by Katy Munger
He replied with a rumbling belch. If I'd had a herring, I would have tossed it to him.
"Sorry, babe," he explained. "There's a new Mexican restaurant opened down the block. They deliver."
They'd prosper, too, with him as a client. The most amazing thing about Bobby was that he had a love life. Yes, there were women in Raleigh, North Carolina willing to date a 360-pound man who dressed in polyester clothing, wore heavy gold chains, sported a bad toupee, and groped them with fingers that resembled greasy sausage links.
"Know anyone down at the county registry of deeds?" I asked.
"Sure," he rasped. "Girl named Nancy. Long-legged blonde with a nice pair of credentials and great legs. Bad marriage."
"Tell her I'm on the way, okay? Ask her to pull the file on the plot of land along the Neuse belonging to Ramsey Lee. Pull the deed for the plot directly across the river from it, too. I don't know who owns it or any of the plot numbers. Can she find them for me anyway?"
"Sure, babe. Nancy could find anything. Especially in the dark."
I didn't want to know. I grabbed my pocketbook and made a beeline for the door. Someone had suggested that Thornton Mitchell meet him in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere. I wanted to find out who. The owner of the land was a logical start. Not that I necessarily believed in logic.
The nice "girl" named Nancy was no spring chicken. Fried was more like it. She had bleached blonde hair—but who was I to throw stones?—a dubiously perky bustline, and the kind of leathery face you seldom find north of Boca Raton in these skin-cancer-enlightened times. But she did have great legs, I'd give Bobby that. They scissored toward me, expertly balanced on four-inch heels. "You Casey?" she asked, snapping her gum as if the pop were a question mark at the end of her sentence.
"That's me."
"How's Big Daddy doing?" she asked, sliding two folders my way.
Big Daddy? Please. Not even Tennessee Williams would have found Bobby D. captivating.
"He's fine," I admitted. "Large and in charge, as they say."
"I'll say." She leaned over the counter, giving me a good look at the tops of her breasts. They were the color of coconuts and looked just as hard. They were not, I am grateful to say, as hairy. "That man can make my motor run, know what I mean?" As if to prove it, her nasal voice softened to a purr. I did not ask for details. "I need this back in twenty minutes," she said, raising an eyebrow at the two folders. "My boss is mad at me on account of I told him he was sexually harassing me. So he's not taking kindly to any personal favors I may hand out these days, know what I mean?" The gum cracked again, on cue.
I nodded wisely, woman-to-woman, as if Bobby spent his afternoons chasing me around the desk and I could really relate. In truth, the last guy to sexually harass me—without permission, of course—wound up with hot coffee in the crotch.
I stuffed the folders in my bag and went outside to read them, choosing a nice spot on a brick wall nearby. There was the usual new construction project clogging traffic on the outskirts of the Fayetteville Street Mall. Probably another hopeful office building going up in this no-man's land of urban dreams.
Nancy knew her stuff. She'd pulled the deeds and deed histories on both Ramsey Lee's land and the plot across the river. Ramsey had been left the property by a grandfather fifteen years ago and had held on to every inch of it since. The other deed was even more interesting. The land across the river had belonged to a former councilwoman for the city of Raleigh. She'd donated it to the city about a year and half before for future use as a public park. Apparently there had been some sort of holdup, because there sure as hell was no park on the plot. The file's checkout history on the outside of the folder showed that it had been a hot item over the past six months. Everyone from a city planning committee representative to a parks and recreation commissioner to several lawyers whose names I recognized had been taking a peek. Plus, guess who? Yep—Thornton Mitchell. Something was going on with the land all right. If Nancy didn't know, I'd search NandoNet for news on it.
"Yeah, a lot of action on that folder," Nancy admitted when I returned it. "Don't follow that stuff myself." I had slipped her a twenty and it disappeared faster than you could ask for change. "Why, thanks. That's right nice of you. Can I get you some photostats?" I nodded and handed her the other file.
She took the folders without comment and disappeared into a back room. She was back in less than two minutes with full copies neatly stapled in one corner. She handed them to me with a sunny smile and I realized that Bobby D. was right: she did have a lot of girl in her. "Here ya go, honey," she said with a wink. The crack of her gum had grown merrier with her twenty-dollar windfall and she sounded like microwave popcorn heating.
"Thank you," I said. "Clairol Ash Blonde?"
"L'Oreal," she replied. "Because I'm worth it."
I made it back to the office in time to do a little cyber surfing and put Bobby on the case of the park that was not yet a park. He was still in the same position, what a surprise, and eager to do what he could to earn that triple fee.
"There's something going on with the piece of land where Mitchell was killed," I explained. "The file on it's been checked out a lot over the past few months. I'm going to comb the press clippings. What can you do?"
"Leave it to me, doll face," he promised, reaching for the phone.
I logged on to NandoNet and launched a search using the name of the property's former owner. I got several hits right away. The land had been in her family for generations, but she had deeded it to the city on the stipulation that it be used as a public park for the education of local school children on the importance of natural resource management. After flexing her liberal muscles, she had packed her bags and left with her husband for new digs in Colorado, leaving the land behind for local politicians and developers to squabble over like coyotes fighting over a dead sheep.
Over the last four months, several related proposals concerning the land had been introduced and then tabled during city council meetings, all outlining what construction should take place in order to bring the dream of a Neuse River Park to life. The version I suspected Thornton Mitchell was connected to called for the development of a wide recreational beach along that strip of the Neuse, complete with an artificial pool for swimming alongside its banks, water slides, a huge snack hut, and an intricate network of roads that led north and south into the woods. I had no idea what purpose these roads served, but thought I could guess: he was hoping to use the park as the centerpiece for a new residential subdivision. A surrounding park was a great magnet for home buyers. It guaranteed that, while you might be spoiling the land and view for others, no one could return the favor.
I peered at the color photograph of an elaborate architect's model that accompanied the article. It was complete with miniature trees, Lilliputian gravel walkways, a shining strip of pseudo-Neuse, and a scaled-down eating complex. There was even a tiny Ferris wheel near the beach. It was painted bright red and yellow. Hordes of miniature people streamed toward the Ferris wheel, as if the entire city of Raleigh had been waiting for generations just to get the chance to eat cotton candy along the banks of the Neuse. No wonder the proposal had been shelved. In Raleigh's current climate—which was moving toward development backlash—a project like this was a guaranteed political disaster. I wondered how much Mitchell had had to do with it.
I'd have to wonder a little bit longer. It was time to face the hordes at Stoney Maloney's fundraiser and see if I could track down Madam X. I printed out a copy of the article and left it with Bobby as I dashed out the door. "I need to know who the potential investors in that piece of nonsense were," I told him over my shoulder. "That architectural model must have cost them plenty. Who paid?"
He held the copy of the photo up to the light and squinted. "Man, I love cotton candy," he said.
My wardrobe for the evening was hopeless. Everything was either too low cut, too tight, too short, or too transparent for a conservative college boy shindig. I'd be
fighting off drunken frat boys like a dog in heat intent on preserving her honor horn the neighborhood studs. I finally settled on a sleeveless white dress with a low scoop neckline that almost, but not quite, hit my belly button. It was a little tight on top and I made a mental note that I needed to cut down on the upper body weight machines because I was starting to look like a fire hydrant. But I thought I might be able to salvage the look if I used my ingenuity.
I had a remnant of red satin I'd been considering for curtains and wound it around each breast and over my shoulders like Miss Liberty. It concealed my cleavage and lent a patriotic air to the ensemble. I then tracked down a bright blue negligee that some misguided soul had given me. I wound it into a belt, tying it off with a perky bow that perched on top of my butt as if my rear end was a gift for the entire party. All I had to do was unearth my red pumps, wear pink lipstick, and slap one of those goofy straw campaign hats on my head to hide my roots in order to blend in. Of course, I looked like a float in an election day parade, but we must all suffer for our art.
It cost me twenty bucks to get in at the door and, to cover the cost of what I intended to spend on cocktails, I reminded myself to tell Mary Lee it had been fifty. The fundraiser was being held in the smaller of two basketball gyms at North Carolina State University. The cramped coliseum was not exactly the swankiest of milieus. I'd seen the women's team play there a couple of times, but tonight they'd shoved the bleachers back to one side in order to make room for a raised platform at each end of the court. Long tables lined the remaining side of a large dance floor and served as a cash bar. In a burst of originality, the ceiling and walls had been decorated with red, white, and blue bunting as well as matching balloons. All I had to do was grab onto a rope and hoist myself up into the air if I needed to blend into the crowd.
One of the platforms held a podium and a row of empty chairs. The other held an aging beach music band that was cranking out ancient dance tunes. The crowd was 100 percent white. The band was 100 percent black, a veritable six-pack of Shaft lookalikes left over from the seventies, decked out in knit suits and iridescent open-necked flowered shirts. They were long and lanky, and looked monumentally bored as they moved in time to the familiar sounds of a North Carolina college crowd. It was a time warp. The dance floor was filled with young men and women dressed in madras shorts and light blue or pink work shirts—sleeves rolled up—all wearing sandals or worn topsiders on their sockless feet. They looked exactly like their parents had, as had their parents before them. It was a strange and rigid species. Gold add-a-bead necklaces winked at the throats of the girls, while the boys were distinguished by their common glassy-eyed concentration. The kegs of beer lining the walls behind the makeshift bars explained the stares. These folks were about as politically aware as slugs. They just wanted to get drunk and dance. And what the hell, they were young—and half right.
I approached the closest bar and asked the middle-aged man behind it for a margarita, straight up, no salt.
"You gotta be kidding, lady," he said. Hmm ... a northern import, no doubt. "I can give you frozen from the vat." He flipped a thumb over his shoulder at a large commercial freezer drum, the kind that used to churn frozen custard at Dairy Queens everywhere. Now you most often found them at yuppie bars, spitting out endless ropes of frozen green goo like some kooky apparatus from a Doctor Seuss book. I groaned. Frozen margaritas could really slow you down and I needed a drink to cope with this crowd. Oh well, what's a girl to do but risk brain freeze and make the best of it? I accepted a huge plastic glass of the mixture and noted that, as compensation, the concoction was loaded with enough tequila to put down a moose. I hoped the party organizers had remembered to line the dance floor with puke barrels.
I wandered through the frantic crowd, bumping into sweating college bodies, shrugging off overeager paws and sympathizing with the occasional adult who stood huddled in solitary misery like a disapproving schoolmarm. Working my way across the floor was a bruising experience because the place was jammed, but I'm an expert at negotiating crowded bars and I was able to elbow my way to a corner near the empty platform without spilling a drop of the margarita down my well-draped bosom.
"Nice outfit," a kid inexplicably dressed in a satin smoking jacket told me. He held a pipe and I wanted to tell him that the days of Hugh Hefner were over. But at least he wasn't smoking a cigar. He admired my dress again. "Kind of retro," he added.
I smiled vaguely. What the hell did that mean? I refrained from telling him that he looked like Jerry Lewis in The Nutty Professor.
"Like the band?" he asked, blowing pipe smoke in my face. "I think beach music is sort of passe, but the hordes seem to find it amusing."
I thought pretentious little whippersnappers who tried to pick up older women were even more pass6, but I kept my opinions to myself. "They're perfect for the occasion," I said instead. I had noticed mass movement of bodies toward the empty platform over on the far side of the gym and was pretty sure that Stoney Maloney and his crew were heading for the podium.
As if on cue, the band broke into a sloppy version of "Bony Maronie," originally a Cajun tune that had been bastardized into a rock-n-roll hit in the early 60's and was now being further bastardized into Stoney Maloney's theme song. I clung to my margarita, listening incredulously, as hundreds of young white conservatives raised their voices in anthem, screaming Stoney's name to the music and throwing themselves on the floor to alligator on their bellies across the now-slimy wood like refugees from a remake of Animal House. I downed about half of my drink in a single gulp, brain freeze be damned, while I reflected on how silly white people looked when they danced. Just as Stoney and his aides took the stage, the singing escalated to a roar. Two hefty young men took up positions on either side of an enormous piece of blue bunting that dominated the wall behind the podium. Grasping ropes, they tugged on the curtain and it fell to the floor, revealing a huge banner that read STONEY MALONEY—THE ROCK OF CAROLINA. A roar went up from the crowd and I almost dropped my drink. For a moment I thought it said THE ROCKMAN OF CAROLINA. The idea opened up endless possibilities. Why, he could go from door to door seeking out female constituents and…
My dirty thoughts were interrupted when the ambitious young organizer of the fundraiser began to introduce Stoney. The crowd grew even wilder, hooting and thrusting fists in the air as the kid made one bad joke after another. Of course, this group was so well-lubricated they'd have sent up a cheer if the guy simply stood there and wet his pants. I wondered if the band could hear him and if they appreciated the humor, but when I looked over they were nowhere to be found. Probably smoking pot in a bade hallway. Anyone who still wore their hair in an Afro these days had to have been smoking pot for a long, long time.
Stoney finally stepped up to the podium and began his speech. I have no idea what he said as I could not hear a word above the cheers. But the crowd loved him. They roared whenever he looked up from his notes, waving their plastic cups of draft beer in homage and squealing approval through drunken lips. I kept my eyes glued on the podium, searching for a female who did not belong. Several were scattered among the official party but no one looked particularly smitten by the words of the Rockman. And, frankly speaking, none of them looked attractive enough to be worth risking a political career over.
Stoney Maloney was nobody's fool. He kept the speech short and ended it by exhorting them all to drink and dance their way to victory. As he raised his hands to a final deafening roar of approval, the band wandered back on stage and obligingly broke into "Tighten Up" by Archie Bell and the Drells. The crowd packed together, dancing itself into a drunken frenzy duly sanctioned by the ability to vote. I fought my way to one side where I could finish my margarita in peace.
Stoney was lingering on the platform, reaching down to shake hands in the crowd. He worked the huddled masses expertly, smiling, joking, and ignoring the drunken weaving of his fans. The coeds loved him and you could practically smell the hormonal overdrive in the air. But the Rockma
n kept his distance and lingered with no one too long. He was all business, with nary a personal smile to break the monotony of his plastic grin. And he stayed that way all night long. For the next hour, I dogged Stoney determinedly throughout the coliseum, surveying his entourage, gauging his reactions, keeping my eyes peeled for a particularly favored damsel. It got me nowhere. I finally called it a night after some pie-eyed pudge face stole my makeshift blue bow and ran through the crowd with my negligee on his head. I would have to find out the identity of Stoney's lady love some other intrepid way. Political appearances were just too jammed. I finagled another margarita from the bartender for the drive back home, reminding myself that tomorrow was another day.
I slept like a college drunk that night, dead to the world and all its ambiguities. When I woke the next day, I reminded myself of how good it felt to be clear-headed instead of hung-over, not to mention unencumbered by a snoring young man who would hoover up my pantry's contents within the hour. But I doubted this lesson in sober self-reliance would last. I knew myself too well.
1-40 was remarkably deserted, the empty lanes stretching out invitingly in the morning breeze. I could have driven forever, but duty called. I made it to downtown Raleigh in under thirty minutes.
"Looking good, Casey," Bobby D. whistled through a mouthful of the ubiquitous cheese and peanut butter snack known in the South as "nabs." Garishly orange crumbs peppered his chin and masked the twinkling of his single gold tooth when he smiled. "You get a makeover down at Thalheimer's or something?"
"Yep," I replied. "And I'm scheduled for a personality transplant at noon." His little dig did not bother me a bit. I did look good—and for good reason. I was considering storming the gates of the Citadel that day, or at least trying to see the great white hope himself. If Stoney Maloney was in the mood. So I was dressed accordingly in white linen pants and a short matching jacket over an ivory tee shirt. I felt like a giant vanilla ice cream cone, but I looked respectable and that's what counted.