Tilt-a-Whirl

CHAPTER THIRTY

“Ma'am?”

For an old lady, she's fast.

She and the dog run out a door and up what I guess is a hall.

Right now, they have the advantage. They've been here before; we haven't. We're first-time guests and they appear to be long-term residents. So they know where the hell they're running. We don't.

“Danny?”

“Right behind you, boss.”

We both pull out our flashlights and tear up the tiered terraces to the exit she used.

On the other side of the door, I bang into this rickety old grocery cart loaded down with trash bags, nickel-deposit bottles, an old moving pad, books, and an eyeless stuffed panda bear with dirt on its nose.

We hear the dog barking somewhere up the corridor.

“Leave it, Henry! Leave the fucking rat alone!”

Now that she mentions it, I can hear the scratchy-toed devils scurrying around inside what's left of the plaster walls.

“Put him down!”

Wonderful. Henry's a “ratter.” But his assorted barks and snarls act like a homing beacon, helping us figure out which way they're running.

Ceepak leads us up a long, dark corridor lined with rooms. Like most hotel hallways, there are no windows. That means there's also no light. No moonlight, no nothing. Our tiny flashlights shoot jittery spotlights across the walls as we run. I half expect a rat in a top hat to jump out and tap-dance like that frog on the WB.

The carpet squishes under our feet as we run. Guess the roof leaks. Or the toilets.

After about fifty yards, we come to a landing where the grand staircase swoops up from the lobby. Tall casement windows in the stairwell let in just enough light for us to see a few shadows and dim outlines.

I smell gasoline.

So does Ceepak. He goes to the staircase. Most of the planks have been ripped out and all that's left are the stringers on the sides and the support joists in between. Guess the floorboards, the treads, were mahogany or oak or something worth stealing.

“C-4,” Ceepak says, looking at what appears to be a brick wrapped in black plastic and duct-taped to a crossbeam. His finger traces the red and white and green wires snaking from the plastic explosive up and down the steps to, I guess, more wads of C-4. There's a gas can sitting in the windowsill.

“Arson?” I say.

“Looks like.”

“Why? There's not much left to burn.”

“More like a demolition.”

The dog barks.

“Come on,” Ceepak says.

There's another bark. And another. A whole series.

“Henry? Shush!”

Now Henry tosses in a couple of howls, like he's singing opera. All the noise comes from below.

“Come on! Down the steps!”

We head down the grand staircase, stepping on the crossbeams and stringers because, like I said, there aren't any actual stairs any more. Once again, I have a really good chance of slipping through a gaping hole and landing on my butt.

We make it to the second floor and hear a long, slow dog yawn.

Downstairs.

I grab hold of the banister and try not to look down where the floorboards used to be. It's like running down a steep railroad track, stepping only on the ties. The boards bang my arches and sting like hell. Before this is over, I know I'm going to make some bone doctor a very rich man.

“Henry? Come on! Henry!”

Now she sounds like she's right below us.

“Henry?”

Sounds like he isn't cooperating.

We reach the lobby. She's tugging on that twine leash, but Henry is lying like a lump in the middle of the floor, all flopped out, breathing hard.

“You need a nap? Now?”

“Ma’am?” Ceepak moves toward what I'm guessing is a crazy homeless person. His hand never goes anywhere near his gun. “Ma'am?”

“Shhhh! Henry's napping. Can the noise, would ya?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Jesus,” she huffs. “Some people. Yak, yak, yak. Ma'am, ma'am, ma'am.”

In the lobby, I get a better look at our quarry. She's tiny. Not even five feet tall. She has on Converse basketball shoes with the canvas toes ripped out and, like I saw earlier, brown paper bags for socks. She's wearing about three different skirts, plaid and denim, with a petticoat underneath. There's a tie-dyed shirt up top over what I figure, from all the bumps circling her like spare tires, is a goose-down vest. Her silver hair is wiry and dirty and wild and curls around her head like a worn-out scrubbing pad.

“You're not going to shoot me, are you, fuzz?”

“No, ma'am.”

“Good.”

“Is that your dog?”

“No. That's Henry.”

“Yes, ma'am. That's a pretty shirt,” Ceepak says. It's tie-dyed all kinds of colors-just like the one Ashley said Squeegee was wearing when he shot her father.

“My boyfriend loaned it to me. I was cold.”

“Does your boyfriend have a name?” he asks. He's made the tie-dye connection, too.

“Jerry. His name is Jerry.”

Ceepak nods, the way you nod when you're visiting the mental ward and a patient tells you the ashtrays have been saying mean things about them lately.

“Jerry Garcia?” Ceepak says, playing along.

“From the Grateful Dead?” the bag lady says.

“That's right. He wears a lot of tie-dye shirts.”

“Jerry Garcia?” she says again.

“That's right. Did Jerry Garcia loan you his T-shirt?”

The bag lady stares at Ceepak like he's an idiot.

“Jesus. Jerry Garcia died like, what? Ten years ago. Don't you read the papers? Watch TV?”

“I thought, perhaps….”

“You need to stay better informed. Especially in your line of work….”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Jesus. My friend's name is Jerry Shapiro. You know….”

She reaches into what I can only imagine is a dirty brassiere rigged up under that T-shirt and down vest and who knows what else she has piled on top of her sagging cleavage.

“Jerry Shapiro!” She pulls out a folded piece of newspaper. “He's famous.”

She unfolds the newspaper and of course it's the sketch of Squeegee.

“You know Squeegee?” I blurt out.

Now it's my time to get the look.

“Squeegee? How fucking insulting. Jerry is a man, not a tool one uses for washing windows. What do they teach you kids in school? To demean those who labor with their hands? Nobody calls him Squeegee except the fuzz and the goons and bulls who run the capitalist car wash.”

“Red calls him Squeegee,” Ceepak says.

“Red Davidson?”

“I never actually caught his last name.”

“Red hair? Like Bozo the clown?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Figures. Red is an a-hole. He's pissed because I won't hop in the sack with him any more. That's over, you know? Red and me? That's history.”

I'm getting a little queasy imagining this lady hopping in the sack with anybody.

“He kicked Henry,” she says.

“Your dog?”

“Red kicked Henry in the butt because we had this mattress upstairs last winter and Henry wanted to sleep with us because the floor was cold. Henry? He has a gas problem. He's old, he's earned it. Henry farts and Red kicks him. Kicks him ’til he yelps, I kid you not. He yelps. Jerry?” She waggles the newspaper clipping to remind us Jerry is Squeegee. “He and I aren't even dating or messing around back then, but the next day, when we're all, you know, hanging out, doing our thing, Jerry tells Red to cut that dog-kicking shit out. Says dogs are not pets, they're our spiritual companions in this earthly realm. Who made man king of the jungle, anyhow? Tarzan? Reagan?”

She tugs at the tie-dye shirt.

“Jerry lent me his T-shirt because I was cold. You got any food?”

Ceepak pulls one more Power Bar out of his pants.

Henry hears the wrapper crinkle and lifts his head. He's interested. Ceepak pulls a Pupperoni jerky strip out of another pocket. The guy lives the Boy Scouts motto. He is always prepared!

“Can your dog have a treat?”

“Is it all-natural?”

“I'm not certain. It's what they call a Pupperoni.”

Henry is licking his chops.

“Pupperoni?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Fine. But if he farts? It's your fucking fault.”

Ceepak bends down and lets Henry eat out of his palm.

“Here you go … good boy….”

The bag lady is staring at the Power Bar.

“Jesus. You got like a veggie sandwich or something? Maybe tomato-mozzarella on a baguette with some pesto or something?”

“I could check another pocket.” Ceepak is trying to make a little joke.

The lady does not know this. She waits.

So he checks another pocket.

“Sorry.”

“Jesus.” She settles for the Power Bar. “What the hell is in this thing? Chemicals and chalk?”

“Yes, ma'am. I believe so.”

“Fucking yuppie food. Next time, bring me that sandwich.”

“Roger that.”

“And grab some chips. Taro chips. Snapple, too. But none of that NutraSweet shit. That's a plot. A conspiracy. All about mind control. The fucking Republicans….”

“Will do.”

“You’re a cop, right?”

“Yes, ma'am. I work with the Sea Haven Police.”

“No shit, Sherlock. How's Scooter Boy?”

“You know Officer Kiger?”

“Don't get me started. That kid Kiger wakes us up all the time. Comes along on that goddamn scooter. ‘Wake up, wake up, you sleepyheads. Get up, get up, get out of bed.’ Kicks us off the beach before the rich people show up. Fascist fuzz….” She stops to fan the air in front of her face. “Whoo! Thank you Mr. Pupperoni.”

“Ma’am-do you know where Jerry is now?”

“Why do you keep calling me ‘ma'am’ like that?”

“Just trying to be courteous….”

“Well, knock it off. Jesus. You sound so fucking subservient. Why? No bourgeois man or woman is your better. All power rests with the people!”

She raises her fist in some kind of salute. I think she might be an intellectual when she's not stoned. Or a socialist. One of those.

“So, just so we're all clear here,” she says, “Jerry didn't do it.”

“Didn't do what?”

“What the papers say he did.” She waves the newspaper in Ceepak's face. “Murder? Kidnapping? Lies and bullshit. Just because it's in the paper doesn't make it true. It's just propaganda-paper and ink and lies and bullshit. Republican bullshit.”

“If that's the case, Mr. Shapiro has nothing to fear from me.”

“Bullshit. You're the fucking fuzz. Can't trust the fuzz.”

“You can trust me,” he tells her.

“Really? How come? What makes you so super-special?”

“I give you my word.”

“Your word? Like your solemn vow?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Wow. That's some heavy, serious shit. You give me your word? Wow. Just like Nixon? He gave us his word. ‘I am not a crook.’ So did Clinton. ‘I didn't have sex with that woman.’ Bush. ‘Saddam has nukes.’ Fucking Republicans.”

She's staring at Ceepak, trying to figure out who he might really be.

“You can trust him,” I say.

“What?”

“He cannot tell a lie.”

She stares some more at him.

“Really? Who is he? George Fucking Washington?”

“Officer Ceepak doesn't know how to be dishonest,” I say.

Now she's studying his eyes.

“What's the matter? Your parents never taught you how?”

“They tried,” he says. “However, they failed.”

“Is that so?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“Uh-uh-uh. You did that damn ma'am thing again.”

“Sorry. Do you know where Jerry is?”

“Maybe.”

“I'd like to talk to him.”

“You won't hurt him?”

“I give you my word.”

“When I was cold? He gave me his shirt. His favorite fucking shirt.”

“I will not hurt him.”

The bag lady bends down to rub the dog's head.

“Upstairs,” she says. “Room 215.”

“Thank you. Danny?”

“Yes, sir?”

“Stay here with….”

“Gladys,” she says.

“Yes, sir.”

Ceepak holds out his hand to me.

“I need the keys to the car.”