32 Cadillacs

Chapter twenty-seven

That same evening, back in Iowa, the first tentative bands of Gypsies were gathering around the edges of Stupidville like rime ice at the edges of a pond at the first freeze of winter. No ice crackled in the corridors of the Stupidville General Hospital, not yet, but it was coming. Oh, it was coming.

Inside the hospital, Barney Hawkins, Democrat National Assurance Company’s adjuster, was red in the face as he strode up and down Staley Zlachi’s room with short, jerky steps. Veins swelled dangerously along the sides of his neck. His suit coat was thrown across the empty other bed. Sweat mooned his armpits.

“Lissen, Klenhard” — his voice made the word an epithet — “you know an’ I know you’re faking it, but—”

“Not by the reflex tests,” said Lulu calmly from her chair by the window. “You watch ’em yourself, mister — by them, my Karl, he got no feeling in his legs.”

As for Staley, he said nothing. In his Klenhard persona he lay on his back under the blankets with his eyes closed.

“Goddammit, man! Are you even listening—”

“You’ll bring on another attack,” warned Lulu.

Hawkins stopped in the middle of the floor and bent over almost double, like a man in pain. He finally straightened up and sighed deeply. “Look, I know you’ve got some shyster lawyer you won’t even tell me his name, but I’ve made a good offer—”

“Fifteen thousand,” said Lulu in disdain. “For my Karl living the rest of his days precarious-like, in pain and possible danger of being paralyzed forever?”

“Twenty.”

Lulu didn’t even deign to reply. Hawkins’s face became scarlet again. With visible effort he got control.

“You’re nothing, you know. Shit on a stick. But I wanta get you off the books because I have some really important cases piling up. So I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll go to the absolute limit.” He lowered his voice. Staley opened an eye to squint at him. “I’ll go to twenty-five thousand.” Hawkins pasted a smile on his face. “And I’m a man of my word. Twenty-five thousand, I got the papers in my briefcase, you can—”

“Seventy-five,” said Staley. And closed the eye again.

“And not a penny less,” chimed in Lulu instantly.

Hawkins snatched up his jacket and stormed out. In the hall he yelled, “I’ll see you both in hell before I go one cent over twenty-five!” As he charged off and the door slowly shut on its pneumatic closer, his voice got smaller and smaller like a Louis L’Amour hero riding off into the sunset. “Crazy bastards think... wouldn’t give my mother a seventy-five-K settlement...”

Staley threw back the bedclothes and slid his bare feet to the floor. He began striding up and down the narrow room, his crumpled white hospital gown fluttering open behind him.

“Are the rom gathering?”

Lulu nodded, then frowned. “Yes. I’m keeping them away from the hospital — you’re too sick to see them. But...”

“But you’re right, Lulu darling. We can’t stall them much longer. Guess it’s time to settle with Hawkins.”

Just then the doorknob turned. With remarkable agility, Staley leaped into bed and jerked the covers up as Lulu, out of her chair with equal alacrity, grabbed up his glass of water and dashed it in his face. Crichton entered to find Staley flat on his back, tossing his sweat-beaded head from side to side on the soaked pillow.

“I heard Hawkins all the way down in the doctor’s lounge,” Crichton began apologetically. “Did he...”

“Terrible abusive, he was,” snuffled Lulu. She was dabbing the moisture off Staley’s contorted features. “He swore an’ called my Karl names...”

Crichton sighed. “I’ll see he doesn’t get in here to bother you again.”

They grinned at each other as the door closed behind him.

“Three-four days oughtta do it,” said Staley.

“Yes, my beloved,” said Lulu warmly.

In San Francisco, it was a night for lovemaking. And con games. And maybe jealous rages.

Bart Heslip and his forever lady, Corinne Jones, were buying a house together above Parnassus in that maze of little streets twisting up the side of Twin Peaks. It was a Victorian with dark hardwood walls and floors, big front windows, an upstairs, an old-fashioned swing on a front porch with chunky balustrades, and a modern kitchen with a microwave and an electric stove that Corinne had installed herself and loved.

Walking uphill from the bus at six o’clock, she found Bart in the kitchen with lamb chops in the broiler, mashed potatoes warm on the stove, brussels sprouts in the microwave, and a green salad on the countertop he’d laid tile by tile.

“My God!” she exclaimed, folding herself into his thick black arms. “It’s a miracle!”

“C’mon, I do lots of cookin’ around here...”

“Microwave popcorn,” she said, opening things and peeking into things and sniffing things. “Hot dogs. But lamb chops... and even a crucifer...” She laughed over her shoulder at his sour face. “What you want? You must want somethin’...”

Bart suddenly grinned. “How about you?” he said.

“That can be arranged.”

It was.

An hour later they sat down to dinner by candlelight, Bart waving his arms around as he told her just how much he wasn’t accomplishing on the Great Gyppo Hunt.

“Everybody’s grabbing cars but me! Even Trin Morales got one of ’em, for God sake! Morales!”

By soft candleglow, Corinne’s black eyes gleamed in her heart-shaped brown face. She was a beautiful woman, with high cheekbones off an Egyptian wall painting and a wide warm kissable mouth. Bart was stirred again just looking at that face.

“You always said he was a very good detective.”

Heslip laid down his knife and fork to gesture some more.

“Also a son of a bitch, unlike the other Latinos I know. Point is, he doesn’t know anything more about Gyppos than I do — but he’s scored. Larry’s got his fortune-teller feedin’ him leads, Giselle’s got some secret informant, O’B just busted one out by the Cow Palace, the Great White Father is down in L.A. knocking ’em off...”

“And poor little Bart Heslip is a pseudo house-husband stuck at home baking cookies for his wage-earning cutie.”

“Well, damn near.”

They both laughed, and tinked their wineglasses gaily; and the phone rang. Corinne wiped her mouth as she stood up.

“It’ll be the office.”

The year before, she had taken over as manager of the downtown travel bureau where she had worked for several years; she and Bart were even talking about buying in when the owner retired. The promotion had meant more money, but in the recession crunch the agency had taken to staying open until seven o’clock weekday evenings, and problems were usually bounced back to Corinne even if she had gone home for the night.

But it was Giselle Marc’s familiar voice on the phone. After hello-hello, Corinne said, “I hear you have a mysterious Gypsy informant all of your own.”

“Mysterious is right,” said Giselle. “One cryptic phone call that led me to a mark who led me to Larry’s fortuneteller.”

“Jealously among the Gyppos?” asked Corinne.

“Something like that, maybe I’ll know more tonight.” She added quickly, “Don’t tell Bart that, he’ll tell Larry and—”

Corinne chuckled. “Gotcha.” Giselle had told her all about Yana and the claws she had in Larry.

“Speaking of Bart the Incredible Hulk, is he around?”

“And grouchy as a bear.”

“Then I think I have some good news for him.”

Heslip was standing beside her when she turned to look for him; he always knew when she was talking with Giselle. The two women had gone through a couple of things together that had made them the same kind of real friends he and Larry were.

He took the receiver from Corinne’s hand, making a kissing mouth at her as she went back to her dinner before it got cold.

“Ed McMahon called, I’m worth millions?”

“Next best thing,” said Giselle. “Dan has a chokehold on Poteet and the man is paying off like a drilled slot machine.”

Cutting lamb, Corinne watched Bart write things down. She knew him so well. They had met just before he had quit the ring, and for years she had hated his being a detective as much as she’d hated his being a boxer, had even convinced herself she hated Dan Kearny for making him a DKA associate. But finally she had realized that Bart defined himself by the game, and his game was Me against You, whether in the ring or in the field.

Me against You, and no color, no social status, no educational differences to worry about. Delinquent debtor, dead-beat, embezzler, skip, defrauder, personal injury cheat, they were all the same. For Bart, just Me against You, physical if you wanted it that way, but usually outguessing, outthinking, or outfacing you to bring you down. In a way she’d even come to approve of it — she couldn’t deny that sort of excitement and challenge to her man...

Who was writing and mumbling, “Yeah, yeah, I got it, mmhmm, Seattle... Yeah. And that’s... Okay, J-O-S-E-F — that’s with an ‘F’—A-D-A-M-O. And his scam... Road paving. We got an address or... Just check on new subdivisions, huh? Okay, Got it. And Chicago... hold it a see...”

He started another REPO ON SIGHT order.

“In Chicago it’s... Mmmhmm, N-A-N-O-O-S-H... what was the second... T-S-A-T-S-H-I-M-O — Tsatshimo, that right?... Yeah... Metal plating? What the hell is... Okay, got you... Yeah... Either likely to be using his real name?... Okay, sure, I’ll call you, give you my motel soon’s I get... Yeah, I’ll fly tonight. Soon’s I can get to the airport...”

He talked a few moments more, hung up, turned to Corinne wearing a face alight with excitement.

“Honey, old Dan Kearny turned this L.A. Gyppo upside down and shook him, and out popped—”

“Seattle and Chicago and a couple of Gyps with names like rare diseases.”

He chuckled. “Think you’re so smart! Anyway, I gotta—”

“Soon as you can get to the airport?”

Her tantalizing Mona Lisa smile made Heslip realize he was going to be several long days — and nights — away from her sweet face and sweet body and that sweet loving he’d just had some of not long before...

“Well, baby, all that ‘soon’ talk is relative, isn’t it? Gotta find out when there’s a Seattle flight, no use hanging around the airport for hours... What’s ‘soon,’ after all...”

Somehow, they never did finish that fine dinner house-husband Heslip had slaved over.