Taming a Sea Horse

27

I had followed the string as far back as I could and it stopped dead at Perry Lehman. It didn't mean Lehman had done anything I cared about. It didn't mean that he could help me find April Kyle. It just meant that I didn't have anywhere else to look. So I decided to look at him some more.

It was full summer in Boston and the heat sat on the city like a possessive parent. I parked half up on the sidewalk near the corner of the alley that led to the Crown Prince Club, and got out and leaned on the fender with my arms folded. I had on a summer silk tweed jacket and a black polo shirt and jeans and running shoes. The jacket was to cover my gun. Summer weight or no, it was too hot for comfort; one of the drawbacks to being armed and dangerous in summer. I thought about getting back in the car and using the AC. But I wanted to be conspicuous. Sitting in the car would make me less so.

Nothing happened. After a half hour I took off my jacket. The gun made me even more conspicuous. But I had a permit and if it bothered people that wasn't my problem. It was nine-thirty in the morning.

Two guys looking a little blurry came out of the club and walked up the alley past me. One of them saw me and the gun and looked quickly away. He murmured something to his friend. They moved away up the alley toward Boylston Street and I caught one of them glancing back as he rounded the corner. At ten-fifteen a guy in a seersucker suit and a straw hat with a colorful band came down the alley and looked at me, and stopped and looked at his watch and looked at me covertly while he was looking at his watch and hesitated and then rang the bell at the Crown Prince Club and went in. At ten-forty another guy came down the alley and saw me and stopped and started forward and stopped and turned on his heel and went back up the alley. The lunch crowd began drifting down the alley at eleven-thirty, all men, rep ties and pin collars and briefcases and Bally shoes and suits from Louis. Many of the lunchers paid me no mind. But some did, and I made them uneasy.

My shirt was soaked through in back by twelve-fifteen when the big doorman in his Rudolf Friml uniform came out of the club and walked across the street. He was studiously uninterested in my gun.

"Miss Coolidge has asked me to see what it is you might want," the doorman said.

"I don't want anything," I said. "But thank Miss Coolidge anyway."

"Miss Coolidge doesn't like you standing out here wearing a gun looking at the members. Members don't like it much neither."

"I don't blame them," I said. "How'd you like to be caught walking into this place for lunch."

"Miss Coolidge asked me to ask you to move along."

"No," I said.

The doorman looked at me for a full thirty seconds.

"Gun buys you a little something," he said. "But don't count too heavy on it."

"You don't think Miss Coolidge will be satisfied with my response?"

"Don't seem likely," he said, and turned and walked back into the club.

It was quiet again, except for the sound of the sweat soaking into my shirt. People came and went from the Crown Prince Club. I thought about lunch. Maybe a lobster roll, and a draft beer. Two drafts, the moisture condensing on the side of the cold glass. And maybe a second lobster roll, but then I wouldn't come out even, so I'd have to have at least one more beer. By two o'clock the lunch traffic had dwindled to a precious few. I was thinking about the different ways beer could be chilled, and which way was most effective, when a maroon Oldsmobile sedan pulled down the alley past me and pulled to the side. Two guys got out and walked toward me. They were both dark-haired and wore thick mustaches. They might have been brothers. The one that got out the driver's side had a sunburned face and his nose was peeling. He had on a madras plaid sport coat with green predominant and a yellow V-neck T-shirt. His hair was combed smoothly back from his forehead and he had on thick-rimmed RayBan sunglasses. His partner was maybe half an inch taller, his hair curled, wearing a Hawaiian shirt hanging out over his belt. Around his neck was a thick gold chain with an Italian pepper hanging from it. I could see by the way the shirt hung that he was wearing a gun under it.

The guy with the sunburned nose said, "What's happening, chico?"

I said, "Are you guys brothers?"

"Yeah, why?"

"I just wondered," I said. "Did you get your hair straightened or did he get a perm?"

"Funny," the guy with the sunburn said.

Curly said, "Don't fuck around with him, Paulie. It's hot, let's get him the fuck out of here and get back in the car."

Sunburn nodded. "He's right, chico. Let's hear it, what are you doing standing out here looking at the club?"

"You guys work for the club?" I said.

"We're asking the questions, chico, and we're getting tired of it. What are you doing here?"

"I'm staying in the sun," I said, "trying to get my nose to peel like yours. It's cute as a button."

"Okay, pal," Curly said, "enough. You either haul your ass out of here now, or we drop you right here on the street."

"Eek," I said.

"You don't think we'll do it?"

"I'm not sure you can," I said. "There's only two of you."

"Listen, stupid," the guy with the sunburn said, "you don't know who you're dealing with. You are getting yourself in really bad trouble."

"Who am I dealing with?" I said.

"You'll find out-if you don't smarten up."

"Listen," I said. "This is getting boring. You guys are stuck. They sent you over here to run me off but they told you not to make any trouble. So you can threaten me, but you can't back it up, because you were told not to."

"You think so, huh?"

"Jesus, who writes your dialogue? Yeah, I think so. The point here is to get me to stop causing trouble here, not to escalate it."

"Say that's right," Curly said. "That don't mean that you ain't going to run into trouble someplace else, if you get my drift."

"Yeah, that's occurred to me. But see, you think I'm scared of you. You're used to it. Most people are scared of you. 'Cause you're official badasses, and you walk around with guns, and call people chico. What you don't understand is that you should be scared of me."

The three of us stood there silently. Then the guy with the sunburn jerked his head at his brother and they turned and walked back to the Olds.

"You'll see us again," he said, and got in the car. The engine cranked and the car backed up with a lot of engine noise and tire squealing. I waved good-bye as it backed into Boylston Street and pulled away. When they were gone I walked up to the corner and found a pay phone in a drugstore and called Henry Cimoli at the Harbor Health Club.

"I need Hawk," I said. "I'm hanging around outside the Crown Prince Club, you know where that is?"

"Yeah, I know. It's a whorehouse for Yuppies," Henry said.

"Unkind," I said.

"But true," Henry said. "I'll tell him."

I bought a package of peanut butter Nabs at the check-out counter and went back down the alley and leaned against my car some more and ate the Nabs.

At five-ten Hawk parked behind me in the alley and got out and walked over to me. He had on a pale lavender sport jacket over a pink tank top. His slacks were creamy linen and his shoes off-gray. He had on wraparound sunglasses and his head gleamed in the late afternoon sun.

"You been here all day trying to get up courage to go in the Crown Prince Club," Hawk said. "And you want me to walk you over."

"I been standing here all day," I said, "and first the doorman came over and asked me to leave, and then two gunnies came around and told me to leave."

"You still here," Hawk said.

"Yeah, but I think maybe I need someone to keep an eye on my back."

"Who the gunnies?" Hawk said.

"Don't know. They were maybe thirty, brothers, southern European, one of them called the other one Paulie."

"Well, we know Perry Lehman connected."

"Yep."

"How come you standing around out here annoying everybody?" Hawk said.

"I don't know what else to do," I said. "So I figured if I annoyed Lehman enough maybe something would happen and I'd know what to do."

"You good at annoying," Hawk said.

"Years of study," I said.

"Yeah," Hawk said, "but you had a natural talent to start with."