by John Lutz
“I don’t trust her,” Lacy said, when they were outside in the night.
“It’s her jaw,” Nudger said. “She can’t help how she looks.”
Lacy glanced over at him with an expression of disgust. “I thought you were a professional. It has nothing to do with how the woman looks. It’s what she said about exchanging Christmas cards with her brother.”
“Family is family,” Nudger said. “Even brothers and sisters on the outs with each other get sentimental about Christmas and exchange cards.”
“One of the things I found on Millman’s computer hard drive was his Christmas card list. Irma’s name wasn’t on it.”
Nudger shrugged. “That doesn’t stack up as evidence. Maybe he knew her address by heart.”
“That doesn’t seem likely. If I had a sister I hardly ever saw, I’d have her address written down on my Christmas card list.”
Nudger wondered if the sister would send Lacy a card, but he kept the thought to himself as he opened his car door.
Lacy opened the door of her car, a friend’s Ford Taurus she’d borrowed for the night, parked behind Nudger’s humble Granada. “You’ve never sent me a Christmas card,” she said.
“I don’t send them to anyone,” Nudger lied. “And I don’t recall ever receiving a card from you.”
“They’re against my religion,” Lacy said.
“I wasn’t aware that you had a religion.”
“I fluctuate.”
“And I’ve never noticed you getting dewy-eyed during the holidays,” Nudger said, lowering himself into the Granada.
“I’ve been known to drink too much and sing ’Danny Boy’ on St. Patrick’s Day.” She leaned on her car door and aimed her cane at him as if it were a gun. “I have my soft side.”
“So does a swamp,” Nudger said under his breath, shutting the car door and twisting the ignition key. “It’s called quicksand.”
Lacy limped over to his car before he could drive away, so he cranked down the window.
“I think we better talk with Warren Tully before Irma does,” she said, leaning on her cane with both hands folded over its crook.
Nudger knew she was right. “Tomorrow morning,” he told her, putting the transmission lever in drive. “I’ll call you about nine.”
She leaned down to peer in through the window as he steered away from the curb.
“Think about that burglar fantasy,” she advised.
Chapter Eighteen
It was almost 10:30 P.M., but Nudger decided to stop by his office on the way home and call the phone number with the heart drawn after it that he’d seen in Brad Millman’s address book.
He parked on Manchester and jogged across the street toward the office, noticing that the lights were on in the back of Danny’s Donuts on the ground floor. Danny would be manning the oven and the deep fryer, preparing doughnuts for tomorrow’s brave souls who would chance a Dunker Delite and a cup of his acidic coffee to start their day.
Nudger went through the street door next to the doughnut shop entrance and made his way up the narrow wooden stairway as quietly as possible. He didn’t want Danny to hear him and offer him food or coffee that he’d have to turn down in the interest of a longer life. Though a cup of decaffeinated coffee sounded good, he knew that with the shop closed, the burner that kept the single glass pot of the stuff hot would be turned off.
When he reached the landing, he unlocked his office door then stepped carefully, trying to keep the ancient hardwood floor from squeaking and being heard below as he crossed it to his desk and sat down. His swivel chair eeeked, and he sat as still as possible while he punched out the heart number on the desk phone. The exchange was for an area in North County, beyond the airport.
A phone on the other end of the connection began to ring. Nudger wondered who might answer. A motel or lodge where someone and Brad had met and enjoyed each other? A secret lover? Nudger the romantic, making his job seem more glamorous than it was.
The phone was picked up and a voice, obviously a male though raspy and high-pitched, said hello.
Nudger decided to forge ahead full speed. “I’m calling for Brad Millman,” he said.
“Who?”
Nudger repeated the name.
“I never heard of—Oh, wait a minute. You mean the fella with the swimming pool company?”
“That’s right.”
“Well, he’s not here. And why would he be? I mean, I only met the guy once and he left me his card.”
“Why did he leave you his card?”
The voice on the phone waited a few beats before replying. “Who is this?”
“We’re investigating Brad Millman’s death,” Nudger said. Let the man on the line assume he was the police.
“His death, did you say?”
“Yes, he was killed in an auto accident last week.”
“Well ... that’s too bad.” There wasn’t much sadness in the voice, only politeness.
“We found your phone number in an address book with a heart drawn beside it.”
The man laughed. “People do that all the time when I tell them my number and they’re writing it down. It’s because of my name.”
“Your name?”
“Yeah. Wayne Hart. H-a-r-t. People jotting down my name and number sometimes just draw a heart instead of bothering to write my name. That way they can remember who the number belongs to, and still be too lazy to write. That must be what Millman did when I talked to him the first time over the phone.”
“What was the conversation about?” Nudger asked.
“A swimming pool. Millman drove out to my place and gave me an estimate on a pool. I thought it was a little high, and anyway, I wanna go with an all concrete pool and—”
“Is that the only contact you had with Millman?”
“Sure. I’m sorry to hear about him dying. He was a healthy-looking young guy who figured to have a lot of years left to live. You say it was an accident?”
“Yes. Car accident.”
“That’s sure too bad.”
“Thanks for talking to me, Mr. Hart.”
“Sure,” Hart said, as Nudger hung up.
So much for late-night detective work. Nudger wished it could be like in the movies, where every clue led to a dramatic development on the road to a satisfying solution.
A creaking sound made him sit up straight.
Someone was on the landing.
The door opened slowly, and Danny stuck his head into the office. His droopy, basset-hound features looked melancholy even though he was smiling.
“I thought I heard you up here, Nudge.” He opened the door wider and stepped all the way inside. “Brought you something.” In his right hand was a cup of the dreaded coffee, not from the decaffeinated pot but from the bowels of the giant steel urn. In his left was an equally ominous Dunker Delite wrapped in waxed paper.
Nudger wanted no part of what was in Danny’s hands, but hurting Danny’s feelings was like kicking the lame. “I just came from eating a late supper,” he explained, “or I’d take you up on the offer.”
“Just the coffee, then,” Danny said, setting the foam cup on the corner of Nudger’s desk.
“Thanks,” Nudger said, before he could stop himself.
“I came up for another reason,” Danny said. “You had a prospective client come by this afternoon.” Danny juggled the Dunker Delite in his left hand and switched it to his right, as if it might still be hot from its submergence in grease. Because of the proximity of the office and doughnut shop, and because Nudger couldn’t afford to hire anyone, Danny served as his ersatz receptionist. A sign taped to Nudger’s office door directed clients downstairs when he was away. “Big fella, he was,” Danny went on, “said he wanted to use you.”
Nudger wasn’t sure he liked the man’s choice of words. “Use me for what?”
“That he didn’t say. I told him you probably wouldn’t be back today and asked his name, but he clammed up. Probably a juicy divorce case. Or
maybe he’s wanted by the police.”
“Sounds like my kind of client,” Nudger said. “Did he say he’d be back?”
“Said you could count on it.”
“Well, I need something to count, business being what it is.” Nudger pried the plastic lid off the coffee cup and pretended to take a sip.
“I gave him one of your cards. One of the old ones with the big staring eye printed in the corner. He kinda smiled when he took it, like it made him reassured.”
Nudger stood up from the desk. “I’m done here, Danny. I better get home if I’m gonna catch the rest of Jay Leno.”
“Don’t forget your coffee, Nudge. It’ll help keep you awake for the show. I always watch Dave on the portable down in the kitchen.”
Nudger dutifully picked up the foam coffee cup and carried it to the door. Danny followed and waited while Nudger locked the office, then went with him down the stairs.
When Danny said good-night and opened the doughnut shop door, the sweet sugar scent from the kitchen wafted out. It wasn’t an unpleasant smell from this distance, and Nudger was glad, since the scent of the doughnuts permeated the building and his clothes and even him. He only wished it was a scent that didn’t travel so well. If Danny ever marketed it as a perfume, he could call it Cling.
He waved to Danny as he crossed Manchester to his car, careful to hold the coffee cup steady so the searing liquid wouldn’t slosh over the rim and take the flesh off his hand.
He drove several blocks before tossing the coffee out the car window. Though he wanted to avoid Danny’s acidic brew, the smell of it remained in the car and whetted Nudger’s craving for a cup of decaffeinated coffee, very real coffee compared to Danny’s.
As soon as he got inside his apartment on Sutton, he went to the kitchen and found a can with a few scoopfuls of caffeine-free ground beans. He got Mr. Coffee going, then went into the living room, sat on the sofa, removed his shoes, then used the remote to switch on Leno.
Jay was interviewing a petite brunette actress who looked familiar to Nudger, but he couldn’t remember her name. She was talking about her latest movie, the story of a gang of female train robbers in the old west. Nudger wondered if it was historically accurate.
He wasn’t much interested in the movie, so he leaned back for a moment and closed his eyes, paying more attention to the coffee perking in the kitchen than to what Jay and the actress were saying. Then he stretched his legs straight out and crossed them at the ankles.
So comfortable ...
Possibly he dozed off, but he wasn’t sure. He sat with the back of his head resting against the soft sofa, still with his eyes closed, listening to Jay’s next guest:
“... see that you quit blundering around where you don’t belong.”
The guy sure had terrible breath.
Huh?
Nudger opened his eyes and saw a huge face looming over him.
It wasn’t a handsome face. The features were thick, with a low forehead and greasy black unkempt hair. Either the man’s head grew to a point or his hair made it appear that way. His oversized ears were almost perfect pink crescents and stuck straight out. One was larger than the other, making him look like a Mr. Potato Head with mismatched parts.
Something about the face rang a bell in the back of Nudger’s mind, but in his surprise and fear, he couldn’t grasp where he might have seen the man before.
Then the man drew back a gigantic fist and rang Nudger’s bell.
Nudger found himself lying on the floor alongside the sofa. The left side of his jaw was numb. He managed to get to his hands and knees before a boat-sized brown shoe came his way. He rolled away from the kick, noticing that the shoe was unlaced and the foot in the white sock appeared swollen. As he struggled to his feet he saw that both the man’s shoes were laced only halfway and left untied, as if he had chronic foot problems and sought comfort.
“You’re not going anyplace but down again,” the pointy-headed goon rumbled. Nudger thought he sounded confident.
The giant leaped forward and took another swat at Nudger but landed only a grazing blow that set Nudger’s left shoulder afire and sent him reeling backward. He kept his momentum and ran for the kitchen and the back door. But just inside the kitchen he was tackled hard from behind and hit the tile floor with a thunk, hurting both his elbows. The big man was amazingly fast as well as powerful.
“No back doors for you, my friend.” The voice rolled like thunder, and for the first time Nudger noticed a slight accent. “No escape at all.”
He had a firm grip on Nudger’s ankle, which felt as if it were clamped in the jaws of a shark. Nudger glanced up and wondered if he’d be able to snatch a knife from the drawer by the sink. Or at least grab onto some hard object he could throw at his assailant. He wished now he hadn’t refused Danny’s Dunker Delite.
“You’re staying on the floor with the rest of the crumbs,” the big man said.
But Nudger raised his free leg and slammed his foot into the hand clutching his ankle. The goon grunted, surprised, and released the ankle.
Nudger scooted away and leaned his back against a table leg. He was gasping for breath, but his attacker seemed fresh. He grinned down at Nudger, revealing teeth that appeared to have been filed to sharp points. That terrified Nudger, who had recently seen a TV National Geographic special about cannibals who had such teeth.
Then the grinning goon reached inside his shirt and withdrew a huge knife with a scimitarlike blade that ended in a sharp point. Nudger recognized it as the bowie knife he’d seen in dozens of western movies.
The leering giant, who looked like no one Nudger had ever seen on TV or in the movies, growled, “Going now to cut the backs of your heels so you won’t be getting around so good for a long time, causing trouble and all like the bad boy you are.”
Nudger realized then why the man seemed familiar. He fit the description of the thug who’d severed Lacy Tumulty’s Achilles tendons.
Nudger panicked.
Energized by terror, he scrambled to his feet.
That seemed to amuse the big man. He flipped the knife into the air and deftly caught it by the handle. Then he grinned wider and moved toward Nudger.
Nudger backed away, his eyes darting to the door to the back stairs. It was locked at the doorknob and with a chain lock. There was no way he could get it unlocked before the man with the knife would be on him.
In his panic, he tried it anyway.
He fairly flew to the door, and he was fumbling with the chain lock when a gigantic hand grabbed his neck and yanked him backward, flinging him across the kitchen and up against the counter by the sink. There was a sharp pain in the back of Nudger’s hand and he yanked it away. The hand had come in contact with the glass pot on the Mr. Coffee burner.
“Operation time,” the grinning thug said. He hefted the knife in his right hand and came toward Nudger.
Fear and instinct made Nudger act. Without conscious thought, he grabbed the handle of the coffeepot and flung the hot liquid in his attacker’s leering face.
The man growled like a bear and backed away, dropping the knife. Both hands flew to his face.
Then he roared with pain and rage and hurled himself in the direction of Nudger.
But Nudger was already running from the kitchen. He didn’t look back as he crossed the living room to the front door. Didn’t look back as he got the door open and half fell, half ran down the steps to the street door and burst outside. Not checking for traffic, he dashed across Sutton Avenue to where his car was parked.
Then he looked back.
There was no sign of the pointy-headed, pointy-toothed giant.
Nudger dug his key ring from his pocket and climbed into the car.
The starter ground, but the engine wouldn’t turn over.
His heart hammering, Nudger heard himself whine as he groveled in the glove compartment for the long screwdriver that had become standard equipment in lieu of carburetor repair.
Finally his fi
ngers closed on the screwdriver’s plastic handle, and within seconds he was out of the car and had the hood raised. He removed the air cleaner and set it on the curb, then poked the screwdriver down the throat of the carburetor to hold the butterfly valve wide open. As he scrambled back into the car to try to start it again, he saw the enraged giant stumble out of the apartment building, a towel pressed to his face.
Nudger twisted the ignition key and the engine caught and then roared steadily, attracting the man’s attention.
“Oh, God!” Nudger heard himself say. With the engine snarling full throttle, he slammed the transmission into drive.
Somehow everything held together. The engine didn’t explode and the transmission didn’t drop to the pavement. The old Granada leaped forward with a screech of tires and blasted down the street.
Nudger could see only the flat surface of the raised hood until he poked his head out the window and craned his neck. The speeding car swayed and swerved down Sutton as he tried to see where he was going and keep his grip on the steering wheel that was slippery with perspiration.
There was a violent lurch and the steering wheel spun and hurt Nudger’s thumb. The right wheel had jumped the curb. Steel screamed as the car scraped a metal utility pole.
For a few seconds Nudger was buffeted around in his seat. Then he fought with the steering wheel and won, and the Granada was back in the street. He stamped hard on the brake pedal, but the car barely slowed. He could smell brake pad burning. Yelling almost as loud as the engine was roaring, he gripped the shift lever and yanked it into neutral.
The Granada rolled to a stop, its engine still screaming.
Nudger felt as if he’d driven terror-filled miles, but he was only a block away from his apartment.
He hopped out of the car, yanked the screwdriver from the carburetor, and slammed down the hood.