Even though I’ve stayed there a number of times, Lotty always treats me as a real guest, taking my bag, offering me a drink from her limited repertoire. She almost never uses alcohol herself and keeps brandy on hand only for medical emergencies. I turned it down tonight— my stomach still had a strong memory of the bottle of Georges Goulet I’d put away last evening.
Lotty had a stew simmering on the back of the stove, some kind of Viennese dish reconstructed from her childhood memories. Hearty and simple, it brought back the comforts of my own childhood.
“You must have known I’d be coming when you made this,” I said gratefully, cleaning the last carrot from my plate. “Just what the doctor ordered.”
“Thank you, my dear.” Lotty leaned over to kiss me. “Now a bath for you, and bed. You have black circles the size of craters around your eyes.”
Before I went to bed she checked my hands. The blisters were a bit tender from my gripping the Chevy’s steering wheel too hard, but they continued to heal. She put more salve on them and tucked me into her cool scented sheets. My last thought was that the smell of lavender was the smell of home.
When I woke up again it was past ten. The sun stuck little fingers of light around the edges of the heavy crimson curtains, striating the walls and floor. In the empty apartment all I could hear was the hum of the bedside clock, an oddly comforting noise.
I pulled on my sweatshirt and padded into the kitchen. Lotty had left a glass of orange juice for me and a note to help myself to food. My long sleep had left me with an enormous appetite. I boiled a couple of eggs and ate them with a great stack of toast.
While I was eating I tried to come up with a design for a perfect tiger trap, but as soon as I started thinking about Ralph MacDonald and Furey and the rest of the gang, I got too nervous for logic or design.
I wished I had the beginning of an idea of where to look for Elena. Maybe she did have some cronies who she could turn to when she hit the bottom of her considerable depths. If she had been in any of the other abandoned buildings on the Near South Side, Furey would have found her by now.
I got up abruptly. Maybe he had. Me could have put a bullet through her or strangled her—her body wouldn’t be found until the wrecking crews came through a year or more from now.
I went into the living room to use the phone and tried the Streeter Brothers again. The Streeter Brothers—Tim and Jim—operate a security firm called All Night—All Right. I’ve used them in the past when I had surveillance work too big for me to handle alone. Tim and Jim operate the firm as a collective with a handful of other guys, all big, all with beards. They move furniture as a sideline and most if not all of them spend their spare time reading Kierkegaard and Heidegger. They do a respectable job, but they also make me nostalgic for the dear dead days of yesteryear.
I got Bob Kovacki, whom I knew pretty well, and explained my situation to him. “I need to find her before this mad police sergeant does, but right now I’ve got a sickening idea he may have flushed her in one of the old buildings on the Near South Side and left her body there. I’d like you guys to look down there first, then we can go over some of her old hangouts.”
“God, Vic, we’re pretty booked now.” I could hear him drumming his fingers on the desktop. “I’ll talk to Jim, see if we can shift the schedule any. You going to be around this afternoon?”
“I may be doing errands, but I’ll call my answering service every hour. Look—I—well, I don’t have to spell it out for you. This is urgent. I know you’ll do the best you can, though.”
Once I’d arranged a tow for the Chevy I’d rent a car and go to the Near South Side myself. I called my garage and described what had happened. Luke Edwards, my mechanic, tisked lugubriously.
“Doesn’t sound good, Vic. You shoulda called me when it first started making that grinding noise. You probably drove the transmission dry. I’ll send Jerry over with the truck in an hour or so, but don’t hope for too much.”
I made a face at the phone. “Don’t be so cheerful, Luke—you’ll build up your endorphins too big and your brain’ll blow.”
“You saw what I see every day and you’d be sober too.”
Luke always makes his garage sound like the county morgue. I gave it up and told him I’d be waiting for Jerry with the car keys. I quickly washed the dishes and made up the bed. Leaving an effusive note for Lotty, I hiked to my own home.
41
Unlit Fireworks
I felt honor-bound to stop at Mr. Contreras’s and inquire into any dark doings in the night. He was intensely disappointed—nothing had happened. Peppy had wakened him around three barking her head off, but it turned out to be just a couple of guys climbing into a car across the street.