Twenty-nine

Artie Wu remembered the Oxnard of nearly thirteen years ago as a small, agriculturally dependent city with a predominantly Mexican flavor and a Japanese mayor. But after he and Booth Stallings paid gruff calls on four of the city’s twenty-four motels, Wu read a tourist leaflet and discovered Oxnard had transformed itself into a diversified business center that boasted industrial parks, a new museum of muscle cars from the fifties and sixties and an almost new passenger train depot, which Booth Stallings claimed was the only passenger train depot built in the United States since 1940.

It was around 4 P.M. When they reached the ninth motel. Wu was wearing a blue blazer, khaki pants, a white shirt open halfway down his bare chest and, on his feet, plain-toed black oxfords with white socks. Stallings had suggested a cheap gold chain to go with the open shirt but Wu said he didn’t want to soften his image. Stallings himself wore a gray suit, white shirt and a dark gray tie with maroon polka dots.

After they got out of the rented Mercedes at the ninth motel, Stallings said, “I’m damn near out of business cards.”

“Maybe we’ll get lucky,” Wu said and led the way into the motel office.

Redundantly named “The La Paz Inn,” the motel was independently owned, fairly new, and offered a small coffee shop, an equally small swimming pool and, Wu guessed, about three dozen units. Behind the reception counter was a stocky man in his late fifties with thin silky gray hair, bifocals and the suspicious pursed mouth that many motel owner-operators seem to acquire after only a year or so in the business. The man stared at Wu for a moment, dismissed him as a potential lodger and turned to Stallings, who was now leaning on the counter.

“Help you?” said the man in a twangy voice that dared Stallings to sell him something.

“Hope so,” Stallings said and handed over one of the last business cards that claimed he was Jerome K. Walters, executive vice-president of the Independent Limousine Operators Association.

The man read the card, handed it back and said, “Don’t get much call here for limos.”

Stallings straightened, glanced around the room, nodded understandingly and said, “Didn’t think you would. But that’s not why we’re here.” He looked around the room again, then leaned toward the gray-haired man and used a soft conspiratorial tone to say, “We’re here on an in-ves-ti-ga-tion.” Stallings pronounced each syllable of investigation lovingly, as if he liked the word’s sound.

The man behind the counter frowned. “Investigation of what?”

“One of our owner-operator members, a fine young man of Mexican descent, drives a couple up here from L.A. Just before the couple checks into a motel — not yours — they give our member twenty dollars to go buy ’em a bottle of drinking whisky.”

“So?”

“So our fine young man, glad to be of service, heads for the nearest liquor store. But when he comes back with the booze, the couple’s skedaddled. Never checked in. And that leaves our fine young man stuck with a two-hundred-and-thirty-five-dollar tab he’d run up driving them all over L.A. And then on up here.”

“That’s one pitiful story,” the man said.

“The thing is, Mr. — ?”

“Deason.”

“The thing is, Mr. Deason, my organization’s bound and determined to put a stop to this sort of thing. We want to prosecute those two thieves — and that’s what they are, thieves — to the full extent of the law. But cops don’t get too excited about some Mexican limo driver who’s been stiffed for a couple of hundred bucks. So we in the ILOA are offering a five-hundred-dollar cash reward for any information leading not to the arrest and conviction of this thieving pair, but just to their present whereabouts.”

“They got names?” Deason asked.

“Yes, sir, they do. Their real names are Hughes and Pauline Goodison.”

Deason looked down at the counter, then up at Stallings, shook his head regretfully and said, “Never registered ’em.”

“In their late twenties or early thirties?” Stallings said. “Both blond and look a lot alike on account of they’re brother and sister but claim they’re man and wife? Talk with a real strong English accent?”

Something changed in Deason’s face. His eyelids drooped and his pursed mouth formed a crafty smile just before he said, “British accents, you say?”

“English. British.”

“Both kinda tall and skinny and blond?”

“Exactly.”

“What’ll you do with ’em?”

“Me and my associate here, Mr. Chang, will pay ’em a call. We’ll ask for a full refund of the fare they stole. Then we’ll make sure they settle their bill with the innkeeper. You. Then we’ll put ’em in that black Mercedes out there and give ’em a fast ride to the police station.” Stallings paused. “In other words, Mr. Deason, we’ll make a citizen’s arrest.”

“What about the five-hundred-dollar reward?”

“It’ll be paid on the spot. Cash. No receipt required.”

Behind closed lips, Deason ran his tongue back and forth across the front of his lower teeth. Artie Wu decided it was part of a decision-making process.

“Room four-twenty-four,” Deason said. “Been here since last Friday. Registered as Mr. And Mrs. Reginald Carter of Manchester, England. Don’t know what they came in, but they didn’t have a car and I never like the look of that. Had one big suitcase and two small carryalls. Nothing else. But listen, I don’t want no damage. They paid me three days cash in advance and I just want the rest of what they owe me and the reward you promised. Once you ride off with ’em, you do what you please.”

“I wish everyone was as public-spirited, Mr. Deason,” Stallings said and turned to Wu. “Pay the man, Mr. Chang.”

Wu scowled. “I think we oughta wait and see if they’re really in four-twenty-four. I think he oughta give us a key. I think we oughta surprise ’em. And if they’re the ones, then I think we oughta give him his five hundred.”

Stallings nodded in judicious agreement. “Mr. Chang here has had himself a whole lot of experience in stuff like this. So maybe you oughta give him the key to four-twenty-four like he says.”

Deason made no reply. Instead, he ran his tongue over the front of his lower teeth again, half turned, took a key from a slot, placed it on the countertop, stepped back quickly and said, “I don’t want nothing busted up, understand?”

Wu picked up the key, examined it suspiciously, examined Deason the same way, scowled again and said, “You mean you don’t want none of the furniture busted up, right?”

“Especially the TV set,” Deason said.

“Don’t worry,” said Artie Wu, aimed a nod at the door and told Stallings, “Let’s go get this crap over with.”

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