Bright Futures: A Lew Fonesca Mystery (Lew Fonesca Novels)

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

  “He’s in school now?” she asked.

  I stood back, knowing that she would eventually turn and see me, or her client would gaze at me again and catch her eye.

  “Yes, he is. At least he is supposed to be.”

  His voice was deep, even.

  “Thurgood is a good student?” Sally said, looking up from the form.

  “When he goes to school, and if you should meet him, he will not answer to the name ‘Thurgood.’ His middle name is Marshall. Thurgood Marshall Montieth.”

  “He is,” said Sally, “twelve years old.”

  “Soon to be thirteen,” said Montieth. “And, if I may, I will encapsulate the data you have in front of you in the hope of speeding the process so I can get back to work. My name is Marcus Montieth. I’m forty-seven years of age. I am a salesman and floor manager at Joseph Bank clothing store in the Sarasota Mall. My wife is dead. Thurgood is my only child. He is a truant, a problem. He has run away four times. I do not beat him. I do not slap him. I do not deprive him of food. I do not try to instill in him a fear of God because I do not believe in a god or gods. My health is good, though there is a history of heart attack in my family.”

  “Thurgood is an only child?” asked Sally.

  “And for that I would thank God were I to believe in one. May I ask you two questions?”

  “Yes,” said Sally.

  “What can be done for my son, and why is that man hovering over our conversation?”

  Sally turned enough in her desk chair to look over her right shoulder at me.

  “Lewis, could you …” she began.

  Something in the way I looked told her this was not one of my usual visits. Usually, I called before I came. Usually, I waited downstairs and listened to John Gutcheon while I waited for her to be free. Usually, there was no sense of urgency in my appearance. Usually, I did not hover near her cubicle.

  “I’ll be with you in a few minutes,” she said.

  I thought it unlikely she would ever be with me. I had let Sally Porovsky move into my life—no, to be fair, I had moved into hers—and let the ghost of Catherine begin to fade a little, but just a little.

  “Mr. Montieth, when would it be possible for you to come back with Thurgood?”

  “Please remember to call him Marshall. During the day he is supposedly in school. In the evenings I work. He comes home to my sister Mae’s apartment after school. I do get Wednesdays off.”

  “Wednesday after school?”

  “Yes,” he said. “Time?”

  “Four-thirty,” said Sally, reaching over to write in her desktop calendar.

  “We will be here,” he said rising.

  He was tall, six-four or six-five, and when he passed me I expected a look of disapproval at my intrusion. He smiled in understanding, assuming What? A fellow parent with a troubled child? A homeless creature in a baseball cap, some scratches on his face?

  “I’ve got a client coming in ten minutes, Lewis,” she said.

  I stepped forward but I didn’t sit. She looked up at me.

  “What is it?”

  “Ronnie Gerall,” I said. “When he supposedly transferred from San Antonio to Pine View, you vouched for him, signed papers of guardianship, found him a family to live with.”

  “Yes,” she said. “Lewis, please sit.”

  Her full, round face was smooth, just a little pink, and definitely pretty. She was tired. Sally was tired much of the time.

  I sat.

  “What’s your question?” she asked with a smile that made it clear that she did not expect me to ask if she would run away with me to Genoa.

  “Two questions to start,” I said. “How did Ronnie Gerall get in touch with you? How old was he when he entered Pine View School for the Gifted?”

  Sally blew out a puff of air as she leaned back in her chair and looked up at the white drop ceiling.

  “A letter and records came from Ronnie’s caseworker in San Antonio addressed to me. The caseworker said Ronnie’s parents had recently been killed in a small plane crash and that Ronnie had no other relatives, though his father had once had a brother in Sarasota. There was a possibility that other relatives might be found. The records showed that Ronnie was sixteen when he arrived here.

  “I called the number I’d been given,” she said. “A woman answered, gave her name, said she was Ronnie’s caseworker and had heard of me through an attorney who had moved to San Antonio a few weeks earlier. She didn’t have his name, but could get it if I needed it.”

  “You were conned,” I said.

  “I know.”

  “Ronnie Gerall was twenty-five when he came here,” I said.

  “Almost twenty-six,” she said.

  “His real name is Dwight Torcelli. When did you find out?”

  “Two years later,” she said. “Just before I met you. How did you find out?”

  “Dixie.”

  Sally shook her head. She looked more tired than I had ever seen her.

  “I was suspicious,” she said. “Dwight Torcelli is a very good-looking, charming, smart, fast-talking young man. With my experience, you might think I wouldn’t fall for things like this, but he took me in and made it clear that he was interested in me as someone other than a caseworker.”

  “And?” I said, knowing, almost welcoming yet another blow.

  “I let him get close, not so close that we … but close. By that time I knew he wasn’t a teenager. I should have turned him in, but he was persuasive, claimed he had never finished high school, that he wanted to go to college and …”

  “Yes?” I said.

  “By that time he was in his senior year. We saw each other once in a while, but we never …”

  “I believe you.”

  “Don’t,” she said closing her eyes. “There were two times, both in the last year. I … I’m forty-three years old, two young children, a job that never stops, sad stories around me all day and here was a young man who reminded me of a very white-toothed young James Dean.”

  “That’s why you’re moving?” I said. “Because Torcelli is here?”

  “That and the other things we talked about.”

  We were silent for a while, looking at each other.

  “You think he killed Horvecki?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Why would he?”

  “He’s married to Rachel Horvecki. She inherits her father’s money.”

  Sally looked over the top of her cubicle at the ceiling.

  “If Ronnie left Sarasota, would you stay?” I asked.

  “Probably not. I broke the rules, Lew,” she said, turning in her chair and putting a hand on my arm. “I’m sorry.”

  The phone rang. Sally picked it up and said, “All right.”

  When she hung up, she said, “My next appointment’s here.”

  I stood.

  “You know where I might find him?”

  She pulled over the note pad on her desk, paused to look at the framed photograph of her two kids, and jotted something down. Then she tore it from the pad and handed it to me.

  “I’m really very good at what I do here,” she said.

  “I know.”

  “I’m sorry. Lew …”

  “Yes.”

  “Get the son of a bitch.”

  I nodded, said nothing and left the cubicle. It was the first time I had heard her utter any epithet more harsh than “damn.” I didn’t want to run into Sally’s next client or clients getting off the elevator. I didn’t want to imagine what it would be like for Sally after our conversation. I took the stairs.

  John Gutcheon looked up at me with sympathy. He knew.

  “I’m sorry,” he said.

  Everybody seemed to be sorry, including me. I wondered how Gutcheon had found out about Dwight Torcelli and Sally, but I guessed that he had seen it in Dwight’s triumph and Sally’s guilt. He saw a lot going by as he sat behind that reception desk. Sometimes one learns more by sitting and watching than running and listening.


  13

  *

  ICALLED AMES.

  “We’ve been parked outside Gerall’s apartment,” said Ames. “Nothing yet.”

  “That’s not where he is,” I said.

  I told him where I was going and asked him to get there soon, and armed.

  “You sound like someone hit you with an andiron.”

  “Yes,” I said. “I know. I’ve got some things you should know. I’ll tell you when I see you.”

  “Saturn needs more work,” Ames said. “Best do it in the morning.”

  “Right,” I said, and hung up.

  Saturn, Mars, Jupiter, and the Earth all needed more work. The Universe needed more work. I tried to concentrate on a new metallic banging under the dashboard. It sounded like an angry elf had had enough of this rust of metal and motion. Up Tamiami Trail into Bradenton and a turn at Forty-seventh. I parked at the address Sally had written for me. Gerall’s car was there. So was a perfectly polished, sporty-looking new Mazda with all the bells and whistles one could buy, enjoy, and show off. I probably wasn’t too late. He could have run away on foot. Unlikely. He could have taken a cab. Possible. Someone could have picked him up and taken him to another refuge. I sat and waited for Ames to arrive.

  The apartment building was small, two stories, brick, in need of a serious blasting to reveal whatever color was under the dirty earth and etched-in dripping patterns from the building’s old drains. The weight of leaves, brush, twigs, and tree branches gave the illusion of a sagging middle to the roof. A sign, as abused as the building, said that choice studio apartments were available in the Ponce De Leon Arms. The dried-up tiny fountain near the take-it-or-leave-it sign let tenants know they had not come to the right place if they were planning to live forever. What the building and the sign did say, without words, was, “If you’re low on the pole and looking for what you can get by on, this is as good a place as any.”

  Victor pulled his car in behind mine and remained behind the wheel, while Ames got out wearing his weathered yellow duster.

  “I’ll go in first. You stand outside his door,” I said.

  Ames nodded in understanding. We crunched over a layer of dead and dying yellow, orange, and black leaves dropped by two massive native oak trees. The entryway door of the building was open. The small foyer, tiled in cracked, ancient squares, had nothing to offer but a bank of twelve mailboxes, one of which hung open, and a collection of flyers and giveaway newspapers promising two slices of flavorless pizza for the price of one. The apartment marked gerall was number seven.

  We went through the inner door, also open, and down the narrow, carpeted corridor to apartment seven. Someone inside was talking. I could have strained to pick up some of the conversation. The voices belonged to a man and a woman.

  I knocked.

  The people inside the apartment stopped talking and went silent.

  “Who is it?” came Ronnie’s voice.

  “Police,” Ames said.

  The room went silent. The pause was long.

  “Police,” Ames repeated. “Open it or step out of the way.”

  The lock was unbolted as Ames stepped back against the corridor wall where he couldn’t be seen unless Dwight Torcelli or whoever was inside stepped out to look. The door opened slightly more than a crack.

  “Fonesca?”

  “Who is it?” a woman’s voice from inside the room asked.

  “Not the police,” Torcelli said.

  “May I come in, Dwight?” I asked.

  “How did you find … ?”

  He stopped after quickly and silently going through the very short list of those who would know about this second apartment and his real name.

  “Sally,” he said.

  “May I come in?” I asked again.

  He stepped back to let me enter and closed the door behind me. Alana Legerman stood in the center of the room next to the bed on which a large brown cloth suitcase stood open. It looked full and ready to be closed.

  “Sally who?” asked Alana.

  “My caseworker,” he said.

  His denim pants were tan, pressed, creased, and tight fitting. His shirt was a Polo pullover, green and white stripes, and not tight fitting.

  “We’re in a hurry here, Mr. Fonesca,” Alana said.

  “I’ll bet you are. Bail jumping, especially on a murder charge, can make someone move in a hurry. You’re going to lose a lot of money.”

  “I can afford it,” she said. “You plan to tell anyone?”

  “Yes, the police.”

  She motioned to Torcelli to close the suitcase. He did and pulled the cracked leather straps tight.

  “You still work for me, Mr. Fonesca,” she said.

  “I resign. Job-related stress.”

  “I have a secret you may wish to know before you make a decision,” she said.

  “You’re really his mother,” I said, nodding at Torcelli.

  “No,” she said, pausing to show that she didn’t appreciate my attempt at humor at her expense. “You stole something from my father.”

  “What?” asked Torcelli.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “He just told me Fonesca and the old man he hangs around with broke into the house and stole something.”

  “The old man is my partner,” I said. “His name is Ames McKinney. And a copy of what we stole is here.”

  I took the folded pieces of paper from my pocket and handed them to her.

  “We have to go,” Torcelli said while she looked at what I had handed her.

  “I find people for a living,” I said. “I’m good at it. It may be the only thing I’m good at. I could find you no matter where you go, and so could the police.”

  “Not true,” he said, folding his arms and standing erect with his arms folded. “Alana, those things in your hand are fakes. He’s …”

  She held up a hand to indicate that she wanted him quiet while she looked over the papers. After no more than two minutes she handed me the documents and spoke.

  “Two questions, and I expect the truth: First, are you really twenty-seven years old? Second, are you married?”

  The answer was a long time coming, and he looked at me with something less than friendship before answering.

  “Yes, and no,” he said. “I am twenty-seven years old. At least I will be tomorrow.”

  “Happy Birthday,” she said, folding her arms across her chest.”

  “I can explain why I …”

  “Are you married?”

  “No,” he said. “I was. She died.”

  “You married Philip Horvecki’s daughter,” I said. “Is she dead?”

  “No.”

  Alana Legerman was freeze-framed in a look of disappointment which turned to anger and then to acceptance with a shake of the head.

  “Alana,” he said. “You know I love you.”

  “You love me? Who are you?”

  “His name is Dwight Torcelli,” I said.

  “Mr. Fonesca, do you have any objection to my leaving?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “I won’t be missing anything else I should know?”

  “No.”

  “Good. Don’t let him get away. Goodbye.”

  “If you let me … ,” he began, but he didn’t finish because she was out the door and gone.

  I wondered what she would make of Ames in the hallway with a shotgun. There was no scream. I heard no voices through the thin door.

  “I didn’t kill Horvecki or anyone,” he said. “I swear. Believe me.”

  “What I believe doesn’t matter.”

  “You’re taking me back to jail.”

  “But not to juvenile. You’re an adult. We’ll let the district attorney’s office figure it all out.”

  “No,” he said. “When you give them those documents about me, I probably won’t even be able to get a public defender who believes I didn’t kill Horvecki.”

  I wanted to ask him about Sally, but I didn’t. He would either lie
or tell the truth, and both would hurt.

  “Let’s go,” I said.

  “No,” he repeated.

  “Suit yourself. Run, hide. Maybe Alana Legerman won’t turn you in. Maybe she really won’t care about losing the bond money. Maybe.”

  I stepped away from the door. He picked up his suitcase and moved toward me.

  “Step away,” he said.

  I stepped away, but something I couldn’t control came over me. I moved in and punched him in the nose as hard as I could. I felt bone break and electric frozen pain in my knuckle.

  There was no satisfaction in throwing the punch. It just felt like something I had to do.

  He let out a groan and dropped the suitcase. Blood gushed from his nose. Rage was in his eyes and his fists were clenched. He was almost twenty years younger than I. I was in good shape from my almost daily workouts at the downtown YMCA, but I was probably not a match for him. The one thing I was sure of was that I could take whatever he threw and keep on coming. I didn’t know how much he was willing to take.

  “You lunatic,” he screamed, doing nothing to stop the blood.

  He looked like a much different person from the one who had opened the door. This was not a young James Dean sans mustache. This was Mr. Hyde played without his hair draped haphazardly down his forehead. His now inflamed nose suggested drunkenness. His eyes were wide and wild.

  “You broke in here and tried to kill me,” he said.

  I knew where this was going. I took a step toward him. A gun, a small gun, appeared in his right hand. He wiped blood from his nose with the back of his left hand.

  “You told me that someone hired you to kill me,” he said. “Maybe Corkle.”

  “Might work,” I said. “But probably not.”

  He was flexing his grip on the gun which was now aimed at my stomach.

  “Why aren’t you scared?” he almost screamed.

  “Nothing you’d understand,” I said. “Lift the gun a little if your plan is to hit my heart.”

  “You are a lunatic,” he said.

  His gun hand moved down so that it was now aimed at the floor. That was when Ames came in, shotgun at the ready and aimed at Torcelli who took a step back.

  “You okay?” Ames asked me. “You’ve got blood on you.”