By the Balls

by Jim Pascoe

  “Hardly at all. I’m done with her. If I can speak frankly, man-to-man, she was an . . . enjoyable girl to know. And I made some modest efforts to continue that enjoyment. But enjoyment comes in many colors and many flavors, if you get my meaning, old boy.” He let out a deep, lecherous laugh. He tilted his head back, and the floodlight reflected off his eyes.

  He looked possessed.

  He moved closer to me, but not too close. “So you can have Suzi Biggs. I can be awful generous with my . . . hand-me-downs.”

  My throat burned with rising bile. I funneled all my anger into the energy to stand. If I had been calmer, more relaxed, I would have exploded. But I was beat down enough to be desensitized to his childish instigations. He was pushing my buttons; the only thing I could do was let him and still stand strong.

  “Why tell me all this, Jack? Why all of a sudden are you so willing to play ball?”

  “I’ve been playing ball with you from the beginning; you just didn’t know the rules of the game. Don’t think for a moment that I wouldn’t have a troublemaker like you locked away in a jail cell, especially when the police are so eager to do it for me.”

  If he wanted me to be grateful for his generosity, I wasn’t.

  “No, I’ve been testing you, seeing what kind of mettle you have. After you stormed into my office, I knew that if any man could take down the Syndicate, it would be you. You have that kind of fire.

  “Don’t get the impression, Drake, that I like you. The truth is that I know you’re in deep enough, and you’re desperate enough, to go out and shake up this group of malefactors. On the one hand, any rabble-rousing that you do to help yourself helps me even more. Of course, on the other hand, whether you choose to ignore me and my gift of information or not, they’ll get to you. I’m sure you haven’t more than a day—two at the most—to live. Then you won’t be bothering me—or anyone for that matter—anymore. Good luck,” he sneered.

  So I was going to be his tin soldier, wound up and let loose in the minefield.

  He was good. I was wound up plenty.

  One of the monkeys threw my keys at me. Then all of their figures faded into the deep black surrounding the quarry.

  This whole week I’d been collecting pieces of a puzzle that didn’t quite fit together. Jack Walker had taken this puzzle and mixed it up good, and suddenly all the pieces were falling right into place. As hazy as my mind was, things were finally starting to make sense to me. I was beginning to see the pattern that spread out over Testacy City.

  The more I thought about it as I drove back to town, the more it scared the hell out of me.

  The scariest part was that one clue was still missing. Though I had no idea what it was or where to look for it, I knew it was the piece that would bring this whole mess together.

  My foot pressed harder on the gas pedal. The city lights rose in the distance. I remembered the bottle of bourbon I’d left in the car. I grabbed it from under my seat, spun the cap off with my thumb, and poured enough alcohol down my throat to make me cough.

  I focused hard on the lights from town. I could imagine the whole city in flames.

  That thought kept me company the entire way home.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The Missing Clue

  It was a little after nine by the time I got home. I was bone-tired, but Walker’s information—along with the bourbon I’d sucked down on the ride back to town—had burned away at the fatigue. I could feel that I was close to the end of this.

  I opened the door to my apartment and found Suzi Biggs laying claim to my favorite chair. That, I had expected. I had also expected the two of us to hit up a restaurant and get a nice meal, then for me to figure out a way to get the last piece of this puzzle out of her.

  What I hadn’t expected to see was Henry Goiler standing over her, his black 9mm Beretta stuck in her face.

  Last I remembered, Goiler was the detective Hal had assigned to the Haufschmidt jewel case. I’d worked with him a couple of times before, and we always had good results, even though his crude ways clashed with mine. Regardless, he was the last person I expected to be threatening Suzi in my apartment.

  His crudeness was all-encompassing. Goiler was a squat little man, pig-like in both appearance and manner. Perched on his head was a brown porkpie hat that was about a size too small. In fact, all of his clothes were too small: his tan pants just brushed the tops of his heavily scuffed brown oxfords, his yellow shirt didn’t quite cover the volume of his belly, and his tiny brown necktie—the short, wide kind—looked like it belonged on a teenager. Over the whole ensemble he wore a threadbare brown suitcoat that seemed as if it was about to burst its seams.

  He looked like a dangerous clown.

  “Goiler?!” My voice cracked with confusion. “What are you doing here?”

  “Ben!” Suzi cried, panic thick in her voice. “Thank God you’re here! This guy broke in here and threatened to kill me!”

  I was having a hard time accepting any of this. “Goiler, what’s your deal?”

  “Like you don’t know, Drake,” he drawled out of the side of his mouth, not taking his eyes off Suzi.

  “I’m not in the mood for this!” The confusion and fatigue only added to my anger.

  “Funny, Drake, very funny,” Goiler spit out. The way he spoke required an excess amount of saliva. It wasn’t pleasant. “I don’t believe that for a minute. I know the tricks you like to pull, and you can’t pull nothin’ over on me.”

  “Come on, Goiler, put the goddamn gun away, and we’ll get this straightened out. Christ, man, you’re with the agency.”

  “Oh no. The gun stays.” He jabbed the Beretta in Suzi’s direction. “One false step, and it’s curtains for the floozy.”

  “Hey! I’m no floozy!” Suzi, indignant, started to pull herself up out of the chair.

  Goiler backhanded her hard across the face, knocking her solidly back into the seat. “I told you not to move.” He emphasized every word with a thrust of his gun.

  We weren’t going to get to the bottom of this as long as Goiler was waving his gun around. And when he hit Suzi, he’d crossed the line. While he was paying attention to her, I made a play. It turned out to be a lame move. My lunge across the room suffered from bad timing and poor execution. Goiler saw me coming and had plenty of time to move his bulk out of my way. I slid past him, and he clubbed me right behind the ear with the butt of his gun as I went by.

  The pain from the blow jarred me all the way to my toes. I lost what little balance I had and tumbled into my television stand, sending its contents skittering across the floor as I continued into the wall on the far side of my cramped living room. I landed with a thump.

  “I told you, Drake, no tricks.” Goiler walked over to me, snatched my gun from its holster, and put it in his coat pocket. “For safekeepin’.” His tiny black eyes glistened like oil-covered BBs from beneath the folds of his puffy face. When he saw I wasn’t moving too fast, he turned his attention back to Suzi. “Now, let’s try this again. Where’s the bracelet?”

  “Ohhh . . .” Suzi moaned, maybe out of pain, maybe out of frustration.

  I pulled myself to a sitting position. “Bracelet?” I rubbed the sore spot behind my ear. It was already starting to swell. “What are you talking about, Goiler?”

  “Oh, Ben,” Suzi sighed, trying not to look at the gun pointed at her. “This is what I’ve been trying to tell you the whole time.”

  “What?” I was getting more confused by the second. “You’ve been trying to tell me something?”

  “Shut up, the both of youse!” Goiler shouted. “I’m not playin’ around here!”

  Suzi started to cry, putting her shaking hands over her flustered face. “Ben, I’m so sorry. It’s been hard . . . so hard . . .”

  “Awright, stop it with the waterworks, already,” Goiler ordered. “I can’t stand blubberin’ dames.”

  Suzi sniffed and managed to get herself under control. She looked over at me. “Ben, the
day before he died, Joe gave me this diamond bracelet. It was beautiful.”

  “Aw, for cryin’ out loud!” Goiler said. “Enough with the back story. Just fork over the goods!”

  I ignored the fat gunman. Now that Suzi was talking, I didn’t want her to stop. “A diamond bracelet, huh?”

  “It was the nicest thing anyone had ever given me. I mean, people bought me expensive stuff before, but I knew Joe had sacrificed a lot to give me this. We were so happy we went out to have a nice dinner at the Long Mile—”

  Goiler broke in: “Nobody cares where you were gonna eat—”

  “Come on, man, have some patience. We’re not going anywhere,” I explained, hoping to cool him off a little. “You’ve got the gun.”

  “That’s right I got the gun. What I don’t got is the damn bracelet!”

  Suzi had been holding back with her story for so long, now that she’d started, it was all flowing out. “The next day Jerry came by. I thought Jerry and I were friends. I thought he was going to comfort me, but instead he demanded that I give him the bracelet.” Suzi’s tears came back with a vengeance, making it hard for her to speak. “I . . . played dumb . . . not wanting to . . . lose . . . the last gift Joe . . . gave . . . me.”

  “I can’t believe you’re telling me this now,” I said.

  “That’s the final camel straw! I’ve had about enough of all this yammerin’!” Goiler pointed his gun at me. “I want the bracelet. I know she’s got it on her, ’cause I already tossed her place and got nothin’.”

  “Don’t listen to him, Ben!”

  Goiler turned and belted Suzi alongside her head, knocking her cleanly out of the chair and sending her sprawling on the floor. Still sobbing, she curled up into a little ball.

  “I told you to shut up!” Goiler screamed at her, sweat running in torrents down his round forehead.

  Seeing Suzi get hit again made me sick to my stomach, but I was too woozy and Goiler was too hopped up for me to try anything. There was nothing I could do except convince her to give him the bracelet.

  Silence, except for Suzi’s quiet sobbing, filled my apartment.

  “I know you got it on you!” Goiler’s bloodlust was running hot. His face was a dark crimson, and the veins in his temples throbbed with impatience. “You gonna give it up, or do I gotta strip you?”

  “Suzi,” I said slowly and quietly. I didn’t want to do anything that would set Goiler off worse than he already was.

  Suzi opened her eyes and peered at me.

  Goiler pulled my weapon out of his pocket and started pacing around the room, a gun in each fist, crazy eyes darting between me and Suzi, looking too much like he was deciding who he was going to shoot first.

  “I don’t care that you haven’t told me everything,” I said. “Really, I don’t. That doesn’t matter now. All that matters is getting you out of this safely. So please, if you have the bracelet, give it to him.”

  “But . . .” Her eyes pleaded with me.

  “Suzi, I know this guy. He’s not kidding around. Give him the bracelet.”

  Suzi pulled herself up into a sitting position. Goiler watched her intently, his big fish-lips twitching, as she slowly unbuttoned the top of her blouse. She reached under the fabric and dug around in her brassiere. When she pulled her hand back out, she was holding a bracelet made up of the biggest diamonds I’d ever seen. It sparkled brightly in the dim light, and tiny rainbows flashed wildly from its many facets.

  It was beautiful.

  Suzi held it out to Goiler, eyes cast down at the floor in shame. He dropped my gun back into his pocket and snatched the bracelet from Suzi.

  “That’s more like it.” Smug satisfaction played across his face. “Thanks for your cooperation, Drake.”

  “Sure, Goiler,” I sneered. “Now how about leaving us alone?”

  Goiler ogled the bracelet with palpable greed. His big pink tongue flicked out and cleaned the saliva from the corners of his mouth with a heavy slurping noise. He stashed the bracelet in the breast pocket inside his coat.

  “Sure, I’ll be leavin’ all right.” He wiped his mouth on the back of his fleshy hand. “But I can’t let you stick around to squawk to the cops, so we’re all gonna leave together.”

  “Where . . . where . . . are we going?” Suzi stammered.

  “We’re all gonna take a friendly little ride,” Goiler’s words, full of malice, oozed out from between his spittle-covered lips.

  “A ride? Jeez, Goiler. Can you get any more cliché?”

  “Shut up, Drake,” he threatened. “Let’s go.” He gestured us to the door with a violent waving of his gun.

  With some difficulty, I managed to get my legs under me and walk over to Suzi. She sat on the floor, staring intently at my shattered television.

  “Oh, Ben,” she wiped tears out of her eyes, “I’m so sorry.”

  “That’s okay, Suzi.” I held out my hand, offering to help her up. “Come on. Looks like we’re not quite done yet.”

  She looked up at me and smiled. It was a small smile, but it was genuine. “I know you’ll take care of me, Ben.”

  She took my hand, and I helped her up. Her confidence gave me strength.

  “Where we going, Goiler?”

  “Well, I’ve got some things to finish tonight, so I thought we’d head out someplace where you two won’t be able to cause too much trouble,” Goiler said. “I thought we’d head on out to the quarry.”

  * * *

  For the second time that night, I drove my car down the desert highway to the quarry at gunpoint. Goiler insisted that he sit in the back where he could easily plug anyone who, in his words, “does anything stupid.” That left Suzi sitting next to me, holding tightly to my leg. She was scared. Her long nails dug deeply into my flesh.

  It wasn’t long before Goiler had found my three-quarters-empty bottle of Old Grand-Dad rolling around on the floor and started taking heavy pulls from it.

  Goiler’s reputation as a slob was second only to his reputation as a braggart. I was hoping his pride, in addition to the alcohol he was consuming, would make him open to answering a few questions. I certainly wouldn’t have time later when I had to make a move.

  “Say, Goiler . . .”

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m wondering some things.” I took a moment to continue, letting curiosity build in my throat. “Now, I’ve figured out that you were the one who ripped off the Haufschmidt jewels—”

  “Did I now?” he interrupted with a coarse laugh.

  “And I’m pretty sure you offed Iverson.”

  Goiler tipped the bottle to his lips and sucked noisily at the bourbon. “Yeah,” he belched, “well, that’s what you call an educated guess there, Drake.”

  “But I just don’t understand why. How’s he tied up in all of this?”

  Goiler cackled from the backseat, “And I thought you were a detective.” He took another swig of bourbon. “Y’see, Iverson wanted to be connected—too many cops-and-robbers shows on TV or somethin’. Anyhow, I helped him out. He was doing a little freelance work for me. The guy had the right attitude for crime, but he lacked conviction. And he forgot the first rule I taught him: you don’t steal from the big man.”

  Finding out that Iverson pulled off the Haufschmidt jewel heist with Goiler was one big curveball—and just when I thought I had a handle on this case. That only left one question.

  “So, did you take out Joe Biggs too?”

  Silence emanated from the backseat. I glanced into my rearview mirror, but all I saw was the black of the lonely highway. The barrel of Goiler’s gun jammed into my head, right behind my ear. Goiler pressed it hard against the tender spot where he had clubbed me earlier.

  “I think you’ve asked enough.”

  Suzi’s nails dug deeper into my leg. I could feel her shaking.

  “That’s not something you need to know, not where you’re goin’,” he said. “An’ you keep yappin’, you’re gonna get there faster.”

  Goil
er was just crazy enough to shoot the guy who was driving the car he was riding in. So instead of talking, I started thinking how I could get me and Suzi out of this fix.

  My brain needed a little lubricant.

  “Okay, then,” I resigned. “If you’re not going to talk to me, then how about giving me a little of that bourbon?”

  More silence, then finally: “Awright, fine. Just don’t drink it all.” He handed me the bottle.

  He sure hadn’t left me much to work with. I took a couple of swallows, getting a good dose of Goiler’s spit in the process, and passed it back. The liquor’s sweet fire started burning in my throat and rapidly spread to my brain. Now it was time for a plan.

  We rode the rest of the way in silence. This drive seemed a lot longer than my last one. Finally, we pulled up under the bright glow of the quarry’s floodlight.

  “Well, here we are,” Goiler announced as I switched off the ignition. “Let’s all move real slow, eh?”

  We got out of the car and started walking. Goiler was pushing us along from behind, a gun in each fist. He stopped us when we got to the edge of the quarry. We were far enough away from the floodlight so that all I could see in front of me was a yawning pit of black.

  I turned around, ready to make my play.

  The dust we had kicked up shimmered as it settled back to the ground, making me feel like I’d slipped into a dream. The distant light behind Goiler streamed around him, cutting a man-shaped hole into the dust. The silhouette was as dark as the void behind me.

  His mood seemed positively lighter, and he chuckled with glee as he said, “Okay, Drake. You got any last requests?”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Leningrad Rules

  “You kill many people out here, Goiler?” I asked, trying to sound casual.

  “What sort of trick are you tryin’ to pull?” He looked at me quizzically.

  “None at all. I’m just wondering how often you bring people out here and shoot ’em.”

  “A couple of times, I guess.”

  “Huh. You kill many people?”