Shop Talk

by Carolyn Haines

  It was the use of the word spy that sent Driskell scurrying out the front door and into the night. From beneath the folds of his cape he withdrew a deadly looking weapon.

  “Driskell, you’re armed!” Lucille thrilled at the sight. Driskell LaMont was more hero than she’d suspected. He was indeed a man of action.

  A sudden movement by the dark alley caught Driskell’s attention and he ran in that direction. He was too late. Whoever had been watching them was moving with the speed of a jungle cat. Lucille joined him, her hand at her throat as she breathed rapidly in and out.

  “Stay here,” Driskell commanded as he went to the corner of the building to make sure there was no accomplice. Now he knew for certain that Dr. Robert Beaudreaux’s abduction was somehow connected to the Hares. But how?

  The night yielded nothing, and he turned back to find Lucille backlit in the doorway of the shop. He hurried to her, his first duty to protect her.

  “My goodness,” she said as she stepped inside and watched Driskell lock the door. “He was looking right at me with this horrible expression, as if he was going to have me for lunch.”

  “What did he look like?” Driskell tried to sound casual.

  “He was old, like in his sixties or seventies.”

  Driskell hadn’t anticipated old. Maybe it was only one of the patients from the VA hospital nearby. “We should wake Bo.”

  “Absolutely not!” Lucille knew her brother would rescind his decision to allow WOMB to meet if she did a single thing to disturb him. “I’m going home.” She felt the coming of morning with a singular dread. She would be exhausted at work, and she’d wanted to be fresh and bright and smart for the writers’ meeting. She swallowed before she spoke, the peeping tom already forgotten in the larger issue of WOMB. “Remember, we’re meeting tomorrow. Would you mind leaving tomorrow night, just for the first meeting?” He would be too big a distraction to her.

  “Not at all.” It would be the perfect opportunity to search her apartment. “If you promise to tell no one about my gun.”

  Lucille felt a ripple of excitement at the memory of him standing outside the door, crouched for action, ready to defend her. Bo would absolutely stroke out at the idea of his employee with a gun. She waved a dismissive hand. “I won’t tell a soul. You have my word of honor.”

  Chapter Ten

  Iris craned her neck through the open door to the shop and watched for the first set of headlights to pull into the parking lot. She put the last snippet of parsley on the cucumber cream cheese crackers and patted her hands on the full skirt of her pale blue dress. The narrow waist accentuated her high breasts, and the turned up collar made her neck longer. Under her breath she hummed the theme music to My Little Margie. She was definitely in a Gale Storm mood with the mission of bonding Lucille with the group of writers. The transfer of Lucille’s leech-like attachment away from Bo to other human hosts was paramount in her mind. It was the only thing that would ease her husband’s feelings of responsibility and guilt for his younger sibling. If Lucille could find a place with the women of WOMB, no matter how bizarre they were, that would be the first step. WOMB was not necessarily the place Iris would have wanted to be nurtured, but if it worked for Lucille … She hummed with a little more force as Bo stepped out of the bedroom. He’d showered, shaved and put on a pair of khakis and a polo shirt.

  Taking in his wife’s hair-do and outfit, Bo grinned. “I do believe it’s Margie Albright.” He gave her a kiss on her cheek.

  Iris lifted the tray with perky energy. “I’ve whipped up a few snacks for Lucille’s guests.”

  “Those look good. So do you.” Bo nuzzled her neck, moving ever closer to the tray of crackers. He was glad Iris had chosen a wholesome old TV show for their nocturnal fantasy play. Mandingo was his favorite, but it took so much out of him. And it bordered on kinky. “I love those old black and white shows. They had a sense of morality, of the link between family members. They didn’t rely on jiggle and cheap sexual innuendo to get a laugh.” He popped a whole cracker into his mouth.

  “And they had better furniture. None of that cheap plastic shit you see on television today.”

  “Look at you.” Bo took her shoulders in his hands and stepped back from her, turning her left, then right. “Simple elegance with a hint of pixie humor. That’s what’s missing from television today.” He stepped forward and hugged her, while at the same time reaching behind her back and stealing another cracker.

  “Touch another one and not even the laugh track will be able to cover up your scream of anguish.” Iris stepped out of his arms and held up a warning finger as she struck a sassy pose.

  “Since I know you aren’t making those delicious little crackers out of a love for cooking, what’s on your mind?”

  “I want to meet the writers and get to know a little bit about them. I thought some snacks might be the ticket.” She lightly slapped his hand as he took another cracker. “Leave some for the women, Bo. That Coco person looks like she could stand some solid food. Of course, if something caloric actually hit her bloodstream, she might rocket through the roof, and then we’d have to fix the skylight again.” Another, darker image struck Iris. She lifted one eyebrow. “Mona was looking at you like she wanted to make dessert out of you.”

  Bo laughed. “Rest easy, Iris. I see Mona as a possible mate for Dennis Hopper, not Bo Hare.”

  Iris’ dark eyes softened. “You sure know how to sweet talk a woman, baby.” She picked up a cracker and put it in his mouth. As he bit down there was a loud knock on the glass door.

  “They’re here,” Iris said.

  “Poltergeist, 1982, and I hope that isn’t a hint on how the night is going to go. Although that tunnel they traveled through in the movie was pretty vaginal looking, which would, of course, lead to …”

  “Womb.” Iris laughed as she peered through the shop. “It’s Lucille, on time. By the way, where’s Driskell tonight?”

  “He had something to do. Some research or something. He’ll be in after midnight. Surely those women will be gone by then.”

  “If they’re not, we’ll let Driskell handle them.”

  Bo picked up another cracker as he looked into the shop and hesitated. Lucille was at the front door. She’d given up knocking and was pressing herself against the glass as if she could transport herself through it by will alone.

  “Bo, baby, your sister …”

  “I’m going.” Bo sighed. “Why do I feel like I’m opening the door to something worse than the plague?”

  Iris gave him a little push. “Go on. You’ve got to help her set up the table and chairs. The others will be here in twenty minutes and I want you safely back here in the apartment when Mona arrives.”

  Jazz turned the lock at the library and went to the check-out counter to retrieve her book bag, raincoat, bonnet, galoshes, and umbrella. It hadn’t rained in three days, but it was April. The sky was unruly, and she liked to be prepared.

  Checking her watch she saw that it was five minutes after six. She was running late again, thanks to library patrons. The night before it had been some tall guy in a cape. Tonight she’d had to run a cranky old man out. At the door he’d turned on her like a rabid dog. She’d actually seen foam at the corners of his mouth. As if she should keep the library open simply because it was something he wanted. “Dang.” She remembered she hadn’t put away the stack of books he’d been examining. It was her rule that no one left the library until all the books had been re-shelved. “Dang it.” She dropped her belongings and hurried back to the secluded table he’d selected. The texts were spread out, along with half a dozen periodicals.

  Jazz loaded her left arm with books and began moving up and down the aisles like a shark. The Dewey decimal system was part of her subconscious, like the multiplication tables and the alphabet. As she paced the bookshelves, her hand darted out here and there, inserting books in spaces that seemed always too small. Jazz had not earned her masters in library science for nothing. Book space
was the commodity that made or broke a library, and she knew how to get the most out of hers.

  She went back for more books, aware that even as fast as she worked, time was slipping away. She could always come back to the library after the writers’ meeting. She had research of her own to do. That would be better than going home. Almost anything was better than going home. Especially since she’d found the steel-toed work boot on her trailer step.

  Or what was left of it.

  The brown leather was mangled and gnawed, as if some giant hound had systematically chewed it. It had also been run-over a few times.

  It was possible that a dog had found it somewhere and brought it to her steps. Except there were no large dogs in the trailer park.

  And why her trailer? The sun beat down mercilessly on the cement blocks that served as steps. The only thing that seemed to thrive in the trailer park were the tufts of bahia grass that shot out the holes in the cement blocks like hair out of an old man’s ears. No dog would leave anything on her steps.

  Mac had left the boot as his calling card. He wasn’t the kind of man who would leave a piece of paper with a written message when a gnawed boot would serve as well. The boot was a graphic manifesto, a signal of his further intentions. As the months of their marriage had progressed, his scorn for books and her writing had grown with each passing day. At first it had been only verbal. Then physical changes had begun–the thickening of his brow, the growth of hair on his knuckles and out the base of his skull into a Billy Ray Cyrus fringe. The lengthening of his four fingers as his eyes narrowed. Bodily change had turned to action. One night when she’d sleepily taken out the garbage she’d found book pages tucked into an empty toilet tissue roll. Each page contained a signature, and had been sliced with a razor from her collection of first edition books. Mac was a devious bastard. He was capable of the boot.

  The boot was a size twelve. Mac’s size. The steel toe was the kind he wore at the shipyard. Mac had been out to LoveHaven trailer park. Was he courting her or threatening her? That was the question.

  She grabbed another stack of books and went to work replacing them. A thick, old volume, slid to the floor and spilled open, the thin pages fluttering. As Jazz bent to get it, she saw the note card stuck near the back. Simple curiosity made her look at it, and then check the book. It was a lengthy local history of the Gulf Coast, from the Indians to Hurricane Camille. Jazz knew the book, and knew that it was boringly written and tediously filled with local names. The old codger with the cane hadn’t seemed the type to get off on local history. She looked at the note card again. It was a hand drawn map of Horn Island, the largest of the barrier islands off the Mississippi coastline. She wasn’t any cartographer, but the detail looked studied, and carefully done. Someone had even gone to the trouble to use calligraphy to name various points and landmarks. Strange names. Zone Destiny. Holding Pen. Incinerator. Ominous names.

  There were circles and X’s on the map, which she found interesting since there was nothing except a ranger base and a wildlife sanctuary on the island. It belonged to the government. They’d taken it over some time during the last world war.

  The island drew a lot of tourists, artists, and campers. Jazz tapped the card against the table. Instead of putting it back in the book, she took it over to her purse. If the old dude came in and asked for it, she’d give it to him. But if he didn’t, she might frame it and hang it in the trailer.

  Jazz picked up her belongings and locked the door as she hurried to the first meeting of WOMB at Bo’s Electronics.

  “What are they doing now?” Bo tried to maneuver up to the crack in the door, but Iris refused to budge.

  “Shush! The fancy one is getting up from the table and going over to get the … bowl of hard candy.” There was awe in Iris’ voice. “Baby, they ate everything. They’re worse than roaches.”

  “The crackers were gone in thirteen seconds. I counted.” Bo managed to find a place above Iris.

  “Then I took in that block of cheese.”

  “I think the skinny one put it in her purse. She kept smelling her fingers. But look at Lucille. She’s … radiant.” Bo watched his sister as she picked up a page, spoke, smiled, nodding around the table. “She never had a high school friend.” Bo took a deep breath. “It does me good to see her like this. Maybe it isn’t so bad that they’re going to meet up here.”

  “After the cheese, I took in the caramel corn. Bo, that was a five pound can.” “Did they eat all that?”

  “Look over to the left. The can is on its side. That was the noise we heard. They gobbled it down and flung the can.”

  “What about the bean dip and corn chips.” Iris made out the empty tray on the work counter. “Gone.”

  “Not to mention the six bottles of wine. That’s one each.” “And the skinny one didn’t drink. She just ate the lemon rinds out of everyone’s iced tea glasses.” “The pretzels?”

  “Gone. And those things were so stale the roaches wouldn’t even bother with them.” Iris nudged her husband in the stomach. “They even ate the hot dogs and beans I made last week. Cold.”

  Bo sighed, a sound of pleasure. “Hell, baby, we can afford steaks if it means Lucille is going to finally make friends.”

  “You’re right.” Iris stood, lifting up into Bo’s arms, which wrapped around her. “It’s eleven fifteen. Let’s call it a night.”

  Bo was still watching the front of the shop. “They’re going. They’re all standing and shaking Lucille’s hand. Iris, baby, this is one of the happiest moments of my life.”

  “If I weren’t so tired we’d do a little Katherine and Spencer.” She yawned. “But I’m more into Sleeping Beauty, and don’t dare kiss me tonight. I want to save myself for tomorrow.” Beneath her sleepiness a spark of mischief surfaced. “I have a very special surprise planned for you.”

  “Gunsmoke?” Bo’s voice filled with anticipation.

  “Come up to my room, Matt,” Iris said, slipping a shoulder free of her shirt and looking over it.

  “Oh, Miss Kitty, you can take off my badge any day.”

  Iris put her hand on his cheek. “Whatever makes you happy, baby.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Driskell found the fluorescent lighting of the bank offensive. More than offensive, it was downright detrimental to health. No living creature should be forced to spend nine hours a day in the sterile atmosphere of the room. Gray walls, long tubes of overhead lighting. It was high noon in bankland. The souls of the employees were left each day, face down in the dust.

  He picked the lock on the bank president’s office and quickly powered up a computer. What he was about to do was highly illegal, but who in Coastal Bank would ever detect a trace of him? Driskell knew how to erase his computer footprints.

  He went for Lucille’s checking records first. There was no savings account. He was stricken by the rhythm of her check writing, a five-note refrain played over and over. There was, of course, the occasional check to Andy’s Tire Zone or a gift shop, but most checks were written to Wal-Mart, Waldenbooks, Krogers, Marina Apartments and a style shop, No Split Hairs.

  Lucille lived “the American Life” with one exception, she didn’t have a car note. In fact, any additional expense would have sunk her. She lived week to week. There was no margin for extravagance in Lucille’s life. Little room for pleasure, except what came typewritten in the pages of a novel.

  Blinking Lucille’s records away, he pulled up Bo’s. Of course, Bo did all of his business with the bank that gave his sister a job. It was the least he could do. Driskell found Bo’s accounts as orderly and repetitive as his sister’s. There was nothing that gave any indication of a threat to the U.S. government. Driskell felt sadly cheated. He’d been so certain he was going to discover something significant to report to Roger. He was finding it harder and harder to believe the Hares were dangerous to national security.

  The only two things worth mentioning were the disappearance of Robert Beaudreaux and the old man Lucille h
ad seen peering in at the shop. There was something there, some connection. Driskell felt a split second of despair. If only Roger would give him a clue as to what he was supposed to look for.

  But that wasn’t the spy game, and Driskell knew if he was ever going to earn a place in the cushy web of international intrigue that brought federal health insurance, retirement, and foreign travel, he was going to have to come up with something.

  He clicked onto the Internet and keyed in Roger’s Internet address. “Hare Report #3. No financial ills. Both Hares clean as a whistle.” What to tell about Beaudreaux and the peeping tom? He put his fingers over the keys and continued. “Possibility of counter-spy at work. Dr. Robert Beaudreaux kidnapped and still missing. No ransom. Need additional instructions.” He sent it off, then erased all traces of it from the computer.

  As he left the chair, his dark cape swirled around his legs. The noise was like a small whip cracking, and Driskell took out his handkerchief and wiped over the keyboard, the arms of the chair, and finally, the doorknob. His prints weren’t on file anywhere, but he liked the idea of dusting all traces away. There was something … comforting about it.

  The car’s engine roared to life as Driskell turned the key and pressed the gas. It was only half past ten. Time for Lucille’s apartment.

  He chose Highway 90, a route he normally avoided. The bright neon colors of the casinos slid into the dark like mental shrapnel. Probing pinks and greens left painful after-images on his retinas. Nestled in the continual line of traffic that had come on the heels of the development of nineteen gambling dens, Driskell gave himself to the blare of palm trees, parrots, the outline of a pirate ship against the dark sky and the darker water of the Mississippi Sound. The light burst into the night, laid for a moment on the windshield of his car, then transferred itself into his soul. He was both scorched and blessed as he crawled down Highway 90, leaving the casinos behind him for a stretch of several miles. Here the old coast could be seen, the stately houses to his right, sheltered by huge oaks. On the left was the water. He rolled his window back down, catching the scent of wisteria and jasmine blended with the twang of the water. The gentle roll of the Sound was so different from the Atlantic, which crashed and pounded and battered the New Jersey shoreline. Here the elements were more subtle, but just as erosive. He realized with a start that he was beginning to feel at home.