Sleep with the Fishes

by Brian M. Wiprud

  “Catch and release? I don’t expect I’ll fish the pond, you know, what with a whole river out there. Besides, the Ballards pretty much used it as an eatin’-fish pond, if you know what I mean. Fed ’em strips of bacon fat and salt pork. Made ’em tasty as all get out.”

  Sid gave Russ’s shoulder another squeeze. “The Ballards is dead.” The remark was framed with a cold, bright eye and a chummy smile. He wanted Smonig to understand that from now on it was Bifulco Cabin. He let his hand fall from Russ’s shoulder.

  “True enough,” Russ admitted, becoming a bit skeptical of the prospects for selling his services as Jenny had suggested. His neighbor was a tough customer. But he forged ahead.

  “Hey, Sid, since you just moved in and all, and maybe you haven’t got around to doing any food shopping, I thought maybe you’d like to come over tonight. I’m going to barbecue some walleye, have a few Yuenglings. Interested?”

  Sid grinned.

  “Thanks, but I got a lot to do.” Sid shoved his hands into the pockets of his bathrobe and stomped in his hip boots back to the cabin. “Adios, Smonig.”

  “Hey, Sid?”

  Sid stopped on his portico and pivoted.

  “Nice outfit.” Russ smiled and turned away. He was crossing the dam breast when he heard Sid’s screen door slam.

  Russ shook his head. Some neighbor.

  Late that afternoon, Sid was loaded for bear. His vest was packed with fly boxes, leaders, floatants, extra spools, clippers, snippers, hemostats, thermometer, and license. Two fly rods—one sturdy bass-weight rod and the more delicate trouter’s rod—plus a medium-duty spin cast outfit. Hip boots, jumpsuit, long-brimmed ball cap, and polarized shades. Off went Sid, down an overgrown path, headed for the Ballard boat and his angling destiny.

  The Ballard rowboat was next to the old bridge abutment. It was speckled gray aluminum, lying upside down, with one end propped up on a stump. When Sid flipped it over, two barn swallows bolted from a nest built under one of the seats. Sid chiseled the clay bird’s nest off with a stick. The oars were wedged under the seats, but he left them where they were while he dragged the boat down the embankment and fifty feet over to a small bay. By the time both tackle and Sid were aboard and the oars were in the locks, he was breaking a sweat as much from the anticipation as from the exertion.

  Sid studied the rapids. From a river-level vantage, it was difficult to see the spot where Smonig had set up, but he knew it was on the other side, and that didn’t look too easy to get to. Sure, if he had a motor, getting there wouldn’t be a problem. Sid wiggled the oars in the air and checked out his biceps. He was a strong guy, he’d worked out regularly in the prison gym.

  And an even, warm breeze was blowing downriver.

  Russ was on his way to pull his boat out of the river before it rained. Halfway there, he saw Sid below the rapids in a rowboat, oars hacking away at the water in great splashes like a clipped-wing swan attempting flight. He was struggling upriver against a heavy current.

  Russ quickened his step, and when he reached his boat, he fetched his binoculars.

  Mid-rapid and rowing ferociously, Sid suddenly dropped the oars, grabbed the anchor, and tossed it overboard. The anchor didn’t hold, and the boat was washed down out of the rapid. So Sid hauled in the anchor, put it on the seat next to him, and pulled the swan routine again until he was in heavy current. And again the anchor didn’t hold.

  Lowering the binoculars, Russ faced upstream, took off his fedora, and let the warm, moist air play with his sandy hair. He could tell just from the texture of the breeze that it was already raining up in Hancock, so he went about his business. By the time he had the boat out of the river and covered up, the first raindrops were thwacking the tarp. Squinting across the river, he noted that Sid was finally set up in the current and casting a fly. Russ shrugged and headed for the shelter of his trailer.

  No sooner had he sat down at the ol’ computer to finish his article “Best Bet for Browns” than there was the hesitant flash, crack, and boom of lightning overhead. The sky opened up, and soon drops from the ceiling plunked into the Folgers can on the kitchen floor.

  Muddy swells boiled around Sid’s bucking rowboat and he was ankle deep in water. But it was the lightning that convinced him this was no passing shower. Time to abort his mission.

  Rain fell steadily. Deep below, the scrap-iron anchor was wedged in a rocky fissure. Despite Sid’s rebukes it wouldn’t budge, and he realized he’d soon be swamped or pulled under the rising river. The one tool he didn’t have was a knife, so he clawed at the frayed rope’s tight, wet knot fastened to the bow. Meanwhile, there was commotion astern—the fly line and fly he’d left drifting in the current jerked taut. Fish on. The rod clattered toward the edge of the boat. Sid lunged. And missed. The rod disappeared into the river chop, but not before Sid grabbed a loop of line caught on an oarlock.

  The sky split with light, there was a heartbeat, then a profound discharge that Sid felt in his fillings. He reared to his feet, pier after pier of rain swirling round him as he began to haul up the line.

  An electric spear shattered the dark, swirling sky, and the flashing blade of a rocket-fish broke the surface downstream. A hooked shad played tug-o-war with Sid’s one hand while the other hand felt the distant rattle of line peeling from his fly reel, deep in the weedy bay below.

  Turbid river water began to top the gunnels; Sid realized the river had him by the balls. That’s when the anchor rope snapped, and the jolt shoved Sid backward. He staggered as the boat swung suddenly around. Man overboard.

  The sky splintered with light, but Sid couldn’t hear the storm’s explosions. Fly line was tangled around his legs, and whitecaps kicked his head against the twirling aluminum hull. He clung to a gunnel by elbow and armpit—to let go would be to join guys that got popped. Boulders nudged him from below. And all the while, he could still feel a well-hooked rocket-fish tugging at one end of the line, like it was sewing him up in a body bag.

  It was almost nine that evening by the time the rain stalled, but Russ had the barbecue pit stoked even as the clouds were running out of gas. Fillets steeped in garlic and beer, topped with strips of bacon, hissed and browned over the coals. Russ sat in a sagging Adirondack chair, one foot on the edge of the brick oven, one hand around a cold Yuengling beer. The other hand held a blue plastic water pistol ready to put out any bacon fires. Eyes alight with the fire, his thoughts turned to Sandra.

  Perhaps the most debilitating aspect of his past tragedy was the emotional baggage he’d packed for himself. At the bottom of this steamer trunk of pain was self-loathing over his inability to prevent Sandra’s death.

  On top of that was his frustration over trying to prove or convince the police that his wife’s “accident” had been murder. Russ had truly hit rock bottom when his friends and family began scolding him for his assertions. They felt he was dragging Sandra’s name through the mud, that he was indirectly suggesting she must have been involved with criminals to be the target of murder. They took to psychoanalyzing him, telling him he was flipped-out from despair, or suffering effects from the bump on his head, or concocting a cover-up for some misdeed on his part.

  Near the top of the trunk rested the conundrum of why someone had killed her in the first place, a question with which police, friends, and family pelted him and for which he had no answer.

  It had been ten years since her death, and the sickly sweet taste of regret had become familiar enough that it was not altogether overwhelming. Over the last couple of years he’d been able to set that aside and remember Sandra herself, the woman he loved, and the time they’d had together, however brief.

  He smiled at the thought of their first meeting, when they’d scraped fenders at Bradley Airport parking lot and subsequently found themselves seated on the same flight, side by side. Their relationship warmed over dinner and the next few months. Eventually, she took him to small claims court over the traffic accident, and when she won, she used the money to take him
to Montego Bay for a week, where they got married to the accompaniment of a steel drum calypso band. Russ burned the photos from that trip after Sandra died. The evidence of his loss was too damn painful to have around. Of course, destroying all those photos was just one more thing to regret, one more garment in the trunk. But he’d managed to rescue one photo of their honeymoon, which she’d kept at her office. It hung over Russ’s fly-tying desk, and sometimes when he saw it, he felt a little like smiling. Those were the good days.

  Russ had decided against Postum with Phennel Rowe. Although she never tired of hearing of his pain, Russ did. After a while, it all seemed perverse, masochistic. He was sick of hearing his own voice, his own sighs, and his own doubts. Phennel’s languid creaky words of comfort and religion were like ice on a burn. It didn’t really help, it only made the boo-boo feel better for a while. Russ never much liked himself after those sessions. He had determined to try going it alone. Alone with that picture.

  So on this night, rather than wallowing in self-pity, he was taking a dip in the warm bittersweet waters of the tragic true romance of his past.

  But he was snapped from his trance by a ghoulish apparition near the willow tree.

  Russ spasmed with fright, toppling his chair. He fell backward, Yuengling gushing all over his chest. Scrambling away from the demon stomping up from the pond, Russ slipped on the wet grass in a frenzied lurch, did a half twist, and fell on his butt facing The Creature.

  Panic melted away, along with all his blood. Russ almost fainted before he realized what he was looking at.

  The Creature stopped abreast of the barbecue pit, clothes torn and muddy, blood running from its nose, and hair in matted tussocks with twigs for accents. Fly line wrapped like mummy tape around its shoulders and legs. One hand held up a battered fish, its silvery moon-eyed countenance held forth like the bizarre lantern of a sea witch. His neighbor’s flame-flickered visage gurgled, then spoke.

  “Smonig, what…is…this…thing?”

  Russ got to his feet, wanting to curse and ask a question at the same time. Instead, he heard himself stammer: “It’s…it’s a shad.”

  Sid nodded blankly, turned, and tromped back into the forest shadows, disappearing behind the willow from whence he’d come.

  Endelpo Thuarte, attorney-at-law, had just returned to New Jersey from a late-season ski trip to Vail. And no sooner had he loaded up his gear and strapped his skis on the ol’ BMW than he was tooling across the Pulaski Skyway toward his Hoboken brownstone, popping vitamins and hitting the speed-dial on his cellular to canvass for a late-night sup with a lady friend.

  After leaving several messages, the phone rang back at him. But there was nobody on the other end. Endelpo thought nothing of it. He continued his search for a date.

  Mr. Thuarte was a man who lived by a golden rule: work hard, play hard, keep your nose clean. Translated, this meant carry the heaviest caseload, get laid as often as possible, don’t double-cross anybody. His forte was defending small-time mobsters, and for all intents and purposes he was on the Camuchi syndicate’s payroll, the very same outfit that had cut Sid Bifulco the sweet deal. All in all Endelpo was a pretty dandy fellow, unless of course you happened to get pregnant. Even then he was quick to offer to pay for an abortion.

  The tan BMW growled down the gaslit and sycamore-lined lane and turned into his driveway; he poked at the automatic garage door opener but nothing happened. Repeated jabs at the button yielded no better results. He unclipped the gizmo from the visor. His white Italian loafers took his ski-jacketed form right up to the garage door, where Endelpo fired the zapper point blank. The door capitulated. It began to rise.

  But the light didn’t snap on.

  “Jesus! It’s always somet’ing, this door.” Endelpo returned to his car.

  The garage was empty except for an old Jacuzzi resting on its side. He pulled the car right up to the whirlpool and switched off the headlights and engine.

  The garage door closed automatically, shutting out what little light the streetlamps had cast. By the glow of the BMW’s dome light, Endelpo made his way to the wall switch. He flipped it up. He flipped it down. He waggled it. Then he squinted in the direction of the bulb. It was broken, smashed.

  Endelpo went rigid. The house key in his hand burned. Could he get it in the lock, quickly?

  Turning toward the door, he saw a large human shape emerge from behind the Jacuzzi. Endelpo’s ears rang, his gut went soggy. The ominous shape moved toward him. The keys that had been in Endelpo’s fingers hit the garage floor. Large hands cut into the wedge of glow from the dome light. Endelpo couldn’t take his eyes off the hands, especially when the digits laced and the knuckles popped.

  “Where’s Bifulco?” a chilly, empty voice asked.

  Mr. Phillips was at home in his cozy New York brownstone on Grove Street, the kind embellished with an elaborate wrought-iron fence, rails, and window guards. Surrounded by his collection of historically significant shell casings neatly arrayed in lighted wall displays, he was considering a prized .30 caliber brass casing fired on a sunny November day in 1963. A former Texas politician had given it to Mr. Phillips for his services during a reelection campaign.

  Those were the days. But now he was older, wiser, so he thought, and content to work small-time and relatively safe jobs for the Camuchi family. Officially, he was retired.

  Omer Phillips was no hit man, and he certainly didn’t look like one. He was a slight, dark man with somewhat pointy ears and high cheekbones. A chess prodigy as a boy, young Omer’s aptitude was incongruous with his Turkish family’s Coney Island homestead. But when any of his eight older brothers got pinched by the cops, they came to their little brother Omer for a way out. And he usually found one, or got beat up. By his teens, Omer had dropped formal chess competitions for speed matches on the boardwalk and the quick buck. And when he sought a trade in the sideshows, he shunned his family’s sword stunts for an apprenticeship with Dr. Renaldo, the hypnotist and noted gangland spy. It was said Omer had once put the chief of police in a trance from an adjoining toilet stall.

  Omer’s talents took him far from Coney Island’s sideshows. In his adult heyday, of course, Omer worked for politicians, anything from covering up a boozy nocturnal tryst-cum-car-crash to banishing the ex-girlfriends of presidential hopefuls. However, his tours de force were “arrangements” whereby a third party got trigger-happy and someone notable died. This had the benefit of adding to his immense collection of infamous shell casings. But the whole scene got too frantic after Watergate. He still got calls from the Washington crowd but did fewer and fewer well-paying “favors” like the one for Ollie. Bill’s mess was ample evidence of the void left by Omer. Omer was not an assassin. Obstructer of justice? Definitely. Tamperer of evidence? Most assuredly. Briber, extortionist, conspirator, and manipulator? All of the above.

  Nowadays, Omer’s work was simple, just the way he liked it. Some Johnny Dangerous has a pissed-off girlfriend threatening to talk to Mrs. Dangerous, the press, the cops—anybody to get back at Johnny? Enter Mr. Phillips. Perhaps said girlfriend would have some kind of outstanding warrant for prostitution in Atlantic City. Or maybe delinquent tax returns. Even an old beau with a vicious bent. Possibly all three. All it usually took was a little fatherly advice and a dab of homespun extortion. Often a smattering of hypnotic suggestion was helpful.

  When the call came in at ten p.m., Omer leisurely answered on the seventh ring.

  “I’m very sorry, Monseigneur, I got thuh wrong numba.” The caller hung up.

  Omer buttoned his plaid vest, straightened his bow tie in the mirror, plopped his gray woolen crusher atop his silver hair, and slipped an umbrella out of the stand on the way out the door.

  Once in his blue Karmann Ghia and out of the garage, he motored down Broadway and stopped at a Worth Street pay phone. He dialed a number.

  A murky, mortuary voice answered.

  “O.K., Mr. Phillips, you got a job.”

  “Always here to help.
It must be serious, at this hour.” Omer twirled his umbrella.

  “I’d say so, Mr. Phillips, I’d say so. Johnny Fest is escaped from thuh Newark overnight lockup infirmary for stomach pains. Was due in court. Killed a guard. Pushed his eyes into his brain. Stole some clothes from hospital staff, a candy-stripers’ shirt. On thuh loose. We want to make sure thuh cops find him. Quick, like before he whacks anybody, friends, lawyers…You know what I’m talkin’ about?”

  “Yes, I’ve got you covered. I’ll let you know tomorrow. Good-bye.” Omer hung up and stared at the phone, rapidly tapping the steel tip of his umbrella on the sidewalk.

  He popped a quarter, called information, and got the nice operator to give him Endelpo Thuarte’s address.

  Endelpo still wore his ski jacket. He lay facedown but at the same time faceup on the kitchen floor. To be precise, Fest’s handiwork had left the victim’s chest flat on the floor, but the startled, sneering face staring at the ceiling. Endelpo’s head had been twisted completely backward. Both arms were clearly broken and folded at odd angles over his back. Johnny, it seemed, hadn’t gotten as far as breaking the legs before Endelpo had either talked or died or both.

  Omer swung his umbrella, paced, and thought. Then he hooked his umbrella on one arm and snapped on surgeon’s gloves. He looked at the dates stamped on the lift tickets clipped to Endelpo’s jacket and pulled an American Airlines ticket folder from the inside pocket. Then he checked the garage—empty, but still fragrant with exhaust. Well, it was obvious that Mr. Thuarte had just returned from a trip and that his luggage as well as his skis and car were nowhere about. This meant Johnny Fest was on his way, soon to switch cars probably, but on his way.

  Omer went to Endelpo’s study, which was littered with strewn files. Among shards of a broken lamp on the desk lay an address and appointment book, which was open to Sid Bifulco’s new address. Taking out a small pad of his own, Omer took a few notes.