Flame

by John Lutz

  Ogden smiled and said, “Don’t trust too much in your luck, Mr. Carver.” He held the door open as Courtney and Butcher slid past him into the hall. Shook his head and said in an amused, boys-will-be-boys tone, “Earlobes. Ain’t that something?”

  “Something,” Carver agreed.

  But the door had already closed.

  Chapter 14

  THE NEXT MORNING, as he limped through the Holiday Inn lobby, Carver tried not to look at the envelope stuffed in the box beneath his room number. A lot of money, Ogden had said. And, to Ogden, a lot would indeed be a lot. There was no telling how much was in the bulging white envelope. Maybe even six figures. Possibilities endless and shining.

  Better not think about that.

  But his mind kept returning to the knowledge of the envelope the way the tip of a tongue keeps returning to an aching tooth. And finding decay.

  He got the Ford from the hotel garage and drove through iridescent streets damp from a dawn rain to the Atlanta Public Library, only about six blocks away on the corner of Carnegie Way and Forsyth.

  The library was a gray stone building with dark-tinted windows. There was a wide concrete area out front that seemed to be home to half a dozen street people. This was a teeming corner, with lots of traffic, both car and pedestrian. Busy Atlantans rushing here and there, conducting the business of the New South.

  Inside, the library was cool and spacious, with beige carpet and cream-colored walls. Carver pushed through a turnstile, and a woman at an information desk told him newspaper back issues were kept on microfilm on the fourth floor, then with a darting glance at his cane directed him to an elevator.

  Same beige carpet on the fourth floor. Same cream-colored walls. Microfilm records were stored in rows of multicolored file drawers, while current newspapers were kept in racks in their original form.

  After removing the appropriately dated small cardboard boxes from one of many gray drawers, he sat at one of half a dozen blue-and-gray viewers and got busy.

  He had to sift through several microfilm spools before he found what he wanted in a July 12, 1970, edition of the Constitution. The moving of Wesley Slaughter and Rendering’s corporate headquarters to Atlanta from New Orleans, along with plans to construct a vast operation south of the city, was front-page news in the financial section. There was a separate item on Wesley himself, recounting how he’d been born in New Orleans into one of the city’s oldest and most prestigious families. His father had been a local political kingmaker, his father a two-term congressman in the U.S. House of Representatives. Wesley had made a name for himself as a high-school halfback, but he hadn’t played college football because of a knee injury. He’d attended Washington and Lee University, graduating magna cum laude within three years. In a surprising move, he’d used family money to buy into Clark Rendering with a college friend, Keith Adkins. The two of them soon had corporate control. Within five years Adkins left the company, whose name was changed to Wesley Slaughter and Rendering. Under Wesley’s guidance, it soon became the largest operation of its kind in the South. Wesley was also a member of an organization called the Southern Christian Businessmen’s League, as well as several other civic groups.

  Next to the news item was a photograph of Frank Wesley in his forties, dark hair worn long over the ears, drooping dark mustache, the sort of smile people associate with daredevil pilots and heartbreakers. Nice-looking guy in a suit and tie, posed with his arms crossed, a freshly slaughtered hog dangling upside-down on a meat hook in the background. Today’s carcass, tomorrow’s bacon.

  It was a striking photograph for several reasons, but the reason it struck Carver was that he was sure the man in the 1970 newspaper photograph and the man who’d died in the car bombing in Florida were two different people.

  He turned the knob that made the lens zoom in on the section of the newspaper page containing the Wesley story. Figured out the instructions printed on the side of the microfilm machine, fed a quarter into its plastic and metal guts, and in a slanted plastic tray received a copy of what was on the screen. Wesley’s photograph had reproduced beautifully.

  Then he leaned back in his chair, holding the copy and the crook of his cane in the same hand, thinking.

  The two gunmen in Wesley’s condo in Fort Lauderdale hadn’t seemed surprised when he’d walked in through the unlocked door. It was almost as if they’d been ahead of him in the game and were sitting there waiting for him. And if he was any judge, Ogden, Butcher, and Courtney had been genuinely surprised by his mention of the two in Florida. As if they actually had no connection with them. Maybe didn’t even know who they might be. Then he remembered Courtney’s sharp intake of breath at the mention of the Fort Lauderdale conversation. Wondered what, if anything, that might mean.

  But the discussion of the two gunmen was the only even slight digression from their scare-Carver act. It was as if they’d talked over beforehand what might frighten him into leaving Atlanta, then gone through their routine in his room and sweetened fear with money. Powerful motivators, cold fear and cold cash.

  Carver had been tempted, but he’d never considered asking the desk clerk for the envelope in his room slot. Not really. Not beyond toying with the idea. He knew better than to take the money. Knew what part of himself he’d be selling. Convinced himself of that, anyway.

  But he couldn’t shake the fear.

  Even if he did keep seeing Butcher’s tiny, intense eyes behind the thin-bladed boning knife, even if he did keep thinking about the photograph of a young Frank Wesley standing and smiling in front of a fresh-killed hog, Carver assured himself that he was leaving Atlanta because he had no more business here at the moment.

  As he checked out of the hotel that afternoon, he saw that the envelope was no longer in his box. He asked the desk clerk, a tall, elderly man with gray hair and a crooked spine, if he knew what had happened to it.

  “Gentleman that left it came by this morning and picked it up,” the man said, regarding Carver as if peering around a corner.

  “Remember what time?”

  “I’d guess about ten, sir.”

  Carver felt a sinking, cool sensation. They hadn’t given him much time to claim the money. As if they didn’t really care how he played it and could handle him easily either way. Hadn’t been bluffing an iota. This wasn’t comforting.

  “That’s okay, I hope.” The desk clerk’s gray eyebrows formed a sharp V of concern. “When he left the envelope, he said whoever was on the desk at the time was to give it to whichever of you two gentlemen asked for it.”

  “It’s okay,” Carver told him. “I just wanted to make sure he got it.”

  He put his room charges on his Visa card and said yes, he’d enjoyed his stay. Especially the guy with the knife.

  Digging the cane hard into the lobby carpet, he refused to let a bellhop carry his suitcase as he limped toward the exit. Despised the man’s pitying and patronizing smile.

  An hour later, he’d turned the rental Ford in to Hertz at the hectic Atlanta airport and was on a plane heading back to Florida.

  The air was calm; the flight was smooth. He sat quietly sipping beer from a plastic cup, watching shredded cotton clouds glide past. Wondering what and how big was the thing he’d become involved in, and where it was taking him.

  And how much had been in the envelope he hadn’t claimed.

  Chapter 15

  ON THE VERANDA AT Edwina’s house, Carver was watching McGregor. McGregor was watching the ocean, thinking over what Carver had just told him about what had happened in Atlanta. A gull circled in, screamed, and swooped at something out of sight below on the beach, soared almost straight up and flapped back toward the sea. The flashing white undersides of its wings were visible for a long time against the blue sky. The ocean breeze ruffled McGregor’s sparse blond hair, causing a lock of it to flop down Hitler-style above his left eye.

  He aimed his close-set little eyes at Carver. Said, “It don’t make fucking sense, you telling me Wesley’s a
live.”

  “Has Bert Renway surfaced?”

  “No,” McGregor said. “I’ve had his trailer watched and he ain’t shown.”

  “Then it makes sense that far.”

  A trickle of sweat ran down McGregor’s forehead, into the corner of his eye. Seemed not to bother him. “ ’Cause nobody’s seen a man in a while, that don’t mean he’s dead. Might be he’s visiting his old mother in another state; that ain’t quite like being dead. Or maybe he met up with a hot opportunity and he’s balling some divorcée tourist or something in a motel down the coast. Having himself a fine time and let the rest of the world go squat. Dipshits like you always assume the worst.”

  “Renway’s almost sixty-five years old.”

  “Hey, you think that means he can’t get it up?”

  Carver said, “Christ!”

  McGregor said, “There’s a name pops up all over Florida, crime capital of the country.”

  “Frank Wesley wasn’t in my office,” Carver said simply. “He wasn’t in that car when it was blown up.”

  “Sorry donghead, but it had to be Wesley, Dental records don’t lie. No two bicuspids are alike, that kinda shit.”

  “Uh-huh,” Carver said. “Like snowflakes and fingerprints. What are you telling the news media?”

  “That progress is being made. Bomb pieces are being analyzed, backgrounds are being checked, witnesses are being questioned. You know the routine—public servants in high gear.”

  Carver knew the routine, all right. The more public optimism and suits and ties and reassuring grins, the more uniforms speaking as if they were dictating a report, the less was actually happening in the background behind the bureaucratic front. And nobody was better at diddling the news media than McGregor. “The lab learned anything about the explosion?”

  “There were a few charred pieces of what looked like an electronic detonator. The explosive itself might have been a plastique. Kinda stuff terrorists use.” McGregor suddenly sat up straighter. The scent of his unbathed body crossed the table. “Hey, you don’t think we’re into political shit here, do you?” As if he’d just now considered the possibility.

  “I’m not sure,” Carver said. “See if you can get me some information on the charming trio of Ogden, Courtney, and Butcher. Maybe that’ll tell us something. Wesley was—is—from a wealthy Southern family that was active in politics. And he did some fund-raising for local candidates.”

  “That ain’t nothing,” McGregor said. “It’s a part of life for most anybody that successful. Every big fish has gotta keep the bigger sharks happy. Probably’s got no connection at all with what’s going on.”

  Carver said, “You never know.”

  “You’re the one seems never to know, asshole. You go traipsing off to Atlanta, and all that happens is you come back and throw shit into the game.”

  “Didn’t traipse, took a plane. And if the picture’s no clearer, maybe that’s because it’s bigger than a pea-brain like you had it figured for from the beginning.”

  McGregor shrugged. “Guy walks into your office, walks out, gets blown up. I wanna find out why. Specifically, want you to find out. Should be simple for a hotshot private investigator even if he is a gimp. Got your own office and telephone now. You’re supposed to be a pro. I mean, I seen your ad in the newspaper business personals, right under ‘Spicy lingerie to perk up your partner.’ ”

  “Should be simple for a police lieutenant, too. But it isn’t. Sometimes one door only leads to another, and you gotta keep opening them. Problem with you is, they keep leading to places only tend to get you more frustrated.”

  McGregor stood up and put on his mean expression. Must have taken very little effort. “You just see you get me unfrustrated, you know what’s good for you. You’ll be limping around selling pencils instead of living here with your real-estate cunt and playing Sam Spade.”

  Carver gripped his cane and actually raised it a few inches, preparing to lash out at McGregor. To smash that lascivious, gap-toothed grin down his throat. He took a deep breath instead, lowering the cane. His knuckles were white against the dark walnut.

  McGregor knew he’d rattled Carver and was grinning wider, playing his tongue around the space between his front teeth. He said, “I’m going now, fuckface. You keep in touch.”

  Carver said, “Works both ways. You gonna do what I asked? Get with Atlanta law and find out about those three names?”

  “Sure. Why not?”

  Carver smiled. There was a reason he’d asked McGregor and not Desoto to check with Atlanta. He said, “Be careful one of those sharks you talked about doesn’t develop a taste for rotten cop.”

  McGregor spat on the brick, then ground the wad of phlegm into a flat wet spot with the toe of his huge wing-tip shoe. “Tryin’ to spook me, jerk-off?”

  “ ’Course not. We both know you’ll always be more ambitious than scared. Sharks don’t much care what their supper’s thinking, though.”

  McGregor stretched his long body, swaying from side to side as if trying to separate his ribs. He spat again, then turned and walked away. He was smiling but not fooling even himself. Like Carver, he was swimming in unfamiliar water that was proving dangerous.

  Carver sat for a while, staring at the ocean and sipping his Budweiser. There was a big ship way out on the horizon, so far away it didn’t appear to be moving. A couple of pelicans fished in the distance, skimming the waves.

  Behind him, Edwina said, “Good, he’s gone.” She’d been waiting in the house for McGregor to leave. She pulled back the metal chair opposite Carver’s and sat down. “That man makes my skin creep six different directions at once.”

  “You oughta tell him that,” Carver said. “Believe me, he’s not sensitive enough to be insulted.”

  Edwina smiled. Behind her the sea rolled blue-green and deep toward the shore. A sudden stiff breeze lifted the collar of her silky white blouse and the point of a lapel touched her cheek lightly, as if caressing it. The few clouds in the sky had disappeared. Nature seemed to approve of her having taken McGregor’s place on the veranda. Carver agreed with nature.

  Edwina said, “I can tell by your expression he cheered you up as usual.” A smile. “Time to share? Or are you going stoic on me?”

  Carver told her about his conversation with McGregor.

  When he was finished, she said, “You better tell all this to Desoto.”

  Carver said, “Desoto’s a straight cop. In his position, there are things he can’t know without passing them on.”

  “He wouldn’t pass them on if you asked him not to; he’s your friend first, a cop second.”

  “Don’t be so sure.”

  “I am sure.”

  “Well, because he’s my friend, I don’t wanna put him in that kind of dilemma.”

  “He wouldn’t see it as a dilemma. Not Desoto.”

  Carver wondered if any woman had ever thought ill of Desoto. Probably not. He looked out at the distant ship again; it still hadn’t moved. Maybe it was anchored there. The pelicans were gone.

  “Think about it,” Edwina said.

  “Sure,” Carver told her. “About that and a lotta other things.”

  “What you need,” Edwina said, “is to forget everything for a while.” She grinned as lasciviously as McGregor, but on her it looked fine. “I don’t have to go back in to work today. Not a thing to do till I meet some clients tonight.”

  He said nothing as she got up, walked around the table, and bent down so her head wouldn’t bump the umbrella. She kissed him on the mouth, letting it linger, using her tongue. She’d been drinking lemonade laced with gin; he could taste it.

  Carver ran the backs of his knuckles lightly over her smooth cheek where the lapel had touched it. She was perspiring but cool to the touch. He felt himself responding to her. The buzzing in his ears was starting again, but it wasn’t loud or unpleasant. It occurred to him that he hadn’t heard it the past day or so except on the plane from Atlanta, and that might have been bec
ause of the change in air pressure.

  Edwina kissed him gently on the forehead. Straightened up and moved away.

  He said, “Me, I got no pressing business, either.”

  She said, “Oh, yes you do.”

  Later, in the cool and quiet bedroom she removed her mouth from him long enough to say, “I’m scared for you. Talk to Desoto. Please.”

  Carver said, “Ummm. Sure.”

  Promise them anything.

  Chapter 16

  DESOTO LISTENED CAREFULLY AS Carver talked. They were in Desoto’s office on Hughey in Orlando. The window air conditioner, which supplemented the central air on particularly warm days, was humming and gurgling away, fighting the good fight against the relentless heat. There were three yellow ribbons tied to its grill, standing straight out and fluttering in the cool breeze to show the filter was clean and the blower was working fine. Reassurance that you were comfortable while you sweated.

  On the sill of the window next to the one with the air conditioner sat Desoto’s portable Sony radio. He’d turned the volume low enough so it could barely be heard above the noise of the air conditioner, and Latin music seeped from the speakers into the office. Music from Evita, Carver thought. Desoto seemed to like, even need, a Latin beat to help him through his days.

  Patti LuPone was singing forlornly about Argentina when Carver finished talking and Desoto leaned back in his chair and looked thoughtful. Desoto had on a white-on-white shirt with French cuffs and a wine-colored tie today. Razor-creased slacks that were beige but so pale they were almost white. A dark brown sport jacket was draped on a wood hanger that was looped over a fancy brass hook near the office door. A tough cop and a dandy, Carver thought, was an odd combination that often caused Desoto to be underestimated. But Carver had seen Desoto with his back to the wall and no longer sold him short.

  Desoto said, “You underestimated me, amigo, by thinking you maybe shouldn’t have told me this. What you should do is listen more to Edwina. Should appreciate her more.”