The Black Marble (48 page)

“I think she
will
be okay,” Valnikov nodded. “Did Natalie call?”

“She, uh, she sends her … wishes for uh … you to git well. I called your brother, but the doc says no visitors till tomorrow. I figured I ain't exactly a visitor and I knew you'd wanna know what's goin on when you came around.”

“Do I have a phone in here, Clarence?”

“Course you got a phone, fool!” Clarence grinned. “You think I'm gonna let them put a ace detective in a room without a phone?”

“Dial Natalie for me, will you?”

“I don't know her number.”

“Sure you do. You have all our phone numbers in your little notebook. The one in your coat pocket.”

“Oh, yeah,” Clarence said glumly, taking out the notebook.

While he dialed, Valnikov touched his head. It was swathed in a bandage that covered his left ear. Some hair stuck out on top. He had some pain in his knee, and his shoulder and ribs hurt, but he didn't really feel as much pain as he expected.

“Natalie?” said Clarence, scowling. “This is me, Clarence. Jist a minute.”

He handed the phone to Valnikov, who took it and said, “Natalie?”

“Valnikov!” she said, “I was worried! How
are
you? They said for us not to visit you until tomorrow! I would've come!”

“I know you would, Natalie,” Valnikov smiled. “How are
you?
”

“We heard you have a concussion. And there was gunfire! A dead dog. Did you shoot him?”

“No, Skinner did. Natalie, are you … well, when do you leave for Hawaii?”

“Valnikov,” she said softly, then the phone was quiet. In the background Valnikov heard the voice of Captain Jack Packerton saying, ‘Who's that, Natalie? Who're you talking to?”

“My partner,” she said. Then to Valnikov: “We moved up our plans. We're going tomorrow. We had our reservations changed. It was tough to do, but we were told that in two weeks there might be too much rain in that part of Kauai. Rain would ruin our vacation.”

“Yes, of course,” Valnikov said.

“Clarence Cromwell fixed it so I could leave tomorrow.”

“Yes, he's a good man to work for,” said Valnikov.

“I wouldn't have gone without checking on you though. I was going to stop tomorrow to see you. Our flight isn't until tomorrow afternoon.”

“Yes, that's the best time to fly,” said Valnikov.

“Well, I better let you rest. You take care, huh? Would you like to have visitors tomorrow? I could bring some books or …”

“No, I don't think so, Natalie. I think I'll just rest tomorrow. You have a good time in Hawaii, okay?”

“Okay, Valnikov. Be seeing you.”

“Be seeing you,” he said, handing the phone to Clarence, who hung it up.

Clarence said, “Hey, guess what? I decided I'm gettin sick and tired a sittin around on my ass runnin that division. I wanna do some detective work again. I was hopin you and me might team up a few days a week. Couple a real ball-bustin cops! How bout that!”

“Great, Clarence,” Valnikov mumbled. “Sounds great.”

“Okay, you git some sleep now, hear? I'll come see you tomorrow. Doc says he's on'y gonna keep you maybe a day or so. Git some sleep, hear?”

“What time is it?”

“Ten o'clock,” Clarence said.

“Night or morning?”

“Night. This is still Thursday. All you lost is an afternoon.”

“That's all I lost,” said Valnikov.

Philo Skinner didn't come soaring in over white beaches and crashing surf at sunset. It was after dark when they touched down, but it wouldn't have mattered anyway. Philo Skinner was slumped in his seat, with his head on a bloody pillow, trying to keep from vomiting. He was burning with fever and making all the first-class passengers around him sick by coughing up endless phlegm balls and spitting into a towel.

The stewardess had not noticed the serious condition of the gray feverish man until they had passed the point of no return. She advised the pilot, who came back to talk to him.

Philo nodded in answer to most of the questions. “I got in a car accident yesterday. Been in the hospital but I'm okay. I'm okay, god-damnit!”

At one point, while Philo slept fitfully, moaning in pain, the stewardess gently removed the flight bag from his lap and put it on the floor under him. The battered man had not released his death grip on the flight bag since boarding. She was afraid of it. Some sophisticated explosives could get by the detector. She opened the flight bag and then closed it quickly and took it forward to the captain, who asked that a radio message be relayed to Los Angeles. The captain believed they had a wounded bank robber aboard.

There was an ambulance waiting when the plane touched down. At about the same time that Valnikov lay staring at the ceiling in the police ward at Central Receiving Hospital, Philo Skinner was being admitted to the Hospital Seguro Social. Philo had not seen the beach and surf nor even the sunshine in Puerto Vallarta. Philo's fever was more than 104 degrees, though they measured it in centigrade and only translated it to Fahrenheit when he demanded to know. Philo Skinner requested that someone from the American consulate be brought to him immediately.

Philo had been asleep for hours but was awakened by a throbbing in his penis. The throbbing became warm, then white hot. He cried out and a young man walked in. The man was in street clothes. He was short and slender, had a small moustache and black hair bright and shiny under the white light.

“I am Doctor Rivera,” he said in nearly unaccented English.

“It hurts,” Philo sobbed. “Down here.” He had to reach with his right arm since the other contained an intravenous needle. He patted the bandages between his legs. “Is it … Oh, please! Is it …?”

“Still there?” the doctor smiled. “It is still there, Mr. Skinner. But you have been mauled pretty badly. You won't be having much of a sex life for a while, but yes, it is all still there.”

“Thank God,” Philo sobbed. “Doctor, I hurt!”

“You are urinating,” the doctor said. “I had to put a catheter in you. You are a sick man, Mr. Skinner.”

“Where's my … my flight bag?” Philo croaked.

“Mexicana Airlines has seized your flight bag, Mr. Skinner,” the young doctor said. “There is a receipt for almost twenty thousand dollars from Mexicana Airlines. They have seized your flight bag pending an investigation with the American authorities.”

“Oh, God!” Philo cried.

“Tell me, Mr. Skinner,” the young doctor said, curiously, “are you a bank robber or what?”

“Oh, God!” Philo cried.

“You may as well satisfy my curiosity,” the doctor shrugged. “I am sure the Los Angeles Police or the F.B.I. or someone is after you. A man with animal bites and multiple contusions and lacerations? A man with a bag full of money? We have a little … how do you say … lottery going on. Some of the doctors and nurses think you are a bank robber. But I don't think banks employ police dogs in Los Angeles. I went to Loma Linda University and I never saw a police dog in a Los Angeles bank.”

“Oh, God, a
lottery!
” Philo cried. He who lives by the bookmaker …

“I think you are a safe … how do you say?”

“Cracker,” Philo croaked.

“Yes, a safecracker. I think that you were cracking a safe and a watchman turned a dog loose on you and … tell me, Mr. Skinner, did you kill someone? A watchman maybe?”

Then while Philo was looking around the little hospital room at the Friday morning sky over Puerto Vallarta, at the smiling young doctor with eyes as brown as a dog's, with eyes as oval and brown as …

“I killed Tutu,” Philo said.

“You what?”

“I KILLED TUTU!” Philo wailed, hollow-eyed and frightful. “And I cut Vickie's ear off! And I shot … I shot …” But Philo couldn't continue. His tears were scalding. Philo Skinner's long bony frame was heaving and shaking the bed. Philo Skinner only stopped crying when he broke into a coughing spasm that almost strangled him.

A nurse came running in and the doctor said something in Spanish.

“Lean forward, a little, Mr. Skinner,” the doctor said. “Here, spit the phlegm in this tray.”

When Philo lay back on the pillow he could hardly see them through the tears. The nurse wiped his eyes and his mouth and said something in Spanish to the doctor.

The doctor's oval eyes were round and electric now. Nobody was going to win
this
lottery! A mass murderer!

“Do you want to tell me about it, Mr. Skinner?” the doctor said. “You killed
how
many? And you cut off an ear?” The doctor couldn't wait to tell the staff. The skinny gringo was another Charles Manson!

“Please, Doctor,” Philo sobbed. “I don't wanna die here. I don't wanna die in this foreign country.”

“You are not going to die, Mr. Skinner.”

“I don't wanna
live
in a foreign country!” Philo cried.

“You are full of infection and you have lost blood and I believe you have a fairly serious lung disorder, but …”

“I wanna go home!” Philo wailed. “Call the Los Angeles cops, Doctor. Tell them to get me home.”

“Yes, but about all those you killed, can you tell me …”

“I'm an American,” Philo Skinner sobbed. “I wanna go
home!
”

16

Byzantine Eyes

On Friday, Valnikov got out of bed before noon and walked unsteadily around the room. Then he phoned his brother and told him to go to the apartment and bring him some clothes.

At 1:30 p.m. Alex Valnikov had come and gone, and his younger brother was walking around the ward in poplin slacks and an old sport shirt.

At 2:00 p.m. a nurse complained to a doctor that Sergeant Valnikov was checking out of the hospital whether they liked it or not.

At 2:30 p.m. Hipless Hooker called Valnikov's room and ordered him to listen to his doctor.

At 2:33 p.m. Sergeant Valnikov informed Hipless Hooker politely that he had just retired from the Los Angeles Police Department and that Captain Hooker could start processing his retirement papers.

At 5:30 p.m., just after a blazing winter sunset in Los Angeles, Valnikov was sitting on the steps by the reflecting pool at the Los Angeles Music Center, listening to Horst, the fiddler, play Rimsky-Korsakov. Fifteen bucks' worth.

Horst was getting tired. There was no one left at this time of day except this guy with the turban bandage who wanted Russian music. Horst asked him what happened to his head, but the guy just said, “An accident.”

Horst was happy to take the guy's bread, but the fifteen bucks' worth had just about run out and Horst had exhausted his Russian repertoire and didn't want to start over again.

Valnikov sat with his back to Hope Street. He listened to a Gypsy violin and stared at the melancholy tableau of a fiddler, and beyond, in the dusk, the courthouse and the knight in chain mail with his hopeful document wrested from King John.

Then Valnikov heard a familiar voice: “They tell me it's raining in Kauai.”

Valnikov turned and cried: “Natalie!”

“Sit down, don't get up,” she said. “Oh, he hurt you! Oh!”

“Hurt? Hurt?” Valnikov cried, with the biggest dumbest smile she'd ever seen on him. “I'm fine! I'm swell!”

Then Natalie walked over to Horst, the fiddler, and said, “Your motor still running, Horst?”

“Huh?”

“We got any music left for the loot he's laid on you?”

“This is it, lady, I gotta go home.”

Natalie Zimmerman took a twenty out of her purse and said, “Rev it up, Horst. Until this is gone.”

“Okay, lady,” Horst grinned. “Whadda ya wanna hear?”

“Gypsy,” she said. “Russian Gypsy.”

“Jesus, more Russian? Does it have to be R
ussian?
”

“
If
you want the grease for your crank,” she said, brushing her Friz out of her eyes.

“How about ‘Ochi Chornyia'?” Horst suggested. “You know, ‘Dark Eyes'?”

“Okay, Horst, give us a shot of ‘Dark Eyes',” she said, going back to Valnikov, who was standing on the steps, looking like a quiz show contestant.

“Sit down and rest yourself,” Natalie said, forcing him down on the steps. “You shouldn't even
be
here. I heard you walked out of the hospital. I heard you retired. Was that for real?”

“I've had enough,” he said. “But you? You're
not
going to Hawaii?”

“Waste of money,” she said. “I think I'd rather invest my savings in a music store or something.”

As Horst burst into twenty bucks' worth of “Ochi Chornyia,” Natalie moved close to Valnikov and said, “Do you know the lyrics to this one?”

“I can speak them to you,” he said. “I'm not in very good voice but …”

Then Natalie moved even closer. He looked at her big goofy glasses, at her brown eyes behind them, and translated from the Russian. “Dark eyes, passionate eyes, fiery and beautiful eyes. How I love you …”