Blind Switch

by John McEvoy

  “You’re like a damn beagle, you’d eat yourself to death,” Doyle snarled at City Sarah, bitterly regretting that Midlife Bustout had reduced him to talking to horses.

  Doyle gave the filly several buckets of water early that afternoon, and she polished off another one right before he put a halter on her prior to leading her over to the paddock for the third race. When he pulled her out of her stall City Sarah appeared more ready for a nap than for a race. She looked at Doyle with as incredulous an expression as horses can manifest.

  City Sarah’s race that day was at six furlongs for $25,000 claiming fillies and mares. She got beat more than twenty lengths—as the heavy favorite.

  The jockey was furious when he brought City Sarah back to be unsaddled in front of the grandstand, from which cascaded a series of heartfelt boos. In a molten mixture of Spanish and English, he cursed City Sarah, cursed Doyle who had shamefacedly gone onto the track to slip a shank on the halter, and he leveled a hard look at Angelo Zocchi. The jockey was Heartland Downs’ perennial leading rider, a tough little number named Willie Arroyo, whose will to win was legendary among Chicago racetrackers. Listening to Arroyo’s tirade, Doyle was reminded of Genghis Khan, another real short guy who hated to lose.

  After dismounting, Arroyo spat on the ground between Angelo Zocchi’s feet.

  “Theez goddam ’orse burp-ed, she burp-ed I tell you, ina gate,” Arroyo said angrily. “She cooe ’ardly move!” he continued disgustedly. “Eet was like rideen a goddam water bed, she was slooshing in ’er belly so much.”

  Arroyo kicked at the ground, then looked accusingly up at the silent trainer. “Steef! You steefed theez one, An-Hello.”

  The jockey slapped his whip against his right boot. With a sudden sweet smile, he looked up at Zocchi.

  “Con I ride ’er back next time?” Arroyo asked.

  “Mind your mouth,” Zocchi growled. “We’ll see.”

  Chapter 3

  Saturday, June 16. The Day.

  Moe Kellman had phoned Doyle earlier in the week, to touch base and offer congratulations. “You did real nice,” Kellman had said. “I’ll see you Saturday night at Dino’s. Just keep your mouth nice and shut—I know that’s hard for you—and your favorite bank teller will be in for a big surprise.”

  Before hanging up, Moe asked, “Doyle, you going to bet some for yourself? Our action’s mainly going down in Vegas. If you want to play some of your twenty-five grand out there just say so, we’ll take care of it.” Doyle turned down this offer.

  That afternoon at Heartland Downs, an hour before City Sarah’s race, Doyle—his adrenaline meter on fast-forward—was pacing in front of the horse’s stall when E. D. Morley sauntered up. He was accompanied by none other than Doyle’s counselor from Cork, the elusive Maureen. E. D. had on his “going to the races” outfit of white shirt, pressed jeans, and white cowboy hat atop his dreadlocks. Maureen, wearing a bright green pants suit, regarded Doyle from behind a pair of oversized sunglasses.

  She gave Doyle a big smile, then a hug. “You’re lookin’ grand,” she said, “and so’s your little harse. Don’t ya tink so, E. D.?” she inquired of her companion. Morley nodded in agreement, a big grin on his broad, black face.

  Doyle said to Maureen, “I tried to call you the other night. Couldn’t track you down anywhere.”

  “Ah, well, I’ve moved on from O’Keefe’s,” Maureen answered. “I’d tell you where I’m going to be, but sure I just don’t know that now. I’m kind of between apportunities, as you lads put it over here.”

  “Well, speaking of opportunities,” Doyle responded in a low voice, “you might risk an Irish punt or two on City Sarah this afternoon.”

  Maureen lowered her glasses and raised her eyebrows. “After the miserable way the poor ting’s been runnin’ here lately?”

  “She’ll run big today,” Doyle vowed. Maureen looked at him, smiling broadly. Morley winked at Doyle and clapped him on the back. “Good luck, mon,” he said.

  Minutes later, when Maggie Howard stopped to chat, City Sarah was full life, poking her head out of the stall to nuzzle Maggie, then bouncing around behind the webbed barrier.

  “Hey, she’s a different horse today,” Maggie said appreciatively. “She’s looking good. You know,” Maggie added, “I hardly ever bet, but I think I’ll put a few bucks on Sarah today.” Maggie handed E. D. a $10 bill. “On the nose, okay? Will you take care of that?”

  “Aay, Moggie, we do dat,” E. D. said with an accent more exaggerated than usual. Turning to leave with Maureen, E. D. gave Doyle another broad wink.

  After they’d departed, Maggie said to Doyle, “Ain’t you gonna bet on this pretty little horse?”

  “Already have,” Doyle said.

  ***

  En route to Dino’s Ristorante that night, the joyous sounds of Angelo Zocchi’s work force still resounded in Doyle’s ears as he drove through the Chicago streets.`

  “She win for FUN, mon….”

  “All by herSELF….”

  “City Sarah’s BACK!” This from Maggie Howard, who was far more pumped by the filly’s return to regular form than by the proceeds of her bet.

  City Sarah that afternoon had romped by five lengths, paying $18.60 to win for each $2 bet. Utilizing his trademark “victory leap,” jockey Willie Arroyo had dismounted from her in the winner’s circle as if coming off a trampoline, vaulting upward from the stirrups before landing lightly aside City Sarah.

  “Theez filly run like a little train today,” Arroyo grinned at Zocchi. “No slooshing in her belly,” he added as he patted City Sarah’s neck.

  “Nice ride,” Zocchi said, abruptly dismissing the jockey. Zocchi looked very relieved. Doyle felt that way.

  Leading City Sarah to the test barn, where she would have to supply urine that would be examined by the racing laboratory for illegal substances—this happened to the winners of all races and to beaten favorites, too—Doyle tried to estimate what this victory might have meant to the Kellman “family” coffers. Besides winning at 8-1, City Sarah had keyed a trifecta that—thanks to the arrival in second and third place of a couple of longshots—paid nearly $4,000 for each $2 invested. Doyle soon stopped speculating about what gargantuan amounts of money were involved here, well aware that he would never be told what they were.

  ***

  As usual, Dino’s Ristorante was jammed, but Doyle found Moe sitting alone at his usual six-person table. He was burrowing through a serving of linguini in garlic and clam sauce from a platter wider than his concise shoulders.

  “Very nice work, Jack,” Moe smiled as Doyle sat down. “Very nice. Have some dinner, and tell me how it went.”

  Doyle opened his menu, and the envelope was there, containing the $100 bills—two hundred and fifty of them—as he’d specified. “No dinner tonight, Moe, thanks. I’m not hungry anyway. I feel like having a few pops, but I can’t stand drinking in the same room as your asshole buddy Dino. We’ll get together,” Doyle assured Moe. “I’ll see you at the gym.”

  Before turning to leave, Doyle said, “This a one-time deal, Moe. You know that, right?”

  Kellman carefully wiped his hands on a napkin before reaching to shake with Doyle. “Understood, kid, understood. Trust me on this,” Moe said, and Doyle departed with a fond look over his shoulder back at Moe’s white dandelion head. Doyle was confident he could do just that.

  ***

  Twenty-five grand in his pocket, but Doyle could not get off on it. Trying to pinpoint how he felt, Doyle thought long and hard before coming up with “soiled…maybe sullied.”

  Doyle hit three of his favorite haunts on the near north side, buying drinks for friend and stranger alike. But nothing worked to lessen his sense of deflation and the feeling of disappointment in himself, not even his final stop, at Andy’s, the near north jazz spot that was one of Doyle’s favorite hangouts. “I needed the money,” he said to himself, “but goddamn it I should have figured out another way to ge
t it. This just wasn’t right, this way.”

  “Part of the problem,” Doyle mumbled, “is that you pulled off something few people have, and you can’t even brag about it to anybody.”

  The harder Doyle tried to celebrate, the worse he felt. On a night that Doyle had made more money than his salesman father had ever made in half a year, he headed home just after 10:30. Doyle had a bit of a buzz on from the drinks, and he knew it, so he was extra careful, parking the Accord with precision in the dank lot beneath his four-plus-one apartment building.

  They had been waiting, crouched, on the off side of the car that bordered the parking space marked “Doyle.” Jack had locked the door and was starting to turn away from the Accord when he heard—much too late—sounds he knew shouldn’t arise.

  They were very good. Doyle couldn’t even fully pivot before he felt a knee jam into his lower back and a powerful arm encircle his neck, felt the arm then jerk his chin up and back so quick and hard he thought his eyeballs were going to exit the rear of his head.

  Quiet instructions were being issued as Doyle struggled. He heard a mixture of them, urgently whispered: “Keep him like that…Not a sound, now…Up with his sleeve…”And when the needle hit midway up his extended right arm, Doyle realized that they were not going to kill him, realized what this was all fucking about. His body already in the sway of whatever they’d shot him up with, Doyle fought to keep awake and alert. This, too, was a losing battle.

  Last Doyle felt, the envelope with the twenty-five thousand was being extracted from his jacket and his assailants were gently positioning him, like a salmon on a bed of slivered ice, across the backseat of the Accord.

  Last Doyle heard as they slipped away were the little sounds of rubber soles across the concrete garage floor and what, in his narcotic-driven slippage, he bitterly discerned to be voices, one a man’s, the other a woman’s, in the respective singular accents of…Kingston, was it? And…Cork?

  Chapter 4

  The two men parked the car nearly a mile from the southern border of Willowdale Farm, Harvey Rexroth’s Kentucky showplace. The trip to the back gate that led to the stallion barn took them less than twelve minutes, even in the dark. They trotted quickly, with purpose, without speaking. They quickly climbed over the white slatted gate and went forward, one on each side of the graveled path, moving silently through the damp grass.

  Each man was dressed completely in black, each wore a black nylon mask. The shorter of the two led the way, moving confidently, as if he were very familiar with the site.

  Once they had reached the complex that housed Rexroth’s stud horses, the most valuable animals on the property, the shorter man motioned to the left and they angled that way. He then gave a signal to stop. The taller man moved alongside. For a few moments they crouched in silence. The only sound was a slight breeze from the west that moved gently through the rhododendron bushes that outlined the stallion barn’s walking ring. There was no sign of any night watchman. No surprise there, thought the shorter man, they’re right where they should be—nowhere close to here.

  After slipping silently through the door of the two-story brick building, they walked softly down the broad middle aisle separating the stallions’ stalls. Their stealthy movements on the rubber-padded barn floor did not go unnoticed. The horses were immediately aware of them, aware that strangers had arrived. Some of the horses shifted their feet in their stalls, uneasy about the presence of these visitors at this unusual hour. Two horses poked their noses against the tall metal screens that served as stall doorways.

  After he’d counted down the row on the right, the short man whispered, “It’s that one.” He pointed to the second stall from the far end of the row. They crept toward it, trying not to further arouse the horses’ curiosity. “I’ll take his head,” said the smaller man, “you slip in there.” He carefully opened the stall door. “Wait till I get a good hold of him,” he hissed.

  The small man held the palm of his left hand forward as he reached for the horse’s halter. In his hand were peppermint candies. “C’mon babe,” he invited, “c’mon babe.” The horse, a nine-year-old bay named Uncle Francis, responded suspiciously to this invitation from this stranger, backing away and tossing his head. But as the shorter man kept talking softly, persuasively, soon Uncle Francis moved his nose forward to the man’s palm and snuffled up the candies with his lips. Like most horses, he liked peppermints.

  “Git to it,” the short man said sharply to his companion. He continued to feed the horse peppermints, taking a stronger grip on the halter with his free hand. His companion slid along the wall to the rear of the stall. He turned on the hooded flashlight he’d carried from the car.

  Poised behind the horse’s left rear leg, the taller man raised his right arm high. In his hand was an iron crowbar. With a sudden, devastating motion he brought the crowbar down as hard as he could against the leg of the unsuspecting horse. Under the impact of the powerful blow Uncle Francis’ cannon bone cracked like an icy tree branch in winter. The horse screamed in agony as he crashed to the floor of the stall.

  Uncle Francis continued to make terrible sounds as he thrashed in the straw bedding, trying to fight his way to his feet. The taller man adeptly dodged the horse’s massive body as he moved to the stall door. Uncle Francis somehow got himself upright, lurching on his three good legs as the other dangled like a broken hinge.

  The shorter man quickly closed the stall door. The piteous sounds of the stricken horse reverberated throughout in the dark barn; the other stallions, very aware of the terror in their midst, had begun a crescendo of neighing that counterpointed Uncle Francis’ cries of pain.

  It would not take long for others on Willowdale Farm to become aware of this event. Lights were already being turned on in the farm manager’s residence, some three hundred yards up the gravel lane, when the two black-garbed figures trotted briskly in the opposite direction, their grisly mission accomplished.

  Two days later, the Saturday edition of Harvey Rexroth’s daily newspaper Horse Racing Journal carried a front-page story describing the “tragic” death of Uncle Francis, a multiple stakes winner and “promising” stallion who had, for some freak reason, in the middle of the night, apparently lashed out with his left rear leg and kicked the back of his stall so powerfully that his cannon bone shattered.

  “There was nothing that could be done to save the horse,” owner Rexroth was quoted as saying. “We summoned the best veterinarians around, and they agreed that this gallant runner would have to be put down for humane reasons. This is a tremendous loss to Willowdale, and to the racing and breeding industry, for we were convinced Uncle Francis would sire a succession of youngsters as talented as he was.”

  Knowledgeable breeding experts responded with skepticism to this claim, for Uncle Francis—following his excellent racing career—had proved to be a disappointment as a sire. Once they’d hit the racetrack and failed to impress, the market value of his young horses had plummeted, as had that of Uncle Francis. He wasn’t unique in this sense, for not every good racehorse makes a good sire. But he was evidently unique in paying such a severely painful price for his progenitive inadequacies. Insured for $8,000,000, he was worth far more dead than alive. None of this was mentioned in the Journal story.

  Reading the story while lying on his motel bed late that Saturday night, on the outskirts of a town one hundred ten miles from Willowdale Farm, the shorter man of the midnight duo cackled with delight.

  “This sumbitch Rexroth is crookeder that we’d ever think to be, man,” he said appreciatively. He was talking to his partner and roommate. But Jud Repke was asleep and did not hear the words of Ronald Mortvedt.

  Chapter 5

  Doyle awoke in a mental haze. After battling his way toward consciousness, he realized he was on the old brown couch in the small living room of his furnished apartment. Vaguely, very mistily, he recalled awakening in the backseat of his car in the apartment building’s garage, pullin
g himself up the short flight of stairs to the elevator, later fumbling for long minutes with his front door lock.

  As he struggled to recall the happenings of the night before, Doyle was aware of some pounding noises as he looked up at the crack in his ceiling, a fissure in the plaster that meandered like the Mississippi. Some of those sounds, he knew, were reverberating in his head, after-effects of the powerful sedative that had been so rudely administered the night before. Then, he realized, there were other sounds as well, evidently emanating from the other side of his front door. Doyle struggled to his feet, temporarily losing his balance as he did so, then staggered toward the source of the noise.

  “Rock fucking bottom,” he said to himself, “that’s what I’ve hit.”

  When he unchained the door, that assessment was immediately confirmed. On the threshold, badges displayed in raised wallets, stood a dark-complexioned man of medium height and a tall, brown-haired woman. The man, whose black hair came to a widow’s peak, wore a navy blue blazer, gray slacks, white shirt under a dark red tie. “Mr. Doyle,” he said, “my name is Damon Tirabassi. I’m an agent of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. So is Ms. Engel, Karen Engel,” he said, nodding to the woman. She, too, had on a navy blue blazer. Her skirt was gray and her white blouse buttoned at the throat. Agent Engel’s green eyes appeared to reflect bemusement, if not sympathy, for Doyle’s obviously painful condition. She was as pretty as her partner was serious, Doyle noted.

  “What time is it?” Doyle blearily managed. “And what do you want?”

  “Eleven o’clock of the morning after,” Tirabassi answered, adding, “the morning after the night of your race-fixing payoff.”

  Doyle took a grip on the door. “What the hell are you talking about?” he said, struggling to reconstruct his recent hours. Then it all came back to him like a cascade of mountain water: the footsteps in the garage, the arm around his neck and needle in his arm, the whispered sounds that he was absolutely sure he knew too well.