“A what?” Rodney was saying. “Where did they find it?” He listened. “How large is it?” Listened again. “Where did it come from?” Listened. “Okay. We’ll check. Thanks.” He hung up, looked at Chee.
“They found a fish trap,” he said. “Thing’s made out of split bamboo by somebody-or-other. They said it had just sort of been pushed up into a passage between two stacks of containers.”
“How big?” Leaphorn asked.
Rodney was dialing the telephone again. He glanced up at Leaphorn and said: “Big as a body.”
Chapter Eighteen
« ^ »
First, Leroy Fleck called his brother. It was something he rarely did. Delmar Fleck had made it very clear that he couldn’t afford to have contacts with a convict—particularly one known to be his relative. Delmar’s wife answered the telephone. She didn’t recognize his voice and Leroy didn’t identify himself to her because if he did, he was pretty sure she would hang up on him.
“Yeah,” Delmar said, and Leroy got right to the point.
“It’s me. Leroy. And I got to have some help with Mama. They’re kicking her out of the home here in the District and the one I found to move her into wants more advance money down than I can handle.”
“I told you not to call me,” Delmar said.
“I just got to have some help,” Leroy said. “I was supposed to get a payment today, but something held it up. Ten thousand dollars. When I get it next week, I’ll pay you right back.“
“We been over this before,” Delmar said. “I don’t make hardly anything at the car lot, and Faye Lynn just gets tips at the beauty shop.”
“If you could just send me two thousand dollars I could come up with the rest. Then next week I’ll send it back to you. Western Union.” Next week would take care of itself. He would think of something by then. Elkins would have another job for him. Elkins always had jobs for him. And until Elkins came through with something bigger, he’d just have to go on the prowl for a few days.
“No blood in this turnip,” Delmar said. “It’s already squeezed. I couldn’t raise two thousand dollars if my life depended on it. We got two car payments, and rent, and the credit card, and medical insurance and—”
“Delmar. Delmar. I just got to have some help. Can you borrow something? Just for a week or so?”
“We been all over this. The government takes care of people like Mama. Let the government do it.”
“I used to think that, too,” Leroy said. “But they don’t actually do it. There’s no program for people like Mama.” Silence on the other end. “And, Delmar, you need to find a way to come and visit with her. It’s been years and she’s asking about you all the time. She told me she thought the Arabs had you a hostage somewhere. She thinks that to keep her feelings from being hurt. Her mind’s not what it used to be. Sometimes she don’t even recognize me.“
There was still only silence. Then he heard Delmar’s voice, sounding a long ways off, talking to someone. Then he heard a laugh.
“Delmar!” he shouted. “Delmar!”
“Sorry,” Delmar said. “We got company. But that’s my advice. Just call social services. I’d help you if I could, but I’m pressed myself. Got to cut it off now.”
And he cut it off, leaving Fleck standing at the telephone booth. He looked at the telephone, fighting down first the despair and then the anger, trying to think of who else he could call. But there wasn’t anyone.
Fleck kept his reserve money in a child’s plastic purse tucked under the spare tire in the trunk of his old Chevy—a secure enough place in a society where thieves were not attracted to dented 1976 sedans. He fished it out now, and headed across town toward the nursing home, counting it while he waited for red lights to turn green.
He counted three hundreds, twenty-two fifties, eleven twenties, and forty-one tens. With what he had in his billfold it added up to $2,033. He’d see what he could do with that with the Fat Man at the rest home. He didn’t like going back there like this. It sure as hell wasn’t the way he had it planned, or would plan anything for that matter. He normally would have been smart enough not to make an enemy of a man when you were going to have to ask him a favor. But maybe a combination of paying him and scaring him would work for a little while. Until he could pull something off. He could make a hit out at National Airport. In the men’s room. The blade and then off with the billfold. People going on planes always carried money. It would be risky. But he could see no choice. He’d try that, and then work on the tourists around the Capitol Building. That was risky, too. In fact, both places scared him. But he had made up his mind. He would fix something up with the Fat Man to buy a little time and then start collecting enough to get Mama someplace safe and decent.
The Fat Man wasn’t in.
“He went out to get something. Down to the Seven-Eleven, I think he said,” the receptionist told him. “Why don’t you just come on back later in the day? Or maybe you better call first.” She was looking at the little sack Fleck was carrying, looking suspicious, as if it was some sort of dope. Actually it was red licorice. Mama liked the stuff and Fleck always brought her a supply. The receptionist was some kind of Hispanic—probably Puerto Rican, Fleck guessed. And she looked nervous as well as suspicious while she talked to him. That made Fleck nervous. Maybe she would call the police. Maybe she had heard something the last time he was here when he told the Fat Man he would kill him if he didn’t hold on to Mama until he could find her another place. But he hadn’t seen her that day, and he’d kept his voice low when he explained things to the fat bastard. Maybe she was around somewhere listening. Maybe she wasn’t. There was nothing he could do about it. He didn’t have any options left.
“I’ll just go on back there to the parlor and visit with Mama until he gets back,” Fleck said.
“Oh, she’s not there anymore,” the receptionist said. “She fights with the other ladies all the time. And she hurt poor old Mrs. Endicott again. Twisted her arm.”
Fleck didn’t want to hear any more of that kind of talk. He hurried down the hallway to Mama’s room.
Mama was sitting in her wheelchair looking at the little TV Fleck had bought for her, watching some soap opera which Fleck thought might be “The Young and the Restless.” They had her tied in the chair, as they did all the old people, and it touched Fleck to see her that way. She was so helpless now. Mama had never been helpless until she’d had those strokes. Mama had always been in charge before then. It made Fleck unhappy when he came to see her. It filled him with a kind of dreary sorrow and made him wish he could get far enough ahead so that he could afford a place somewhere and take care of her himself. And he always started trying to think again how he could do it. But there was simply no way. The way Mama was, he would have to be with her all the time. He couldn’t just go off and leave her tied in that chair. And that wouldn’t leave him with any way to make a living for them.
Mama glanced at him when he came through the door. Then she looked back at her television program. She didn’t say anything.
“Hello,” Fleck said. “How are you feeling today?”
Mama didn’t look up.
“I brought you some licorice, Mama,” Fleck said. He held out the sack.
“Put it down on the bed there,” Mama said. Sometimes Mama spoke normally, but sometimes it took her a while to form the words—a matter of pitting indomitable will against a recalcitrant, stroke-damaged nervous system. Fleck waited, remembering. He remembered the way Mama used to talk. He remembered the way Mama used to be. Then she would have made short work of the Fat Man.
“You doing all right today, Mama?” he asked. “Anything I can do for you?”
Mama still didn’t look at him. She stared at the set, where a woman was shouting at a well-dressed man in poorly feigned anger. “I was,” Mama said, finally. “People keep coming in and bothering me.”