To Catch a Spy (12 page)

“Like watermelon seeds with legs,” I said.

With that I went over the fence and headed for my Crosley. I had lost time talking to the old man. I moved fast, leaving a wake of destruction in the grass and the small tomato patch in the yard where I had parked. I should have left some money in an envelope or my name and phone number, but I didn’t have time. I would just have to add that to a long list of minor guilts I’d accumulated in a lifetime of bad decisions.

I pulled back out onto the street, looking in the direction the Buick had turned. There were a few cars moving, but no Buick. I drove back the way I had first come, made a left, and kept going for five blocks before I turned left again and made a circle that took me half a block from Volkman’s apartment.

There were two Buicks parked on the street, neither one of which was the one that had followed me. I made my way back up the stairs to Volkman’s apartment. There was nothing to indicate that a dead man had been found inside. All was quiet. Birds chirped. Somewhere dishes rattled. I tried the door. It was locked. Getting it open was no problem.

Inside, I moved quickly across the living room to the bedroom and went to the dresser. The photograph of the little boy and the woman was still there. The picture of Volkman and the other man wasn’t.

“Looking for this?” a voice said.

I turned fast, hoping a good lie would come, but I didn’t need one. Cary Grant stepped out of the closet, the same closet where I’d found Volkman’s body. The framed photograph was in his hand.

“You gave me the address,” he said. “I thought about it for a while and decided that I couldn’t let you take all the risks. You’re helping, but the problem is mine.”

“I think you should get out of here,” I said, reaching for the photograph.

“I think you’re right,” he said. “By the way, which one of these men is Volkman?”

“On the left.”

“Yes, I think I recognize him,” Grant said, examining the photograph. “From Paramount. But the other man. Him I definitely recognize. Victor Cookinham.”

“Victor Cookinham?”

“Can’t forget a name like that, can you?” Grant said. “Cookinham’s an agent.”

“Talent?” I asked.

“For the German government,” he said. “He’s been missing for almost two years. Just managed to get away when the FBI was closing in on him.”

“How do you …?” I began but we heard the front door open.

Not again, I thought. At this rate, I’d be paying back Marty Leib for the rest of whatever remained of my life. Grant moved to the partially closed bedroom door and peeked into the living room. Then he turned to me and whispered, “Let me.”

With that, he stepped into the living room with me right behind him.

A man wearing a flannel shirt and trousers with suspenders stood there. Grant stopped suddenly, a look of indignation and surprise on his face.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?” the actor demanded.

“Who am … I’m the janitor,” the man said. “The Sullivans downstairs said they heard.…”

“The Sullivans? Never heard of them,” Grant said, looking at me. “You?”

“Never heard of them,” I agreed.

“Well, anyway, with Mr. Volkman being … you know what happened … I—” the janitor stammered.

“This man is Bruno’s second cousin,” Grant said, putting an arm around my shoulder. “The deceased’s only living relative.”

“Only living … I thought he had …” the janitor tried.

“Dead,” said Grant. “All dead. Only Mr. Beeberhoffer is left.”

“I’m sorry to.…”

“Sorry is the perfect word,” said Grant gently. “Mr. Beeberhoffer is going to take care of all the funeral arrangements. We just came by to pick up a few family mementos.”

Grant held out the photograph for the janitor.

“Remarkable likeness,” the actor said, reexamining the photograph. Remarkable.”

“Looks very much like him, but.…”

“You’d be doing Mr. Beeberhoffer a great favor if you’d sell the furniture,” Grant said. “Of course, you could keep whatever little it brings in. It would be a great favor.”

“I’d be happy.…”

“Good,” said Grant with a smile. “I could tell I could count on you the second I saw you, Mr …?”

“Stepple, Amos Stepple. May I say something?”

“By all means, Mr. Stepple,” said Grant.

“Who are you?”

“Friend of the family,” Grant said. “Trained in grief counseling in the Dutch army. As you can see, Mr. Beeberhoffer is so overcome with grief he can’t even speak.”

“I see that, but.…”

“Take the money you get for the furniture and buy something nice for your wife and children,” Grant said, ushering the janitor to the front door.”

“I don’t have any … I mean my wife has two daughters from her first marriage, but they’re in Seattle and …”

“No need to explain,” Grant said, opening the door. “I can tell your heart’s in the right place.”

The man put a hand to his chest and looked at me, completely baffled.

“We’ll be going ourselves in just a few minutes,” said Grant. “We’ll be quiet. Mr. Beeberhoffer just wants to it for a bit, begin to accept his loss. You understand.”

“Not really,” said the janitor, “but I can keep whatever I sell the furniture for?”

Grant looked at me and I nodded. Then Grant closed the door on the bewildered man.

“Anything else we need here?” he asked.

“No,” I said, then changed my mind. “Yes. Maybe. In the bottom drawer of the dresser if the cops didn’t take them.”

We moved into the bedroom again, and I opened the bottom drawer and pushed the underwear aside. The Nazi literature was still there. Grant scooped it up and said, “Let’s get out of here before Mr. Stepple decides to call the police.”

We went out the front door and down the stairs.

“Where’s your car?” I asked.

“There,” he said, pointing at a dark DeSoto at the curb.

“I was followed when I left my office,” I said as we walked. “Dark Buick. Two men. They might show up here.”

“Then let’s not be here,” said Grant, handing me the photograph and the Nazi literature. “Call me later.”

I said I would and watched while he got into his car and drove away. I looked both ways. No Buick. I was back in my Crosley, thinking of what to do next and listening to Bill Stern the Colgate shave cream man telling me that Gunder Haegg, the Swedish long-distance runner, had decided he had reached his peak and was considering retirement. Stern sounded very sad.

I switched the radio to
Blondie
and heard Arthur Lake as Dagwood trying to explain to Mr. Dithers, his boss, why he needed a raise to pay for a new roof. Everyone was having problems.

CHAPTER

9

It was too late to do anything more that day, so I headed for Mrs. Plaut’s boardinghouse. There were a few parking spaces. I took the one closest to the house and walked up the short concrete path to the steps, the photo and literature tucked under my arm.

When I entered the house, Mrs. Plaut was standing there.

“You are back,” she said, as if I had been among the missing.

“I am back,” I said.

“There’s an egg salad sandwich on Holsum bread on the table in your room.”

“Thank you.”

I moved toward the stairs.

“A Buick, green, has been driving past my house for the past hour,” she said. “A man has been looking at my house from inside the Buick. Such things have occurred before and usually in some connection to you. Is this one of those things, Mr. Peelers?”

“It may be,” I said.

“You lead a life of books, nooks, and crannies,” she said. “Is it in your capacity as an exterminator or an editor that these men are seeking you?”

“Could be either,” I said, moving toward the stairs.

“Shall I call the police?”

“No. I’ll take care of it.”

“Are they dangerous?”

“Maybe.”

“If they come to the door and try to get in without my permission, I may have to shoot them with the Mister’s shotgun,” she said seriously.

“I wouldn’t grieve,” I said. “Unless they’re policemen, which is a distinct possibility.”

“I would not want to shoot policemen,” she said. “I’ll simply hold them at bay and call you.”

“That would be best,” I said.

I had complete confidence in Mrs. Plaut and was sure she would do exactly as she said. If not, two bad guys, or possibly good ones, would get themselves shot. I was well up the stairs when she said, “The manuscript is resting comfortably next to your plate with the egg salad sandwich on Holsum bread.”

Resting comfortably. That’s what they said at the hospital when you called about a sick friend or relative and they didn’t want to tell you that things had not gone nearly as well as they would have liked.

“I’ll read it tonight,” I said.

I heard Mrs. Plaut lock the front door and then go into her rooms as I hit the second-floor landing and made my way to my room.

When I turned on the light, I saw Dash curled up on the couch against the wall. He looked up at me without moving his head and closed his eyes again.

I took off my jacket, hung it up, kicked off my shoes, and moved to the refrigerator, where I took out the milk and poured myself a glass of milk and a bowlful for Dash He didn’t come running across the floor to drink it. I’d need more milk in a day or two. I took a couple of Doc Parry’s pills and three aspirin.

The egg salad sandwich was just what I needed. Lots of mayo, thick with eggs, pepper, and salt with a slice of onion on top. Fuel for the task ahead.

I picked up Mrs. Plaut’s manuscript and began to read as I kept eating:

THE SORENSON TWINS IN NEW ORLEANS

New Orleans is a city of humidity, noise, music, sin, and seafood you have to get to by cracking lots of shells which is fine with some people but is not for me.

The Sorenson twins, who were on my mother’s side, were named Sidney and Parker. They were boys of a devious nature and the time was 1814 or somewhere nearby. Andrew Jackson had broken Sidney’s foot during the war when the general in a hurry to get to the outhouse on the Kelsy Plantation stepped on him and just kept going without an I’m sorry. There were bowel problems during that war and even a great general with bad manners was not immune which was the only satisfaction Sidney could take from the incident.

Sidney and Parker opened the Sorenson Tavern with money they had taken from their father Abel. They had taken the money back in Ohio considering it due to them because they had worked the family farm for twenty years or more without a thank you or a nickel. So while I do not condone their theft, I grant them some understanding.

Then the ptomaine, if that’s what it was, and the great fight.

Parker was the cook. Sidney limped around greeting and serving people. Sometimes, but not often, they switched places, but though they were twins they didn’t fool anyone, not that they were trying to, because you see Sidney had this limp given him by General Jackson. Now Parker could have pretended to limp but that would not have been in good taste and what would the point have been? Folly.

When the ptomaine and battle took place, the Sorenson twins were two weeks from celebrating their fortieth birthday. The night of the disaster they were serving dinner to a full house, all tables taken, shells crunching on the wooden floor, people slurping shrimp, clams, lobsters, and here and there a fried fish.

Through the wooden door came three men wearing dark fur coats and carrying muzzle-loading Pennsylvania long rifles and wearing big hats and sporting unkempt beards and looking mean and out for trouble.

This was not an unusual sight in the Sorenson Tavern, which had an unruly reputation, but when Sidney told them they would have to wait a few minutes for a table, the three men took umbrage and shot a quartet consisting of a gambler, a thief, a prostitute, and a man named Davies who may or may not have been a whiskey drummer.

There were four dead and a rash of pandemonium. People scurried and the three men with long guns sat at the table which was no longer occupied by the living.

What next transpired is a confusing mess.

To start with the dog appeared. He was a big dog. He had all his teeth and a temper. Parker later claimed that the animal did not belong to him or to Sidney. Nonetheless, the dog attacked the three men in coats carrying long guns. When he, or maybe it was a she, attacked the first man whose fingers were wet with oyster drippings, the second one from only feet away fired his long gun. The shot missed the dog and all but the man with the wet fingers. The shot killed him dead which led the other man at the table to shoot the man who had just shot the other man if you follow my meaning. I imagine the first dead man bore a kinship to the now only remaining intruder. The dog looked around confused and attacked the last living man at the table who fired hitting Sidney in his already- Andrew Jackson-maimed foot.

The last man of the three fled screaming, “Mercy on me. Mercy damn.” He was out of the door and gone.

Sidney lost his foot and for the remainder of his life walked with a special shoe. The dog ate some oysters and disappeared. The militia constable declared that everyone killed everyone and left the tavern ordering the Sorenson twins to see to the burial.

A grim and grisly tale but one not ended.

Sick at heart the twins sold their tavern parted ways and moved West where Sidney became Limping Sid Lightning, gunfighter, and Parker became the Reverend Sorenson in Tucson where he spawned many a child and was known for his sermons on the wonders of dogs and the joys of cooking.

Amen.

That ended the chapter. I was beginning to notice something in Mrs. Plaut’s chapters. People were always getting shot or going mad. There lay a sadistic streak in Mrs. Irene Plaut, and I decided, for a change, to suggest something. Why shouldn’t the next chapter she wrote be about something pleasant?