Meeting Evil: A Novel Page 4

  The young woman was not so easily evaded. She successfully drew Richie away from the door of the cop car and said, quietly but including John, at whose elbow they stood, “Thanks, but what’s the deal here?”

  Richie carefully eyed the officer and then said, smirking, “I expected more gratitude.”

  “Sure,” she said. “But right now I can’t figure it out. We never saw each other personally before, am I right?”

  He murmured, “Who says chivalry is dead?”

  The cop hung up. He spoke out his window. “Okay: you check out.”

  Richie seized John’s wrist. “And this gentleman agrees to work this thing out with our insurance companies.”

  The policeman stared at John. “You’re the owner of the other vehicle?”

  It was a mistake not to end his involvement right here, but John could not bring himself to lie outright. Therefore he said nothing at all in answer to the question, hoping the young cop would repeat it and insist on a response. Instead, Richie quickly broke in.

  “The Triple-A wrecker is on its way. That’s where I was, right after it happened: on the phone.”

  The cop called the woman to his window and returned her papers. Then he bent his capped head to write on a pad held against the steering wheel. Subsequently he presented Richie with a summons, saying, “I’m doing it by the book: reckless driving. You’ll have to explain it to the judge. That’s not my job. My job is to protect the safety of the public.”

  “Sure,” Richie said, accepting the ticket without looking at it. “I understand. You’ve been very nice, Officer.”

  “Now just pull your vehicle over to the curb there while you wait for the wrecker, if you can,” said the policeman. “Does it run, or do you need a push?”

  “No problem here,” Richie said.

  The cop looked across toward the car that had been in front of the doughnut shop—that which he thought belonged to John!—and said to its supposed owner, “I see you already moved yours. Where is it, around the corner?” But he did not wait for an answer, putting the cruiser into a slow roll as he spoke. “Okay, now try to keep out of harm’s way for a while.”

  Whether the last was said ironically John could not tell as he turned and saw that, as he had wanted to predict, person or persons unknown had driven Richie’s car away. It might be a routine matter nowadays for the Samaritan to be punished, but it did not usually happen so quickly after the commission of the good deed. For helping the red-haired woman Richie had received an even more negative reward than John had got for coming to his aid.

  John ran to the compact. Richie had just climbed in behind the wheel.

  “Somebody stole your car!”

  Richie smiled and said, “Relax.”

  “He can’t have gotten far—”

  The redhead was in the passenger’s seat. She stared at the back of Richie’s head in an apparent mixture of emotions, of which apprehension would seem to be one. Now she asked, “Does it run? If it does, I can take it from here.”

  Richie ignored her. To John he said, “Then somebody did me a favor. You saw the trouble I had with that piece of crap. Now I can claim the insurance.” He winked. “Come on, climb in.”

  “Yeah,” said the young woman, straining to be seen. “Come on along. Please?”

  “I can’t,” John told them. “I have to get home. I don’t have any business being here in the first place.” It seemed like hours since he had answered the knock on the door. While at home on his day off, he never wore a watch, so he now did not know the precise time, but he had been away long enough for Joanie to wonder what had become of him, perhaps even to worry.

  “See,” said Richie, jerking his head in reference to the woman, “everybody wants you.”

  It occurred to John that the redhead might have made Richie the same proffer she had presented to himself. In truth, it would only be fair: he had certainly saved her bacon with the cop. But perhaps she now had second thoughts. Richie irritated him, but being the more physically powerful, John hardly felt threatened. A woman, however, might have another point of view.

  “Do you live near here?” he asked her. “Or are you going someplace nearby? If it’s close, I’ll ride along. But then I definitely am going home.”

  Instead of answering him, the woman anxiously addressed the back of Richie’s head. “Listen, give me that summons. I’m not going to let you pay for what I did.”

  Richie said to John, “You’ve got to let me give you that lift home. Your leg is getting worse.”

  He was quite right, and John was amazed, even flattered, that the man could notice such a matter in the midst of what had happened—when even John himself had been distracted from it. Nevertheless, he intended to part company without further compromises.

  “On second thought,” he said, “I think I’ll just get a cab.” But so as not to be too stark, he asked, with a smirk of incredulity, “Are you really just going to let your car be stolen like that?”

  Richie made a speculative moue. “It’s already been done. I wouldn’t have any idea where to look by now.”

  Behind him the woman was gesturing forcefully at John, but John did not know what she wanted except perhaps to inveigle him into an uncomfortable situation. His conscience was clear: she had not bothered to answer his question.

  To Richie he said, “I meant, at least report it to the police?”

  “The police?” Richie asked derisively. “They are probably the ones who stole it! That little skunk talking to me, it was probably his partner who sneaked over there and drove it away.” He slapped the steering wheel with his elongated fingers, which gave the impression of having more knuckles than most. “John, you and I both know it’s the police who commit most of the crime these days.”

  There was no reason to respond in any way to such a ridiculous statement. “Okay,” John said, and without thinking added one of the meaningless departure-clichés he had used all his life. “Take care.” He turned.

  “John!” the woman cried. “Can I talk to you, please?” She was out of the car, on the far side.

  “Hey!” Richie’s tone was threatening. “Get back in here.”

  John did not like this. He told Richie, “If she wants to talk to me, she can. Also, it’s her car.”

  Richie lifted his hands from the wheel in a submissive gesture. “Okay, okay. What a touchy guy you are.”

  The woman met him halfway, at the back bumper. She spoke in a tone designed to be too low for Richie to overhear, but in a moment he had rendered that measure needless by putting the radio on at high volume and also closing his window, providing them with so much more privacy than was needed that it seemed derisory.

  “I want you to come along,” the woman said. “I don’t trust this guy. I know he helped me out just now, unasked, but there’s something wrong with him. Believe me.” Her eyes now looked sore within the heavy liner and blue-green shadow.

  “Just throw him out of your car,” John said. “I’ll back you up on that, if you want. But I’m not going anywhere else.”

  “He doesn’t care if his car was stolen.” The woman checked on Richie through the back window: he was tossing his skinny head about to the music. “You can figure that out: he stole it first himself.”

  John sighed. Hearing such an alarmist view, he was inclined to think the man even more harmless than he had earlier believed. John was by nature skeptical of exaggeration; he had always been that way. Things were rarely as bad or as good as assessed by the overexcitable.

  “Look,” he said, “do you want me to throw him out?”

  The car was still angled into and blocking one lane of the street, and the traffic had to swing around it. Some drivers sounded their horns in annoyance. Now Richie suddenly gunned the engine and accelerated away.

  “Hey,” the woman shouted, “he’s stealing my car!” She ran in pursuit, red hair flying.

  John actually felt relief. She could notify the police, and he would be well out of it. She undoub
tedly had insurance against theft.

  But as it happened, Richie had belatedly done only what the cop had instructed him to do: pull into the nearest space at the curb, twenty yards up the street.

  Before either of them could involve him again, John limped to the office of the taxi service. Within, an enormously fat woman sat at a desk filled with gadgetry: PC, fax machine, telephone console with a selection of buttons, and a CB radio, all of which hardware looked to be well maintained. But the rest of the place was squalid: stained walls, filthy floor with conspicuously sticky patches, wastebasket overflowing with discarded fast-food containers and ex-soda cups.

  “Where to?” the fat woman asked, or rather grunted, disagreeably. John gave the address, and she squinted at him through little eyes that glinted from deep within her cheeks. “Let’s see your money.”

  He wondered how she suspected he carried none, and then remembered he had caught a glimpse of his own reflection in the plate-glass windows of the doughnut shop and for a moment thought it was someone else, unshaven and dressed in shabby clothes. A far cry from the workaday John Felton, in green blazer with the yellow breast-patch logo of the national real-estate association to which his employers belonged, and gray-and-white striped tie.

  He quickly explained all that might justifiably puzzle the taxi woman, and added, “I live at the address I gave: I can just run inside and get the fare.”

  The woman snorted porcinely. “Take a hike.” The phone rang, and she seized the handpiece in the pudgy fist at the end of a pneumatic forearm. “Twelve-oh-eight Fillmore. You got it.… Eight-ten minutes.” She pressed something on the radio and spoke into the little standing microphone. A crackling response was heard from the appropriate driver. When the exchange was completed, she glanced up malevolently at John. “I thought I told you to get outa here.”

  “If you could just call my wife,” John pleaded. “It’s a good neighborhood, right up the hill. It’s right next to DeForest.” By which designation, taken from the name of a park, one of the most affluent sections of town was popularly known (nouveau-riche types used it as part of their addresses, though without official post-office authority).

  The fat woman won the stare. “The only call I’ll make is to the cops. Unless”—she reached under the desk, making the grunting noises elicited by the effort, and brought to view an aluminum baseball bat—“you’d rather take a damned good beating from me.”

  There was nothing John could do at the moment, but he planned to drop in when he was back in his blazer and embarrass her for shaming a fellow local businessperson. After all, he was in a position to throw some trade her way. New homeowners often asked for a list of reliable electricians, plumbers, lawn-maintenance services, and there were times when anybody might need a cab—e.g., when leaving a lone family car for a change of oil.

  On emerging from the taxi office he was in the rare state of mind in which he could see with relief that Richie was still at hand—or at any rate, the little compact car was yet at the curb where it had been parked earlier. He limped up to the passenger’s side and saw the by now familiar red hair. He bent and said wryly, “Hi. I’m back.”

  Her head turned quickly, birdlike, to the open window. Nevertheless, her nonphysical responses seemed to have lost their previous edge. For an instant it did not look as though she recognized him.

  He chuckled mirthlessly. “I got thrown out of the cab office, believe it or not. I don’t have any money with me.” He bent more extremely, to look beyond her. Nobody was behind the steering wheel. “I guess I can use that ride after all. Where’d Richie go?”

  “He’s getting breakfast.” She nodded toward the doughnut shop across the street.

  That had been Richie’s mission before the accident. John asked, “Do you mind if I get in?” While saying nothing, she made a movement of the head that was hard to interpret, but John took it as permission. It seemed most sensible not to disturb her but rather to enter by way of the driver’s door, lowering the seat-back and climbing into the constricted rear compartment, where there was space for his legs only if he angled them, for lanky Richie had moved the front seat back as far as possible.

  Suddenly the red-haired woman came to life, swiveling her head. “I thought you were going to drive! Let’s get out of here while the getting’s good.”

  In all decency, John pointed out, “The guy’s own car was stolen, for God’s sake. I’m not going to strand him here while he’s buying doughnuts. I wouldn’t worry so much about him if I were you. He might be eccentric, but he’s harmless. I’ve known plenty of people like that.” Because his motives in saying such were of the highest virtue, he was not consciously aware that this was not at all true.

  “He stole that car. I’m begging you to drive. I’m not in any condition myself. I was stupid: I took something.”

  Obviously some sort of tranquilizer. Joanie occasionally took a pill when under certain strains, and he never failed to warn her against driving at such times.

  He leaned forward. “All right. When Richie gets back, I’ll do the driving, if that’s what you want.”

  “That will be too late.” She returned to her earlier state of torpor.

  John went ahead and climbed out and into the front seat, sliding it forward somewhat to accommodate his legs, which were shorter than Richie’s. At five-ten he was certainly no midget, but he really did regret not having reached six feet, for most of his forebears had been taller, though he was among the thicker-set. He had been husky enough to play fullback on his high-school team, but at 185 he was too small for the college squad, not to mention that his speed was not sufficient to compensate. Today he was in the neighborhood of 210, despite trying to watch what he ate. But it was rare that he exercised.

  When he looked at the ignition, he saw that the keys were missing: he could not have stranded Richie if he had wanted to.

  A moment later Richie was back, paper bag in hand and a smile on his face. He professed delight at John’s return.

  Not wishing to leave the impression that he had come back for any reason but necessity, John explained about the woman in the taxi office.

  Richie scowled. “Scum. They’re everywhere these days.” He handed the bag to John. “Help yourself. I got extra doughnuts and coffee, just in case. I’ll be right back.” He walked rapidly away.

  “Hey,” John shouted, but Richie vanished around the back of the car. John could not see where he went from there. “Goddamn him,” John said to the woman. “He’s been doing that to me all morning, and as usual I’m trapped.… Look, I hate to ask, but I assure you I’m good for the money. Could you possibly lend me the taxi fare to get home? It couldn’t be more than five bucks. I live just up the hill. I swear to you I’m a respectable person. I sell real estate, have a wife and two little kids, one just a baby. I look like this because it’s my day off and I didn’t expect to be out of the house.” He handed the bag to her.

  In a hollow voice she said, “I don’t have any money. He took it all.”

  “Richie? Are you saying Richie took your money away from you? He just took it?”

  She acquired more energy. “He asked me for money. He didn’t have any.”

  “Well, that’s different, isn’t it?” John said reproachfully. “I’m asking for a loan right now. If you had any to give me, and you gave it, would you say I stole it?”

  She looked at him. There was no life in her eyes. “I told you I’m afraid of that guy. He’s dangerous. I didn’t have the nerve not to give him everything I had.”

  John began privately to fume. Richie was taking forever, leaving him with this woman, who seemed quite as nutty a person as Richie himself. After all, she had begun their acquaintance by offering to have sex with him, a perfect stranger. He still did not know her name.

  “Look,” he said, “I’m John Felton.”

  Her response was mumbled.

  “Sharon?” he asked. “Is that your name?… Okay, Sharon, I’ll get your money back from him—less, o
f course, what he paid for the doughnuts—and everything will be all right again, you’ll see. Then I’ll drive you home. Maybe at that point you’ll lend me the cab fare. Meanwhile, maybe you have a quarter left, somewhere way down in your purse? I know my wife sometimes finds change down there.” He had spotted a public telephone set into the outside corner of a savings-and-loan building a few doors down. Unfortunately the S&L was not one of those which he recommended to home-buyers when they asked for places to go for mortgages. The ladies who owned Tesmir Realty had several other preferred institutions. Else he could have gone inside and borrowed a bill or two from one of the loan officers who would have known him.

  But before Sharon could react, Richie had returned, coming to the driver’s window and giving John the keys, his manner that of an obedient boy surrendering the family car to his father. Before he reached the passenger’s door, Sharon desperately scrambled out and jumped into the rear. She was short, so presumably would be more suited to the little backseat than Richie, but still it did not seem altogether right to John for her to give way in her own car to a stranger, though perhaps it was otherwise if Richie could be called a guest.

  But he himself was under no such restraints, and when Richie was in place beside him, John turned and said, “Let’s have Sharon’s money.”

  “Let me get settled first,” Richie gently complained. With some difficulty, given his tight jeans, he dug into the left-hand pocket and extracted a sheaf of paper money and then some coins. He offered the handful to John, who gestured toward Sharon.

  “Better count it,” Richie said, pushing it between the seat-backs. “I don’t trust anybody these days.”

  “It’s okay,” she said quickly.

  It seemed probable enough to John that Richie had not extorted money from her but instead had taken only enough to pay for the food, which furthermore was intended to serve as refreshment not exclusively for himself but for the whole group. In fact, he now asked Sharon, who was still clutching the bag, to help herself to the contents and pass the remainder up front.