Thereby Hangs a Tail (22 page)

“I told you there wasn’t any.”

“An accounting of your activities, then.”

“My activities?”

The count’s voice sharpened. “To take one example—did you follow up on my suggestion?”

“The Babycakes lead?” Bernie said. “A dead end.”

“Dead end? Did you interrogate Ganz?”

“We talked.”

“And?”

“We ruled him out.”

“Ruled him out? This means?”

“That he didn’t do it.”

Hey! That was what it meant? I’d heard the expression a lot, had never quite grasped it. Good thing the count asked. He had a funny way of talking, hard to understand, plus his breath had smelled of fish and he had a mustache and mustaches always bother me, but still, I started to like him. I liked most humans I’d come across, except for bad guys, perps, and gangbangers, and even some of them—take this one dude, for example, who’d got his ear caught in a—

But maybe a story for another time, because at that moment the count, even though I was starting to like him, sounded annoyed. “How can you be ruling him out? Ganz is ruthless, capable of anything.”

“Don’t think so.”

“What are you saying?”

“That he’s not the type who’s capable of anything.”

“Then you have misunderstood the man, and badly,” said the count. “I am paying for results.”

The count was paying? Had I known that already? Now I liked him even more.

“I’m aware of that,” Bernie said. “But we’re in for the duration, money or no money.”

Uh-oh.

“Your business plan is unusual, no?” said the count. He had that right.

“It works for us.” Oh, Bernie. “How well do you know Earl Ford?” he said, losing me completely.

And maybe the count, too. After a slight pause, he said, “This name again?”

“Earl Ford.”

“Never heard of him.”

“He’s the sheriff of Rio Loco County,” Bernie said. “His office is about twenty miles from your ranch.”

“There are still sheriffs here? Like the Wild West? What a country!”

The count had that right, too!

“How about his deputy, Lester Ford?” Bernie said.

“Is he of the Detroit Fords?” said the count. “I dined with several on the Costa Smeralda.”

“These aren’t the Detroit Fords,” Bernie said.

“Then I don’t know them,” said the count. “Why do you ask?”

“I’m surprised they haven’t interviewed you,” Bernie said.

“Why would they?”

“The kidnapping happened in their jurisdiction.”

“I have talked only with Lieutenant Stine and the state police. Your system is very complicated.”

“So is this case,” Bernie said.

“How troubling to hear that,” said the count. “I’m boarding a plane right now, but I expect to be informed of your progress from now on.”

“All right,” Bernie said. “Just one more thing—what were the circumstances of Nancy Malone coming to work for you?”

“How can that possibly concern you?”

“Is it true she used to work for Ganz?”

“What lies has he been telling you?”

“We’re trying to separate truth from lies. That’s a big part of our job.” It was? First I’d heard about it. Our job was to track down perps and grab them by the pant leg. But Bernie had his reasons, whatever that meant, and I had my own ways, which was why we were such a good team, except for our finances. “. . . backstage at Balmoral,” Bernie was saying, “and so the Nancy Malone question may be relevant.”

“Ah,” said the count, “now we get to the famous kneecapping.”

“Did it happen?”

“Of course not.”

“Did you see it?”

“See something that didn’t happen? What kind of detective are you?”

I wasn’t exactly sure what this conversation was all about, but one thing I did know at that moment: I’d stopped liking the count.

“Someone saw it happen,” Bernie said.

“That’s a lie,” said the count. “Ganz
claims
to have seen it— even you are aware of the difference, no? Poor Nance hardly even touched that foul creature.”

Fowl? A kind of chicken, right? I’d had some fun with chickens in my time, but where did they fit in?

“Not only an accident,” the count was saying, “but Babycakes wasn’t even hurt, could have competed.”

“Why didn’t she?”

“Because of Ganz.”

“Why wouldn’t he want her to compete if she could?”

“He is—what is your expression?—a drama queen. Have you not spotted such an obvious fact?”

“But if Nance—”

The count’s voice rose. “This has nothing to do with Nance.”

“Is it true she worked for Ganz?”

“Did you not hear me?” the count said, his voice rising some more. “Do what I’m paying you to do—find Princess.”

“And Adelina?”

“Yes, yes, of course. Did I say Princess? This is the stress. My meaning was Adelina. Find her. And Princess, too.”

“It would help if—”

Click.

After that, Bernie was quiet for a long time. Once or twice he spoke, saying things like, “Business fucking plan” and “Costa fucking Smer-alda,” and somehow I knew things were okay. We drove through the Valley, past malls and big box stores and rows and rows of houses rising into the canyons as far as I could see—and somewhere in those canyons was our canyon with our house and Iggy right next door, my best buddy, who’d once, before the electric fence, caught a bird, I’ll try to get to that later, snatched the little bugger right out of the air!—plus golf courses with fountains of spray shooting up over the putting greens—have I mentioned putting greens yet, my very favorite running surface, the feeling under my paws indescribable?—fountains of spray often topped with rainbows. Was there a better place to live? Hard to imagine.

But we weren’t headed home. I knew that because we didn’t take the ramp just before the longhorn bull billboard, this huge bull raising a frothy mug of beer, one of my favorite sights in the whole Valley. Instead we kept going, in traffic that thinned out as we rose through the hills and came down into the desert on the other side.

“Before we head back to work,” Bernie said, “kind of just for fun, let’s see if the count really did get on a plane.”

Did that sound like fun to me? Not really, and besides, work was fun—I had the best job going—but Bernie deserved some fun, too. Once, on a night when Suzie had stayed for a sleepover, I’d woken up and heard her through the door, saying to Bernie, “All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Did that have anything to do with anything? Hard to tell. All I knew was that no boy named Jack ever appeared, and I missed Suzie.

“Where the hell is she?” Bernie said at that exact same moment. We were partners, me and Bernie. “How do you hide a yellow Beetle?” Good question. For the rest of the ride I kept my eyes on the traffic, saw all kind of cars, trucks, buses, motorcycles, RVs, and even a whole house on a trailer—would it be great to live like that or what?—but no yellow Beetles.

We drove through the gate at Rio Loco Ranch—I remembered that overhead sign, and something about a perp named Hickok—and went past the corral, empty today, no white horse prancing around, but I could smell him, not far away, so passing the barn I let out a quick, loud bark, just to see if anything happened, and what was that? One of those weird whinnies that horses make? Yes, and scared out of his freakin’ mind, no doubt about it. A good feeling came over me, like we were making progress on the case.

The road swung around the barn, led to a huge house with the kind of tile roof I like, lots of trees and gardens, all very nice.

“Call this a ranch house?” Bernie said as we hopped out. I had another quick scan of the house, found nothing not to like.

Bernie knocked on the door, a real big one. I always enjoyed this moment—on the trail of some perp, waiting for a door to open. My tail was up high, stiff; all set for anything. Once, at a moment just like this in Sunshine City, a whole hive of— The door opened and there stood a big dude with a ponytail, taller than Bernie and just as broad. I remembered him from before, cleaning a rifle in the barn. He looked at Bernie, then at me, back to Bernie: I loved when they did that!

“Hi, Aldo,” Bernie said, “we’re looking for the count.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

“It’s about the case—he’ll want to see us.”

Aldo’s forehead wrinkled up and his eyebrows got closer together, always a sign of something, what, I wasn’t sure of, but something good for us. “He’s not here.”

“Where is he?”

“I’m not, uh, authorized.”

“Requires an object,” Bernie said.

“Huh?” said Aldo, which was my thought, too.

“Not authorized to do what?” Bernie said.

“Tell you his whereabouts. But it wouldn’t matter anyway because you couldn’t reach him.”

“He’s in jail?” Bernie said.

“Jail? Why do you say that?”

“No reason,” Bernie said. When he’s really enjoying himself, Bernie sometimes gets this crinkly look around his eyes; he had it now. “Central State or the Federal Pen down south?”

“For God’s sake,” said Aldo. “The count’s not in prison—he’s on a plane.”

“Where to?”

“New Yo—I’m not authorized.”

“Understood,” Bernie said. “He’s on a plane to parts unknown.” He sniffed the air and said, “Do I smell coffee?” I almost fell over. For one thing, I’d never seen Bernie sniff the air. But mostly: I myself didn’t smell coffee, not the faintest whiff.

“Coffee?” said Aldo. “There’s none made.”

Whew.

“Then how about brewing up a quick pot?” Bernie said. “Nice to drink coffee while we talk.”

“We’re talking?”

“Why not? Your English isn’t so bad.”

“Huh?” said Aldo.

“For a foreigner, I mean,” Bernie said.

“Foreigner?” said Aldo. “I’m from New Jersey, born and raised.”

“Passaic?”

“Yeah, Passaic. How’d you know?”

“That’s why we have to talk,” Bernie said.

“’Cause I’m from Passaic?”

“And other reasons.”

“What other reasons?” Aldo said.

By that time, Bernie and I were already in the house.

“Sherman Ganz let us in on a little secret,” Bernie said. We were in the kitchen, a huge room with two tiny silver bowls in one corner, Bernie sitting at the counter, drinking coffee, Aldo standing. I went over and sniffed the bowls—both empty—caught a faint peppery whiff: Princess.

“Oh?” said Aldo.

“You were his source on the Babycakes kneecapping incident,” Bernie said.

Aldo sat down. I stayed on my feet, eyes on his pant leg. “Why would he do that?”

“Is it true?” Bernie said.

Aldo’s face lost some of its color. A big guy, Aldo, bigger than Bernie, but not as strong, not nearly. A force came from Bernie when you were near him; I didn’t feel that from Aldo.

“Are you going to tell the count?” Aldo said.

“For what reason?”

“You’re working for him.”

“I don’t think Ganz has anything to do with this,” Bernie said. “So your involvement isn’t relevant. But I wouldn’t mind hearing why you did it. Simply love of fair play?”

“Not really,” Aldo said. “Babycakes doesn’t play fair either.”

When he gets real interested in something, Bernie’s eyes light right up—you can see it from across the room, which was where I happened to be, headed for the narrow space behind the stove, often a good place for finding scraps.

“You know they’ve gone head-to-head a bunch of times,” Aldo said.

“Princess and Babycakes?” said Bernie.

“And Babycakes always won, except at Balmoral.”

“What’s the unfair part?”

“Babycakes is good, no question about it, but Princess is great, one of the greatest competitors I’ve ever seen.”

“You know something about the show world?”

Aldo gazed into his coffee cup. “I used to.” Behind the stove: nothing, not even a spiderweb or a dust ball.

“And the unfair part?” Bernie said.

“This move she taught Babycakes. It’s got nothing to do with any of what’s in the book—you know, the criteria—but it gets them every time.”

“The judges?”

“Exactly. Just before they parade the dogs around, Babycakes has this move where she raises up one paw”— Aldo held up his hand. —“like she can’t wait to get going but is too well trained to jump the gun.”

“Sounds pretty cute,” said Bernie.

Aldo smacked the counter, so hard his coffee cup fell and smashed on the floor. A big surprise to me, and to Bernie, too: I could tell by the way his eyebrows went up. “But it’s worth zero points—I just told you,” Aldo said. “She taught Babycakes to cheat.”

“She?”

“Nance, of course. She worked for Ganz. Didn’t you know that?”

“I never got the full story.”

“The story is the count got tired of losing and hired her to come teach Princess some even better trick,” Aldo said. “But guess what.”

“Princess refused?”

“Goddamn right. She’s way too proud.”

“You like her.”

“Princess? She’s great—the best dog I ever worked with, by far.”

“You worked with Princess?”

“They canned me when Nance came over. I was her trainer from the beginning.”

“I thought you were the secretary.”

“That’s what they call me now. They’re just keeping me on the payroll till I find something else—Adelina’s doing, of course.

If the count had his way, I’d be out in the street.”

“Did you know Adelina in Passaic?”

“Sure. Her dad had show dogs going way back, and my mom was the trainer.”

“And she taught you?”

Aldo nodded. “When Adelina and the count got into the show world, she offered me the job.”

Bernie reached for a roll of paper towel, tore some off, and cleaned up the coffee spill and all the broken pieces. Aldo watched him the whole time, but Bernie never looked at him until it was all cleaned up. Then he said: “The kneecapping—it happened the way you said?”

“Yes.”

“No chance it was an accident?”

“No.”

“And you told Ganz because you wanted to get Nance fired?”

“Anything wrong with that?”

“It’s a little indirect,” Bernie said. “In my experience indirect methods tend to go wrong.”

Aldo snorted. Always interesting when humans do that. I can snort, too, but it happens by itself and means nothing. Human snorts mean something, but I don’t know what. “You’re right about that. The count bought the accident story and threatened to sue Ganz.”