Odditorium: A Novel (40 page)

“Another Gatortail sets sail,” Karl sang to himself.

He was deep in the suds, and suspicious. What could Tildy be doing in there all this time? It had taken him a while, but he’d narrowed down the possibilities. She had to be showing that big-town slick something he shouldn’t see. Either the box under the bed or herself on top of it.

“Some kinda way for a man to be treated under his own roof,” he called out.

The silence came back down like a trap and Karl had to ask himself the really thorny question: What is it makes me such a pussy? Why can’t I kick that door in and pull my wife out by the hair?

He could only ask, not answer. It hadn’t always been this way. Once he’d been a death defyer in a cherry red race car, and any woman who went behind his back got popped in the chops—But jackshit! A man of his young age shouldn’t be playing “those were the days.”

He tottered to the window. There were those bitches he’d asked Tildy to do something about, and they were playing cards in their bras and laughing.

“Hey. Hey.” He rapped on the glass. They took no notice, so he flung the window up and dangled himself out. “Hey, you fatbags gotta take off now. You see there, it almost be night.” He pointed to where the sun was like a damaged eye socket on the western horizon. “Put on your pants and take off…. I said it right. Put on, take off.”

“Pipe the fuck down,” M.J. responded.

Karl swung at the air, spilled beer down his arm. “Pull your bags over here and we’ll see ’bout it.”

“Break it up, brats.” Tildy had come out to see about the noise.

“Your husband can’t hold his liquor. Don’t get salty with us about it.” Flora, nonetheless, was getting into her pants.

Tildy, pulling Karl aside, yelled back, “I’m sober and as anxious to see you gone as he is.”

“What took ya so long?” Karl tried kissing her, missed.

“I overslept,” she told him.

“What’s this attitude for?” Flora said.

“For peace and harmony.”

“Your problem, girl, is you forget who your friends are.” M.J. hoisted herself up, toed a pillow like it was something not quite dead. “You practice loyalty, and in the end you thrive. Go your own way and you won’t have shit to show for it.”

“An attitude problem,” Flora agreed. “It all stems from that.”

“No sermons. Just get going.”

“You wrote the ticket, just remember that.” M.J.’s head vanished inside a Cougarettes sweatshirt, then popped free again. “Straight along to clown town.”

“I’m sorry it had to be this kind of job,” Flora said, “but I want that garage.”

“What kind of job?”

All Tildy got for an answer was M.J.’s upraised middle finger as Flora slapped her car into reverse, cut past the Galaxie to the blacktop; and then all six splatting notes of the custom installed “Charge!” horn.

“Should be some purple exhaust ’bout now,” Karl said.

Christo came up behind them with a tube of olive loaf seated cherootlike in his molars. “So what’s the latest?”

“Finally run them bags offa the property, din’t we?” Karl missed another kiss and fell heavily among the Gatortail empties.

Tildy pictured transiently a famous tattoo: Born to lose. She was dazed but cognizant. Sparn had sent those two for bloodhounds. They’d report back now, if they hadn’t already with that phone call from R.C.’s.

“I think we’re in the crosshairs,” she said. “I think we ought to pack a bag and go.”

“Could you translate that?” Christo said.

“Just think the worst and you’ll be there.” She helped Karl to his feet. “Come on, kiddo. Help me sort through the drawers.”

“Awful sudden ain’t it?” Tildy herded him backward. “We goin’ on a trip, I’d like to know where.”

“Tarpon fishing in the Keys? Would you like that?”

“Honeyboat, you know I would. I’ll be a fish-killin’ fool for you.”

“Where does that leave me?” Christo said.

Where it left him was right by the window and in a position to understand just a few minutes later that there wasn’t going to be any fishing trip. The clock had run out and the exits were closed.

“A large black car just drove up on the lawn,” he said. “Guy in a cowboy hat and a beehive blonde. They seem to be checking the place out.”

Tildy rushed to join him, the confirmation of dread in some strange way a relief. Vinnie Sparn wore the cowboy hat and striding regally under the dome of glazed hair was Dolly Varden. Sundown tints blushed the waxed surfaces of the limo as Big Pete stepped out, buffing his lips with a monogrammed handkerchief.

“Isn’t that the bozo who tried to grab you at the hotel? The one in the hat?”

“Yes, yes.” Tildy pulled away from him. “I’m going out there.”

“What good is that going to do?”

“Whozzat?” Karl, who had put on a hat adorned with lures, moved uncertainly out of the shadows. “You leavin’ without me?”

“Don’t worry,” Christo said. “Nobody’s leaving.”

Karl shuffled forward and peered out. “Is it bad?”

Pete had spotted them, waved his hanky. “Hello, young people. A lovely spot you have here.”

Tildy froze with her hand on the knob. “Ten more minutes,” she said hopelessly. “Ten more minutes and we could have been gone.”

Karl’s lips began to tremble. “It’s bad, isn’t it?” In one horrible mental leap, he’d understood what this was going to cost.

Then Pete nodded to Dolly, who began to read expressionlessly from her stenographer’s notebook.

“Florida statute number seven one six point zero one: ‘It is hereby declared to be the policy of the State, while protecting the owners thereof, to possess all unclaimed and abandoned money or property for the benefit of all the people of the State. This law shall be liberally construed to accomplish such a purpose.’”

Sparn looked skyward and opened his arms like a crooner. “I come here today as a representative of the people, one citizen standing for all. In this capacity, it is my intention to recover the abandoned property of one Lester Clines, deceased, on behalf of the general public. The liquid capital subsequently transferred to me will then be sent through the pipelines of my various commercial holdings to trickle down and irrigate the economic community at large. I love Florida. I believe there is no better living anywhere on this planet. I’ve had many good years here. Profitable years, years of growth and family closeness. Now, in my own small way, I would like to offer recompense.”

Christo whistled softly. “Somebody throw a net over this guy.”

“Go home, Pete,” Tildy said from the doorway. “There’s nothing for you here.”

“I have different information. According to a call I received this morning from a trusted employee—one, I might add, who believes in the team concept—the Clines bequest may be found in a footlocker under your marriage bed.”

All Tildy could think of was: Why in God’s name didn’t we take a vault at the bank?

Finally, because something was required, she said, “If it was only a question of money, I’d say come on in. But see? I’m locking the door.”

“If you like. I’m a generous man and I haven’t forgotten the good times we had. Ah, how I favored you. A waste. But I will allow you a last thirty minutes to enjoy your ill-gotten wealth before you hand it over to me. Starting now.” Sparn gave a limp salute and turned to his boy. “Vinnie, you may set the table.”

“Righto, Dad.”

Vinnie seethed with resentment. Set the table, Vinnie. Change the tire, Vinnie. Orders me around like one of his greaser caddies at the club. Like I don’t have feelings.

He began removing things from the trunk, remembering the trip down and Pete making him call the radio station that was having the Mother’s Day Mom-A-Thon. For a pledge of fifteen dollars or more to Children’s Leukemia Research, they read your message on the air. To Mrs. Helen S. with love and admiration. Right there in front of Dolly; Pete had even handed him the dime. What could he do? Righto, Dad.

Vinnie set up the folding chairs, the card table. He fluffed the linen cloth, laid out plates and silverware, cheese and fruit and cold cuts. He lit the tall white candles.

“A toast,” Pete said as he filled three glasses. “To better things for all of Florida’s sons and daughters. And for Les Clines and his boys, our hope that the heat’s not too terrible down where they are.”

“This wine should have been chilled,” Dolly said.

The siege was on.

“So?” Tildy’s cigarette was the only light in the room. “Sorry you came, I’ll bet.”

Christo reached across her and took a puff of his own. “To be a part of this little pageant I would have come twice as far.”

“I believe you.”

“So where do we stand with our half hour?”

“They’re still dining out there. Maybe his watch stopped.”

The refrigerator door was audible as it opened and closed, its rubber gasket unpeeling, slapping; then came the clatter of an ice tray being emptied.

“Karl, are you mixing drinks?”

“Probably not a bad idea,” Christo said.

They saw moving past them a vague shape which, as it neared the front window, turned out to be Karl cradling a bowl of ice.

“Cocksuckin’ Sparn. Eat ice.”

Before they could stop him, Karl began flinging cubes at the enemy. Hard white knots bounced in the grass, burst against the limo fenders. One, traveling straight as a clothesline, knocked the fork from Dolly’s hand, and Karl gave out a long falsetto war cry.

Vinnie pulled open his suede jacket. In the hand that dipped under his heart was an oily black lump.

“Get back,” Christo roared. “He’s got a piece.”

Karl said, “I ain’t afraid of no popgun cowboy. Whyn’t you come a little bit closer?”

Vinnie aimed and squeezed off a round: exploding glass and a shriek from Karl as the slug buzzed over him and buried itself in the wall. The recoil threw Vinnie’s arm upward and his second shot hit nothing but sky.

“When are you going to learn to use both hands?” his father said.

Refusing until now to let go of old putty, a final wedge of glass fell and the sound made Karl duck and cover. Christo dragged him up and threw him angrily against the wall.

“Want to get us all killed? This is no playground fight, you jar-head. It’s dead serious and we’re all in the line of fire. Now, can you grasp that or not?”

“Okay, so I’m a jerk. But I don’t need you to tell me what’s serious. Who you think dug up that treasure chest they all want so much? Karl D. Gables, that’s right. And ain’t nobody got cause to take it from me. I figured where to look and how, and with my own wife disbelievin’ me, I made it pay off. So you’re damn right it’s serious. Just as serious as my life.”

“Not mine.” Tildy was curled on the floor, as far away from everything as she could get. “I don’t want to die for a box of jewelry. Let’s give in to him. I want to see the end of this, that’s all.”

“Let’s not go overboard,” Christo said. “Maybe he’ll take half.”

“Ain’t yours to offer, neither one of you.” Karl tried to find his wife’s face in the dark. “Don’t do this to me, baby. You know it ain’t right.”

“Karl, didn’t anyone ever give you the story on being a grownup?”

Out of the murk, her hand slapped his face. He felt weak all over and an awareness of disgrace filled his brain, made him forget where he was.

“You’ve got to learn to compromise,” Tildy said. She went swiftly to the window and called Pete over. “Let’s deal.”

He moved languidly, examining his hands front and back for traces of food. “Marvelous. We’ll settle it now, and then everyone can have a slice of Dolly’s blackberry pie.”

“We’ll give you half, Pete. Free and clear.”

“Give?” Sparn’s voice jumped an octave. “You’ll
give
me half?”

“Seems more than fair to me. In a just world, a claim jumper like you would be hanging by his neck from the nearest tree.”

Shooting his heavily starched cuffs, Sparn clucked sadly. “I am here to retrieve the contents of Lester’s trunk. All of it. There is simply nothing more to talk about. No bargains, no trades. You’ll have it ready as soon as I finish my dessert, clear?”

A nerveless fixity. A thick black line drawn flat across the air. Three sets of lungs worked in rhythm and three pairs of eyes kept closed. Man and wife and suitor sat in a row on the sofa like end-stage crackpots in the lobby of a welfare hotel, loitering without sentiment at the scene of their own ruin.

An auto horn fanfare, then Pete bellowing through cupped hands. “This is your last chance to cooperate. If you don’t come out voluntarily, we’ll have to force you out.”

Tildy whispered, “He means it.”

“Fuck him.” Christo breathed deep. “We handled his Vinnie Winnie before, we can do it again.”

“Absolutely the last call.” Pete waited. “It’s your choice then. I’ve done my best.”

The green bottle in Vinnie’s hand was filled with kerosene. He thumbed the wheel of his lighter, the rag wick flared and he started to run. Christo saw the orange streak first, screamed, and the others were already scrambling away as Vinnie hurled the firebomb. Flames spread across the floor and up the wall. As Christo retreated, one leg of his jeans caught. He dropped and rolled, smothering the burning denim with his hands.

“Got to contain it in this room.” Christo sprang up, coughing. “Turn shower on. Soak down. Blankets, towels too. Go. Run.”

With augmented strength from spurting adrenaline, he pulled furniture away from the front of the room where the blaze was worst. Heat was something alive on his skin and wanted to squeeze the breath out of him. Then Tildy was beside him with a wet towel in either hand, beating at a diagonal line of flame trying to skid behind their defenses. Ashes swirled in the air, all that was left of the curtains. Karl emerged from the haze with soaked shirts and a wastebasket of water.

“More, more. Fill pots, whatever you can find.”

“I can’t breathe,” Tildy cried.

“Keep on. Push it back.”

“Too fast. Coming too fast.”

Christo flailed like a mad dervish at the oncoming wedge of flames. He was half blind and pain spread over his hands. They were losing ground. He knew very soon it would be time to run. Cold water exploding on his back and, through a chink in the smoke, Karl waving his arms.