Buyer beware

7

I was on the outskirts of Orlando by five that evening, and by five fifteen I was listening to the measured ticking of my directional signal while waiting to make a left off a wide four-lane street to park in front of the Dolphin Motel. The drive had taken longer than I'd planned. A brief late-afternoon shower had slowed highway traffic, and though the sun was out brightly again, there were still a few clear droplets and streaks of rainwater on the compact's windshield and gleaming green hood.

The Dolphin Motel was one of those neat and moderately priced family motels, two stories high and built in a wide, sweeping U around a fenced-in swimming pool. The pool was crowded now with a few adults and a proliferation of the preteen and very young, leaping and splashing with unfeigned ecstasy, as though it would never be over. Near the office I walked past a large sheet-metal dolphin that was lurching repeatedly in clumsy mimicry of that species' graceful arcs through ocean waves. There was a self-satisfied, silly grin on what passed for its face.

Gordon and Melissa Clark were in Number 27, second floor, toward the rear of the motel. I climbed metal steps to an iron-railed cement walkway, stepping aside for another flock of small children. The motel was no doubt packed with families here for the illusory adventure of Disney World. For a moment the memories began to bloom at the back of my mind, and I reminded myself of why I was here.

Gordon Clark opened the door immediately at my knock. He looked fresher than he had at police headquarters. The redness was gone from his eyes and he wore neatly creased plaid pants and a blue short-sleeved sport shirt open at the neck. He invited me in and stepped back.

The room was motel modern-two single beds, angular low furniture and a ceiling fixture that resembled a space satellite. Melissa was sitting cross-legged on the floor, near the foot of one of the beds, piecing together a small jigsaw puzzle. Good practice for her, the way her life was going.

"I'm sorry about how things turned out," I told Clark.

"It wasn't your fault. And I have Melissa." He turned toward her. "Melissa, this is Mr. Nudger."

She glanced up from the puzzle. "He has to shave."

I crossed the room and sat on the edge of the bed nearer her. "I've decided never to shave again. I'm going to grow a long beard and tuck it into my belt."

She looked at me and smiled slightly. "How long will that take?"

"Few days."

Melissa put down her puzzle piece. She was ready to argue about that. "Dave didn't shave once all weekend and his beard wasn't that long."

"Must be something wrong with his beard. Who's Dave?"

"Mommy's friend."

"I came here to talk to you about your mommy."

"She's gone."

"Do you know where?"

"She said she'd be back."

"Did you like living on Star Lane?"

Melissa shrugged and stared down at the half-completed puzzle, a striped kitten jumping over something not yet pieced together.

"It was bigger than your other house, wasn't it?" I asked before she could get interested again in the puzzle. But she was only staring at it for a focal point.

"No," she said, "the other house was bigger, with lots more people in it."

"Where was the other house?"

"On a street with tall houses on it. It was a 'parment."

"An apartment building?"

"Uh-huh."

"In Lay ton?"

"Uh-uh." She shook her head no.

"Where at?"

"On a street with other tall houses on it."

"How far away?"

"Long ways."

She picked up a puzzle piece from the carpet, held it with her little finger extended, as if she were holding toast spread with jam.

"Did you like Dave?" I asked.

"Most times…" she answered absently.

"That one goes there, doesn't it?" I said, helping her fit the piece into the puzzle to complete one of the kitten's forepaws. I was given a smile of gratitude. "Did you like living at the apartment best?"

"No, there were people all the time. Mommy and Vic always had people there, talking 'stead of sleeping."

"Who's Vic?" I asked Melissa, glancing at Gordon Clark, who looked stupefied.

"You know…"

"A friend of Dave's?"

She laughed, picked up another puzzle piece.

"A friend of your mom's?"

"Yes."

"What did all these people talk about when they came to your apartment and you were trying to sleep?"

"Ingerence. Other things sometimes, too."

"I don't know what ingerence is, Melissa."

"Well, that's what they talked about. Mom and Vic talked about it all the time, too."

"Did Dave?"

She laughed again. "You're silly."

"Was your mother happy on Star Lane with Dave?"

She seemed to consider, her wide eyes looking inward. "She was worried all the time."

"Did they ever argue?"

"Uh-huh. The time when Vic didn't shave."

"What did they fight about?"

"I dunno." She had about reached her limit of conversing with me and was being drawn back to the challenge of the puzzle. I leaned down again, helping her fit the pieces.

"Did your mom like Vic better than Dave?"

She giggled as she completed the red ball beneath the kitten.

"Vic and Dave are the same person, aren't they?" I said.

"Course."

"Where did you live before the apartment build-ing?"

"Someplace the same. I'm hungry, Dad."

"We'll eat in a little while, Melissa," Gordon Clark said.

I stood up from the bed. "Thanks for talking to me, Melissa."

"I'm hungry now." 'Okay, honey," Clark said, "in just a little while."

He and I stepped outside on the bright cement walkway.

"Did talking to her help you any?" he asked.

"I know more than I did."

Clark slipped his hands into his pants pockets and stood with his shoulders back, as if to expose himself to the maximum amount of sunlight. "Why do you think this Branly guy called himself Vic?"

I glanced down at the kids yelling and thrashing their way through cool water in the pool. "We'll know that when we find out why he was killed."

"And why Joan's disappeared?"

I nodded. "Why everything." I watched him half close his eyes to the sun. "Do you think Joan might come back to you?"

"No, but I'll let you know if she does." Clark smiled his curiously dreary smile, shook my hand. "I'll mail you the second part of your fee."

"That won't be necessary," I told him. "I didn't earn it." As I heard myself speak, I was amazed at the generosity rooted in my newfound wealth.

"I have Melissa back."

"You probably would have got her back without me."

He slipped the fingertips of his right hand back into his pocket. "I feel I should warn you about something, Nudger."

"Go ahead," I told him. "I have so much to worry about now, it probably won't make much difference."

"In confidence, of course."

"Of course."

"I don't think you should trust your client all the way."

I waited for him to tell me why. He chose not to, so I nodded and thanked him for the word of caution. He was Dale Carlon's son-in-law; he should know.

When Clark opened the door to go inside, Melissa peered out from the comparative dimness of the motel room.

"Come back when you have your beard," she said.

I decided to have dinner at a western-style steak house in Orlando before driving back to Layton. As I ate the surprisingly good rib-eye and baked potato, I thought over my conversation with Melissa. She was a typically succinct and scatterbrained seven-year-old, and though our talk had brought out a few hard facts, I suspected that what she'd given me were puzzle pieces much like the ones she'd held in her hands. Why did Branly use two first names? Where was the apartment in which they'd lived? Who were the people who had visited them often? And what the hell was "ingerence?"

By the time I reached dessert I knew which way I'd have to go in the investigation. Melissa hadn't given me a starting point, so it would have to be the dead David Branly. He was easy enough to keep tabs on, and the Layton police should have had some background information on him by now. If I probed about in that area of time just before his death and traced his movements, I was bound to learn something of the recent activities of Joan Clark. The trouble was that Branly's murderer was also a part of that area of time, making it a dangerous area in which to be probing about.

The house on Star Lane would be the place to start, and with Dale Carlon's influence the Layton police should be completely cooperative.

I finished my ranch-house pudding and signaled a cowgirl for a refill on the coffee. It was going to be a long drive back to Layton.