Part 7 (1/2)
”You put on a great rap, you sneaky b.a.s.t.a.r.d!”
”Well, now! All fresh and clean and pretty as a picture. See, Meyer? Her eyes focus and her neck is clean. Carrying a little too much weight, but trim her down and she could cut it at anybody's convention.”
”Mark was making a joke. That's all. I want to tell you I didn't appreciate the floor show you put on.”
I smiled at her. ”What were we supposed to do, honey? Sit there and let three heads think that the laughing was a great put-on? Should I have plucked that scarecrow stud out of the chair and booted his scrawny tail out into the traffic? Should we have ignored you and spoiled your fun? Should we have gotten up and walked away? Name it.”
”We had some Mardil caps with a c.o.ke was all.”
”All for Jeanie?”
”That's something else again.”
”Yes indeed. She is long gone. It looks like barbs to me. What's she using to come back? Speed? Is she popping it or eating it?”
”She is not long gone. She'll be okay.”
”Get her when she's leveled off, kid, halfway between, give her a little kiss, and say good-by.”
”You know so d.a.m.ned much, don't you?”
”I tried to sweat the whole thing out once upon a time with a very dandy little girl named Mary Catherine. She went onto reds and blues. Tuinal. They used to hate to see her coming, because the ward nurses hate the barbiturate addicts worse than the drunks or the ones on horse. Took her up to North Carolina to a cabin to get her once and for all clean. I'd go in for groceries and come back and find her gone away on some kind of high. Sneaked back and watched through a window. Draining gas out of the lantern, heating it and sniffing it. Lovely sweet faraway smile. Busted in. Tears, promises. Never again. Then she took off. Couldn't find her. Pretended to look. Pretended I had the broken heart. But you know, Red, that look on her face had killed it. I was the most relieved lover in contemporary history. I have no idea what Jeanie is to you.”
”My best friend. My roommate at school.”
”Take my word. She'll never make it back. Not from where she is.”
”So what if she, doesn't? It's her life, isn't it?”
”If you want to call it living.”
”Hah! That big act of yours, mister. It so happens I found out you're nothing but some kind of rotten private fuzz, both of you. Private pigs for the establishment, down here to make trouble for people. That's some kind of living, isn't it?”
Meyer hitched around and leaned toward her. ”Listen to me, my dear. And believe me. We came here as an act of friends.h.i.+p to find out how a lovely girl died. Just that. Nothing more. It seems like such a waste. Your friend Jeanie seems like a tragic waste to me. And to you too, I think. You are being very defensive and impertinent because you are very troubled. I think more has happened than you can handle. If I can help you, privately, personally, no strings attached, if I can help you in any way, just tell me what you need.”
She shook her head. ”Oh, for chrissake. You kill me. Honest to G.o.d, me need help from you!” And she began to laugh. Very merry. Very young and jolly. Ha ha ho. Meyer sat looking at her. Very patient. No change in the concerned, benign expression. And the laughter took on a thinner edge, a shrillness that suddenly broke into a sob. She slumped, face in her hands, crying quietly. I opened my mouth to speak. Meyer gave me a warning look, a quick lift of the hand. She was straining for control, trying to smother the crying, trying not to be conspicuous.
”What do you need?” he asked.
She reached blindly, head bowed, chin against her chest. She grasped his bulky forearm with both hands. ”Can you... can you get us out of here? Jeanie and me. Please... Tickets. I can... pay you back.”
”Where to, dear?”
”Oklahoma City.”
”Where are your people?”
”In Europe with my youngest brother, traveling.”
”How soon do you want to get out of here?”
”Now! Tomorrowl”
He burrowed a blank sheet from my pocket note book, and put it and his pen in front of her. ”Write your names and addresses.”
She hunched over the paper, snuffling. She gave it to Meyer. He said he'd be back in a few minutes. She wiped her eyes with a paper napkin and sat up and sighed deeply and made a wry mouth. ”He isn't kidding?” she asked in a small voice.
”No. Not Meyer.”
”I have run into so many lousy rotten people.”
”Who briefed you on me?”
”Oh, there was a man around like an hour ago, maybe even two hours. Sort of handsome and elegant and f.a.ggotty. He was speaking real good Mexican to one of the waiters and he came over to the table with the waiter and the waiter pointed me out. So he asked me to come back to his table for a minute. So what the h.e.l.l, why not?”
”Brown-gray hair, good tan, bangs, gold mesh ring.”
”Yes, that's him. He lives here. He described you and, boy, did I ever remember you! He said he found out there was some kind of scene and wanted to know what went on. I asked why, and he said that a girl had died accidentally, the Bowie girl, and I knew about that, of course. Everybody who was here knew about that. And he said you were an investigator trying to turn it into a murder or something so you could make more money off her parents, and you were trying to make trouble for innocent people who live here. So I told him that what happened had nothing to do with anything like that. He wanted to know who else you talked to, and I said you had talked to the big fellow named Mike, with the Jesus beard, the one who paints, and the black girl named Della who's living with him, but I didn't know what you talked about to them. And that was all.”
Meyer returned and gave her a pat on the back of her hand and said, ”You can pick up two air tickets at the travel desk in the lobby after eleven tomorrow morning, dear. For your protection more than mine, I'm arranging it so they can't be turned in for cash.”
She nodded. ”I think that's the best way. I... I won't believe it until I've got the tickets in my hand.”
”You leave here at two tomorrow afternoon. You'll have three hours in Mexico City, so you better stay in the airport.”
She tried, almost successfully, to smile. ”Is there anybody you want killed?... Sorry. I guess that isn't very funny.”
”You might be able to help us with one little problem. We're looking for three people Bix Bowie traveled with. There were five altogether, but the Sessions boy died. We'd like to find Minda McLeen and Walter Rockland, known as Rocko, and Jerry Nesta.”
”Those last two, Rocko and Jerry, if anybody wants to kill those two, I'll help. They are rotten human beings, especially Rocko. Look I'm not going into any details about it. A bunch of us went back to that camper with those two, for like a fun party for one evening. So that Rocko gave me something that ran me up the walls. It ended up a girlfriend of mine named Gillian and me, we were there for I think it was three days. It taught me why the blonde and the little dark one split and lived in that crummy hotel room. Mostly that lousy Rocko had me. He is strong as a bull. I mean I knew that if I went there I might end up getting balled, and that it would be taking that risk right? Look, there are things you say you won't do. You know. Stopping points. But when people keep hurting you and hurting you, then it's easier to do any sick thing than keep getting hurt. It was all rotten. The kids who should have gotten us away from those two didn't do a d.a.m.n thing. They just left us there. Jerry wasn't so bad. Gillian had the idea he'd be all right if he'd get away from Rocko. Jerry has this fantastic black beard. It's the biggest, blackest beard I ever saw. All that shows are his eyes and a little bit of cheekbone and the end of his nose. I saw her in the market two or three days ago and she said they'd been out to Mitla and she saw Jerry walking along with a kind of ugly little Mexican woman walking behind him, so she made Ricky stop the car and she went back, but he was very strange. He didn't want to talk to her at all. He's living out there someplace, but he wouldn't say where. I haven't any idea where Rocko went, and I couldn't care less. I heard that the dark one, Minda? Yes, Minda. She's supposed to be up in Mexico City and her father is here waiting for her to come back. So that's all I know.”
She got up and smiled good-by and said she couldn't say thank you or she'd start crying again. But she bent over and kissed Meyer in a very quick, shy, small-girl way. And fled.
”How did you know she'd grab at it?”
He shrugged. ”I didn't. But sometimes you can smell despair. Besides, all generosity is selfish. It made me feel good all over.”
Quickly I told him about Bruce Bundy's quest. It was logical, Meyer agreed, that Bundy would have a good contact among the waiter staff, because it would be useful to know what was going on at all times.
”But,” asked Meyer, ”what is he so d.a.m.ned jumpy about?”
”That is what we now go to find out.”
He looked doleful. ”A minute ago I felt good all over.”
Nine.