Is Fat Bob Dead Yet?

by Stephen Dobyns

“Like a Komodo dragon, or so he says. I’ve never seen it myself. It shows up when he’s coming to from a blackout after drinking Everclear.”

  By now they’ve reached a four-story yellow brick building with the word HOLLYWOOD painted over the bolted-shut front door. Above are Palladian windows sealed with gray plywood. On either side of the windows, four brick pilasters, three stories high, resemble Greek columns emerging from the brick wall. A plain, classical frieze runs across the building below the roof.

  “This’s the Capitol Theatre,” said Linda. “It’s been closed for forty years. No sprinkler system, and no one wants to buy it. Supposedly it’s very fancy inside. It’s probably full of rats.”

  “Was it a movie theater?”

  “For a while at the end, but it was built in the twenties as a vaudeville theater. It’s where George Burns met Gracie Allen—isn’t that romantic?”

  The names are only vaguely familiar to Connor. “Hmm,” he says. “It’d be nice to see what it’s like inside. A bunch of those theaters from the twenties were decorated to look like ancient palaces. Is there a back door?”

  “Off a parking lot, but it’s shut up like these.”

  “There’s got to be a functioning door someplace. People must go in and out.”

  “Not that I’ve seen, though that doesn’t mean anything. It’s just a dead building and probably haunted. Why’re you interested?”

  “No reason, I guess. Just curiosity. Well, I don’t expect to see it in any case.”

  Connor and Linda continue up the street.

  We should say that Connor is mistaken about never seeing the inside of the Capitol Theatre. It’s like those times when a person says, “I’ll never break my leg.” The next day he falls down the stairs and breaks his leg. To claim certainty about a future possibility is risky business. Didi would claim that the tradiculous is at work again. For instance, if we brag we never get the flu, we’ll get it by the weekend. But such claims rarely work in our favor. If we say we’ll win a million dollars, we won’t. This is how we know it’s an example of the tradiculous, because if it weren’t, then the negative and positive would show up fifty-fifty. So with Connor saying he doesn’t expect he’ll see the inside of the Capitol Theatre. It’s a form of tempting fate, especially if the consequences are negative—that is, like awful.

  “So if you don’t work around here,” says Linda, “what sort of work d’you do?”

  Connor stumbles over his feet, which suddenly feel very large. Linda catches his arm. The feel of her touch startles him, as if they shared a metaphysical link, and perhaps this is what leads him to be truthful, or perhaps he’s just tired of lying.

  “I work for some people who collect money for phantom organizations that support phantom causes.”

  Linda has stopped, and they look at one another. Pedestrians divide and pass around them like a stream passing around a rock.

  “What sorts of organizations?”

  “They change. Right now it’s Prom Queens Anonymous, Orphans from Outer Space, and the Holy Sisters of the Blessed Little Feet.”

  Linda laughs. She laughs so hard she has to lean against a building. Connor waits. He had expected censorious indignation, not laughter.

  “That’s wonderful,” says Linda, still laughing. “What do you do with the money?” She wipes her eyes with a tissue. They begin walking again.

  “We spend it, though Didi—he’s in charge—gives fifteen percent to real organizations if they’re vaguely similar to a phantom organization. For instance, we’ve also been collecting for Free Beagles from Nicotine Addiction, and Didi says some of the money goes to the Humane Society, but I’m not sure I believe him.”

  “Why not?” Once more Linda begins to laugh.

  “His relationship to the truth is relatively elastic.”

  “I guess it’d have to be. Who gets money from Orphans from Outer Space?”

  “Well, that specific organization brings in very little, so I assume he puts it in the general fund.” Connor thinks that if he expanded his account of Bounty, Inc. to include the work of Vaughn Monroe and Eartha Kitt, she’d be certain they were nuts. Maybe we are, he thinks. Maybe we’re in some kind of alternate universe.

  Connor and Linda have reached the corner, and Linda stops. “This is as far as I’m going. I’ll get a cup of coffee and take it back to the office. I’m already late.”

  Connor is surprised. He hadn’t thought of her going. “Now? What about Fidget?” Besides being disappointed, he feels an element of grief. Just a touch. It’s like a chill inside him, and the day gets a bit darker, though it’s only midmorning. At first he doesn’t recognize the feeling, a tiny mix of sadness and loss. We don’t want to make too much of this. This particular element of grief is just a seedling.

  “Either you’ll find him or you won’t, even if I come with you. Just keep going up the street.” She sticks out her hand. “I liked talking to you.”

  “Don’t tell the police.”

  Linda laughs again. “Of course not. Actually, I’d much rather work for you than for the travel agency. It sounds great.”

  Connor shakes her hand. She wears brown leather gloves, so, really, he has no idea what her hand feels like. The handshake contains no intimacy, but she has a strong grip. He imagines asking her to take off her glove, and he smiles to himself.

  “What’s funny?” asks Linda.

  He shakes his head. “May I have your phone number?” The question takes some courage on his part.

  Linda hesitates and then says no. “I don’t think it’s a good idea.” How complex are the simplest of exchanges. Their faces express interest, but Linda thinks, Should I? And Connor had thought, Why not ask her? As for their emotions, there’re a bunch of them, starting with Connor’s disappointment, which leads to the worry that she finds him unattractive. Maybe she doesn’t like his black hair or his dark eyes, or maybe his chin is too big. And Linda thinks, Why do I always say no? Dr. Goodenough has been saying I need to take a chance. What am I afraid of?

  We know these situations. They’ve been repeated millions of times. Anna Karenina and Count Vronsky had similar exchanges, but they spoke in Russian, which makes it more interesting.

  “Are you married?” asks Connor.

  Linda shakes her head.

  “Do you have a steady boyfriend?”

  She again shakes her head and then says, “But I’m in the office every day. You can stop by whenever you want.”

  “Maybe I’ll do that.” He says good-bye, waits for the light at Golden Street, and then crosses. The element of grief within him has begun to sprout. He no longer has an interest in finding Fidget. But he won’t give up; he’ll keep looking. Bank Street, Tilley, Green Street, State, Starr Street, Pearl—Connor walks them all. By noon, with sore feet, he quits to get a sandwich.

  We should understand that Connor is torn. First we have Eartha with her scientifically engineered breasts that include silver nipple bars with tiny rubies at the tips. Then there’s Céline. Tight white shorts and a small white T-shirt, black eyes, a tangle of black hair. She might lack Eartha’s warmth, might in fact be devoid of warmth, but her half smile made Connor shiver.

  Then there’s Linda with her glasses and her short, slanting blond hair and runner’s body. Connor finds her very pretty, but he also likes her manner, her edge of irony and interest, and he liked her laugh and her response to Orphans from Outer Space. Well, such comparisons are complicated. Put these ladies on a wheel and put Connor on the hub and have them circling and circling, and Connor would be no more dizzy than he is now.

  EIGHTEEN

  Manny pulls his Subaru Forester up in front of the Hog Hurrah. To his left, a dozen shining Harleys are parked side by side like multicolored jewels waiting to be strung for a giantess’s matinee necklace. “I could knock them over with a little push,” says Manny. “Wanna see it?”

  “Why would you want to?” says Vikström, getting out of the car.

  “Just to add a few vitamins
to the day. A little adrenaline.” Manny’s black eye has become a pale yellow with some bits darker than others.

  Vikström decides not to answer. Looking at the row of Harleys, he sees a red one that looks exactly like a red one he’d seen in Fat Bob’s garage. Actually the color is called Amber Whiskey. At the moment he assumes it’s a coincidence.

  The detectives stand on the sidewalk by Manny’s car. They’ve spent three hours looking for Fidget without success. Now they want to talk to Lisowski. The doors of the Hog Hurrah are up, and biker types give them quick looks, though—considering what Lisowski said—they’re more likely brain surgeons or real estate agents.

  “You know what my wife did?” Manny asks in a stage whisper.

  This sort of question generally drives Manny crazy, and if Vikström had asked it, Manny would shout, “How the fuck could I know what your wife did!”

  Vikström says, “Please tell me.” He suspects that Manny is at the very edge of an explosion, and he has no wish to ignite the fuse.

  Manny stands with his legs apart. His overcoat is unbuttoned and shows his blue suit. The sun twinkles on his silver belt buckle with the dying Indian slouched forward over his starving horse. A flicker of suspicion crosses his face: Vikström isn’t usually so polite.

  “She gave a thousand bucks to a crook on the phone who promised to use the money to keep dogs from smoking cigarettes. You ever heard such nonsense? We had a fight, and I’ve got to sleep on the living room couch.”

  Vikström maintains his friendly expression. He decides he’s being baited in a complicated way he has yet to understand. “Who knew that dogs were problem smokers? Is this what’s been making you angry?”

  “Wouldn’t it make you angry?”

  “We don’t have a dog. How do the dogs buy the cigarettes?”

  “They don’t fucking buy them, nitwit,” says Manny, raising his voice. “The dogs are in medical-research labs hooked up to machines that make them smoke. Yvonne says they have yellow lips, and she says the fucking check has already been cashed. She sent it to a post office box.”

  “All kinds of dogs?” Vikström notices that many of the ponytailed, middle-aged men in black leather vests have put down their tools and are listening.

  “Fuck no, just beagles. Yvonne says they only use beagles because they’re so bighearted, like our Schultzie. She says they use seventy thousand beagles a year.”

  One of the ponytailed middle-aged men whistles in surprise. Manny shoots him a look that says, I could crush your head with my bare hands if I wanted.

  “So they’re not made to smoke, they choose to?”

  “First they’re made, then they choose. They’re addicted.”

  “What happens after?”

  “Just what you’d expect—they’re tossed in the trash.”

  A biker makes a sympathetic groan.

  “Still,” says Vikström, perhaps forgetting himself, “it’s for a good cause.”

  “Fuck you! You never had a dog. Anyway, they’re crooks. No charity gets money to make dogs stop smoking. They call themselves FBNA, Inc. That stands for ‘Free Beagles from Nicotine Addiction.’ I Googled it, and it doesn’t exist.” Manny lowers his voice. “And one more thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “She said the guy on the phone sounded exactly like Vaughn Monroe.”

  “The singer? Isn’t he dead?”

  “He’s Yvonne’s favorite singer. We always sing his stuff at—” Here Manny glances at the ponytailed bikers, who listen as if hearing Shakespeare recited. Manny drops his voice even lower. “On our karaoke nights.”

  Vikström sees Milo Lisowski standing in the door of his office. As we’ve said, he has a glass eye, a wandering eye, or he suffers from strabismus, with each eye pointing in a different direction. We don’t know which is correct. So even though Manny and Vikström are standing five feet apart, each thinks that Lisowski’s stare is focused on him alone. Why the fuck’s he staring at me? This thought comes to both. In truth Lisowski looks at a spot between them, or someplace else entirely, like up at the clouds.

  “You been to the post office to check the mailbox?” asks Vikström.

  “The wife wants me to leave things as they are. She says it’s her money from her bank account, which is true enough. And there’s the Vaughn Monroe stuff. She doesn’t want me fucking around with Vaughn Monroe. It’s almost a religious thing.”

  “So this’s what’s pissing you off?”

  “Let’s say it’s not cheering me up.”

  “What about Vaughn Monroe?” asks Vikström.

  “I don’t give a fuck about Vaughn Monroe!” shouts Manny. “Fucking Vaughn Monroe died in 1973! No more fucking ghost riders in the sky for him!”

  Vikström sees that ten ponytailed bikers stand in the doorway staring at the detectives. Some seem amused, some critical. Lisowski stands to one side. They all have expectant expressions as they wait to hear what the detectives will say next. Lisowski’s can’t be read. Vikström takes Manny’s arm. “We need to talk to Lisowski and beat it unless you want TV trucks to start showing up. These guys are waiting for you to pop.”

  A minute later the detectives are in Lisowski’s small office with its piles of papers, catalogs, repair manuals, newspapers, and several banana peels. Lisowski leans against his desk, and Manny stands in front of him. Vikström stands back by the door, thinking about lunch. The office smells of oil and bananas. Nobody says anything. Lisowski gets increasingly uncomfortable. His blue overalls are spotted with grease, and his wandering eyes are doing calisthenics.

  “We just going to stand here?” says Lisowski, acting tough. “I’m going back to work.” He takes a step toward the door.

  Manny holds out a hand signifying stop. “We’d like to see your pistol.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “The pistol you used to shoot up Fat Bob’s Fat Bob: the bike that burned in front of his house. We picked up ten nine-millimeter casings.”

  “I haven’t had a pistol for years.”

  “You got a permit for a Smith & Wesson 469,” says Vikström. The news about Lisowski’s pistol permit came back that morning. This is what led to the detectives’ visit.

  “The gun’s in the house someplace. I don’t know exactly where.”

  “You report it as missing?” asks Vikström.

  “No, no,” says Manny, “he means it maybe slipped between the cushions of his favorite chair. It could happen. It’s one of the small ones, right? Three-and-a-half-inch barrel, shortened grip? It’s probably somewhere under the rug, or—I know—you lost it in the wash like a stray sock.” Manny bends over and sneezes. It’s one of those joke sneezes invented around the time of the Mayflower: “Horse-shit!” Then he straightens up and gives a smile as thin as a crack in a teacup.

  Vikström has heard Manny do this five hundred times, and his face is stony. “Why would someone shoot up the Fat Bob?” he asks.

  One of Lisowski’s eyes seems focused on the window looking into the garage, where two impact wrenches practice a duet. The other looks idly at the ceiling.

  “Beats me,” says Lisowski.

  “Hey!” says Manny. “You got to do better than that. We’re having a pleasant chat. We take you downtown, it won’t be pleasant.”

  “I told you before,” says Lisowski with some exasperation. “Fat Bob owes people money, and he’s not paying. Lots of people are pissed at him.”

  “How much does he owe you?” asks Vikström.

  “’Bout a grand.”

  “You said before it was a coupla hundred,” says Vikström.

  Manny interrupts, seeming astonished. “You blew up a guy’s bike for a thousand bucks?”

  “I told you, I’d nothing to do with it, but I bet whoever blew it up didn’t think the bike would explode. He only wanted to put some holes in it.”

  “Just clean fun, right?” says Manny. “What happened to the money?”

  “He lost it at
Foxwoods. He thought he had a system.”

  “How many people does he owe money to?” asks Vikström.

  Lisowski works hard to appear helpful and patient, but a muscle in his cheek twitches impishly. “I don’t know. Ten, maybe twenty, maybe more. This goes back a few years. It adds up.”

  Manny points to the window and the garage beyond. “He owe money to any of those guys?”

  “Dunno, you’ll have to ask them.”

  “You own a green Ford?” asks Vikström, who already knows he doesn’t.

  “Not me. I got a Tacoma. White.”

  “A green Ford pulls up to Fat Bob’s old house with two guys in the car,” says Manny. “The guy riding shotgun is the shooter. He blasts the bike and they’re gone. A day later some guys swipe bikes from the garage of Fat Bob’s new place. Maybe the same guys. So, Lisowski, if you weren’t driving the Ford, you had to have been the shooter. You blast the bike with your Smith & Wesson and leave lots of nine-millimeter shells. During the shooting the bike explodes. Maybe it’s an accident, but no court will buy that. In fact, because it exploded, it looks like terrorism. But you give us the gun and say who was driving the Ford, maybe we’ll drop the terrorism charge. You ever been to one of those training camps in Afghanistan?”

  Lisowski is pressed back against his desk. “Course not! I hardly leave the state except for Motorcycle Week up in Laconia. What d’you mean, Afghanistan?”

  Vikström shrugs. “He’s joking. He can be a funny guy… .” Vikström wants to ask Lisowski about the red Fat Bob out in front, but Manny keeps distracting him.

  “By the way,” says Manny, “you seen Fidget anywhere?”

  “The homeless guy? What’s he got to do with anything?”

  “Just need to talk to him,” says Manny.

  Lisowski begins to tell them he hasn’t seen Fidget, but then he says, “Someone mentioned they’d seen him coming out of a package store across town with a couple bags of stuff. Said he was practically dancing.”

  “When was this?” asks Vikström.

  “I don’t know, yesterday maybe.”

  “Who told you?” asks Manny.

  Lisowski pulls thoughtfully at his nose. “That’s what I can’t remember.”