SEASONS’ GREETINGS FROM YOUR FRIENDS AT ACME EXTERMINATING AND PATIO DECKS.
And then in ink at the bottom: BEST WISHES, WALT AND BIFF.
Meanwhile, things at Afrique Ouest continued to deteriorate. His client list dwindled to a trickle. Authentic pre-colonial African art was not a hot item in Palm Springs, where tastes ran toward Leroy Neiman prints. Clive wanted more money and fewer hours. And the Indians were shaking him down for a bigger cut.
George Kajika had taken to stopping by the gallery regularly to see how the pieces were moving, his narrow dark eyes scanning the shelves in a silent inventory. The 92 percent Choctaw—a great-grandmother had had a fling with a Chinese railroad worker, he explained—wanted to see his books.
What books? Didier’s concept of accounting was limited to moving money from one pocket to another. Even when he was stealing money for the colonels in Upper Volta, he had not written things down. Writing things down just got you in trouble. It left footprints, and Didier Onyekachukwu had gone to great lengths in his life to leave as few as possible.
They sat in his office, or what passed for an office—a redecorated supply room with a gunmetal-gray desk and an empty file cabinet. George Kajika chain-smoked unfiltered Camels and uttered a series of not-so-subtle threats to cut off Didier’s product supply.
“My people are not so happy.”
“I’m sorry to hear that.”
“They are suffering from illness.”
“That’s regrettable.”
“Medicaid sends them to far-off places.”
“How unfortunate.”
“Many travel a hundred miles in their pickups to get medicine.”
Didier nodded, with as much sympathy as he could muster.
“Many miles in pickup creates hemorrhoids.”
This would go on for a while—George Kajika smoking, coughing, and uttering his pointedly oblique threats—until Didier put some cash in an envelope and the Indian would leave. He would rise, like Sitting Bull at a war council, gathering his threadbare California Angels windbreaker around him like a ceremonial robe, and walk out the door.
Didier considered replacing the Indians with illegal Mexicans, but he would have to retrain the labor force to produce items that looked something like African art objects and not souvenirs from a Tijuana tourist stand. He thought of replacing Clive as well, but it would mean that Didier himself would have to spend his days at the gallery watching nobody come in.
What he needed was a game plan. That charming American sports metaphor had no translation in French. Not to mention an end game. Once Sammy Dee was out of the way, things would fall into place. But in the meantime, he was scrambling just to keep his head above water—like a football team with a one-goal lead in injury time.
He even considered taking the job over from Acme. He could put poison in Sammy Dee’s pizza himself. Or just buy a gun and shoot him. Self-defense, Your Honor. It was either him or me.
But violence was never something that Didier Onyekachukwu was comfortable with. He had spent his life accommodating the people who actually committed the violence, insulating himself from both danger and distaste. He believed that he was, at heart, a decent human being. Maybe not Nobel Peace Prize material, but not Idi Amin either.
When Marcy was exclusively his, he could devote himself to good works. He could teach French to migrant workers, produce Moliere plays in the lettuce fields. He could make an attempt to track down his numerous children and send them money to get out of Burkina Faso. He could stop selling bogus African antiquities to unsuspecting suckers who needed to feel better about the forlorn continent of Africa by displaying a Yoruba fertility fetish on their coffee table.
And he could live happily off Marcy Gray’s retirement income, cooking for her and making her happy at night. Maybe he’d even take up golf. In memory of Sammy Dee. It would be the least he could do.
At four o’clock in the morning, as Didier lay awake trying to figure out if there was a way he could unload his entire supply of pre-fab African art on some wealthy ignoramus with empty wall space, he had another idea. What if he capitalized on all the publicity surrounding Sammy Dee and Paradise Gardens to promote the business? Since the Italian’s car had been blown up, they had all been pestered by reporters looking for next-door-neighbor stories. Didier’s voice mail was cluttered with the names and numbers of people wanting to talk to him.
Why not do an interview at the gallery? Get a TV crew over to Afrique Ouest and make sure they shot him in front of the artwork? He could make up some merde about the Italian and slip in a few plugs for the business. My good friend Sammy is a serious collector of Benin bronzes . . .
Who would know? Sammy refused to watch the news on TV. Marcy, well, she’d get a kick out of it. He hoped. And it was reasonable to surmise that the French narcotics police would not be watching the Palm Springs ABC station, nor would any of his former wives and children.
Among the messages on his voice mail were three from Tracy Tohito. Didier remembered seeing the Eyewitness News reporter, pert in a beige knit suit with too much eye makeup, standing with a microphone near the crime scene tape around the empty space where Sammy Dee’s car had been parked and talking about Al-Qaeda plots. The message said to call her anytime and left her cell phone number.
As soon as he’d had his morning coffee, Didier dialed the reporter. She picked up on the first ring.
“This is Tracy.”
“Miss Tohito, I am Didier Onyekachukwu.”
“Who?”
“A neighbor of Samuel Dee, at the Paradise Gardens community. You have been leaving me messages.”
It took only a microsecond for her reporter’s reflexes to kick in. She sucked in air and said, “Thank you for calling back, Mister . . .” Like most people, she didn’t bother trying to pronounce his name.
“I would be willing to speak with you about my good friend and neighbor, Samuel.”
“Great. Wonderful. So you know him well?”
“Intimately.”
“Fabulous. Would you do it on camera?”
“I would be pleased to, but I do not want to do it here. There is too much publicity already, and I do not want to displease my neighbors.”
“Of course. I understand. Where would you want to do it?”
“At my place of business, which is a gallery of art, a stone’s toss from Paradise Gardens.”
Didier could hear her reporter’s brain taking this in, no doubt already figuring how to frame the story. Intimate friend of Al-Qaeda target’s art collection. “Okay, so I need to run this by my producer and round up a crew. I don’t think there’ll be any problem. Are you talking to anybody else?”
“Not at the moment.”
“I need to sell this as an exclusive, you understand?”
“That should not be a problem, provided that you allot sufficient amount of time to the interview.”
“Of course. We’ll lead with it at six and eleven. Okay?”
“All right. I am available this afternoon, at three o’clock.”
“You got it.”
He gave her the gallery address and hung up. Then he took a long shower and composed a fictional version of his intimacy with Samuel Dee. He went to his closet and foraged around for his most African wardrobe, settling on a colorful pagne that he had gotten by mail order from a place in Dakar while he was selling art in Nice. He’d put a little makeup on his cheek, below his eyes, to accentuate the tribal scars, which had long since started to fade.
“. . . Samuel and I have both been interested in African art since the days when we first met, in New York. We had invested in a restaurant downtown and had done quite well with it, using the profits to purchase authentic art from the Benin basin on the West Coast of Africa, hence the name of this gallery, ‘Afrique Ouest,’ which is spelled the French way, O . . . u . . . e . . . s . . . t.”
Tracy Tohito stood beside him in front of a wall of Yoruba masks, holding the microphone as a camera followed
them through the gallery.
“Can you explain, Mr. Onyekachukwu”—she had spent five minutes practicing it before they began—“why Al-Qaeda is so interested in eliminating your good friend and former business partner?”
“I am not confident that I can tell you that, Tracy. A good deal of the information is classified.”
“Are you . . . a CIA operative, as well?”
“I can neither confirm nor deny that.”
“Perhaps you could speculate.”
“Well, for a while now, Al-Qaeda and the Taliban have shown a vibrant interest in West Africa. As you know, there is an appreciable Muslim population in those countries, which they would like, naturellement, to radicalize. So they are looking for operatives who have some connection in the region.”
“And you being African . . .”
“Oh, not me. I am too obvious. They are using less transparent people.”
“Like Sammy Dee?”
“As I say, I cannot comment on that. But I can tell you that Samuel is particularly fond of Benin bronzes, from the Niger River delta, encompassing Nigeria, Benin, Togo, Ghana, and Ivory Coast. We have quite a few here in the gallery, a stone’s toss from downtown Palm Springs, open ten to six every day . . .”
Tracy Tohito’s editors edited the story severely, but enough of it remained to give Afrique Ouest the kind of free advertising that he couldn’t afford to buy.
For a few days, traffic at the gallery picked up. Mostly lookie-loos interested in visiting the venue where Sammy Dee, undercover CIA operative, bought his art. Didier showed pieces similar to those that his dear friend Samee Dee owned, and people took pictures with their camera phones and posted them on their Facebook pages.
But with the exception of the two middle-aged sexual perverts from Paradise Gardens—who bought an Ashanti fertility fetish that could be used as a dildo—no one wrote checks. George Kajika came by to assess the action, and pointed out with satisfaction several little red dots next to pieces that supposedly meant they were sold, but which Didier had put up to give the impression that the exhibition was a success.
He had to pay Clive for overtime and put out a spread of wine and cheese, to which people helped themselves liberally. Word quickly spread among the town drunks that there was free chardonnay in the gallery, and they showed up in numbers, staggering around the gallery with plastic cups of wine.
All in all, Didier’s scheme to capitalize on Sammy Dee’s notoriety to sell art was a crashing failure. The only bright spot may have been the reaction of Marcy, who seemed to be amused by the stunt. She showed up in a big straw hat and lovely cotton dress, looking like a Renoir painting, and circulated with him, admiring the art.
Didier vowed that when she was his, he would give her an education in art appreciation so that she would no longer be impressed by the shit he was selling. He would take her to the Louvre and teach her about chiaroscuro and brush stroke techniques. And when they went on their tour of Africa, he would show her genuine art pieces that he couldn’t afford even on consignment.
The two Palm Springs police detectives who had questioned him after the poisoned pizza canard showed up fishing for leads. They stood around in their atrocious sports jackets, the outline of their holsters making a visible impression in the polyester, their eyes darting back and forth, as if the people who placed the bomb under the Italian’s car would be dumb enough to attend.
Didier approached the cops and said, “Detectives, how nice to see you.”
They nodded quickly, not happy to have been recognized.
“Are you gentlemen off duty?”
One of them looked at the other for guidance and then said, in an attempt at ambiguity, “We’re not here . . . officially.”
“Well, in that case, could you unofficially remove the drunk who is throwing up in the toilet?”
The whole deal fell apart completely when it was discovered that Sammy Dee was not a target for the Taliban, but an innocent victim who had inadvertently parked his car beside an Afghan double agent that they had trailed to Palm Springs. It was all over the TV—a CIA spokesman in a dark suit reporting from Washington that they had managed, without resorting to a drone, to take out one of the Taliban’s most notorious agents. And that America was safer for it.
Not to be outdone, the two local cops who had shown up at Didier’s gallery got some camera time to announce that the collaboration between federal, state, and local law enforcement had functioned the way it was meant to function, and that Palm Springs was safer for it.
Didier watched it all with mixed feelings. Certainly, he was happy to be rid of the pack of reporters who had been parked outside Paradise Gardens since the incident, and not to have to waste decent wine on Sammy Dee for dinner every night, but at the same time, this new development freed his rival to go out and pursue his advances on Marcy Gray. He could take her out to dinner or to a movie, invite her to his place without worrying that the reporters were watching his door, or take her away for the weekend, God forbid.
It was clear to Didier that he would have to escalate his attack, now that his rival was no longer hors de combat. This was no time to relax his guard. He would go back on the offensive, pursuing Marcy with renewed fervor until Acme Pest Control got rid of his problem for him once and for all. He would keep up the attack by inviting Marcy for afternoon Scrabble games by the pool, something that the Italian could not compete with—English clearly being at least his second language, after Sicilian and God knew what else.
Didier would buy a state-of-the-art grill, on credit at Sears, and cook exotic dishes for Marcy. At night, the two of them would dine, à deux, on his patio, enjoying châteaubriand au point with a bottle of Château Margaux. He would play Juliette Greco on the CD player and take her in his arms to seal the deal. Parlez-moi d’amour. He would speak to her of love, under the desert moon, and she would be his. Finally.
X
SAMMY
That the African was trying to kill him was weird enough, but that he had contracted with the same outfit that Sammy was using to do him was seriously weird. Okay, there was a chance that Acme occasionally redid a patio without killing anyone, in order to keep up appearances, and that Didier Onyewhatever just happened to decide to redo his patio after Sammy did his. But the coincidence was hard to swallow, even for someone as desperate as Sammy Dee.
Biff must have put the bomb under his car while Sammy was playing golf with Walt and the periodontist. And his unscheduled stop at Vons to pick up the Drano had saved his life. Incredible. Those fuckers had taken the contract without batting an eye and were trying to cash in on both of them. The one who was fortunate enough to be dead would not have to remit the final ten grand, but he wouldn’t put it above them to go after the estate.
Did Charlie Berns put the African on to Acme? Or did Diddly Shit stumble on Walt and Biff’s Facebook page? Unfuckingbelievable.
What to do about it was another matter. Contacting Acme involved the inevitable invitation to golf. And then what? On the third green, matter-of-factly drop: Nice shot. By the way, you guys trying to whack me too? He wouldn’t put it above them to assure him that it was not personal. Just business, Sammy. You’re on the tee . . .
He could put Marshal Dillon on to them. Agreeing to hit someone in a WITSEC program had to be some sort of federal crime. But, then again, so was taking a contract out on someone. He and Acme would do time together. Conspiracy to commit murder. Ten to twenty. Marcy would visit him in San Quentin with a file baked into a lasagna casserole.
Or he could break down and accept Dillon’s offer to relocate again. Let them send him to Kalamazoo with a new name. He’d go to Marcy and convince her to come to Kalamazoo with him. He’d get snow tires for the Porsche. There was Jacksonville or Tucson, but the program didn’t give you your choice of locales. This time of year, warm weather relocations were undoubtedly very much in demand. He could be dead by the time one opened up.
Nevertheless, he decided to see what was available
from WITSEC. Then he would evaluate his options. Unfortunately, there was no way to get into this with Marshal Dillon over the phone. Even though Sammy had been given a special, untraceable cell phone, the marshal told him it could still be hacked. The only communications that are secure are face-to-face in an unbuggable location.
The unbuggable location turned out to be one of Dylan’s favorites, the deli next to the Movie Colony Hotel with the best pastrami in the Coachella Valley. For breakfast, no less. The marshal ordered it, while Sammy stayed with a bagel and coffee. They sat in a booth in the rear, next to the kitchen, Dylan facing the door. In case Al Capone walked in.
He was wearing pressed Dockers, a Lacoste T-shirt, and Hush Puppies. As far as Sammy was concerned, you could make him as an undercover cop from a hundred yards. Taped to his calf there was undoubtedly a 45-caliber Glock with six rounds.
“You’re not looking very good, Sammy.”
“I’ve been through a lot of shit.”
“Well, you’re out the other side now.”
“What do you mean?”
“They made the guy whose spot you parked in.”
The man actually believed that shit.
“I’m thinking, Marshal, of maybe taking you up on the relocation deal.”
Dylan chewed his pastrami with his usual thoroughness, then put the sandwich down for a sip of root beer. “Why is that?”
“Like you said, I’m in the news. Someone could make me.”
“You were in the news. Not anymore. Now you’re just another retiree walking around the Springs in polyester.”
“Yeah, but still, someone could’ve made me while I was famous.”
“You assured me that no one did.”
“Well, I assumed so . . . but I’m not a hundred percent sure.”
“I don’t get it. Last week you told me you refused to go anywhere, and now you’re not so sure. What’s going on?”
There’s a contract out on my life with two ruthless scratch golfers who just missed offing me in Vons parking lot, that’s what’s going on.
Purgatory Gardens Page 20