No Relation

by Terry Fallis

  “That could be just a coincidence,” I said. “I mean packaging multiple pairs of underwear is hardly a groundbreaking idea.”

  “But hang on, I’m not finished,” she cut back in. “A couple of days ago, I found this waiting for me on my desk.”

  She passed over a plain brown envelope. I opened it and pulled out three photographs. They were taken from above at a very large meeting. In two of the shots, lots of people were milling about. In the other, the meeting was clearly in session.

  “What is this?” I asked.

  “It’s the annual general meeting of MaxWorldCorp.”

  “Yeah, so?”

  She leaned over and pointed to a figure sitting and listening during the meeting.

  “Carlos! What’s he doing at our prime competitor’s AGM?” I asked.

  “Good question,” Sarah replied.

  Then she pointed to the two other photos.

  I could now see Carlos standing there in conversation with three men. He seemed to be smiling in one of the shots. In fact, everyone seemed to be happy-happy.

  “Thanks to Google Images, I’ve confirmed that those are two senior MaxWorldCorp execs he’s talking to. Not sure about the third suit.”

  “Surely you’re not suggesting Carlos is feeding company secrets to the bad guys, are you?” I asked.

  “I can’t believe that’s possible, but neither can I explain photos of Carlos at the MaxWorldCorp AGM. It makes no sense.”

  Sarah left early the next morning. I didn’t even hear her, despite my best intentions of making her coffee and seeing her off properly. My body clock was still a bit messed up. I agreed to fly to Chicago on Friday. I spent the next four days confirming that Marie and I were, for all intents and purposes, a couple. I feared that it might just have been the escapism of Paris at work, but it felt the same in Manhattan, just with bigger cars and better drivers. Of course, Marie only had limited time as she had a business to run. I had lots of time as I had no job and was no closer to writing the sentences that would start Chapter 12 of my novel than I’d been before embarking on the Ernest Hemingway Exorcism World Tour. So I just kind of hung out at Let Them Eat Cake! and helped out where I could. I was particularly good on cleanup duty. I’m actually quite adept with a scrub brush when dirty pots and pans are in the sink. Fortunately, business had been picking up as word spread. The catering side of the operation was also growing. I credited the chocolate cake with the uptick in customers, but really, everything on the menu was great. This all made Marie even happier than she usually was, which made me happy, too.

  Most of them were there by the time I arrived. I’d taken my car into the shop for a long-scheduled brake job and the subway had been a little slower than usual. As I stepped through the door, the room burst into applause.

  The makeshift banner taped to the wall read “Welcome home, Hem!” Everyone was there except for John Dillinger and Julia Roberts. A trestle table off to the side was bowing slightly with all the food it supported. Marie had brought two cakes. Jackie Kennedy had filled two large plates with four kinds of cookies. Mario Andretti had cooked a vat of meatballs and tomato sauce. Professor James Moriarty had brought wine, which we were certainly not supposed to be serving in an unlicensed room in the Manhattan Y. Everyone else seemed to have come loaded with culinary contributions. Jesse Owens brought salad. Clark Kent made a very good batch of nachos. Peter Parker actually made some outstanding butter tarts. Hat and Diana Ross seemed to have joined forces to make butter chicken.

  A few minutes later, John Dillinger and Julia Roberts arrived together, both looking a little giddy.

  “Sorry we’re late,” John said with a kind of smug look on his face. “We were, well, you know, ‘busy.’ ”

  He put the word “busy” in finger quotes. Julia giggled and slapped his arm. They may have been a little tipsy.

  “Well, we’re very pleased for you, um, both,” I said. “I’m particularly happy for you.”

  I couldn’t help but glance over at Marie as I said it. I didn’t really mean to, it just happened.

  We all stuffed ourselves. It was wonderful to be back in their midst.

  I gave a full, day-by-day account of the trip and all the adventures we’d had, although I did not provide quite as detailed a night-by-night summary. James, Marie, and Hat all added their own colour commentary. In fact, Hat kept cutting in to correct or augment my version of the Key West stint. We spent nearly the entire hour laughing.

  “But did it work?” asked Professor Moriarty. “Have the words and the ink started to flow again?”

  “Alas, not yet,” I admitted. “And if I’m being honest with myself and with you, I fear it may not even work in time. I’m beginning to question whether it’s really Hemingway haunting me at all, or someone or something else. If it were Hemingway, I’m quite sure the trip would have resolved it. But I’ll get to the bottom of it all, eventually.”

  There was an awkward silence for a moment or two as if I’d just cast a pall over the proceedings – probably because I’d just cast a pall over the proceedings.

  “But let me say again how grateful I am for the thought that went into the exorcism tour idea. I think there are many good things that have come from the trip,” I said, unable to stop myself from looking at Marie again. “I’ve gotten to know some of you much better. And I’m no longer intimidated by the man whose name sounds exactly like mine. In fact, by the time I reached Ketchum, Idaho, I’d come to feel sorry for him. He lived hard and burned out early. I hope to be writing well past the age Hemingway was when he died by his own hand. So the value or success of the trip should not be measured on whether my writer’s block is cured. I will be writing again, perhaps even soon. In my mind, the trip was a rousing success from so many other standpoints. So thank you all, particularly James, Marie, and Hat, my fellow travellers.”

  Everyone applauded again. This was a group that liked to clap.

  The good feelings carried over into our baseball game. We actually got on the board first. Jesse Owens homered at her first at-bat and then so did I. Then three quick singles by John Dillinger, Clark Kent, and Hat loaded up the bases with nobody out. Mario popped out to the catcher. Julia Roberts then bunted up the third base line. Well, she didn’t mean for it to be a bunt, but that’s what we’re calling it. The third baseman eyed John back to the bag and then easily threw out Julia. Peter Parker then stepped to the plate and cranked a triple that cleared the bases. Diana Ross managed to make contact with the ball, although it was with her shoulder as she whiffed on her swing. The ball rolled up the first base line. Fearing she might never get near the ball again, the umpire accepted her shoulder hit but the catcher threw her out at first. So after our half of the first inning, we were up 5–0. I considered calling off the game convinced that we’d hit our zenith, but there was no real way of doing it within the league rules.

  Of course, I was right. While we scattered a few hits in the rest of the game, nothing came close to the offensive tsunami of our first inning. We lost 31–5. Julia and John were inseparable at the bar afterward and left together long before the rest of the team headed their separate ways. They were holding hands when they left. That made my day. For the third night in a row, I stayed at Marie’s apartment above Let Them Eat Cake!

  The veil finally lifted the next morning as I walked to my appointment. There was no flash of epiphany, but more of a slow but steady dawning of realization over the course of ten or fifteen minutes. I remained calm. I had no regrets about the exorcism world tour, even though I now knew it had been nothing more than a wild goose chase. The revelation was almost anticlimactic.

  “So what conclusions have you drawn from your trip?” Dr. Scott asked.

  It was 8:00 Friday morning, the only opening she had. I’d just spent about twenty minutes describing, in considerable detail, my Hemingway junket.

  “Well, either confronting the spirit of Hemingway on his own turf is ineffective against writer’s block,” I started.

/>   “Or …” she prompted.

  “Or the tour failed because it’s not Hemingway causing my writer’s block at all, but something else.”

  She nodded with a look that said “Finally.”

  “Let’s stay with that for a moment. If Hemingway isn’t your problem, then who or what is? Actually, let’s stick with who.”

  “I’d been thinking about it nonstop since Key West and had come up empty. But then I finally checked my voice mail after my trip and noticed several calls from my father. No messages were ever left, but he made the calls. Then it all fell into place quite easily after that. I didn’t really accept it until I was nearly here this morning. So it’s very fresh in my mind. Now that I know, I cannot understand why it took me this long to see it. It’s been right there in front of me for a very long time.”

  Dr. Scott was smiling now.

  “So, just to be clear, are you suggesting that it was not Ernest Hemingway the writer haunting you and your novel, but Earnest Hemmingway your father?”

  “You’ve known for a long time, haven’t you,” I said.

  “I haven’t ‘known,’ but I tagged it months ago as a strong possibility,” she admitted.

  “Why let me twist in the wind and gallivant around two continents if you knew the answer resided in the family home in Chicago?”

  “You don’t really want me to answer that, do you?”

  “Yes, I really do, but let me try first,” I replied. “You believe that had you suggested my troubled relationship with my father was the root of all of these issues, it might have taken me much longer to reach enlightenment. That leading me to my father before I understood what it meant, and accepted it, might well be worse than not ever finding the answer.”

  “In a manner of speaking,” she replied. “Knowing the answer is not always enough. Ideally, you come to the answer in your own way, in your own time, and then can confront it, embrace it, and actually deal with it. That’s far superior to just knowing the answer.”

  “You’re very smart.”

  “Not smart enough to get you there any faster than this. But I’m glad you feel you’ve arrived now.”

  “It’s no wonder I’m still blocked. I just spent ten days chasing the wrong guy.”

  “Yes, but you got the girl, did you not?”

  “So far, it seems I did. So I owe Hemingway that, I guess.”

  “Seems like a good time to wrap, for our thirty minutes are gone.”

  I was just back out onto the sidewalk when my cell chirped.

  “Sarah?”

  “Hem, I need you to do something for me. I just have a hunch it’s important.”

  “I’m yours. What do you need?”

  “I’ve just learned that Henderson Watt is flying into LaGuardia this morning. I have no idea why he’s going, nobody knows. I just got his flight info from his admin assistant. I told her I needed to speak with him today.”

  “Okay, so what can I do?”

  “I want you to go to LaGuardia and tail him. Find out where he’s going. I think it could give us the answers we need. I’m convinced he’s not what he seems. Putting it another way, he’s an asshole and he’s up to something.”

  “So let me get this straight. You want me to go to the airport, hide behind a post because he knows who I am, and then shadow him until he gets back on the plane?” I asked, sounding as incredulous as I could.

  “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m asking you to do. It’s all connected somehow with Dad and the future of the company. I can feel it. Hem, it’s important.”

  I said nothing while I thought it over. When she put it that way. I didn’t really feel I could say no.

  “Hem, are you there?”

  “Okay. I’m just trying to figure out how I can go all gumshoe on this guy without him knowing.”

  “You’ll figure it out. He’s on Delta 253 from O’Hare, arriving at LaGuardia at 11:15 this morning.”

  “Whoa, I gotta get moving.”

  “Don’t let him see you, whatever you do.”

  I hung up and headed home. Halfway there I realized I had a problem. My car was in the shop and wouldn’t be ready until late in the day. I couldn’t very well jump in a cab and say “Follow that car,” could I?

  Think.

  I did not call a taxi. Instead, I phoned Hat.

  CHAPTER 13

  Hat pulled over to the curb to pick me up. He was driving a bright green, beat-up van with a New York Jets logo on the side with the words “Stadium Audio” stencilled on the door – very discreet for shadowing purposes. Mario Andretti was with him. Bless Hat. In my absence, he had taken over helping Mario prepare for his driving test. I’d interrupted one of their sessions.

  “Thanks, guys. You’re life-savers,” I said as I climbed in. “This could be kind of fun.”

  “Where to, Hem?” Hat asked. He looked deadly serious.

  “LaGuardia, and we’re a little behind schedule.”

  I didn’t think you could stomp on the accelerator of a beat-up nine-year-old van filled to the rafters with audio equipment and still squeal the tires. Well, you can, and Hat did. I banged my head on the side window as he flipped a U-turn and headed for the airport. Mario flew into the back of the van, but eventually reappeared a few blocks later, when Hat actually decided to respect a red light at a busy intersection. Mario gripped my seat in a submission hold and hung on until we made it to LaGuardia. I briefed them on the drive. They were quite excited about it all.

  Hat drove us to the Arrivals level and pulled up to the very end of the pickup lane. We were just going to make it. Mario and I leapt out and dashed inside. Hat kept the engine idling, which doesn’t sound as if it would be a challenge, but trust me, with that van, it was. I scanned the Arrivals screen and saw that Henderson Watt’s flight had already landed. We stood behind a concrete pillar and peeked around to the sliding doors spewing passengers from the baggage area. I’d found a ratty old New York Jets ball cap in the van and grabbed it before coming inside. I pulled it down low until the brim was pretty well resting on my nose. I could still see if I tilted my head back.

  “Stand right in front of me,” I said to Mario. “I’ve met the guy we’re waiting for, and it will make it tough to follow him if he recognizes me. He’ll be suspicious immediately.”

  Mario leaned against the pillar, trying to look casual, while I hovered behind. We hadn’t been there more than five minutes when the sliding glass doors parted and released Henderson Watt wearing a light olive green suit, a blue button-down Oxford cloth shirt, and a yellowish striped tie. He sauntered right toward us. He carried nothing with him.

  I inched around to the other side of the pillar as he passed to keep it between us. So far, so good.

  “There’s our guy,” I said, nudging Mario.

  We fell in about twenty yards behind Watt and tried not to look as if we were following him. We achieved this, or at least attempted this, by chatting amiably with each other and looking around at all the sights a modern airport has to offer. But through it all, I tried to keep one eye fixed on Henderson Watt. The operative word being “tried.” I’d just sent Hat a quick text citing our code phrase, “The eagle has landed,” but when I lifted my eyes again, Henderson Watt was nowhere to be seen. At that same instant, I walked straight into Mario, who had stopped in his tracks.

  “I lost him, Mario. I lost him,” I hissed. “Where’d he go, and what’s with the sudden stop?”

  “Bathroom,” Mario whispered, turning his head and elongating his mouth to aim the words back at me.

  “Why didn’t you go before? There’s no time right now. You can go when we get back.”

  “No, Hem, I mean our guy’s in the bathroom. That’s why I stopped.”

  “Oh.”

  We found a second pillar close by and the stakeout continued. Two minutes later, Henderson walked back out and headed for the door. We watched him join the taxi lineup before we slipped out the door and rejoined Hat in the very inconspicuous big batte
red green New York Jets van. We had a perfect view of the taxi stand. When Henderson slipped into a cab three minutes later and pulled out, we followed. I just hoped he had not heard the screeching brakes and angry honking of the airport bus Hat cut off in the process.

  I memorized the number of Henderson’s taxi just as two other cabs snuck in between us. It took some concentration to keep the right cab in sight, particularly as we entered Manhattan. Henderson’s cab eventually slowed and pulled over in front of a sidewalk café in SoHo. I think it was on Prince Street.

  “Okay, he’s stopping,” I said, then pointed. “Hat, drive right on by and then, if you can, pull a U-turn and park across the street there. That’s how they do it in the cop shows.”

  He actually pulled it off without attracting too much attention, although Mario took another unexpected trip into the depths of the van when Hat yanked on the wheel to make his sudden turn. By the time Henderson stepped from the cab, we were already parked a little way down the street from the café. I only hoped he was actually going to the restaurant. We were in luck. A nattily dressed man already seated on the patio stood, called out to Henderson, and waved. The guy looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t place him. Henderson approached, shook hands with the other suit, and sat down. It was only a table for two, so, using my well-honed powers of deduction, I assumed no more guests were expected. Unfortunately, we weren’t parked as closely as I would have liked, but there were no open parking spots any nearer. Besides, we couldn’t hear what they were saying anyway, so it really didn’t matter, I guess.

  The two of them looked very comfortable together. They obviously knew each other reasonably well, judging by what looked like the easy back-and-forth of the conversation. It’s amazing how much you can discern from a café conversation, even without the benefit of sound.