Fletch Won

“News-Tribune resource desk. Code and name, please.”

“Hiya, Pilar. How’re you doin’?”

“Good morning. This is Mary.”

“Oh. Good morning, Mary.”

“Code and name, please.”

Still ravenously hungry, Fletch was glad at least to be back in his own car, headed for his own apartment. “Seventeen ninety dash nine. Fletcher.”

Jogging to the bus stop, his eyes scanning the storefronts for a place open for breakfast, Fletch then realized he had no money. The police had stolen his wallet and keys. The thought amused him that if he robbed a convenience store, Alexander Liddicoat would be blamed.

His car was in the parking lot of a pizza store way out at the beach. He hitchhiked. The first driver who picked him up was a middle-aged man who sold musical instruments. He tried to interest Fletch in the roxophone. He was then picked up by a van filled with kids headed for the beach. At that hour of the morning they were passing around a joint of marijuana and already had finished one quart of white wine. A group of youngsters headed for the beach on a fine morning, each was near tears. It was past nine o’clock by the time Fletch arrived at his car, removed the parking-violation notice from it, hot-wired it, and started the drive back to his apartment.

“Messages for you,” said the resource desk’s Mary over the car phone. “Someone named Barbara called. Sounds like a personal message.”

“Yes?”

“We’re not supposed to take too many personal messages, you know.”

“Ah, come on, Mary. Be a sport.” Fletch’s hunger, the morning’s heat, the bright sunlight, made his eyes and head ache.

“Message is, ‘Did you eat all the pizza yourself? All is forgiven. Please phone.’ ”

The reference to pizza made his tum-tum beat a tom-tom.

“Well?” Mary asked.

“Well what?”

“Did you eat all the pizza yourself?”

“Mary, that’s a personal question. No personal questions, please.”

“You did. I think you ate the pizza yourself. There’s nothing worse than expecting someone to bring you a pizza and that someone eats it all himself.”

“Mary, have you had breakfast this morning?”

“Yes.”

“I haven’t.”

“You don’t need breakfast, with all the pizza you ate.”

“Is there another message?”

“I wouldn’t forgive you. Yes. Ann McGarrahan wants to hear from you. Message is, ‘Fletch, know you have your hands full with present assignment but please phone in. Beware B.W. and other social diseases.’ ”

“Okay.”

“What’s B.W.?”

“Mary, that’s another personal question.”

“I never heard of B.W.”

“You’re lucky.”

“I thought I knew all the social diseases. I mean, I thought I knew of them.”

“Fine. Now I need the address of Felix Gabais.” He spelled the name for her. “In the St. Ignatius district.”

“Aren’t you going to warn me about B.W.?”

“Mary? Stay away from B.W.”

“I mean, how do you catch it?”

“Sticking your nose in places it doesn’t belong.”

“Oh, we never do things like that. There’s only one Gabais in the St. Ignatius district. First name, Therese.”

“That’s it. He lives with his sister.”

“That’s 45447 Twig Street. Mapping shows the address to be a half-block west of a car dealership on the corner.”

“Thank you. One more: I need the address of Stuart Childers.” Again he spelled the name.

“That’s disgusting,” she said. “Anyone who does that deserves B.W.”

“Mary…”

“That’s 120 Keating Road. Mapping shows that to be Harndon Apartments. Swank.”

“Okay. Thanks.”

“I shouldn’t tell you this, I suppose, but Mr. Wilson called in a while ago. He wanted that address, too.”

“Which address?”

“The one in St. Ignatius. Therese Gabais.”

“Mary, you’ve already got B.W.”

“Oh, don’t say that.”

“Be careful, Mary. B.W. can lay you up a long time.”

“This is an answering machine,” Fletch said into his apartment phone on the third ring. “I am not able to come to the phone just now—”

“Fletch!” Barbara shouted through the phone. “You don’t have an answering machine!”

“Oh,” Fletch said. “I forgot.”

Fletch didn’t have much. Across from the rickety, secondhand couch where he sat, posters were on the wall of the harbor of Cagna, on the Italian Riviera, of Cozumel, in eastern Mexico, of Belize, of Nairobi, Kenya, of Copacabana, in Rio de Janiero, Brazil. He hoped someday to have some really decent photographs on his wall, a proper collection. Someday, maybe, he’d have walls big enough to hold some decent copies of the paintings of Edgar Arthur Tharpe, Jr., the western artist.

“Are you all right?”

“Of course.” On the chipped plate on the chipped coffee table in front of him there was very little left of his breakfast of scrambled eggs, waffles, and bacon. “Why do you ask?”

“You went out for pizza last night at eleven o’clock! And you never came back!”

“Oh, God! I didn’t! Are you sure?”

“You never even phoned!”

“I did not eat all the pizza myself. I didn’t get any of it.”

“Were you in an accident, or something?”

“Or something. How come you’re free to phone me? Cecilia finally get a customer for her jodhpurs?”

“I’m doing an errand for her, at the drugstore. We damned near starved to death.”

“Did you lost those eight pounds you don’t like?”

“I think I did.”

“What did you and Cindy do?”

“Went to bed, finally. What else could we do? We waited for you until past one o’clock.”

“Did Cindy stay the night?”

“Of course. What else? We’d had drinks, remember? She knew she shouldn’t drive.”

“Yeah.”

“Damned inconsiderate of you. You could have at least phoned.”

“I could’ve?”

Hung from the ceiling across the room was his surfboard, a thing of beauty, a joy forever.

“We were worried. I phoned the pizza store. The man said no one named Fletcher had been there.”

“You ordered in the name of Ralton.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot. Where did you spend the night?”

“Long story. Mind if I tell you later?”

“Does it have to do with Habeck?”

“I guess so.” Fletch looked at his plate. His headache was gone.

“Did you read Biff Wilson’s piece this morning?”

“Yeah.” The News-Tribune was on the couch beside Fletch. It was not reported that a gun, the possible murder weapon, had been turned in to police the night before.

“His piece strongly indicates, Fletch, that Habeck was bumped off by the mob because he knew too much.”

Fletch sighed. “Maybe he’s right.”

“I mean, really, Fletch, how long has he been covering crime for the News-Tribune?”

“A long time.”

“He must have contacts everywhere.”

“He must have.”

“I mean, sure, people must talk to him: the police, mobsters, informants. He probably has it all figured out.”

“Probably.”

“There’s little point in your being up all night, losing sleep over it. There’s no point at all in your losing your job over it.”

“Listen, Barbara, I’ve got to shave and shower and get to work.”

“Ate all the pizza, and slept late. And I’m marrying you?”

With a flick of his fingers, Fletch knocked the News-Tribune onto the floor.

“I’d have second thoughts, if I were you,” Fletch said.

“Too late. I’m on my umpteenth thought. Remember you’re having dinner with my mother tonight.”

“Absolutely.”

“Six o’clock at the beach house. If you disappoint her again, all her doubts about you will turn into certainties, for sure.”

“For sure.”

“You’ll be there?”

“Absolutely.”

“Okay. By the way, Cindy said to call her at twelve-thirty sharp at 555-2900. She’ll answer the phone herself.”

“Say again? That’s not the number of Ben Franklyn.”

“No. She said she’ll just be there at that time, waiting for you to call. That’s 555-2900. She’ll have things to tell you then.”

“Okay.”

“Fletch, this is Wednesday.”

“Already?”

“We’re getting married Saturday. You absolutely must be at dinner tonight.”

“Okay.”

“There are things to discuss.”

“Okay, okay.”

“I’ve got to get back to work,” Barbara said.

Fletch said, “Yeah. Me, too.”