Back from the Dead hl-2

by Peter Leonard

  When he got outside Harry threw the spent shell casings onto the mountain of scrap metal behind the building, and watched the last semi rumble out of the yard. His crew, through for the day, were putting equipment back in the warehouse.

  Phyllis had hired a Vietnam vet named Archie Damman to work the scale after Jerry was killed. It wasn’t a done deal, but Harry liked what he saw. This guy Damman put in the hours and seemed to know what he was doing.

  He thought about Colette as he cruised through Hamtramck on his way to the freeway, couldn’t wait to see her. She had driven back from Florida with him, and made the trip fun. He enjoyed spending time with her, had gotten used to having her around, and missed her when he went back to work. This was new for Harry. He’d thought about it, analyzed it and decided he’d had trouble with previous relationships because everyone he’d been close to had been killed. He’d dated a lot of girls in the eighteen years since Anna had died, but most of the relationships had lasted less than a month.

  Harry didn’t know what was going to happen with Colette. Her career was in Germany and he’d been kicked out of the country, and they had only been together for a couple weeks, but he sure liked her. She was going back to Munich in a few days and that would be their first real test.

  On the way home Harry stopped at the cemetery and stood in front of Sara’s gravestone. He hadn’t been here since she’d been buried almost seven weeks ago. He still couldn’t believe it, but there was her name etched in black marble.

  Sara A. Levin 1953-1971

  It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. Sara should’ve been standing here looking at Harry’s grave. He picked up some twigs and leaves on the ground and put them in his coat pocket. “How’re you doing, honey? You doing all right?” He paused, feeling self-conscious. Was this crazy, talking to Sara like this? No, Harry said to himself. It’s okay. “I met somebody, a girl named Colette. I think you’d like her.” He paused. “I miss you.”

  Colette was on the couch in Harry’s den, having her lunch, chicken salad on lettuce and tomato, watching a soap opera called General Hospital, when she heard the doorbell, stood up still watching the television, looked out the front window and saw a white van parked in the driveway. It said Acme Carpet Cleaning on the side in brown letters. The doorbell rang again. Harry didn’t mention anything about having his carpets cleaned. Maybe they had the wrong address.

  From the back hall Colette could see a man in a red cap through the glass panes in the door. He saw her and waved but she sensed that something was wrong. Colette moved into the kitchen, picked up the phone and dialed Harry’s office number. She heard the side door open, and the sound of footsteps. Heard Harry’s secretary say, “S&H Scrap Metal Recyclers, how may I direct your call?” The phone was taken from her and replaced in the cradle. There were two of them. They picked her up, carried her into the living room and rolled her up in one of Harry’s antique rugs, legs pressed together, arms pinned to her sides. She couldn’t move, could barely breathe, started to panic.

  They never said a word, picked her up and carried her outside. She could feel a cool breeze blow through the open ends of the rug and it calmed her a little. They slid her in the back of the van and closed the doors. Colette heard them get in the front, heard the engine start and felt the van move, backing down the driveway. All she could think — it had to be retaliation for the article she had written about Hess. But how would anyone know she was staying with Harry? She didn’t tell her editor, didn’t even tell her mother.

  Colette was on her side. She could smell dye on the fabric and taste the dust. She sneezed a couple times. Her nose itched. She bent her head forward and rubbed it against the coarse fabric. She smelled cigarette smoke, and felt the sway of the truck and felt herself sliding. Heard the twangy chords of country music on the radio, and the sounds of traffic outside the van. They were moving at a steady speed now.

  She tried to take her mind off what was happening, pictured herself skiing with her mother in Courmayeur, the Italian side of Mont Blanc, going down the mountain, skis buried in deep powder, leaning back, her mother slaloming down the mountain in front of her like a teenager.

  Colette heard cars passing the van going in the opposite direction and then the whining sound of tires on asphalt. The van slowed and made a left turn and a right and came to a stop. The rear doors opened and she was lifted out and carried, felt the rug tilt up as they went up a couple steps, entered a room and put her down. Then she was spinning as they unrolled the rug. Colette, dizzy, trying to focus, seeing white walls and a brick fireplace. She was on the dusty wood floor, in a house, shades covering the windows. The two men were dark shapes in the dark room, the sour smell of sweat and cigarette smoke clinging to them. “Sprechen sie Deutsch?”

  “No, we don’t sprechen sie no Deutsch,” the one wearing a red cap said. He spoke with a southern accent.

  “What do you want?”

  The one in the cap moved behind her, holding her biceps. The second one picked up her legs. “We’ll let you know,” he said.

  “Ain’t suppose to talk at her,” the one in the cap said.

  “Don’t worry about it, okay? Just pick her up.”

  The one behind her had his wrists under her armpits now, hands holding her breasts.

  “Well lookit her, will you? Don’t like nobody touching her sweater pups,” the one in the cap said.

  “Pup’s ass, Squirrel, them’s full grown.”

  Colette started to twist and kick.

  “We got us a little cougar, ain’t we?” the man behind her said. “Full of piss and vinegar. I’m going to drop you on your head you don’t stop squirming.”

  Colette went slack and they carried her along a hallway, through a door, down a narrow staircase into the cellar, tied her tight to a chair, arms behind her back, her legs bound to the chair legs. When her eyes adjusted she saw the furnace and hot-water tank on the other side of the empty room that had unpainted block walls and high windows on both sides covered with newsprint.

  “Don’t y’all go nowhere,” the one wearing the cap said. The gamey smell of him made her sick. He touched her breasts, hands hard and rough. “I be back for some of your sweet, sweet cooze.”

  Colette watched them walk up the stairs, already uncomfortable, arms and shoulders aching.

  She must’ve dozed off. The sun had moved over the house and the light was brighter coming through the papered windows on the west side of the room. She heard footsteps on the stairs and saw the one in the cap appear and move toward her, grinning. Colette could smell him before he reached her, an odor so foul she had to breathe through her mouth. He walked around behind the chair, placed his hands on her shoulders and started to massage her.

  “All them German girls stacked like you?”

  He reached over and pulled the top of her blouse open. Two buttons popped off and hit the floor. Colette felt her pulse race. He dug down and pulled her breasts out of the cups of her bra, squeezing them with callused hands.

  Colette screamed, hoping the other man would hear her and come down.

  He put his greasy hand over her mouth, pawing her with hard thick fingers. She tried to bite him and he slapped her across the face with an open hand.

  “What the hell you doin’ down there, Squirrel?” the other man said from the top of the stairs. Colette heard him come halfway down.

  “Nothin’.”

  “Get up here.”

  Squirrel leaned in with his face close to hers. His breath had a bacterial reek that made her gag.

  “I’ll be back,” he said and walked up the stairs.

  Colette had fallen asleep and woke to the sound of footsteps on the stairs. The light in the windows was fading. She felt herself start to wind up again, thinking Squirrel was coming back for her. But it wasn’t him. A tall man in a black leather jacket appeared with a folded lawn chair. He opened it and sat a few feet from her.

  “You are from Munich, I understand.”

  Colette star
ed at him.

  “Would you like to come upstairs, have something to eat and drink, use the toilet? You have been down here a long time. All you have to do is tell me what I want to know.” He paused for a beat and said, “Where is Ernst Hess?”

  Harry pulled in the driveway, parked and went in the side door. He expected to see Colette in the kitchen, starting dinner. She was going to make sauerbraten, potato dumplings and red cabbage, an authentic German meal. He’d been thinking about it all day and he was hungry. Colette was a terrific cook, and that was another benefit of living with her. He threw his keys on the counter, hit the message button on the answering machine. Another one from Galina.

  “Harry, you going to call me one of these days?”

  No, he said to himself. Walked into the foyer, glanced in the den and moved into the living room. Someone was sitting in his leather chair, legs crossed on the ottoman. The man had dark shoulder-length hair and wore black jeans, a white shirt and a black leather jacket.

  “I don’t think you’re a burglar,” Harry said, “or you’d be looking for the silver, so tell me what you’re doing in my house?”

  “I stopped by your office. We could have handled it there, but you were too busy to see me,” he said with an accent that sounded like he was from Berlin.

  “You buying or selling?”

  “I am trading.”

  “For what?” Although Harry had a pretty good idea. “Where is Ernst Hess?”

  “I’d try his estate in Schleissheim or his apartment in Munich. Maybe start by talking to his family and business associates?

  “I know he came here to see you.”

  “Where’s Colette?”

  “Safe for now. Tell me about Herr Hess.”

  Harry pulled the Colt from under his shirt and aimed it at him. “I’ll tell you what. You want to trade, I’ll trade Colette for you. We can start there, see how it goes.”

  “Put the gun away. You are not going to shoot me or you will never find her.”

  The guy got up and came toward him. He was tall, six two, six three, and looked like he was in shape. Harry pulled the hammer back with his thumb. “First one’s going to blow out your knee cap. You better hope there isn’t a second one.”

  That seemed to persuade him. The German froze.

  “I’m going to give you another chance. Where’s Colette?”

  “Not far from here.”

  “Let’s go see how she’s doing.”

  “I have to call, tell them we are coming.”

  “How many are there?”

  “Two.”

  “We’re going to surprise them,” Harry said. “And if they’ve done anything to Colette, you’re the first one I’m going to shoot. Believe that if you believe anything. Take off your coat, throw it over here and turn around.” He did and Harry checked the two outside pockets of the jacket, found a parking receipt, and a pair of handcuffs. There was also a piece of notepaper that had an address on Crooks Road in Troy and a phone number. “This where they have Colette?”

  In the other pocket he found car keys and a small semiautomatic. He ejected the magazine and put it in his pocket. The German had his back to Harry, looking over his shoulder. “Take off your clothes. I want to see what else you’ve got.” The German stripped down to his briefs and tossed everything on the floor at Harry’s feet. Harry picked up the man’s pants and checked the pockets, found the key to the handcuffs and his wallet. Opened it, name Albin Zeller from Munich on the driver’s license. “You a Nazi, too, Albin?” Harry said.

  Zeller, with his back to him, didn’t say anything. He was less threatening now in his underwear, thin legs, pale skin that had never been in the sun.

  “Why are you looking for Hess?”

  He didn’t respond.

  “You break in, say you want to talk, but you don’t say anything.” Hess was a wealthy man and a member of the Christian Social Union, an important political figure in Germany. Harry could understand why there were people who wanted him found. Hess must have told someone his plans. Otherwise how would Zeller have been able to follow his trail to Detroit? Harry threw him the handcuffs. “Put them on.”

  Zeller turned, caught them, clamped them on his wrists. “Where’s your car?”

  “On the street.”

  That wasn’t going to work, walking a handcuffed Nazi in his undies out to the car at gunpoint. “All right, let’s go. We’ll take mine.”

  “They are expecting a phone call.”

  “Well they’re going to be surprised then, aren’t they?”

  “What about my clothes?”

  “You’re not going to need them.”

  “You drive up to the house they will kill her,” Zeller said. “Then we won’t drive up to the house.”

  Harry was parked in the driveway by the side door. It was 5:30 and almost dark. He led Zeller out, popped the trunk, took his eye off the German for a second and Zeller took off, hurdled the neighbor’s fence like a track star and disappeared. Harry started after him and stopped. Went back to the car, closed the trunk and drove to Troy to find Colette.

  Four

  At 1:27 a.m., Hess saw the Bahamian policeman walk by the door, going outside to smoke. He pulled the IV out of his arm, slid out of bed, crossed the room, the ward quiet, patients asleep. Light from the moon was coming in the window next to his bed, illuminating part of the ward. At the door he glanced to the right and saw the policeman at the end of the hall. He looked the other way: no one was at the nurses’ station. He went back through the room to the window next to his bed, opened it and punched out the screen.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Hess turned and saw Paulette, one of the night nurses, coming toward him across the ward. She must have been in the toilet room.

  “Have you lost your mind, man? Get back in da bed.”

  She reached him, hands on his arm and shoulder, trying to pull him away from the window. “Come on now, we don’t want no trouble.”

  Hess pivoted and went for her throat, taking the 110-pound woman down on the hard tile floor. She thrashed and fought, legs kicking, fingers trying to scratch his face. He had never strangled anyone. It required more effort than he realized. He kept his weight on her and the pressure on her neck and gradually she stopped fighting, eyes bulging, and went limp. Hess was breathing hard, exhausted from the effort, sweated through the hospital gown. He glanced toward the doorway, heard footsteps coming along the hall, picked up Paulette, put her in his bed and covered her with the sheet and blanket.

  He brought a chair over, stood on it and slid his feet through the window, sitting on the sill, turned on his stomach and lowered his legs until his feet touched the ground. Barefoot and naked under the gown, Hess crossed the street, feeling weak, and moved past dark storefronts in downtown Freeport. He saw two figures approach, slim Negros in white shirts, skin blending with the darkness.

  “What we have here?” the first one said.

  “We take your money,” the second one said, waving a knife at him theatrically.

  Hess looked at them and smiled.

  “Man what you wearing?”

  “Look like he escape from the hospital,” the second one said.

  Hess picked up the front of his hospital gown, flashed them and laughed.

  “Keep away from him,” the first one said, stepping back. “Crazy old bugger, man’s a mental case.”

  They moved past him down the street, Hess watching until they disappeared. He walked along the storefronts, stopping in front of Morley’s, a men’s store, bright-colored island attire on headless manikins in the window. He continued walking to the end of the streets, went right and right again, moving down an alley behind the stores.

  Morley’s had a solid rear door with deadbolts top and bottom. There was a window behind closed shutters. He saw headlights coming toward him, ducked behind a big blue trash bin, watching as a police car crept by, its spotlight sweeping across the buildings.

  When th
e police car was out of sight Hess went back to Morley’s and dug his fingers into the shutter slats, pulling the sides open. The window was latched, so he broke a center pane in the upper half with his elbow. The glass cracked and shattered. Hess reached in, turned the clasp, slid up the bottom half of the window and climbed in the room. Then he pulled the shutters closed and locked the window.

  It was a tailor shop, three sewing machines on worktables, bolts of cloth stacked on deep shelves. He walked into the store and looked around, checking the racks of trousers and jackets, and shirts folded and stacked on wooden shelves. He tried on a pair of white-cuffed trousers that bunched at his feet. He pulled the waist up higher on his stomach and they fit better, still too long but acceptable. Hess slipped a white short-sleeved sport shirt over his head and tucked it into the trousers. He chose a black leather belt from the belt rack, size thirty-eight. And a light blue sport jacket, size forty-four. The collar needed work and the sleeves were half an inch too long. Hess liked to show a little linen, although with short sleeves what did it matter? He posed in front of a full-length mirror, decided the white trousers were too much and swapped them for a pair of light gray trousers that were cut the same way. He took off the blue jacket and tried on a yellow one, decided it was too loud and went back to blue. He selected black espadrilles for stylish comfort, and a tan Bailey straw with a black band. The transformation was remarkable, Hess changing from ward patient to prosperous island gentleman.

  He opened the cash register behind the counter and took 150 Bahamian dollars. The manager’s office had a couch. He removed the hat and jacket, lay down, exhausted, and closed his eyes, listening to the sound of police sirens in the distance.

  In the morning he felt better. He scanned the street from the front window, unlocked the front door, walked out of the shop and down the street, hailed a passing taxi, and rode to Lucaya.