A Flash of Green (37 page)

“She’s something to show,” Eloise said. “She must be over five ten.”

“In that glass she’s got is gin and ice,” Leroy said.

“You seem to know her pretty well, Mr. Shannard,” Connie Merry said, with a smile that wrinkled her freckled nose.

“As well as I ever shall, my dear,” Leroy said. “When they’re that young, they alarm me.”

“Maybe it isn’t any of my business,” Martin Cable said, “but isn’t it rather bad judgment on the part of one of the founders of Palmland Development to get mixed up with a young girl? Don’t the rest of you disapprove of such … an obvious relationship?”

Leroy smiled. “Ol’ Buck hasn’t been much use to us lately. But what are we going to do about it?”

“I can tell you one thing you can do about it. You can tell your other associates that the bank, any bank, is always hesitant about loaning money to people of dubious moral stature.”

Leroy looked at him sharply. “Do you mean that, Martin?”

“I was stating a fact, not an opinion.”

Leroy shook his head in mild wonder and said, “You know, I think a romance just ended. Didn’t it sound like that to you, Jimmy?”

Five men stood around Charity Prindergast. They all wore the same glazed, bemused expression. He saw her pat one of them atop his bald head, hand him her empty glass. The man scuttled off.

“I heard a small crunching sound,” Jimmy admitted.

“Suppose he won’t give her up?” Eloise asked.

“A noble stance like that,” Leroy said, “can happen in books, plays, and television, but not in the life of Buckland Flake. When anything stands between Buck and a dollar, he boots it out of the way.”

“Are all men like that, Leroy?” Eloise asked, slightly coy.

“Most of them, my dear. There are exceptions. I try to have the best of both possible worlds.”

“How nice for you!” she said acidly. “Isn’t Leroy clever, Martin?”

“What? I wasn’t listening, darling.”

“Let me guess! You were thinking about the bank!”

“Well … as a matter of fact, I was.”

By twelve-thirty most of the guests had left. Most of those who remained were drunk enough to have no intention of ever going home. There was one stubborn swimmer, and one girl who
danced slowly, dreamily by herself, circling back and forth in front of the floodlights.

Jimmy Wing killed time, glancing at his watch. Elmo and Leroy were up in the office. Elmo had told him to come up at about quarter to one. Buck had passed out, facedown on a long padded bench in the workshop. The bar was self-service. Major had gone home. When Jimmy went to make himself another drink he found Charity sitting cross-legged on the floor, going through the stack of records.

She smiled up at him and said, “These are sticky old disks, dear. Look. Wayne King, for the love of God!”

He leaned on a table near her and said, “You’re trapped in the middle ages, Miss Prindergast. Rectangular types. We’re not cool. We’re not way out.”

She laughed up at him. “Buckie does that too.”

“Does what?”

“Tries the hip talk, but it doesn’t sound. It’s way over flat. Like I was to say ‘twenty-three skidoo’ and so forth.”

“God, girl! I’m a more recent vintage than that!”

“What difference does it make? I mean when a thing is gone, does it matter how long it’s gone? It’s like memories, you know.”

“No, I don’t know.”

“Well, you have a pocket to keep memories in. And there’s a sweetie memory that happened when you were six, right? And you can take it out of the pocket and it’s as shiny as what happened yesterday. And I have a memory of when I was six. In those memories, yours and mine, we’re both six and it happened yesterday. I was twenty last week. You can be twenty with me by taking out a memory from when you were twenty. There isn’t any age but young, dear. And the only time left is now. What is your name, anyhow?”

“Jimmy Wing. A momentarily confused Jimmy Wing.”

“Oh. With the paper. I don’t confuse myself. Why should I confuse you?”

“Stay where you are. I have to go now. I’ll be back later.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I always like being where I am best. I don’t have to go looking for me because I’m never anywhere else but here.”

“While we’re apart, I’ll think that over.”

Elmo was sitting on his desk. Jimmy sat on the couch beside Leroy Shannard. “We could have banners made,” Jimmy said. “The Palmland Panthers.”

“You drunk?” Elmo asked, frowning.

“No. I was just talking to Miss Charity. I got into the habit of a stream of consciousness.”

“Stream of unconsciousness,” Leroy said.

“Leroy is as pleased as I am with the two little things you worked out for us, Jimmy.”

“I’m pleased that he’s pleased.”

“We’ve decided that for a little while you’re going to mark time,” Elmo said. “We might not have to push anybody. They may drop off of their own selves.”

“Particularly when they find out they’re being un-American,” Leroy said.

Jimmy turned and stared at him. “How’s that?”

“I guess you just haven’t thought it through,” Leroy said. “What’s the greatest strength of America? Free enterprise, of course. And what’s more free-enterprise than reclaiming unsightly disease-breeding mud flats and turning those flats into a garden spot dotted with beautiful American homes? It adds strength to the economy. Why, my boy, if all over this great
country little bands of Communist sympathizers and Communist dupes could put a spoke in the wheels of free enterprise by blocking progress and production, Red Russia could bring this mighty nation to its knees without using one single little bomb. Lenin said that in order to achieve victory over the capitalist nations, it is first necessary to bankrupt them. Leaving that bay untouched is one of the devices of a welfare state. It’s socialistic in nature. It’s part of the trend of the government owning everything. Naturally some of the people in Save Our Bays, Incorporated, have the best motives in the world. They love birds, or fish, or canoeing or some damn thing, but can you say they aren’t being subverted by somebody working behind the scenes, somebody who will take every chance that comes along to divide and confuse us and cripple the free-enterprise system? And maybe that person has a Red Chinese wife.”

Jimmy stared for a moment and licked his lips. “That’s a hell of a dangerous thing to turn loose in this town.”

“You mean people would believe it?” Elmo asked.

“A lot of them. Too many of them. It’s just wild enough and absurd enough and idiotic enough.”

“It’s been turned loose in a lot of towns, for a lot of different reasons, Jimmy. And it’s loose here already.”

“Who started it?” Jimmy demanded.

“I did,” Leroy said, “and I didn’t mean to, and I’m ashamed of myself. A few days ago one of our more militant crackpots was in my office. Whenever he wants to sue somebody he comes to me and I talk him out of it. Jake Cooper. You know him. He heads up that big trailer park group.”

“Fighters for Constitutional Action,” Jimmy said. “Yes. I know him. He’s a damned old bore.”

“I was tired and bored, so I went into that little spiel just for kicks. Suddenly I realized he was taking it seriously. So I told
him I was just making a complicated joke. He kept nodding and licking his lips and saying he understood. He’s been hungry for some new liberty to suppress. Before he left he told me that he understood that I had to say it was a joke because I didn’t want to get mixed up in that end of it. He said I didn’t have to worry a bit. He said I could leave all those dirty radical nigger-lovers to him. He’s already started making a noise, Jimmy. The other idiot-fringe groups will jump in. It was a stupid thing to do, but I console myself by saying it was such a natural that it would have happened anyway. So let’s just lay back for a while and see what happens.”

Elmo said, “You just write pretty words about Grassy Bay for us, and let me know if Jennings happens to come up with any good ideas. The money will keep coming.”

“But weren’t you talking about one little odd job for him, Elmo?”

“Hell, yes! I damn near forgot. You won’t get much sleep tonight, Jimmy boy. You got to go pack that big blonde of Buckie’s and stick her on an airplane. Here’s a hundred dollars for a ticket.”

“Where to?”

“She can pick her own direction, long as it’s a nice long flight.”

“Does Flake know about it?”

“He will in the morning, and when Leroy finishes talking to him, Buck will go down on bended knee and thank us for giving him a second chance. If she’s long gone, he’ll be easier to handle.”

“Does the girl know she’s going?”

“Leroy’s going down there right now with you and have a little talk with her. Leroy’s good at this kind of thing. I’ll be down in a while, but I expect you’ll be gone by then, so goodnight, Jimmy.”

•   •   •

As they walked down toward the pool, Leroy said, “All you do is back me up if I have to bring you into it. Two work better than one on these things. She’s just a kid.”

Charity was fixing herself a drink when they found her. Flake was still in the same position, mouth open, arm dangling.

Leroy smiled at the girl and said, firmly, “You come out here for a while. We want to talk to you.”

She came along willingly. Leroy took her to the far end of the pool and had her sit in a redwood chair. He pulled two other chairs close, facing her, and motioned to Jimmy to sit down with them.

“I want to ask you some questions, Miss Prindergast.”

“I never give interviews except at the studio, sweetie.”

“Where’s your home?”

“Wherever I happen to be, sweetie.”

Leroy Shannard made a sudden skillful motion. His hard palm cracked her face around to one side. Her drink fell and shattered. She was motionless for one stunned moment, then squealed with rage and lunged at him. Leroy shoved her back into the chair. When she tried again, he slapped her again.

“Settle down or I’ll really have to hurt you. You’re not among friends.”

There were welts on her face and her eyes were streaming. “You … you dirty bastard!” she said.

“Exactly. Precisely. Now answer the questions without any cute talk. Where are you from?”

She hesitated. When he raised his hand she said, quickly, “Dayton, Ohio.”

“That’s better, dear. You met Flake in Fort Lauderdale. You went there for spring fun and games with the rest of the kids. Why didn’t you go back home?”

“I was going to flunk out anyway.”

“Buck Flake was stupid to bring you back here. Do you realize that?”

“I don’t know what you mean. He offered me a job.”

“You know what I mean. He’s a married man.”

“He’s a lot of fun.”

“The fun is over.”

“You better ask him about that, sweetie.”

“Buck has a lot of friends. He’s tied up with a lot of people in various business ways. Those people want to take good care of Buck, whether he wants it or not. So nobody is asking him anything, Charity. In fact, nobody is asking you anything. We’re telling you exactly what choice you have. Mr. Wing will take you home and wait while you pack and drive you to an airport, buy you a ticket and put you on a flight. If you want to be stubborn, I can have a sheriff’s deputy and a jail matron here within fifteen minutes. They’ll take you in and book you for theft.”

“Of what?”

“Anything plausible. My wallet, maybe.” He smiled. “Or it could be disorderly conduct, public intoxication, soliciting.”

“Whatever you do, Buck would get me right out.”

“Probably, if none of us could talk him out of it. But it’s a funny thing about that matron at the county jail. Every time a pretty girl is booked, the matron looks her over and seems to find lice or the evidence of lice in her pretty hair. So, in the interest of hygiene, she orders the pretty tresses shaved off, before she puts the girl in one of her nice clean cells. Sometimes it takes four holding and one shaving to get the job done. But it gets done, Miss Prindergast.”

She raised her hand slowly to her heavy silver hair. She stared at Jimmy Wing. “Could … could that happen?”

“It usually does.”

“You’re both trying to scare me.”

“If you want to take the gamble, Charity,” Leroy said, “go right ahead. It wouldn’t be permanent damage anyway. Hair always grows back.”

She snuffled, bit her lip and looked at the pool. “Can I even say goodbye to Buck?”

“You might say it too loud and wake him up, dear,” Leroy said. “You have your purse. You better leave right from here.”

“But I didn’t want to leave. This is a fun place.” She sighed. “They’re all fun places. Hey! How about my pay?”

“What’s due you?”

“Let me see. It would be about eighty dollars.”

Leroy took out an alligator wallet, separated eighty dollars and handed her the money. “I’ll get it from Mr. Flake.” He stood up and said, “It wouldn’t be wise to write or phone Mr. Flake, or to turn around and come back.”

“I said he was fun. I didn’t say he was a thing.” She stood up. “Well, Jimmy Wing, let’s go. I just didn’t realize Buckie had such sweetie friends.”

She was a tall girl to walk with. She had nothing to say. She sat in the car, subdued, as far from him as she could get. She did not speak all the way to Palm Highlands, except to direct him to the display house where she was living. It was several doors beyond the sales office. He stopped in the drive and said, “I’ll wait here.”

“Hell, come on in and help me say goodbye to it.”

He followed her in. She turned on the lights in every room as she went through it. All the furniture was new. She had managed to strew clothing in every room, fill every ashtray, dirty every glass. She turned the built-in music system on at high volume, hauled two blue suitcases out of a closet, fixed herself a drink and told him to help himself.

“He belted me a couple of good ones,” she said. “Look at the damn marks!”

“It surprised me.”

“I know. Your mouth hung open. But it didn’t surprise you as much as it did me. Go gather up clothes, dear. Start in the living room. Dump them in this suitcase.”

In less than twenty minutes she was ready to leave. As she went around, taking a last look, she said, “It makes you feel like dirty, being hustled out of town. It makes me feel cheap. All clear, I guess. Help me get the lights. Key on the table, I guess. Should I leave him a note? Hell, no. What would I say? Four pieces of luggage and one sweater. Where are we going, dear? Which airport?”