Past Due

by William Lashner

  “How did it feel to realize he was your father?”

  “He’s not my father. My father took care of me all his life, my father tucked me in at night and worked in his crummy little store to make sure I had a house and fabulous clothes. My father was the most brilliant man I ever knew. Mr. D was just a distant relative, but still, blood is blood.”

  “What about her?” I said, gesturing to Alura.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t expect much.”

  “I never do, V. But she’s my mother, isn’t she? That means something. There might be things I can learn from her.”

  “God, I hope not. So now that you’ve quit your vice presidential position, what are you going to do with yourself? Merry Maids?”

  She lifted her hands, showed off her nails, shrugged.

  “Why don’t you think about becoming a lawyer? You would be a dynamite lawyer. What jury wouldn’t grant you your every wish? I could talk to someone at my old law school, give you a leg up on the application process.”

  “Victor, that’s sweet of you and all, but really now. Take a look at me. Do you see me in a stuffy blue suit, black shoes, bowing and scraping to judges over every little piddling legal point? I don’t think so. Besides, from what I can tell about your finances, I wouldn’t earn enough to keep me in the lifestyle to which I intend to become accustomed. Actually, I sort of like the vice presidential thing.”

  “Really?”

  “I was thinking maybe business school or something? Maybe Wharton? Do you know anyone at Wharton?”

  “No, but I bet he does,” I said, pointing to the justice.

  “Do you think he’d help me get in? Do you?”

  “For sure,” I said, though her brilliant smile told me she knew it already.

  When McDeiss finally released us, with stern warnings about leaving the city or talking to reporters, I raced down those bare metal stairs, through the engine room, out the gangway, and onto the pier. It was crowded now with police and press and an ambulance, which scared the hell out of me. Bright lights, yellow tape, flashing reds and yellows. The perverse cheerfulness of a crime scene late at night. I ignored the shouts from the reporters, which was painful, believe me—free publicity being so…—and instead walked around like a fool, calling out for Beth. That’s what I was doing when I spotted Skink chatting up a nice-looking police officer.

  “Victor, come over here, you oughts to meet someone. This is Madeline. She’s just out of the academy, full of vim and vinegar.”

  “Where’s Beth?” I said.

  “At the end of the dock,” he said. “I’ll take you in a moment.” He leaned back toward the officer. “Sos like I was saying, the thing about detecting is observation. You always gots to be looking out for the telling detail. You never know what it is that will—”

  “Can we go now?”

  “Wait a minute.”

  “Phil.”

  “All right. Here, sweetie, my card. Give me a call and we’ll have that coffee.”

  “Sure thing, Phil.”

  As we walked off to the end of the pier, Skink was rubbing his hands. “She’s got a sweet smile, she does.”

  “You’re impossible,” I said.

  “Just trying to be of assistance to the local constabulary, I am. You clear everything up in there?”

  “It was Colfax.”

  “Never did like him.”

  “How’d it go out here?”

  “Like pie. As soon as I ran into Kimberly and had a little heart to heart with her it wasn’t nothing finding our girl. She wasn’t even guarded, just tied up with rope and duct tape, and put belowdecks.”

  “She was okay?”

  “She’s tougher than both of us. How did our Kimberly do up there?”

  “Amazing.”

  “It was she who insisted on going up, delaying everything to give me time to find Beth and make the call. Quite a girl, that. See I told you, I had a feeling about her from the start.”

  “Yes, you did.”

  He led me around the long warehouse on the pier to the rear of the great rusting boat sitting in the harbor. At the end of the pier stood a shadow, staring out into the water. Beth.

  “You did well, Phil.”

  “I know it. Go on, now. She’s been asking for you.”

  I gave him a glance and then walked slowly toward her. She didn’t turn around to look at me when she said, “It was here, the boat he put me on. It was right here.”

  “I guess Eddie Dean sailed it away.”

  “You let him go.”

  “Kimberly let him go. But it was Colfax who took you on his own, without Dean knowing or approving. How are you?”

  “Fine. Shaken but fine.”

  She turned and gave me a hug, a strong hug, stronger I think than she had ever given me before.

  “I knew you’d come for me,” she said.

  “It wasn’t me. It was Phil.”

  “I know.”

  “And Kimberly told him enough so he could guess where you were.”

  “I know, but it was you who came for me. When Colfax pointed that gun in my face and took me away I realized I wasn’t as scared as I should have been. And it was because I knew you’d come for me.”

  “That’s what partners do.”

  “I’m so glad you’re my partner. We’ll make it work, Victor.”

  “Okay.”

  “I don’t care about the money. We’ll sell cookies door to door if we have to.”

  “Okay, but we won’t have to. Selling cookies, I mean. I took the last bit of money still left in Tommy Greeley’s suitcase. Thirty thousand dollars.”

  “What are you going to do with it?”

  “I thought you and I would pay a visit to Joey’s mom and give it to her. She won’t see a penny from the man who killed him, he’ll be judgment proof. But I’d still like to give her something.”

  “Okay.”

  “Excluding our one-third contingency, of course.”

  Beth laughed. “Of course.”

  “Should last a few months. And then something will come in, I know it. Before we go to Mrs. Parma’s, make sure you haven’t eaten for a few days. Her veal is amazing.”

  “I won’t. So when?”

  “Soon, but not tomorrow.”

  “What’s tomorrow?”

  “Tomorrow?” I said. “First I’m getting Rashard Porter out of jail. Then I’m saying good-bye to my dad.”

  Chapter

  75

  I WAS LATE for the hospital, but I had one quick errand to run.

  The bell tinkled with silvery merriment when I opened the door. The shop was small, bare, dusty. Its entrance was in an alleyway, you had to go down four steps to reach the door, the sign was too small to read from the street. You didn’t just happen to wander into Bullfinch’s Stamps and Coins, you came looking for something specific, and so I had.

  Inside, the few shelves were stocked with old reference books, the counter was unmanned, with only a banker’s lamp on its surface. A table to the side of the bookshelves had a pile of scrap paper and a ballpoint attached to a chain. I walked over to the table, examined the pen. A good thing the chain was there, wouldn’t want anyone to walk off with the Bic.

  “Yes, yes, what do you need?” said a man who appeared behind the counter, wiping his hands on a filthy towel. He was tall and stooped, his shirtsleeves were rolled up, his glasses were round, his mustache gray. He would have been the telegraph operator in a frontier town except the frontier was gone and everyone now had cell phones. “Are you here to buy or to sell?”

  “Neither really,” I said. “I’d just like some information.”

  “Public library has a very fine reference section. Eighteenth and the Parkway. Now if you’ll excuse me, we’re very busy.”

  I looked around at the empty store. “This won’t take long.”

  “Why don’t you come back when we’re under less of a rush?”

  “When will that be?”
/>   He glanced at his watch. “February,” he said.

  “Are you Mr. Bullfinch?”

  “No,” he said. “That was my father. Good day.”

  “It is, isn’t it?” I said. “Twenty-dollar Saint Gaudens gold piece.”

  He cocked his head. “What about it?”

  “Worth much?”

  “How can a question like that be answered, Mr….”

  “Carl.”

  “What year? What condition? Motto or no motto? Regular strike or proof? Please, Mr. Carl. The twenty-dollar Saint Gaudens is generally considered to be the most beautiful American coin ever minted. Let’s say a regular strike in decent condition, you could sell it for three hundred or so, buy it for four-fifty or so, prices varying depending on the year, the mint, and, of course, condition.”

  “Three hundred thousand?”

  He laughed. “No, Mr. Carl. There were seventy million issued between 1907 and 1933. They are beautiful but not rare. You seem disappointed.”

  “Is there a higher end market for the coins. Are some vastly more valuable than others?”

  “As with everything. Recently a Saint Gaudens, once the possession of King Farouk of Egypt, sold for over seven million dollars, but that was truly one of a kind. It had historical value. But there is a more accessible higher end, if you’re interested.

  “Very,” I said.

  Bullfinch opened the gate of the counter, walked to the door, opened it, peered outside, then closed it, locked it, pulled down the shade. “One moment, please.”

  He disappeared into the room behind the counter and returned a few moments later with a flat black box. He placed it beneath the banker’s lamp, switched on the light, lifted open the box’s lid to reveal a surface of fine black velvet with a single coin atop it.

  The coin shone in the light with the sweet glister of gold. About an inch and a third wide, it had a deeply sculpted figure of Lady Liberty striding forward amidst the brilliant rays of a radiant sun.

  “May I touch it?” I said.

  “No, you may not. Fabulous, no? This is a high-relief Saint Gaudens in excellent condition, rated at MS65. There were only eleven thousand of these issued, before the design was flattened for convenience. They didn’t stack well, you see, and the banks complained.”

  “What’s it worth?”

  “If you had one like it, Mr. Carl, I would buy it from you for, let’s say, thirty thousand dollars.”

  “And how much would you sell this one for?”

  “More.”

  “I see.”

  “This is a business.”

  “It’s quite beautiful.”

  “Yes it is. It is the finest coin in my stock.”

  “So, this is what is referred to as ultra-high.”

  Bullfinch snapped shut his black box, pulled it close to him, switched off the lamp. “That is not what I said. Good day, Mr. Carl, we are quite busy.”

  “So what is an ultra-high?”

  “It is something not worth considering.”

  “Consider it for me,” I said.

  Bullfinch clutched the black box in his long fingers, leaned forward, lowered his voice. “I’ve never seen one, you understand.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Saint Gaudens’s original design called for something very unusual. He made a proof set, struck with nine blows from the minting press each. Nine, when normally there is only one. The result was spectacular, more sculpture than coin. Only twenty-four were struck, given to influential senators, to the president, a few notables. Twenty-four. They are very rare. Some of them are held by organizations never to be sold. Others have disappeared, a few disappeared in Philadelphia, the locations and purview completely unknown.”

  “How much?”

  “Mr. Carl, why the interest?”

  “How much?” I said.

  “Again, condition is of paramount importance. But recently, those that have reached the market have sold for in excess of one million dollars.”

  “In excess?”

  “Well in excess.”

  “Well, well, well,” I said. “So four would be worth?”

  “Now you’re being silly.”

  “Yes, you’re right. I am.”

  “You wouldn’t, Mr. Carl, happen to know the whereabouts of such a coin?”

  “Thank you for your help, Mr. Bullfinch.”

  “We could be of great assistance if you do.”

  “I’m sure you could.”

  “Would you like a card?”

  “No, thank you,” I said, as I unlocked his door. “If need be, I know where to find you.”

  “Good day, Mr. Carl.”

  “It is,” I said, “isn’t it?”

  “This is the big day, Victor,” said Dr. Mayonnaise, with an unseemly excitement in her voice.

  “Yes, it is,” I said.

  “He’s been waiting for you.”

  “I’m sure he has.”

  “Did you ever think this day would come? Did you?”

  “No,” I said. “Truthfully, I did not.”

  “The paperwork’s been signed and everything is settled so you’re free to take him home whenever you’re ready.”

  “That’s great,” I said. “Just great.”

  “He’ll need some care for a while. He’s still weak, but he’ll get stronger day by day.”

  “That’s my father, like something out of Godspell. I want to thank you, Karen, thank you for everything. You were right about the medicine, you were right about Dr. Goetze. You’re a hell of a doctor.”

  “I appreciate that, Victor. I really do. Not everything works out so well. We’re going to miss him here.”

  “Really?”

  “Oh, yes. Your father tells the most wonderful stories.”

  “Stories? What about?”

  “About you. That time, at school, when you mistakenly put your underwear on the outside of your pants?”

  “Oh, that one. The funny thing is that I was in high school at the time.”

  “Take care of him, Victor,” she said.

  “I’ll try.”

  She was right, Dr. Mayonnaise, my father was waiting for me, sitting in a wheelchair, in his street clothes, a small suitcase on his lap. The surgery had gone off without a hitch, his recovery was labeled remarkable by the staff, his breathing was growing stronger every day as he worked out his newly efficient lungs by blowing a ball in a tube for exercise. The ball and the tube were going home with him so he could continue his rehabilitation.

  “Where you been?” he said when he saw me.

  “Running an errand,” I said.

  “They’re making me sit in this wheelchair. I don’t need no stinking wheelchair.”

  “They’re afraid if you fall and break a hip on the way out you’ll sue.”

  “And I would too, the bastards.”

  “I could sure use the work. How do you feel?”

  “I hurt,” he said. “I hurt all over.”

  “That’s better than the alternative. I’ve been to the house and readied it for you, made it nice and cozy.”

  “It’s never been nice and cozy.”

  “Until now.”

  Slowly I pushed him out the door of his room and down the hall. All the nurses stopped us and said good-bye, told him jokes. It was like there was a stranger in the chair, the way they were going on, someone who had charmed them all, had become like a favorite old uncle. How was that possible? At the last, Dr. Mayonnaise leaned over, gave him a little hug, said her words of encouragement.

  “She’s a nice girl,” he said as we waited for the elevator.

  “Yes, she is.”

  “You know, that cat thing. They got pills for that.”

  “So I’ve heard, but how do they get them to open their little mouths.”

  “You’re going to have to grow up sometime,” he said.

  “Yes, I’m afraid I am.”

  In the privacy of the elevator I couldn’t help from asking. “Dad, you know tha
t box you were talking about. The one you buried. Do you have any idea where it is?”

  “Why?”

  “I’m just asking.”

  “Let me tell you something. There’s nothing in there worth a damn thing. Nothing in there but blood and despair.”

  “Okay.”

  “It ruined enough lives.”

  “Okay. We’ll talk about it later.”

  “No, we won’t.”

  “Maybe now’s not the time. But there is a map?”

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “No, you didn’t. So, Dad. The girl in the pleated skirt. You never told me. What happened to her?”

  “She left me,” he said. “What did you think? What else was going to happen? She left me.”

  The elevator doors opened, I wheeled my father to the entrance. An orderly in blue scrubs was waiting for us at the door.

  “I’ll take the wheelchair for you, Mr. Carl,” he said.

  “Thank you,” I said as I took the small suitcase off my father’s lap. “All right, Dad, are you ready?”

  “No.” But even as he said it he took hold of my arm and pulled himself to standing. Slowly, together, we walked outside. It was bright outside and warm. My father put a hand up to his eyes and turned his face to the sun.

  Later that night I was sitting alone, in my apartment, with a picture of the Grand Canyon in my hand. The picture was on one side of a postcard, the other side had a simple message: “Wish yous was here with us. Thanks.” No signature, no name, but I knew who had sent it. Derek Manley. He had picked up his boy and was driving cross-country, seeing the sights, trying to figure out his next move. It would probably be witness protection all over again, but this time starting over with his son. Good for him. But something about the postcard was troubling me. It wasn’t Derek I was thinking of, it was myself.

  I stared at the great mysterious landscape carved by the Colorado River and tried to put it all together. It was as if everything that had happened to me since Joey Parma had called the morning of his murder had been leading me toward one thing, yet I couldn’t figure out what it was. There was something in the confluence, something in the gaps, something I was missing.

  I suppose it is a common flaw, to believe yourself to be an acute observer of humanity and yet be totally blind to the circumstances of your own small life. Or maybe I am the only one totally clueless. Because it took me a long time, far longer than it should have. I had been thinking I had unshackled myself from my past when everything I had learned, everything that had happened, had proven with utter clarity that I had not. You don’t free yourself from the past by ignoring it and hoping it goes away, because it won’t, ever, it can’t. The only way to free yourself is to reach out to your past, try to understand it, fight to embrace it no matter what the barriers.