I will admit, even though it hurts, that Alejandro does resemble a screen idol. Think Tyrone Power in Blood and Sand. (But then, I have often been likened to Jeffrey Lynn, so there!) Alejandro is a second-generation Cuban with boatloads of charisma who has inflamed Miami’s Cuban population (which is most of Miami, in case you haven’t noticed) by vowing to raise an armada and invade Cuba; raise an army and invade Cuba; raise an air force and invade Cuba; all of the above and invade Cuba. He speaks at political rallies, marches in parades, organizes youth groups and does a mean tango—think Valentino in The Sheik.
There is talk of Alejandro running for political office, and to that end a pretty mujer with the right credentials (Connie is a Marielito) would go a long way in securing votes. Connie’s cousins, who alone comprise half the Cuban population of Miami, are devoted followers of Alejandro, and on her last visit there the two met and indulged in a tango or two. Alejandro is now smitten and Connie is issuing thinly veiled ultimatums: name the day or adiós, Archy. Connie has made similar threats, veiled and otherwise, and I have prevailed by turning the other cheek and ordering another martini.
Alejandro is also several years younger than Connie, making him several-plus several years younger than I, a fact that inflates her ego and pricks mine. I would rather be intimidated by Connie’s knife than Alejandro’s good looks and youth.
Is it any wonder I awoke with a headache? Once again I missed breakfast with the family, which caused father to comment, mother to scold and Hobo to withdraw. I depend on father to maintain my lifestyle and on Connie to contain my libido. To alienate either would cause me pain; to estrange both would be suicidal. And right now my generous benefactors were politely cautioning me to shape up or ship out. Out? I have no place to go except, perhaps, to share the digs of my friend Binky Watrous, late of a mobile home in the Palm Court. Pass the hemlock.
But before anything so repugnant is passed my way, let’s look at the situation in the bright light of day. Was I being a bit too pessimistic? Had the sight of Connie flaunting her relationship with Alejandro put me in a funk out of all proportion to reality? The answer to both is a resounding Yes!
There was method to Connie’s madness. She was manipulating me and I was reacting like a puppet pulled by strings. What was called for was retaliation, not capitulation. There were any number of young ladies—young being the operative word—who would be more than happy to give Archy’s ego a boost in these trying times. All I had to do was pick and choose. Those who came immediately to mind had me thinking that Consuela Garcia was doing me a favor. Things were looking up.
As for my parents’ concern for my future, well, it was only natural that they longed to see me settled. And perhaps one day I might do just that—but not right now.
So it was with a light heart that I sped down the A1A on this glorious South Florida morning for my meeting with Claudia Lester.
I should have known better.
3
LATER, IN MY OFFICE, I could still feel the touch of Claudia’s finger on my lips and see the look in those blue eyes promising that all things were possible. I remembered, too, the warmth of her hand covering mine. What is the old adage? Cold hands, warm heart? It was the converse, warm hands, cold heart, that gave me cold feet. Our parting was a standoff. When I said goodbye, she said, “Till later,” with a confidence born of prior experience.
As Binky, preceded by his mail cart, entered my monastic cell, I filed Ms. Lester in that area of my brain labeled “Do Not Open Till Christmas,” where she was cheek-to-jowl with Alejandro. Perfect positioning for a spirited tango, and the pounding in my head told me they were already going at it. Well, at least I hope it was the tango.
“Not one with a first-class stamp,” Binky greeted as he placed a pathetically small packet of envelopes on my desk, unnecessarily bound in a rubber band.
Binky Watrous is our mail person, a position he holds thanks to my advocacy. It was a show of beneficence I was beginning to rue, but then there is so much to rue in the life and times of Binky Watrous. “Your job,” I reminded him for the umpteenth time, “is to sort, collate and deliver the mail, not scrutinize the postage and return addresses.”
“I take an interest in my work, Archy. It’s the secret of my success.”
If Binky had had any success during his tenure in numerous previous positions, it was the best-kept secret since the location of Amelia Earhart’s last pit stop.
“Al got his name in the paper,” Binky now said with great relish.
Did I mention that Binky is a Palm Court neighbor of Sergeant Al Rogoff, his trailer being but one removed from Al’s? It is not a happy pairing, when one considers that Al’s WELCOME mat has been replaced with one that reads GO AWAY. I told Al to practice the good-neighbor policy and give Binky time to exhibit his more comely qualities. “He grows on you,” I told Al. “So does fungus,” Al replied.
“He caught two guys bonking on the lawn of the old Beaumont place,” Binky informed me.
Bonking? Now, that was a new one on me. Binky’s colorful vocabulary was largely self-created. “To bonk,” I said, “is to collide.”
“I guess that was their aim,” he remarked with a giggle. Binky is the most enthusiastic fan of his own wit. “One of them was wearing a skirt. What do you suppose he was wearing under it?”
“I have a very delicate stomach this morning, Binky, and would rather not think about bonking or undergarments. Good day.”
“I guess it’s a result of all those olives you consumed last night.”
I could see that the gods were not going to give Archy a break anytime soon. It’s said there is a time and place for everything, and this was a time to keep my mouth shut. Due to the couple Fred-and-Gingering in my medulla oblongata, I didn’t heed the warning. “And how do you know how many olives I consumed last night?”
“I ran into Tommy Ambrose this morning, and he said you were popping olives last night like there was no tomorrow.”
Tommy Ambrose is a hooligan whose father gives him carte blanche at the club, an indulgence enjoyed by too many errant youths in this affluent beach town. I noticed young Ambrose at the Pelican bar last night in the company of a girl who was no better than the kid deserved. “And here it is tomorrow, so I guess I was wrong. Goodbye, Binky.”
Not the type to be discouraged by a door slammed in his face or a mat stamped GO AWAY, Binky inquired, “Who was the blonde you saw in the conference room this morning?”
Is nothing sacred around this office? Not with anchorwoman Trelawney broadcasting newsbreaking stories as they happened. “None of your business, that’s who.”
Binky shook his head of limp blond hair and rolled his brown doe eyes upward. “You’re out of sorts because Connie invited Alejandro to dinner at the club. You don’t know how to handle rejection, Archy.”
“And, apparently, neither do you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It’s supposed to mean that you invited Alice for a drink seventeen times and she turned you down seventeen times.” Alice D’Amico is one of our prettier young secretaries, whom I would have invited for a drink were it not my policy to shun office alliances outside of the office. I have no doubt I would have fared better than Binky Watrous.
“I didn’t know you were counting, Archy.”
“Everyone in the office is counting,” I countered.
He began to back himself and his cart out the door, as it is impossible to make a U-turn in my chamber. “Are you on a case, Archy?” he asked.
“I will be on your case if I don’t see the back of your head, lad.”
“That’s not possible in this closet.”
“It’s a figure of speech,” I all but shouted.
“So is bonking,” he all but shouted back.
No sooner had Binky departed than Claudia Lester returned to fill the void. She was a hard woman to shake off—or was I reluctant to see her go? I must say her dilemma and its solution had piqued my interest. She
was at the Ambassador with a suitcase filled with fifty thousand dollars in cash, awaiting my arrival. A guy named Matthew Harrigan was in a nearby motel awaiting the arrival of the suitcase.
It was the perfect plot for one of those old serial films that ran for fifteen consecutive Saturdays at the local Bijou. In the first episode the hero is in possession of a map that leads to a hidden treasure. The lights go out, there is a scuffle, and when the lights come on again our hero is holding half the map in one hand and rubbing his head with the other. He spends the next fourteen episodes looking for the other half of his map while the villain is looking for the half he left behind.
Both the genre and the Bijou have long been extinct, and I had no desire to carry half the map to its mate in order to shower Matthew Harrigan with gold. There was something that didn’t smell right about the setup, and, come to think of it, Ms. Lester didn’t smell at all. Unless I was suffering from a bout of anosmia, I would say Claudia Lester wore no scent. Her eyes said it all, and what they said was I don’t believe Matthew would have the nerve to double-cross me. He knows the people who owe me favors.
Anyone involved with that diary would eventually draw the attention of those who owed Claudia. I resolved, yet again, to forgo the stipend I would have earned as her messenger boy. This day had begun with a headache and had gone downhill from there. I should have left the office, gone home, changed into my beach togs and taken my swim—my customary two miles—before retiring to my room to sulk until the cloud of doom blew out to sea.
What I did was call Connie to make sure a light was still burning in her window for yrs. truly. On a day like this I should have known better.
“Lady Cynthia’s residence.” Connie, at the controls of a communication system that was the envy of the Pentagon, picked up on the first ring.
Connie is social secretary to Lady Cynthia Horowitz, a septuagenarian of great wealth and little sense. Lady C, who has the face of a hawk and the body of Aphrodite, spends her time and her money giving parties and taking lessons—tennis, swimming, golf, dancing, acting, et cetera—and hires only the best (looking) instructors as her mentors. So determined is she to succeed that she insists the instructor of the moment move into her oceanfront ten-acre spread. Not an unusual arrangement in sunny Palm Beach.
“It’s me, Connie. Archy.”
“Oh, you.”
Or was that “who”? Two words and already it was not going well.
“Did Alejandro go back to Miami?” I politely asked.
“He did,” Connie told me.
I couldn’t help wondering aloud, “Did he leave last night or this morning?”
“No comment,” Connie said as if she were giving a press conference to publicize one of Lady C’s charity balls.
“No comment is the most telling comment of all,” I lectured.
“Then you have your answer,” she said.
Moving right along, I suggested, “Would you like to have dinner with me tonight?”
“I’m washing my hair tonight.”
“Fine,” I said, “I’ll bring over the fixings, and cook dinner, and I’ll rent a video for later on.”
“I’m not in the mood for your paella, Archy, and even less in the mood to see What Price Hollywood?, with what’s-her-name.”
“Constance Bennett is her name, and the film is a classic.” Really, Connie could be infuriating. There was a time when she would cook the paella and watch the Three Stooges run amok just for the pleasure of my company.
“I know it’s a classic, Archy, but after several viewings it wears thin, like other things I could mention.”
Good grief, what was she referring to? Unless I was mistaken, it had a slightly risqué connotation, at my expense. “I guess you don’t want to see me tonight, or any other night,” I whined.
“Don’t get your ego in an uproar, Archy. I just need some time alone to think.”
“Think? About what?”
“My future. Now I have to go, my entire board is lit up. Call me tomorrow, Archy.”
Tomorrow? My life was in shambles, and I doubted if the pieces would all come together by the morrow. However, if I had reached the nadir of existence, what had I to lose by showing up at the Ambassador at seven this evening? Seek and you shall find, and I had just found the rationale to do what I had intended doing since eleven o’clock this morning.
H. W. Longfellow wrote, “Between the dark and the daylight, When the night is beginning to lower, Comes a pause in the day’s occupations, That is known as the Children’s Hour.” At the McNally house that time of day is better known as the cocktail hour. In the drawing room El Padre mixes, stirs and pours two martinis that are as dry as the rain forest. Mother, smart woman, drinks only sauterne. We then fill one another in on what course our lives had taken that day and impart our thoughts on current and sometimes future events. Our motto: Families that drink together, think together.
Father reports on his rich clients, mother on her begonias and her clubs, while Archy relates his latest case as long as it is not too macabre or bawdy for mother’s ears. I assiduously avoid mentioning my love life, or lack thereof, and pass around pictures of my sister and her three lovely children when cornered. It satisfies their grandparental urges and gets me off the hook. Dora, the sister in question, resides in Arizona, which is near enough for an annual visit and far enough for anything more frequent.
When summoned, we march into the dining room for one of Ursi’s culinary delights.
If my occupation as a discreet inquirer I owe to father, my bon vivant ways go back to what I learned at my mother’s knee. “Archy, live as if every day may be your last, and always wear clean underwear.” Tonight, I would do both. On covert operations, such as delivering the ransom loot, I dress in black. Jacket, trousers, turtleneck, socks and shoes. Plus a clean pair of heather-gray briefs and matching T-shirt.
I once added a black mask to this ensemble and went to one of Lady C’s costume balls as Zorro. I spent the evening brandishing a sword with a black Crayola tip and marked many a costumed behind with my trademark. Although I did not win a prize that evening, I did precede the graffiti craze by a decade.
Tonight I would have to forgo both the vermouth-laden martini and Ursi’s minty loin lamb chops, garlic and herb roast potatoes, arugula, orange and fennel salad and chilled raspberries topped with a dollop of vanilla-bean-scented whipped cream. Yes, I snooped in the kitchen when telling Ursi to make my apologies to them who bore me, stressing the fact that I was off to a business meeting. “Business before pleasure” was one of Prescott’s favorite edicts, and I aimed to please.
Perhaps Ms. Lester would offer me a drink, and when I returned with her precious diary would invite me to the Ambassador Grill for a late supper. That presumption was my first mistake of the evening. My second was not renting a more nondescript set of wheels, as my red Miata is both easy to spot and easy to remember. My third mistake was ogling the lady who opened the door to her Ambassador suite, thereby giving her the opportunity to comment with a mocking smile, “I knew you would come.”
She wore what I believe is often referred to as a little black dress. It began with spaghetti straps at the shoulders and ended with a slight flare above her knees. In shimmering black, the little that was betwixt and between the straps and the hem clung to Ms. Lester to accentuate the positive and resembled madam’s undergarment once, and perhaps still, known as a slip. There was little doubt what was beneath: nothing.
Eyeing my outfit, she quipped, “Who died?”
“I am in mourning for my life,” I said.
We were in the suite’s sitting room, which contained comfortable chairs, two side tables with lamps and a desk. The few pictures on the walls were hotel art of the finest quality. “As bad as all that?” She spoke as she walked to the desk, upon which was a black attaché’ case I would guess was labeled “Crouch and Fitzgerald, Madison Avenue.”
“My favorite brunette refused to dine with me tonight.” Not knowing if sh
e could handle the fact that she was aiding and abetting my suicide, I let it go at that, grossly underestimating the lady’s ability to tolerate suffering in those she employed. Ms. Lester would find Les Miserables amusing, but once again I get ahead of myself.
“How lucky for me,” she exclaimed, “and you should never fret over a lost love, Mr. McNally. Like trains, there will always be another.”
I wondered if I should ask for her timetable as she opened the executive tote bag and said, “Count it.”
“Is that necessary?”
She focused those blue eyes on me and stated, “Very necessary. I don’t want Matthew moaning that I came up short.”
“Do you think I’m a crook?”
With a shrug of those creamy white shoulders, she informed me, “I think everyone is a crook, Mr. McNally, and am seldom disappointed.”
“You speak of Matthew Harrigan?”
“I speak of Homo sapiens.”
That’s when I should have left. Instead I counted the greenbacks. They were arranged in stacks of fifties and hundreds. There was a time when the culprit would have demanded tens and twenties, but times do change. “If it’s legal tender,” I said when finished, “it’s all here.”
“Oh, it’s legal, believe me. The Crescent Motel. Number nine. Just off the main drag as you approach Juno Beach. He knows your name. I’ll expect you back directly after you’ve made the exchange. If you have any problems, call me here.”
And I was dismissed, thinking myself lucky that she didn’t handcuff my wrist to the handle of the attaché case. Having lured me into doing her bidding, she saw no reason to waste her time or charm on a hooked fish. Only professional civility prevented me from reneging on the deal.
Florida has more motels than you can shake a stick at—whatever that means. The Crescent was a convenience motel, if you get my drift, with one carport for each of the attached units, which were laid out in, what else, a crescent shape. Not being a resident, I pulled into the visitors’ space at the far end of the complex. Very neat. People could come and go without attracting the attention of the office—again, if you get my drift.
McNally's Alibi Page 3