Midnight Pass

6

Traffic was weekday-morning heavy on both I-4 and I-75. I was back in the DQ parking lot and climbing the concrete stairs to my office and home a little after nine-thirty.

I called Kenneth Severtson’s number. No answer. I was relieved. I didn’t want to talk to him. I didn’t want questions.

“Your wife and kids will probably be back tomorrow,” I told his machine. “They’re fine. Be nice. Stark’s dead. Killed himself. A long story. Your wife will tell you.”

There was one message on my answering machine. It was one of the secretaries in the law offices of Tycinker, Oliver, and Schwartz.

“Mr. Fonesca”-her voice came through flat and dry-“Mr. Tycinker asked me to remind you that he needs those papers served on Mickey Donophin before Saturday. If we do not hear from you, he will assume you are unable to do this and will contact the Freewell Agency.”

I called Tycinker, Oliver, and Schwartz. There was no one there, but there was an answering machine.

“This is Lewis Fonesca,” I told it. “Tell Mr. Tycinker I’ll have the papers in Mickey Donophin’s hands within twenty-four hours.”

I hung up, got my soap, a towel, toothbrush and toothpaste, and my electric razor and moved toward the rest room I shared with the other tenants and Digger, an otherwise homeless old man, who was standing in front of the mirror over the sink when I went through the door.

“Ah,” he said, looking at me in the mirror. “The little Italian.”

The rest room was almost always clean, which came as a stunning surprise to most visitors. A smiling, retarded man named Marvin Uliaks, for whom I had recently done a job, kept clean the rest room and most of the stores and storefront businesses on the three-block stretch of the seven short blocks of 301 between Main and the Tamiami intersection. He accepted whatever the business owners wanted to give him and smiled even when he was given only a quarter.

“How do I look?” Digger said, turning to me.

He looked like a disheveled mess of a human being who had put on a wrinkled gold tie that had nothing to do with his wrinkled blue-and-red striped shirt and sagging dark trousers.

“Dapper,” I said as he gave me room to get to the sink.

“Got a job interview,” he said over my shoulder, checking his tie in the mirror.

There was no hint of alcohol on his breath. There never was. Digger didn’t drink. He couldn’t afford to. He had told me when we first encountered each other by the urinal a few months ago that he neither drank nor took drugs.

“It’s my mind,” he had said. “Doesn’t function right. I lose days, weeks, get headaches, fall a lot.”

“Where’s the job interview?”

He moved out of the way so I could brush my teeth.

“Jorge and Yolanda’s,” he said, checking his own teeth over my shoulder and rubbing them with his finger.

I held up my tube of Colgate, and he held out a finger for me to drop some toothpaste on it.

“Obliged,” he said as I stepped out of the way after rinsing my mouth so he could work on his teeth.

Jorge and Yolanda’s was a second-floor ballroom-dance studio right across the street. I could see it from my office window.

Satisfied with his teeth, Digger rinsed with a handful of tap water and stepped back. I turned on my razor.

“Want to know what I’ll be doing?” he asked.

To the hum of my razor, I looked at him in the mirror and said, “Yes.”

“Dancing,” he said.

“Dancing?”

I stopped shaving.

“They have dances for their clients and prospective clients every Friday night,” he said. “They need extra men because they have more women than men. What’re you looking at me like that for? I’m a terrific dancer. Anything, you name it, waltz, tango, fox-trot, rumba, swing. You name it. I get fifteen bucks and all the appetizers I can eat every Friday night providing I don’t make a hog of myself.”

Digger used to be a pharmacist. He sometimes slept in a closet of one of the twenty-four-hour Walgreen’s. There was a seemingly infinite number of Walgreen’s and Eckerd drugstores in Sarasota, an even greater number of banks, and a supply of cardiologists, oncologists, and orthopedic surgeons that probably rivaled Manhattan’s.

I knew little about Digger’s past, didn’t want to know more.

“Sounds great,” I said, returning to my shaving. “Good luck.”

He looked at himself in the mirror again.

“Haven’t got a chance, have I?”

“Not a chance in the world,” I said, finishing my shave and checking my face for places I might have missed.

“What the hell. I said I was coming in, answered an ad in the paper. Said I was coming in. What the hell? It’s just across the street. What have I got to lose? You know?”

He started to loosen his tie.

“Got this tie at the Goodwill for a quarter,” he said. “Real silk, just this little stain where you can’t even really notice, but what the hell.”

“What time’s your appointment?” I asked, washing my face.

“Just said I should drop by some time after ten, but what the hell.”

“You’ve got time to shave, use a comb, get a pair of pants that fit, a white shirt, and a pair of socks and shoes at the Women’s Exchange.”

The Women’s Exchange consignment and resale shop was a few blocks down Oak Street.

“That’d cost,” he said, looking at me with eyes showing a lot of red and little white.

“How much?”

I dried my face.

“Ten, fifteen bucks,” he said.

I fished out a twenty and held it out. Digger took it.

“I gotta pay this back?” he asked.

“Get yourself something at the DQ if there’s anything left,” I said.

“Don’t worry,” Digger said, some of his confidence returning. “This isn’t a precedent.”

“I know,” I said. “Good luck.”

“Thanks. I tell you something? Now that the twenty is in my pocket?”

I nodded.

“You never smile.”

I nodded again.

“Some things are funny,” he said.

“Some things.”

“I mean, I’m not talking about a big smile like one of those yellow stickers. Just something besides doom and gloom.”

I imagined Lillian Gish in Broken Blossoms, pushing up the corners of her mouth into a pathetic smile when her brute father ordered her to smile.

“I’m working on it,” I said, towel folded around my soap and shaving gear. “Know any jokes?”

“Couple maybe, if I can remember them,” he said. “Never could remember jokes. Wait, I’ve got one.”

He told it. I took out my notebook and wrote it down. The list for Ann Horowitz was growing. I already had the start of a second-rate stand-up act.

Digger looked as if he had something more to say but couldn’t come up with it.

“Wish me luck,” he said, going out the rest-room door ahead of me.

“Luck,” I said, and headed back to my office.

There were three new messages on my answering machine. I didn’t play them back. I knew I had a dying politician to find and not much time to do it and some papers to serve for the law firm of Tycinker, Oliver, and Schwartz, but there were other things more important at the moment, like spending the day on my cot sleeping when I could, watching a video of Panic in the Streets or A Stolen Life. I was trying to cut back on my dosage of Mildred Pierce.

I took off my pants and shirt, draped them on the wooden chair, and lay down after removing my shoes.

I didn’t have to sleep. Dreams came while I was awake. The dying Stark would be added to my sleeping nightmares. My waking dreams always came back to moments with my wife, little moments. A laugh shared across the table at the Bok Choy Restaurant, our buttery fingers meeting in a box of popcorn while we watched a movie I couldn’t remember. Her holding my face in her cool hands and looking into my eyes after we had an argument until I grinned and conceded her victory. Picking out the car in which she was killed.

There was an endless supply of pain. I savored every image, my depression fed on it. It wasn’t simply self-pity. There was some of that, but it was that deep sense of void, loss that I wanted to hold onto and lose at the same time.

I fell asleep before I could insert a videotape. I dreamed of nothing and was awakened by the ringing of the telephone. It was still light outside. I checked my watch. It was almost seven at night. The sun was going down. I went into the office and picked up the phone a ring before the machine kicked in to take the message.

“Fonesca,” I said.

“What happened?”

It was Kenneth Severtson asking a reasonable question.

“I left a message on your machine.”

I looked at the battered metal box I had picked up in a pawnshop on Main Street.

“So?” he asked anxiously.

I told him the story and ended with “They should be home soon. Your wife had to answer a few questions for the police.”

Long, long pause.

“He killed himself in front of Kenny and Sydney? She was in bed with him in front of Kenny and Sydney.”

“They were in another room. They’re young,” I said. “I don’t think the sex part sunk in.”

I didn’t believe that and I wasn’t sure he would either, but it was a lie he could pretend to hang onto if he really wanted it.

“I’m thinking about a divorce and asking for custody of the children,” he said.

“Talk to Sally.”

“I don’t know. I want things the way they were,” he said, thinking out loud.

“I know, but it won’t happen. You take her back, you take the pain. There are things harder to take. Talk to Sally.”

“If there’s ever anything I can do,” he said.

I thought of asking him if he knew any jokes, but decided to say, “Thanks, you owe me some money. You can send it to me or drop it off.”

“How much?”

“Three hundred,” I said. “I’ve got to go.”

I played the messages, erased Severtson’s and two from Dixie to call her. I dialed Dixie at home.

“It’s me, Lew,” I said before she could cough or say hello in her fake hoarse voice.

“Roberta Goulding had a brother and a sister,” she said. “Brother, seven years younger, Charles. Sister, six years younger, now Mrs. Antony Diedrich living with her husband in Fort Worth. He’s got a Toyota and a Buick dealership. Don’t know where the brother is.”

“Thanks, Dixie,” I said.

“That’s not why I called mainly,” she said. “Kevin Hoffmann, member of the board of just about everything in Sarasota, major contributor to the Ringling Museum, Asolo Theater, Sarasota Ballet, Sarasota Opera, Pine View School and Booker School Scholarship funds, Committee to Open Midnight Pass. Goes on and on.”

“He’s bought lots of friends.”

“One might conclude,” said Dixie. “Makes lots of money, like lots.”

“Like?”

“Taxes on income over the past six years show over a million and half a year, some years over two million,” she said.

“Thanks,” I said.

“You haven’t heard the best,” she said. “He’s going to have a birthday Sunday.”

“I’m happy for him,” I said.

“You might want to give him a present,” she said, and told me why.

When I hung up with Dixie, I called Roberta Trasker. She answered after three rings.

“It’s Lew Fonesca,” I said.

“You found William?”

“You know Kevin Hoffmann?”

The pause was long. I opened the phone book and searched the pages for Hoffmann’s number while I waited. He wasn’t listed.

“Yes,” she said. “Socially. He and his wife, Sharon, and William had business with him. Sharon left him about five or six years ago.”

“You said ‘William had’ business with Hoffmann.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I suppose I’m…”

“I understand. Mind if I call Hoffmann and ask him if he has some idea where your husband is?”

“No,” she said. “I gather you haven’t gotten very far in finding William.”

“One small step closer,” I said. “I’ll call you when I have more. You have his number, Hoffmann’s?”

When I hung up I looked over at the Dalstrom painting on the wall, the deep dark jungle and darker mountains, the single touch of color in the flower.

Then I dialed the number Roberta Trasker had given me. A man answered.

“Mr. Hoffmann?”

“Who’s calling?”

“Lew Fonesca,” I said. “Mrs. Trasker give me this number.”

“What do you want to speak to Mr. Hoffmann about?”

“William Trasker,” I said.

“What about Mr. Trasker?”

“He’s missing,” I said. “I want to ask Mr. Hoffmann a few questions that might help me find him.”

“You’re making this inquiry on behalf of Mrs. Trasker?”

“Yes.”

“You’re with the police?”

“I’m not against them,” I said.

I was tired. I wanted to go to a back booth at the Crisp Dollar Bill across the street, listen to the bartender’s tapes, eat a steak sandwich, drink an Amstel, get back in bed, and watch a videotape, something old, something black-and-white, something with William Powell.

“May I have a noncryptic answer?” the man said.

“I’m not a police officer.”

“One moment.”

The phone was placed down gently, and I looked at the painting on my wall while I waited. The jungle was inviting and I wanted to smell the orchid. I didn’t know if the orchid in the painting had a smell.

“Mr. Hoffmann is busy. If you leave a number, he’ll get back to you tomorrow.”

“Tell him I have a birthday present for him,” I said. “It can’t wait.”

The phone went down again and this time a different man’s voice, a higher voice, said, “This is Kevin Hoffmann. And you are?”

“Lew Fonesca.”

“You told Stanley that you have a birthday present for me.”

He sounded amused.

“Yes.”

“And you are looking for Bill Trasker?”

“Yes.”

“And you are representing…?”

“Someone who wants to find Trasker.”

“Come on over,” he said.

He gave me the address.

“I’ll be there in forty minutes.”

I called the Herald-Tribune office and got a young reporter named John Rubin who maybe owed me a favor.

“Midnight Pass,” I said.

“I’m on a deadline,” Rubin said. “Call me back tomorrow, early afternoon.”

“Two minutes,” I said.

“Something in it for me?”

“Might be,” I said.

“Something big?”

“A woman I know,” I said, thinking of Ann Horowitz, “says all size is relative. A hit-and-run on Webber might not be worth more than a paragraph on page ten unless the victim or the driver was someone with power, pelf, or notoriety.”

“Pelf?” Rubin said with a laugh. “You’re a funny guy, Fonesca.”

“I don’t try to be but I’m working on it, my shrink’s orders,” I said. “Midnight Pass.”

“That’s your big story?” he asked. “Midnight Pass? I’m working on a double murder, guy goes nuts, stabs his wife with a screwdriver, batters her boyfriend with a foot stool, shoots himself with a speargun.”

“A speargun?”

“Yeah, and if you think that’s easy, try it some time.”

“There are better ways to kill yourself.”

“Much better, but they don’t make good stories. Any case, they’re dead, he’ll live. Midnight Pass, huh?”

“There’s a vote on Friday on whether to start reopening it,” I said.

“The vote will be to open it,” Rubin said. “If I count my votes right.”

“Maybe you’re counting them wrong,” I said.

“You know something,” he said, sounding interested.

“You tell me something,” I said.

“Okay,” said Rubin. “Pass started closing up when Casey Key drifted closer to Siesta Key. In 1983 two property owners got permission from the county to fill in the Pass and reopen it a little bit south. They filled Midnight Pass and tried to open it a little south. It didn’t want to reopen. Two very small armies lined up across from each other, sometimes literally. One cried, Open the Pass for traffic and nature. The other cried, It was too expensive to open it and keep it open and nature was doing just fine without it.”

“And?”

“Both sides tried to line up environmentalist backing, but that hasn’t led to much. One pack of environmentalists didn’t like the fact that man and not nature had closed the Pass. That pack didn’t like the fact that the closing created a dark-watered and not always fragrant-smelling Little Sarasota Bay the Gulf waters couldn’t flush out.”

“And that is bad,” I said.

“Some say it was good, that nature was about to close the Pass anyway and will close it again if it is opened. New ecosystem for marine life, a rare Florida ecosystem they think makes it worth keeping the Pass closed. Then came the studies ordered by the county commissioners. Bottom line and a quarter of a million dollars later, the county was told it could reopen the Pass for five and a half million dollars and keep it open for another two hundred sixty thousand dollars a year.”

“The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers?” I prodded.

“Right, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reviewed the study and weren’t all that happy with it. Now, before the commissioners can apply for state and federal money to open the Pass, there would have to be another study, a big one, estimated cost, one million plus.”

“And the commission is voting tomorrow on whether to have another study,” I said.

“And if they vote to have it, they’re pretty well locked in to going ahead with opening the Pass if the study says they should. And I think that’s just what the study will say if it’s approved. That answer your question?”

“Yes,” I said. “And who makes money on this?”

“Besides the company being paid for another study? Landowners. People with land in Little Sarasota Bay if the Pass opens. People with land on the Gulf Coast if it stays closed. But money’s not the only issue. A lot of people with plenty of time and money look for religions to invest their time, heart, and money in. Midnight Pass is nearly a religion for a lot of people in South County.”

“Thanks,” I said.

“Welcome. So what do I look for?” he asked.

“Be at the commission meeting,” I said. “Stay till it’s over. Then you might want to interview one or two of the commissioners after the vote on the Pass is taken.”

“And the commissioners will talk to me about it? I mean talk and say something with shark teeth?”

“At least one will be quotable, possibly more.”

“You’re sure?”

“Since I have no reputation, I can’t stake mine on it. It won’t cost you anything but a few hours sleep.”

“I’ll be there,” Rubin said. “I gotta get back to my suicidal speargunner. You still smiling, Fonesca?”

“Always,” I said, and we hung up.

I put on my blue slacks, my only white shirt, and my only tie, blue-and-red striped. I put on blue socks and my ancient black Rockport shoes.

I was going to a party.

Hoffmann’s fortress was on the mainland opposite Bird Keys. The sun was just going down when I got there. I had stopped at Walgreen’s on Bahia Vista and Tamiami Trail to pick up Hoffmann’s present.

I parked next to the ten-foot-high brick wall. I could hear the surf somewhere in the distance behind the wall. The black steel gate was locked. I pressed the button in the wall to the right of the gate and waited. The gate opened a few seconds later. I walked up to the house on the inclined, cobble-paved driveway. The house, big, Spanish-looking, was on a small ridge, a few feet of added protection from rising bay water when a hurricane or gale storm hit.

The door was open. The man standing in it was a little over six feet tall, lean and well-muscled, a little younger than me. He was wearing dark slacks and a short-sleeved green polo shirt. He was also wearing glasses.

“Fonesca?” he asked.

“Stanley?” I responded, recognizing his voice.

He stepped back to let me in, closed the door, and led me into a gigantic living room with a long bar to the right and an open French door to the left, facing the water. A man stood with his back to me, looking out at the water. He was about my height but broad across the shoulders. His white hair flecked with black was cut short and glistened as if he had just gotten out of a shower or pool.

He turned. Kevin Hoffmann’s face was unlined, handsome. I had seen his picture in the Herald-Tribune. He looked even better in person. He was wearing white slacks and a short-sleeved New York Yankees shirt. On his feet were white deck shoes. No socks. I was overdressed.

Hoffmann looked at me with an Arnold Schwarzenegger grin. Stanley stood off to my right, adjusted his glasses, and stood at ease, military at ease.

“You like baseball,” Hoffmann said, looking at my Cubs cap.

“I like the Cubs,” I said.

“Right,” he said. “You’re from Chicago. Process server now. Used to work for the state attorney’s office in Cook County. Lost your wife in an accident. Sorry about that. I lost my wife about the same time.”

I wondered how much more he had learned about me in the time since I had called. I knew he wanted me to wonder.

“Come with me,” Hoffmann said, motioning with his right hand.

I followed. Stanley didn’t. We moved into a dark room beyond the tasteful Southern plush furniture in the living room. He flicked a switch and motioned for me to step in.

The room was an office with an antique desk and chair in the middle with a phone on it. No computer. There was a window on one wall, facing the water across a wide stretch of grass and sand. There was a small dock but no boat that I could see. The walls of the room were covered ceiling to floor with glassed-in cabinets. Inside the cabinets were hundreds of baseballs, and in one corner were four racks of baseball bats.

Over my shoulder I sensed Stanley standing in the doorway.

“All autographed,” Hoffmann said, bouncing athletically on his heels and looking around. “All fully authenticated. I’ve got Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, Ted Williams, DiMaggio, Hank Aaron, Clemente, Sandy Koufax, even a Carl Hubbell. Cubs corner is on the lower shelf over there. Banks, Dawson, Pafko, Sandburg, Sosa, Hank Sauer, Frankie Baumholtz, thirty Cubs. Almost two hundred Yankees. Take a look.”

I moved forward, holding the small box I had brought, and looked at the baseballs Hoffmann was pointing to. I was impressed.

“And the bats,” he said, picking one out of the rack. “Brooks Robinson. And I’ve got a Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Orlando Cepeda, a Mark McGwire, and a Pie Traynor.”

Hoffmann took a cut through the air with Brooks Robinson’s bat. It swished about three feet in front of my face.

“I still play,” Hoffmann said. “Senior softball league out on Seventeenth Street. Had a doubleheader this morning. A few of the players were in the majors, a lot played college ball or minor league. Of course we use aluminum bats. I keep mine in the back of my car.

“Want to handle one of these?” he asked, shouldering the big bat.

“Some other time,” I said. “Let’s talk about William Trasker.”

I looked back at Stanley in the doorway.

“Let’s,” Hoffmann said. “A great man. Lots of people don’t like him, but I admire him. He lets people know what he wants and he lets them know he plans to take it. We’ve had business dealings together for years. I’ve learned a lot from Bill Trasker.”

“You know where he might be?”

“I know where he is,” said Hoffmann with a smile. “Like something to drink?”

“No, thanks,” I said.

Hoffmann looked around the room.

“I don’t just collect these things,” Hoffmann said. “I told you I play. Two leagues. All year around. One of the great things about Florida. One of many reasons I moved here when I was younger.”

“Twenty years ago,” I said.

He nodded, holding the bat in front of him and examining Brooks Robinson’s autograph.

“Something like that. You play baseball, softball, Fonesca?”

“Used to, a little. Babe Ruth League. Good field. No hit. I got to the point where I just waited for walks and hoped the pitcher didn’t hit me with a fastball. Gave up the game after one season.”

“I’m a first baseman,” he said. “I make a good target on the field and at the plate and I didn’t give up when I was a kid. What position did you play?”

“Outfield. Babe Ruth League. I wouldn’t make a good target at first base.”

“Don’t underestimate yourself,” he said, pointing the bat at me as if it were a rifle. “You’d make an adequate target.”

“Trasker,” I said.

He shook his head and carefully placed the bat back in the rack.

“Upstairs, in bed. My dear friend is gravely ill. Can’t be moved. Doctor’s orders. Bill is in the terminal stages of cancer. He’s comfortable, well, as comfortable as modern medicine can make a dying man with cancer. He is watched over twenty-four hours a day.”

“Shouldn’t he be in a hospital?”

“Can’t be moved. If you like, you can talk to Dr. Obermeyer. That is if Mrs. Trasker says it is all right.”

He moved behind the desk and sat in the leather swivel chair.

“I love this room,” he said, looking around.

“Mrs. Trasker doesn’t know her husband’s here,” I said.

“Of course she does,” Hoffmann said. “Stanley called her when we brought poor Bill here, didn’t you, Stanley?”

We both looked at Stanley, who adjusted his glasses and said, “I forgot.”

Hoffmann looked at me with another shake of his head.

“Stanley is normally the most reliable of my employees,” he said confidentially but not so confidentially that Stanley couldn’t hear. “Stanley is bright and he has the virtue of complete loyalty. But he has many duties and sometimes little things and, yes, even big ones slip past him.”

“That speaks well of Stanley,” I said. “Then I can see Mr. Trasker?”

“I’ll call Mrs. Trasker right away, but I’m afraid Dr. Obermeyer means it when he says no visitors,” Hoffmann said, closing his eyes and nodding sadly.

“Mrs. Trasker’s going to want to see him,” I said. “She’s going to ask him if he wants to go to a hospital, maybe make the decision herself if he’s not up to it. Bring in another doctor or two to examine her husband.”

“Mr. Trasker has stated quite clearly that he wishes to remain here,” Hoffmann said, smiling up at me.

“Mrs. Trasker might want to ask him herself with a policeman or two at her side,” I said.

“She is welcome to proceed with any legal action she wishes,” he said. “I’ve sworn to my old friend that I will follow his wishes, and that I will do until the law orders me to do otherwise.”

“Which means warrants, lawyers, Dr. Obermeyer.”

“At the very least,” Hoffmann said amiably. “And that will take several days, perhaps a week.”

“At least till after Friday’s County Commission meeting?” I said.

Hoffmann looked as if this were something he hadn’t considered.

“I suppose that’s true,” he said. “But even if it weren’t, Bill is definitely in no condition to attend any meetings.”

“You’re a true friend,” I said.

Hoffmann made a fist with his right hand, put it up to his chest, and said, “I try to be. I want nothing more than to follow the wishes of my friend and mentor and let him exit this world, if he wishes, in the bed upstairs. He’s getting the best medical attention money can buy. I only wish that money could buy him more time and a return of his health.”

“I’m deeply moved,” I said.

“I can see that. But you plan to pursue this?”

“Yep.”

“I’m willing to go to great lengths to protect William Trasker,” he said, looking at the rack of bats.

“I’m moved even more deeply,” I said.

Hoffmann scratched his cheek.

“You are being threatened, Mr. Fonesca,” Hoffmann said. “I’ll be blunt. If I asked him to, Stanley could make you disappear. Is that right, Stanley?”

“That’s right,” Stanley said.

I think I smiled, a small smile.

“Are you suicidal, Mr. Fonesca?” Hoffmann said, puzzled.

“Someone asked me that yesterday. I’m not sure about the answer. It’s one of my problems,” I said. “But I’m working on it and I’m not going to take my own life. I’ve got a good shrink.”

Hoffmann looked genuinely interested.

“You mean what you’re saying, don’t you?” he said.

“I mean it.”

“Ah, a good Italian Catholic,” Hoffmann said. “You won’t take your own life but if someone else kills you…”

“I’m not a Catholic,” I said. “None of my family is.”

“What are they?”

“Episcopalians.”

“Then we are at an impasse,” Hoffmann said. “I think our visit is over. You can follow Stanley to the gate.”

He stood up.

“I’ve got a present for you,” I said, holding out the gift-wrapped box of chocolates I’d picked up at Walgreen’s.

He took it.

“I think you are more than a little bit crazy,” Hoffmann said.

I had shaken him, but not enough. So far I was just a determined little man who couldn’t be intimidated.

“Why are you giving me a present?”

“Yesterday would have been your birthday,” I said. “If you had lived.”