Every Man a King

31

I literally staggered back to Aja’s chair and sat down hard. The springs were still juddering when there came a knock on the door.

Pistol in hand I went to an awkward corner, pointed the gun at the midpoint of the door, and said aloud, “Who is it?”

“Olo.”

It took a moment for the name I’d coined to break through the fear.

“Olo?”

“Yes, Joe, it’s me.”

When I opened the door and saw my Mel-provided bodyguard I wanted to hug her, I really did. She saw the embrace in my posture and I think she would have allowed it. But I held back.

“Did you see them?” I asked.

“I heard you talking in here,” she said. “I waited by the door in case of trouble. And then, when they came out, I went down around the corner until they were gone. That was Cassandra Brathwaite, wasn’t it?”

“You know her?”

“Int-Op has done work for her before.”

“I thought I was dead.”

“Feels kinda good when you come out the other side, doesn’t it?”

“I can see why Melquarth likes you so much.”

I kept a fifth of sixteen-year-old hundred-proof single-malt Laphroaig Scotch in my office. Oliya joined me in a shot.

“How did it go with Monica and her man?” I asked while pouring the second hit.

“She was nervous all the way until we got to Mookie’s. But the minute they saw each other they were fine. Better than that. They started taking off each other’s clothes in the back seat on the way to the lawyer’s.”

“Makes you wanna think twice before falling in love.”

“What’s next, Joe?”

“I need to go out of town again.”

“I’ll come along.”

“No. I want you to watch over Aja and her great-grandmother.”

She took me in with her eyes and then nodded.

In the morning I called Minta Kraft.

“Hello?”

“Hey, Minta, Joe Oliver here.”

“Mr. Oliver.”

“I need to talk to Mathilda.”

“Have you heard from her?”

“No. I’m calling because of what they’re saying about her husband.”

“She’s gone.”

“Gone where?”

“I don’t know.”

“How can that be? You’re the one that drives her around.”

“When she didn’t come down for breakfast, I went to her room and she was just gone.”

The story sounded true enough — as far as it went.

“If she calls will you tell me?” I asked.

“Yes. And if you hear from her please let me know.”

Three hours later I was on a flight to Blue Grass Airport in Lexington, Kentucky, birthplace of the incomparable Muhammad Ali.

There I encountered a smiling redheaded young woman standing behind a counter. Her name tag read SHAWNEE. Shawnee managed the local car rental concession at the far end of the small airport.

“I need a car,” I told her.

“What kind you want?” she replied, a big smile on her face.

“As small as you got.”

“We have a six-year-old Volkswagen. That’s the smallest. It’s in good shape ’cause nobody hardly ever wants it.”

It took about four hours to get to the tiny town of Peanut in southeastern Kentucky. The Wikipedia entry still described it as a coal miners’ town with a mostly Black population. Main Street was paved and quite lovely, but many of the roads that led away from the downtown were still dirt lanes.

Across the street from city hall was a big glittery cube that encompassed an entire country block. It was, and is, the most anomalous piece of architecture I’ve ever seen. It could have been a beached spacecraft as far as anyone might know.

I went into the city hall, finding what once might have been called an effeminate Black man sitting behind a small oak desk in a large atrium, alone.

“May I help you?” the pecan-colored dandy asked. His suit was very yellow and his shirt a cobalt blue. The slant of his satin white necktie reminded me of a smile made vertical. It brought the grin out in me.

“Yes, I’m looking for a young woman named Mathilda Prim.”

“Oh,” he said exhibiting some surprise. “Mattie. I haven’t thought about her in some years. What’s your business with her?”

“Is she in town? The last time I saw her she was in Long Island, New York, but she said that she spent some part of the year down here.”

“What’s your name?” the little seated man asked.

“Joe. Joe Oliver.”

“I’m Peter Southbrook.” He stood and held out a hand for me to shake.

“Nice to meet you, Mr. Southbrook.”

“You too, Mr. Oliver.”

We stood there for an awkward moment, as if maybe the conversation was over.

“So,” I said. “What about Mathilda Prim?”

“Well, Joe, I haven’t seen Mattie in a few years. But that doesn’t mean she’s not here.”

“She still have people in Peanut?”

“Most of them moved away some time after she did.”

“Sounds like a migration,” I said.

“They were a tough bunch,” Peter informed. “Fightin’, drugs, and there was what you might call a looseness in their women.”

Mr. Southbrook did not approve of the Prim Bunch, that much was sure. His dislike of them might have tinted my presence in his eyes.

“That hotel at the north end of the street,” I said.

“Minerva’s Inn? What about it?”

“That the only inn in town?”

“You’re planning to stay?”

“I would like to find Mathilda. From what you tell me it might take a bit.”

Peter Southbrook took a few moments to digest my plans.

Finally he said, “Minerva’s is the only inn in twenty-two miles. But there’s no businessmen in town around now. You should get a room pretty easy.”

“Thank you, Mr. Southbrook. You’ve been very helpful.”

“That’s my job.”

“You’re the welcome wagon?”

“I’m the mayor of Peanut,” he said proudly.

“Down here all by yourself. Is this some kind of holiday?”

He laughed. “No, sir, most of the municipal offices are upstairs. I sit down here alone so people can see what they voted for.”

Minerva’s Inn was walking distance from the town hall. It stood four stories and looked refurbished. The bricks were all neat, cleaned, and repointed. There was a flower box outside each window, all of them blooming with multicolored mums and daisies.

I wasn’t so much aware of the stifling heat until I walked into the overlarge guesthouse.

It must’ve been thirty degrees cooler in there.

I counted fourteen paces from the front door to the reception desk. There sat a bronze-skinned round woman wearing a floral dress. She seemed to be bubbling with goodwill.

“Hello,” she erupted. “I’m Wilma. Please, have a seat.”

The chair was fashioned from dark wood and was upholstered with turquoise felt that matched the color of the thick carpeting.

I sat and said, “Nice to meet you, Wilma. My name is Joe.”

It was then I saw it. The smiling hotelier was completely without empathy. I was nothing more than the cause for a brief, unpleasant performance. I think that she saw the revelation in my eyes.

“How can I help you, Joe?” she said, her brilliant smile having dimmed by half.

“I need a room for a night or two.”

“Oh. I’m so sorry. We’re booked for the next week.”

“Doesn’t look that busy.”

“A group of technicians are coming in this evening.”

“Technicians?”

“They come down here sometimes, to work at the Big Nickel.”

“That metal building down the street?”

“Yes,” she said, a little impatiently.

“What do they do there?”

“I wouldn’t know. They built it two years ago and hired about eight hundred Peanutians.” She pronounced the last word the way one would refer to the inhabitants of Venus.

“Some kind of science lab?”

“Is there anything else I can do for you, Joe?”

“Mayor Southbrook told me that there were lots of rooms available at Minerva’s.”

“Mayor Southbrook doesn’t keep the reservations log.”

The smile was gone.

Outside again I felt the heat. For the first time in a long while I wished I had a bigger car. The cramped seating of a Volkswagen Bug is not conducive to sleep. But that was the only place I had to rest. I was sure this was the place that would lead me to Mathilda Prim.

I’d spent a good deal of my adult life around the rich and powerful. As a cop I stood outside protecting their properties and their secrets. As a PI I went into those lives. In all those years I never felt much empathy for my betters. But Mathilda was different. I wanted her secure and adored the way millions felt about Jackie O and Princess Di. It was a powerful feeling. I don’t believe I’d ever want anyone to feel that way about me.

“Mr. Oliver.”

Walking on the hot pavement, I was transported as my grandmother sometimes was in church. I felt that if I found Quiller’s widow I’d be saved or, at least, successful.

“Mr. Oliver! Yoo-hoo!”

The words were like a nagging thought you want to forget.

“Mr. Oliver!”

Wilma was running up the block in my direction. She wasn’t built for that kind of locomotion. I stopped and then began to walk toward her. Relieved, she stopped completely, bending over almost far enough to touch her knees.

“What’s the problem, Wilma?”

She had to take in six or seven sorely needed breaths before answering.

“I just realized that we have one vacant room. It’s a room without a number and so it doesn’t have a place on the computerized spreadsheet.”

Taking in a deep breath, she stood up straight.

“I’m sorry if I was rude to you,” she added. “It’s been a long day.”