The Anything Goes Girl (A Brenda Contay Novel Of Suspense Book 1)

by Barry Knister

  “It shouldn’t have happened,” he said. “It didn’t have to. I told him to radio Pohnpei about the headaches, but he was afraid they’d make him leave. I was so busy it just… I forgot.”

  Everything in Moser’s face seemed to ask for forgiveness. He turned and walked back behind the divider. He had needed to tell someone the whole story.

  ◆◆◆◆◆

  Rubbing mosquito bites on his leg, Ehrlich watched the light dim in Moser’s windows. He backed away from the clearing, using the moonlight to reach the path from the coral yard.

  Moser had told the woman just what he’d reported earlier. Slapping at mosquitos as he walked, Ehrlich relaxed. All systems go, he thought. Cal Moser hadn’t gone fishing, he was still sticking to his own project. He was ambitious, but you could never be one hundred percent sure of someone not in the loop. Say he figured it all out and felt used. Or said something stupid, decided he was being set up.

  “Not true.” Ehrlich shook his head. “Just do your plant thing out here, make a name for yourself.”

  It made perfect sense to him. If your firm gave you an open-ended budget and cut you loose to pursue your pet project on some atoll—committed close to a million, signed contracts, leased trawlers in Japan—well, you owed them something. At least the use of your research site for something else. Something far more important than insects eating taro leaves. So they didn’t tell you what it was, it was all legal. You weren’t being set up, or hung out to dry.

  He heard the TV from the meeting house ahead, in the island’s central clearing. Glowing out into the darkness beyond the roof, light from the big Sony bathed the undersides of trees and cast shadows.

  It was part of GENE 2’s deal with the island, and made him confident. Mostly women sat grouped before the set, their children asleep on mats. All those mothers were safe, protected. Their kids would grow up and go to college. See the outside world, have choices. The parents had more money than they knew what to do with. Radios, outboards, power tools.

  He moved across the clearing to Soublik’s house and entered. It had window openings, and he pulled up the woven shutters for more light. One room, mats and pillows on the floor. Clothes on hangers hung from a pole. It surprised Ehrlich that nothing had been touched. He’d assumed the islanders would strip it bare, but cans of corned beef and soup were still stacked above his books on shelves. Like a shrine. The girl who had lived with Soublik was back with her family.

  He felt around in the corners, looked under the clothes and table, behind canoe paddles and shipping crates. Nothing. In the footlocker, he found a flashlight that worked. On the last trip, he had checked when Soublik was out. The fountain syrup had still been here, two cases.

  He thought a moment. If they had started stealing the syrup, maybe Soublik had locked it in Moser’s lab. The Pirimese loved anything sweet, even used the syrup in food like sugar water. Ehrlich exited the house and hurried toward the dark trees bordering the clearing.

  This was something far more important. Before coming out, he had worked with the team seeking FDA approval in Washington, and Ehrlich had learned some of the science. Think in terms of AZT, they told him. Protease inhibitors. Enzymes that break down proteins and interdict viral replication. We adapted the idea from AIDS research. A simple pre-treatment taken orally, any vehicle will do. Liquid-center candy, soda pop. Maintenance applications two or three times a year, and no more tumors—think of it! Not just another incremental step toward a cure, but a real, bona fide breakthrough.

  Except Phase One studies with stateside prisoners had produced bad side effects. Severe headaches and psychotic symptoms caused by localized edema of the mid-brain. The problem wasn’t with the active site where the inhibitor countered the cancer virus. It happened at some tertiary point in the molecule.

  After re-formulation, the decision had been made to leapfrog FDA regulations by testing several variants offshore. It’s your baby now, Bob, they told him, and everything had gone perfectly. He had negotiated the contract on Pirim and arranged for the leadership to ask their new Peace Corps Volunteer to perform breast exams as part of his regularly scheduled physicals. But two women had visited the island from the Pirimese colony on Pohnpei. While on Pirim, they had been stung by wasps from the first shipment.

  Rats scuttled over matted leaves. Reaching the trees, Ehrlich snapped on the flashlight, trained it on the ground and started for the beach. The two women would pose no problem, but now Soublik had drowned. Plain bad luck, the roll of the dice. One of the drug’s variants was being tested in the Philippines. So far, it had produced no side effects.

  Going to the lab would take twenty minutes, maybe more. Mosquitoes danced in the narrow beam. But no body meant no autopsy. Ehrlich slapped at a bite and kept moving, careful of fallen nuts and breadfruit.

  FRIDAY, AUGUST 7

  FLAMINGO HILTON, LAS VEGAS

  4:15 P.M.

  “Bernie… Then tell her there’s no problem. Yes, I know it’s a she. That’s my business… No I’m not jacking her around. Listen, do you want me to see Zimmer or not? The Boardwalk? Fine, Bernie, you just tell her I’ll be in touch. Right, Monday. Sometime after the start of business.”

  Lindbergh hung up. Dressed in slacks and a silk camp shirt, he stood at a pay phone in the Flamingo’s charter lobby. Rows of Asian tourists sat facing the hotel’s check-in desk, waiting patiently for transportation to the airbus that would fly them back to Japan. Patience is good, he thought as he looked at the impassive faces. He wished the woman in Phoenix had some herself.

  He turned and moved down a long passage, hearing calliope reward music ahead. The fugue of synthesized tunes was coming from the Flamingo’s 1600 slots. The sound grew as he entered the huge casino and passed through a parti-colored clatter of slot payoffs and blinking lights. Cocktail waitresses and change-makers roamed the aisles. Most of the gamblers at this hour were retirees. He breathed in as he walked, the air rich with oxygen, added to keep people awake and alert.

  Lindbergh put on his sunglasses and stepped out of the casino, beyond the shallow lap of air-conditioning, into the 105-degree afternoon. Across the broad strip, acres of pencil-thin trees and statuary floated in the heat before Caesar’s Palace. He turned left and walked toward the cross street. The light turned red and he stopped at the curb.

  Bernie had said the client was upset. She’d gotten a courier package from Chicago, and had questions. Lindbergh had planned it that way.

  He had taken the Trailways bus into the city, photocopied Song’s report, and sent the copy along with Song’s calculator and pens that afternoon. Then he had gone to Brooks Brothers and bought button-downs and ties, summer shirts with the Brooks logo, and two suits, a summer-weight charcoal gray and a blue pinstripe. He tipped the clerk to have the suits altered the same day, then checked into the Palmer House. Up all night, he had gone to bed with the annual corporate reports taken from Song’s briefcase.

  Very interesting firms, especially GENE 2. It was public, but Neff owned a controlling interest. The drug company was downsizing with an aggressive program of buyouts and transfers that would position it for greater return. Quarterly dividends were nil, all profits devoted to R & D.

  Before leaving Chicago the next morning, he had called his broker in Reno. Against the broker’s protests, he had told him to sell everything in the account and start buying GENE 2 on dips.

  The traffic light turned green, and he crossed. Ahead, a hundred yards off the Strip, The Boardwalk’s cheap marquee jutted before a one-story structure. In back stood a standard motel on two levels. It was the flip side of fun in the sun, a last-resort resort. Instead of headliners, the Boardwalk’s sign offered “Gigantic Giant Foot-longs!” three for a buck. He reached the almost-empty parking lot, walked around a municipal garbage truck and moved to the entrance.

  Inside the air was smoky and dim. In orange coveralls, sanitation workers on break sat eating foot-longs among a dazed crowd of low-rollers in halter tops and plaid pants. The
carpeting looked like landfill and held the smell of red hots and onions. Lindbergh moved past a craps table not in use to the cash window, and tapped the glass.

  “Leo Zimmer.”

  The cashier pointed to the entrance. “Two-twelve.”

  Lindbergh went out and rounded the casino to the motel, taking the stairs. He stepped to Zimmer’s door, pulled a newspaper from his hip pocket, knocked and waited. A curtain moved in the window.

  “It’s hot out here, Leo.”

  The door opened. Zimmer fit the description Bernie had given—fifty-plus and heavy, with a lot of gray hair. He wore horn rimmed glasses and was in his underwear.

  “Did I get you out of bed? Catching up on your shut-eye?” Zimmer looked resigned. “That’s good, Leo. Catching up is good. I’m your wake-up call.”

  “Look.” Zimmer smiled. “We don’t know each other. I’ll get dressed, we’ll have a drink.”

  “Not necessary. You had a very good week at the sports book in The Stardust. Thirty-four thousand and change. Your horse and the Mets both hit on the same night. I think that’s great.”

  “A cushion,” Zimmer said. “This I know, with this cushion I will clean up all the vig, absolutely.”

  Lindbergh slapped his thigh with the paper. “I really hate that term,” he said. “Say ‘interest’, Leo. Wise guy talk puts me off. Especially from a putz. Think in terms of cash flow and the Fed cranking up interest rates.”

  “Look, a week, maybe ten days max. I’m sure you know what I mean. Right now, this is a very terrific moment here. You have to let—”

  “No, I don’t know, Leo. I don’t gamble. But that’s nice about the moment. Two thousand you can keep, because even a deadbeat shouldn’t be broke. The rest you wire today.”

  “There’s not enough time.”

  “Sure there is.” Lindbergh looked at his watch. “Plenty of time.”

  “I don’t see—”

  Lindbergh held up a hand and unfolded the Gary Sentinel Times, purchased in the Palmer House before leaving Chicago. He refolded it, so that the picture of the charred truck was face up with the headline Faulty locks blow up van, driver and offered it to Zimmer.

  The gambler took it and smiled. “Look, I’m hip to cash flow,” he said. “I just need one week.”

  “Read, Leo.”

  Staring at him, Zimmer raised the paper. He scanned the headline, then studied the photo. The smile dropped away and he handed back the paper.

  “No, I want you to read what it says.”

  Blinking, Zimmer again raised the paper and tilted his head to look through the bottom half of bifocals.

  “Isn’t that something?” Lindbergh said. “Locks, electric razors. It really makes you wonder about the engineering. You own a car?”

  “No.”

  “Smart, Leo. Nothing but trouble. Take cabs instead. I once worked it out. If you did that, the annual nut for most people would actually be smaller than payments and insurance.”

  Leo Zimmer held out the paper and nodded. “No, keep it,” Lindbergh told him. “From me to you. You don’t want a recall on this, so get dressed. I’ll wait out here, then we’ll go collect your money.”

  Zimmer nodded again. He stepped back inside and started to close the door, but Lindbergh stopped it. “Hustle, Leo, it’s hot out here.”

  The gambler turned away, leaving the door cracked.

  Lindbergh went to the walkway railing and looked out over the baking parking area and adjacent lot. If you got people to understand right away, if you communicated, there was no need to follow up. In an hour, Bernie would have his money—more good communication. It would fix whatever doubts he had about arranging the outsourced assignment for GENE 2. Lindbergh knew it had been right to come to Vegas first. The woman in Phoenix was upset about the photocopied report. Song’s original was in a safe deposit box, and she would want to know about it.

  I’m going to tell you everything, he thought. In person. As the greasy smell of fried onions floated up from below, Lindbergh saw himself in the new gray suit.

  SATURDAY, AUGUST 8

  Laughter. Bird song.

  When she opened her eyes, Brenda wondered what was wrong with the ceiling. Then she remembered and looked at her watch. It still worked: seven-fifteen in the morning. In Southfield, it was now six-fifteen the previous night. W-DIG would be moving into the second half of the afternoon news.

  Her ribs felt stiff under the now-dry compress, but didn’t hurt. She relaxed, enjoying the smell of the house. Accompanying the scent of fresh-cut boards were images of her father, who had made his money in lumber. Growing up, Brenda had loved how the whole house smelled of cedar. It was why she had chosen her apartment, a unit with a cedar closet.

  Not yet hot, the air seemed to seek her out, floating steadily from the door and windows. Someone was dribbling a basketball. Brenda felt a strong sense of peace, of being somewhere that seemed to want her there. She could hear the generator chugging, and above or beyond it was the rolling hiss of surf.

  From where she lay, Moser’s small house seemed to have all the comforts. Canvas director’s chairs, compact stereo, a refrigerator that must run on kerosene. Colorful sheets were tied back from the windows; fishing rods rested in one corner, canoe paddles in another. His books stood on shelves in two open footlockers resting on end.

  Curiosity finally got her up. On the other side of the divider, a futon lay open. Shelves held canned goods and lab supplies—gram scales, glassware, and retorts. A stainless-steel sink without faucets had been fitted into a plywood counter. Big plastic water tanks stood on either side, the drain hole emptying out under the raised floor. Everything looked suited to a serious person doing purposeful work.

  A thud sounded on the porch. Brenda stepped back into the front room and crossed to the entry. Sitting on the step and wiping his face with the tail of his shirt was Robert Ehrlich. He heard her and looked around, long enough to check out her bra, before facing the coral yard. Through the trees Brenda saw a procession of islanders, their shoulders loaded with gear from the Nauro Maru.

  “Moser says you’re better.” Ehrlich pulled off a boat shoe and emptied out sand. Even in the porch shadow he looked burned.

  “I am. Did they try to get the ship loose?”

  “Tomorrow. After we finish unloading, to lighten it.”

  She couldn’t help but feel sorry for the man. All those Polo shirts. Sent out to do a job, he had leased a ship, made arrangements. Everything had gone wrong. None of it was his fault, but in a meeting thousands of miles away, he would probably be made a scapegoat.

  “Calvin tells me you come out every few months to re-supply him,” she said. “You both work for GENE 2.”

  Ehrlich stood, wiping his hands on his shorts, then dug a paper from his hip pocket. He smoothed it flat on his thigh, got out a ballpoint and came up to the screen door.

  “What’s this?” She opened it and took the paper and pen.

  “Close the screen,” he said. “I wrote it this morning. If you sign, we can talk.”

  In buttoned-up, party-of-the-first-part legalese, the paper said that for the exclusive right to the story of GENE 2’s recombinant DNA research breakthrough in pest management, Brenda Contay would agree to “honor the proprietary integrity of company operations until given permission to make the story public.”

  She studied him. “With all due respect for proprietary bullshit, Bob, I’d like to point out the situation we have here on Pirim atoll.”

  Islanders were passing behind him, happily toting kapok mattresses and fishing gear, frozen tuna, boxes of canned goods. Oblivious to them, Robert Ehrlich had a piece of paper. If she signed it, his day would be made. Her sympathy for him had lasted all of ninety seconds.

  “I’m talking about when we get back,” he said.

  “What if I refuse?”

  “Then you learn nothing.”

  “Oh? Some of these people know English. They watch TV all night. I’m sure they can ‘learn’ me, B
ob.”

  “I wouldn’t fraternize with them,” he said. “We’re not responsible.”

  “What are they going to do, cook me up as missionary stew? They saved my life.”

  “They’re sick. They do crazy things. It’s possible Soublik caught something from them.”

  “He caught the DTs. Vince went native and it killed him.” Ehrlich didn’t answer. She sighed and signed the paper, cracking the door to hand it back. “Your typewriter needs cleaning.”

  “It’s Soublik’s. I stayed in his house last night.” He folded the paper and put it in his pocket. “I’m sure you play CYA at your shop, too.”

  “Okay, Bob, your ass is now covered.”

  He left and Brenda resumed her tour of Moser’s home. Behind another patterned sheet, a platform extended from the house and served as the shower. A pipe attached to a showerhead ran up to water-catchment oil drums. There was also a toilet arrangement, a cement trap that flushed with a bucket. She found a stack of towels in the main room and helped herself to two.

  Like everything else, the rainwater felt soft, inviting. She was toweling off and checking the bruised ribs when Moser returned.

  “Brenda?”

  It was the first time he had used her name, and she liked the sound of it. She wound his towel around her.

  “I’ve got your suitcase,” he called. “The chief’s here.”

  “Grab something for me.”

  He spoke in Pirimese, and someone with a deep voice answered. Brenda worked away at her hair with the second towel. She heard him come around the divider and stuck her head through the curtain.

  “Put this lotion on too.” He handed her a plastic bottle.

  “Sunscreen?”

  “I’ll explain later, but don’t go out without applying it. In your scalp, too. Better wear long pants and this.” He handed her the olive cotton pants she had packed, and a man’s white broadcloth shirt. “It’s Vince’s,” he said. “He had fair skin like you and brought those out. He wore long sleeves the first couple months.”