To Fetch a Thief Page 14

  “No problem,” Bernie said. “We’ll just clear up one little discrepancy and you can ride this baby into the wild blue yonder.”

  “Discrepancy?”

  “On the four roses story. You’re on the record as telling two different versions, one to Sergeant Torres and one to us.”

  “Who’s us?”

  “Chet and I.”

  Ollie gave me a look, his face kind of pinched—like . . . like how could I be part of the team, or something. I made up my mind about him. My teeth got this funny feeling, a sort of wanting to bite.

  “Aw, c’mon, man,” Ollie said, “what difference does it make now? Gonna indict a snake?” He laughed, a haw-haw-haw that went on way too long for me.

  “We killed the snake,” Bernie said. “Chet and I.”

  “Yeah?” said Ollie, giving me another look, not so pinched this time.

  “And that still leaves us with a missing elephant,” Bernie said. “So we’re going to have to straighten out your testimony.”

  Ollie’s eyes went to the key in the ignition. Bernie removed it in one smooth motion that didn’t look particularly quick, but by the time Ollie said, “Hey!” the key was in Bernie’s pocket. That Bernie! I remembered once when he told me you don’t bring a spoon to a fork fight, or something like that.

  “Think, Ollie.”

  “About what?”

  “What you saw the night you came back from Uncle Rio’s.”

  “Didn’t see nothin’, man.”

  “So you lied to us.”

  “Sorry.”

  “The eighteen-wheeler with the four red roses on the side?”

  “Made it all up,” Ollie said, “like out of whole, um, whatever it is.”

  “Cloth.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Why did you lie?”

  “More like a fib. And I already said I was sorry.”

  “You told Sergeant Torres you were afraid of us.”

  “Yeah. Never been comfortable around dogs.” Uh-uh, buddy; I wasn’t getting that, not one whiff. “And you’re kind of threatening yourself, no offense.”

  “Me?” said Bernie.

  “You took my key.”

  “Not nice.”

  “No.”

  “But the thing is, Ollie, you’re an acrobat, and I just can’t buy an acrobat scaring so easily. You’re brave by definition.”

  “Thanks,” Ollie said.

  “So what’s going on?” Bernie said.

  Ollie’s mouth opened and closed.

  “You’re afraid of something,” Bernie said, “but it’s not us. So let’s hear the name.”

  Ollie stared straight ahead. “There’s no name, man. Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Bernie took out the key, stuck it back in the ignition.

  “You’re free to go,” he said.

  “Uh, nice talkin’ to you,” Ollie said.

  “Drive safe.”

  “Always do.”

  Bernie turned to go. “Oh, and one more thing—you know Darren Quigley?”

  “Security guard? We’ve had a few drinks together.”

  “At Uncle Rio’s?”

  “Matter of fact, yeah.” Ollie kicked the starter, vroom vroom. I’ve been on a Harley before, let me tell you. But some other time.

  Back on the road, Bernie said, “Shot in the dark, Chet. Boozers working in close proximity—they tend to find each other.”

  A shot? Hadn’t heard one, not at the cemetery, not since the Chang case, in fact. The Chang case: a nightmare, but the food! Another story for later. I yawned a nice big yawn, the kind that sometimes catches my lip over a tooth, and by the time I got everything straightened out, whatever I’d been worrying about was gone. Why worry anyway? I had Bernie.

  A green car with a gold star on the side was parked in front of our place. A bald guy in a green uniform climbed out as we pulled into the driveway.

  “Bernie Little?” he said, as we left the Porsche, Bernie through the door on his side, me over the one on mine.

  “Yeah,” said Bernie.

  The guy came closer. “What a great-looking dog,” he said.

  “Chet,” said Bernie.

  “Nice name,” the man said. “Okay to give him a treat?”

  What a question! The next thing I knew I had a biscuit in my mouth, not big but very very tasty.

  “Mathers—Game and Fish,” said the man. Mathers: he had a nice name, too. I liked him from the get-go. “You’re the one who killed the snake?” he said.

  “For God’s sake—you came to write me up for that?” Bernie said. “It was self-defense.”

  “No, no, nothing like that,” Mathers said. “I’ve got a map of the area here, southeast section of the Sangre Hills. If you can point me to the spot where this happened, I’ll go out there and take a look.”

  He spread the map on the hood of the Porsche. They huddled over it. Bernie pointed. “Right about there, more or less. What are you hoping to see?”

  “Hard to specify,” said Mathers. “The remains of a crate, maybe, or a cage. Even a canvas sack.”

  “There was nothing like that.”

  “No?” Mathers said. “Nothing at all to indicate the snake wasn’t just out there on its own volition?”

  “On its own volition?” Bernie said. “Must be thousands of diamondbacks wandering the desert on their own volition.”

  “True,” said Mathers. “But your snake was a puff adder.”

  “So?”

  “So puff adders aren’t native to our desert, aren’t native to the Americas, in fact. This particular kind comes from sub-Saharan Africa—Gabon, Congo, places like that.”

  “I don’t get it,” Bernie said.

  “Meaning the only puff adders in this state come in with a permit,” Mathers said. “A permit to keep, not to release into the wild.”

  “I’m surprised you let them in at all.”

  “Completely insane,” Mathers said. “But this is the land of the free.”

  Bernie laughed.

  “We don’t get puff adder applications very often,” Mathers went on. “Three since I’ve been with the department—going on ten years now—all to licensed vendors and all accounted for, as of this morning.”

  “Meaning our snake was illegal?”

  “Looks that way,” Mathers said. “Could be some idiot sneaking it in through an airport and releasing it when he got tired of providing live mice for dinner. That, or it was an escapee from something bigger.”

  “Something bigger?”

  “Illegal animal trafficking’s a multibillion-dollar business. You didn’t know that?”

  “All new to me,” Bernie said.

  “Second only to drug smuggling in terms of illegal international business, but doesn’t get much press,” Mathers said. “And as usual, Mexico makes an ideal staging point.” He folded the map. “Did you know the puff adder’s responsible for more deaths than any other snake? I’m talking about within Africa, of course. Happening over here—that’s unbelievably bad luck.”

  “Just what I was thinking,” Bernie said.

  Were they still talking about snakes? No snakes around: I’d have been the first to know, certainly in this crowd. But there was no question that more biscuits lurked in Mathers’s pocket: the smell was overpowering. I moved a little closer to Mathers, wagging my tail.

  SEVENTEEN

  Uncle Rio’s,” said Bernie, backing into a little parking space in one move, smooth and easy. Driving with Bernie: always a pleasure, unless the tools had to come out. “You’ll like this.”

  I was liking it already. Me and Bernie together—what was not to like?

  Uncle Rio’s was on a dark street not far from the fairgrounds. The only bright lights around were the top of the Ferris wheel, spinning slowly in the night, and the neon signs in Uncle Rio’s window. It was a bar, of course: I can smell them from miles away, miles away being kind of far unless I’ve missed something. What do bars smell like? Stale beer, burn
ed grease, puke. Hey! They go together! A strange thought, not my usual . . . I wondered . . .

  And was still wondering when we went into Uncle Rio’s. It turned out to be one of those dark skinny joints, a long bar on one side, a row of tables on the other, a little dance floor at the end. No dancing happening at the moment, probably a good thing, since dancing sometimes gets me going. There was only one woman in the place, drinking down at the end of the bar. A few big guys sat by the beer taps, big guys with cut-off denim jackets, maybe bikers. The bartender serving them had a tattoo on the side of his neck; a cigarette dangled from his mouth even though I was pretty sure there was no smoking in Valley bars. He looked at us, saw Bernie, and said, “You son of a bitch.”

  The big guys turned and gave us tough-guy stares. The biggest said, “Want us to take care of this dude, Rio?”

  The bartender laughed, one of those booming laughs that came from deep inside. Women don’t have that laugh and neither do most men, but no time for that now. I got ready for trouble, but no trouble happened. The bartender said, “Why’d I want you to do that? Bernie here would mop the floor with you assholes and then the cops would come and make me put out my smoke.” The big guys looked confused. The bartender hurried around the bar and threw his arms around Bernie. They banged each other on the back real hard.

  “Rio.”

  “Bernie.”

  More banging. “Bastard never comes in here,” Rio said. “Too snooty now for a dump like mine?”

  “You know the answer to that,” Bernie said.

  Rio stepped back. “You’re in shape.”

  “Nah.”

  “Want to stay in shape, here’s my advice—never run a bar,” Rio said.

  “Got ya.”

  “Imagine you running a bar.”

  “What’s so odd about that?”

  Rio didn’t answer, just laughed another one of those boomers. He had a big belly and it shook; I always like the sight of that. And maybe because I was watching him, he suddenly noticed me, an interesting thing that happens sometimes with critters of all kinds.

  “Hey,” he said. “Is this Chet?”

  “How do you know about Chet?”

  “Ratko Savic was in here last week.”

  Ratko Savic? Hard to forget old Ratko, with his long drippy nose and his fondness for knife play.

  “What’s he doing out?” Bernie said.

  “Early parole,” said Rio. “Have to ask yourself what the world’s coming to when a menace like Ratko scores early parole. But nothing for you to worry about—he’s got a healthy respect for Chet, better believe it.”

  “Did those skin grafts take?”

  “Actually improved his appearance.” Rio gazed at me for a moment, eye to eye. Some of my guys—General Beauregard, for example—don’t like that one bit, but I don’t mind. “He looks like a big sweetheart to me,” Rio said. “Got some Slim Jims behind the bar—he allowed a Slim Jim? Hey, down, big guy!”

  “Chet!”

  Uh-oh. Was I embarrassing Bernie? Never want that. I sat down, alert, quiet, professional.

  “Knows Slim Jims, that’s for sure,” Rio said. “I bet he understands a lot of things.”

  “His understanding can be selective at times,” Bernie said, “in a convenient sort of way.”

  Lost me there.

  “Sounds like my fourth wife,” Rio said.

  “There’s a fourth?”

  “Was. A stripper like number two, but less intellectual.”

  Soon we were at one of the side tables, Bernie and Rio with glasses of beer, me underneath with a Slim Jim. The Slim Jim had pretty much my whole attention, so I missed a lot of what they were talking about, too bad, because the war was part of it, a desert war, but not our desert, somewhere far away, a war Bernie didn’t talk about.

  “I’ll never fuckin’ forget that,” Rio was saying.

  “It wasn’t thought out,” Bernie said. “Just dumb reaction, that’s all.”

  “Makes it even better.”

  “Nah,” said Bernie. He sipped his beer. “A guy named Jocko Cochrane ever come around? Sizeable, wears a bandanna?”

  “Don’t ring a bell.”

  “How about Darren Quigley? He’s supposed to be a regular.”

  “Wouldn’t call him a regular,” Rio said. “He’s in here from time to time.”

  “We’re looking for him.”

  “What’s he done?”

  “Maybe nothing. He’s more of a witness.”

  “Guys who run a tab I keep their addresses,” Rio said. “Little creep like that I don’t run a tab.”

  “Darren’s actually in the wind right now,” Bernie said. “Does he ever bring friends?”

  “Sure—there’s that drinking acrobat. Least he’s supposed to be an acrobat. But a drinker for sure.”

  “Any others?”

  “Isn’t there a lady friend?” Rio looked up, called down to the woman at the end of the bar. “Hey, Delores, you know Darren Quigley?”

  “Not in any meaningful way.”

  “C’mon over here a sec.”

  “I’m happy where I am,” Delores said. “Deliriously.”

  The bikers all turned toward her. She ignored them, took a tiny sip of her drink, a greenish-colored drink in a tall glass.

  “Maybe we could go join her,” Bernie said in a low voice.

  Rio called down again. “Mind if my friend Bernie here joins you?”

  Delores gave us a long look. “If he brings the dog,” she said.

  We went down to the end of the bar, me and Bernie.

  “I had one like this once,” Delores said, “maybe not quite so handsome. What’s his name?”

  “Chet.”

  She reached out to scratch between my ears. “I suppose they call you Chet the Jet,” she said. Hey. Delores was smart. Plus she turned out to be a real good scratcher, with long fingernails that dug in deep but not too deep, just the way I like.

  “Can I buy you another one of those?” Bernie said, nodding toward her drink.

  “Only if you’ve got an ulterior motive,” Delores said.

  Bernie laughed. “Bernie Little, Little Detective Agency. We—”

  Delores raised her hands. “You won’t take me alive, copper,” she said. Then, in a quieter voice—up until then her voice had reminded me of Bernie’s mom, and in fact she reminded me of Bernie’s mom in other ways, including how the longer you looked at her the older she got—she added, “You’re about ten years too late for that.”

  Losing me completely, but maybe not Bernie who said, “Don’t believe that for a second—you’re the liveliest thing I’ve seen all day.”

  “Aren’t you sweet?” said Delores. “A transparent liar, but sweet.”

  “Bernie, sweet?” said Rio, now back behind the bar, appearing with another green drink for Delores and a beer for Bernie.

  Bernie took out his wallet.

  “Don’t insult me,” Rio said. “Your money’s no good here.”

  “Free drinks at Uncle Rio’s?” Delores said. “I’m hallucinating.” She raised her glass. “To sweetness,” she said. She and Bernie clinked glasses; love that sound.

  “Darren Quigley has a lady friend?” Bernie said.

  “The ulterior motive,” said Delores, “but not the right one. Darren had a lady friend, past tense. The Darrens of the world don’t keep lady friends for long.”

  “Why not?”

  “Have you met him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then what’s the question? As for the ex-lady friend, she’s really just a girl, one of those small-town girls who still keep coming west, in search of I can’t remember what. Her name’s Bonnie Hicks, she works at a nails place in that strip across from the East Central Mall, and she lives in the trailer park behind the strip.”

  “Thanks,” said Bernie.

  “Any time,” said Delores. “What else can I do for you?”

  Trailer parks turn up in our job from time to time. Some are in the
middle of nowhere—like that nudist one where we once had to go on a case I never understood involving a stolen oil rig, but I learned one thing for sure: humans look better with their clothes on. No offense.

  Other trailer parks can turn up right in town. We parked in front of a strip mall, our headlights shining on the darkened store fronts. “Nails by Diva,” Bernie read, as we got out of the car. “What’s that all about?” he said, “women and their nails? Growing them longer, for one thing, and how come men don’t . . .” His voice trailed off.

  We walked around the strip mall into scrubland at the back, came to a gate with two posts but no gate in between. Beyond that stood some trailers, low rounded shadows under the pink night sky, none of them showing any lights, and also a tent. A fire burned in front of the tent, and a dude sat beside it, smoking a joint. Bernie sniffed the air: pot’s an easy scent for just about anyone.

  “Evenin’,” said the dude.

  “Hi,” said Bernie.

  “You a cop?”

  “No.”

  “Look a bit like a cop.”

  “Is that a crime?”

  The dude started laughing, then stopped abruptly. “That’s kind of a puzzler, stop to think about it,” he said. “Like The Matrix.” He took a long drag, noticed me. “Out walkin’ your dog?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I had a dog once. He ran away.”

  “Too bad, at least for you,” Bernie said. “We’re looking for Bonnie Hicks.”

  The dude took a quick glance at one of the trailers, a small silver one up on blocks. He turned back to Bernie and said, “I might know how to find her.”

  “We’re all ears.”

  We were? I looked at his ears, not small for a human, but how well did they hear? For example, was he picking up that sound—pretty faint, it’s true—of a woman crying somewhere in the trailer park? If so, he showed no sign.

  “Like they say,” the dude was telling Bernie, “it’s the information age.”

  “Yeah?” said Bernie. The firelight shone in his eyes, a beautiful sight.

  The dude took another hit—that’s drug lingo—and held his breath. You see that pot-smoking breath-holding combo from time to time in this job, after which things usually go downhill pretty fast.

  A big smoke cloud exploded out of the dude’s mouth. “Put it to you this way,” he said, “simple as I can. Once upon a time it was the age of things, and people paid money for them. A Pontiac Firebird, say—that’s a thing. Now it’s the age of information.”