Murder by Candlelight (30 page)

Placing the stool under the spot where the
rope went over the beam, getting behind the hood, pocketing the
gun, Z boosted the thug up so he stood on the shaky seat. Pulling
the rope tight, Z tied off the end around the frame of the garage
door rail.

To complete the procedure, Z picked up the
remaining piece of cord; fastened one end to the bottom of the
nearest leg of the stool, the other end snubbed up around the
inside handle of the closed garage door.

"Two things could happen," Z said, patiently
explaining. "Either you go to sleep and fall off. Or somebody opens
the garage door, the opening door jerking the stool out from under
you. Since you're some kind of cowboy, I'd 'a liked to put the rope
around a limb, and you on a horse, but this will have to do. So,
while I got the chance, let me just say, a great big so-long from
Mr. Minghetti."

Z's work completed, first wiping off his
prints, Z tossed the empty gun on the floor near the knife and
bullets, after that retreating through the house, exiting past the
alarms -- which the thug hadn't bothered to reset -- into what was
left of the night, grateful to be alive, satisfied with the night's
work.

Driving the Cavalier
through a pre-dawn drizzle, splashing his way out of the lavish
sub-division, Z thought about the possibilities. If the man hanged,
Z wouldn't be
too
unhappy, though that wasn't the plan. Since Z had been
careful to arrange the "hanging" on the
girl's
side of the garage, the idea
was for the girlfriend to return to the house later that night.
Pushing the button on her electric garage door opener, the opening
door would jerk the stool out from under the punk, dangling him
there before her eyes, kicking and strangling. (Z hadn't arranged
enough of a fall to snap the man's bull neck.)

At that point, either of two things might
happen. If the hood had been a son-of-a-bitch to his girl, she
might just push the garage door button again, driving off
peacefully, leaving her abusive boyfriend to croak. Or, she might
rush inside, setting up the seat, getting his feet on it so he
could stand and take the pressure off his neck.

With the same knife Z used to do his "rope
tricks," she would then cut the bully boy loose, the guy not so
injured he wouldn't retrieve and reload his gun.

Z hoped the second of those two
possibilities happened ... because, thinking this action out
carefully, Z's long-range plans for the gunsel had not yet been
realized!

* * * * *

Chapter 17

By the time Z got home, the rain had
stopped, the night too far gone for Z to attempt sleep. Anyway, who
could sleep with the sweat of fear still oozing from his pores?

The first order of business was to run a
quiet bath.

Feeling better after soaking his weary body
for twenty minutes, Z flopped down on his unmade bed, planning only
to rest his eyes for an hour before the sun came up.

To find himself fighting to wake up from
another in the "horrible nightmare" series. This time, Z was in the
desert, faceless men on all-terrain vehicles chasing him, his feet
sinking in the burning sand. Blazing yellow dunes, like giant piles
of quicksand, lay in wait to suck him under. He was running,
running, the machines roaring at his back, gaining on him,
beginning to flank him, to get ahead of him. His only salvation was
to top a rise of hard-packed sand. Except that the closer he
dragged his weary body toward the top, the hotter he became.
Finally, the machine-men almost running him down, Z was at the top
... only to find he'd fallen into the sun, his clothes catching
fire, his face melting! ...

And he was awake. Basted in sweat. His skin,
feverish.

Where
did
these crazy dreams come
from??

The morning sun blasting in the bedroom
window, Z covered his eyes until he could adjust to the punishment
of the light, then choked down more than his usual handful of
aspirin in a desperate attempt to reduce his head size.

Going to the bathroom for water to wash down
the aspirin burn, he made the mistake of glancing at himself in the
lavatory mirror, it always a shock to see his face before gravity
drained the puffiness from his eyes. Today, he looked worse than
usual, his skin discolored, lumpy. To complete the picture, his
head hurt like the bang of a migraine drum, the cause of the pain,
a touchy lump on the back of his skull.

Leaning forward, Z saw he'd grown a wino's
broken-veined nose and a brawler's swollen eye -- his face, the
perfect answer to a child's question about why, after a prize
fight, boxers wore sunglasses to interviews.

Z could only hope his general state of
health was better than he looked: his experience, that people who
appeared to be at death's door, usually were.

It was not --
emphasize
not
--
going to be a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

Shaved, teeth brushed -- gently -- putting
on shoes, shirt, and slacks, Z shuffled into the living room to get
a fire going and the air conditioners chugging.

Now fully awake -- a state that made Z feel
even worse -- his only interest was retrieving the morning paper
from the front lawn.

Going outside and along the side of the old
house -- enough rain fall last night to make a jungle of the
returning heat -- Z picked up his paper (the other tenants' papers,
long gone.)

Returning to his cooling
apartment to sit at the table, Z shucked the
Star
from its plastic wrapper to
find the front page shouting: health care, Korea, mayhem in
midtown, and K.C. politicians vilifying one another. The
usual.

The inside features were no better: in the
order of their importance, the comics, the daily horoscope, and
advice from Billy Graham.

Rethinking his disappointment, Z reflected
that the paper was probably "put to bed" around three in the
morning: too early to include dark deeds done in the dead of night,
specifically, too early to include someone found tied up and
hanged.

Willing to try an even
more
doubtful
source of information, Z turned on the nineteen-inch
black-and-white on the front room lamp table, switching channels to
the station that broadcast local news at eleven-thirty. Only to
hear a half hour of nothing but Missouri gossip. (On
that
station, even
the
national
news
was given a local slant. Z fully expected a report one day saying:
"A Kansas City man was only three streets away when terrorists blew
up the White House. Interview at ten."

Giving up his knowledge quest, Z fixed
brunch, irritated to be scraping out the last of the peanut butter
to make his sandwich. Got himself a Diet Coke.

It was only after he'd gummed down his
peanut butter and jelly -- every chew a painful stretch of face and
a thump of headache -- that he remembered about the bug. (Lack of
quality sleep was becoming more than an annoyance.)

Wearily plopping himself on the butt-sprung
divan, Z started by unscrewing the mouthpiece on the phone's
receiver; immediately located the miniaturized electronic device
the punk had put inside.

Removing the listening device, going to the
kitchen, Z took delight in smashing the little gizmo with the
handle of a tableware knife, Z cleaning up by scraping the even
tinier bits and pieces off the counter and sprinkling them in the
fireplace.

Discovering the
transmitter motivated Z to search the rest of the apartment for
a
second
bug -- a
time-consuming, head-pounding process.

But a hunt that produced nothing. The thug
-- and Z still didn't know the crook's name -- was so cocky about
breaking in without being caught, he thought that one mike was all
he'd need.

What was really
dumb
-- knowing that
someone had searched his apartment -- was for Z to have overlooked
the
possibility
of a thug-bug. Right then and there, Z took a solemn pledge
to pay more attention to guys who had it in for him!

Z's mind skittering like a model T on a
rutted road, Z was bounced back to wondering what the crook had
planned for Z. Surely, not to shoot Z in the garage. The hoodlum's
scheme was probably to knock Z out again, then drive Z somewhere
quiet; after taking Z's car keys, drill him. Leave the body, run
Z's car off somewhere, then call a cab to take the mobster home.
When word of the hit was passed around, wait to see if Johnny D.
crawled out of the woodwork.

It could easily have happened that way --
but didn't -- leaving Z alive for sweaty speculation about what
might very well have been the end of him.

Still tired, still shaky,
Z decided to stay away from the office; instead, to get some rest
on the small sofa --
rest
, he'd heard, nearly as good for
you as
sleep
. (Z
hoped so, because he was thinking seriously about giving up sleep
permanently, as little sleep as he got between bad dreams.) But
found he couldn't relax on the cramped divan. Nor could he get
comfortable when he tried to go back to bed.

Two o'clock.

Deciding that any activity
was better than sitting around mumbling to himself, Z drove the
Cavalier to the IGA. Bought peanut butter, of course. And
this
time, a loaf
of
whole
wheat
bread. (As bad as he was
feeling, Z thought it would be a good idea to eat healthy for a
change.) Added Diet Coke, paper plates, and paper
napkins.

Just the staples.

Was amazed to discover that being out in the
heat had made him feel better. Worrying about grocery costs while
putting away his purchases, Z thought, again, of Harry Grimes;
leading Z to persuade himself he'd better check his answering
machine, just in case Harry, hearing Z was trying to contact him,
might have left a message.

All of the above accounting for why Z showed
up at his office after all, arriving at four o'clock (about the
time he generally left it.) Only to have his hunch about Harry
calling, disproved.

Standing by his
"secretary's" desk, tempted to swear, the knock on the door
startled him. (After all, it
could
be the toasted hoodlum on the loose. Or even more
deadly -- Millie the tax preparer.)

Creeping to the door, Z put his ear to the
hollow panel. Listened ... for what? The thug lighting another
cigarette? The click of a thumbed-back hammer? Reasoning that it
was unlikely the racketeer would come into the building -- at the
same time wanting to exercise caution -- Z slowly rotated the
doorknob, easing the door open a crack to peek through the slit,
seeing ... just enough to tell that the person out there was
shorter that last night's punk.

Relieved, Z opened the door all the way, to
find ... Johnny Dosso.

A shocker!

As much because Johnny D.
had
never
been to
Z's office as because John was supposed to be in hiding.

Moreover, not the Johnny
who Z had dropped off at the Happy Hollow. Standing before him was
the
real
John,
dressed in sartorial splendor: white silk shirt cuffed with diamond
links, monogrammed pocket with genuine pearl buttons, fawn-colored
meringue wool slacks with a knife-edged crease, and mirrored finish
dark bronze shoes.

"I see you're feelin' secure. You don't even
have your blackjack out to bust in your friends' heads." John was
in the best of spirits. "Well, you goin'a ask me in?"

"Sure."

Z stepped aside, John strutting in like the
fat peacock he was.

"What a shitty
hole-in-the-wall you got here," Johnny said, looking around with
disdain. "Excuse
me
!" he corrected himself, bending forward to peer through the
arch into Z's part of the office. "What a shitty
two
-hole-in-the-wall you
got here."

The formalities over, Z
led the way into the other "hole," waving John to the client chair,
Z sitting behind the moldering desk. This was
Z's
office -- no matter how
"shitty."

"So, why don't you come to work for me?"
John asked, something he did periodically. "You get easy duty."

Herding hookers with my fists, Z reminded
himself.

"Hell, we even got major medical."

Not much good, Z thought cynically, for
healing bullets to the brain.

"Now I know what you're thinkin'. I sort of
hinted that I'd retired. But what I meant was, I needed a little
vacation, is all."

"Oh?" Not many people "vacationed" at the
Happy Hollow.

"Sure. I'm too important to the organization
to retire permanent." John tried to cross his legs; gave it up
because he was too fat to be comfortable that way.

John had something to say; would get around
to saying it sooner or later.

"Sure, there was that little dust-up I had.
But that was nothing. Not that I don't appreciate what you did for
me."

"That was
nothing
?"

"Well, a little more than
nothing. But all's swell that ends swell, if you get my meaning."
John had never been much of a scholar, Shakespearean or otherwise.
"When I received the news from my contacts in the organization -- I
got out of that flophouse, pronto. First, going back to my home for
a decent change of clothes. Which reminds me, don't worry. I didn't
torch
your
rags.
I got 'em in my car. In the trunk where they don't smell up the
leather interior. Didn't bring 'em in 'cause I wasn't sure you were
here. I didn't call first, 'cause I wanted to come by in person to
see how you were makin' out.