LaBrava (31 page)

“The boat-lifter. Cundo Rey.”

She turned her head to stare at him. “How do you know that?”

“I showed you his picture, didn’t I? You use somebody you never saw before. That was your first mistake. No, it would be your second mistake. Richard was your first.”

She was silent again.

“How much does he want?”

After a moment she said, “All of it.”

“Or what?”

“He didn’t say.”

“Tell me what he did say.”

“He asked me if I wanted to buy a typewriter.”

There was a silence.

“Your typewriter?”

“Yes.”

“It can be traced to you?”

“I think so. There’s a little sticker on the back—the name of the place where I have it serviced. I forgot about that.”

They all forget something. “How’d the boat-lifter get it? You didn’t give it to him, did you?”

“No, someone else.”

“You gave it to a world-class fuckup to get rid of and he gave it to the boat-lifter who probably sold it and then had to get it back, once he figured everything out . . . What else did he say?”

“He wants me to meet him, so we can talk.”

“Where?”

“A bar on LeJeune, Skippy’s Lounge.”

“Skippy’s Lounge. Jesus. Are you supposed to bring the money?”

“No, that’s what we’re going to talk about. Where we make the exchange.”

“Where is it, the money?”

She paused. “In my apartment.”

“You think the place is safe now because they tossed it?”

She said, “Joe, if you’ll help me . . .”

He waited and she seemed to start over. She said, “You have to understand something. I love Maury in a very special way. I know him better than you or anyone else ever will, and he knows me, he understands me.” She said, “Joe, I promise you, I would never do anything in the world to hurt him.”

Something she had said before, but in real life, not in a movie that he remembered. He said, “That’s nice but we’re past that. Torres called. They found Richard.”

She stared straight ahead.

“It wasn’t a cabin up in the mountains. It wasn’t even that far from other houses . . .” He gave her a moment, but she said nothing. “I told Torres to have a talk with Richard’s pal, Glenn Hicks.” She turned again to stare at him and he said, “You get the feeling I know more about it than you do?”

After a moment she looked at the view again and said, “Joe, you have to believe how I feel about Maury . . .”

“I thought we were on Richard now.”

She said, quietly, “There is no way anyone can prove I killed him.”

“I didn’t even say he was dead. But I’m not gonna tell on you. You’re grown up enough to do it yourself.”

She said, “Does he really matter?”

“Not to me, no. But the state attorney, you hear him you’re gonna think Richard was his kid brother. See, you shoot and kill somebody you have to have a better reason than for money.”

She said, “You broke his arm. What if you had hit him in the head?”

“I had a chance to and I didn’t. That’s the difference. Richard could’ve brought me up if he wanted to, I accepted that possibility. You’re trying, as they say, to get away with murder.” He realized he was at ease because he was in control and it didn’t matter what role she tried on him. The poor lady didn’t know who to be, so she was playing a straight part for a change and not coming off anything like a star. She was beginning to look older to him.

The view was the same. It didn’t change.

She started to get up and he said, “Where you going?”

“To buy a typewriter.”

Good line. He liked the way she said it; it gave him a feeling for her again.

He said, “Put your bra on and relax. I’ll go talk to him, see if he wants to turn himself in.”

“Why would he?”

“It’s better than getting shot . . . I’ll need the key to your apartment, to pick up the money.”

“Swell,” Jean said.

“Save that one,” LaBrava said. “It’s not over yet.”

IT WAS LADIES’ NIGHT
at Skippy’s Lounge.
Ladies Only. Drinks two for one till 9
P.M.

So LaBrava hung a Leica and a camera bag on him and told the manager he was doing a photo story for the
Herald’s
Sunday magazine, “Tropic,” and the manager said to be his guest—but don’t shoot any housewives supposed to be at K-mart shopping and a movie after unless you get a release. There were about a hundred of them, all ages, crowded around the circular stage watching the all-male go-go show. LaBrava said, “Let me get one of you while we’re standing here, Skip.” The manager said, “I look like a Skip to you? Those assholes up there with the razor cuts and the baby oil all over ’em are the Skips.”

Five of them plus Cundo Rey doing their show opener.

The five Debonaires wore wing collars with little black bow ties, cuffs with sparkly cuff links and black bikinis. Cundo Rey wore a leopard jock and cat whiskers painted on his face, streaked out from his nose to his ears. He was the one and only Cat Prince, extra added attraction, who hung back in the opening number and did not new-wave-it the way the serious all-white Debonaires did. It was their set, repetitious, robotic, each Debonaire dancing with his own ego, three of the five in front of the beat, stepping all over it; they ducked and hopped to
I Do
coming out of the sound system and set J. Geils back ten years.

Cundo Rey came on for his solo with his raven hair, his earring, his painted-on whiskers, with West African riffs out of a Havana whorehouse, and Cundo was the show, man turned on with flake and blood into the cat-stud prince come to set the ladies free; his body glistened, his moves purred with promise, said stuff a five into my polyester leopard-skin, ladies, and we’ll all be richer for it.

Many of them did and Cundo followed the waitress to LaBrava’s table counting his sweaty wet take. He eyed LaBrava, smiled at the camera, blinked in the flash.

“So, the picture-taker.”

LaBrava lowered the camera. “The boat-lifter.”

Cundo ordered a sugar-free soft drink from the waitress, slipped into a chair still glistening, smelling of cologne, cat whiskers waved by his smile. “So, you and the woman. Is all the same to me. I sell you the typewriter, a nice one. I think you have to give me the camera, too. Is it the same one?”

“A better one,” LaBrava said. “Older but more expensive.”

“That’s okay, I’ll take it.”

“Why didn’t you try to take the other one?”

“I didn’t know it would be so easy like this.”

LaBrava said, “Is it?” He pushed the camera bag toward Cundo, who leaned over the table to look inside. As he looked up, LaBrava pulled the bag back, closer to him.

“Tha’s Richard’s gun?”

LaBrava nodded.

“What happen to him?”

“He got shot.”

“I believe it,” Cundo Rey said. “Guy like him, he would get shot. Did it kill him?”

LaBrava nodded.

“That guy, he don’t know what he was doing. I don’t know what he was doing either. Or you, or the woman. But I know what I’m doing, man, I’m going to sell you a typewriter or that woman is going to jail. Maybe you going too.”

LaBrava said, “What would you think—you give me the typewriter, then give yourself up?”

Cundo said, “Give myself to the police?” He sat back as the waitress, with dollar bills folded through her fingers, placed a glass in front of him and filled it from a can of Tab. She walked away and Cundo leaned in, frowning. “I look crazy to you?”

“I don’t know you,” LaBrava said. “You could be some broke dick going from failure to failure, never gonna make it. See, if you’re like that maybe you ought to turn yourself in, they’ll take off a few years. You go up to Raiford and do your go-go number they’ll make you Homecoming Queen.”

“Man, I don’t steal nothing. Why do I want to go to jail?”

“For killing that old man, Richard’s Uncle Miney.”

“Man, what is this? Some shit you telling me. What we have to talk about—you like to see that woman go to jail?”

“No, I wouldn’t,” LaBrava said, “and I’ll tell you why. I don’t trust her. I think just for a kick she could put the stuff on us. I mean the whole thing with her is for fun. She doesn’t need the money, it’s for thrills.”

“For thrills . . .”

“You understand what I mean? She’s a very emotional person.”

“Yes, I understand.”

“She borrows the money from the old guy that owns the hotel . . .”

“Yes?”

“Then steals it from him.”

“She’s some woman.”

“Very determined. You know, hardheaded. She says she doesn’t want to buy the typewriter.”

“She doesn’t? Why?”

“Because of her honor. She won’t be forced to do it. She doesn’t think you’d give the typewriter to the police.”

“No?”

“No, because if you turn her in—she said for me to tell you—she’ll give them your name. They already have your picture, your fingerprints . . . Is that true?”

“Yes, is true.”

“So if she goes to jail, you go to jail.”

“What about you, yourself?”

“What did I do?”

“You kill Richard?”

“I never said that. But I see what you mean. You got a point.”

“I do?”

“Yeah, she could lay Richard off on me. Try to.”

“So why don’t you kill her? You want me to?”

“I don’t think we have to go that far. But I don’t think you should try and sell her the typewriter, either.”

“No?”

“See, if the cops even suspect her, they search her place and find it?”

“Yes?”

“She could be pissed off enough she’d finger both of us.”

“Yes, so what do we do?”

“You give me the typewriter. I’ll take care of it.”

“Give it to you . . . What do I get?”

“Half the money.”

Cundo had to bite on his lip and think about it. “Three hundred thousand dollars?”

“That’s right.”

“How would you do it?”

“No problem. She already gave me the money, to hide. See, in case they search her place. So I give half to you and you give me the typewriter.”

“What does she do then? Her money’s gone.”

“Who gives a shit? The typewriter’s gone, too; she can’t even prove
she
did it. She tries to put the stuff on us, it’s her word against ours. What can she prove?”

“Nothing.”

“So, all you have to do is give me the typewriter.”

Cundo thought about it again. He said then, “You give me half the money, okay,
I
get rid of the typewriter.”

“If I knew you better,” LaBrava said, “if we were friends it would be no problem. But I don’t know you. You understand? You give me the typewriter, you get half the take, and neither one of us has to worry. What do you say?”

Cundo thought some more and began to nod. “All right, half the money. Keep your camera, I don’t want it.”

“When?”

“Maybe tonight. After I go-go.”

“Why not right now? Three hundred thousand, you don’t need to hang around here shaking your ass.”

“I like to do it.”

“Okay, then later on?”

“Let me think.”

LaBrava let him. He looked at those cat whiskers painted on Cundo’s face and said, “You know, one time I was as close to Fidel Castro as I am to you right now. It was in New York.”

“Yeah? Why didn’t you shoot him? Maybe I wouldn’t go to prison if you did.”

“What were you in for?”

“I shot a Russian guy.”

“Just trying to hustle a buck, uh?”

“Man, is tough sometime. You got to think, is somebody want to kill me? You never know.”

LaBrava, nodding, had to agree. “As Robert Mitchum once said, ‘I don’t want to die, but if I do I’m gonna die last.’ “

The Cuban with the cat whiskers painted on his face stared at him and said, “Who’s Robber Mitchum?”

Cundo Rey was back at the place on Bonita now.

The first thing he had decided: there was no sense in the picture-taker giving him half the money when he could give him all of it.

The second thing: he needed light to see it. Make sure it wasn’t some money on top of newspaper; he had enough newspaper. He didn’t want to go to the woman’s apartment where, the picture-taker said, the money was still in the trash bag; he didn’t want to go anyplace he had never been. He didn’t want to go to a bar or a cafe or some all-night place where people came in. He didn’t want to go outside, in a park, where there wasn’t any light.

He went through all this before coming around to the place he already had, on Bonita, a perfect place. Nobody on the street knew him or maybe had even seen him. All he had to do was leave the picture-taker here, go over the Seventy-ninth Street Causeway to the Interstate, be in Atlanta, Georgia, tomorrow. Go anyplace he wanted after that with his bag of money. Somebody would find the picture-taker in a week, two weeks, they would smell him and call the cops and break into the place.

He couldn’t get over the picture-taker being so simple and trusting. He had thought the country people recruited for the housing brigade in Alamar were simple. This guy was as simple as those people. Either he believed he could trade half the money for the typewriter, or he believed he could pull a trick, get the typewriter and keep the money. Either way he would be very simple to think he could do it.

Cundo could feel his snubbie pressing into his spine, silk shirt hanging over it. Let the guy come in. Make sure the money was in the bag—no newspaper. Then do it. No fooling around. Do it. Leave the guy. He could drive out maybe to Hollywood, California, see how things were doing out there. Sure, get some new outfits, go Hollywood.

He was getting excited now, looking out through the Venetian blinds to the street that curved past the apartment. Empty. It always looked empty, even during the day. He was getting anxious waiting for the guy to arrive here. He rubbed a finger under his itchy nose, looked at his hand and saw the black Magic-Marker on his finger, from his cat whiskers he had forgot to wash off, from being anxious and excited. It was okay. Take half a minute.

Cundo left the window, moved from the living room through the short hall to the bathroom. That snubbie was hurting him. He pulled it out of his pants, laid it on the toilet tank. Wrap a facecloth around it after he washed off his cat whiskers, try it that way stuck in his pants, so the hard edges wouldn’t hurt . . .