Ed Lacy - Blonde Bait

Her big eyes were bright with excitement as she nodded. “You're pronouncing it correctly, but it is not a woman. It is—or was—a village in the mountains of Algeria. A terrible crime took place there.”

“A village? What crime?”

“Mass murder. Every man, woman, and child in the village was deliberately hacked to pieces. Mickey, how can you be involved in this?”

“Involved? I didn't know it was a town until now. And I can't wait to forget it. Look, I hate to cut this short, but I have to go. Where's the nearest public phone booth?”

“Go to your left on leaving the house. Turn at the corner and you will see a newspaper store. Can't you use our phone?”

I shook my head. “Thanks again for everything and tell...”

“Mickey, make your call and then return here. I must make you something to eat. I'm a fine cook. I will also give sandwiches to take with you.”

“I can't...”

“I insist! I will be insulted if you do not at least try my cooking. What's another half hour or so? Don't be rude.”

“Well, let me make this call and see... er... what's doing.” I walked to the door and she grabbed an old cap from the closet and said, “Wear this to protect your wound. Please come back. It isn't the food alone. There is something important I must discuss with you, about Hal.”

“I'll be back,” I said, inspecting myself in a mirror near the door. I looked like Joe-Average-Citizen in Hal's old clothes. But I couldn't disguise my size.

It was very dark outside and that helped my nerves, until I realized the darkness could be a cover for whoever was after me. Had the superintendent reported to the cops that he'd been slugged? He must have. The police might still be checking the neighborhood. But I was too excited at the thought of talking to Rose to think of anything else. Not even the astonishing news that Me-Lucy-ah was a city in North Africa. Like the rest of the merry-go-round I was on, it didn't make much sense. Of course, Colette could be wrong, too.

I cased the newspaper and candy store as best I could, walked in and bought a couple of cigars to get some change. Dialing long distance and the boatyard, I waited anxiously for the guy to call Rose to the phone. It seemed to take an awfully long time. I sat there restlessly; an icicle of uneasiness growing inside me. It melted in a flood of warmth with Rose's throaty, “Mickey?”

“Yeah. Honey, I'm in the big city and on my way....”

“Oh Mickey! I've been worried out of my living mind! You should have been here hours ago. Anything wrong?” There was a kind of thickness in her voice. Maybe it was the phone connection. Or, Rose had hit the bottle and was cranked-up.

“No, no, everything is jake. I had a small accident I...”

“You're hurt!”

“No, honey, I lost my wallet. I had to scrounge around to get enough money to even phone you. But I'm set now and I'll be on my way in a few minutes. How're things at your end?”

“Quiet, except for worrying about you. Please, Mickey, make it fast. Darling, I want you to be near me so. Oh, Mickey, I'm lost without you!”

“Sit tight, babes, and don't get lost in a bottle. We're not in the clear yet, for all I know,” I said, maybe blushing—I was that pleased. For some silly reason I told myself Hal could have his Colette with all her bright efficiency. She could never be half the woman Rose was.

After telling her to stay on the Sea Princess and be careful, that I should be out by midnight, I hung up. I started to dial the bus terminal when I saw a short squat man standing to one side of the booth. He kept glancing at me. I got this sudden lump of suspicion until I noticed he wasn't wearing a tie under his overcoat. He looked as if he'd rushed out of his home to make a call.

Still... I thought of the poor janitor I'd clobbered. I'd been pure lucky, but another slugging and I could be jammed-up. I decided to bluff, play 'em like you got 'em, as poker players say. When I got the bus terminal I hung up and opened the booth door. “You waiting for the phone?”

“I certainly am!” he shrilled. “I have an important business call to make but that doesn't stop my daughter from tying up the phone. It's a plain outrage when a man can't use his own phone for...”

I stepped out of the booth. “Make your call. I have to use the phone again.”

“I have to make several calls. I shall make one and let you...”

“That's okay, I can wait.” I lit a cigar and walked over to the phone books, figuring they might have a map of New Jersey in them. They didn't. When Shorty left the phone I dialed the bus terminal and found the last bus to Asbury had left a half-hour before. The clerk was a talker and when I said I had to get there, he gave me directions for taking a train to Newark, then connecting to a train or bus going to Red Bank. A cab from Red Bank he said would only be a few bucks. I phoned the train station and found I had ninety minutes before the next train to Newark, and after that, they seemed to run every half-hour.

I sat in the booth and smoked. I had enough money, it would be safer for Colette and myself if I didn't return. She was making this food, and Lord knows what she expected me to tell her about Hal. I didn't want to be a crude jerk but this wasn't the time for playing at manners. But I did have time and hanging out at her place was better for me than the streets.

I thought about buying her kids a box of candy: that might be like a guy borrowing money to bet against you in a crap game. I walked toward her house slowly, looking up and down the street to see if I was being followed, and feeling like a guy who hasn't the smallest idea of what he's doing.

She had some long-haired junk on a record player and said the food would be ready in a moment. I studied the chair she was fixing, and wondered why you never heard of women carpenters. She called me into a kitchen full of a hundred gadgets and I sat down to a plain cheese sandwich and a cup of coffee. She had also packed some food in a bag for me to take, which was fine—it would make me look a working stiff on his way to the night shift. When I finished the sandwich she insisted I have another cup of Java but I said I had to go.

“Your call. Everything is all right?”

“Sure. Listen, I'll send you the money.”

“Mickey, you can't leave! A few more minutes, please.”

“Colette, I'm a lousy gossip. I don't know what you think I can dish out about Hal, but I don't know a thing that...”

“That was a lie to make certain you returned. Mickey, you must stay a few more minutes. It's very important! Somebody wants to talk to you. He's on his way here.”

“Somebody is coming? How did...?”

“I phoned Jacques. You must talk to him about Melouza. You can trust him.”

“Aren't you the real live doll!” I said, trying to keep my voice down, remembering the cop downstairs who owned the house. “I don't trust anybody! In the last dozen hours I've been shot at, slugged, and pushed around. From now on my sole hobby in life is keeping my nose clean! Did you tell him my name?”

“I think I said Mickey. You can trust him, trust me. You must!”

I could see the red line of danger streaking toward us; once they knew my name and the boat, we were finished! I started for the living room. Colette flung herself on my shirt. She said fiercely, “I trusted you! When you came here I didn't ask if the police were after you, or if you were bringing danger to me and my children! You are Hal's best friend, why should I harm you?”

I stared down at her for a moment without talking. I mumbled, “You don't understand, I can best help you and your kids by taking off—now.”

“Mickey, you are the one who lacks understanding. I don't know if you are only pretending or you really don't know what this is all about. Jacques is a good man, very smart, a member of one of the French diplomatic staffs. He will know what to do.”

“Do about what? Colette, if you have any sense, let well enough alone.”

“No, no, you see I know a little—about Willy Sowor, and more about Melouza. Mickey, you may have something very big for us.”

“Who's 'us?'”

“The decent people of the world. The true story of Melouza is so important!”

“Important? I don't get your message—what are you trying to sell me?”

“To wait for Jacques, he can tell you much more than I know. Mickey, you have nothing to fear from either Jacques, or myself. Believe that!”

“Damn it, how do you know what I have to fear?” I asked, pushing her away, wondering if Hal had mentioned what I'd told him in Haiti about Rose. Two other ideas were rattling around in my sore head. I had wanted to see Sowor to find out what Rose was in. Strange as it seemed—and nothing about this set-up could actually surprise me any more. Colette and this Jock could give me the info. The other idea, the bigger one, was that if I ran now, Colette might give this Jock my real name. And then he would trace me to the boat, the island. Ruin our last hiding place.

Colette was standing with her back to me, blocking the door neatly. I said, “Sure I trust you, I have to. But one thing I insist upon: under no circumstances are you to tell this Jock, or anybody connected with him, my full name or anything about me. I have my reasons. A deal?”

“Deal? Of course, anything you wish. Mickey, I would no more hurt you than I would expect you to harm me or my children. I...”

“But you can be hurting the hell out of me without knowing it! Like now, asking this Jock in without first even asking me.”

She looked away for a moment. “I simply refuse to believe you are on the other side.”

“The other side of what?”

“Of humanity and everything that makes life worth living.”

I never was good at riddles. “I don't know about sides, but let's settle two things: no mention of my real name, and I'll wait ten minutes for this...”

There was a knock on the downstairs door. Colette actually raced down the stairs and returned with a compactly built guy dressed like a conservative fashion-plate. His face was vaguely familiar as he took off his homburg and black overcoat with the velvet collar. He stared at me, blowing on his finger tips, as Colette talked to him in runaway French. His hair was completely white and the tired eyes had tiny wrinkles around them, yet I had an idea he wasn't much older than me, maybe younger. He nodded as Colette talked, now rubbing his thin hands together slowly. I once knew a knife thrower who had hands like that; sort of delicate but strong, like thin steel wire. Sitting on the couch, he pointed toward a chair and said, with a kind of clipped, and perhaps phony, British accent, “Now let us talk, Monsieur Mickey.”

As I put it down, the accent reminded me of the old man in the turtleneck. This Jock was staring at me and I looked him smack back in his eyes. And knew where I'd seen the face before: he was one of the Maquis in the snap on the bedroom wall, although his hair hadn't been white then. And from the way he'd been standing in the picture, he'd been their officer. I said, “Okay. You do the talking.”

He gave me a weary smile. “As you wish, Monsieur Mickey...?”

“Mouse,” I added, brightly.

“Ah, yes, Monsieur Mouse,” he said without a smile. “Very good. He is a jovial chap who tries to make the world laugh. But enough of small talk. It will save us both time, and I understand you are in a hurry, if you will kindly tell me why you were trying to contact the late Monsieur Sowor?”

“Nothing to it: I was looking for a gal I once knew. She'd mentioned Sowor. As I told Colette, it was an easy name to remember, being she said the guy was a German... Sauerkraut. Of course I thought it was spelt s-o-u-r, but took a chance this Willy Sowor might be the same guy, might know where this gal is now. Or where Me-Lucy-ah is and she might know. I thought she was an Oriental gal. Colette says she's—it's—a town. Very confusing.”