelope had been mailed somewhere in Monroeville early the previous day. Probably the post office, since I doubted mail was picked up anywhere else on a Sunday morning. Opening the envelope, I pulled out a single piece of paper, with the usual information listed that you see on these things. Someone had written the responses in crayon. This is what it said:

  What?

  A party

  Where?

  My place

  When?

  Friday night, 7:00

  Dress?

  Casual

  Near the bottom of the paper was another note in crayon that said RSVP, with Laura’s phone number. But what really caught my eye was the final line on the invitation, which was written in a beautiful and precise feminine hand.

  Favors will be provided.

  Chapter 40

  Irv hadn’t been able to do anything with the disc on his home computer, from which, incidentally, I firmly believed he could launch one of the space shuttles, so he’d told me that he was taking the disc to the university’s computer lab, where he no doubt had access to equipment capable of tilting the Earth’s axis. Until I heard from him, or, in one way or another, from Elias, there wasn’t much I could do. Denny had called and asked if I wanted to work out with him at the Y on Thursday night, so that’s where we were at seven o’clock when I heard from Elias. The Y has a room devoted to Nautilus equipment, and Denny and I were the only ones in there at the moment. Denny was wearing old navy sweatpants of indeterminate origin and a faded maroon T-shirt with the sleeves cut off. I had on my usual Y outfit: grayish sweatpants that have been laundered so many times I’m not sure what their original color was, and a short-sleeved yellow T with “Art is My Life” on the front, a gift from my brother. Denny was doing some abs work while I used the biceps machine. We were discussing where to go for a late meal when the five bruisers walked in. They were all big and white and mean-looking and wearing jeans and tight T-shirts. Scufflin’ clothes, nothing loose that an opponent could grab onto. I know it’s wrong to traffic in generalities, but the term redneck just leaped out at me. Also, I couldn’t help noticing that none of the five had an outfit that was color-coordinated. There are just no standards anymore.

  The head bruiser, a bald guy with one earring, walked over to where Denny and I were now standing together by the biceps contraption. He ignored me and spoke to Denny.

  “Okay, Smoke, this is your lucky day. You ain’t involved in this, so take a hike. And close the door behind you.”

  In this case, the generality had been pretty accurate.

  Denny looked at the bruiser, and then at me. Without saying a word, he walked over to the door. He put his hand on the knob. And then he closed the door.

  From the inside.

  And then he locked it.

  I smiled at Earring.

  “Hi there,” I said. “You guys in town for the Tupperware convention?”

  Earring said, “We’re in town to kick the shit out of you. And if dark meat back there wants to hang around, fine with us.”

  My smile grew wider, and I’m pretty sure my dimples were showing. That happens when I’m really happy. Or, occasionally, when I’m really pissed. Earring wasn’t getting the happy face version.

  Over the past few weeks, I’d had way too many people trying to intimidate me. It was starting to wear thin. I could feel the tension in my body. I crossed my arms at the chest, causing my biceps to swell.

  The doofus at Jake’s Bar and Grill. About to kick your ass if you don’t get the fuck outta here right now.

  The other four bruisers began to spread out a little.

  Manny. Drop the thing you’re workin’ on.

  One of the bruisers was angling in my direction. The other three were facing Denny now.

  Marko. Maybe you’ll take five seconds to get the hell out of here instead.

  Earring smirked and said to his buddies, “Two for the price of one today, guys.”

  The idiot in the elevator. You gonna get a beatin’.

  Earring reached out with his left hand and pushed me.

  And the tiger was loose.

  I grabbed Earring’s arm and twisted it. Hard. I heard something snap. It was a very satisfying sound. Meanwhile, the guy who’d been sneaking up on me tried to grab my arms. Unfortunately for him, he put his hands in the crooks of my elbows. I bent my arms up, locking his hands in place. Then I raised my right foot and brought it down hard on his right instep. It had the desired effect, and then I released his hands and turned around and smacked his ears with the palms of my hands. In movies and on television, you see people punching other people all the time, but in real life, that usually hurts like hell, so I try to avoid doing it when I can. Smacking somebody on the ears with an open palm does the job just as nicely.

  I glanced over at Denny. One of the remaining three bruisers was unconscious on the floor beside him, and the other two were warily approaching Denny from either side. I was starting over to help out when Earring suddenly punched me on the right side of my face. It was a good punch, one that he’d feel the effects of tomorrow but was doing the most damage to me at the moment. Had to give it to old Earring. I knew he had something broken in his left arm, but he was still coming. I turned around, ducked under another right from him, and gave him a short, hard left jab in the kidney. He doubled over a little, and I took advantage of that opportunity to put an uppercut on his chin. Sometimes you can’t avoid using the fist-against-face approach. My knuckles would be a little swollen tomorrow, but that was nothing compared to how bad Earring felt right now. He went down and stayed down.

  I turned back to Denny’s side of the room. The left side of his face had a reddish tint to it where somebody had hit him with something, but his
two opponents were much worse off. One of them had blood pouring from his nose, and the other was currently wrapped around the lats machine. His head seemed to be somewhat misshapen on one side. As I walked over to Denny, the remaining bruiser remembered about discretion and valor and bolted for the door, forgetting that it was locked. While he was frantically twisting the knob, Denny put his hand around the guy’s neck, lifted him off the floor, turned him around so they were facing each other, and then banged him back against the wall beside the door. When Denny released him, the guy slid slowly down to the floor and made no attempt to get back up.

  It was all over too fast. The tiger was back in the cage now, and Denny and I checked all five of the bruiser brothers for weapons. Surprisingly, none of them was armed. Denny used his cell phone to call for some black-and-whites to come and collect the rednecks. He also went out to his car and came back with his police revolver, just in case. We sat on the floor and waited for the gendarmes to arrive.

  “Tell me I didn’t hear you whistling Smoke Gets in Your Eyes a while ago,” I said.

  “Of course not,” he said. “That would have been too obvious.”

  “Not for this crew,” I said.

  “You got a point there,” he agreed.

  “Hey, let me ask you something else,” I said. “In situations like this one, do you psych yourself up by concentrating on the racial slurs these goobers used?”

  “Hell, no,” he said. “You saw those outfits. People dress like that, they need to take a beating every now and then.”

  Chapter 41

  None of the five had any kind of identification, and none of them would talk to us about who had hired them. Denny went with the uniformed cops who came to take the bad guys away. He’d be doing paperwork most of the night, so we cancelled our after-workout snack and promised to keep in touch regarding the newest members of our playgroup.

  Denny called me a little before nine the next morning.

  “Hope I got you outta bed,” he said. “I’ve been here since six. Don’t know why I bothered going home last night.”

  “I’ll have you know that I’ve been up and about since the crack of dawn,” I told him, as I pulled the covers back and sat on the edge of my bed.

  Denny chuckled and said, “Right, JB, and you sound groggy on account of the fierce beating you took last night.”

  “That works,” I told him. “I think I’ll go with it. Any luck on our friends?”

  “Nah, not yet,” he said. “We kept them separated last night and tried to get them to turn on each other, but they’re either incredibly loyal or extremely afraid. Since you and I both know that Manny’s gotta be somewhere in this, I’m guessing the latter. And speaking of Manny, he’s nowhere to be found.”

  “Surprise, surprise,” I said.

  “Actually,” Denny continued, “I think it’s only the guy with the earring knows who hired them. The others seem to be mostly just day labor. And Earring ain’t saying a thing, other than he wanted his lawyer.”

  “So what’s next?” I asked.

  “’Bout what you’d expect, JB. I can hold these guys on assault charges, but eventually they’ll make bail, even with one of the victims being a police officer. And we’ll keep looking for Manny. Meanwhile, why don’t you lie low for a bit, just in case Manny, or whoever, decides to try again, maybe more forcefully.”

  “I’ll be careful, Denny. Thanks.”

  After we’d hung up, I thought about whether I should have mentioned the disc to Denny, but I doubted if anyone on the force could crack the password faster than Irv could. Once I knew what was on the thing, if it related to the case, I’d tell Denny.

  Since I was semi-up anyway, I decided to get dressed and do some grocery shopping. Usually, I’m willing to brave the Giant Eagle without a weapon, but this morning I took my gun. You never know when that old lady handing out free samples of cheese spread is going to turn feisty on you when you tell her you’re on a non-dairy diet.

  The shopping excursion was uneventful, and as I walked back into the townhouse at a little before noon, my phone was ringing. It was Dee-Dee, and she was upset.

  “Jeremy!” she shouted. “You gotta come over here, right now. Somebody’s after me. Or after that disc. You gotta come over.”

  “Are you at home?” I asked.

  “No. I’m at Marko’s. It’s not far from my place. Can you come right now?”

  “I’ll leave right away.”

  She gave me the address. I was there in half an hour.

  * * *

  Marko lived in a surprisingly nice apartment complex. He had a garden apartment with a front-facing patio that had a grill and little picnic table and benches. The drapes were closed over the sliding glass door that led to the patio. When I knocked on the front door, to the left of the patio, Marko opened it with the chain still on. When he saw who it was, he closed the door and took the chain off and let me in.

  “Just so you know,” he said. “It wasn’t my idea to call you.”

  “I’ll make a note,” I told him. “Where’s Dee-Dee?”

  “Right here,” she said, as she walked in from the kitchen. She was wearing white slacks and a yellow pullover, and her face was puffy and red. Someone had been slapping her around, and not too long ago.

  “What happened?” I asked.

  “Sit down,” she said. She sat on the sofa, and Marko immediately sat beside her. I took one of the chairs on the other side of the coffee table.

  “Okay,” she said, “that disc thing? I had the copy all along. Terry gave it to me the last time I saw him, just before he was killed. He stopped by on his way home that night, just for a little while, and before he left, he gave me the disc. I asked him what it was, and he laughed and said it was his passport to a partnership. Anyway, he just told me to keep it for him for a while. He said he’d get it back from me later on.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you had it when I asked?”

  “’Cause I didn’t know what was on it. Since you were asking about it, I thought maybe it was valuable, you know? If I turn it over to you, maybe I never see it again. So I decided to wait awhile, try to find out what was on it. I put it in my computer, but I couldn’t get the damn thing to download. Then, last night, I realized that maybe I didn’t have to know what was on it as long as somebody else thought I did. So this morning, I called Terry’s law firm and asked to speak to Mr. Chaney. I knew he was the boss there. When I finally got him, I told him I had a disc that he probably wanted, and I offered to sell it to him.” She looked at me a little defensively and said, “I mean, Terry ain’t got no use for it anymore, right?”

  “Right,” I agreed. “Then what happened?”

  “That creep Chaney said he had no idea what I was talking about, and he hung up. An hour later, some asshole showed up at my apartment. I thought it was my new refrigerator being delivered. It took me three months to get the super to agree to give me one. When I opened the door, this guy pushed his way in and said he wanted the disc. I said what disc and he started slappin’ me. I tried to scream, but he grabbed me and stuffed a dishcloth in my mouth and threatened to kill me if I wasn’t quiet. He kept asking me where the disc was, and I kept telling him I didn’t know what he was talking about. Then Marko showed up.”

  I glanced over at Marko with a quizzical look in my eyes.

  “Dee-Dee told me last night that she might need some help with this refrigerator that was supposed to be delivered this morning, and I told her I’d drop by. When I got to her place, I heard some noises inside, so I called her name, and then I heard like a muffled scream, you know, so I tried the door. It wasn’t locked, so I went inside.”

  “That’s when the asshole pulled a gun and pointed it at Marko,” Dee-Dee said.

  “If he hadn’t had that gun,” said Marko, “I’d’ve reamed his ass for him.”

  “Anyway,” continued Dee-Dee, as though Marko hadn’t spoken at all, “this guy didn’t seem to know what to do. He looked at me and he loo
ked at Marko and then he just took off. I grabbed the disc, and Marko and me headed over here to his place, and I called you.”

  “You were lucky,” I said.

  “How do you figure that?” she asked.

  “Your visitor had probably been told to get the disc and, maybe, kill you. Maybe not. But then suddenly here’s Marko. The thug didn’t have the disc yet, and he probably didn’t know if there was a limit on the number of bodies he was allowed to leave behind. Not his fault, really. He was just lower-echelon, almost certainly out of the loop when it comes to decisions about the big picture. So he bolted.”

  “But how’d he know who I was or where I lived?”

  “Do you have a star-69 block on your phone?” I asked her.

  “Un-uh,” she said.

  “When you called Elias Chaney, he star-69ed you and got your number, which he then gave to somebody else, who was able to use it to get your address.”

  I was pretty sure I knew who the somebody else was.

  Dee-Dee reached into her purse and pulled out a disc, which she handed to me over the table.

  “Here,” she said, “I don’t know what’s on this thing, and I don’t want to. When people start coming at me with fists and guns, it’s time to get out of the game.”

  “Good thinking,” I told her. “Do you have a place where you can stay for a while?”

  “She can stay right here,” said Marko.

  “Un-uh,” I said. “You work with her. You’re too easy to find.”

  I turned back to Dee-Dee.

  “You got a relative or a friend you can stay with for a few days, until this thing is settled?”

  “Yeah, a friend of mine lives up near Erie. Sheryl would put me up for a while. She owes me a favor.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Marko and I will drive back to your place with you, so you can get some things together for your trip. Then Marko can drive you to your friend’s place.”

  Marko nodded his agreement.

  We left, and I followed Marko and Dee-Dee back to her apartment. Within an hour, they were on their way north. I told Dee-Dee to call me in a few days, so I could let her know if it was okay to come back.