Kill Me Tomorrow (18 page)

Tony did his bit. The vote was unanimous to send the transcript to the mayor and council, with some tacked-on recommendations, consulting the sheriff and such. Lucrezia had given me the names of the council members and they were already written down in my book, so as the eleven members, other than Tony, voted or spoke I merely checked off the numbers, made a few notes.

Some gave me more words by far than I needed. For example, Reverend Archibald stood up and, I do believe, began to deliver a speech—or possibly a sermon—in that syrupy, sonorous, oracular style of his, but Tony chopped him off after a few sentences. He sat down reluctantly, but managed to get off a final oboe-like “‘Sinners and whoremongers!'” plus a bit more. I missed the chapter and verse; no matter, it was something Holy. I listed Archie as No. 6. DiGiorno-Lecci was No. 2, first of the council members to speak. The Beagle, on Brizante's left, became No. 12. So I switched on my mini-recorder again, then walked over to Lieutenant Weeton for No. 13.

It wasn't necessary to draw a comment from him. I no sooner sat down in an empty seat next to him than he said, his voice imbued with no less grating whininess than when last we'd chatted in front of Yarrow's, “Scott, I never
heard
nothing so dumb. What'd you do, hire some out-of-work actors for that crap?”

“Actors?” I said, raising my eyebrows. “It sounded authentic to me. Matter of fact, Lieutenant, it was the legit.”

He lifted one of his hamlike, almost misshapen fists, and shook it gently. “If I thought for a minute that was the up-and-up I'd have to guess somebody broke the law.”

“Presumably you do
not
mean those lads who were talking about hitting Reyes. So I suppose you imply you'd have to arrest me. In front of all these people. Who just listened to all those actors. Something like that?”

His jaw muscles bulged. “Maybe it'll come to that, Scott.” He paused, continuing to exercise his jaws. “For crissakes, everybody on your supposed authentic tape sounded like the same guy. Could've been anybody talking—even you.”

“Sure. Or you. Or Cary Grant. Or Ace. Or Fleepo. Can you tell me anything about those two actors, Lieutenant?”

He didn't answer. I had enough, anyway. And I'd come to this meeting with a slight worry that Weeton might actually arrest me. That, of course, would mean he
believed
in me—and in my tape. And it did seem the lieutenant wasn't a believer. I assumed he'd be glad to put the arm on me anyway, should a complaint be filed. But the complainant would almost have to admit his voice was on my recording, and I didn't expect that to happen.

So I left him with one final comment. “Just suppose this was the McCoy, Lieutenant. Maybe it isn't possible to tell from the sound who was speaking—I'll admit that much. But … deductions can be made.”

“What does that mean?”

“I can tell you one guy who, for sure, was
not
at the party.”

“Yeah? Like who?”

“Like Lucky Ryan.”

He stared at me, touched his tongue to his upper lip, and sort of wiggled it there, as though thinking with it, and continued to stare. I told him good-bye, politely.

Lucrezia and I left, sat in the car until Tony and Sergeant Striker came out, then followed them back to Brizante's home. I had told Lucrezia I'd be taking off right away, and before she and Tony went into the house, she asked me if I'd come in for a minute before leaving.

Striker had been as impressed by the recording as Weeton had not. I talked to him for a few minutes, then asked, “Sure this won't get you in any trouble? I know it may get you killed, but I mean any other trouble.”

“Nope, I made arrangements. With the captain.”

“Weeton might not be happy with your going over his head.”

He laughed, as though the thought pleased him.

Lucrezia met me at the front door and asked me into the empty living room. Then she stood in front of me, about a foot away, pushed her head forward a couple of inches, pooched her lips out in a perfect pucker—there really should be a better word for it—and said, “Shake, stranger.”

And if that strikes you as even vaguely sickening, you have led the wrong kind of life. You have been misled. You are malconditioned. You salivate to the ding-dong bell.

You have, at least, not seen and heard a “Shake, stranger,” in the presence of the pucker—there
really
should be a better word for it—of luscious Lucrezia Brizante.

I shook.

Back at Mountain Shadows, I had a thick, blood-rare steak with all the trimmings in the main dining room. I even requested a table overlooking the pool—despite the fact that the drabness of sky I'd noted at dawn had become dark grays and near blacks almost ominous—for it had struck me that these might be the last moments of calmness and peace I would enjoy for a while.

It was my firm conviction that, somewhere behind the scenes, there was not only consternation—mixed with some relief—among the evildoers, but plans being laid for more evildoing. And that in connection with the evildoing my name was being bandied about in all kinds of reckless ways. I doubted, however, that any bombs or machine guns—or even small artillery—would go off before dark, thus I meant to prepare myself as much as possible for whatever my immediate future might be, if I had any. So, after a splendid and long-overdue meal, I went back to my suite, left a call for six
P
.
M
., and turned down the sheets on my dandy double bed.

It was about one minute until noon, so before conking out I switched on the TV, then climbed into the sack and caught the noon news. I thought there was a chance mention might be made of this morning's events at the Sunrise Villas council meeting. To be perfectly candid, I kind of hoped there would be, maybe including even a complimentary, if fleeting, reference to me. I did feel the morning's adventure had been quite newsworthy. If, of course, one didn't mind being sued.

Sunrise Villas, yes; council meeting, no.

First crack out of the box, the announcer mentioned the Villas and I pricked up my ears and maybe smiled, sort of hopefully. But, no; the reference was to Sunrise Villas as one of four retirement communities in Arizona—the others being Sunrise Villas' “twin” or sister-city at Tucson, called Tucson Villas, Del Webb's Sun City, and Festival Town up near Flagstaff in northern Arizona.

And: to AGING, to Kerwin Stephens, and to the glorious opportunity just around the corner for many of Arizona's senior citizens. I listened with only half an ear, and watched with a droopy eye, but when Congressman Stephens himself appeared on the screen I recognized not only his avian features but his huskily cooing voice.

He mentioned the Commission of the Agency for Gerontological Investigation and Need-Grants—using the whole handle—and the fact that, as its chairman, he was
deeply
concerned with the
need
evidenced in Arizona and elsewhere, which I gathered meant all fifty states.

Then he said something like, “We begin with the premise that as long as some men have more than others, we have not achieved social justice. Thus it is our task to work diligently until no man has less of anything than everybody else, or more of everything than anybody else. I am sure we all look forward to the day, perhaps in the not-too-distant future, when no man is more underdeprived or less overpoverished than any other man.”

Well, it was something like that. Whatever he said, it was pretty tough to take on a full stomach. So I let my mind wander. On my way back to the Shadows I had stopped by Professor Elliott Irwin's home and left with him the cassette of tape I'd recorded at the Villas. By now he was, I imagined, playing with it and letting out little elfish yips of excitement. Having by then heard the original tape, he'd been having a great time making spectrograms of the seven “definitely criminal” specimens, and had attempted to involve me in his enthusiastic elucidation of this decibel level and that apparently vestigial epiglottis, and had even showed me some of the black-on-white spectrograms or “contour Voiceprints” which he'd already made. They resembled aerial maps of aerial maps, a bunch of waving lines forming squarish circles and oblongish dollops, and had not been of huge interest to me.

Of huge interest to me was the fact that the professor's work was progressing well, and he was certain he'd be able to get the results to me—by telephone—within a few hours, perhaps before sundown. He agreed to call as soon as possible, and we worked out a simple method for him to convey his findings to me.

There were, I realized, other avenues of investigation I could pursue, but the professor's research might well make some of them unnecessary, and even open up entirely unsuspected directions in which I might more profitably go. So I didn't feel I was losing any time, really, but merely recharging the physical battery while awaiting—hopefully—revelation.

Nothing about me on TV yet.

In fact, though I was pretty sleepy and may not have caught every single one of his words exactly, Congressman Kerwin Stephens was really going lickety-split now: “I am happy to say we are making real progress, my friends. We have made great advances in aiding the underprivileged and providing advantages for the disadvantaged. But this—even AGING—is only a beginning! We must—
and we will
—aid not only the overaged and the underyouthed, the underaged and the overyouthed, but also the overpovertied and the underluxuried, the underovered and the overundered. This, of course, will cost money.”

I shook my head in sleepy wonder as Kerwin cooed, or so it seemed to me he cooed: “The Committee on AGING is at present funded with only one and one half billion dollars, a mere pittance. In time, of course, a few more pittances will be required. But surely the wealthiest nation in the world can afford a small percentage of its Gross National Product to bring security, health, joy, happiness, intelligence, success, peace, prosperity, and superiority to every man, woman, and child …”

Believe it or not, even though there was a chance something nice might yet be said about my morning's work at Sunrise Villas, I didn't even get to hear Kerwin finish telling me, and everybody else, what he was going to do for us. I fell into dreamland, with the TV still on.…

The insistent ringing pulled me out of sleep, and my first sluggish thought was of Professor Irwin. But it was the operator, calling me at six
P
.
M
. I hung up, clicked off the TV, phoned room service and ordered coffee. Then I dressed—with care, and in a brand-new suit, since the first wearing of a new suit always elevates my state of mind, which could use some elevation.

When I sat down to coffee I was clad, gorgeously, in a lovely custom-tailored garment of shimmering fabric, sort of bluish with a little green and slight pinkishness and faint gold threads running every-which way—I thought of it as the color of a drunken dragon's eye. Thus appareled, like a matador going forth to joust, after my second cup of coffee I was not only nearly awake but felt splendid, recharged and optimistic.

It was a bit too early for Elliott Irwin to call. In the meantime, I felt it would be wise to figure out what I intended to do this night no matter what the results of his Voiceprint comparisons were. While my public playing of the Jenkins tape had undoubtedly been helpful in many ways and, I believed, necessary, in another way it had at least diminished what might have been a golden opportunity. Because I felt it would be very helpful if I could get my hands on one of the hoods I'd run up against in the past twenty-four hours.

I knew Ace and Fleepo had been present at that meeting of the seven, and thus would be able—if I asked them in a way sufficiently persuasive—to tell me who the other five had been. Or, rather, the other four, since I figured Frankenstein had been there, too. He wouldn't be of any help to me now, however, not in his condition. But neither would Ace and Fleepo if they'd skipped as far and fast as I assumed they had.

There was also Lucky Ryan, who might know much I would be pleased to hear. But unless a very slick con job was pulled on him—or info about the Jenkins tape failed to reach his ears—Lucky was not likely to be available, either. I ticked them off. Frankenstein, Ace, Fleepo, Lucky Ryan. Thus from the total of five, Lucky Ryan plus the four boys with whom I'd tangled at a distance there on Willow Lane last night, only one likely choice remained. There was …

It was funny, but every time I thought of that monstrously wide and massive egg, the same treacherous little words I'd thought upon first lamping him sneaked in, unbidden, and scampered around inside my skull like tiny rats:
Man, I hope I
never
get clobbered by Bludgett
.

It wasn't that I was afraid of Bludgett. Not really. Not exactly. It was merely, I told myself, that it would be infinitely simpler to extract information of value from comparative weaklings such as Ace and Fleepo, or a gorilla, if I could get them off alone someplace. Probably you could pound on Bludgett with a ball-peen hammer until he yawned. The problem, then, was how to get my hands on one of those
other
creeps. Hell, maybe some were still around. It was possible. Sure. There was hope.

At that very moment there was a soft knock on my door.

For a few seconds I almost believed my problem had been solved, that one of the lads I'd been thinking about had come here to kill me. What luck! After all, thoughts are things, and if you think about something long enough and hard enough you usually get it. All I had to do was dream up something sufficiently clever, and capture whoever it was who'd come to kill me, and—

My plans were interrupted by a voice outside the door.

“Mr. Scott? You there? This is Artie Katz.”

I let him in.

“I just saw something I figured you ought to know about.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, I went out to pick up a Lincoln for a guest and I saw a guy looking inside your car. You know, like he was looking at the registration, making sure who it belonged to.”