The Midnight Plan of the Repo Man

by W. Bruce Cameron

  My patience broke with an audible snap—I’d had it with Kermit’s wonderful vocabulary. “Decimate. To destroy,” I said to him, my voice shaking with anger.

  Kermit looked a little surprised at the heat in my response. “No, I mean, to keep a tenth of the business.”

  “You said decimate. It means to destroy, like blow up,” I shouted.

  Kermit glanced at Becky. “Ruddy…” she began.

  “No! No, Becky.” I pointed at her. “I’ve had it with Mr. Vocabulary. Let’s get a dictionary. We’re going to settle this whole thing once and for all. Right here. Right now.”

  “What whole thing?” she asked timidly.

  “No!” I yelled. I marched into the back room and grabbed a dictionary, flipping agitatedly through the D’s. “Decimate!” I cried. I stopped, moving my lips a little.

  One of the meanings of the word “decimate” is “remove onetenth of.”

  I slapped the dictionary shut. “Okay! Fine! You win, Kermit! Happy now?” I stomped out the door.

  Alan came awake as I was trudging down the muddy sidewalk. “What are you so angry about?” he asked.

  “What makes you think I’m angry?” I challenged.

  “I can tell by the way you’re walking. And your fists are clenched.”

  “Let me ask you this, Alan. What does the word ‘decimate’ mean to you?”

  “Decimate?”

  “Just answer the question.”

  He thought about it. “I guess it means to destroy something.”

  “Aha!”

  “Also to remove every tenth man from a group, or withhold ten percent of something,” he reasoned.

  “Well, why do you keep dropping off to sleep all the time? What kind of person are you? You’re never around when I need you!” I stormed.

  “Sorry?”

  “Alan, this is one of those times when you should just stop talking,” I fumed.

  Milt was in his office when I got there. “That fence you hit, Einstein’s place?” he greeted.

  “That I allegedly hit,” I responded. Alan snorted.

  Milt waved his hand. “Doesn’t matter. Turns out Croft put the thing in without a permit, and get this—it wasn’t even on his property, it was too close to the road. You want to, you can sue him.”

  Milt handed over a couple of assignments—the death grip of winter was finally relaxing its hold on business a little bit, and we were heading for a far happier time—repo season.

  With business picking up it felt like a good time to tell him I needed to borrow some money, at least fifteen thousand dollars, maybe more, and that I had a free-and-clear house he could attach as collateral.

  “For the Bear?” he asked when I explained what the money was for. “I guess I don’t understand, I was in there last night. A lot more business than I’ve ever seen on a weeknight. My nephew says they’re going to have to hire someone to help cook.”

  “It’s not that. I just got us into a bad business deal, Milt, and this is the only way out of it.”

  Milt said he’d get going on the paperwork, and Alan was silent when I got into the tow truck. “Okay, Alan, what is it?” I demanded testily.

  “Why didn’t you explain about Kermit’s numbers-running business?” Alan asked. “Seems like it would have been a perfect opportunity to let him know what’s going on with his nephew.”

  “I don’t like that sly tone in your voice, Alan.”

  “You can’t help it, you like the guy.”

  “Who, Kermit? I loathe the guy. But I love my sister. So…” I shrugged.

  “So you decided not to tell Milt because it would have gotten Kermit in trouble with his uncle,” Alan finished for me. “Ruddy McCann, repo man with a heart of gold.”

  “Yeah, well, don’t let it get out,” I grunted.

  I spent the afternoon hauling a Chevy Malibu out of the middle of a cow pasture. According to the file, the customer decided he was too inebriated to drive on the roads one night and attempted to make it home from the bar by traveling directly overland. He made it through some barbed-wire fences without a problem, but became bogged down in the mud and concluded he shouldn’t have to pay for such a defective automobile. He called the bank and told them where to find it. The bank’s collection department was headquartered in Los Angeles and apparently the folks there thought that cow pasture was roughly the same as shark tank, so instead of calling a tow truck they elected to contract out to a repo man the task of recovering their collateral from amid the dangerous animals.

  In truth, the biggest danger from cows is their curiosity. As I shoveled and cursed and squirmed around in the mud trying to hook the car frame solidly enough to winch it out, they stood around and watched, their flat expressions communicating a complete lack of comprehension. When I finally managed to get underneath the car I looked over and three of them had their heads lowered so they could watch what I was doing. They didn’t seem particularly awed at this feat by a superior species.

  “What if one of them is a bull?” Alan asked nervously.

  “You see any horns, Alan? Only thing we have to worry about is one of them stepping on us while trying to get a better view.”

  We had a busy Friday night, busy enough that I could let Becky serve Janelle bourbon without making it appear I was avoiding her. Janelle, though, kept turning her eyes toward me, so finally I steeled myself and went over to her table.

  “Hey, Janelle.”

  “You’ve made some amazing changes in here. I love the new floor,” she greeted. “Engineered wood. Nice.”

  “Becky did all the work,” I replied.

  She looked good—hell, she looked very good, everything pulled together, a black sweater and black skirt clinging tightly but tastefully to her curves. She sat back in her chair and gazed at me for a long moment, while I stood there getting more and more uncomfortable. Alan, of course, was asleep.

  “I’m going to visit my sister in Kansas City for a month,” she said softly. “Might look for a job while I’m there. Get out of this place.”

  “Wow, really? That’s great.”

  “I leave tomorrow. I have a bunch of food in the fridge. Rather than me throw it out, why don’t you come over after the Bear closes and pick it up? It won’t last for as long as I’ll be gone.”

  Her eyes were watching me steadily.

  “Oh, well, that’s really nice, Janelle. The thing is…” I cleared my throat. “I’m sort of seeing somebody.”

  I couldn’t tell if she thought I was lying—it certainly felt like I was lying.

  “I’m just offering you the food from my fridge, Ruddy,” she replied, her voice faintly mocking.

  “I can’t.”

  She looked away from me. “Suit yourself.”

  I watched her walk out that night, in heels no other woman ever tried to wear in the Black Bear, and not for the first time felt slightly regretful over my decisions surrounding Janelle. But you can’t have everything, and with Katie I was trying to direct all my efforts into having something.

  * * *

  The next day was Saturday and Katie and I had planned a picnic on Lake Michigan. Since I was going to be in East Jordan I decided to take care of a little errand and drove over to Einstein Croft’s place. I pulled a thin envelope out of my folder and walked up the steep driveway, which had been completely cleared of any fence. Doris was picking at the ground and pointedly ignored me as I mounted the stone steps and knocked on Einstein’s door.

  Einstein looked and smelled like the inside of his house, stale booze coming off his breath. He smiled a little when he saw me, and for an uneasy moment I wondered if he had a pistol stuffed in his belt.

  “I don’t like this,” Alan muttered. “He looks too happy to see us.”

  “Mr. Croft?”

  He stepped outside. “C’mere a second.”

  “Sorry?”

  He pushed past me and clumped down the steps. “Got something I want to show you.”

  “I wouldn’
t go with him,” Alan stated nervously.

  “I’m just here to give you something,” I said.

  “And I’ve got something for you,” Einstein replied. He kept walking.

  Curious, I followed.

  “Ruddy…,” Alan pressed anxiously.

  Einstein strode toward the back of his property line, not looking back. Glancing over, I noticed the rifle was still lying in the mud where I’d thrown it. My father would have killed me for treating a weapon like that.

  “Here ya go, Repo Man. She’s all yours.” Einstein grinned at me and gestured expansively to what was left of his truck. He’d burned it in the center of a patch of concrete that looked like it had once been the floor of a garage. The tires had melted off the rims, the interior had turned to ash, and everything made of aluminum or plastic had run off onto the ground.

  “That’s insurance fraud,” stated Alan the amateur lawyer.

  “You can’t file an insurance claim on a fire you set yourself, Mr. Croft. That would be fraud,” I advised him.

  He threw back his head and laughed. “In-surance! I don’t got any in-surance. I’m telling ya you can have it. Sorry it got a little burnt.” He laughed at my expression, loving the moment.

  Sighing, I handed him the envelope. He took it from me suspiciously. “What’s this?”

  “It’s a free-and-clear title, Mr. Croft.”

  He blinked at me in noncomprehension.

  “The cosigner had a life insurance policy on the loan. Your dad. When he died, it paid off in full. The truck’s all yours, free and clear.”

  Einstein stared at me.

  “Have a nice day, Mr. Croft.”

  I resisted the temptation to glance back, but I sensed that Einstein Croft was still standing there, frozen in place, as I came out of the trees and walked down his driveway. “Nice meeting you, Doris,” I called to the goose, who raised her head and watched me go with a disapproving expression.

  I was just driving past the PlasMerc factory when a patrol car lit up its emergency lights behind me. “Every time I go to East Jordan,” I muttered, pulling over.

  It turned out to be the same deputy with the same message as the night Drake was killed: The sheriff wanted to talk to me.

  “Can you follow me to his office, please, sir?” the deputy requested.

  “To the … to the jail?” I repeated.

  “Just to the sheriff’s office, sir.”

  “Couldn’t we do this on the cell phone?”

  Apparently not. “What do you suppose Strickland wants?” Alan wanted to know as we followed the deputy.

  “Well, let’s see, Alan. He’s had two murder victims turn up this year, both having something to do with me. I’m surprised he hasn’t decided to make me a permanent guest of the county by now.”

  Strickland was standing at his window when the deputy led me in, and lowered himself into his chair with a weary sigh. He pulled out a file. “All right, then. Tell me why you thought the ballistics from the rifle that killed Drake would match the one from Lottner.”

  “Did they?” I blurted.

  Strickland gave me a stony glare. “Tell me why you thought the ballistics from the rifle that killed Drake would match the one from Lottner.”

  “Because Franklin Wexler and Nathan Burby killed Alan Lottner, and I think they blew up the nursing home, and I think they shot Drake in my living room, believing it was me.”

  There was a long silence, during which Strickland just stared at me.

  “Oh, Ruddy,” Alan said sadly.

  27

  A Meeting with Sheriff Strickland

  Strickland was quiet for so long I was afraid he was thinking of just pulling his weapon and shooting me. Finally he cleared his throat and spoke very quietly. “Why do you think these two men committed those crimes?”

  “Because that’s what I dreamed. I mean, I didn’t dream about the nursing home or about Drake, but in my dream, that’s who killed Alan.”

  “Why would they do something like that?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. Maybe Marget Lottner was seeing Nathan Burby and he decided to get rid of the competition.”

  “So Mrs. Lottner is involved, too,” Strickland speculated neutrally.

  “No!” Alan shouted.

  I cocked my head, considering. “Well, maybe, but I don’t think so.”

  “Ruddy, you know that’s not right,” Alan lectured me.

  “I mean, I don’t know that’s not right, but it could be,” I said, trying to keep the irritation out of my voice.

  Strickland was pondering something. “I’ve read the file on the nursing home explosion probably one hundred times. Did you know a woman named Elizabeth Wexler was killed in the bombing?”

  “Liddy Wexler, yes I did.”

  “Everyone with a relative at the home was looked at. Franklin Wexler was in Las Vegas that night. I remember that because in the file there’s a picture of him shaking hands with Wayne Newton.”

  I shook my head in frustration. “Well, okay, look. I can’t explain it. But, Sheriff, what if when we die, there’s a … a remnant of us, something of us that stays around sometimes after we’re gone. Something no one can explain or prove, but that can get a message to the living.”

  “You’re saying what, that Alan Lottner is communicating with you from beyond the grave?”

  “Please don’t tell him, Ruddy,” Alan begged.

  “No, just that I think the dream came from him. Sheriff, if you search Burby and Wexler’s houses, I know you’ll find the rifle that killed Alan and Drake.”

  He shook his head. “No, I won’t.”

  “How can you say that?” I asked in frustration.

  “Because it wasn’t the same gun. You were wrong about that.”

  “Oh.”

  “I don’t have probable cause to search anything except your home—there was a dead body in the living room, last time I was there.”

  “Yes, because Burby and Wexler thought it was me.”

  “Nathan Burby is out of town, according to Deputy Timms,” Strickland observed.

  “Oh, yeah. Right, I knew that. So it must have been Wexler.”

  He sighed.

  “If you pull in Wexler for questioning…”

  Strickland raised his cold eyes to mine.

  “Oh-oh,” Alan murmured. “He looks angry.”

  But when Strickland spoke again, it was without heat. “When I was a cop in Muskegon, twenty years ago, one of my first calls was on a woman, shot to death in her bedroom. We were out canvassing the area, checking garages and backyards to see if maybe the perp was hiding in the area. I rang the doorbell of a neighbor and when the guy opened the door, I knew he was the one. I don’t know how I knew it, I just had it, that feeling in my gut, that I was looking at the guy who shot the victim.

  “I was just a beat cop then, but when I told the homicide detective about the feeling I had, he followed up on it, and they nailed the guy on forensics.”

  Strickland stood up and stared out his window, his hands in his pockets. Then he shook his head. “I am not going to pull in anyone for questioning based on a dream, McCann. You say you have a, a remnant of some kind, but that doesn’t do me any good. I can’t take it to the D.A. and I certainly can’t as a police officer act on it. A man was killed in your living room the other night and you’re an ex-con—those are things I can act on.”

  “He’s going to arrest you!” Alan squeaked.

  I swallowed. Absurdly, the only thought I had was that if I were taken into custody I would miss my date with Katie to see the sunset.

  Strickland wasn’t arresting me, he was dismissing me. “My gut’s been telling me all along that you’re clean on this, that you didn’t kill Alan Lottner. I think you made a mistake you’re going to have to live with the rest of your life, but you’re not the same kind of criminal that lived next door to the murder victim in Muskegon. And I understand that there are some things we can’t explain, like how I knew I wa
s looking at the perpetrator twenty years ago when he opened the door. But what was true then is true now—it takes police work to solve a crime.” He turned away from the window, giving me a sober appraisal. “It’s best you go home now, Ruddy.”

  I left the station feeling as if I’d just somehow been found not guilty—but only by reasonable doubt.

  Katie and I watched the sun expand into a huge orange ball and drop into Lake Michigan with our arms around each other, and then decided nothing would be more fun for her than to watch me help Becky tend bar.

  We drove to Kalkaska, but as we drew close to the Black Bear, traffic—and there never really is such a thing in Kalkaska that time of year—was at a standstill. The congestion seemed at its worst right in front of the bar.

  “Why all the cars?” Katie asked curiously.

  I looked at her. “I don’t know. Something’s going on.”

  We parked at my house and made our way back to the Bear on foot. The place was packed to the walls; I had to shove my way in.

  “I had no idea this place was so popular!” Katie shouted to me over the crowd noise.

  I shook my head. “It isn’t!”

  We fought our way to the bar and found out why there was such a mob: Becky was pouring everyone free champagne. “Ruddy!” she shrieked when she saw me, giving me a huge hug and a kiss.

  I reminded Becky that she had already met Katie, and Becky gave her an ebullient hug, too. “I take it that we’re drinking what we’re not giving away?” I asked.

  Becky tugged on me and I nodded at Katie to give me a minute. In the back room, things were more quiet.

  “This is the best day of my life, Ruddy,” Becky told me. “You know what we got in the mail today?”

  “The new Home Depot catalogue?”

  “No!” Becky shook her head wildly. She was, I decided, drunk, a state in which I’d never seen her before. “The money.”

  “The money?” I repeated stupidly.

  “The sex line sent us the money back. Everything we sent to them, they sent back. We can cover everything and have some left over!”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “They must have interpreted the death of their business manager as a sign of the way you work,” Alan speculated. “They decided to send you the money before you came down to collect it in person.”