“Who the hell are you?” Stone grumbled. “And where’s that drink?”
“Oh, all right, give him what he wants,” she said, sounding exasperated. “Get him into bed and keep him there until morning, and call me if he’s still disoriented when he wakes up.” She handed Dino a card. “Good night, Mr. Barrington,” she said. “I hope you feel better tomorrow.”
Tommy put a glass of bourbon and two aspirin into Stone’s hand.
“There you go.”
Stone washed down the aspirin with the bourbon and took a deep breath. “That’s better,” he said.
“Can you stand up?” Tommy asked.
“Sure I can.” He stood up and held on to Tommy’s shoulder for a moment. “I’m hungry. We hadn’t ordered dinner, had we?”
“No, we hadn’t, but the doctor said you should be in bed.”
“What doctor?”
“The woman who just washed her hands of you and left,” Dino said. “Come on, Tommy, let’s get him inside; he’s not going to cooperate.”
The three men went back into the restaurant and sat down at their table.
Stone was still rubbing his neck.
“You want some ice on that?” Tommy asked.
“I don’t want to make a spectacle of myself,” Stone said. “People are staring at me as it is.” He took another slug of the bourbon, and it began reaching the places it should, including the back of his neck.
“Now, will you guys tell me what the hell happened?”
“I directed you to a guy at the bar,” Tommy said. “You showed me his picture. Evan Keating?”
“I don’t remember that,” Stone said.
“You walked over to him and apparently introduced yourself, gave him your card, then the two of you walked outside.”
“I don’t remember that, either,” Stone said, sipping more bourbon.
“Tommy and I were talking for a couple of minutes, not paying attention to you, then Janet came over and said you were lying on the sidewalk outside, and that’s where we found you.”
“This doesn’t make any sense,” Stone said. “Are you saying that Evan Keating knocked me unconscious, and that I didn’t see it coming?”
“Seems like you caught one on the back of the neck,” Tommy said. “Dino, did you see anybody follow them out?”
“I wasn’t looking that way,” Dino replied.
“Neither was I,” Tommy said.
“And I don’t remember any of it,” Stone said. A waiter brought menus, and they ordered, and someone brought a plate of hummus and some bread.
“I’m hungry,” Stone said.
“That’s probably a good sign,” Tommy replied. “If you were badly hurt, you wouldn’t be thinking about food and booze.”
“He hardly ever thinks about anything else,” Dino said, “except women.”
“Speaking of women,” Stone said, “who was that doctor? She looked pretty good.”
Dino handed Stone her card. “I think he’s going to be okay,” he said to Tommy.
6
STONE WOKE UP the following morning with his headache nearly gone. He took a couple of aspirin, ordered breakfast and found Dino on the front porch waiting for him.
“How you feeling?” Dino asked.
“A lot better. I still have a little headache, but I took some aspirin.”
“You remember anything else that happened last night?”
Stone thought about that. “Yeah, I think I talked to Evan Keating at the bar, but just for a minute.”
“Do you know how you got outside?”
Stone thought some more. “He suggested we talk outside, I think.”
“You remember anybody following you outside?”
“No, Keating was ahead of me.”
“Was he with anybody?”
“There was a girl, I think, but I thought he left her at the bar.”
“Was she beefy, muscular?”
“No, she was slim and attractive.”
“Then she either packs a hell of a punch or she hit you with something solid.”
“I don’t remember her going outside.”
“She could have been behind you.”
“I guess.”
“What did you say to Keating at the bar?”
Stone replayed the scene in his head again. “Not much. I told him I had some business with him and suggested we get together in the morning to discuss it. I think I told him . . . that he would like what I have to say, or something like that.”
“Maybe he didn’t get that message and thought you were some sort of threat,” Dino said.
“Didn’t Tommy say that he busted the guy on some sort of drug thing?”
“Yeah, but it didn’t hold up, and he was released.”
“Well, maybe the cops got an address for Keating.”
“I’ll call Tommy,” Dino said. He produced his cell phone, spoke briefly to Tommy Sculley and hung up. “Hotel La Concha,” Dino said. “I think that’s Spanish for ‘conch.’ It’s on Duval Street.”
Stone went and got the map the rental car agency had given him.
“Yeah, here it is,” he said, pointing. “Duval is kind of the main drag, and the hotel is marked. It’s only a few blocks from here.”
“Then let’s go see him after breakfast,” Dino said.
“Yes,” Stone said, “and carefully.”
Breakfast arrived and they ate, then showered and dressed.
“Let’s go see Mr. Keating,” Stone said.
“I think I’d better watch your back this time,” Dino replied.
“Good idea.”
They drove over to Duval and down to the Hotel La Concha, which was a large stucco building. They found a parking place and fed a lot of quarters into a meter, then went inside to the front desk. Stone approached the clerk on duty.
“May I help you?”
“Yes, I’d like to speak to a Mr. Evan Keating, who, I believe, is a guest here.”
“You just missed him,” the clerk said. “He left maybe fi ve minutes ago.”
“Do you know what time he’ll be back?”
“He won’t. He checked out and didn’t leave a forwarding address.”
“Did he say anything that might give you a clue where he was going?”
The man shook his head. “No. In fact, neither he nor his girlfriend said a word, except to ask for the bill.”
“He didn’t mention, for instance, the airport?”
“No.”
“Do you know his girlfriend’s name?”
“What’s this about?” the clerk asked.
Stone handed him a card. “I’m an attorney from New York. I have some business with Mr. Keating.”
“You’re suing him?”
“Nothing like that. I just have some papers for him to sign.” Stone showed him the envelope in his coat pocket. The clerk went to his computer terminal and typed a few strokes.
“The woman’s name is Gigi Jones.”
“Any home address for either of them?”
The clerk chuckled. “No, it just says ‘Itinerant.’ That’s the fi rst time I’ve ever seen that one.” The clerk smote his forehead. “Oh, I remember: when they arrived, Keating said they were on a boat.”
“Sail? Power?”
“He didn’t say. I got the impression that they were cruising and just wanted to get some shore time. Lots of people on boats do that; they want a real shower and their laundry done.”
“Did Keating get his laundry done?”
The clerk gazed at his terminal again. “Yep. Charge of $189 for laundry and dry cleaning. That’s a fair amount of stuff.”
“Did you have any other conversation with Keating?”
“Not really, just when he checked in and out.”
“Did he get or make a lot of phone calls?”