Burn Marks

by Sara Paretsky

  I followed. His apartment was pretty much a copy of mine in terms of layout, but his style-and budget-were way out of my league. The living room was done in textured contrasting whites. The long wall backing onto the stairwell was covered by an abstract oil in different blues and greens. That was the only color in the room-the bookshelves and coffee table were a clear glass or acrylic or something.

  I lowered myself carefully into one of the low-slung nubby armchairs, hoping that my jeans wouldn’t leave any telltale dirt streak behind. Vinnie sat as far from me as he could get, in a matching chair near the front window, while Rick leaned against the wall near him.

  “So tell me what happened,” I invited.

  When Vinnie didn’t show any inclination to answer, Rick spoke for him. “This was a week ago tomorrow night, right? We were asleep-” He broke off to look at me guardedly, to see if I was going to scream and yell at this revelation. When he saw I wasn’t reacting he went on.

  “The dog was barking her head off-that woke us up. The bedroom is next to the hall, you know.”

  In my place it was on the outside and the kitchen was next to the hall, but they were reversed on the first floor because of the way the back stairs came down-I knew from all the times I’d been in Mr. Contrera’s kitchen picking up the dog.

  “We got up and saw you leaving. And Vinnie said it was the last time you’d wake him up in the middle of the night. He said you did something illegal and had the cops paid off but he was going to track you down, catch you in the act, and go to the police with hard evidence that would make them arrest you.” He cocked his head on one side. “Just out of curiosity, what is it you do? You don’t look like a dealer or a hooker.”

  I couldn’t help smiling. “I’m a private investigator, but that doesn’t have anything to do with why I’ve been waking him up. Actually it’s an aunt of mine-she got burned out of her home and came to me for late-night assistance a few times. But Vinnie reacted so violently I couldn’t bring myself to confide in him. So what did you do when you saw me leave?”

  “We got in the Mazda and followed you.”

  Rick had a cool poise that made me wonder what he saw in Vinnie. Still, it wasn’t the first ill-matched couple I’d ever met. I thought back to my cautious approach down Indiana to the Prairie Shores. I didn’t think I’d been followed.

  “We waited on Cermak,” Rick explained. Neither of us was paying any attention to Vinnie, who sat hunched inside his Dead T-shirt. “If you were really meeting a drug dealer, I didn’t want to be caught in the middle. And that was the eeriest street I’ve ever seen. We drove up and down Cermak a few times; we saw you come down Indiana and disappear behind that building, the one that burned. So we turned up the street and watched and after about twenty minutes we saw the place start up in flames and some guy running off. That really freaked us, but we thought we’d better call 911. Is it true that they tape the calls?”

  I nodded abstractedly. Of course this could be a romance cooked up to appease me, but it had the ring of truth to it. Vinnie looked too sulky, for one thing, and the bit about not wanting to leave Cermak Road sounded authentic.

  “Could you describe the man you saw running away from the building?”

  Rick shook his head. “It was dark and he was dressed in dark clothes. I think he had a leather jacket on, but I was too nervous to pay much attention. I’m pretty sure he was white; I think I saw the lamplight reflect off his cheekbones, but I’m not sure if I really remember that.”

  “Then you stayed around to see if someone came to put out the fire?”

  He looked a little ashamed. “I know we should have rushed into the burning building to save you, but we didn’t know what you’d been up to-whether you’d set the fire yourself, maybe you’d gotten out however you came in. And the fire got going fast.”

  “Because of the accelerant,” I said absently. “But Elena told Mrs.-told someone that she’d seen the man who torched the Indiana Arms and that he had the most gorgeous eyes. And that’s what she said when she saw Vinnie the first night she woke him up. So I thought maybe she’d recognized him and had been blackmailing him,”

  My voice trailed off as Rick began to laugh. “This is pure Restoration, Vinnie. Come on, lighten up! You think she’s running a crack house upstairs all the time she’s tracking you down as a pyromaniac. I want you two to shake hands and have a drink together.”

  Vinnie didn’t want to and I wasn’t much in the humor for it, either, but Rick went off to the kitchen and came back with a bottle of Georges Goulet. It seemed churlish not to have a least one glass. In the end Rick and I drank that bottle and part of another one while Vinnie stomped angrily off to bed.

  36

  Treasure Hunt

  I didn’t have a clear memory of getting back to my own apartment. Ten hours later I wished I didn’t have a clear sense of waking up, either. Someone was running an artificial surf machine inside my head. It swooshed and swirled when I tried standing. Even if I hadn’t drunk the champagne, I would have felt awful-my hike around the Ryan had stiffened up my legs. My shoulders felt as though I’d spent the night on a circular saw. With the better part of a bottle swelling my cytoplasm, I wished I could spend the next twelve hours unconscious.

  Instead I staggered into the kitchen looking for orange juice. The maid or wife or whoever looked after these things hadn’t been to the store yet. I thought about going out myself, but the idea of being in direct sunlight made me feel so ill that I had to sit down. When the spasm passed I went into the bathroom, located the Tylenol, and took four, extra-strength, with a couple of glasses of cold water. After a long soak in the tub with the water as hot as I could tolerate, I shuffled back to bed.

  When I woke up again it was past noon. I didn’t feel like running a mile but I thought I could manage getting dressed and going to the grocery. When you feel really lousy, puppy therapy is indicated. I stopped at Mr. Contreras’s to pick up Peppy.

  “You look terrible, doll. You doing okay?” He was wearing a red shirt so brilliant it hurt my eyes.

  “I feel like death. But I’m going to get better. I just want to borrow the dog for a while.”

  His faded brown eyes were bright with worry. “You sure you even oughta be dressed? Why don’t you go back to bed and I’ll fix you something to eat. You shouldn’t of got out of the hospital so soon. I don’t know what Dr. Lotty would say if she could see you.”

  I swayed slightly and caught hold of the doorjamb. Peppy came over to lick my hands. “She’d say I got what was coming to me. This is just cork flu-it doesn’t have anything to do with my injuries, or at least not much.”

  “Cork flu?” He cocked his head to one side. “Oh. You been drinking too much. Don’t do that, doll. It’s no way to solve your problems.”

  “No, of course it isn’t. Who should know that better than you? I’ll bring Peppy back later.”

  I wobbled off with the dog while he was squawking righteously about how knocking back a few with the boys was not the same as me drowning my sorrows in whiskey, I should know by now it was bad for my system. Peppy was totally uninterested in these fine points of ethics, or the different morality prevailing for men who drink than for women. She was staggered that we weren’t going running. She kept looking up at me to see if I was watching her, then looking very pointedly to the east to say we should be going that way.

  When she saw it wasn’t going to happen she took it like a lady, waiting sedately outside the grocery on Diversey and staying fairly close going home. She’d run a half a block ahead of me, come back to see if I was still there, tree a squirrel a few yards back, then move ahead again. Back at my apartment she placed herself on the kitchen floor between the stove and table. In my stupefied condition I kept stepping on her tail but she didn’t move-what if some food fell?-she wanted to be able to get to it before I tripped on it. That’s what a guard dog is for.

  I squeezed some orange juice and fried hamburgers for the two of us, hers without rye or lett
uce. The hamburger raised my blood sugar to the point that I thought I might even manage to live another few days.

  I’d intended to go back to the Recorder of Deeds office to look up Farmworks; if it wasn’t a partnership, I’d have to drive to Springfield to see whether they’d been incorporated. Halfway through the second bottle last night, though, as Rick described in hilarious detail the collapse of a set he’d designed for the La Brea Tarpit Wars, I’d remembered the Lexis system. If you had a pal who subscribed to it, you could find out who the officers of a closely held company were as long as it had filed to do business in Illinois.

  I wasn’t up to taking the first step, visiting the Recorder’s office in the old county building, but I went to the living room to call Freeman Carter. He’s my attorney, not exactly a pal, and he wouldn’t get me the information for nothing, but it still beat driving to Springfield.

  Freeman expressed himself pleased at hearing from me-his secretary had brought in the news clips about my near death. He’d been waiting for me to feel better before seeing if I wanted to start a civil action against anyone.

  “You mean the way you have to do if the Klan murders your kid?” I asked. “What is it you do-sue for being deprived of your civil right to life?”

  “Something like that.” He laughed. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m coming along, but I was too ambitious yesterday- I’m not going out today. I was wondering if you’d do something for me.”

  “Maybe, if it relates to my proper professional role in your life and if it is very clearly marked ‘legal.’”

  “When have I ever asked you to do something illegal?” I demanded, stung.

  He responded more promptly than I really enjoyed. “There was the time you asked me to give you financial details on one of Crawford, Meade’s other clients. That’s not only illegal but highly unethical. Then when you wanted me to get a restraining order against Dick you could hardly stand it when I turned you down. Then ten or twelve months ago-”

  “Okay, okay,” I interrupted hastily. “But those were all things I would have done myself if I’d been able to. Name something illegal I wouldn’t do myself.”

  “I don’t have that much imagination. And anyway, you wouldn’t give away confidential client records to anyone. Probably not even to me. Still want to ask me something?”

  “Just for some information out of Lexis.” Peppy, giving up on the idea of more hamburger, started exploring the room to see who had been there since her last visit.

  “You still don’t have a computer? Christ, Vic, when are you going to join the eighties?”

  “Soon,” I promised. “Very soon. As soon as I get four thousand dollars that isn’t marked rent or mortgage or insurance or something. Also I need a new car. The Chevy has ninety-five thousand miles on it and is starting to make horrible grinding noises at high speeds.”

  “Don’t drive it so fast,” he advised unkindly. “What do you need off Lexis? Just the officers of a corporation? Spell it out for me, okay-one word, right, ‘works’ not capitalized. One of the paralegals will call you back this afternoon or tomorrow morning. Drink some chicken soup and get a good sleep.”

  The sleep idea sounded inviting, but first I checked in with my answering service to see how many people I’d kept hanging since Saturday. Lotty had phoned once, as had Furey, Robin Bessinger had called a couple of times.

  Maybe Michael had some word on my aunt. I tried both the station and his house and left a message on his machine.

  After hanging up I went to the window to stare down at the Chevy. The real reason I’d been skipping my calls was my aunt. Her condition had been pretty marginal when she left the hospital; every time the phone rang I was afraid it was someone with bad news about her.

  If she did turn up alive, she’d probably need some nursing care. Maybe I could get Peter to shell out for it, but history didn’t make me want to bet on it. You’d better not be blowing your transmission or anything really irreplaceable like that, I warned the car. ′Cause it’s you and me, babe, for the foreseeable future.

  At least I could call Robin. It might be that we’d killed the personal side of our life together, but I ought to be friendly-if I could only play the corporate politics right, I could turn Ajax into a major account.

  Robin was in a meeting. With her usual bouncy good cheer the receptionist promised to give him my message. I fiddled with the cord to the blinds. What I really ought to do was call Murray and talk to him about the lack of any Hispanic or black workers at the Alma work site, even though they’d won part of the Ryan contract because they were a minority contractor. But MacDonald had promised me more details about Alma and Roz and I thought I should give him another day before going public. Waiting wasn’t my style, though. Why was I being so patient now?

  “You’re getting old, Vic,” I told my wavery reflection in the window. “People didn’t used to scare you so easily.” Was it his phone call last night or my being trapped in the Prairie Shores last week? It had to be the phone call- I didn’t have any reason to connect him with my near death. Except, of course, for the note he’d sent with his greenhouse.

  Behind me Peppy was whimpering in frustration. I pulled on the cord to the blinds impatiently, then flicked them shut and looked to see whether she needed to go out. She came over to me, pawed my leg, then went back to the sofa, got down on her forepaws, and whimpered again, her tail waving gently.

  “Whatcha got there, girl?” I asked. “Tennis ball?”

  I lay down on my stomach and peered underneath but couldn’t see anything. She refused to give up. Despite all my assurances that nothing was there, she continued her impatient mewing. Once she got going on something like that she could easily keep it up for an hour. I bowed to her superior concentration and hunted for my flashlight.

  When I finally remembered dropping it with my other tools on the floor of the hall closet Sunday night, Peppy was still trying to burrow her way under the couch. I hoped she hadn’t found a dead rat, or worse yet a live one. With some foreboding I got back down on my belly to peer underneath. Peppy was crowding me so closely I couldn’t see anything at first, but at least no red eyes stared back at me. Finally I saw light glinting off metal. Whatever it was lay out of the reach of my arm.

  “Naturally you’ve seen something that involves moving the couch,” I grumbled to the dog.

  When I pulled it away from the wall she danced hurriedly around to the back, tail wagging vigorously. She raced in front of me when the object came into view, sniffed at it, picked it up, and laid it at my feet.

  “Thank you,” I praised her, rubbing her head. “I hope you think it was worth all that effort.”

  It was a gold link bracelet, a heavy piece, big enough to be a man’s. I pushed the couch back against the wall and sat down to examine the trophy. Two amethysts were set among the links. I turned them over but the backs of the stones hadn’t been inscribed.

  I tossed it from one hand to the other. It looked vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t think of any recent male guests who might have lost it. What men had visited me lately? Robin had come over on Saturday, but he hadn’t gone near the couch. Terry Finchley and Roland Montgomery had sat there when they came to accuse me of torching the Prairie Shores Hotel on Saturday, but it was hard to imagine how they could have dropped it so it fell underneath. It would be so much more likely for something someone dropped to land in the cushions if one of them had lost it. Still, it wouldn’t hurt to ask Finchley.

  The only way I could really see it getting down underneath like that was if someone had been sleeping on the sofa bed-when it was pulled out there was a gap between the end of the springs and the floor. Guests of mine had occasionally forgotten a watch or a ring that they’d absently laid on the floor after going to sleep.

  Cerise and Elena had been my only recent overnight guests. I thought I’d know if Elena had been carting around such a valuable knickknack, but maybe not. She could have stolen it, after all, hoping to tr
ade it for liquor. Maybe it had belonged to Cerise’s boyfriend and she wore it the way girls did when they went steady in my high school. Maybe I should drive down to Lawndale and show it to Zerlina since it was much likelier that Cerise had owned it than Terry Finchley. But would Zerlina know? And if Maisie was standing militantly in front of her, would she even say?

  I was feeling better but not well enough to deal with Maisie. Anyway, the bracelet was scarcely the most urgent item on the agenda. I stuffed it in my jeans pocket and looked down at Peppy’s expectant face.

  “You’ve been treated badly the last few days by the people who ought to be worshiping you. You’d like to go to the lake, wouldn’t you?”

  She thumped her tail happily.

  37

  Hunting for Rabbits

  I walked along the beach, Peppy dancing around me, dropping sticks for me to throw. It was almost October. The water had grown too cool for me, but she could swim happily for another month if we didn’t get any heavy storms.

  I ambled along to the rocky promontory jutting east into the water. When I sat to stare at the water Peppy jumped down the rocks to explore for rabbits. It was a pretty steep drop, but she occasional found them burrowing in the boulders along the shore.

  The water had a flat silvery sheen, a flinty shade that you don’t see in summer. You can tell the seasons by the color of the lake, even if nothing else in the landscape changes. When it’s calm the water seems infinitely enticing, offering to hold you, to caress you until you sleep, as though there were no cold depths, no sudden furies that could dash you helpless against the rocks.

  It was helplessness I feared. A life like Elena’s, bobbing along without any channel markers to guide it. Or my own the last few days, nibbling circumspectly at the edge of the dam but not daring to dive clean in. Letting myself wait on Ralph MacDonald, for instance. I didn’t even know if it was out of fear of him, fear of his veiled threats I’d been doing so. Maybe I was just too worn by my aunt’s recent escapades to have energy left for taking charge of my own affairs. It was an ego-salvaging theory, at any rate.