by Tom Corcoran
“Your modesty is your new bad habit,” said Tanner. “You are smarter for sure than the people who can poison someone and make police in two countries think it was a heart attack.”
I eyeballed the two of them. They were about to deliver big.
“The cardiology report is fake,” said Dubbie, “planted online to fool anyone who might be nosing around. There’s a clinic with a similar name in Montreal and it has a great reputation. But that Queen Street address in Toronto is a fish-and-chips joint in an area called Little Portugal.”
“And who would look around,” I said, “but the badge boys? You think they were the main target?”
“Seems like a lot of work, doesn’t it?”said Tanner. “Why not just hack him to bits like the other stiff?”
The stiff that had been shot, not stabbed, I thought, but I kept quiet on that. I dug out my phone, found Beth Watkins’s name, pressed the prompt.
She took it on three rings. “Is Superman just waking up?”
“Hours ago,” I said. “He kicked off his booties and his feet got cold. Where’s your Emerson Caldwell about now?”
“Mine?” she said. “Someone else’s Caldwell is chilling at the funeral home on Kennedy Drive. Waiting for his cremation and paperwork to fly home to Canada.”
“You have every right to order an autopsy, correct?”
No response.
“Please do it,” I said. “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
“The medical examiner signed off. The county and the Feds both came up with reports on his medical history. There’s nothing inconsistent with a heart attack.”
“Did you personally verify those report sources?” I said. “Because if this deal goes sour, it’ll be your failure before the other agencies throw their babies to the wolves. That’s one of the bennies for bottom cop in the hierarchy.”
“It will piss off my boss and Caldwell’s family members,” said Beth. “And the piss will come straight down to me, the bottom cop. Along with a lot of shit from the Feds, Liska, and the media.”
Something in her words pulled a string in my brain. I motioned for Dubbie and Wiley to listen up as I spoke to Beth. “In our focus on Teresa last night, I forgot to tell you a piece of trivia from my trip home. There was a man on the Miami-to-Key West flight, the gregarious type, and we shared a cab from the airport into Old Town. His name is Robert Fonteneau and he mentioned that he had come from Canada to tend to the affairs of a friend who recently died of a heart attack.”
“Thank you for the warning,” she said. “He’ll be in the vanguard of those who will be pissed at me. What prompted your suggestion that I insist on an autopsy?”
“I don’t know, maybe an old TV show or something.”
Dubbie motioned with his hand and whispered, “Potassium injection.”
“I heard that,” said Beth. “Are your snoops obstructing my investigation?”
“I’ll take all the blame,” I said. “Just trying to help.”
“Thank you, Alex, for caring about my career,” she said. “An autopsy was in the back of my mind, but my mind was overruled by professional pressure.” She clicked off her phone.
“We anticipated this path of inquiry and resistance,”said Wiley. He held another page printed from the web and read aloud, “Canadian consular staff can request a local investigation in the event of a crime or death, if there is evidence of suspicious circumstances. Consulate General of Canada, 200 South Biscayne Boulevard, Miami. With a phone number and an email address.”
“Will they accept anonymous tips?” I said.
Wiley smiled. “Can’t hurt to try.”
“And why this guy Fonteneau,” I said, “instead of Caldwell’s wife?”
“Her schedule may be full,” said Dubbie. “She finally accepted Wiley’s ‘friend’ request on Facebook. We haven’t had time to dig deep, but our first impression is they’ve been ‘kinda married’ for the past seven years.”
“Emerson is a Key West kind of guy, eh?”
“Probably, but we need to do more work on her,” said Tanner. “There’s a chance that Christi Caldwell is an anywhere kind of cougar.”
Wiley extracted a four-by-six photo print from his envelope. “Christi Caldwell is a lovely woman. She could attract partners wherever she wished. We pulled this off of Facebook.”
For about ten seconds we looked at the picture in silence. The collar-length light colored hair, the high cheekbones, cute chin and straight nose.
I finally spoke. “She could be Beth Watkins’s sister.”
“I thought the same thing,” said Tanner. “Damn close and spooky.”
Wiley put his papers on the table. “I’ll look into her when I can’t chase Ocilla.”
“Can I ask you one question, personal as hell?” I said to Fecko.
“The personal side of my life has been on public display for eight or nine years,” he said. “Why would I worry about one question?”
“What caused you to sober up, all of a sudden?”
“Fair enough,” he said. “Two reasons. I was panhandling on Front Street and a passerby threw a handful of pennies on the sidewalk. I was scrambling around on the hot concrete, sticking my hands under the sandals of tourists, burning my fingertips to grab pennies before anyone else could get to them. I mean, picture it. Pennies. Fucking pennies.”
“Gotcha,” I said.
“And the second reason dips into the extra-personal,” he said, “but you asked.”
I waved my hand. “It’s not a requirement.”
“No, it’s part of my rehab,” said Fecko. “Part of baring my soul. Or my previous soul.”
“Okay,” I said.
“You might regret this,” said Dubbie.
“I woke up still drunk one afternoon in July,” said Wiley, “and grabbed the wrong tube from my kit. I brushed my teeth with hemorrhoid ointment.” He shook off his mental image of the memory. “I couldn’t eat or drink for a day and a half.”
I admired his decision, but I wasn’t sure how to react to his story. I smiled but held back my laughter.
Dubbie Tanner kept a remarkably straight face. “He couldn’t talk, either,” he said. “That was the best part.”
Then we all had a laugh.
I extracted my wallet, pulled out four fifties, handed them two each. “Keep on doing what you’re doing,” I said. “Both of you. I think we’ve hooked a fish here. The trick will be to play it right.”
Fecko stood, stretched proudly, put a hundred bucks in his front trouser pocket and bum-shuffled toward the door. “We’ll boat it,” he said.
Around 11 am Marnie’s bright orange Jeep stopped in front of the house. I wasn’t ready to face her. If she had found out that I held back info as a favor to Liska, she would literally kick my ass. While she had cut back on karate recently, her skills were genuine.
But it was Sam behind the wheel. “Fish sandwich, Square Grouper?” he said. “I’ll drive.”
“Splendid,” I said. “My turn to buy.”
By the time we hit Stock Island I was no longer in the mood for a 45-mile round-trip. “Hogfish Grill?” I said.
Sam veered down Macdonald Avenue. “Your call, I’m good with it.”
He wove his way around to the funky restaurant, past dozens of ancient cars with faded paint, mismatched tires, duct tape repairs, drooping headliners. Unlike years ago, most of the trailer homes in the area were in better shape than the cars.
Sam found a parking slot down toward Fishbusters. Climbing from Marnie’s Jeep we were greeted with a thunderous fly-by, four Navy jets in formation. Inside, every table was taken, so we chose stools on the far side of the bar. Creedence Clearwater Revival sang about looking out a back door, and electric fans on tall stands provided a blanket of white noise, put the restaurant chatter in the background.
Sam asked for a Beck’s and a cheeseburger. I ordered a hot Bloody Mary and a Pork Poor Boy.
The server winced and scratched her shirt collar.
&n
bsp; “Changed my mind,” I said. “Shrimp Poor Boy, instead.”
She smiled, wrote it down.
The Creedence song faded into “Ophelia,” by The Band, and I heard Levon Helm sing the line, “Ashes of laughter, the ghost is clear…” and my thoughts whipped back to Teresa.
“Was she in the Citizen this morning?” I said.
Sam knew who I meant, and nodded. “Her mother died of a stroke last year, and her natural father went down to diabetes a month later. The FDLE finally found Paulie Cottrell vacationing in Aspen. Once he was informed, the cops gave Marnie the go-ahead to publish. She said that City Hall is like a funeral parlor. There’s a black ribbon on her office door.”
I hadn’t heard that Estelle Cottrell had passed away. Paul Cottrell, Teresa’s stepfather, the city’s zoning inspector for years, had retired a while back. He dabbled in real estate for about six weeks, said “Screw it,” and took his retirement seriously.
“I guess Marnie had success with her story,” I said. “Does that give her a bit of job security she didn’t have a week ago?”
“Neutral effect,” said Sam. “She sold the piece to an online syndicator, then the Citizen editor asked her forgiveness before insisting that her follow-ups stay local. They also assured her that the paper’s financials were in fine shape, no danger of shutting down. Now she’s her own biggest problem. Her passion is print journalism. On days she doesn’t feel like writing, she imagines she’s burned out on Key West. That might be the truth. It’s not the newspaper, her colleagues or her boss. She’s suffering Rock Fever, as we called it years ago.”
The server brought our food. We concentrated on stuffing our faces for several minutes. I wasn’t sure why she had steered me away from the pork, but the shrimp was the rare type that hadn’t been to Miami and back in a reefer truck before being served in the Lower Keys.
“Has Marnie considered leaving town?” I said.
“She talks about independent city newspapers, medium-sized cities, like they’re the last American pinnacles of truth and high ideals. I try to remind her that news is everywhere, but my income flows best in warmer climates.”
“What options do you have?”
“Hell,” said Sam. “I can hustle charters anywhere there’s salt water. Every year I spend a little more time in south Alabama. I could build a clientele, talk some of my regulars into fishing the Panhandle and Mobile Bay, the Mississippi coast. She could look around Pensacola and Mobile.”
“Okay, let’s say you take her to Alabama. There’s no guarantee that the papers up there are solvent enough to promise her a future. While you’re out making a living, she might have to sit around at home, bored.”
“We’ll cross that bridge when we run into it.”
“Are you sure you want to see that bridge?” I said. “She’s done well these last few years. She could go back to hard time on the sauce.”
“Oh, shit, we don’t need to go backward.”
“What do you think will happen first?”
“What do you mean?” he said.
“The world runs out of newspapers or the ocean runs out of fish?”
11.
I leaned against a fish-cleaning table, studied the water behind the Hogfish Grill and watched foot-long fish more skilled at begging handouts than the city’s ubiquitous street people. It was too early in the year for silver king tarpon, the creature I preferred to observe, though I hated that they had learned to beg. The air was sticky with marine moisture cooked out of the L-shaped boardwalk by the tropical January sun. Several sailboats, nosed to the dock like horses to a hitching rail, bobbed between pilings a few yards west of where I stood.
I became fixated on small items. Styrofoam flecks, off-white paint spatters, gull droppings, nylon fishing line, strands from old dock lines. Out of all that, for some reason, came the memory of my first lunch with Teresa Barga, our first date, years ago. We had stopped for sandwiches at B.O.’s Fish Wagon. Afterward, like sneaky teenagers, we had kissed in her city-owned car, a ratty ancient Taurus not worth the tires it rode on.
Escaping my renegade memory, I returned to the bar where the lunch crowd was leaving, mostly locals headed for business offices or back to their homes. Sam started to pay the tab when the server took our food baskets, but I stopped him. It was my turn. He pocketed his wallet and generously ordered two more drinks. I went for an Amstel Light, not wanting to push my limits with noon vodka.
“You blew town,” said Sam. He hadn’t mentioned my trip until then.
“Gainful employment.”
“What’s Sarasota like?” he said.
“I’m sure there are plenty of wonderful folks there.”
“And the ones you met?”
“They’re apparently into over-eating, sport-fucking and classic cars.”
“Where do they find time for cars?”
I told him a condensed version of my twenty-four-hour Sarasota Saga. The chance encounter at Saluté, the chat on Olivia Street, my agreement to work for Beeson, the change of plans, the quiet flight, and the awful building full of exciting muscle cars. I dropped in the back-story of Eileen’s gift for art, then Anya’s strip tease and aquatic ballet, the naked photo I happened to find in the guest bedroom and Justin Beeson’s morning hangover. Finally my exterior photos, Luke Tharpe’s godawful discovery of Amanda’s body, the procedures of the investigative team.
Sam nodded as if he understood everything, which meant he didn’t. “You up and left without telling anyone? Not even Carmen?”
“Things happened quickly. It was a cash job offer.”
“Beeson knew all about you beforehand?”
“He asked around town. My name came up. He heard good things.”
“Why didn’t you back out when you saw his building? Have you no shame? They rent cars in Sarasota, right?”
“It was a fat paycheck,” I said. “Then I saw the man’s car collection and I hoped my assignment might expand. Pictures for insurance companies, show entry forms, what have you. I love to shoot cars. All you need is sunshine. You don’t have to wait for them to smile.”
“And now this joker’s disappeared?”
“The detective bitched because Beeson wasn’t making himself available. Those were the words he used.”
“Big money and flash cars,” said Sam. “A foxy girlfriend, high-end child support and an expensive ex-wife. Now this boy needs to sell a building because it’s flopped a couple of concepts. Can we assume cash crunch on all fronts?”
“Maybe not current,” I said, “but impending. I hope it’s not current. He still owes me expense money.”
“You think the fox and the ex-wife were sporting around?”
“I don’t know if the women were an item. I don’t know if that picture was taken before or after the divorce. But they sure looked like close friends.”
“Okay,” said Sam, “check me on this. You have talked about Justin, Anya, Eileen, Amanda, Edwin and Luke.”
“Correct.” I drained my Amstel, balanced the cardboard coaster on top of it so I wouldn’t get served another.
“For my money,” he said, “the four adults all did it. They brought you in as the confusion factor. Beeson knew your reputation as a photographer but also knew that you had worked with the cops, and not just in this county. You have credibility up the wazoo. You are what they call impugnable, don’t let it go to your head.”
“Don’t even say it, Sam.”
“Already did, Alex. Think about it. Forty-eight hours ago you didn’t know any of these people. They were total strangers. Now you know one hell of a lot about all six. Beeson set you up to be everyone’s alibi, discounting the daughter. You haven’t heard the last of this nervous little drama.”
When I got home I faced up to a task I dreaded. I called my brother Tim’s number in Orlando to let him know about Teresa.
“Hey, old man, what’s poppin’?” he said.
Right to the nut, a family tradition: “Teresa’s dead.”
&nb
sp; “Hmm. Well, I suppose I could have used better news. But if it had to be anyone… Did her cop boyfriend take her out?”
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, our time with the girl more or less overlapped, so I got a feel for where he was coming from. From a distance, I mean.”
“Well, there are no suspects so far.”
“Truth is, from what I heard, she did me like she did you. She lets her gents down hard, as they say.”
“Everything cool?” I said.
“Cool as no school,” said Tim. “Thanks for making the call. I know delivering bad news is not your favorite pastime.”
I hung up relieved that Tim had taken it well. He was dealing with his recently acknowledged alcoholism, doing his best not to slip back into the sauce. There was always the chance that shit news might tip the teetering balance.
An hour later I walked the aisles in Fausto’s Food Palace, greeting half the town’s residents and filling my basket—not forgetting Mountain Dew for Fecko. All of life’s necessities. The weight of my selections told me it was time to pay up. I had to carry them all on the Cannondale.
I chose the shortest checkout line, not that anyone in line or working the register might be in a hurry. A woman in front of me said, “Talking the other morning at breakfast, it was a shame we didn’t know Greg was in trouble. Have they questioned all of his girlfriends?”
I hadn’t noticed that I was in line right behind Cathy, our server at Pepe’s.
“All of them?” I said.
“There was the older woman, the Latina who dropped him off for work every so often. She came in one time, drunk, demanding to know where he was. It was his day off, I remember.”
“You know for sure she was Hispanic?”
“She had a first name… You know, it sounded like…”
“Ocilla?”
“Just like that,” said Cathy. “There was also the woman who taught art at the college and the girl who bartended at Irish Kevin’s. Then there was the bubbly doll from up north who would come to town every so often and hang with him.”
“How far up north?” I asked.