Geezer Paradise

by Robert Gannon

  "I'm sure she'll understand," I said. We got back on the road and headed toward Sofie's house.

  The next day I got a call from Evelyn. I had to pick Oscar up as soon as possible.

  "What happened?" I asked.

  "I think the honeymoon is over," Evelyn said. "I woke up this morning to the sound of screeching, and things bouncing off the walls. Lulu was throwing things at Oscar, and Oscar was hiding under the bed."

  "That doesn't sound good," I said. "I'll be there as soon as I can."

  Sofie was worried about Oscar. She rushed me out the door to get him.

  "That hussy," she said. I assumed she was talking about Lulu and not Evelyn.

  "I'll go with you," Willey said. We got into the Wrangler and drove north on 19 to Port Richie, on a mission to save Oscar from married life.

  Evelyn opened the door. She looked a wreck. Her hair was standing up in spikes and her blouse was hanging out of her slacks on one side.

  "I'm so glad you're here," she said. "I'll get Oscar."

  When she returned with Oscar we saw he had a bandage wrapped around his head, a small splash of red was showing over his left eye. Lulu must have a good pitching arm. I apologized to Evelyn and she apologized to me.

  "Kids," she said. "Go figure." We both shook our heads.

  Evelyn smoothed her hair down with her hands. She said, "Barney, you'll have to come by for coffee once you get your piece about Weeki Wachee finished. I'd love to read it."

  "I will," I said, and then we said goodbye. Was I imagining things, or was Evelyn coming on to me? Of course, in South Florida any man that is still breathing is up for grabs, so I didn't let it go to my head.

  We settled Oscar into the back seat. He wasn't himself. He was subdued, looking glum, and staring straight ahead.

  "Well Oscar," Willey said. "You can't live with them, and you can't live without them." Oscar didn't appreciate Willey's humor.

  When we got Oscar back to Sofie, she hovered over him like a mother hen, patting his head and telling him what a good boy he was. She made him some lunch, but he only picked at it. Then she tucked him into bed and let him take a nap. He looked like he needed it.

  The next afternoon Willey and I got tired of watching the river and decided to go down to the main drag, Dodecanese Boulevard, and watch the tourists. We asked Sofie if we could leave Oscar with her. She didn't mind at all. We didn't want to call attention to ourselves, and Oscar was a people magnate. We asked Snydely if he wanted to come with us, but he thought it would be too dangerous. He was probably right.

  Willey and I got into the Wrangler and drove down to Dodecanese Boulevard. We found a two dollar parking space behind a gift shop. That's about the cheapest parking you can find. We parked, walked out to the front of the shop, and went in to pay the lady behind the counter.

  It was a weekend afternoon and the Boulevard was jammed with tourists. It didn't look like the hurricane did much damage to the area. We walked past the numerous small shops. Across the street the sponge boats were sitting peacefully at their moorings along the sidewalk. They didn't show any signs of hurricane damage, either. As we passed a bakery we were drawn back to it by the aroma. Suddenly we were starving. We turned around and went in. We took a small table near the windows and ordered from the counter. We both ordered coffee and hot spinach pie. You can't beat the spinach pie in Tarpon Springs, except for Sofie's. We settled into our spot and watched the tourists go by. Across the street the sight-seeing boats full of people glided past the sponge boats. I felt I like I could reach out and touch them. It was a pleasant way to spend an afternoon.

  Afterward we walked down to the cigar hut and bought a couple of cigars.

  Then we sat on a sidewalk bench and lit them up. There were no self righteous stares from the crowd here. In fact, quite a few of the men walking by were smoking cigars.

  "This is how life should be," Willey said. I agreed. We were sitting in the shade and there was a nice breeze coming off the water. It could not be a nicer day if it tried . . . and then a dark cloud came rolling down the sidewalk. John Flaherty was heading our way! Willey had spotted him at the same time I did. I reached over to a basket-like trash can next to the bench and pulled out a discarded newspaper. I gave half to Willey and put the other half in front of my face. Nobody was a more ardent seeker of news than Willey and I as we sat on that bench.

  Flaherty walked past us. He hadn't seen us . . . or did he even know what we looked like?

  "Does he know what we look like?" I asked Willey.

  "Snydely and Stevens are the only ones who know what we look like."

  "Let's see where he goes," I said. We jumped up and trailed Flaherty down the street. Before long Flaherty went into a bar.

  "Should we go in," Willey asked.

  I looked in the front window. It was pretty dark in there. "I don't have my gun on me," I said. "What if Flaherty knows what we look like and he has a gun? Do you think he's crazy enough to shoot us?"

  Willey scratched his beard. "If I go in and sit at the bar and he pays no attention to me, then, after a while, you can come in."

  "What if he recognizes you and he shoots you," I asked.

  "In that case, don't come in."

  "I don't like that idea," I said. "We'll both go in. Besides, I don't think Flaherty would shoot us with people around." We went in, but it was so dark we couldn't see much at first. We sat at the bar and let our eyes adjust to the dim light. Flaherty was three stools down from us. If he looked at us, we didn't see it. He was busy talking to the bartender. We all looked up at the television when the announcer started yelling. Someone must have hit a homerun. The bartender looked to be Greek. Tarpon Springs was settled by Greek sponge fishermen many decades ago. He was weathered, and old enough to have been working a sponge boat long ago. There were a few other men in the bar. They were glued to the ballgame.

  The bartender came over and asked us what we were drinking. We both ordered draft beers. Then he went back to talk to Flaherty again. My hearing isn't all that good, so it was up to Willey to eavesdrop on the conversation, and relay it back to me.

  "What's Flaherty saying?" I asked.

  "Nothing important. Baseball stuff." I nodded and tried to look bored. Then Flaherty started telling the bartender jokes. The bartender laughed and Willey started laughing, too. So Flaherty could be charming when he wasn't having people killed.

  "I elbowed Willey. "Stop laughing and pay attention. He might say something important."

  After an hour the beers were starting to affect us. We didn't want to drink anymore--we had to have clear heads.

  "We can't sit here all day," I said.

  Willey said, "The police have a warrant out for his arrest. We could make a citizen's arrest. After all, he's a fugitive from justice."

  "Do you think we could pull it off? Maybe we should call the police."

  "What if the police are busy and can't get here for a while? Flaherty could waltz out of here free as a bird." He had a point. This was the chance we'd been waiting for. If Flaherty was arrested it would solve all of our problems.

  "But what if he resists?" I asked. "It could get nasty. I don't think the sight of two old men would scare him into surrendering."

  "Maybe the bartender will help us. Don't they usually keep a baseball bat under the counter to deal with unruly customers?" Willey asked.

  I rubbed my chin. Would the bartender help us? I wondered. "It looks like the bartender is Flaherty's friend. He might use his baseball bat to crease our skulls."

  "We can't just let him walk out of here," Willey said. "Not after what he did to Freddy and Mary." He was right. I looked around for a weapon. There were three empty beer bottles on a table behind us that the bartender hadn't yet picked up. I leaned over and grabbed two of them.

  "We could use these for weapons, "I said. I handed a bottle to Willey. "Let's try it. We got off our barstools and strolled down the bar. I got on one side of Flaherty and Willey got on the other side. We lifted
our empty bottles in a way that said we were going to use them to clobber Flaherty.

  I said, "John Flaherty, you are under citizen's arrest. There is a warrant out for your arrest."

  Flaherty went wide eyed. "What?" he asked.

  The bartender yelled, "What the hell do you guys think you're doing?" But he didn't reach for a baseball bat. That was an encouraging sign.

  "We're putting Flaherty under arrest," Willey said. "The police want him."

  "I don't know who Flaherty is," the bartender said. "But this man is my brother-in-law. Now get the hell out of here." Whoops!

  "Oh, were so sorry," I said. "But he looks just like Flaherty." We put the empty beer bottles on the bar. "I hope you'll excuse us," I said. The brother-in-law looked at us as if we were insane.

  The bartender reached under the bar and came up with a baseball bat. "Get out of here," he yelled. We hurried to the door and pushed our way out onto the sidewalk. We just stood in the glaring sun for a few seconds, letting our eyes adjust to the light.

  "I'd have sworn he was Flaherty," Willey said.

  "Me, too. He looks just like him."

  "I think we handled the situation pretty well, though," Willey said. "I mean, considering the circumstances and all."

  "Yes. We handled it better than the average moron, that's for sure."

  "I don't think we should tell Sofie about this," Willey said. "Or Eduardo."

  I agreed. We walked up Dodecanese Boulevard toward the Wrangler.

  Our lips were sealed.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  ****

  JOHN FLAHERTY EASED his boat between the overhanging bushes. The island was across the river from the where the old woman's house sat at the river's edge. The island made a perfect hideout. He could watch the house from there. Buckland finally did something smart, hiring a private detective to watch the old bastard's Wrangler in the swamp. The detective had followed the Wrangler to this house. That's where Flaherty's enemies were now. Flaherty only wished he could get a shot at the Attorney General, too. Imagine him throwing his crazy old father into dumpster and squashing him, just for the insurance money--and then blaming it on him.

  But none of that mattered any more. Now everything was lost because those two old bastards that had been hounding him. They must have stolen the flash drive with the books on it. And Snydely had to have helped them. He knew the combination to the safe. Now the Attorney General had the real books . . . it was all over. Flaherty took another swig from the bottle of rum and rubbed his four day growth of beard. His eyes were burning from lack of sleep. He would lay over at the island for the night and get a fresh start in the morning. He didn't want to miss his targets. First he would shoot the two old fools who had ruined his life. Then he'd find Snydely and shoot him, too. After that, well maybe he'd head to the Bahamas. He hadn't thought things out that far. But first things first. And the first thing John Flaherty wanted was revenge.

  ****

  Later that afternoon Willey, Snydely and Oscar, were sitting on Sofie's back deck. Oscar was minus the bandage but he had a good sized lump on his forehead from where Lulu had bopped him. Sofie made him sit on a cushion as if he were an invalid. Snydely was strangely quiet. He was still worried that Flaherty's henchmen would find him.

  I had noticed a cabin cruiser idling in the middle of the river, with a fishing pole stuck into a holder, but nobody was fishing. Didn't the clown know that the middle of a crowded waterway was no place to catch fish? Sofie came out of the kitchen with a pair of binoculars. "Have you noticed that boat stopped out there?" she asked.

  "Yes," I said. "He's not going to catch any fish out there."

  Sofie yelled, "Look out. He has a rifle!" The crack of a rifle shot rang out across the water, and the flower pot next to me exploded. We all went down to the floor of the deck. Sofie was peeking out between chairs with the binoculars.

  Sofie said, "He can't get a good shot at us because the boat traffic is bouncing his boat around. And he looks like he's drunk." Two more shots came at us but they both hit high up on the house. Then the boat turned sharply and sped away. We watched as the boat disappeared behind a bend in the river. We picked ourselves up from the floor and plunked ourselves back into our chairs. Except for Oscar. Sofie had to pick him up.

  "Well, now we know where Flaherty is," I said.

  "Yes," Snydely said. "And he knows where we are."

  Willey took out his cell phone. "I'm going to call Eduardo and tell him what happened."

  "Don't call Eduardo," Sofie said. "He has three more days at Quantico, and they have a shortage of agents. It will be hours before someone gets here, and Flaherty will be gone by then. I'll get a boat and we'll find out where he's hiding, then we'll call Eduardo and let him decide how to handle taking Flaherty in."

  We followed Sofie into the kitchen and she got on the phone. She talked for a minute, then said goodbye and hung up. "The boat is on the way," she said. "Get your guns while I change." I hoped she knew what she was doing.

  When she came out of her room she was wearing those jeans again. She had her pistol in a shoulder holster under her left arm. I noticed she had taken the silencer off. She looked like a sexy gun moll.

  A few minutes later a car pulled into the driveway. Sofie went out and talked to the woman driver. Then a boat arrived at the dock. It was a good sized cabin cruiser. A boy about sixteen with curly black hair, climbed onto the dock and tied the boat off. He ran up to Sofie and gave her a kiss, then he got into the car with the woman. Sofie waved them goodbye and we headed for the boat. Once aboard, Sofie gave us each a life jacket. She put a child's life jacket on Oscar, and made sure we put ours on the right way.

  I untied the lines and Sofie started the engine. We headed straight to the spot where Flaherty had turned out of sight. We reached the turn in the river running at high speed. There was no sign of Flaherty's boat.

  "It's about a thirty-five footer with a red stripe running down each side," Sofie said. "We'll go to the marinas and check them out." We idled into the first marina we came to, and checked the place out--no sign of Flaherty's boat. We headed out to the next marina and did the same. Still nothing. We spent the afternoon going from one marina to another and found no trace of Flaherty.

  "He could be anywhere," I said. "With all these small islands, he could be hiding in any one of them."

  Sofie looked up and down the river. "That's what I was thinking, too. Let's circle some of the islands. I'll need you boys to keep a sharp lookout for his boat. He'll have it hidden in the brush." Oscar was looking over the side of the boat watching the waves. He thought we were on a pleasure trip. He had forgotten all about Lulu.

  "That means you, too, Oscar," I said. "Keep a sharp eye on those islands." Oscar turned and smiled at me. He was having a great time. We headed to the nearest island and slowly circled it--nothing. Then we went to the next island and did the same. Again, nothing. After a while we figured Flaherty had left the river and gone out into the Gulf. From there he could have gone anywhere. We wouldn't find him until he showed up to kill us again. We started back to Sofie's house.

  We were coming around a bend in the river when Snydely said, "Look. Over there." He was pointing to a canal which had been cut into the mainland. Houses lined both sides of the canal, and their boats were tied up in front of the houses.

  "This isn't a marina," Willey said. "Those are private homes."

  Snydely said, "I remember Stevens telling me that Flaherty had a mistress he keeps in a house by a canal." Sofie swung the wheel and we slowly approached the mouth of the canal. It was a short canal, but it was ocean side property. They had access to the ocean. I could only imagine what it must be like to get into my boat at my front door and be able to go anyplace I wanted--if I had a boat.

  Sofie threw the engine into reverse and stopped the boat. She pointed. "Half way down the line on the left," she said. It was a thirty-five foot cabin cruiser with a red stripe running down the side. "What do you think, Barne
y?"

  "I think we should come back after dark and check it out."

  "That's what I was thinking, too," she said. Sofie backed the boat out and we headed back to her house to wait until dark.

  When we got back Sofie called Eduardo to get the registration number of Flaherty's boat. Eduardo wanted to know why she wanted it. He was worried she might get involved with Flaherty and get hurt. Sofie didn't tell him Flaherty shot at us, instead she told him she thought she had found Flaherty's boat and she just wanted to verify it. She promised she'd let me and Willey check it out for her.

  Eduardo had to call his office and have someone find the registration numbers in his files. He called back with the numbers and Sofie wrote them down. Once again he had Sofie promise she wouldn't take any chances. Sofie promised. Sofie handed me the paper with the numbers and a small flashlight. We decided we all had to go together. We couldn't leave Snydely or Oscar behind. It would be too dangerous. Especially now that Flaherty knew where to find us.

  As the sun started to set we got into the Wrangler and headed north. Sofie sat in front with me. Willey, Oscar, and Snydely were in back. Oscar stood behind the back seat in the cargo area, holding onto the back seat for balance. Sofie had used her computer to get a satellite view of the canal area. There was a wide spot in the road just before the canal. Snydely wasn't sure he wanted to go poking around Flaherty's house--if it was Flaherty's house. The registration numbers on the boat would tell us. We all walked up to just before the parking lot and read the street sign, "Pirates Cove". Then we went into the bushes along the back yards. Snydely took Oscar by the hand. There was an older couple cooking out on their back deck, so we moved deeper into the brush.

  We reached the rear of the house we thought might be Flaherty's and moved in for a closer look. There were no lights on inside. It appeared to be empty. We moved through the shadows to the front of the house. There we crouched close to the house and hoped no one could see us from across the canal. Across the sidewalk sat the boat, rocking gently in the water. One of us had to cross the sidewalk and read the registration number on the side of the boat. The area was well lighted and there was no cover.