“Hell, I don’t think I can get anybody to do it if he knows he has to die,” Trace said.
“Try,” his father urged, then looked glum again. “No. Never mind. I’m just doomed. Thanks for thinking of me.”
“Your father’s drinking too much,” Chico said.
“Funny. I’m the one who’s going to be forty and he’s the one who’s got the midlife crisis.”
“That’s now. Wait until Thursday when the big four-oh comes. I’ll tell you how it’ll be. First, you won’t be able to get out of bed. What for? Another dismal day like all the rest? So you’ll stay in bed. Your body will ache and you’ll think of a cup of tea. With lemon. And honey. I’ll parade through the room naked, but I won’t get any response because you know if you use it all up right away, it’ll be another week before you can do it again. You’ll start riding buses, instead of walking, and you’ll think about answering ads in the sex columns. ‘Beautiful horny young woman looking for generous elderly bachelor. Please write Lulu LaTour. Send photo. All letters answered.’ I tell you, Trace, I don’t envy you. Your pop’s all right. He’s just depressed, but he’ll get better when he gets home. For you, it’s the end of the line.”
“The only thing that keeps me going is knowing that you’ll be there with me in my sunset years,” Trace said.
“Hah. All these years you’ve been abusing me?” Chico said. “Now it’s my turn. From now on I flaunt my lovers in front of you. Eighteen-year-old bellhops. Valet parking attendants. Carry-out boys from the supermarket.”
“You don’t go to a supermarket,” he said.
“I’m going to start. I’m going to all the supermarkets. A different one each day. And I’m going to have them all deliver. You can lie in bed rusting and hear the squeals of pleasure from the living room. We’ll be on the rug.”
“It’s nylon. I hope it scratches your butt and he gets knee burns. If he turns his back, I’ll club him with my cane.”
Chico didn’t answer. She was looking from the doorway toward the sofa where Trace’s father sat, still looking at his drink. Mrs. Tracy was next to him, her jaw moving continuously. “Your father’s quite a man to have let her live,” Chico said.
“I know. I wish there was some way to bail him out. You know, that’s what my marriage was turning into?” He stopped as Bob Swenson came into the room, holding two glasses. He saw Chico and Trace, gave the bartender the glasses to fill, and walked over.
“How’s it going?” Trace asked.
“I’ve got her now. I’ve got her convinced that she’s Ingrid Bergman, Pola Negri, and Lillian Gish all rolled up into one.”
“Even better than them.” Trace said. “She does an animal act.”
“That was in the past. A youthful indiscretion,” Swenson said. “From here on in, it’s only serious acting. She and I are discussing her career plans right now. She needs an older, wiser man to rely on. A mentor. I shall be her mentor.”
“You’re really a disgusting vulture,” Chico said with a smile.
“You’ve driven me to it,” Swenson said, “by rejecting me all these years.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Sorry, got to go back before someone tries to make a move on her.”
As he walked away, Chico said, “I love him. I really love him. He’s the quintessential male animal. You never have to wonder where he’s coming from ’cause he’s always coming from the same place. Love letters straight from the groin.”
Trace saw his father nod his head and stand up alongside his wife, and he thought they should take a picture of his parents and post it in every marriage-license bureau in America and force every applicant to look at it and initial it first. The marriage rate would drop 50 percent. You wanted zero population growth? That picture’d give you a minus expectation.
Sarge and his wife met them near the door.
“Well, it’s about that time,” Trace’s father said with a sigh. “Hilda’s getting tired.”
“What’s on the schedule for tomorrow?” Trace asked.
His mother answered. “I think we ought to keep trying those slot machines near the door. After all, you promised.”
“And probably Circus Circus,” Sarge said wearily.
“Not tomorrow,” Trace said suddenly.
“What do you mean?”
“I need your help, Sarge,” he said. “I’ve got this case and there’s just too much legwork for me to do alone. I need you to help me. I know it’s imposing on you, you being on vacation and all—”
“It certainly is,” Trace’s mother said.
“Quiet, woman,” Sarge snapped. “What are you dealing with, son?”
“A murder and a million-dollar jewel heist. I think I’m in over my head. Can you help?”
His father stroked his square jaw. “Well, I hate to miss Circus Circus. I think they’re changing their trapeze act tomorrow. But, well, you’re my kid. What else could I do?”
“Thanks, Sarge. I appreciate it,” Trace said.
“And what will I do?” his mother whined.
Trace and his father looked at each other. Both had a good answer and neither wanted to say it, so they smiled.
“You’ll think of something,” Trace said. “Sarge, come on up to my place in the morning, maybe tennish, and we’ll go over what I’ve got so far.”
“I’ll be there. Come on, Hildie. I’ve got to get some sleep. If I’m going to be sharp tomorrow, I can’t party all night. ’Night, son. ’Night, Chico.”
“Good night, Sarge. Good night, Mrs. Tracy,” Chico said.
Mrs. Tracy sniffed and her husband pulled her through the door. After they were gone, Chico said, “Trace, I love you.”
“Aaaah, you’re just saying that to torment my aging body.”
“No. Really. Love you. You’re such an asshole most of the time and then you can do something like that. It’s the only reason I hang out with you, why I’ve turned down fame, fortune, and young men with good bodies. Just because, once in a while, you can do something really nice.”
“I guess I’m just my mother’s son, after all,” Trace said.
Trace and Chico were in bed and she said, “I’m extending your option for another month.” In the dimly lit bedroom, she lit a cigarette and handed it to him. “Here. A reward. For services rendered.”
“Oh, God, have I come to this? Tricking for cigarettes?”
“Quiet, I’m thinking.”
Trace smoked silently, blowing large billows of barely visible smoke up toward the ceiling. The ceiling of the room had started out like the walls, white, three years before, but a four-packs-a-day habit, only now being corrected, had coated the entire apartment with a thin, sticky yellow film. He was only aware of it when Chico took down a painting and he could see how white the wall was underneath it. It was one of the nice things about her. She didn’t smoke, but she didn’t squawk either. If she complained about his smoking, it was not because of its effect on the walls, ceiling, or furniture. Only about what it might be doing to his lungs.
“You know,” she said, “that insurance detective. Nobody knows who he is.”
“Right.”
“I bet Walter Marks knows.”
“I think he would,” Trace said.
“So why do you think he was cozying up to that baron all night long? You said they were talking about the case.”
“Yeah.” A light was starting to glimmer in his head.
“And the insurance detective was supposed to just arrive, and that Baron Humbug or whatever his name is, he just arrived. Wouldn’t being a baron be a wonderful cover for some insurance snoop who works on jewel thefts?”
“Sure would. And it would also explain a lot of inquisitiveness on his part,” Trace said.
“Think about it. He may be your man,” Chico said.
“I don’t have to think about it. He is.”
“I didn’t say that, remember. Just a possibility. But Marks was all over him.”
“Yeah, he was doing everything but shine his sh
oes. When he wasn’t abusing Willie.”
“My secret Italian lover’s valet?” Chico said.
“The same.”
“I was talking to him. He’s nice. And very funny.”
“‘Funny’ is never a word I would have applied to Willie,” Trace said.
“He did an impersonation of Marks while I was talking to him. You know how Marks curls up his lip when he tries to sound important and winds up sounding like a constipated Richard Nixon?”
“God, do I know. I hear it all the time. In my sleep I hear it.”
“Willie did him to an absolute T. And he’s cute. He never said he was doing him, but he was watching my eyes, and when he knew that I knew, we both laughed.”
“Good for him,” Trace said. “The next time you’re chitter-chattering with him, tell him to keep his eyes open for Jarvis’ passport. Felicia couldn’t find it.”
“Maybe Sarge can help,” Chico said,
“Maybe. Quiet now. It’s time for my thinking cigarette. No more talk.”
“Who’d want to talk to you anyway?” Chico said.
12
Sober, well-rested, Trace woke up at eight-thirty and panicked. God, he thought, I’m sober and well-rested. I don’t even feel like throwing up. This can’t be allowed to continue.
“What do you want for breakfast?” Chico yelled from the kitchen.
“A glass of ipecac. A big glass. Get me back to normal fast.”
“Stay as you are. Your father will be over in a while.”
“Oh oh. Now I’ve got to think of something for him to do.”
“Stop worrying.”
Trace showered and brushed his teeth and went into the kitchen, where he answered the phone on the first ring. Chico was already at the table eating. She was always eating, it seemed. The tiny woman seemed to have the determination of a picnic ant and Trace sometimes wondered if she actually ate all the food that she made disappear or if she buried some of it for the winter.”
Bob Swenson was on the telephone.
“How’d it go last night?” Trace asked.
“Awful. The worst night of my life.”
“I don’t believe it. You had her eating out of your hand,” Trace said.
“I overplayed my hand,” Swenson said. “I got her head so filled with dog dust, I didn’t know she was going to believe it. I’m cursed. I slept with a woman who makes her living balling donkeys and I didn’t get in. If this gets out, it’ll be the end of me.”
“There, there. I’ll never tell,” Trace said consolingly.
Swenson grumbled on for a while and then admitted he had forgotten why he called. “Tell Chico I’ll see her at the sales workshop.”
Trace hung up. “Swenson,” he said.
“How is he?” Chico asked, and put more food in her face without waiting for an answer.
“He’s not happy,” Trace said as he sat down, sipped at his coffee, and looked without enthusiasm at his plate. It held one egg, one piece of bacon, a half-slice of toast, and a dollop of jam. He nibbled at the edge of the toast like a mouse on a diet.
“He was doing all right,” Trace said. “National Anthem thought that he was warm and wise and wonderful. She was really impressed by his plans for her career. She should go straight, make people regard her as a serious actress. How long can one screw donkeys before the public begins to regard it as a shallow gimmick?”
“It’s hard to have a relationship with a donkey and have anyone think it’s meaningful,” Chico mumbled with a full mouth. “God knows I’ve tried.”
“Silence, woman. So he spirits her off to his room, still talking his nonsense. Be the part. Let your good heart shine through. Drop your drawers. They were thinking out parts for her to make her career on. Swenson had in mind Cleopatra. Did you know that she blew the whole Roman Senate?”
“I didn’t know that,” Chico said.
“Well, Swenson said that she did and he knows things like that. Anyway, he’s thinking Cleopatra or Catherine the Great—she was kind of strange too—but somehow Nash gets in her head Joan of Arc, the Virgin of Orleans. And then she’s got to be Stanislavsky and live her part. No touchie, no feelie. Her womanhood is assault-proof. She puts her hands over her crotch and falls asleep. And she snores. This morning, she gets up and dresses and kisses Bob like he’s her pastor and tells him that he’s a very special man to her and leaves and he’s yelling at the door, ‘I don’t want to be a special man in your life. I want to fuck you like everybody else does.’ But she’s gone and he’s miserable. Watch out for him today.”
“I’ll wear my chain-mail knickers,” Chico said. “He should have stuck with Flamma. First rule of wing-walking.”
“What’s that?”
“Don’t let go of what you got until you’re damn sure you’ve got hold of something else,” Chico said.
Trace nibbled another crumb from his toast. “You know, eating is good sometimes.”
“All the time,” Chico agreed, and stole his single piece of bacon.
She had already left, looking very professional and very lovely in a dark-blue suit with a red blouse and a red handkerchief in her jacket pocket, when the doorbell rang and Trace let Sarge in.
“Sergeant Tracy reporting as ordered, sir,” his father said, and tossed off a snappy military salute. He was wearing a gray business suit. His shoes were thick-soled, highly shined, and very practical-looking. Under his arm, he carried a red-covered spiral-bound notebook.
“Have some coffee, Sarge. Where’s Mother?”
“I left her in the coffee shop playing Keno. It’s a new game for her. She likes the idea of maybe winning twenty-five thousand for only seventy cents.”
“Good. Keep her busy.”
“Just what is it you want me to do?” Sarge asked.
They sat at the small table in the kitchen and Trace poured coffee.
“What’s the notebook for?” he said.
“For notes.”
“Good,” Trace said. “The first thing you have to do is keep accurate records. That’s really important.”
“Accurate records of what?”
“Your expenses, of course. But now, don’t give them to anybody or talk to anybody about them except me. Well, you can talk to Chico if you want, but mostly me. And what I’ll do is I’ll be very creative with them and I’ll send them in to Groucho, and then when he and I are finished negotiating over them, you’ll probably get all your money back and maybe show a small profit.”
Trace sipped more coffee and sat back with a satisfied look, as if he had just solved the mystery of existence. “That’s all there is to it,” he said.
“I think I ought to know a little bit about how I’m supposed to run up these expenses,” Sarge said. “Like maybe, what is this case all about?”
“Okay. Let me tell you what’s going on.” Trace quickly and carefully explained the jewel theft and the murder of Early Jarvis. Before he could even sum up, his father said, “Where was this Jarvis’ passport?”
“That’s good, Sarge,” Trace said. “That’s what I’m wondering too. He needed a passport to get back into the country. But he didn’t “have one on him and Felicia told me last night that she couldn’t find it.”
“Felicia?”
“The countess.”
“Oh, the redhead who was here. I didn’t know you had friends who were countesses,” Sarge said.
“To know me is to love me. Anyway, the passport. I’d like to know where it is. Did he lose it? Did he put it in a locker at the airport? What the hell for, if he did? What’s that all about? You got any ideas?”
“Some,” Sarge said. “But I’d like to nose around first.”
“How do you start?” Trace asked.
“You have a picture of Jarvis?”
Trace shook his head.
“Your first mistake. All right. I’ll go down and see your friend Rosado at headquarters. He should have a picture of him and I’ll borrow it. Then I’m going out to the airport and star
t talking around, see if anybody saw him, the usual. I know how to do all this stuff, son.” While he talked, he was making a neat list in his notebook of things to do. Trace thought of suggesting to him that he keep one page free for his grocery list.
He said, “I know you know how to do this stuff, but this isn’t New York.”
“What do you mean?”
“In New York, everybody talks. Hell, you can’t buy a newspaper without getting somebody’s whole life story. But that’s New York. This town’s different. Everybody’s a smart guy or thinks he’s a smart guy. Keeping your mouth shut around here is a way of life. Nobody talks in Vegas, nobody tells you a thing. If you give them money, then, maybe. But they’re all just afraid that if they wind up saying the wrong thing to the wrong, person, they’re going to be found the next day buried in the desert with a canary sewn inside their mouth.”
“They’ll talk to me,” Sarge said confidently.
“How’s that?”
“Because I’ll reason with them. I’ll be very polite. I’ll explain how it’s incumbent on a citizen to cooperate with a police investigation because if one man isn’t safe, then no man is safe. I’ll talk, movingly, about the responsibilities of good citizenship. And then, if they still won’t talk to me, I’ll punch the piss out of them. You got a gun?”
For a moment, Trace envisioned the Las Vegas Airport laid waste, strewn with dead bodies, and Sarge standing atop the Golden West Airlines counter, shooting his gun into the air and screaming, “Talk. Damn your eyes, talk.”
“I don’t think we actually need a gun yet. Not until we get closer to something. If you need a deadly weapon, use your hands.”
“Don’t be smart.”
“You’re not licensed to carry a gun around here anyway,” Trace said.
“Devlin, my boy, I may be retired but I’m not senile. Everybody in this town carries a gun. Or else there’s a helluvan outbreak of goiter under the left armpit.”
“That’s why we’ll do it without guns. It adds a touch of challenge to it. Another thing. Remember that guy you met last night, the baron?”
And 47 Miles of Rope (Trace 2) Page 9