Retribution: A Lew Fonesca Novel (Lew Fonesca Novels) (16 page)

Still ruffling among the mess, she said, without looking up, “He’s the greatest. Patient, calm. Look at me. I’m a boob. I can’t find a damn sheet he needs and I had it right … here it is.”

She held up the yellow sheet in triumph and showed a great set of teeth.

The phone rang. She looked at it with dread.

Ames and I exited.

“What do you think?” I asked as we walked down the corridor.

“He looks like he’s letting it all out,” Ames said. “I’d say he’s holding it all in.”

“Think I should check on Brad Lonsberg’s tales of the wealth of his kingdom?”

“Might be,” he said.

“And if I find he’s not the mogul he says he is? What does it mean?”

“Don’t know,” he said. “Ever think of trying this?”

He nodded at the window of the Center for Traditional Chinese Medicine. The office waiting room was three times the size of Brad Lonsberg’s. A lone waiting woman sat reading a copy of
The Economist
.

“They’ve got herbs, stuff for what ails you,” he said.

“What ails me?” I asked as we passed the office heading for the elevator.

“The past,” he answered.

“They have pills for that?”

“Pills and they stick needles in you,” he said as we reached the elevator and I pushed the button.

“And it works? You’ve done it?”

“Ed at the Texas comes here. Has his own problems. Liver. Swears on them. Costs some though.”

“I haven’t got some,” I said as the elevator dinged and opened. There were no passengers inside.

“And if you did?” he asked as the doors closed.

I shrugged. I wasn’t sure I wanted a quick fix on my
grief. I wasn’t sure I wanted a pill or a needle to take away what I was clinging to. Dealing with Ann Horowitz was one thing. She wasn’t trying to take away my history, just find a way for me to live with it.

“Cup of coffee?” I asked as the elevator went slowly from the second to the first floor.

“That Starbucks place?” Ames asked.

“Why not?”

“Never been there. Two, three dollars for a cup of coffee with some sweet juice or something.”

“It’ll be a new experience. On me.”

We stepped out of the building and headed across the parking lot toward Starbucks.

“Nice kid,” he said.

“Adele?”

“And the girl back there, Maria.”

We stepped into Starbucks and both ordered the coffee of the day, Irish something. We sat at a table looking at the other customers reading newspapers, talking business.

“Someone in here named Fonesca?” called a girl with a Hispanic accent behind the desk.

I stood up.

“Phone call,” she said.

I crossed the room, inched my way past a big woman in a hat who was filling something that looked like a tall cup of whipped cream with little packets of Equal. The woman handed me the phone.

“Adele,” I said before she could speak.

“Finish your coffee, then go back to your car,” she said. “I left the title page.”

“Adele, did you call Sally?”

“No.”

“Will you?”

Long pause.

“I guess.”

“Can we talk?”

“We’re talking,” she said. “But I’m not stopping.”

“Mickey’s grandfather,” I said. “Someone killed Mickey’s grandfather.”

“It’s his fault,” she said.

“Lonsberg?”

“It’s his fault,” she repeated.

“Why?”

She hung up.

“Let’s go,” I said to Ames, hurrying back to the table.

He took the last of his coffee in one hot gulp and we went out the door past an incoming quartet of Sarasota High School students who had walked or driven over after school, books in hand. The two girls were blond and pretty. The two boys were lean and young-looking. I wondered how Ames and I looked to them.

“There,” said Ames, pointing across the parking lot toward Bahia Vista. The white van turned right onto Bahia Vista heading east.

We hurried to the Cutlass. I couldn’t smell anything burning, but there was a box on the driver’s seat. I hadn’t locked the car. We got in and I opened the cardboard box. It was filled with finely shredded paper, shredded so thin that each piece would tear at the slightest touch. One sheet was intact. It read:
Let Me Introduce the Charming Devil
. Conrad Lonsberg’s name was neatly typed below the title and he had signed it and written the date, 6/8/88, at the bottom of the page.

I dropped Ames back at the Texas and told him I’d get back to him in the morning. He nodded and leaned onto the open passenger window from where he stood.

“They’re all lyin’,” he said.

“I know.”

“What are you gonna do?”

“Go home, get a banana coconut Blizzard and two DQ burgers, and watch a movie.”

At least that’s what I planned to do when I left Ames standing on the sidewalk. Oh, I got the banana coconut Blizzard and the burgers but when I got back to my office, I found four messages on my answering machine, a new record.

I pushed the
REPLAY
button and ate a burger.

Caller one was Marvin Uliaks: “Mr. Fonesca, have you found Vera Lynn yet? I don’t want to bother you, you know. I just want to talk to Vera Lynn. So, have you found
her yet? Am I calling the right number?” Marvin sounded confused.

Caller two was Conrad Lonsberg: “Progress or setback? I’ll be home until ten in the morning.” Conrad Lonsberg sounded resigned.

Caller three was Clark Dorsey who had taken time off from constructing his house of irony to say: “Fonesca, my number is 434-5444. Call me.” Dorsey sounded troubled.

Caller four was Sally Porovsky: “Lew, Adele called, left a message on my machine. She says she knows who killed Mickey’s grandfather, but she’s not ready to talk until she’s finished destroying the manuscripts.” Sally sounded tired.

I was almost finished with my burgers and Blizzard trying to decide who to call first. There was a knock at the door.

“It’s open,” I called from behind my desk and in came the homeless Digger.

He stood in the doorway, a Neiman Marcus bag bulging in one hand and an envelope in the other. I could smell him, and like a vampire who has to be invited in, he stood waiting, weaving.

“Hypocrisy,” he said. “It rules the world.”

“I appreciate the information.”

“Monks, Luther’s ghost itself haunts our rickety abode,” he said.

“You saw him again?”

“He just left another message on your door. I watched. There was an aura of the uncanny about him. He floated like a specter.”

“A ghost?”

“My imagination is enhanced by a less than vintage wine, I must admit,” said Digger, “but while this is not a dagger in my hand, it is certainly palpable to feeling and to sight.”

“I thought you didn’t drink,” I said.

“In great moderation,” he said. “And only on special occasions.”

He stepped across my threshold, a vampire uninvited, his hand out to place the envelope on my desk.

“Thanks,” I said.

I didn’t want to say what I said next, but it would have been left hanging and heavy.

“Where are you staying tonight?” I asked.

He pushed out his lower lip and shrugged.

“The lavatory,” he said.

I took out my wallet and handed him a five-dollar bill. It was a mistake. It meant he would be back. Maybe not tomorrow. Maybe not the next day or the one beyond, but at some point he would come bearing a note from a ghost, a papal bull, the Sunday
New York Times
, and expect payment.

He took the bill and smiled.

“There’s a condition,” I said. “You rent a real bed, at least for tonight. Know anyplace?”

“For five dollars?” he asked. “There are crevices of this city of sun and beautiful beaches where hidden people for two dollars a night provide cots and dubious company. I have a friend who lives beneath a stone bench right on Bayfront Park. His head rests on his guitar and the police leave him alone. For fifty cents, he will move over and share his musical pillow.”

“A roof, Digger,” I said, opening the envelope.

“Then Lilla’s it shall be,” he said, his head lolling. “A refreshing walk in the evening, a cot, and conversation. Life goes on but the pace is so slow.”

“I agree,” I said as he staggered out the door and closed it behind him.

The four-folded unlined sheet of paper in front of me was written in the same block letters as the first one left by Digger’s monk:

YOU CAN’T BRING BACK THE DEAD. LET THEM REST. YOU CAN ONLY MAKE IT WORSE.

That was it. I have been threatened by pimps, muggers, cops—crooked and otherwise—goons, loons, and the completely mad. This note read less like a threat than a warning, a warning that something bad could come out of the box if I opened it any wider and looked in.

I called Sally. Her son Michael answered.

“It’s Lew. Your mom home?”

“Yeah, you ever have zits?”

“Yes,” I said. “When I was about your age. Also boils. Two on my neck. Had to be lanced. Hurt like hell.”

“I don’t have boils,” Michael said.

“I know. I was trying to make you feel better,” I said. “I understand they have all kinds of things for pimples. Over the counter.”

“They don’t work,” said Michael.

“Soap, water, prayer, and the passage of time,” I said.

“Shit,” he said. “I thought you might be able to come up with something. You know, like some old Italian remedy. Italian kids don’t seem to get it as bad as Jewish kids.”

“I always thought it was the other way around.”

“Here’s my mother.”

I heard the clinking of the phone being passed and heard Sally say, “Lew?”

“Yes, Michael and I were just bonding philosophically over adolescent pimples.”

“Adele called,” she said. “Not long ago. Michael just went back in his room. I think the pimple talk was a result of talking to Adele. He’s got a crush on her. God, I’m doing more than showing my age. ‘Crush.’ They must have a better word for it now, or at least a more graphic one.”

“Adele has that affect on men and boys,” I said.

“She told me she was all right and that she planned to continue to burn Lonsberg’s manuscripts. She asked me to tell her how much trouble she was really in.”

“And you told her?” I asked.

“Can’t lie to them, Lew. Once they catch me in a lie they never believe me again. I told her Lonsberg wanted the manuscripts back, of course, but I also told her I didn’t think he’d be going to the police about them. She had already figured that one out. I told her she had to go back to Flo’s or she was subject at worst to criminal charges or to placement in another foster home. She asked me if I’d do that.”

“And you said ‘no.’”

“I said ‘no.’ Where could I place a sixteen-year-old former prostitute? The possibilities are few. Flo is perfect for
her. So, I asked her about Mickey Merrymen and his grandfather. She said they had gone to his house, found his body, grabbed a few things, and left. She wasn’t lying, Lew.”

“You’re sure?”

“You mean would I put my life on the line for it? No, but I believe her. I told her the police were certainly looking for Mickey.”

“So?”

“She’s angry,” Sally said. “She’s determined. All she would say is ‘He’s going to suffer for every page.’ Then she hung up. Hold it.” Sally put her hand over the mouthpiece but I could hear her call out, “Susan, did you shampoo? That was one quick shower… No, I’m not calling you a liar. It’s a matter of degree and intensity. I’m sure your hair is wet and has just had at least a passing acquaintance with shampoo. I’ll check.” Then back on the phone with me. “Lew, I can cover Adele for a few days, even that’s taking a chance. I’ll file a report that she may be missing. The report will stay buried on my overburdened desk for a few days, no more. Find her.”

“Sunday?” I asked. “Can you get away for a movie?”

“I can get away if I bribe Michael and Susan with a
Scream 3
tape from Blockbuster and a sausage pizza.”

“Seven?”

“Check the show times,” she said.

We hung up. That left Dorsey to call. I dialed. The voice came on before the first ring had ended.

“Yes,” he said.

“Lew Fonesca,” I said.

“My wife is out,” he said. “She’ll be back soon. So this has to be fast. I talk to Charlie once or twice a year. He always calls me, never tells me where he is, but…”

“Caller ID,” I guessed.

“Yes,” Clark Dorsey said as if he had just betrayed his brother, which was probably just what he was thinking.

“Vera Lynn is alive?” I asked.

“Yes, but I don’t know much. He just says, ‘Clark, are you okay?’ I say, ‘I’m fine.’ He says he’s fine though he doesn’t sound it. And then he hangs up. That’s it. He
sounds worse each time we talk. We’re brothers. We were close. Now … I think he needs help.”

“What number did he call from?” I asked, reaching for an envelope and a blunt pencil.

“I called it back,” he said, giving me the number. “It was a phone booth in a rib house someplace not far from Macon, Georgia, called Vanaloosa. A man with a black accent answered, said there were no white people around that neighborhood. Charles must have picked out the phone so I couldn’t find him. Maybe you can. He sounded like… he sounded like. I can’t explain it. Like he was dead and going through the motions. My brother was tough, Fonesca. Big, tough, smart. I don’t know if you can resurrect the near dead. My wife thinks what happened to Charles is responsible for our… well, responsible for what we are. But he’s my brother.”

“I’ll try to find him. How’s the house coming?”

“I bought new lumber like your friend suggested. I’ll even out the walls, but the house doesn’t seem to care. It just grows, section by section, each room holding less and less.”

“Ever think of seeing a shrink?” I asked.

“I don’t believe in it,” he said.

“I see a shrink,” I said. “Good one. I think she’d see you. You might want to give it a try.”

“My wife would like it,” he said flatly. “But I’m not sure I want to be anything else than I am.”

“I know. You get used to it,” I said. “Then it’s hard to give up the pain.”

“Yes, I guess. How do you know?”

“You build more rooms. I crawl back into smaller ones,” I said. “I don’t like talking about it.”