Chapter Eighteen:
Saturday. It didn’t take long for the fun to begin. At a little after 8 a.m., Carl showed up. You know, Alex’s soon to be ex. He was drunk. Drunk and chock full of incoherent, wild eyed, violence. He wanted to break me into fifty different pieces, put them back together again, then break them apart all over again.
Me? I was barely awake. I’d only been awake for about twenty minutes and hadn’t even finished my first cup of coffee yet. Under no circumstances did I want to fight Carl. He was a lot bigger than I am, and, because of the alcohol, a lot meaner too. I opened the inside door, but left the outside door locked. He saw me standing there and the veins were all throbbing the same coded message: Kill him. Kill him. He fucked my wife and ended our marriage.
I didn’t know what to do. Physically confronting him was not an option. One of us would end up dead. Neither was trying to reason with him. Carl’s brain was in Crazy Town and brains residing in Crazy Town weren’t known for their ability to participate in calm, rationale discussions. When he began pounding on the door like an uncontrollable madman, I stood there for a few seconds and wondered no one had ever thought about having tranquilizer guns that could be used on people. Out of control elephants get tranquilized. Out of gorillas get tranquilized. Why not humans? No, out of control humans get tasered or shot. Must be more of that brilliant human logic at work, don’t you think? Or do you think?
All I could think of to do was to let Carl rant until he eventually ran out of steam, gave up, and went home. But hell, I thought, that could take a hell of a long time. So, I closed the door and walked away. If he would’ve had a gun, I would’ve played the situation differently. But he didn’t have a gun.
Rain came then, a thick steady downpour. Carl’s tirade lessened almost immediately. Three or four later, the tirade was completely gone. Great, I thought, he’ll get in his car and go home. But he didn’t. He stood there, soaked to the bone, and looking like an absolute fool. But he wasn’t leaving. No just yet. He’d come to get some satisfaction and he wasn’t going anywhere until he got some.
When I saw him go to the trunk of his car and pull out the tire iron, I thought he was going to smash the glass in the outer door. But he had his sights on other game. Namely, my car. I had already spent a lot of money repairing my car from the first time it was mauled. Now, I was going to have to do it again.
The windshield took a bit of work, but it was the first thing to go. The two driver side windows were next. Then came the rear window. And finally, the passenger side windows. Out of steam and breathing heavily, he called me on his cell phone.
“That’s for fucking my wife and ending our marriage, you shit faced little bastard. You‘re lucky I didn‘t bring a gun motherfucker.”
Carl then stumbled to his car, got in, and drove off. I was standing there in my living room stunned and more than a little confused. Where in the seven hills did he get the idea that Alex and I had fucked? Where? Certainly not from me. Alex must have told him that. But why?
I wanted to go lay down and sleep for a day or two, but I couldn’t. Within ten minutes of Carl’s departure, Ty Covington called and set our meeting for one o’clock. It was to be, of all places, a downtown coffeehouse. There were a small number of coffeehouses in Wannabe and all of them were in the downtown vicinity. I cailled Alex and told her time and place of the meeting. She said okay, but sounded bad doing it. I said nothing about Carl and his visit.
I still had something to do between then and the meeting. Go over the information on Gina Wilson and see if any of it implicates her in any way to Donna’s death, tampering with the crime scene, stealing Donna’s will, or some combination of two or even all three.
Let’s start with her phone records. There have been numerous calls back and forth from Gina’s cell phone and Sonny Winters cell phone. They started three and a half weeks before she told me she’d arrived inWannabe and ended the day of Donna’s death. There were also numerous calls between Gina and Donna. The time frame for when they started and when they ended were the same. There were daily calls to Gina from someone named Howard B. Willmore, a man who bears an identical modus operandi as a loan shark. There was also plenty of calls from a female loan officer of the bank where Gina has her money. And there were a long list of calls from someone Long Tom Fitzpatrick, a man with his hands in several pies, some of which reach the middle echelons of organized crime.
As for Gina’s financial situation, you can probably already guess that she had a warehouse full of problems. Her business was hemorrhaging heavily in the red.. She took out a second mortgage on her home. She had massive credit card debt. At the very least, Gina could’ve lost her business, her home, her car, and a large percentage of her worldly possessions. At the most, she could’ve lost her life.(see Howard B. Willmore and Long Tom Fitzpatrick)
I cut my examination of Gina’s background short. The time was approaching to go see Ty Covington and hear his version of what he witnessed the night Donna died. I was hungry and needed to get something on my stomach. I ate in a hurry, which is not good for the digestion. And I ate a lot of processed food, which is not good for the digestion or any other part of the human anatomy. Politicians have spent a lot of time, money, and effort running at cigarette companies. When are they going to do the same with the food companies? There are scores and scores of statistics concerning how many people get diseases and die prematurely from smoking cigarettes. Where are all the statistics concerning how many people get diseases and die prematurely from bad food? And have you ever noticed how much more good food costs than bad food? Stop telling everyone what’s good for them. Make it affordable for them.
I was a few minutes late picking up Alex to go the coffeehouse. From the second she got into the car, I knew she didn’t have any booze in her and she was hurting because of it. She was a nervous wreck. She fidgeted the entire drive to the coffee house. She flipped, flopped, twitched, tremored and shook. She bounced around like a small, super ball caught in the spin cycle of a mad washing machine. It wasn’t until we were within a few blocks of the coffeehouse that we started talking.
“I’m not parking in front of the coffeehouse,” I said. “I’m parking a couple blocks away.”
“No change for the meter? Or are you refusing on principle?”
“Both.”
“I thought maybe it was because you’re so cheap.”
“That too.”
“Go ahead. I’m not allergic to walking. Maybe the air will do me some good.”
“Do you mind where I park?”
“As long as it’s not in the middle of someone’s living room.”
“I can’t guarantee much, but I cam guarantee that.”
I parked the car two blocks over and one block up from the coffeehouse. I checked my watch. We were a little late. It was five after one. To me, this was no big deal. But who knew if it was a big deal to Covington or not?
The coffeehouse, a converted bus depot, was narrow but long. It’s a strange place, this coffeehouse, with every manner of human being you could think of patronizing the place. I’d only been in the place once before and that was while working a case too. I’d never been in this place for purely social reasons. Never been and never will be. It’s hard to put into words, but there’s something about places like this that I don’t warm up to.
As we came in, my eyes went off to the right, while Alex’s went straight back. Covington had proclaimed himself to be a six foot, lean, prime looking man. I didn’t see anyone matching that description where I was searching. The first thing to gain my attention was a chess game being played by two sixty something seniors. One guy was white, the other guy was black. The white guy was playing black; the black guy was playing white. The game was somewhere in its latter stages by the look of things, but I couldn’t tell if either of them was winning.
I brought my eyes away from the chess game and back to the center of the coffeehouse. I saw business types, musician types, social climbing back stabbing types, computer types, but I didn’t see anyone matching Covington’s description.
“I see him,” Alex said. “I think.”
“Where?”
“Back at the counter to the left. Long black leather coat. Big over the top hair.” She pointed to the man she’d described.
“The guy with a coffee in one hand and a cell phone in the other?”
“Yeah.”
“I missed him somehow.”
“What did you do, leave your Sherlock eyes at home today?”
“Maybe they were steamed up by overpriced coffee.”
“Let’s go find out if he’s the guy.”
“Lead the way. Age before beauty.”
“But I’m both younger and better looking than you.”
“Well hell, just forget it then.”
We walked to the counter in split formation with one of us ending up on each side of the man we presumed to be Ty Covington. We introduced ourselves and ordered coffee. He introduced himself as Covington, took his coffee, palmed his phone, and sat down at a nearby table. A couple of minutes later, Alex and I got our coffee and joined him at the table. The first and most obvious thing anyone was likely to notice about Covington was his hair. There was no better way to describe it than to call it a mane. A thick brown, waved over mane, an almost exact replica of the kind worn by a lion.
“So,” I said, “you have something to tell us?” I wanted this meeting to be all business. No distractions, no extra bullshitting, just business.
“Did we agree on a price?”
“What’s the lowest you’ll go?”
He told me. His lowest, in my opinion was still too high. I told him so. He wouldn’t haggle. Everybody haggles I said. Everyone except him, he said. I thought about all the money I’d spent during the course of this case. Car repairs, house repairs, paying people. It added up to thick chunk of cash. But then I thought about my hacker acquaintance and our plan to plunder the Winters family fortune. I thought about my share of it. I agreed to Covington’s price.
“Are you ready to talk now?,” I asked. “Or do I need to shine your shoes first?”
“No, I already have someone to do that for me. Thanks for the offer though.”
“That wasn’t an offer. That was sarcasm.”
“I know.”
“Well?”
“Well what?”
“Are you ready to talk now? I’m not in the mood for dancing. You do understand, don’t you? Whatever patience I had when this case started died a long time ago. I’ve been jacked up and jerked around from the beginning. I even time in a hospital after being led up the golden path of near death. So, say what you have to say right now or we’re leaving.”
Covington slugged down the last of his coffee, then ran a slow hand across the entire length of his mane. I looked over at Alex and caught her sneaking a couple of shots of liqueur into her coffee. She hadn’t heard a word of what had been said. And she didn’t look to be in the mood to start anytime soon.
“I was up there conducting business,” Covington said.
“Where exactly?”
“In that open space between the two buildings.”
“The old grocery store and the short plaza.”
“Right. I deal going on. I had this guy on the hook and we were about to finalize the thing, you know.”
“And?”
“Then this whole “Twilight Zone’ thing starts to happen.”
“Twilight Zone,” Alex said, infusing herself into the conversation for the first time. There was a little more flush now to her cheeks and a lot more calm to her manner. Both were due to the liquored coffee, no doubt. She took another sip, swallowed hard and repeated the only two words she’d said so far: “Twilight Zone”.
“A car came into the parking lot,” Covington said. “It’s lights were off and it kept circling around as if it couldn’t find a place to park.”
“What kind of car?”
“The moon was full and the sky was clear. So, there was light enough to see.”
“And?”
“It was a Mercedes. Can’t be sure of the color. But it was dark toned.”
“Did you see who was in the car?,” I asked, putting myself back into the conversation.
“You’re jumping ahead of me Marlowe. Slow down.”
“Okay, okay. What happened after the car parked?”
Then a sudden thought struck Covington. He hadn’t been paid yet. Not a dollar, not a dime. Nothing. So, he stops talking right in the middle of his story. He wants his money and he wants it now, he says. All of it.
He stands up and purposely towers over me in my seated, leaning forward position. His coat is open and I can see a pistol holstered on his hip. He smiles a masterful smile of power and intimidation. He passes by me and goes for more coffee. Alex goes too, but at a much faster rate than Covington. She’s wants for coffee, which means she wants more booze.
Alex returned first. She didn’t need sugar. She didn’t need cream. All she needed was her liqueur. In it goes. First in the cup, then in her. Our eyes haven’t met since we arrived here. And they don’t meet now. There’s an ever widening gulf between us and I don’t know how to fix it.
A minute or so later Covington comes back. He’s moving even slower than when he left. When he finally reaches our table, he lets out a snort of disapproval. He expected his money to be there when he returned. It’s not. He then sat down and took a big swig of his coffee before putting the cup back down on the table
He and I sat there in a rising tide of aggressive tension, eying each other suspiciously. Time passes in thick, minute particles. Nothing is said by anyone. He is younger than I am, taller than I am, and armed. He is also, on any given day, more to violence than I am. I can see it in those dark, heavy lidded eyes of his. Physicality is his world, his domain, the one place where he can invade, conquer, and reign.
“You don’t care, do you?” he said to me.
“No, I don’t.”
“But I do,” Alex said, then opened her coat to show him the pistol holstered under her left arm. “And I’m too close and not drunk enough to miss. Besides, you’re not stupid enough to draw in here. So, just calm down, drink your coffee and finish your story”
Alex then turned to me and said in a quiet voice: “What the hell are you doing? I thought you wanted to end this thing as fast as possible. Get in, hear the story, and get out. Put the money on the table, damn you, and don’t waste another second doing it. Let’s end this case once and for all.”
It was the first time our eyes met since we’d come into the coffeehouse. Her eyes were frantic. They were somehow both pleading for help and refusing it at the same time. To her question: ‘What was I doing?’, I had no answer. I was confused. Now, confusion was no stranger in my life. It was more than just a mild acquaintance. It was a close, long standing friend of mine. And the older I got, the closer we became. People, life , religion, science, cricket, all confused me to end. And there were plenty of more things on that list. But I don’t have the time, space, or patience to name them all here. I The confusion that rose up out of nowhere at the coffeehouse, though, was different. This was the most basic, profound confusion of all. The conflict between wanting to live and wanting to die. Somewhere here in the middle of this coffeehouse, I became confused as to what was the answer. Had I been purposely trying to provoke Covington into violence because the answer was no. Sure, it could’ve been that or it could’ve been a touch of dyspepsia and a lack of sleep. I hoped then, as I hope now, that it was the latter and not the former. Otherwise, I just might -------.
“Finish the story,” I said, putting the money on the table. “And don’t stop until you’re done.”
Covington picked up the money, counted it, then put it away.
“Where was I?,” he asked himself. “Oh yeah, I remember. The car pulled up, circled around for awhile, then stopped. After that, nothing happened for at least five minutes. Then someone got out of the car. Someone big, wide, and wearing a dark colored parka. ”
This was Gina, I thought to myself. Covington continued.
“This guy(I didn’t bother to correct him) just stood there staring back into the car. This lasted two or three minutes. When the staring stopped, he pulls something from underneath the parka and leans into the car. Then another car pulls into the parking lot.”
Alex and I exchanged sideways glances. A second car? What was a second car doing there? And who was driving it? The most likely scenario all along was that Gina alone altered the scene to implicate Sonny as a murderer. The presence of a second car threw that theory into the waste bin with the label garbage attached to it. Covington pressed on with his story.
“The second car was a Mercedes too. Same make, different year. The color was dark like the other one, but they might not have been the same. The second car pulls up close to the first car, with the guy in the parka in between. The guy in the parka turns around and has a conversation with the driver of the second car. The driver of the second car gets out and walks over to the other car, with the guy in the parka close behind.”
“I need to interrupt your story,” I said. “Give me a general description of the driver of the second car.”
He did. And while this general description could’ve applied to millions of other people, it also could’ve applied to one person. Sonny Winters. Especially when you add a general description of Sonny’s car. Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, and Vishnu. Gina and Sonny together. Covington closed in on the end of the story.
“The two of them lean into the first car. They’re in this position for a couple of minutes. They come back out. They stand aside and talk some more. The drivers’ side door is open and I can see inside. There’s someone in the front seat. This someone is slumped back and isn’t moving. The guy in the parka and the one he was talking to walk over to the second car, get in, and drive off. And I get the fuck out of there.”
“No gunshot?,” I asked.
“No gunshot..”
“Are you staying or going?”
“Staying. I‘ve got other business here.”
“We’re going. Come on Alex, let’s go.” I stood up and Alex soon followed. Both chairs stayed the way they were, out and away from the table.
“You know,” I said to Covington, “it would be healthier to pick another line of work.
“I don’t remember telling you what that was.”
“You didn’t. And I don’t know the specifics of it. But I could guess it in three tries or less. And all three come with long jail sentences or short life spans.”
“I didn’t make the world Caterski. The world made me.”
“The convenient motto of the damned.”
“I’m not afraid of jail. And I’m not afraid to die.”
“Then you’re a fool. But hell, you do have a lot of company.”
Alex led the way out. I followed a step or two behind. Once outside, I buttoned my jacket and pull up the lapels to act as a buffer against the piercing cold air. I closed my eyes and a long, slow sigh pressed through my chapped, trembling lips. Alex and I walked back to the car right in the face of a rising wind. A hard, bitter rain was about to fall. Again.