Fala Factor (17 page)

“Henry is dead?” he said.

“Unless a parrot can live without a head.” I sighed. “Just thought I'd give you a little good news to start the day off right.”

Before he could recover and consider having Bass remove my head, I went out the door, hobbled through the outer office, went into the hall, and headed for the stairs, the location of which I had noted before I had entered the office.

I wasn't sure what I had discovered beyond the fact that Bass had killed Mrs. Olson, but that was a start and a few things were fitting into place.

Jeremy was working on the mirror in the Farraday elevator when I arrived. He sprayed, scrubbed, looked at his own image. Since my ribs were bruised, I rode up with him.

“I should replace this mirror,” he said, “but I like to maintain the original. Replacement is necessary in all things but there comes a point at which so much has been replaced that what you have is but the replica of what once stood. When that process begins, we are too often unaware of the transition. However, my fear, Toby, is that when singular replacements become necessary, I will lose my interest in maintaining the building.”

“That will never happen,” I assured him as we groaned up past the first floor, which reminded me. “How are Alice and Jane getting along?”

“Remarkably,” he said, working away at the mirror “Miss Poslik is very much interested in our children's book and has already begun illustrations. Of course, we could offer her no money at this point, perhaps at no point, but there is a communal feeling about this project.… What is wrong with you, Toby?” he asked, suddenly looking at me in his mirror as we squeaked past the second floor.

“I ran into your old friend Bass,” I said, gently touching my rib cage to reassure myself again that nothing was broken. “He sends you his best.”

“I doubt that,” he said, turning to examine me “You are fortunate that he simply toyed with you.”

“He dangled me out of an eighth-floor window,” I said as we approached the third-floor landing The elevator came to a stop and Jeremy, tiny bucket in huge hand, stepped out after sliding open the metal door. His lips were tight in anger.

“He should have been dealt with long ago, before he had the opportunity to seriously hurt anyone,” he said.

“He killed a woman last week,” I said, as the elevator door closed.

“And he is on the streets?” asked Jeremy, looking up at the slowly rising cage.

“No proof,” I said, sagging back against the mesh.

“Justice does not always require evidence of the senses,” his voice came up. “It can even go beyond intuition.”

Our voices were echoing down the halls now, vibrating off metal and marble and over the whine of machines and distant humming voices.

“I thought you were coming to the idea that there was no good and evil,” I shouted. “What about your poem in the park?”

“I have no obligation to be consistent,” he shouted back. “My thoughts and feelings are one. When enlightenment comes, it will come not because I will it but because I am ready for it.”

“Whatever you say, Jeremy,” I said, as the elevator came to a stop on four. I said it quietly to myself. It was hard to think about enlightenment with a ringing skull and bruised ribs.

When I reached the outer door, I knew that things had changed, that I would enter a cleaner but even less savory realm because it would be a false one. The still moist sign on the pebbled glass read S
HELDON MINCK, D.D.S
. There was no reference, even in small letters, to the existence of Toby Peters, Private Investigator. Inside the door, the waiting room had been scrubbed and a new, metal-legged trio of chairs sat waiting emptily. The small table was clean, the ashtray scrubbed and empty, and two editions of the dental journal, both recent, rested waiting for an eager patient to explore their visual wonders. The ancient poster of gum disorders was gone. In its place was a framed, glass-covered sign urging waiting victims to buy war bonds and stamps.

Beyond the next door, the wonders continued. The sink was still clean, the instruments lined up neatly on a white towel, and Shelly was wearing a freshly scrubbed white jacket buttoned to the neck. He was sitting in the dental chair puffing on the remains of a cigar when I came in. Before he peered up from his magazine through his thick lenses he heard me and cupped the cigar in his palm.

Coughing and choking, he bolted out of the chair.

“It's … you … for God's sake … for chrissake Toby. I thought it was the inspectors. You could give a man. “He returned his cigar to his mouth, still coughing and pushing his glasses back on his nose.”

“I thought they were coming tomorrow,” I said, heading for my office.

“They like to fool you,” he said with a wry smile “You know, come in a day early or a day late. But I'll be ready. How do you like the place?”

“Depressing,” I said. “I liked it better the old way.”

“Mildred likes it better this way,” Shelly said defiantly.

“Then Mildred can come down and work in it. I think I'll move out.” The words came out before I had a sense that they were coming.

“Out?” Shelly choked. “You wouldn't. We're friends. Who would I get to rent that closet?”

“Why is my name off the door?” I said through my teeth.

“I'll put it back on as soon as the inspection is over,” he said, looking to heaven for help with my unbending position.

“You've got three days,” I said. “Three days. It goes back on or I move out. And if this hands-off-the-walls stuff continues, out I go.”

“You're threatening an old friend,” Shelly said sadly, flipping the pages of his magazine.

“I'm threatening
you
,” I said “That's not quite the same thing.”

“I was going to ask you a favor,” Shelly said. “But with your present attitude …”

He paused, waiting for me to ask him what the favor was. I didn't ask.

“I was thinking that when the inspector came you could pretend to be a patient. You know, sit in the chair, let me clean your teeth, take an X ray.”

I laughed. The laugh hurt my ribs.

“Anyone who lets you x-ray his mouth with that left-over prop from
Metropolis
deserves the fate that awaits him.”

“Never mind,” he said, shoving his face into the magazine. “Just forget it. You'll get your name back on the door. And in case you're interested, you've got a visitor.”

The visitor was Cawelti, who was looking at the photograph of me, my dad, Phil, and the dog. Cawelti's hands were behind his back.

“Nice family portrait,” he said.

“I don't want to talk to you, fireman,” I said, getting behind my desk and biting my lower lip to keep from showing the pain in my aching ribs. My feet kicked something under my desk. Shelly had put the coffee pot, cups, and various pieces of junk and magazines in a box and shoved them there. I kicked them and the rattling turned Cawelti's head toward me.

“Seidman's doing better,” he said, pulling out the visitor's chair and sitting on it after turning it around. I hated people who did that. It would have been nice if the damned chair collapsed, but it didn't. “No thanks to your friend out there.”

“Shelly would be happy to work on you for nothing,” I said. “You got business with me, fireman, or is this social chitchat? Should I send out for coffee and cookies?”

“Jane Poslik is missing,” he said. “You wouldn't know anything about it, would you?”

He leaned forward, his arms on the top of the chair, his head resting on his hands. I could see where he had cut his face shaving that morning.

“You cut yourself shaving,” I said.

His hand inadvertently shot up to touch his chin and then backed down. His face went bright red.

“Jane Poslik, prick,” he said, clenching his teeth.

“I don't think she's got one,” I said back through my clenched teeth.

“You think you're funny,” said Cawelti, standing and pushing the chair into the corner.

Shelly's voice came through the door in a petulant whine.

“Hold it down in there, will you? There's a doctor at work out here. Inspectors could be coming in any time now.”

“Shut up, you hack,” Cawelti shouted back.

“That's quack,” Shelly shot back. “Im a quack, not a hack. Get your insults straight at least in there.”

“He's right,” I agreed. “He is a quack.” Then I whispered to Cawelti. “I'd say you get half credit for your answer Any more questions?”

Cawelti's hand came across the desk toward my neck, but I was ready for him. I came up with the coffee pot in my hand and swiped at his advancing arm. I caught him at the elbow.

“You son of a bitch,” he yelped, jumping back holding his arm.

“I'll be sure to tell my brother what you called our mother the next time I see him,” I said, still holding the coffee pot like a hammer.

He turned and left, slamming the door behind him. In the outer office I could hear Shelly say, “Hey, try to stay away from here a few days, will you? I've got some classy people coming through. Hey, hey, what are you—” The door slammed and Cawelti was gone.

“Some caliber of people you've got coming to see you, Toby,” he shouted at me. “Spitting on the floor. My patients don't even do that.”

I put the coffee pot back in the cardboard box under my desk, pulled the box out. and carried it into Shelly s office. He was settled in his chair, the LA.
Times
covering his face.

“Where the hell is Madagascar?” he said from behind the open paper. A puff of smoke popped over the back page.

“A French island, I think. Somewhere near Africa.” I said, walking toward him slowly.

“British occupied it over the weekend,” he said. “About time our side occupied something instead of moving out of somewhere.”

Shelly was still behind his newspaper as he flipped the pages.

“Mildred and I didn't get away over the weekend,” he said. “We were in here cleaning up, but I think we'll take in
The Man Who Came to Dinner
over at the Bliss-Hayden Theater. You know, a reward for passing the inspection. Right here Katherine Van Blau says Doris Day as Maggie the secretary ‘proved herself to be an actress of scope and fine sincerity.' You think that's the same Doris Day who stole Cal Applebaum's mother's candleholders? Couldn't be. She wouldn't come back here with the same—”

I dropped the carton on the floor and cut off Shelly's babbling. The newspaper came down and Shelly's eyes focused on the floor as an ash fell on his recently washed white jacket.

“What the hell?” he said. “Toby. I can't have that stuff in here with the inspection.”

“Find another place for it Take it home. Put it in the trunk of your car. Put it out in the hall. Someone will steal it within five minutes. I don't care where you put it, but not in my office.”

“You don't plan on cooperating with me on this crisis, do you?” he said, nodding his head knowingly, a man who finally recognizes betrayal.

“You're beginning to understand that, are you?”

“All right. All right. Just leave it there. I'll take care of it,” he said, looking down at the carton. “Just go on with whatever you were doing. It doesn't matter that I might lose my license, that I might not be able to help all those people out there who rely on me.”

“Like Steve Seidman,” I said. “You could at least go see him in the hospital or call.”

“Me?” Shelly said, putting his newspaper aside and pointing to his chest. “I didn't do anything to him. If he has an infection or something, it's because …”

“Good-bye Shel,” I said sweetly and left the office.

I had a hard time finding Jeremy. He wasn't in his office. He wasn't in the elevator recleaning the mirror. He wasn't Lysoling the stairs or polishing the name plates in the lobby. I went back up to Alice Palice's “suite” and found him there. Alice's suite consisted of much the same space Shelly occupied two floors above. In the center of the main room was a large oak dining room table. On the table was Alice's printing press. Surrounding the printing press were cans of ink, towels, and stacks of paper. In fact the room was a mess filled with paper and books. It looked like moving day on the Island of Yap just before the invasion. The smell of ink hit hard and not unpleasantly. Jeremy was standing and shaking his head over something he was reading, which had probably been printed on the press.

“Toby,” he said, “one should be careful about one's promises. I told Alice I would keep an eye on things for her, she is expecting a delivery. She and Miss Poslik have gone downtown to a sale at Bullocks. They are getting along very well.” He put the printed material down and looked around the room. “I would be very willing to put all this in order, but Alice and I have an agreement.”

“Think you could close up shop and keep me company while I keep an eye on the guy who I think has the dog?” I said.

“You need company?”

“I may run into Bass,” I explained.

“Then it will be my pleasure to join you.”

We took my car, which proved to be a mistake. Since the passenger door wouldn't open, Jeremy had to slide in on the driver's side. It was a tight fit past the steering wheel and we almost had to give up. We didn't think of what might happen getting out. Fifteen minutes later we were parked in front of Lyle's building on Broadway. I left Jeremy and found by listening at the door that Lyle was still in his office. Then it was back downstairs and more waiting while Jeremy tried to educate me with poetry and a lecture on modern literature. At one point a guy who looked like an old George Brent came out of the shoe store we were parked in front of. He looked like he was going to tell us to move. Then he got close enough to see my face and Jeremy's body and decided instead to pretend he was looking for stray customers.