But Not For Me Page 11

  “I don’t understand.”

  I decided that it was okay to release her hands. “Because the thugs who jumped us were cops.”

  Jill’s mouth dropped open and she let out still another “Oh, my god.” As I lit a cigarette she began to pace the office, back and forth in front of me. “What do we do now?” she said without slowing.

  Cigarette firm in my lips, I pulled out my watch. “In about 20 minutes, I’ll stroll over to Lenny’s Newsroom. While I’m questioning Miss Holloway, you poke around some more for the Cresto girl. We know now that’s her name. Look for anything, where she attended elementary school, anything. And see if you can dig up some information on one of Kansas City’s finest, Detective Kerry Patterson.”

  “He one of the thugs?”

  “That he is, Jill.”

  I put my watch away and took a long drag of the Lucky. A smoke helps me think. “Martha’s husband’s a Detroit firefighter isn’t he?” Martha was Jill’s big sister. Jill nodded.

  “Give Sis a ring and see if her man’s heard of a Detective Harmon of the Detroit P.D. Don’t know his first name.”

  “Another cop thug?”

  “Yeah, an out-of-town pugilist, a real head thumper.”

  “I’m not sure how soon I can reach Martha, or when she will next see Mark. Firemen work strange hours.”

  “That’s okay; just covering all of the bases here. What’d Rusty want?”

  “He asked how you were. Now I know why. He said you should call or come by his office after one.” Jill stopped pacing and stood in front of me. She reached her hands in the direction of my head. I reacted, grabbing them before they procured their target.

  “It’s okay, Phil. I won’t hurt you.” I relinquished my hold and ever so softly she clasped my neck below the ears, leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on my forehead. “Listen,” she whispered, inches from my face, the scent of Juicy Fruit flowing with the words. “I know I can’t convince you to drop this case.” As her gentle hands still caressed my neck, I shook my head. She smiled a sad smile.

  “But I don’t want to lose you,” she said. The way she said it—the angst and desire of her inflection—involuntarily, my eyebrows shot up. Jill released me and stepped back. “Because Rusty won’t pay me nearly as much.”

  With a swish of her skirt, Jill turned her back and walked away. At the door, she spun around with a move that rivaled a Ziegfeld girl’s. She delivered another shot. “Besides, Rusty’s office is too far from my apartment.” Another spin and a hand tossed in the air, she returned to her desk. “I’ll get busy on Cresto and the cops while you go make goo-goo eyes at the Holloway girl.”

  The scent of Juicy Fruit faded, replaced by the smell of my Lucky Strike.

  Henry must have gone to lunch or taken a break as his relief brought me down to the first. The reliever was a ham-faced and silent woman. Our conversation consisted of me saying “Lobby, please” and her answering with an almost imperceptible, “Hmph.”

  I hoofed it down to Lenny’s, four blocks south. The movement helped keep the damaged muscle tissue from tightening. The Newsroom’s big-windowed store front allowed me to check out the place before I entered—no Colleen yet, and no familiars either. The place was half-full.

  By noon, all of Lenny’s eight tables would be occupied as would the dozen or so counter stools. Lenny provided good food, the local daily papers and a handful of several-days-old big city dailies like the Chicago Tribune, the LA Times and the New York papers. They sold a lot of papers, but most folks came for Lenny’s greasy-good food.

  I gave the lady at the register a nickel, grabbed the morning Kansas City Times and took the table at the far end of the room. Remembering my ribs, I slid gingerly into a chair and sat with my back to the wall. The gal serving tables looked over at me and held up her coffee pot. I nodded. A couple minutes later she showed with a cup and the pot.

  “Want cream with that, honey?”

  “Nope, black as coal. There’ll be two of us,” I said. “Just keep my cup filled till my pal shows and then we’ll order.”

  “You got it.” She stared at me, allowing her coffee pot to tilt precipitously. “Somebody use your head as a bowling ball, hon?”

  “Something like that” She nodded with disinterest and headed for the kitchen, topping off cups as she went.

  The fire was front page news. A fireman had been overcome by smoke and was in the hospital in serious condition. The night watchman, badly burned, was in another hospital—probably the guy we saw being wheeled in last night. The fire chief reported finding two charred bodies, as yet unidentified. The police called the fire suspicious and declined comment on any possible evidence uncovered. Norman Clark, the head man of Genoa Distributing, placed the value of lost inventory at nearly two hundred thousand bucks. Clark said the night watchman should have been the only person there that time of night. After my talk with Dominic, I suspected Mr. Clark was a well-paid figurehead for the Black Hand mob.

  I flipped to the sports page. There was an article about the 1934 World Champion St. Louis Cardinals. They called them the Gas House Gang because of their rough and tumble brand of play. My dad would have loved them, and in a different life maybe I would have been with them playing in the outfield. The sports page’s lead column asked the question: Is Babe Ruth Done? The Babe had been merely human the last two years and wasn’t getting around on the fastball anymore. The Bambino was getting too old for baseball, a young man’s game.

  Sipping my coffee, I wondered about private detectives. Was investigations a young man’s game? Unlike baseball, a club doesn’t cut you loose when you can’t get around on the heater anymore. Detectives, like firemen, like night watchmen, like cops and crooks, might get dead if they get too old to do their jobs well. So what about me? Was thirty-four getting long in the tooth for a detective? Those thoughts tap-danced around my head until something down deeper popped to the surface. Jill said someone from the police called and I never asked who. Maybe I was getting old.

  The gal showed with more coffee and I shook off that line of thought. I wasn’t ready to hang up my gumshoes. My cup full, suddenly I had a case of the heebie-jeebies. The hair on my neck bristled. My eyes rose from the Times and I looked around expecting something odd. But there was nothing around me but decent folk chowing down. No boogie men peered in from sidewalk either. The clock on the far wall showed 11:13. Colleen was late.

  A few minutes later my cup sat empty next to the paper. I was trying to get the waitress’s attention when the door flew open and Colleen hurried in. She stopped just inside the door and looked around, hands on hips and legs apart like she had just flown the Atlantic solo. Her wind-blown blond bob looked professionally mussed to make her appear casual. She wore navy blue pants with knife-sharp creases, tightly pleated at her tiny waist and billowy below. A matching navy blazer hung open on her frilly white blouse. She saw me and waved. Heads turned as she approached, mostly male.

  I hopped up and pulled out the chair across from mine. My rib cage issued a stern reminder about sudden swift movements. She plopped down in surprisingly good spirits for the frantic sister of a missing boy.

  As I returned to my seat, she must have seen the wince, or maybe it was the lumpy head. Her expression changed. “Phil, what happened to your head? It looks horrible.”

  “You should see my ribs.”

  The worried look faded, replaced by a sly one. “Is that an invitation?”

  Confounded momentarily, I eventually returned her smile with one of my own. “Rhetorical, Miss Holloway. When I offer an invitation, you’ll know it. Any news about your brother?”

  “Nothing.”

  “No ransom notes, bank withdrawals, rumors flying?

  “No.”

  The waitress showed with menus and more java. I folded the paper and took a quick gander at the menu. It had been a while since I’d eaten here, but I remembered the burgers were good. I ordered one with cheese. Colleen ordered a salad and a glass of Coca-Col
a.

  “Tell me about your brother’s car.”

  “The Stutz Bearcat? It’s really nice, but I’m not sure it’s his, though.

  “What do you mean?”

  “It might be a loaner from that mobster Tommy’s been hanging out with.” Her Coca-Cola arrived and she dipped her teaspoon in the sugar bowl, brought up a heaping spoonful, tapped it on the side of the bowl until it leveled and then dumped it into the cola. She swirled her spoon around and around, dissolving its contents.

  Maybe I had a funny look on my face, for when she looked up her smile broadened, showing rows of perfect teeth. “What?” She said.

  I shrugged my shoulders.

  “Sweets for the sweet,” Colleen said as she took a gulp and offered an audible sigh. “Now, you poor man, what happened to you?”

  “Later, Miss Holloway. Do you know where he keeps the car?”

  “Why later? And why Miss Holloway?”

  “This is business. I’m on the clock.”

  “Well, you just better take a lunch break or I’ll get angry.” She stuck out her lower lip.

  “Okay, Colleen, do you know where your brother keeps the Stutz?”

  “That’s better. And yes I do.”

  “Where would that be?”

  The pouty lip returned. “You don’t sound like you’re taking a lunch break.”

  “And you don’t sound like a girl whose brother is missing, and who might be in big trouble or dead.”

  That did it. Out came the tears, and they looked like the real deal. I pulled out a fresh handkerchief and held it out to her. She took it, nodded, blew and wiped for a bit. When she looked up her eyes were wet and red and had changed from blue to green.

  “Okay,” I said. “We’ll eat our lunch. But afterwards, we need to talk about your brother.” She reached across the table and squeezed my hand. The sniffling abated, and she asked me if I had heard about the fire. I showed her the Times front page account, which she skimmed.

  “It’s those mobsters getting a gulp of their own medicine,” she said.

  “You may be right.”

  “Of course I’m right. It’s obvious.”

  “You think it was arson?”

  She paused and looked up at the ceiling before her bloodshot green eyes returned to me. “Yes, I do. Somebody they hurt just hurt them back. That’s all.”

  “Sounds personal.”

  Colleen folded her arms. “It’s just that I don’t like bullies.”

  “Some would say your father is a bully.”

  “And some would be right. He is. He is to everyone, his family included. Especially his family.” Anger rose around her pretty eyes.

  “So maybe your brother got tired of the bullying and ran off.”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think so. And besides, we’re on our lunch break—no more Tommy for a while.” We sat in silence while she read the fire story.

  Our lunch arrived. Colleen dug into her salad but seemed particularly interested in my burger. After the third bite, watching her eyes follow each one up to my mouth and back to the plate, I offered her a bite.

  “Oh, no thanks, I’m fine.”

  “Aw, c’mon,” I said. “Have a bite,” and I held the burger over her salad plate.

  Colleen tilted her head and pursed her lips. “Well, okay, a little one.” She took the burger, held it daintily, her pinkies sticking out as if she held a fancy tea cup, and then took the biggest little bite I’d ever seen. She handed what was left to me and struggled to chew the mouthful she had taken in. We both burst into laughter, which had her spewing burger, lettuce, and bun crumbs, which in turn ratcheted up our laughter.

  People turned to gawk at the fuss and some of them began laughing. Still giggling, Colleen managed to get the rest of the bite down and we went back to our own meals.

  As we ate Colleen asked me what I liked to do as a kid.

  I thought about it for a moment. “The usual stuff boys do—sports, especially baseball. I loved to play Civil War soldiers with the other boys. And I loved to read. My whole family, and occasionally some of my pals rode horses at my uncle’s ranch near Strong City.”

  “Strong City? You’re teasing. There’s no Strong City.”

  “No, I’m serious. It’s a little town an hour west of Emporia by car. It’s beautiful out there. Ever hear of the Flint Hills?”

  “No. Tell me about them.”

  I gulped my coffee and held the cup up. The waitress nodded. “The most beautiful place I’ve ever seen. Rolling hills of bluestem, hardly a tree anywhere. And when the wind blows, which is always, the bluestem waves like it’s a pale blue ocean.”

  “What’s bluestem—some kind of grass?”

  “Yeah, and in the heat of the summer, it turns blue like a hazy summer sky. It grows tall, taller than any grass around here. My friends and I would ride through it along the ridges and we’d canter down into the valleys. By July the bluestem grew so tall it was as if our horses had no legs, as if they just floated along on the waves.”

  “Sounds beautiful, Phil. You’re a poet.”

  I laughed. “Hardly. But that place’d make a poet out of my Plymouth if it spent an afternoon there.”

  Colleen giggled and put her hand on mine. Then she got all serious. “Would you take me there someday?”

  “Maybe. Let’s find your brother first.”

  She turned serious, no hint of mirth. “Promise me.”

  “Yes, Colleen; I’ll take you to see the Flint Hills.”

  Damn if it didn’t look like she was about to cry again. But she shook it off and brightened.

  “And we can ride your uncle’s horses?”

  “I suppose. You ever ride a horse?”

  “A lot when I was a girl, but only English saddle.”

  “We’ll have to make a Western girl out of you.”

  “I can’t wait,” she said.

  At that instant, frozen in time, Colleen looked like a teenager. I could imagine her riding in those tight English britches with that rhythmic up and down gait. But she would look good in denim and flannel too. I wondered what it would be like to live on a ranch with her. I had a hunch she’d love animals.

  “Did you have your own horse?” I asked.

  She sank in her chair. “No. I begged Daddy for one, but he wouldn’t listen. I rode one of the stable horses, the same one every time. I pretended Thor was mine. I loved grooming him and feeding him apples and carrots. Thor got excited every time I walked into the stables.”

  Thor apparently had good taste.

  “You said you rode with your friends,” she said. “Did you have a lot of friends when you were a kid?”

  “I suppose. I had two best friends, Mike and Mark. We were always together, and then there was a handful of others we played with. What about you?”

  “No, not really.”

  “No friends? Or no best friends?”

  “Neither. Daddy’s position placed me on a kind of rich kid’s island, and only the wealthiest, most important kids could be there. I didn’t go to normal kid schools. I never even went to a school that had boys.”

  “Really?” I said. As I pondered that, she pushed what was left of her salad around with her fork. I considered how different my own childhood would have been without friends, and how it might have changed who I am now.

  “What about the girls you went to school with?”

  She laughed. It wasn’t a laugh of humor. And she didn’t say anything, but instead speared the last cherry tomato and forcefully bit down on it.

  “Those girls were more competitors than friends,” she said, chewing. “Who could make the best grades? Who could wear the latest fashions and say the meanest things about those who didn’t? Whose fathers had the nicest cars, the biggest houses? I hated most of them, and they envied me because my daddy was at the top of the food chain. And they hated me because I wouldn’t play their mean little games.”

  She looked up and thoughtfully chewed her tongue, then p
ointed her fork at me. “They called me Little Rich Bitch, mostly behind my back. But they were the bitches and they didn’t even know it.”

  I could think of nothing to say.

  “So there you have it. I guess I’ve always been just a lonely girl.”

  “It’s funny,” I said. “There are probably a million girls who’d swap places with you.”

  “And most of them would regret it before long.”

  Our plates were sparsely populated when our waitress showed and asked if we’d saved room for pie. We decided to split a slice—cherry—and we nixed the waitress’ a la mode suggestion.

  “Phil?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you think I’m pretty?”

  I gave her a theatrical up and down assessment. “No,” I said, and then watched Colleen scrunch her mouth tight to hide the quivering lower lip. “Gorgeous, certainly, and even stunning, but, sister, you left pretty back in the dust.”

  Colleen’s face lit up and she laughed her husky laugh. She reached over the table and squeezed my hand again. A guy could get used to that touch.

  The place had begun to fill, and each time someone came in I raised my eyes to check them out.

  “Why do you keep looking at the door?”

  “Force of habit, doll. Want to make sure no undesirables get the jump on me.”

  “Who?”

  I hadn’t told her about dropping the hood, Colin Hardy, and decided to keep it that way. “Guy like me makes enemies as a part of doing business. A guy like me who isn’t careful doesn’t get to be an old guy like me.”

  “You’re not old.”

  “You’d be surprised.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Sorry, guys like me have some information that must remain confidential.”

  “But not your age?”

  “Sorry, but that’s double secret.”

  She smiled the canary-eating smile she gave me the first time we met in her father’s library. “We rich girls have ways of obtaining information, Mr. Morris. I’ll know how old you are by lunch time tomorrow.”

  I dropped the only-as-old-as-you-feel cliché on her, to which she responded, “With that bruised head and the ribs you won’t show me you must feel like an old man.”