After they were assured that he wasn’t wearing a recording device, Didier was invited to ride in the cart with the older man. They conducted business between holes. The man told him exactly what would have to happen, how and when, if he wanted Sammy Dee taken care of. There was no negotiation; this is the deal, take it or leave it.
Didier was relieved of the necessity of putting for the remainder of the round. He sat in his own cart again and watched the two of them hit the ball great distances with astounding accuracy. He hoped that they were as good at extermination as they were at playing golf.
When they were finished, they all removed their hats, shook hands, and exchanged pleasantries. Didier returned his cart and called for a taxi. As he sat on a bench outside the pro shop waiting for his cab, he marveled at how painless it was to get rid of another human being. All you needed was $25,000, and you got a new patio deck in the deal. Pas mal.
At a little after eleven that morning, he knocked on Sammy Dee’s door to return the golf clubs. When the door opened, he saw, over the Italian’s shoulder, Marcy Gray sitting on a kitchen stool with a coffee cup in her hand. What was she doing there at this hour? Had she spent the night?
Sammy Dee reached to take the clubs, not inviting him in, but Marcy saw him and smiled. “Didier. Comment allez-vous?”
“Bonjour, Marcee,” he replied with a smile of his own.
“Come join us for a cup of coffee. Sammy makes fabulous cappuccinos.”
“Merci, Samee.” And without waiting for an invitation from the Italian, he walked past him and took a stool beside Marcy’s.
“I didn’t know you played golf,” she said.
“I am, how do you say, a crack shot.”
“No kidding?” Sammy said. “What’d you shoot?”
“Seventy-two.”
“Bullshit.”
“Maybe it was a hundred and seventy-two,” he laughed. “I round off a little.”
Marcy laughed along with him, and Didier’s heart jiggled. He would love to hear that laugh on a daily basis.
“Who’d you play with?” Sammy asked.
“Some customers. They are purchasing art.”
“You really selling that stuff?”
“Sammy, Didier’s gallery has beautiful things in it.”
“Four-hundred-year-old African dildos?”
“They are not, as you say, dildos, but rather authentic fertility rite artifacts, used among the Yoruba to test for virginity as part of the marriage contract.”
“Oh, of course. Everybody ought to own a hymen tester. You never know when it’ll come in handy.”
Didier accepted a grudgingly provided cappuccino, which, he had to grudgingly admit, was excellent. Though he was tired from having gotten up at the crack of dawn and wanted a nap, he was not going to relinquish his stool and allow Sammy Dee exclusive access to Marcy. The thought that he may be, as they said in Africa, milking the goats after the hyenas had already visited, troubled him, but he decided to let it pass. She did not have that flushed après amour look that he believed he could recognize in women recently emerging from a sexual encounter. Not a satisfactory one, at least.
As she talked about some movie that she had been in years ago, she skillfully divided her attention between her two suitors, turning first to one, then the other, like a politician making a speech.
Marcy was clearly enjoying their little ménage à trois. Why shouldn’t she? What woman doesn’t like to be pursued? Is it not the ultimate homage to have several men competing for your favors?
They ought to fight a duel. Pistols at dawn. With Marcy sitting in a carriage across the lake, waiting to see which one of them would survive to worship her. Didier liked his chances with firearms. The colonels in Ouagadougou used to take him hunting with them. They would go out on the savannah, drink beer, and fire Kalashnikovs at anything that moved.
“. . . and we were five days behind schedule and the studio was freaking out. They flew some suit out to the set—we were shooting in Mexico, or in Costa Rica, I don’t remember—to give us a hard time. All the women decided to draw straws to see who was going to fuck this guy’s brains out. The wardrobe mistress—a cute little Czech girl—drew the short straw, and she visited the man in his hotel room. He never made it to the set. Talk about taking one for the team . . .”
Both men laughed, each one trying to out-laugh the other. Didier had no problem winning that contest. He had always been a good laugher. The Italian laughed like an old man moving his bowels.
As usual, they waited each other out, until Marcy herself rose to leave. They both got up, as if she were royalty.
“Sorry, guys, I’ve got to go make some phone calls.”
They nodded, almost simultaneously, and watched as she sauntered out the door, all four eyes riveted on the undulating spandex. Then they were side by side, awkwardly staring at the closed door. Didier could smell the Italian’s cologne—strong and cheap. Maybe he didn’t have to have the man killed after all; the cologne alone should keep him out of Marcy Gray’s bed.
Didier quickly followed her out the door, not even bothering to mutter a pretext. The last thing he wanted now was one-on-one time with the man he had just contracted to kill. He would say a few kind words at the man’s funeral. He was generous with his golf clubs and made decent cappuccino.
Three days later, Didier got another note in the mail, containing detailed instructions on how to proceed with his patio deck. He was told to show up with the money in a FedEx envelope at a car wash in town. This demand presented a problem. He needed to have a car to wash.
He thought about borrowing Marcy’s, but immediately thought better of it. He didn’t want her involved in any way with the Acme people. Renting was impossible without a driver’s license, so his only recourse was to ask his neighbor, the film producer, if he could borrow his old Mercedes.
Didier rang Charlie Berns’s bell and asked him if he wanted his car washed.
“Why start now?” the producer asked.
“Why not? I have a friend who has just opened a car wash in town, and he wants to create the impression that there are lots of cars going in there, so others will come, so he asks all his friends to go there today with a car. As you know, I do not have one.”
“Thanks, Didier, but I’m a little under the weather today. Allergies kicking up.”
“That is no problem, Charlee. I will take your car there for you and bring it back. Span and spic.”
“I just hope that it runs when it’s clean. It’s been a couple of years since I washed it.”
It took some effort to get the car out of the garage. Backing up in a narrow space was challenging for a man who had never had to parallel park in his life. In Ouagadougou, he would just leave the car in front of a restaurant or a nightclub and not bother with fitting it into a space. There was a lot of space in Upper Volta.
Charlie Berns’s Mercedes was an old diesel model that sounded like a coffee can full of nails. Its wood paneling and leather seats were smooth with age. In the glove compartment he found a veritable drugstore of over-the-counter medication, everything from Contac to Rolaids.
He had been instructed to put his car through the car wash and meet Biff in the area where the customers waited to retrieve their cars. He wasn’t there. Didier sat with his FedEx envelope and watched the illegals dry the cars and polish the hubcaps until the younger of the two golfers showed up.
Without even saying hello, Biff told Didier to meet him in the men’s room in exactly three minutes. Didier nodded, and three minutes later, he got up, ignoring the Mexican who was waving his rag above the Mercedes, and went to the door marked MEN.
The man locked the door from the inside. This time Didier just got patted down and not strip-searched. After the man took the envelope and counted out the cash, he said, “Okay, here’s the deal. We’ll do our best to take care of this before the holidays, but we don’t guarantee it. It’s a busy time of the year for us. Holiday shopping.”
Didier tried to laugh, but nothing came out.
“When it’s done, you’ll deliver the rest of the money, in the same manner and probably in the same place. We’ll let you know. And I would suggest you don’t hold back the final payment, just in case you’re thinking of it. We would have no compunction about doing to you what we’ve done to your guy.
Didier nodded, anxious to get out of the small room.
“We’re done.”
He unlocked the door, turned back to Didier, and said, “By the way, nice Benz. What year is it?”
“I don’t know. I borrowed it.”
“Very considerate. You’re returning it clean.”
And Biff walked out of the men’s room with the FedEx envelope stuffed with cash. Didier waited a minute before leaving to retrieve his car. He stiffed the Mexican who had waved a rag at him.
Now that the die was cast, Didier felt liberated. There was no going back. He had invested almost all of his remaining assets on the job. Marcy Gray was now his life raft. He was running out of continents to flee to.
To celebrate, he stopped off at a local wine store for an overpriced bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape to stand up to the pizza he intended to have for dinner. And he stopped next door, at the cigar shop, and bought a couple of Montecristos for twenty bucks apiece. Why not? From this point on, it was feast or famine.
That afternoon he took a long, delicious nap, filled with dreams of his days and nights with Marcy Gray. The sun was almost down when he woke. He got into the shower to wash away the cobwebs, and then picked up the phone and ordered a large anchovy pizza with mushrooms and onions from Pizza Hut.
When it arrived, he opened the bottle of wine, sniffed the bouquet, took a sip, and, for a moment, remembered the fragrance of the French countryside. Just as he was sitting down to enjoy his pizza, the phone rang.
Picking up, he heard the voice of his beloved.
“Didier, bonsoir.”
“Marcee, comment ça va?”
“Bon, très bon . . .”
“Non, ma petite, you must say très bien, not très bon, because it is an adverb, not an adjective.”
“Of course, yes. Listen, Didier, I know it’s last minute, but I made some boeuf bourguignon for dinner, and I must have doubled the recipe because there’s just oodles of it. I thought I’d invite you and Sammy to share it, but he’s not home. So how’d you like to help me out?”
It took Didier a nanosecond to say yes. Fuck the pizza.
“Volontiers, Marcee. I have the perfect bottle of Châteauneuf-du-Pape to complement your boeuf bourguignon. I just opened it.”
Didier hung up, changed into one of his exotic dashikis, daubed a little deodorant under his arms, started to put the pizza in the refrigerator and then, remembering that American pizza was bad enough warm and fresh, he tossed it in the black trash bin for non-recyclables outside his unit and walked over to his neighbor’s with his bottle of wine.
The boeuf bourguignon turned out to be only slightly overcooked, and Didier resolved that when she was his exclusively, he would improve her culinary skills, along with her French. She looked marvelous in a cashmere sweater, unbuttoned just enough to be alluring without being sluttish, a pair of jeans one size too small, and laced-up calfskin boots. He detected a soupcon of Hermès 24 Faubourg emanating from her.
She seemed to be pulling out all the stops, but was it uniquely for him? She’d called the Italian first, or so she said. Was he merely the stand-in? He wished he knew the answer to that question.
In any event, the boeuf bourguignon accompanied the Châteauneuf a lot better than the anchovy pizza would have. And she was a better companion than the six o’clock news. So he relaxed and enjoyed the dinner and her anecdotes, sprinkling a little French lesson in between courses and slipping a chunk or two of beef to Klaus under the table.
When they were finished eating and the bottle of wine was down to the dregs, she pushed back a little from the table, sighing contentedly, emitting a charming little belch. She giggled. He loved it.
She was exhibiting the signs that he had learned to recognize of a woman who wanted to have her dessert in bed. It was the right moment, he concluded, but the wrong time. Sammy Dee was still around, casting his ominous shadow, polluting the air around her. He would wait until the man was safely out of the picture—and she was his prize, to savor exclusively, at a moment of his choosing.
So instead of taking her in his arms, he thanked her for the repas délicieux, and returned alone to his condo. He went outside to his soon-to-be-remodeled patio, sat down on the rusty recliner, lit up his Montecristo, and looked up at the stars.
It was a beautiful night, perfectly quiet except for the sound of the Finnish lesbians’ cat prying loose the cover of the trash can. Must be the anchovies on the pizza. Good. Qu’il mange des anchois!
It wasn’t until Didier was face to face with Detective Sergeant Jorge Melendez the next morning that he learned that the anchovy pizza he had tossed in favor of Marcy Gray’s boeuf bourguignon had been laced with strychnine. He had apparently slept through the wailing Finns, who had woken almost everyone else in the complex.
Fortunately, Didier was still half-asleep and sluggish enough not to overreact to the news. He stood in the doorway, absently scratching his ass, until the policeman said they wanted to ask him some questions.
Several minutes later, when the cops told him what had happened, Didier understood that someone was trying to kill him, that there was no good reason to share this revelation with the police, and that he would need to think about what this meant before he had the cops thinking about it as well. For the moment, he relied on a reflex developed in Africa and in France to avoid volunteering any information to the authorities that he didn’t have to.
“Mr. Onyochinko . . .”
“Onyekachukwu.”
“Mr. . . .” he abandoned the attempt to pronounce the name and continued, “Sir, did you order a pizza from Pizza Hut last night?”
“Pizza Hut? You are talking about the take-out pizza establishment?” Didier asked rhetorically, stalling for time to figure out why the cops were talking to him.
“Yes. The place on Desert Canyon Drive.”
“Oh, that establishment . . .”
“Yes. That establishment. It’s the only Pizza Hut in Palm Springs.”
“Would you gentlemen care for some coffee?”
“No, thank you.”
“No drinking on duty, right?”
Didier laughed his laugh, which crumbled around the edges. “Last night . . . I had dinner with my charming neighbor, Marcy Gray. The actress. You, no doubt, have seen her films?”
“Afraid not. So you didn’t order a pizza?”
“Not that I recall.”
“Not that you recall?”
“Yes. I do not have a recollection of the event.”
Melendez screwed up his features, consulted his pad, and said, “Well, according to them, someone called up at 6:19 p.m. last night, ordered an anchovy pizza, and gave them your address.”
“Hmmn . . .”
“It wasn’t you?”
“I believe I would recall that.”
The two cops shared a look, as if trying to silently convey some sort of strategy for the interrogation. Maybe it was Bon flic, Sale flic—a number that he had seen Starsky et Hutch use countless times in all the episodes he had watched in Nice.
“And, apparently, someone then called back and canceled the order,” Melendez said finally.
“Uh-huh . . .”
“And that wasn’t you either?”
“Tell me, why would I cancel an order I had not made?”
At last the other cop joined in. “That’s what we want to know.”
“An excellent question, no doubt, but I am afraid I cannot help you answer it. Would you mind if I made myself some coffee? I am, how do you say, a trifle hung out. Too much Châteauneuf-du-Pape last night. It did honor to Miss Gray’s splendid cuisine.”
“Ca
n you think of anybody, sir, who might use your name to order a pizza?”
Didier shook his head and walked over to the kitchenette, his back to them, so as to minimize eye contact. As he poured water into his coffeemaker and scooped several spoonfuls of extra bold French roast into the basket, he tried to slow down his mind. A great deal was going through it at the same time. Who canceled the order? Why were the cops so interested in pizza?
The last question was answered as Didier switched on the machine and stood waiting for it to deliver the coffee he desperately needed.
“Sir, someone poisoned that pizza.”
“Oh my dear. Did someone eat it?”
“Yes. Unfortunately.”
“Who?”
Another pause for dramatic effect. This was more Hutch than Starsky. Starsky was the fast talker, the friendly guy. Hutch played it close to the vest.
“Tuuli Rennholm’s cat.”
“How dreadful,” he intoned, avidly breathing in the coffee fumes, like a drowning man gulping air.
“Do you happen to know anyone in this complex who didn’t like the cats?”
“Well, I believe that Mr. Dee, the Italian who lives across the hall from the cats, had complained several times about them.”
Starsky wrote something down in his pad. “Anyone else?”
“No. I am fond of cats. They are beautiful, are they not?”
The cop didn’t bother answering the question. “Are you an American citizen, Mr. Oyochinko?”
Didier did not like where this particular line of questioning was going. He considered saying that he was as American as Sergeant Melendez—whose relatives were polishing hubcaps at the car wash—but thought better of it.
“I have a green card.”
“Can we see it?” Hutch popped up.
As Didier went to his bedroom for his wallet, he tried to stop thinking about what had happened and concentrate on getting the cops out of there so he could think of what had happened in peace.
After looking at his green card meticulously, they handed it back, along with their cards, and told him to get in touch if he remembered anything about last night.
“Especially about the pizza,” Hutch added, with what Didier thought was a sarcastic grin.
Purgatory Gardens Page 14