She opened the book and checked the index for marked references. Finding none, she fanned the pages for notes in the margin. Something had been marked in brackets, and she flipped back.
Oppressed by a fatal disease, a severe handicap, a crippling deformity? Show him proper compelling medical evidence that you should die, and Dr. Jack Kevorkian will help you kill yourself, free of charge.
It was quoted from the Detroit Free Press for March 18, 1990.
“Excuse me—”
Standing in the road under the street light, an elderly woman was straining to hold a dog on a leash. A cocker spaniel. The leash was retractable, the kind Tina Bostwick used with her golden retriever. Very soon, Tina would not be able to walk Sonny or even read. Brenda closed the book and stepped outside.
“We’d appreciate it if you’d follow the rules,” the woman said. She was tall and thin, dressed in a light blue sweater and matching slacks. “I’m sure Mr. Sweeney gave you a copy.”
“I’m not a tenant,” Brenda said. “I’m a visitor.”
“That’s fine, but please tell whoever is here we close our garage doors at night.”
“I’ll let them know.”
“If we don’t remind people, things start to slide.”
“I understand.” Brenda closed the garage and reentered the house. She left through the front door.
“Dennis! What you doing, man?”
Stuckey looked across the yard and waved. “In a minute! Be right there!”
“No minute, man, get your ass over here!”
He went back to the stove and turned off the burner. He dipped a wooden spoon into his pan of lentils, raised it and blew. Carrots, onion and celery, sea salt and fresh ground pepper, a little cumin. Tasting the lentils, he nodded, put down the spoon and moved again to the entrance. Across the yard, Ray and Bernard Perez were humping a sofa out of the house. The garage was now almost empty.
He started across. In the last hour, they had loaded everything worth taking for resale in Miami. We give the rest to charity, Colon said. For a tax write-off. What Colon had not explained was why, at night, they were also loading Rivera’s own furniture. Seeing they would take out the heavy stuff first, Stuckey had left them to go check his lentils. They paid him to sit with people, not get a hernia.
He neared the house, hearing them out front talking Spanish, humping the couch up the ramp into the truck. Stuckey entered through the open double doors to Rivera’s bedroom. The ceiling light was on, and he looked for something small to take out. A floor lamp rested next to an easy chair. He picked it up, carried it into the hall and moved to the kitchen entrance. A new electric knife sharpener sat on the counter, the cord still secured with a twist tie. He picked it up and moved with the lamp back out to the patio, into the garage.
It had been full of such things—coffee makers still in the original boxes, new walkers and TVs, a pair of battery-powered Amigo scooters. Even used, the Amigos would be worth a grand each. But there was lots of junk, too. Old patio sets, sprung or sunken chairs, chipped veneer end tables. You got to take it when the family give it to you, Ray said. They think they doing you a favor.
Stuckey crossed through the garage to the ramp as Colon was coming down. “I told you,” he said. “No old furniture. The lamp is old.” He reached Stuckey and took the knife sharpener. “Go on, take it back. Go have a seat, you less trouble that way.”
Kiss my ass, Stuckey thought. He carried the lamp back through the garage. With Rivera, you could at least have a conversation. He was the smart one, and he understood it was important to have someone like himself available. You were always going to have problems with old people. They got sick or fell, made up stories how you stole shit. If you were in Rivera’s position, you would need a point man, a lightning rod.
Stuckey retraced his steps into the bedroom and set down the lamp. He stood listening to them outside as they rearranged things in the truck. I’m a health-care provider, he thought. Not a piano mover.
It was the first time Stuckey had been in Rivera’s bedroom. He looked around.
It had pictures on the walls like those in the houses. Sunsets, scenes with sea oats blowing on a beach. The bed looked Spanish, and Rivera had two tall, matching wardrobes. Stuckey crossed and opened one. On hangers were blue and black blazers, some kind of silk sport coat, slacks. Lined up on the floor were pairs of the dress shoes Rivera wore when he escorted an old lady to brunch or a memorial service. Stacked on the shelf were laundered dress shirts and polos. All of them bore the Ralph Lauren logo.
Stuckey took down the top dress shirt, new and white, tissue paper folded inside. He listened. The men were still loading the truck. He turned with the shirt and stepped out the back. Rivera said you always dressed for the job you wanted, not the job you had. If you wanted to run a business and not be a servant, you made that statement in your appearance.
Shirts made by slave labor in Asia weren’t Stuckey’s style. His style was tee shirts from Grateful Dead concerts or dashikis made of hemp or flax. But with a vague sense of the future, he now jogged toward the guesthouse with the shirt.
Doing eighty on the Interstate had helped convince Schmidt he was wrong.
You didn’t leave like some kid who picked up his marbles and went home. But first he wanted to get rid of the Town Car. It embarrassed him. He would continue north to exit 21 and pick up something else at the airport.
“What the hell’s the matter with you?”
He passed the sign for exit 19 and put on his turn signal. Displacement was what Schmidt thought Brenda would call what he was doing. Or was it projection? She said Freudian terms helped you think you were in control, even when you weren’t. You did things like worry about what car you were driving, when the only thing on your mind was whether to turn away from the best thing in your life because she had spread her legs for someone else.
Schmidt angled into the right lane.
But it still pissed him off. Damn. Schmidt shook his head. He had seen her just ten days before, in Milwaukee. They were talking on the phone almost every day now. He’d never spoken that much to anyone in his life. Including his wife. At the start, he had consciously limited the calls, not wanting Brenda or himself to feel pressured. He believed she had done the same. But by December, Schmidt had forgotten about pressure, and maybe that was why she’d gotten cold feet.
He reached the crest of the exit ramp, slowed, and turned left. She was right, he thought. You should’ve stayed for the brats.
Except he couldn’t. Not then. But driving had calmed him, at least about the worst part. Schmidt still didn’t understand it. Yielding to an impulse that way wasn’t in him. Except, driving, Schmidt remembered the first time they’d had sex. It had happened after something like five or six hours spent together. Hardly longer than a plane trip to Florida. It meant he could not be so sure about himself.
He guided the big Lincoln down the entrance ramp and accelerated. Back on southbound 75, in seconds the needle was pointing at 85. Schmidt eased off. When the sun set here, it was dark immediately. He remembered it from the trips with his wife: bright sun followed by pitch blackness with stars. Then it turned cooler but stayed humid. You would get used to it, maybe even come to like it. But feeling clammy, he buzzed up the window and turned on the air conditioning.
Jutting above berms and privacy walls along the expressway were the roofs of gated developments. Spotlighted signs announced golf courses, followed by stretches of bone-white Melaleuca trees. He had read that the trees had been introduced from South America to soak up water in swampland.
Schmidt looked back to the road.
◆◆◆◆◆
“Who?”
“Krause is the owner. The guest is named Contay. On Paisley Court.”
“If your name isn’t on my list, I can’t let you in.” A different guard glanced up from his clipboard.
Schmidt reached in his hip pocket for his wallet. He took out his driver’s license, his Visa and Mastercard, and held them out. �
�Why don’t you hold onto these?” he said. “I understand the rules and what you have to do, but I need to see Miss Contay. I have a number you can call.”
The guard handed back the cards. He leaned inside, and the barrier rose. Schmidt nodded his thanks and drove in. Ahead, the lighted putting green sparkled with dew. He drove carefully, seeing dog walkers, couples holding hands. Ground fog hovered above the fairway.
He didn’t have to think about it. He would just go inside and let her see he was back. Maybe he would take a swim. It was what she’d said they should do, just jump in. Enter a new medium, a different reality. Anything to buy time and give her a chance.
At Paisley Court he pulled up, crossed quickly and knocked. He took a breath and let it out, heard a TV inside. Maybe she was watching the European figure skating championships. It’s what he’d be doing, to take his mind off it. Or he’d be down in the basement, working on the wainscoting panels. He had started the project before Christmas, refinishing nice walnut panels taken from the manager’s flat in one of his buildings. He had planned to install them in Brenda’s condo, for their “anniversary.”
The door opened. “Hello.” The neighbor swung the door wide. “She was right.”
Schmidt stepped in, unable to remember the woman’s name. “I’m afraid she’s not here.”
“Any idea when she’ll be back? I’m sorry, I forgot your name.”
“Rayette Peticore.” She put out her hand. “You and me never really met.”
They shook. “Charlie Schmidt.”
“I know,” she said. “Brenda’s going to be real glad to see you.”
He followed her inside, seeing ahead a TV screen reflected in the glass doorwall. A woman skater. When they reached the living room, the neighbor used the remote. “Let’s see,” she said. “She went to Sweeney’s to check one last time if he came back. If he didn’t, she was going to Immokalee to see someone named Rivera. She thinks this Rivera might know what happened to Pat. She has her phone. I would think she’ll call sometime soon.”
He remembered the way to Sweeney’s and said he would go there. Rayette walked him back to the front. “I hope I’m wrong, but I think he must be dead,” she said. “Brenda does, too. Did she tell you what we found there?”
“She took me to see it,” Schmidt said. “She told me about the wife and family.”
Rayette shook her head. “If someone ever had a reason to call it quits, it was Pat Sweeney.” She stared out the open front door. “It’s so horrible just to think about. The whole country going crazy from 9/11, and Pat and Terri living with that. I don’t know where you go after.”
◆◆◆◆◆
In two minutes he reached Sweeney’s. Schmidt went to the door, rang the bell. Waited. Pounded. He went to the back and entered the screened cage. Something covered the pool, a tarp of some kind. He went up the steps, into the bedroom. He found the light switch—clothes still on the bed—and moved to the back. The closet was still empty.
Stepping back out to the deck, Schmidt stopped to look a moment at the dark golf course. He imagined the light beams from last night. Heard her laugh. Don’t do it, Schmidt thought, and followed the pool’s border, watching his feet in the wedge of light from the bedroom. The plastic pool blanket meant Sweeney had come back. Brenda had found him, and they’d gone someplace, maybe to some town called Immokalee.
He stopped before the blanket handler, a thing shaped like a giant rolling pin with a crank handle. Why take time to cover the pool?
He went back inside, found a panel of switches and clicked the first. A light came on over the lanai. With the second, a ceiling fan began turning. He clicked the third switch, and the plastic pool cover turned blue. At the shallow end, something underneath made the blanket dark.
He moved along the deck to the deep end, knelt and began cranking the handler. The thick, quilted plastic slid toward him, dripping as it gathered on the roller. Schmidt stopped and stood, seeing what was there in the beam of subsurface light.
He moved along the deck to the shallow end. It must be Sweeney. Duct tape covered the mouth, and more tape had been wound around the wrists and ankles. A bag of golf clubs rested on the body to keep it submerged.
Schmidt knelt. No, it wasn’t Sweeney. Blood moved in lazy currents around the head. Floating free, the hair was brown, not white. He was face up, eyes closed, dressed in a white shirt and dark slacks, his feet still in tassel loafers. It’s Ivy, Schmidt thought, and it disappointed him. Then he felt shame. You want it to be some guy named Sweeney, he thought. Someone you never met who lost his whole family. Someone without blame.
“What? I can’t hear…”
Rivera kept walking backward on the shoulder. He cupped his free ear and turned away as a trailer truck whipped past. “No, Ray, I was driving a Mazda. Both front tires blew right after I got on 75. Both tires, like they were timed.”
His cousin asked why he was driving a Mazda. “If they’re looking for me, they’re looking for a white van.” Another semi-trailer whipped past. He kept walking backward, facing northbound Interstate traffic.
“What did you do?” Ray asked. “They ask me about some letter on Burlson’s computer, about a boat.”
“Don’t ask, don’t tell, Ray. Need-to-know, understand?” Rivera squinted against oncoming headlights. “All you need to know is, I have to leave. You’ll be fine, there’s plenty of money. I have twelve thousand with me. I’ll contact you later.”
“Okay. But one thing for sure, I’m firing Stuckey.”
“That’s your call now. You were right, Ray. We should use our own people.”
“I been telling you.”
“You were right. It took a while, but I see it.”
His cousin was now telling him about loading the truck. Was everything going to Miami a legitimate gift? “We have records for all of it,” Rivera said. “All signed. Anyone says All Hands stole anything will look stupid. A Tonto.”
He twisted around to look north, still moving, gripping a canvas gym bag. As Ray went on about the truck, a car’s brake lights lit up ahead, on the shoulder. But the brake lights weren’t flashing as they would in an emergency. By now, Collier and Lee County sheriff’s deputies were looking for him.
“Why you talking about stealing?” Ray asked.
“You’re going to hear things—” Another big truck slammed past. Rivera began jogging toward the stopped car. “Just remember,” he said. “Everything was for All Hands on Deck. Fifty-fifty.”
“Kleinman,” Ray said. “You listen to him too much. He’s dirty.”
“He knows how things work,” Rivera said. “Talk to you later.”
He clapped the phone shut and slipped it into his pocket. Jogging faster, Rivera got out his handkerchief and wiped his face. The night felt humid. His shirt must be wrinkled. He stuffed the handkerchief in his hip pocket, smoothed back his hair. Close enough now to see through the ground fog, he made out the car. It was an older Jaguar, beige, an XK12. He glanced to his right. In the damp, foggy atmosphere, Rivera could not see between the shoulder and whatever lay beyond. He turned back and kept jogging. The southbound headlights coming at him looked like amber holes burned into paper. Someone was getting out of the Jag. Illuminated by approaching lights, he was dressed in shorts and a sweater. A car whipped past.
“Damn, I thought that was you—”
He was familiar, someone Rivera knew. The airport, he thought. Mrs. Larson’s son. Teddy Larson was standing with his hand on the open door, smiling.
“Is that your red Mazda back there?” he called
“Both front tires blew on me.”
“What are they, Firestones?”
Rivera reached him and stopped. “Could be, it’s a Ford product.”
“Yeah—” Larson put out his hand. “It’s all the same.” They shook. “Ford, Lincoln, Mazda. This thing, too,” he said. “It’s in the shop half the time. Where do you need to go? You want me to call a wrecker?”
“That’s a good
question—”
Rivera scratched his head, acting lost. He had planned to go back to Immokalee and ride with the truck to Miami. It would be easy to lose himself in Miami. He had never been fingerprinted, and the photo on James Rivera’s forged driver’s license would soon bear no resemblance to Quinto Colon.
“Where are you going?” he asked.
“The airport,” Larson said. “An emergency. I have to go up to D.C.”
“If you can get me there, I’ll lease something.”
“Done.”
Larson got in and waited until Rivera was seated before putting the car in gear. He checked the mirror and punched the accelerator. The sports car shot off the shoulder, revving hard. Larson shifted, and again. Once he was in fifth gear, he leaned back. “There we go,” he said. “This is the same kind of foggy crap that caused that pileup two weeks ago.”
“I read about it.”
“What was it, five dead?” Larson shook his head. He was big and looked crowded behind the wheel. “Twenty-some vehicles.”
“Fog or rain,” Rivera said. “Nobody slows down.”
“It’s even worse in Chicago,” Larson said. “All because of four-wheel-drive. Ten- or twelve-inch snowfall, who cares? You’ve got the Range Rover, just bust through.” Larson laughed. “They all need a course in physics. They don’t get it. Four-wheel-drive doesn’t change anything brake-wise.”
It’s good, Rivera thought. A former client had recognized him and stopped to help.
It was how things should be, with loyalties and mutual self-interest. But it wasn’t how things were, because he was Mexican. Never forget it, he thought. Learn as you earn. From now on, he would trust no one but family.
“You didn’t call,” Larson said. “I meant it when I asked you to. I don’t give my card to everyone. It’s James, right?”
“Right,” he said. “I didn’t forget. I’ve been busy.”
“Don’t I know.” Larson nodded sympathetically. The familiar warble of a phone sounded. “I come down here for some R and R,” he said. “What a joke. Pissing off other foursomes, having to let people play through to take another call. Pretty soon, no one’s going to play with me, it’s completely out of hand.”
Godsend Page 23