"And could I have some of those fake sugar thingies?" Susan said.
The waiter paused.
"We have Equal, m'am."
"That'd be great," Susan said.
"High maintenance," Tedy said.
"And well goddamned worth it," Susan said.
"You think?" Sapp said to me.
I nodded vigorously.
"How's the ophthalmologist?" I said.
"High maintenance," Tedy said.
He smiled.
"And well goddamned worth it," he said.
The waiter brought coffee and hot water with lemon and some little Equal thingies. I put a little cream and sugar in mine. Susan squeezed the lemon into the water, and stirred in a packet of Equal.
"So," Tedy said, looking at the room. "What do you need?"
"There's a town out west, place called Potshot. It's being harassed by a bunch of bad guys, and the cops can't seem to do much."
"They got the wrong cops," Sapp said.
"They do," I said.
Sapp picked up his coffee cup and held it in both hands while he took a sip.
"Lemme guess," he said to Susan. "He's gonna ask me if I want to go out there with him and straighten things out."
"How could you know?" Susan said.
"Gay intuition," Sapp said.
"Of course," Susan said.
Sapp looked at me.
"How many bad guys?" he said.
"Thirty or forty," I said.
"How many guys you got?"
"Counting you, three."
"There's two guys you asked ahead of me?" Sapp said.
"They were closer to home."
Sapp grinned.
"Aside from the fun of going out to West Bum Fuck, excuse me, Susan, in August to shoot it out with forty hoodlums, what's in it for me?"
"You get to work with me again," I said.
"Hot diggity," Sapp said.
"And I'll pay you a lot."
Sapp nodded and drank some more coffee.
"Place closes the month of August so everybody can have vacation."
"What could be more convenient?" I said.
"You planning on hiring anybody else?"
"I have a few more in mind," I said.
Sapp looked at Susan.
He said, "How do you feel about all of this?"
"I wish he were a portrait painter," Susan said, "but then he wouldn't be him, would he?"
"And that would be a bad thing?" Tedy said.
Susan smiled."Yes, God help me, that would be a bad thing."
"And you a shrink," Sapp said.
"When you two get through doing Sonny and Cher," I said, "could we sort of focus on the reason I'm here?"
"Which is to recruit me," Sapp said.
"Yes."
"Okay," Sapp said.
"Okay we'll focus? Or okay, you're in?"
"Okay, I'm in," Sapp said. "Though I may have to have Susan talk to Ben."
"The ophthalmologist?" Susan said.
Tedy nodded.
"Him," he said.
"How long have you been together?" Susan said.
"Twelve years."
"Do you think Ben wants you to be different than you are?"
"No," Sapp said and grinned. "I guess he only has eyes for me."
Susan sighed.
Chapter 21
IN LATE JuLY, in southeastern Nevada, the temperature is 100 and the sun shines every day. No one much cares about this in Las Vegas, because everything is air-conditioned and everyone is inside. Losing money.
I was at the bar in the Mirage, nursing a beer, playing the dollar slots, and waiting for Susan to get rid of fifty dollars playing blackjack. She had brought fifty dollars to gamble with and, since she didn't really know how to play blackjack, it wouldn't take long. I had tried to explain to her that the object was not to spend it, but to try to win more with it. I'm pretty sure she didn't believe me.
Bernard J. Fortunato was across the way with a dark-haired woman in spike heels who would have been taller than he was in her stocking feet. They were playing blackjack. Bernard was looking good in a blue seersucker suit, pink shirt, pink-and-white striped tie and a snap-brim straw hat with a pink hatband. I waited. It was bad form in Vegas to break someone's concentration while he was losing his money. I was in no hurry. I had ten more dollar coins to give to the slots at the bar. Occasionally I would win. But I was undeterred. I would keep feeding coins into the slot until they were gone.
After awhile Bernard J. Fortunato and his tall companion had won enough, or lost enough, I couldn't tell which, and headed for the bar where I sat. He spotted me while he was still halfway across the casino floor. He stopped and stood motionless while he looked at me, trying to remember. Then he came the rest of the way to the bar and stood in front of me.
"Spenser," he said.
I nodded. Bernard looked around. "Hawk with you?"
"No."
Bernard nodded as if this information confirmed his suspicions. He put a hand on the brunette's arm. "This is Terry," he said.
Terry smiled and put her hand out. She had on a short flowered summer dress with thin shoulder straps. She was quite beautiful, with big eyes and a wide mouth. All of her that showed, which was considerable, was pretty good. She was carefully made up, and probably somewhat older than she looked.
"Very pleased to meet you," she said.
"And you," I said.
They sat at the bar. Bernard sat beside me and Terry sat beside him.
"Whaddya drinking?" Bernard said.
"I'm all set," I said.
The bartender came down the bar.
"Coupla Mai Tais," Bernard said.
The bartender went away. Bernard looked at me sidelong with his head tilted.
"Whaddya doing here?" he said.
"I'm looking for you," I said.
"Why?"
"Confidential," I said.
The bartender came back with two Mai Tais and set them on the bar on little paper napkins.
Bernard said to Terry, "Take your Mai Tai couple a stools down the bar, while I talk with this guy."
"Sure," Terry said, and picked up her drink and her napkin and moved down to the end of the bar. She didn't seem to mind.
When we were alone, Bernard said, "So?"
"Still got that short Colt?"
"Sure."
"Want to make some money?"
"How much?"
"A lot."
"Sure."
"You want to know what you have to do?" I said.
"Let's get right to the amount," Bernard said.
I told him.
"And expenses?" Bernard said.
"Yes."
"Okay," he said. "What do you need done?"
I told him.
"Hawk in on it?" he said.
"Yes."
"Some others?"
"Yes."
"How many?"
"So far, counting you and me, five."
"You got some others guys in mind?"
"I'm working west," I said.
"L.A.?" he said.
"Yes."
"Okay. What's first?"
"First," I said, "is you drive down to Potshot and rent us a house. Talk to a local broker down there, J. George Taylor."
I handed him one of my business cards with Taylor's name and address on the back.
"House should be big enough for six, seven guys. Use any name you want as long as it matches your car registration. Move in. When you got a phone, call me. Don't say anything much to anybody about anything."
Bernard looked at me disgustedly.
"Don't talk? What do I look like, Blabbermouth Barbie? I done this kind a work before."
"Good to hear," I said.
"And I'm a cash-and-carry business. Up front."
I took a checkbook from my inside pocket and wrote out a check and ripped it out and handed it to Bernard. He looked at it to make sure it was done properly, then he folded it and put it in h
is wallet.
"This clears, I'll head down to Potshot," he said. "I'll let you know."
I stood. Bernard jerked his head at Terry, who smiled and picked up her drink and moved back down the bar beside him.
"Nice to have met you," she said to me.
"You too," I said.
Bernard gestured at the bartender.
"Two more Mai Tais," he said.
I left.
Chapter 22
"BUT I DON'T want to stay at nineteen," Susan said. "I want him to hit me."
"But unless he hits you with an ace or a two," I said, "you bust."
"But staying is boring," she said.
"Of course it is," I said.
"You're humoring me."
"Of course I am."
We were in Beverly Hills, walking up Rodeo Drive, the silliest street in America, holding hands, discussing blackjack.
"But what's wrong with my approach," Susan said.
"It guarantees that you'll lose."
"I'm going to lose anyway."
"Very likely," I said. "But the point of the exercise is to try to win."
"I get bored standing there waiting for the proper cards."
I nodded. We were quiet for a little while as we marshaled our arguments.
"Are you thinking sexist things?" Susan said.
"Like `women, hmmph!'?" I said.
"Like that," she said.
"Not me."
Susan smiled.
We were staying in a hotel at the foot of Rodeo Drive. We liked the hotel. It was expensive, but I'd gotten a supportive advance from the Potshot cabal. And we were right in the heart of Beverly Hills, so we had continuous access to comic relief.
"So much to buy," Susan said, "so little time. How long do you think we'll be here?"
"I need to do a little background on Steven and Mary Lou Buckman," I said.
"I need a new wardrobe," she said. "For fall."
"Didn't you buy a new fall wardrobe last year?"
She gave me a withering look.
"How will you go about checking on the Buckmans?" she said.
"I'll start with Mark Samuelson. He's the one who sent Mary Lou to me."
"Why are you checking on them?"
"Better to know than not know," I said. "Nothing seems quite plumb in Potshot. I want to know about them before they went there. In fact it might help if I knew why they went there."
"To get away?"
"From what?"
"It would probably be good to know that, too," Susan said.
"Hey," I said. "You're detecting. That's man's work."
Susan ignored me, which probably accounts for the longevity of our relationship.
"I have women's work to do," she said. "Why don't you go about your business and let me do it."
Which I did.
Chapter 23
MARK SAMUELSON HAD been a lieutenant with a drooping moustache and no hair when I last did business with him. Now that I was doing business with him again, he was clean shaven, a captain, and had no hair. He was still wearing his tinted aviator glasses. And he had a healthy outdoor look about him.
His office was in the Parker Center now. It was bigger. It had higher partition walls. And the airconditioning worked.
"You look the same," he said.
"Yeah," I said, "crying shame isn't it."
"You working with Mary Lou Buckman?"
"Yeah."
"And you want to know what I know about her."
"And her husband," I said.
"My oldest kid played for him at Fairfax High," Samuelson said. "That's how I know him."
Samuelson had his coat off, and his gun was high on his hip on the right side.
"He used to ask me to come talk to the kids a few times, warn them to stay out of trouble. Rah-rah them about physical fitness and staying clean. That kind of crap. Bored the shit out of the kids."
"What kind of coach was he?"
"He was a hard-on," Samuelson said. "He thought he was Vince Lombardi."
"Kids like him?"
"Nobody liked him. Lot of kids quit."
"Yours didn't?"
"No. Ricky's good. He couldn't afford to quit. He was in line for a full ride at San Diego State."
"He get the scholarship?" I said.
"Yeah. Wide receiver."
"Buckman help with that?"
"Buckman didn't help with anything. When the college coaches were around, looking at the kids, Buckman was trying so hard to impress them that he got in the way."
"Looking for an assistant's job?"
"Looking to be head coach, I think."
"Too late now," I said. "He have a temper?"
"Yeah. I don't know how real it was. He was one of those guys who thought he ought to have a temper. Liked people to be scared of him, you know? Watch out for Steve, he's got a temper. He'd been in the Marines. Figured he could chew up a crowbar."
"Was he any good?"
"Oh he could bully the kids okay," Samuelson said. "And he probably won all the fights in the faculty lounge. But you and me have spent most of our lives with genuine tough guys," Samuelson said. "Buckman was just another Semper Fi asshole."
"How come he left coaching?"
"Got me," Samuelson said. "Ricky graduated three years ago. I lost interest."
"How about the wife?"
"I met her a few times. She was okay as far as I knew."
"They have any trouble at home?"
Samuelson shrugged.
"I'm not their pal," Samuelson said. "When she come in here, told me her husband got clipped in the desert, I wasn't sure who she was."
"You look into it at all?"
Samuelson got up and went to a coffee machine and poured a cup. He looked at me. I shook my head.
"Yeah, a little. Called a guy I know out there, dick in the Sheriff's Department named Cawley Dark. He said the case was dry. Said he probably got whacked by a bunch of local thugs, but there was no evidence and no witnesses and nothing that looked like a lead."
"So you passed her on to me," I said.
"Always looking to help out," Samuelson said.
"You bet," I said.
"She asked me who could help her. I figured you could make something out of nothing, if it got your attention."
"First time I saw you out here, I made nothing out of something," I said.
"You had a bad run. But I liked the way you handled yourself."
"Better than I did," I said.
"I've fucked a few cases myself," Samuelson said.
"People get killed?"
"Once or twice."
I shrugged. "Where'd she get the money?" I said.
"To pay you?"
"Yeah. Wife of a high school football coach? How much could she have saved up?"
"She's good-looking," Samuelson said. "Maybe she figured there'd be some way to broker a deal."
"It's a thought," I said.
Chapter 24
FAIRFAX HIGH SCHOOL is located at the corner of Fairfax and Melrose, not very far from CBS and The Farmer's Market down Fairfax, and excitingly close to the center of black lipstick and body piercing a little further east on Melrose.
The principal looked like a short John Thompson, black, about six-foot-five, and heavy. I introduced myself.
He shook hands. "Arthur Atkins."
He asked to see some ID. I provided some. He read it carefully.
"You are a private investigator," he said.
"Yes."
"Well you look like you can handle the job."
"You look like you could provide firm guidance yourself," I said. "To rebellious teenagers."
"We got school police with shotguns. They help me."
"Are sock hops waning in popularity?"
"Waning," Atkins said. "You wanted to talk to me about Steve Buckman?"
"Yes."
"You say he's been killed?"
"Yep."
"How did he die?" Atkins said.
"He was murdered."
"Jesus Christ," Atkins said. "What do you need to know?"
"Anything you can tell me," I said. "I'm just feeling my way around in the dark."
"Aren't we all," Atkins said.
"Was he a good football coach?"
Atkins paused a moment, thought about it, and decided.
"Not for us," he said. "This isn't the NFL. Any coach wants to win. But it's also about the kids. About learning to work hard, and achieve some selfcontrol, and respect one another and win with grace and lose with dignity and cooperate, and follow directions, and think on their feet, and, for crissake, to have some fun."
"Buckman get any of that?"
"Got the win part, though not the grace part. Got the follow directions part, as long as they were his directions."
"Did he leave voluntarily?"
"No. I fired him."
"Any specific reason other than being a jerk?"
"I don't even remember the official reason. There always has to be one. But that was the real reason."
"How'd he take that?"
"He said it was a racial thing. Said he was going to kick my ass."
"Did he?"
"He figured he was a pretty tough guy," Atkins said. "Been in the Marines. Was a running back at Pacific Lutheran."
"And?"
"I been in the Marines and played football."
"Where'd you play?"
"SC."
"Offensive tackle?"
"Very."
"So what happened between you and Buckman?"
"I invited him to the office and offered him the chance to kick my ass."
"He take it?"
Atkins smiled. "No."
"He have any kind of part-time job?" I said.
"Most teachers do. I think he was a personal trainer."
"At a gym?"
"No. Takeout. He'd come to your home."
"Besides coaching," I said, "did he teach something?"
Atkins smiled.
"Typing," he said.
"Could he type?"
"I don't think so. But we had to do something with him. We don't pay enough to hire a coach just to coach."
"Know anything about the outfitting business he ran in the desert?"
"I think that was mostly the wife," Atkins said.
"How about the wife?"
"Lou," he said. "He met her in college, I think. She was pleasant, perky at social events. I don't really know her."
"She work as well?" I asked.
"I think she worked with the DWP."
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