Revenge of the Spellmans

by Lisa Lutz

  Allow me just a moment to enlighten you about the state of parking in San Francisco. There is none. There have been nights I’ve returned home and hunted for close to an hour for a space, only to expand my perimeter to nearly half a mile from my residence. In theory, my parking life should have improved during my stay at David’s place, but since he left his own car in the garage and offered his driveway to a neighbor with long-term houseguests, I was out on the streets. This particular day, I thought I’d parked my car on Eddy between Hyde and Leavenworth. I found my car on Geary and Hyde with absolutely no memory of parking it there.

  I honked my horn in front of Morty’s house—there’s no sound reason why Morty deserves door-to-door service. Besides, even after I was twenty minutes late, he made me wait another five minutes.

  “I thought I should make a pit stop before we hit the road,” Morty said as he got into the car. “I brought something for us to nosh on, just in case.”

  “Buckle up,” I said.

  “I invited Gabe. When he heard we were going on a stakeout, he just had to come along. He lives in the Mission, right on the way, so don’t tell me it’s inconvenient.”

  “You don’t just invite someone along on surveillance. It’s not like going to a movie.”

  Morty paused to think about it. “Actually, it kind of is.”

  We drove five minutes to Gabe’s house. Morty rang the buzzer since he had to “use the little boys’ room” again. It occurred to me that the time span for which Morty was capable of sitting in a car without a restroom break was most likely two hours on the outside. The drive to Burlingame was at least a half hour. This surveillance would be short-lived at best. As Gabe and his grandfather returned to my car, I reworked my plan. I made a right turn at Sixteenth and Mission and headed back north.

  “Where are we going?” Morty asked, concerned that I had changed my mind.

  “I need to get something at my parents’ house.”

  “You should have thought of that sooner. Now we’re going out of the way.”

  “Morty, when I agreed to bring you along on this surveillance, what was rule number one?”

  “No singing?”

  “That was rule number four.”

  “No dental noises?” 1

  “That was number three.”

  “Oh yeah. No complaining.” 2

  “Thank you. I need to pick up a GPS from my parents’ house, okay? I wasn’t planning on using one, but since you have to pee all the time, we might not be able to stay on the subject for very long.”

  During the ten-minute drive to the Spellman residence, Morty regaled Gabe and me with a detailed medical discussion of his prostate issue. The speech ended with the following inspirational wisdom for his grandson: “Kid, don’t think this won’t happen to you. God willing you live to eighty, you have a ninety percent chance of having this very same problem. Ninety percent. You can just forget about sleeping through the night.”

  Thankfully, I reached my parents’ house and was able to escape the car and the prostate Q & A that followed the lecture. I double-parked down the block and handed Gabe the keys.

  “Why don’t you park in the driveway?” Morty asked. “It’s empty.”

  “Because I don’t want my parents to know I was here,” I replied as I exited the vehicle.

  I casually slipped along the side of my parents’ residence. Remember, there’s a window there with easy access to the office. I keep a milk crate nearby to ease entry. I stepped on top of the crate and listened for voices. The office appeared empty. I pushed the slightly ajar window up and threw myself over the windowsill. I toppled headfirst into the office a bit more clumsily than usual and banged my elbow on the heater.

  My parents own two GPS devices, which come in handy for tracking individuals and picking up a lost tail. They’re less useful if you’re more interested in what the person is doing than where he or she is doing it. I opened the drawer where we house the equipment and noticed that one of the devices was already missing. I took the remaining GPS and hoped that its absence would go unnoticed. I needed the instrument just long enough for Bob Goodman to show me who he was working for.

  Thirty minutes later, Morty and I were sitting in my car, parked a block away from Ernie’s house. I had just sent Gabe on a research-and-reconnaissance mission. For reasons I never did establish, he’d brought his skateboard along on the surveillance. This worked in our favor. He skated down the block toward the Black residence, hunting for a car with a man sitting in it. Along the way, Gabe flipped his board a few times.

  “It would never work out,” Morty said with an air of authority.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked.

  “You know.”

  “I really don’t.”

  “You and Gabe. It would never work.”

  “Where did this come from?”

  “First of all, if you two were to last, you’d have to convert.”

  “To what?”

  “Judaism. And that requires some studying and I know how you hate that.”

  “Don’t you think you’re rushing things?”

  “Secondly, you still got it bad for that cop.”

  “I do not!”

  “You should give the cop your number,” Morty said, like he always says.

  “He has my number.”

  “Give it to him again.”

  “That’s enough, Morty.”

  Morty, apparently, doesn’t understand the saying “That’s enough.” So he continued: “Thirdly, I don’t know how his mother would feel about him dating a woman with a criminal record. And fourthly—”

  Gabe skated back to the car. I had to figure out a threat that would silence the old man. “Unless you want to spend the rest of your days taking the bus or hailing cabs, you will mind your own business,” I said.

  “I think he likes you, Izzele, so let him down easy when the time comes,” Morty said, and then pantomimed locking his mouth shut and throwing away the key.

  “Did he say something to you?” I whispered right before Gabe got back into the car, but Morty was fully committed to his pantomime act.

  Gabe seemed to enjoy his little adventure. He reported the facts like a professional: “A male, anywhere from fifty to fifty-five years old, about thirty pounds overweight, wearing a Raiders cap and driving a late-nineties Nissan with a Raiders bumper sticker, was parked two doors down from the Subject’s residence.”

  “Morty, I’m going to need your help. Are you game?”

  “What’s my cover?” Morty asked, followed by a wink.

  If I had been with Rae, we’d already be on our way home, but I was dealing with amateurs. I made it simple for them: “Morty, you distract the guy in the car while Gabe places the GPS device on the vehicle.”

  In response, they came up with an impressive number of questions.

  “What does the car look like again?”

  “It’s blue. But just look for the car with a man sitting in it.”

  “What does the guy look like again?”

  “It will be the only blue car with a man sitting in it.”

  “How long do I need to stall him for?”

  “As long as it takes Gabe to attach the GPS.”

  “What if he makes me?” 3

  “Okay, so you got that out of your system now?”

  “Yes, I do. Now what’s my cover?”

/>   “Just pretend you’re old and lost,” I said. “Scratch that. Just pretend you’re lost.”

  “Where do I want to go?”

  It wasn’t pretty, but Morty and Gabe completed their assignment. Bob, who was never famous for his observational skills, had no idea that a GPS device was now safely attached to his car.

  Since the GPS would be doing most of my work for me, the Schilling men and I decided to get lunch. While Morty was in the bathroom, Gabe and I planned our subtle integration of the Florida conversation. The final execution went something like this:

  MORTY: How’s the turkey?

  ISABEL: Dry. Just the way I like it. Is the pastrami to your liking?

  MORTY: Better than ever.

  GABE: Better than, say, Cheerios?

  MORTY: What are you getting at?

  GABE: On average, for how many meals per day are you eating a bowl of Cheerios?

  MORTY: Are you spying on me?

  GABE: I had my eye on your recycling.

  MORTY: Mind your own recycling.

  ISABEL: That can’t be healthy, Morty.

  MORTY: Sometimes I slice up a banana in it.

  GABE: Maybe you could slice up some broccoli, too, or maybe some zucchini.

  ISABEL: Gross. I’m trying to eat here.

  GABE: You can’t tell me you don’t miss Nana.

  MORTY: Of course I miss her.

  ISABEL: You call your grammy “Nana”?

  GABE: You call your nana “Grammy”?

  MORTY: I’m ready for a subject change.

  GABE: Me, too. We know about the deal between you and Nana.

  ISABEL: I thought you were a man of your word.

  GABE: As a lawyer you must realize you are in breach of contract.

  MORTY: That’s enough out of both of you.

  ISABEL: Fifty-five years of marriage and this is how you repay her.

  MORTY: [furious] The discussion is over.

  GABE: No, Grandpa, it isn’t. You’re moving to Florida whether you like it or not.

  MORTY: That’s it.

  At this point Morty put his sandwich down, wiped his hands on his napkin, and walked out of the deli. If he were a cartoon character, steam would have been coming out of his ears. A few minutes later Morty returned to the deli and asked Gabe for cab fare. He did it with as much dignity as could be expected under the circumstances. Then he made his final, less dramatic, exit.

  After Morty exited the deli on hostile terms, Gabe provided further details on what I discovered was a very firm deal made between Mr. and Mrs. Schilling. As far as I could tell, Morty was indeed in breach of contract. Gabe and I then worked out a plan to nudge—no, steamroll—the man into moving to Florida. Essentially our strategy was to cut him off. It would be hard, but once Morty realized that he had no one in this city, he would go kicking and screaming.

  Then Gabe suggested a movie. We picked up a discarded SF Weekly from an empty table and scanned the listings. Gabe pulled a quarter from his pocket and said, “Heads or tails. Winner chooses the movie.” I chose tails and in a typical illustration of my luck, the quarter landed with George Washington faceup.

  “Let me get a look at that quarter,” I said, just to be certain. After inspection, I agreed it was a legitimate piece of currency.

  Gabe chose a foreign film. I won’t provide the name because I have no particular interest in sharing with you the torment that I endured for the first forty-five minutes. At the forty-seven-minute mark, Gabe turned to me and said, “I’m bored.”

  “I’m even more bored,” was my reply.

  “Want to make out?” Gabe asked as if he were suggesting another bowl of popcorn.

  “Or we could just leave,” I said, intrigued by the offer but too forewarned by my previous conversation with Morty to entertain it in any way.

  We left. I’ll tell you more about Gabe later. Now it is time to update you on the Rae/Maggie/Henry Stone situation.

  THE RAE/MAGGIE/HENRY STONE SITUATION

  A bout a week or so after I had coffee with Maggie, she left a message on my voice mail asking me whether I had looked into her breached credit report. I immediately raced over to the Spellman offices and ran her report. As you probably know, credit reports are tagged every time there’s a credit inquiry. The tags are most often from lenders or landlords, and my hope was that if I saw the tag, I would be able to prove who was checking Maggie’s credit.

  Her credit was excellent, in case you were wondering. Less than 5 percent average balance on her credit cards and only two inquiries in the past year. No liens, no bankruptcies, no dirt whatsoever. Whoever looked was disappointed. The “whoever” was ALLCORP Corp. Yes, it is a redundant name. A little joke of my father’s when he created the dummy company to use whenever our investigations required a credit inquiry. Most people don’t keep track of their credit reports, and this tiny tag from something that sounds legitimate would most likely go unquestioned.

  As I’d predicted, the culprit in the mini Maggie investigation was Rae. She must have pulled the report before I stepped in to mediate. It was typical fare for my sister; she wanted dirt on her archenemy du jour. I phoned her just to confirm.

  “Rae, were you investigating Maggie?”

  “A little bit,” Rae replied nonchalantly. “You know, before the negotiation. We’re getting along much better now.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.”

  I didn’t mention this to Maggie right away, fearing that the mere mention of another attack from my sister might bring about another battle. However, a few days later, whatever was simmering had been removed from the burner and tossed in the bin.

  My sister has the ability to make friends and enemies with the flip of a switch. About a week after my initial negotiation with Henry, Rae, and Maggie, I received a phone call from Henry asking for my assistance.

  When I arrived, Maggie and Rae were seated on Henry’s couch, watching a movie.

  “I’m bored,” Rae announced.

  “Give it time,” Maggie replied.

  “When is it going to get funny?” Rae asked.

  I circled behind Henry’s couch and, to my surprise, discovered that my sister and Maggie were watching The Pink Panther (the original 1963 version, of course).

  “We need better snack food,” Maggie said, wisely.

  “Something salty,” Rae said. Inspector Clouseau, speaking to a colleague, spun around a globe in his office and then leaned on it for support, crashing to the floor.

  “I just don’t get it,” Rae said in response to the brilliant on-screen pratfall.

  I turned to Henry, hoping for an explanation.

  “What’s going on here?”

  Henry pointed at Rae—seated on his couch—as if she were in the midst of committing a criminal act.

  “I can’t get her to leave.”

  “Have you ask
ed?”

  “I can’t ask because I’m not speaking to her.”

  “Please don’t tell me that you asked me all the way over here to tell Rae to leave.”

  Maggie checked the cupboard. “No chips,” she said. “Only pretzels made from spelt. What has enriched flour 1 ever done to you?” she then said as she tossed the bag back into the cupboard with a look of distaste on her face.

  “Maggie won’t relay messages,” Henry replied to my question, ignoring Maggie’s. He then turned to the sink and began washing the three dishes that remained.

  Maggie shoved Henry out of the way and grabbed the sponge and plate from his hands.

  “Stop it now! I’ll do my own dishes,” she said with mock indignation.

  Henry spun around and spotted Rae putting her feet up on the coffee table. Briefly abandoning his vow of silence against my sister, he shouted, “Rae, get your feet off the coffee table!”

  Rae removed her feet and said, “Oh, so now you’re talking to me.”

  “Isabel, I don’t want her here all day watching movies,” Henry said. “And how is it possible that she’s never seen The Pink Panther ?”

  Maggie placed a clean dish on the rack and asked me, “Were you raised by wolves?”

  “That’s one way to look at it,” I replied, but that wasn’t the full story.

  The Pink Panther franchise is hands-down my father’s favorite canon in film. 2 But no one likes to watch movies with Dad because of his habit of interacting with the TV. Dad has most of the Pink Panther films memorized, and so he likes to perform different roles, depending on his mood. Maggie finished washing the last dish in the sink and made a silent show of it to Henry to be certain that he registered her accomplishment. She then slipped on her shoes and coat.