Operation Whiplash (3 page)

“I just talk a good game, Robin,” I said.

“You haven’t forgotten it’s a rental car?”

“I’ll get the papers from you in Hudson.”

I put her on the bus with a ticket and her bag. Then I took the Chevy to the Tallahassee rental agency and turned it in. I told the agency I’d lost the papers. I had them call Little Rock and get the charges. I paid up, took my briefcase, and hailed a cab.

I had the cabbie take me to the largest used-car lot in town. In twenty minutes I was the owner of a two-year-old Ford for which I paid cash. The dealer’s boy put on the temporary ten-day tags.

An hour after Robin’s departure I aimed the Ford toward Hudson.

Near midnight I pulled into a trucker’s terminal. I had a sandwich, then took my briefcase into the men’s room. I went into a cubicle and changed wigs and makeup. I took my Bianchi belt-holster from the briefcase and exchanged it for the belt I had on. I settled the Smith & Wesson in it after loading a clip. Its solid, familiar weight felt comforting.

I tested the trigger-pull of the derringer before carefully inserting two of the dozen cartridges acquired from Rudy Hernandez. Fortunately the trigger-pull wasn’t unduly sensitive. I made a temporary shin holster from two heavy elastic bands I bummed from the restaurant’s cashier. I put the derringer under the lower one, pulled my long sock up, covering the weapon, then fastened the sock under the upper elastic. I’d arrange something more permanent later. Right then I got back out on the highway.

Beyond Perry there was little traffic. I reached Hudson at two
A.M
. The last time I’d driven past its single traffic light it had been at 90 m.p.h. with a posse of police cruisers after me. I knew where my first stop was going to be. I was going to break into Nate Pepperman’s office. There might be a message from Hazel.

Nate’s office was upstairs over the bank. I parked a block away and walked back. The outside door at the foot of the stairs was ajar a fraction of an inch. I examined it for a full minute and the silent street for another before I widened the aperture cautiously. That door shouldn’t have been open.

I went up the stairway, staying close to the wall to avoid squeaky stair treads. The upper hallway was dimly illuminated by a streetlight shining through a window. The door to Nate’s office was wide open. I think I knew what I was going to see before I saw it.

Even in the poor light I could see Nate Pepperman sitting at his desk, slumped to one side.

The top of the desk was covered with blood.

Pepperman’s throat had been cut viciously.

Hazel’s financial consultant was dead, and it was plain that he had been for some time.

I moved inside the office, careful where I put my feet. Blood had dripped onto the floor. I didn’t want to leave footprints in the crust. At closer range I could see that the dead man bore cruel face-cuts as well as the gruesome throat-slash. Nobody sits quietly in a swivel chair for that kind of treatment. Nate Pepperman had been held from behind while the knife-wielder performed from one side.

There was an underlying odor in the office. I connected it with the body at first, but then I recognized it. It was the smell of cordite. I stood beside the brutally slashed body of Hazel’s financial consultant while I scanned the deeper shadows in the room.

Again I knew what I was going to see before I saw it. The door of the office safe dangled drunkenly from one twisted hinge. Papers were scattered on the floor. The knife-wielders had blown the box and cleaned it out, discarding items of no value.

Not for a minute did I believe that Nate Pepperman had unluckily walked in upon a safecracking. That wouldn’t account for the condition of his face. I touched his shirt-sleeved arm. There was no give to it. Rigor mortis was well advanced. How had he remained undiscovered in his office for so long?

Robin had said that Hazel was in the office with Nate on Wednesday morning. She had found me on Friday evening. We had driven part of that night and most of Saturday. Today. Yesterday, rather. It was now two
A.M
. Sunday. If Nate had been murdered Friday night, it was possible no one would miss him on Saturday.

A dozen thoughts flickered through my mind as I stood in the murky, foul-smelling office, but one stood up and begged for attention:
Where was Hazel?
Where had she been since she checked out of the Lazy Susan? Where was she now? Did she know anything about this slaughterhouse of an office?

I had no answers.

I hadn’t really pressed Robin before about the circumstances of Hazel’s asking her to find me. Perhaps something had been said in Pepperman’s office when they were all together that would give me a starting place to look for Hazel.

I needed a starting place.

I backed out of the office, doubly careful to touch nothing. A visit to Robin at the Lazy Susan might get me started. I crept down the stairway and reconnoitered the street. A lone pedestrian was crossing the square. There were no moving vehicles in sight. I eased onto the sidewalk and walked unhurriedly to the Ford.

The Lazy Susan Motel was south of town. In the middle of the next block I hit the brake and sat there with the motor running. Above the dime-to-a-dollar variety store across the street there was a light on in another second-floor office. It was a real estate agency run by a young fellow named Jed Raymond, a self-declared country boy with a quick wit and a keen mind.

Jed had been my best male friend in Hudson, but I’d almost killed him before I left. Ordinary common sense dictated that I couldn’t approach Jed Raymond. He was a part-time deputy sheriff, for one thing. That was why he almost got killed.

But he’d also been Hazel’s friend.

He’d been the one who introduced me to her.

He had seemed pleased when we paired off.

More importantly, if anyone knew Hazel’s present whereabouts in Hudson, it was likely to be Jed Raymond.

I pulled over to the curb and parked again. I slid out of the Ford, crossed the street, and climbed the stairs. This time I made no effort to move quietly. When I reached the landing, I tapped lightly on the black-lettered, frosted window in the door.

A minute went by and nothing happened.

Could Jed have a girl in the office?

I tapped again.

I heard the shuffle of feet finally, and the door opened a crack. “Yes?” Jed’s familiar drawl inquired.

“Not married yet, I see,” I said. “No wife would put up with this kind of hours.”

Jed opened the door wider to peer out at me. “You seem to have the advantage of me, friend, if you’re sayin’ you know me,” he said at last.

“Where’s all that famous Southern hospitality?” I said. “Don’t I get invited inside?”

He thought it over, then backed away from the door after a moment and let me in. He was wary, though. By the time I got inside, he had the waist-high office counter between us. I knew he kept a hand gun within reach, like everyone else in the South.

He still had a thin face which was usually decorated with a slow grin. His hair was a cross between reddish and sandy, his fair skin was lightly freckled, and he was so skinny every female over the age of fifteen automatically wanted to mother him. Jed Raymond was an unlikely-looking Casanova, but no careful-thinking man on the west coast of Florida turned his women loose and unhobbled in Jed’s vicinity. Which still had never hampered Jed greatly.

He was looking me over again in the better light inside. Then he shook his head negatively. “I’m sorry if I seem a little slow,” he apologized.

“Does the real estate business still require you to date the daughters of land developers, Jed?” I asked.

His grin appeared. “I reckon I really should know you,” he said puzzledly. “Must be my head’s so fuzzed up with figures—” he glanced at his desk which was covered with yellow-paper scrawled notes and neatly typed forms, “—that I just can’t place you.”

“Still doing your drinking at the Dixie Pig?” I continued. Jed had introduced me to Hazel at the Dixie Pig, a tavern she had inherited from her second husband, Lou Espada.

Jed frowned. “That’s all changed now.” His head was cocked in a listening attitude while he tried to catalog my voice. “I just don’t recall—”

A shadow stirred in the farthest corner of the office. It materialized into a huge brown-black German shepherd which stretched itself slowly. The big dog nosed the air, sniffed loudly, then padded toward the counter, its toenails clicking on the wooden floor. The shepherd raised himself on his hind legs, stretched across the counter, and put his front paws on my chest.

“Kaiser!” Jed exclaimed in a scandalized tone. “I’m sorry,” he said to me for the second time. “Kaiser doesn’t usually have anything to do with strangers.” He paused as if he realized what he was saying. The dog lowered his wedge-shaped head onto my shoulder while his bushy tail wagged busily. “Say!” Jed exclaimed in a shocked tone. He couldn’t have looked more startled if he’d been struck by lightning.

“That’s right,” I said, ruffling the shepherd’s shaggy fur. “Kaiser doesn’t need to recognize a face to know me, Jed.”

The shepherd had been my dog before he was Jed’s. I’d rescued him from a roadside ditch after a hit-and-run driver had deliberately knocked the dog into it. During my stay in Hudson, Kaiser and I had been inseparable. When I had to leave hurriedly, I’d arranged for Jed to take over.

It was fortunate for Jed that I had. Kaiser was the principal reason Jed was alive today. The dog might even be the reason I was alive, too. Jed, as a part-time deputy sheriff, had been point man on a roadblock set up to stop me. Jed didn’t know it was me in the oncoming car, but I could see him plainly in my headlights as I roared up on the two deputies, cruisers drawn across the highway with Jed standing in the gap between them, waving me down.

I intended to try to smash my way through the space between the back-to-back cruisers whose snouts extended out onto the shoulders of the road, barring escape via that route. Jed was a good friend, but if he stood his ground he was going to have to take his chances, like I was taking mine.

But then Kaiser had stepped out onto the road in front of Jed, head high, tail wagging. Somebody else will have to explain it to you, because I can’t, but I spun the wheel hard left. The car shot into a field where it hit a ditch. I catapulted out and broke a leg when I landed. I crawled back under the car and shot it out, handgun against rifles, until a deputy’s bullet exploded the gas tank in my face. After that it was the prison hospital for me, and a long, painful facial reconstruction.

Mingled emotions flooded Jed’s expressive features as he recalled the situation, too. Disapproval was counterbalanced in his face by—what? Lingering friendliness? Grudging admiration? “Man, I never thought I’d see you in this town again!” he blurted.

“Neither did I,” I returned.

“Not that you didn’t do the town a favor by gettin’ rid of Blaze Franklin an’ a couple of his crooked friends,” he went on.

“My pleasure,” I said. Franklin had starved my partner to death, trying to get him to reveal the hiding place of a sack of money my partner and I’d liberated from a bank in Arizona. I wanted to move the conversation onto safer ground before Jed’s emotions crystalized adversely. “Have you seen Hazel?” I asked.

His face brightened. “Had dinner with her Tuesday,” he said promptly. His boyish grin returned. “I still can’t get her to go to bed with me.” He stopped, the grin fading. “I feel like I’m sayin’ things to a stranger when I look at you now, instead of jokin’ about ‘em like in the old days.”

“Have you seen her since Tuesday?”

“No. Matter of fact, she was supposed to call me last night if she was free for dinner. I didn’t hear anything from her. Why? Is somethin’ wrong?”

“What do you imagine it would take to bring me back to Hudson, Jed?” I countered. “Considering how I left it.”

He nodded slowly. “Trouble for Hazel,” he said. “But what? She didn’t say anything Tuesday night. Everything seemed fine. I didn’t ask her directly about you—” he smiled apologetically “—but she gave me the feelin’ you were together.”

“You didn’t ask because you had a duty to perform if you knew I was on the scene?”

He shook his head emphatically. “No duty. I resigned from the department more’n a year ago. I got tired of bein’ assigned to keep the kids out of the back seats of their cars in Locust Park. I really didn’t have the time to give to it, anyway.”

I had the answer I needed. Jed was his own man, and that man I was almost sure I had no need to fear. “Hazel sent a messenger to get me,” I explained.

“Get you?” he echoed puzzledly.

I ran through the situation for him. “Naturally I went to Nate’s office as soon as I got into town,” I continued. “Which was ten minutes ago.” I paused for emphasis, and Jed looked at me expectantly. “Nate Pepperman’s street door and office door are unlocked, and he’s sitting in his swivel chair with his throat looking like a shaved pussy.”

Jed’s hazel eyes dilated as his quick mind translated the image. “You mean—” He drew a stiffened forefinger across his throat.

“That’s what I mean. There’s dried blood a quarter-inch thick on the top of his desk.”

“Christ! Ol’ Nate dead?” Jed drew a quick breath. “Holy cow! Who’d—”

“He’s been dead at least a day, maybe longer,” I cut in. “Why wouldn’t his body have been found?”

“Nobody to report him missin’. Nate’s a bachelor. Was a bachelor,” Jed corrected himself. “An’ he always did work crazy hours. Like me. I remember now he was supposed to be at a cookout last night. People wondered where he was.” He shook his sandy head in mute wonderment. “Ol’ Nate never bothered anyone.”

“Jed, you don’t get your throat cut if you haven’t bothered anyone.”

“Yeah, I s’pose so.” He was staring blankly at the counter top. His tone sharpened as he looked up at me suddenly. “An’ you don’t know where Hazel is now?”

“Correct. I was hoping you’d know.”

“Sure wish I did. I don’t like the sound of this at all, you know?”

“I know.”

“I sure wish there’s somethin’ I could do.”

“Maybe there is, Jed. I know you always keep an ear to the ground about what’s going on in town. Think back about anything you may have heard about Nate Pepper-man’s business dealings in the last couple of months. Maybe the last couple of weeks. Whatever came up, it seems to have come up in a hurry.”

“I’ll sure try,” Jed said, but his tone was doubtful. “Nate never did much talkin’. Damn, I still can’t b’lieve he’s dead. We never had nothin’ like that here.” He stopped. “Except—”

“Except when I was here before,” I supplied.

“Well, yeah.” He looked uneasy. “What’re you gonna do?”

Kaiser was rubbing his cold, wet nose against my neck. I disengaged myself and eased the big dog down behind the counter before I answered. “Call the sheriff’s office about Nate for a starter. Unless—”

Jed shook his head at the implied question. “I’d rather you did. Save me tryin’ to explain how I knew.”

“I’ll take care of it. Then I’ve got one place that I’m hopeful about to look for Hazel. Can I reach you here in the morning?”

“I’ll make damn sure you can. Even though it’ll be Sunday.” Jed looked at his watch. “Is Sunday.” He ran a hand through his already tousled hair. His eyes were upon the tail-wagging Kaiser who had backed away from the counter until he could see me. “Why don’t you take the dog? He might help. He almost turned himself inside out when Hazel walked into my office.”

“That’s not a bad idea.” I raised my hand to attract Kaiser’s attention, then snapped my fingers. The dog shuffled forward, close to the floor. He launched himself effortlessly and soared over the counter-top, landing at my feet. “See you tomorrow, Jed,” I went on. “My name’s Earl Drake now.” For a while, anyway, I thought to myself. I turned toward the door, Kaiser at my side.

“You let me know if you find Hazel, y’hear?” Jed called.

“Find her or don’t, you’ll hear,” I promised.

I left him standing at the counter. Kaiser and I went down the stairs, the dog in the lead. He pranced across the street, ears cocked alertly. I liked Jed’s idea better every moment. The dog would make the best point man in the country on any search missions. I opened the car door for him on the passenger’s side, and he flowed into the front seat. Evidently the big dog still loved to ride in an automobile. I resumed my interrupted trip south of town.

I made one more stop before reaching the Lazy Susan. I stopped the car again beside a lighted roadside telephone booth. “Sit,” I told Kaiser. He gave me a canine grin. He had a ferocious-looking mouthful of teeth, and I knew they weren’t for show. The dog was absolutely fearless. Like his newly reacquired master, Kaiser had accumulated a few extra lumps because he hadn’t backed up when discretion called for backing up.