Jack exited the kitchen and searched the rest of the house.
Conclusion? If Vince Komoko was a pirate, he was definitely out of the Captain Crunch school.
Hanging in the bathroom were towels from motels in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. The shower curtain was from a joint in Tucson. The bath mat was from Dallas. The stampsized slivers of soap had been lifted from Motel 6. Tiny containers of designer shampoo and conditioner circled the tub. Without a doubt, that stuff came from joints that rated four stars in the Triple-A tour books.
Jack opened the cupboard under the sink. The space was stacked solid-miniature Kleenex boxes, rolls of one-ply toilet paper guaranteed to snag on a hairy man’s ass, even a couple of bottles of industrial strength Pine-Sol with PROPERTY OF ROADRUNNER MOTEL/GALLUP, NM scrawled on the side in magic marker.
Jack checked out the bedroom. The bed looked like it had been made by a guy who had spent some serious time in the military-spread folded just so, sheets and blankets tucked in tight. But, then, Freddy had said that Komoko was some kind of war hero, so that fit.
The only thing about the bed that didn’t scream GI was the little mint on the pillow. Red letters on the silver wrapper told Jack that the mint had been stolen from Freddy G’s own Casbah.
The bedspread was from a Best Western in Albuquerque, as were the pillowcases. The TV above the dresser had once been bolted to the wall of The Big Texan Motel in Amarillo. The lamps-a pair of avocado beauties that practically screamed 1973-were refugees from a Sheraton in Wichita Falls.
Jack sat on the bed. It was hard as a rock; had to have been from a motel, too. He glanced at the nightstand and was not a bit surprised to see a little metal box that made him suddenly nostalgic.
MAGIC FINGERS!
ENJOY AN “ELECTRO-MASSAGE”
ON OUR VIBRATING MATTRESS!
LET THE GENIE’S FINGERS TAKE OUT THE KINKS!
25 FOR? HOUR
Jack had a quarter in his pocket.
He dropped it in the slot. Pulled off his boots. Settled back.
When the machine kicked off a half hour later, he had everything figured out.
He put on his boots and walked back to Pablo’s garage.
“I need maps for Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas,” Jack said.
Pablo shook his head. “No, you don’t.”
“Huh?”
Pablo laughed, shooting his thumb over his shoulder at Jack’s Celica. The hood was up and two guys were under it. “You ain’t gonna make Texas in that thing. Not unless you leave it with me for a week.”
“You’re probably right. But it doesn’t hurt to plan ahead.”
Pablo handed over the maps. Jack started for the door.
“Hey, amigo,” Pablo said.
“Yeah?”
“You sure you want to pour all that money into your car? I could probably fix you up with something used that’s pretty nice, give you more bang for your buck.”
“No way. That Celica, it’s going to be a classic. The Ford Mustang, that’s the classic from the sixties. A couple more years, the Toyota Celica’s gonna be the Mustang of the seventies.”
Pablo thought that one over. Finally, he said, “You know what?”
“What?”
“You gotta stop taking punches to the head, amigo.”
Maps in hand. Jack returned to Komoko’s house. He found a stash of emergency sewing kits from the Dallas Westin in a drawer in the bedroom, and he used the needles to pin the road maps to the living room wall.
Then he sorted through all Komoko’s junk-the ashtrays and coffee cups and bath towels and miniature bars of soap and anything else he could find-spearing the cities on the map that the stuff had come from.
When Jack was finished, a couple dozen needles marked Komoko’s trail. It looked as if Vince had traveled the expected route-93 out of Vegas to Interstate 40, then 40 straight across Arizona and New Mexico and a good piece of Texas, finally cutting south toward Dallas on smaller highways. With one exception, Vince Komoko’s pirate booty had been appropriated from unsuspecting businesses along this route.
And that one exception didn’t make any sense, because it was a flyspeck town way to hell and gone in southern Arizona, a place with the unlikely name of Pipeline Beach.
Jack picked up an ashtray that he’d found in the bedroom, thinking maybe he’d read it wrong the first time. But there was no mistaking the words stenciled on the smoky green glass-
Surf’s up at
THE SAGUARO RIPTIDE MOTEL
Pipeline Beach, Arizona
Jack thought it over. Maybe Vince had taken a pleasure trip down south. Maybe. But for some reason, he didn’t think so.
So he thought about Vince Komoko, motel pirate, motor lodge Blackbeard. A guy like that. . Christ, talk about your small potatoes. What was Komoko doing heisting Freddy G? Ripping off two mil from the mob was a hell of a long way from stealing a TV set or a midget-sized coffeemaker or a handful of pillow mints.
You didn’t make that kind of jump unless someone pushed you.
Jack stared at the ashtray.
He wondered if Vince Komoko had any friends in Pipeline Beach.
He wondered if Vince saved his phone bills.
The woman picked up on the third ring. “You got me,” she said.
“Hey, that’s great,” Jack said. “But it’s Vince I need to talk to.”
The woman was a couple hundred miles away, but Jack could feel her jump. “Uh. .” she said. “You. . you must have the wrong number.”
“No I don’t. You know Vince. Vince Komoko? Calls you all the time? You guys get together at the Saguaro Riptide, have some real laughs. Vince told me all about it.”
“Uh. . well. .”
“Sure, you know Vince. I’m his buddy. I’m supposed to meet him down there. Why don’t you give me your address and I’ll drive on down from Vegas. I’ve got something for Vince. Something he forgot-”
“No,” she said. “You’re wrong. I don’t know any Vince. And don’t come near me.”
She hung up.
Jack dialed Freddy G’s private number. Freddy’s niece picked up-at least she said she was Freddy’s niece. Her tone of voice said something else entirely.
A second later, Freddy came on the line. “Jack, how you makin’ out?”
“Good. Look, I’m gonna need to make a drive down to Arizona. Little town called Pipeline Beach.”
“Never heard of it.”
“That makes two of us. But I think our friend Vince has.”
“That’s good enough for me.”
“The thing is, my car’s in the shop. I probably can’t get started until tomorrow.”
“Forget that.” Freddy chuckled. “You get a cab and get your ass out to McCarran. Catch a plane. You need Tucson or Phoenix?”
"Tucson.”
“Okay then. The tickets will be waiting for you. We’ll make reservations for tonight at a motel in Tucson, and tomorrow you can drive down to Pipeline Beach.”
“Sounds good. But I’m kind of tapped out right now, what with the boxing commission holding up my purse and all-”
“Forget about that,” Freddy interrupted. “Soon as I get off the phone with you. I’ll call the Casbah manager and have him fix you up with some corporate plastic.”
“Hey, that’s great news.”
“Glad to oblige. ’Cause right now, you could use some great news.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, the word on the street is that your pal the promoter dropped the assault charges.”
“Hey, that is great news!”
“Wrong-o, Jack.” Freddy sighed. “I’m afraid your tongue-tied pal has called in the Muslims.”
“Christ on a cross,” Jack said.
FOUR
The man in the african hat stood in the desert, waiting, surrounded by towering sandstone monuments the color of blood. The sky, too, was bloody, but the blood in the sky was drying, cottonlike clouds daubing the wound, the hot wind smearing clotting rivulets across a canvas the color of gutted salmon. But the man who waited in the desert realized that these colors-and, in fact, his impression of same-were impermanence personified. Soon other colors would come, triggering other impressions. Perhaps the wound would begin to heal. Perhaps a rusty brown horizon would scab the injured flesh of the heavens. Or perhaps the sunset would fade gently, less violently, to the color of an insignificant bruise-a magnificent, plum-ripened purple.