by R. D. Rosen
“Can I come in?” She asked. Her complexion was orange from her TV makeup.
“Not right now.”
“Who’s in there?”
“Nobody.”
Mickey craned her head for a better look. “That looks like the back of Moss Cooley’s head.”
“It’s not.”
“Bliss, what’s going on?”
“Nothing. We’ll talk later.”
“Okay. Meet you at Haven Brothers?”
“Give me an hour.”
“Okay. Bliss, that’s the back of Moss Cooley’s head.”
“Whatever.”
“And, if I’m not mistaken, that’s Felix Shalhoub’s leg.”
“No comment.”
“And you’re in Marshall Levy’s skybox office.”
“That I can’t deny.”
“Something’s going on.”
“We’re having a motivation meeting. I’ll see you in an hour.”
When Harvey sat back down, Moss was shaking his head, muttering, “Chihuahua.”
“More like a fox,” said Marshall Levy. “Is she going to be a problem, Professor?”
“Meaning?”
“Nobody can know about this, not even Mickey.”
“She won’t be a problem.”
“You two an item?” Moss said.
“More like a deeply flawed long-term proposition.”
“Then I apologize for my comment.”
“Forget it,” Harvey said. “I don’t like the press, either. Now where were we?”
“The cops,” Marshall said.
Moss shook his head. “No way.”
“Exactly,” Felix said.
“Not until we know what we’re dealing with,” Marshall said. “Which is where Harvey comes in.”
“Anyway, Harvey was a private investigator after he left baseball,” Felix explained to Cooley. “Till he entered the lucrative world of motivational speaking. But we’d like him to keep an eye on you.”
“I don’t need a bodyguard,” Moss said.
“Just think of him as handling the situation,” Marshall said calmly. “Officially, we’d be bringing him on as a motivational coach. You’d have to go along with that. Look, Cool, there’s just too much at stake. You’ve got a chance to make history.”
Harvey coughed lightly. “What’s in the box?”
“Yes, the box,” Marshall said, standing, placing his hands ceremoniously on top of it, as if it were the Torah or something. The box had no markings on it. “Two nights ago, someone dropped it off outside the gate to the player’s parking lot. It was addressed to Cool.”
“We figured it was just another gift from a fan,” Felix said.
“You wouldn’t believe the shit I get,” Moss said. “Someone sent me a Toast-R-Oven. Note said, ‘DiMaggio’s streak is toast.’ ”
“This is no Toast-R-Oven,” Marshall said, opening the top flaps of the box. “Give me a hand, Cool.” With Marshall’s help, Cooley reached in the box and, grunting, lifted out the headless lawn jockey.
“Lovely,” Harvey said.
“Wait till you see the note,” Marshall said, handing him a piece of white paper folded in thirds.
Harvey opened it. The note was made up of letters cut from magazines and glued to the page:
“ ‘DiMaggio evades apprehension,’ ” Harvey read aloud. “ ‘Do nothing in greatest game. Escape retribution.’ ” He looked up at the others. “Christ, that’s got to be the wordiest death threat ever.”
“It’s kind of like a fortune cookie fortune,” Marshall said. “Without the cookie.”
Harvey was confused. The threat’s verbosity had the effect of undercutting its menace. What psychopath bothers to use words like evade and apprehension? On the other hand, the size of the jockey and the labor involved in transporting it suggested someone going to great and serious lengths to scare Cooley.
Moss passed a huge hand across his forehead. “I’m one big-ass target. A big black buck with a forty-six-game hittin’ streak, a white girlfriend, and a Jewish bodyguard.”
“You’ve got a white girlfriend?” Harvey asked.
“Same as you, my man.”
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves,” Marshall said. “It’s probably nothing to worry about. A prank. Remember what Hank Aaron went through in ’seventy-three and ’seventy-four. One good thing, Cool, is that they don’t know where you live.”
“Not so fast,” Cooley said.
Marshall twitched. “Excuse me?”
Cooley picked up the brown paper bag at his feet, placed it on Marshall’s desk next to the headless lawn jockey, reached in, and removed a grinning lawn jockey’s head. Its rust-dappled red cap matched the torso’s vest.
“Jesus,” Marshall said.
While the others watched, Cooley leaned over the desk and placed it gently on top of the jockey’s body, where the irregular planes of the severed neck and body were perfectly joined.
4
HARVEY WAS AS SKILLED as the next person at avoiding his feelings. Actually, for the past six months or more he had been considerably more skilled than the next person. Now he stared at the reunited lawn jockey and felt nothing for a moment. It was as if none of this could possibly have anything to do with him. Then everything came slowly back into focus—Marshall’s office, the concerned faces in it, the headless figure on the desk. His slumbering instincts kicked in with the force of a controlled substance crossing his blood-brain barrier.
“Where do you live, Moss?” he asked abruptly.
“Cranston. In one of those developments.”
“A gated community?”
Cooley shook his head.
“Does your house have a security system?” Felix and Marshall were now looking at Harvey as if he had just awakened from a coma and begun reciting Shakespeare.
Cooley said that the first floor was wired.
“Motion detectors?”
“No. Just the doors and windows.”
“Sound detectors? Pressure mats? Pressure switches on the stairs, anything like that?”
“No, no, and no.”
Harvey leveled a look at Marshall. “We’ve got to get him the hell out of that house.”
“Hold on, Harvey,” Marshall said, holding up his hands to stop Harvey’s verbal onslaught. “Can you be so sure this threat’s serious? I mean, it’s just a lawn jockey.” Minimizing the very reason they had summoned him from his funk in Cambridge.
“Marshall, this is not like getting a piece of garden-variety hate mail. We’re talking major-league harassment.” Out of the corner of his eye, Harvey could see that Cooley was registering this opinion of the danger to him with a tightening of his neck muscles.
“You want to move him out of his own house already?” Marshall said, stroking his upper lip to a point with his thumb and index finger.
“Marshall, I’m happy to go back to what I was doing this afternoon.”
“What was that?” Cooley asked.
“Sitting on my sofa watching an HBO documentary about baseball’s golden days.”
“Tell us what you have in mind,” Marshall said.
Harvey turned to Moss. “I know a broker in town that deals in executive transfers. I’ll see what she’s got lying around. What do you drive?”
“Range Rover.”
“Not anymore.” Harvey pivoted his head to Marshall. “You must know someone in the car business in Providence.”
“Max Malise is an old friend. Malise Motors.”
“What kind of cars?”
“Subarus, Hondas.”
“Good. Call Max tomorrow morning and tell him you want to rent two nondescript cars from him in your name. Tell him you’ll turn them in in a few days for two more. And that you might keep doing that for a while. If he asks you why, don’t tell him. Have the first two cars delivered to the players’ parking lot tomorrow morning. Make sure they have tinted windows.”
Harvey thought of his five-shot Smith & Wesson .38 Detective
Special sitting in a lockbox on the highest shelf of his closet in Cambridge. Good thing he’d gotten requalified two months ago at the firing range in the basement of the Cambridge Police headquarters—he’d scored 267 of a possible 300. His concealed firearms permit was valid only in Massachusetts, though. Rhode Island didn’t honor Massachusetts permits, so it might take weeks to get a Rhode Island pistol permit if he didn’t have someone run major interference for him with the AG’s office. He wondered if Detective Linderman, who headed up the Rudy Furth investigation fifteen years ago, was still with the force. Harvey’s mind was on fire.
“Moss,” he said, “I don’t know what your autograph policy’s been—”
“Cool is very good about autographs,” Marshall said with paternal pride.
“Not anymore. Until this blows over. I’m sorry. Also, I don’t know where you hang out after hours—”
“I got a couple bars where I know the owner—”
“Well, you’re going to have to change your routine for now. If there’s really somebody out there who wants to whack you in the knees, or worse, we’re going to make it hard for him to find you. Are you with me?”
Cooley looked at Harvey as if he were an oncologist with bad news.
Felix said, “What about the ballpark? Talk about being exposed. We’ve got a ten-game home stand.”
“The park’s where he’s going to be safest. Especially since, unlike, say, Wrigley Field, there’re no buildings outside that would give anyone a shot at Moss.”
“I don’t want to become too hysterical, Professor,” Marshall said, listing a bit as he spoke so the lawn jockey didn’t come between them, “but what about a guy on the roof of this place with a high-powered rifle and a telescopic sight? …Sorry, Moss, but we’ve got to cover the possibilities.”
“First, Marshall, you’re going to eliminate all access to the roof, if you haven’t already. That aside, there’re just too many opportunities to be seen, especially with a rifle, which can’t be concealed from forty-five thousand potential witnesses. And then there’s the problem of getting away. You think it’s easy to get out of a stadium in the middle of a game after shooting someone? Gentlemen, if someone’s going to take a crack at Moss, it’s going to be where he can go one-on-one, with the element of surprise completely on his side and the getaway assured. Where Moss is vulnerable. Going in and out of his home, in and out of the bars or restaurants where he’s known to hang out. That’s why we’ve got to change everything about your routine, Moss. Your habits.”
“Damn,” Cooley said.
“Hey,” Harvey said, trying to leaven the mood with a little laugh, “if Campy can change your stroke and turn you into the game’s most consistent hitter, I can change your lifestyle for a week or two and keep you alive. Marshall, can you put Moss up tonight in your home?”
“Sure.”
“Wait a second,” Moss said. “I’ve got plans with my lady.”
“Tell her you’re temporarily indisposed. Marshall has a very nice house, and I’m sure you’ll be comfortable there tonight until I can get back from Cambridge tomorrow with a change of clothes and my gun.”
Cooley looked up. “Gun?”
“I’m good with a purse, Moss, but I’ll feel safer with my .38.”
“Damn.”
“I’ll see if I can come up with a new house for you by tomorrow. In the meantime, I don’t want you anywhere near your own.”
“I need to go home and change my threads,” Cooley said.
“No,” Harvey said, then quickly: “Look, we all hope this is nothing. These things often are.” He let the reassurance hang there in the air for a moment before it quickly dispersed on its own, like a puff of cigarette smoke.
“Maybe we ought to clue the rest of the team into what’s going on,” Felix suggested. “So they can be looking for any unusual activity, suspicious characters?”
“Let’s wait on that,” Harvey said. “Let’s stick to the motivational-coach cover for now. By the way, I wouldn’t mind having that for a little while.” He pointed again at the headless jockey standing politely on the table between Marshall and him. Harvey didn’t think he had seen one of them in anyone’s yard for twenty or thirty years.
“Be my guest,” Marshall said, taking off his designer eyeglasses and wiping each lens tenderly on a handkerchief. “All right with you, Cool?”
“It’s cool with Cool,” the ballplayer said, and Harvey felt a stab of disappointment to hear Moss indulge in the celebrity vogue for referring to oneself in the third person.
“Should we get it fingerprinted?” Felix asked.
“I assume it’s already been handled enough to make the search for usable prints futile.”
They struggled to get the lawn jockey—and its head— back in the box, and Marshall beckoned Robert the skybox steward and gave him instructions to get the package down to Harvey’s car in the players’ parking lot.
Five minutes later Harvey stood with Moss Cooley in the clubhouse while he gathered up some toiletries and extra clothes from his cubicle. They were alone except for a twentyish clubhouse assistant, collecting dirty postgame dinner plates from the food area and sponging off the two long dining tables. A much older black gentleman was vacuuming the clubhouse’s indoor/outdoor carpeting.
“I don’t need this shit,” Cooley muttered as he began to lay his belongings carefully into a small green nylon duffel bag with the Jewels’ logo silk-screened on the side. “I don’t need you all in my business.”
“Don’t blame you,” Harvey replied, careful not to say too much or make a bad impression. He and Moss, who had had no relationship at all until an hour ago, had been thrown rudely together now, like contestants on Blind Date. “Listen, I’d appreciate it if you used a different bag. I’d rather you didn’t carry anything that might identify you.”
Scowling, Cooley took the two hangered items—a pair of slacks and a silk shirt with a brown-and-tan geometric pattern—and held them out to Harvey. “Here, you take them then.” He disappeared around the corner into the food area, returned with a plastic grocery bag, and dropped his toiletries and some other items into it.
“I want you to do something for me tonight, Moss, while you’re enjoying Marshall’s hospitality. I want you to make a list of every place you go regularly in and around Providence at least once a week. Gas stations, movie theaters, restaurants, you name it. Any place you go on a regular basis. Plus any place where you’re known to make an appearance. Any place the papers have reported you going to.”
“What’re you tryin’ to do, man, invade my life?”
“No, I’m trying to save it.”
“Let’s get out of here. Mr. Levy said to meet him in the parking lot in fifteen.”
“I want you to make a second list.”
Cooley rolled his eyes.
“This one’s got your habits on it. You jog? Good. Put it down, including the route. You play miniature golf? Good. When and where? You gamble? Fine. I want to know who your bookie is.”
“I don’t gamble,” Cooley said flatly.
“Moss, anything you’re used to doing, you’re going to stop doing until your streak is over. Let’s be optimistic and say you break DiMaggio’s record. You’re twelve games away. That’s two weeks. We can do that. We’re going to change your life fast so that you don’t have to think about it. You can get back to the game and let me do the worrying for you. Okay?” Twelve games away from the record? It was a vast distance—unthinkable that his luck would hold out—and Harvey was calmed by the thought.
“Okay.”
“One other thing.”
“What?”
“Your girlfriend.”
“Cherry Ann. What about her?”
“Does she live with you?”
“No. She comes over a couple of times a week. I go there some. But we get together at odd hours. We both got night jobs.”
“Let me ask you a question, Moss, and don’t take it personally.”
“Go for it.”
“Are you just getting laid, or is this a love project?”
“A lot of the first and some of the second. She’s not some bimbo of mine. She’s a student at Johnson and Wales. She’s studying to be a chef. Open her own restaurant.”
“Do you trust her, Moss?”
“Meaning?”
“Can she keep a secret? Would she ever betray you?”
Cooley furrowed his brow. “What kind of question is that?”
“It’s a good one, Moss. A young woman is dating a famous ballplayer making several million a year. People might offer her money for information about you or your whereabouts. I’m talking about tabloid journalists, or even worse.”
“I don’t believe she’d ever do that.”
“It’s hard for the best people to keep their mouths shut about knowing a celebrity. Especially about sleeping with one. I’m just being realistic. Do a lot of people know you see each other?”
“I haven’t seen it in the papers, if that’s what you mean. We’ve only been dating since May, and we’re very careful.”
“Does she know about the death threats?”
“No. I’ve just told her I get letters.”
“What about the jockey?”
“Haven’t told her that yet.”
“Where’d you meet her, Moss?”
He hesitated slightly before answering. “At Teasers.”
“Teasers?”
“It’s a strip joint in the Jewelry District.”
“She likes to go to strip clubs?”
“She doesn’t like to go there. She works there.”
“Great,” Harvey said.
“It’s not what it seems. She’s not the person you see up there.”
Harvey didn’t want to touch the philosophical and ontological edges of that one. “I’d like to talk to her.”
“She’d never be involved in this shit.”
“Not knowingly. Look, Moss, I don’t know about cooking school, but a strip joint’s not the kind of place I’d want to have my name bandied about, and frankly, it wouldn’t surprise me if she’s been boasting about you.”
“She’s just stripping for money. It’s not her life.”