Watch Your Back!

28

WHEN DORTMUNDER AND Otto Medrick and Stan Murch walked into the O.J. Bar Grill at ten to three that afternoon, having left Stan's most recent transportation, an eight-year-old Taurus, in a restricted area in front of a neighborhood funeral parlor, it was two hours later than the time Medrick had promised, or threatened, to meet his brother Frank. The reason for that was, once Dortmunder and Medrick were safely on the ground and out of that flying metal cigar and walking with Stan toward the transportation du jour, Dortmunder had insisted that people in physical contact with Mother Earth not only were required to eat but were required to eat solid food.

"The O.J. isn't going anywhere," Dortmunder had pointed out, "which I could only wish I could say about myself."

Stan had offered strong support for this view, adding to it that he happened to know, between Newark and Manhattan, a diner that wasn't half bad, because it was patronized by long-haul truckers who well knew there was nothing to eat in America from New York City to either New Orleans or Chicago.

Medrick, while he made it clear that what he really wanted to sink his teeth into was a relative, was at last persuaded that the good will of his new friends was worth a detour. So they'd filled up on Cajun this and Lake Shore that, and now, as they entered the O.J., Dortmunder felt he was ready for anything.

Except he wasn't. It was awful; it was like a natural disaster. No, not natural; that was why it was so awful. This wasn't a disaster; it was an atrocity. The middle of the afternoon, and the O.J. was empty. Empty stools, empty booths, empty floor, empty backbar. Not a customer, not a regular, not even Rollo. To look at this muffled, tomblike dark space, in which even the good aromas of beer and whiskey were beginning to fade, was to come directly to the concept of mortality. That this could happen to the O.J.

On second look, after one's eyes had adjusted to the dimness from the bright outdoors, the place wasn't absolutely, totally empty after all. A man was seated at the bar, over to the left, where the regulars used to hang out. He wore a green polo shirt and brown shorts and white sneakers and a Red Sox baseball cap worn frontward. There was no glass in front of him, only a pair of glasses on his face, and he was reading a magazine.

Which he tossed onto the bar when the trio walked in. Getting to his feet, walking forward, he said, "No clocks in Florida, either, huh?" Since he looked like Otto Medrick, though some years younger, and sounded like him, though some degrees less irascible, this must be the brother Frank.

Yes. "Don't blame me, Frank," Medrick said, and waved a dismissive hand at Dortmunder and Stan. "With these two, the stomach comes first."

"Well, you know, Otto," Frank Medrick said, "with a lot of people, that's true." Looking at Dortmunder and Murch, he said, "Which of you's the back-room crook?"

"Hey!"

"Both of them," Medrick said, pointing. "That's the one came down to tell me."

"Well, I guess I have to thank you," Frank Medrick said, sticking his hand out. "You saved a lot of people a lotta agita."

"Not yet, he hasn't," Medrick said. "That's why I'm here."

"I didn't catch your name," Frank Medrick said.

"John," said Dortmunder, who hadn't thrown it.

"Catch this one," Stan Murch said, sticking his own hand out. "Stan. I drove them here from Newark."

"Via today's special," Medrick said. "So what's happening on the Raphael front?"

Frank, who actually did have a watch, now looked at it and said, "At this moment, Raphael is in front of Judge Bernice Steinwoodvogel, being railroaded into the loony bin with the assistance of Dr. Leonard Ledvass."

"That's a very short railroad," Medrick commented. "What else we got?"

"Let me show you," Frank said, and went around behind the bar.

"While you're there," Stan said, "would you feel like drawing one? With a side of salt."

Frank looked very blank, like a person being addressed in Urdu, and Dortmunder said, "Let's wait a little, Stan, take care of this other stuff first."

"Oh, sure, no problem," Stan said. "Driving is a thirsty-making process, that's all."

Impatient, Medrick said, "You'll get it," as his brother came up with messy stacks of paper from under the bar and spread them out in front of them all. Bending over these, pushing papers disdainfully back and forth, Medrick muttered, "Here's some old friends. Oh, and can these fellas turn a blind eye. Look at this shit."

"You don't want," his brother advised him, "to look in the back room. Or the ladies."

"The ladies I wouldn't look," Medrick said. "The rest I don't got to look, I can see for myself. Frank, the phone is back there."

Frank brought over a black phone on a long cord, and Medrick chose one of the invoices before him, then punched out a number as though killing cockroaches with one finger. He waited, tapping that finger on the bartop as his brother and Stan and Dortmunder all watched with interest, and then he said, "Hello, sweetheart, this is Otto Medrick, lemme talk to Harry. No, you haven't, but you're hearing from me now. Thank you."

The pause that followed might very well have been diagnosed as pregnant, and then Medrick, grinning like an old timber wolf who's just seen a young lamb, said, "Harry? Yeah, it's me, yeah, I've been away. Florida, that's right. Well, you know, it's Florida. But I had to come back because there's a little problem with my joint. No, Harry, it's my joint, my nephew Raphael was what we call a caretaker, and he's — Who? I don't know anybody named Mikey, Harry, and if God is good I never will know anybody named Mikey. Well, there you go, that's another symptom, I didn't even know about that one. Symptom of what? Mental disease, Harry, it's terrible, the whole family's in a state of shock. Well, I can't, I can't tell you everything that happened because I don't know yet everything that happened, but I do know this much, Raphael Medrick is right at this minute in a court of law being committed to an upstate loony bin because of diminished capacities, and one of the proofs of this diminished capacities, which happened to be shown to the judge, was this purchase of his, from you, Harry, of thirty barstools. Where did you think he was gonna put thirty barstools, Harry? No, I don't suppose it is. Well, that's not exactly right, Harry, in this particular instance the customer was wrong, and I've got the judicial system of the State of New York to put it in writing that the customer was a fruitcake that no decent entrepreneur such as yourself, Harry, could properly — Harry, that's up to you. What I'm telling you is, you've got a choice here. You can either try to sue a nutcase in an upstate laughing academy, or you can come get your barstools back."

"Still in their plastic," Dortmunder said.

"Thank you," Medrick said, and into the phone, "Still in their plastic, Harry, make it easier for your crew. You'll send somebody today? Oh, we'll be here, Harry. No, I understand, you're right, business is business. Nice to hear your voice again, Harry," Medrick said, with his savage smile, and slammed the phone into its receiver. "Eleven more of these bastards to go," he said, and the front door opened.

They all turned to look, and here came two more of them, or maybe two from an earlier occasion. Associates of Mikey, in any case, swaggering chunks of veal in Day-Glo shirts, ironed designer jeans, handtooled boots, and hair like chocolate mousse. Entering, looking around, they said, "This place isn't open."

"You're right," Medrick told them. "Come back after six, we'll be open then."

One of them placed himself in front of Medrick. "You're not following me, Pops," he said. "This place is closed."

Medrick spread his hands. "So whadaya doing in here, if it's closed?"

"I don't know who you think you are, Pops—"

"I am Otto Medrick. I own this joint. If I was your pop I'd kill myself. Lucky thing I'm not. Get outa here."

"Hey, you," the other one said, and they both did that thing of the hand reaching under the shirt to the waist in back.

Mildly Dortmunder said to Frank Medrick, "There's a pistol in that drawer there. Next to the parasols."

"And a telephone in my hand here," Medrick said. "What was that number again? Nine one one?"

As Frank opened the drawer in which Dortmunder, on an earlier occasion, had found that firearm, the two visitors backed away, hands out from under their shirts but many stormclouds on their brows. "You better know what you're doing," one of them said. "We're gonna call Mikey, we're gonna see about this."

"You do that," Medrick told them, turned away, and dialed a number. As the veal left, he said, "Rollo? It's me. Yeah, I'm here, in the O.J. Well, it's a mess, you know that, but we're gonna deal with it. Could you open here at six? Good. And those pals you told me about, all belong to that ex-Merchant Marine club? You still hang out with them? Good. Spread the word, in honor of me being back and you staying on, those pals of yours, it's open bar for a week. And you could tell them, they might even get a chance to bang some heads, like the old days. Great, Rollo. I'll be here."

Medrick banged the phone down and looked at the stacks of invoices. "Which bastard next?"

In far-off darkest New Jersey, Mikey hung up the phone and turned a plaintive face toward his father. "Well, what the fuck?" he asked.