Caveat Emptor and Other Stories Read online

  I opened the front door as she came onto the porch. “Everything all right?” I demanded.

  “Wafford has offered to buy back the house for what I have in it and more. We agreed that I’d move out tonight and collect my furniture later. I want to thank you for everything you’ve done, Deanna. I’ll write once Cody, Gerald, and I have a new address.”

  “Gerald?”

  “I’ve agreed to take him with us to be my resident babysitter and handyman. He did me a favor and I owe him big. I’ll swing by the home and pick him up on my way out of town.”

  I was afraid to go into it any further. “What about your classes?”

  “I’m not sure I want to be a teacher,” she said with a wry grin. “I may decide to go into real estate. I’ve learned quite a bit over the last few months.”

  “What about Wafford?”

  “He’s inspecting the property to make sure it’s in the same condition as it was when I bought it. He’ll leave before too long.”

  She hugged me, then turned around and went home. Over the next hour, she and Cody loaded the car with suitcases and boxes. Wafford’s Cadillac was in the shadows at the far end of the driveway, but he never emerged with an armload of anything. Not that he was the kind to help anybody.

  Amy finally started nagging me to help her with her homework, so I abandoned my vigil and went into the kitchen. After she’d finished and gone to bed, I went back to the front room. Sarah’s car was gone. Wafford’s car was still there, and a light was on in the back of the house. I couldn’t imagine what he was doing.

  It was none of my business, so I made myself some popcorn and turned on a movie.

  The next morning I noticed Wafford’s car was gone too. I fixed pancakes, then listened to my daughter gripe about her boss before she gulped down a cup of coffee and shooed Amy out the door to drive her to school.

  The ritual was familiar, but not comforting. Once I had the house to myself, I tidied up and started a load of laundry, but the window in the front room was a magnet. Why had Sarah befriended Gerald, of all people? Even odder, why had Wafford agreed to buy back the house? He’d always circled like a vulture, waiting to foreclose on hapless widows and families whose breadwinners had been fired or become disabled.

  I hadn’t received any great insights by three o’clock, when it was time to walk to the bus stop. I was almost there when Mr. Perniski came outside, dressed in his customary cardigan sweater and khaki pants.

  “What’s going on at the end of the road?” he said. “That young woman was acting mighty peculiar last night.”

  “Sarah?”

  “You betcha. She pulled into the driveway over there”—he pointed at our neighborhood drug dealer’s establishment—“and gave that one with the beard what looked like a key. Long about midnight, he went sneaking down the road toward her house. The last thing we need out here is another criminal. My grandson found a hypodermic needle in the ditch last summer. We have—”

  “Sarah and Cody moved out last night,” I said, cutting him off. “Are you sure she gave him a key?”

  “Hell, I ain’t sure about nothing,” Perniski muttered, then wandered away.

  I thought about all this while I waited for the school bus, and I hadn’t made much progress by the time Amy was occupied with a bag of cookies and old sitcoms on television. I finally slipped out and went across the street to what had been Sarah’s house. The doors were locked, so all I could do was peer through windows at unoccupied rooms.

  The police did not arrive for more than two days, and my instinctive response was to tell them nothing. After a moment, though, churchgoing woman that I am, I murmured something about the basement door, its shiny new bolt, and the possibility that Wafford’s Cadillac was in a chop shop in the next county. As for Sarah Benston, I’ve never heard from her. I’m not real worried; as she said, she learned a lot about real estate during her brief stay across the street.

  She can take care of herself.

  A Little More Research

  Bart Bellicose realized time was running out. In the distance, he could hear the whine of sirens, and he knew the police cars were closing in on him like a swarm of killer bees. He stepped back, then threw his two hundred forty pounds of bulk against the flimsy door. It gave way with a shriek of pain, and Bellicose stumbled into the apartment.

  There on the carpet lay the mortal remains of his client. Even in death, the semi-nude body was as undulating as the ocean, as smooth as the inner petals of a rose. He could see that his client was as dead as the proverbial doornail, one of which had ripped his arms in an angry slash of

  “Terry, honey, when are you gonna be finished? I’m getting hungry, and it’s almost too late to make reservations.”

  “I’ve asked you not to interrupt me. The deadline’s tomorrow morning at nine o’clock, for pete’s sake, and my editor’s about to have an apoplectic fit. I can’t concentrate when you come in here every five minutes.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s just that I get all lonesome out there by myself. Maybe it would help if I rubbed your neck …”

  “It would not. I’m on the last chapter and I need to get it done tonight. Please don’t interrupt me any more.”

  “Okay, I’ll be a good little guest and wait in the living room. All by myself.”

  “Thank you so very much. And shut the door, will you?”

  grinning blood. It was obvious to anyone who’d ever eyed a fresh corpse that the

  “Don’t let me disturb you, but how about if I make reservations for later just in case you get done with your story?”

  “I’m not going to get done if you don’t leave me alone. I told you when you insisted on coming over tonight that I absolutely must have peace and quiet in order to concentrate.”

  “I happen to be speaking very quietly, my dear Hot Shot Writer.”

  “You also happen to be standing in the doorway, which means I’m looking at you rather than at the word processor. Go ahead and make reservations any place you want. I really don’t care.”

  “Well, maybe I’ll just do that.”

  It was obvious that … It was obviously murder. Bart could see that as he stared at the Bart frowned at the gaping Bart gasped as he spotted the hilt of the dagger protruding from the contoured chest

  “Honey, telephone.”

  “I’m not home. Take a message and I’ll call back tomorrow.”

  There was something about the dagger that touched a raw nerve. He’d seen it

  “It’s your editor, and he sounds real mad.”

  “Tell him I’m not here, and close the door on your way out.”

  “But I already told him you were home and working real hard on the story. He says he wants to talk to you right this minute.”

  “All right, damn it.”

  before. Sorry, Bart. Back in a minute. Try to remember, huh?

  “Yo, Terry baby, how’s it going?”

  “It was going quite well until you called and interrupted me, Irwin. You do realize every time I’m interrupted I lose my train of thought?”

  “Right, right. I wanted to remind you that we go into production tomorrow, with or without the last chapter. The book’s gonna look pretty funny with a bunch of blank pages at the end. You promised me this manuscript. We paid a fat advance, and then waited patiently while you missed not one but two deadlines. You’re in the catalogue. I’ve held the production people back till the bitter end, but the bottom line is that’s where we are.”

  “And I’m not in my office finishing the book. Au contraire, I’m standing in the kitchen chitchatting with you. Goodbye, Irwin. I’ll be in your office at nine o’clock.”

  “You and Bellicose, I presume.”

  “At this very moment Bellicose is standing over a body, and he’d like to investigate in the immediate future.”

  “So you finally got the plot straightened out?”

  “Yes, I finally got the plot straightened out. Tomorrow at nine, okay? We can celebrate with Danishes.�
��

  “I’ll get a dozen of them. Just make sure you show up for the party.”

  “I’m hanging up now, Irwin. Next time you get lonely, call your ex-wife.”

  He’d seen the dagger somewhere. Great.

  Forget the dagger.

  Bart stared at the bullet hole in the forehead. It was a third eye, as unseeing as the deep blue pools he’d

  “Are you off the telephone?”

  “No, I had the receiver implanted in my head and I’m listening to the time and weather as we speak. What is it?”

  “I was trying to catch you before you started writing again to ask if you think Chinese sounds good. Or Japanese, I suppose, but not squid or tofu or anything creepy like that.”

  “I don’t care. Do you mind? I mean, do you really mind giving me more than three minutes undisturbed?”

  “I was just asking. You’re acting like you’ve forgotten about last night. You didn’t object to my company then.”

  “When I get this story done, maybe I’ll remember. Please?”

  “I’ll sit in the living room and be as quiet as a mouse.”

  Deep blue pools of squid ink. On tofu.

  Deadline. Deadline. Deadlineeeeee.

  Bart recognized from the size of the wound that the bullet was of a low caliber. Could it have involved the swarthy woman with the mustache who’d come to his office yesterday, the one who’d cried and begged him to help her save her missing dauuuuuu

  “What was that, damn it?”

  “Don’t pay any attention, Terry. I’ll clean it up. After all, I don’t have anything else to do.”

  “Clean what up?”

  “Don’t worry about it. It’s no big deal.”

  “How can you say it was no big deal? It sounded like a friggin’ nuclear explosion.”

  “I don’t remember seeing you at Hiroshima. Just go back to work and stop yelling at me like I was some kind of kid or something. I said I’d clean it up.”

  “Was it the plate glass window?”

  “Go back to work.”

  “The television? My new state-of-the-art television that I have three years to pay on?”

  “No and leave me alone so I can clean it up. I thought you had a deadline tomorrow …”

  ghter. Bart stared around the room, which looked as if a nuclear bomb had gone off minutes before. The plate glass window was a spiderweb of cracks, and the television, a particularly expensive model with remote, built-in video cassette recorder, quadraphonic stereo, and one hundred thirty-seven channel capacity, was nothing more than a smoldering ruin of useless wires and busted tubes and would still suck up thirty-five more monthly payments.

  But Bart warned himself not to dwell on the devastation and bent over the body. The flesh was still warm, and a ribbon of blood flowed from one corner of the mouth, which was twisted into a faint smile of surprise. So the victim had known the perp, Bart decided as he reached into his pocket and took out a pack of

  “Did you take my cigarettes?”

  “What?”

  “I said, did you come into my office and take the pack of cigarettes I keep in the bottom left drawer for emergencies?”

  “It was an emergency. I was out.”

  “Well, so am I. Bring that pack back.”

  “I smoked all of them this afternoon while I was watching this really great old movie about this debutante that falls in love with her sister’s—”

  “I’ll read the newspaper if I want a review. Go down to the deli and get me another pack. You know I can’t write when I’m out of cigarettes.”

  “No way. It’s already late and I’m not about to get myself mugged just because you want a pack of cigarettes. It’s your crummy neighborhood, not mine. If you’re so desperate, go get them yourself.”

  Bart realized there was no time for a cigarette, not with the police moving in like a pack of vicious, slobbering wolves. Despite the sense of panic that could be appeased only by a cigarette, by a long deep satisfying lungful of carbon monoxide flavored with nicotine, he reluctantly turned back to the body, keenly aware that the evidence before him could lead to the identity of the murderer.

  The clue was there before his eyes. He could almost see it, almost touch it, almost smell it, that acrid redolence of smoldering

  “I smell smoke. What the hell’s burning?”

  “Nothing, Terry.”

  “Don’t give me that. I smell smoke. I smell cigarette smoke, damn it! I thought you said the pack was empty.”

  “Don’t short out your pacemaker over it. There was one cigarette left in the pack, that’s all.”

  “The pack that you stole from my office? Is that the pack we’re talking about? I cannot believe you would not only steal the pack from my desk, but then lie and say it was empty while sneaking the last cigarette!”

  “If you keep huffing and puffing like that, you’re gonna blow the door down. I am sitting in here on the sofa holding my breath so I won’t disturb you, and it seems to me you’re the one bellowing and snorting and carrying on like a baby who wants a lollipop. It’s like you’ve got some kind of oral fixation or something.”

  “First you steal my emergency pack, then you—”

  “This is very childish. Perhaps you might worry a little less about me and a little more about the deadline tomorrow morning?”

  The lingering smoke meant nothing, Bart thought with a snarl. No, the clue, the goddamn clue

  No, now he could see what must have happened in the seedy apartment. The jagged corner of yellow paper beside the body was the exact same shade as the scrap he’d found at the nightclub. And that explained it. Yes! Yes!!! It was the link to the woman who’d lost a daughter, and it was the link to the strange fellow in the fedora who’d been following Bart for all those long days while he’d been on the case. It was as if the sun had finally broken the horizon after so many long weeks of arctic winter.

  Bart smiled as the police stormed the room, their revolvers aimed at his heart. He knew he could explain

  “Terry, I made reservations at that Thai restaurant everybody talks about all the time. We need to leave pretty soon if we’re going to get there on time.”

  “Screw the Thai restaurant.”

  Bart held up the scrap of paper and said

  “They’re always packed, and the only reason we got the reservation is because a bunch of Shriners got drunk in the bar and refused to eat.”

  “Screw the Shriners.”

  Bart said screw the shriners oh hell come on bart you know who did it and who that fedora dude is and the scrap of yellow paper come on bart bellicose don’t forget you can remember you had it a minute ago and it was good bart it was good and it was tight and it was right up there with brilliant and

  it is gone finito ciao adios arrivederci

  “Is everything okay, Terry? You’re making an awfully funny noise in there.”

  “Don’t worry about me. See, here I am in the kitchen and I’m just fine. As soon as I find a certain something in the drawer, I’m coming in the living room. Why don’t you fix us a nice drink?”

  Bart Bellicose left the police station, trying not to strut as he remembered how deftly he’d wrapped up the case in a pink bow to hand over to the detectives. They had listened in awe as he’d explained how his client, an errant husband with a fondness for exotic dancers, had blackmailed the sultry, smoky-eyed postal carrier who moonlighted at the Turkish Bazaar. The chump had opened the door to sign the yellow slip for a registered letter. Now his coffin and the case were closed.

  There would be another case tomorrow, another chance to outwit the police. But for the moment, Bart savored this victory. If you wanted a case solved—and you wanted it solved right—then you called Bart Bellicose, by damn.

  The end.

  Yahooooooooooo

  “Yo, Terry, what time is it? Lemme get the light. Jeez, it’s after midnight and I got to face the production guys in the morning.”

  “Stop at the bakery on your way to work,
Irwin. Bart Bellicose has pulled it off again.”

  “It’s done? You got it done? Lordy, I was sweating in my sleep for you. I’m not kidding; my pajamas are sticking to my armpits. All those glitches in the plot, those false starts and stops … I can’t believe it.”

  “I’ll admit I was having trouble with it. I just couldn’t get a handle on the corpse sprawled on the living room floor. I couldn’t see him, if you know what I mean. I couldn’t touch his body, smell his blood, analyze his expression of surprise and fear.”

  “But you figured something out, huh?”

  “With a little help from a friend.”

  “Well, I’m glad to hear it. Hey, I’ve got a bottle of twelve-year-old scotch I’ve been saving for my son’s wedding. Now he says he wants to be a priest. Hop a cab and come on over to celebrate. Bring your friend.”

  “A fine idea, Irwin, although I’m afraid my friend’s not up to a small party. I’ll stop at the deli for a pack of cigarettes and be over shortly.”

  “Then be careful. You may write the hardest boiled private eye series in the industry, but you look more like a genteel lady librarian from Phoenix. Too bad Bart can’t come along as your bodyguard. So tell me the truth—how’d you pull it off so quickly?”

  “I realized that all I needed to do was a little more research. That’s what it took—a little more research.”

  The Maggody Files: Time Will Tell

  “Mary Frances was so excited I could barely get her hair rolled,” Estelle Oppers said as she reached for the basket of pretzels on the bar. “She was as jumpy as a long-tailed cat in a room full of rocking chairs, and I finally had to threaten to get a towel and tie her down.”

  Ruby Bee Hanks smiled as she envisioned Mary Frances Frank, who wasn’t even five feet tall but had more energy than one of those nuclear power plants. “Well, you got to admit being named Teacher of the Year is an honor. I don’t know how she’s faced those teenagers every morning for forty years and tried to get them interested in poetry when they were more interested in one another’s britches. Back in my time, we sat on opposite sides of the room, and—”