Pronto

  "Send somebody," Joyce said.

  "Yeah, with a message for the Zip." Raylan thought about it, Joyce watching him and Harry eating, unconcerned.

  "Use one of the bellhops from the Cardozo. Give him five bucks to run up the street. Wouldn't take him but a couple of minutes. Once he delivers the message," Raylan said, picturing it again, "if the Zip goes in the hotel, where he could be making a phone call, then the meeting's off. You go home right away."

  "I'm at the Cardozo?" Harry said.

  "That's right."

  "Well, if he's up the street at the Esther, how do I know if he goes in his hotel?"

  "I'll let you know."

  "Yeah? Who invited you? I know I didn't."

  "I told the Zip I might see him," Raylan said, "around two-fifteen."

  Harry left them to visit the bathroom. Raylan said, "He hasn't gotten any sweeter, has he?"

  "It's you," Joyce said. "Or me talking about you this afternoon, saying nice things. I could feel him closing up."

  "You tell him about Robert?"

  "He said it was too bad."

  "What's wrong with him?"

  "He doesn't like to be wrong. Listen, why don't you leave pretty soon. He'll expect me to stay the night, so I'm going to have to explain what's going on. You and I are what, seeing each other?"

  "I guess you could call it that. It's going to tear him up, though, isn't it?"

  "At first he won't believe it. Then he'll act hurt, he'll use it as an excuse to get drunk. He'll use it whatever way he can. He might even start smoking again. Wait for me downstairs, okay? In the park?"

  That's what he did: sat on the low stone wall separating Lummus Park from the beach and watched the two-lane bumper-to-bumper Saturday-night traffic on Ocean Drive. He'd read that movie stars had bought condos here, but had never seen any of them. There were quite a few homosexuals, though, all neat-appearing young fellas with haircuts. Raylan had nothing against homosexuals; he wasn't sure if he had ever met one. Not just some of them but others down here wore clothes Raylan had never seen in any stores. Where did they buy their outfits? A guy in a regular suit of clothes, like the one in the seersucker suit coming along the walk, was from another planet... Jesus, or the Miami Bureau office. The guy coming this way in the suit, sport shirt open at the neck, hands in his pockets and looking kind of aimless, was Special Agent McCormick. He looked this way. Raylan didn't move. McCormick looked again, no recognition on his face. He seemed about to walk past when he stopped.

  "I thought that was you. I don't believe I've seen you around lately."

  "I took leave."

  "What was your name again?"

  Raylan stood up as he told him.

  "Right, you're the one wears the cowboy hat."

  "It's western, yeah."

  "You probably haven't heard, we shelved the Capotorto investigation. Turns out Jimmy's small potatoes, the kind you can take to a grand jury, but is it worth the effort?" He said, "Well," starting to edge away, "I'm meeting one of my favorite snitches for a drink. Nice talking to you, Raymond."

  Joyce walked up as McCormick left.

  "Who was that?"

  "Just some guy."

  "He looked lonely."

  "I wouldn't be surprised."

  "You have to watch yourself around here," Joyce said, "you never know who you're talking to." She slipped her arm through his and squeezed it, telling Raylan, "Don't worry, I'll take care of you."

  Chapter Twenty-Seven.

  Nicky said after, if Jimmy wasn't in the middle of his breakfast he would've gotten up from the table and slapped her around, her talking to him like that.

  Eleven-thirty, he was having his usual Sunday morning breakfast of runny fried eggs on waffles with bacon and a few English muffins after with apple butter. Gloria was having a Coke with her toast. Nicky was serving, because the Cuban guy who usually did it was off Sundays. The cook fixed the stuff and then he left too. What happened: Jimmy said, "We're going to Butterfly World today." Gloria said, "Gee, I'd love to but I can't." Jimmy said, "Oh? You going to see your mom again?" Gloria could tell by his tone what he was getting at. She said, "I did go see my mom yesterday," beating him to it. "On the way back I drove through South Beach, see if there was anything new. You know how it changes all the time? And Tommy saw me. I was stuck in traffic and he asked would I have an iced tea with him. That's all."

  Jimmy said to Nicky, "Take that hot coffee and pour it on her fucking head for lying to me."

  "I'm not lying."

  "You told Nicky before you left you were going to see Tommy."

  "I was putting him on. Why would I see Tommy?"

  "That's what I'm asking you."

  "It happened that I did see him. Or he saw me. I can't help that, can I?"

  "You say you stopped on the way back from your mom's?"

  "That's right."

  "Only it isn't on the way. Is it, Nicky?"

  Gloria said, "It is if you take the MacArthur, South Beach is right there, you go through it. Jimmy, you don't drive, so you have kind of a weird sense of direction."

  "What I have," he said with his mouth full, "is a sense of when somebody's bullshittin' me. We're going to Butterfly World."

  Gloria said, "You're going to make me look at butterflies when my mom's dying of terminal cancer and it may be the last time I see her?"

  Jimmy Cap said, "You're in the car when we leave or hit the fucking road. I'll get a replacement for you."

  Gloria shined her eyes at him. "You don't mean that, do you?"

  Jimmy said, "Try me." Maple syrup on his chin.

  He finished and left the dining room. Gloria sat at the table looking at Tropic, the Herald's Sunday magazine, while Nicky cleared. He asked what she was going to do and she said without looking up, "Where were you? You didn't hear what I told him?"

  "Yeah, but he'll throw you out."

  "You think I'm going to turn the Zip down to go see some fucking butterflies?"

  "You could've told Jimmy that."

  "The Zip doesn't want Jimmy to know till after; so don't tell him. Look at the butterflies and keep your mouth shut."

  "I've never been out there."

  "You walk through like screened-in jungles, natural settings, full of all kinds of butterflies. Jimmy's favorite, they have a giant moth that's about six inches wide and doesn't have a mouth. Jimmy kept staring at it. He goes, 'How'd the fucker get so big if it can't eat?' You could see Jimmy thinking, Jesus, not have a mouth."

  Nicky said, "Well, how's it stay alive?"

  "It doesn't. It only lives a few days."

  "Shit," Nicky said, "I don't want to go look at butterflies. I want to see what the Zip does."

  "So tell Jimmy you can't go," Gloria said. "Make up a story." She shrugged in her tank top. "Tell him you made plans, you're going to whack out the Zip."

  He'd wear his hat today for sure, so he put on his navy-blue suit -- he liked the way the light-tan Stetson went with it -- drew his Beretta nine out of its holster and slipped the pistol into his waist, tight against his belly, and buttoned his suit coat. It would work.

  At 8:45 A. M., early enough to find a place on Ocean Drive, he parked the Jaguar across from the Esther and walked to Joyce's on Meridian. He had left there two hours earlier to go home and get dressed for today. Joyce fixed grits and hot biscuits for breakfast, to please him, and they grinned at each other. He had worked out a part for Joyce in this business, but didn't plan on telling her about the deadline, 2:15 p. M., until last night they were in bed holding each other in the dark and he changed his mind.

  He told her and she said, "But you can't do that," was silent a few moments, and said, "Can you?" He said it made sense to him, telling a gun thug to leave town.

  She said, "But if he's meeting Harry at one--"

  "If he shows up he doesn't think much of the deadline, that I was only trying to scare him."

  She said, "When he finds out you're serious--"

  "I doubt he'll run,
" Raylan said. "A person like him, they back down they're out of business."

  "But he'll be unarmed. He told Harry he can search him."

  "Don't worry, he'll have a gun," Raylan said, "or somebody'll bring him one." He said, "Get a table inside against a wall and sit down across from Harry."

  In the dark she said, "Maybe I still don't understand you."

  He said, "You didn't see him shoot Robert."

  By 12:45 Raylan had returned to the Jaguar and was sitting behind the wheel. All the tables on the hotel porch, the Terrace, and along the sidewalk appeared to be occupied. He didn't see the Zip.

  At 1:10 Joyce came up the street in a pair of white slacks, a navy top; she walked up on the porch looking around, was out of sight for a minute or so, and reappeared, the Zip with her, coming from the Fourteenth Street side of the porch. The Zip said something to Joyce and she waited on the sidewalk in front while he went over to the dark-haired maitre d', peeled a bill from a roll, and handed it to him. After that the Zip and Joyce started down Ocean Drive toward the Cardozo.

  Raylan waited.

  Not long. At 1:25 Gloria Ayres came around the corner from Fourteenth. She carried a straw beach bag with a big blue flower on it, went up the steps, and stood looking around the Terrace. Raylan watched the dark-haired maitre d' approach her. He said something. She said something. He said something else, touched her bare shoulder in the tank top, and she walked off with her beach bag.

  Raylan got out of the car. He followed Gloria down Ocean Drive to the Cardozo as people crossed the street going to the beach. It was a beautiful day.

  Nicky stood in the bedroom doorway holding up the gun they'd gotten for him in Italy, the .32 caliber Targa, showing it to Jimmy Cap.

  Jimmy said, "Yeah, what about it?" still in his robe, getting ready to take a shower.

  "It's the one I'm gonna use. Perfect kind of piece. I leave it at the scene, there's no way they can trace it back. Holds six."

  "You think that's enough?"

  "I put every one of 'em into him."

  "How you know where he is?"

  "Gloria told me."

  "Gloria's a bullshitter. Where is she?"

  "She left already."

  "Where'd she go?"

  It was unbelievable. You tell him something -- the man refused to fucking listen.

  "I thought I mentioned it. Didn't I? About her helping him take out Harry Arno?"

  "You believe that?" Jimmy chose a pair of Bill Blass designer briefs from the bureau, green ones, and closed the drawer. "He don't tell me, he tells Gloria?"

  "He don't tell you, Gloria says, 'cause he's showing everybody what a hard-on he is on account of pretty soon, if I don't stop him, he's gonna take over. Gloria says while you're out looking at butterflies."

  Jimmy was taking off his robe. "I got to have a talk with Gloria before I kick her ass out. Maybe you should squirt some gasoline on her, what do you think?"

  "If I could get you to picture it," Nicky said, wanting to hit him, drive his fist into that huge gut. "The Zip's sitting there with Harry. He don't even see me. I time it. He pops Harry, I walk up and pop the Zip. Let him see me so he knows it's from you."

  Jesus, he had the robe off now. All that fat, no muscle, it barely looked like a human body.

  "I know you want me to whack him out, you said so. I was just thinking that right now--"

  "I told you where we're going," Jimmy Cap said, walking into the bathroom.

  The lobby in half light, only a few tables occupied, reminded Joyce of Italy, Harry's villa. Their table was across from the entrance, the doors standing open. The Zip walked up taking off his suit coat, held his arms outstretched, and turned around in front of Harry. "Okay?" Harry said to sit down and have a drink; Harry on his third beer, sunglasses covering his watery eyes. The Zip looked at Joyce's white wine and ordered iced tea. He slipped his coat back on saying, "How you doing? I haven't seen you in a while."

  Joyce said, "Not since you were lying on my living room floor."

  When the girl walked up with her straw beach bag she said, "Well, hi," to the Zip. "I just happened to come in to use the john." The Zip asked her to sit down and the girl said, "Okay, for a minute," took the empty chair across from him, and shoved her beach bag under the table. The Zip said, "This is Gloria," and Gloria said, "Boy, what a day," laying her sunglasses in her hair. "Everybody's outside, on the porch." Joyce watched the Zip. He said, "We like it in here. Harry, you picked a good table." Harry said, "What?" Joyce watched the Zip's gaze raise. She looked over to see Raylan standing in the entrance. Harry didn't see him until he was approaching the table.

  The Zip glanced at his watch and said to Raylan, "I got forty minutes yet. Right?"

  Harry wasn't listening. He said to Raylan, "You're late. I already checked him out and he's clean."

  Raylan said, "You look in his socks? He took an ankle gun off me in Italy. I doubt, though, he's wearing it."

  "Not my style," the Zip said. He seemed relaxed in his light-gray double-breasted suit, white shirt, and dark tie; in charge. "So what do you want? Is that all you have to say? I'm not going to talk to Harry about personal business in front of you. Can you understand that?"

  Now Raylan looked at his watch, studying it for a moment. He said, "I don't see you're going to have time to talk much at all. You have less'n forty minutes to the deadline. Figure it'll take you a good half hour to get out of Dade County from here, that means you actually have only about eight minutes."

  Joyce kept quiet. Not Harry. He said, "You know what you're talking about? If you do, let me in on it."

  "What it means," Raylan said, "he can't hurt you."

  Harry seemed confused now. "Why not?"

  "He won't be around."

  "What're you talking about?"

  "He's going out of business," Raylan said, and laid his hand on Gloria's bare shoulder. "Honey, you're through here, aren't you?"

  She didn't move right away, not until Raylan helped, pulling her chair back. Gloria got up and said, "Well..." She didn't seem to want to leave. Or she was waiting for the Zip to tell her it was okay.

  He said, "Good to see you."

  Joyce watched her walk off across the lobby: in a tank top, shorts, and high heels; only in South Beach.

  Raylan was seated now across from the Zip. They seemed to be watching each other without staring directly, eye to eye. Harry said he had to take a leak and left for the men's room. Raylan said to Joyce, "Would you excuse us for about seven minutes? Wait for Harry and take him into the bar? I need to get something cleared up here."

  She wanted to stay with him, not walk away now to put up with Harry, argue with him. There were so many things she wanted to say to Raylan. Joyce hesitated a moment and picked one from the front of her mind.

  "I think Gloria forgot her beach bag."

  Raylan said, "You bet she did."

  The Zip had it upright between his legs. All he had to do was lean forward on the table, slip his hand into the straw bag, and bring out the piece with the towel still covering it. Use it below the table. Gloria did okay: pushed it over as she sat down and he got it in position right away. It would've been nothing to do Harry. It would be done by now.

  This cowboy was something else. Lays it out for you, this is how it is. He remembered Nicky telling how the guy had shot Fabrizio up on the mountain and remembered Fabrizio's face against the car window with his eyes open.

  This time, though, it sounded like the guy was trying to fake him out, telling the broad excuse us for seven minutes. That was bullshit. The guy was a cop, wasn't he? A fed? They had to have warrants and court papers before they made you do something. All that legal shit. Tell him, I got news for you, I ain't going nowhere. Or don't tell him nothing. Wait him out.

  "You got five minutes."

  "The fuck you talking about?"

  "Five minutes," Raylan said.

  It was weird seeing Jimmy Cap naked from behind, as big and fat as he was his ass was a norm
al size. Jimmy was in there brushing his teeth, in the pink glow of the bathroom. Nicky was still in the doorway, across the bedroom from him.

  "I don't see where you need me, if all you're going to is this butterfly place."

  "They got a moth there, great big fucker, that don't have a mouth."

  "I heard about it."

  "Can't eat."

  "I mean if Jack's driving he'll be with you."

  "You're driving. I gave Jack the day off."

  Nicky moved across the bedroom toward the pink glow repeating what Jimmy said, that he'd given Jack the day off, but sounding amazed.

  "He asked me last week."

  "You could've changed your mind." Nicky was in the doorway to the bathroom now. "What I want to do isn't way more important? Christ, whack a guy for you? I got the piece" -- the Targa, still in his hand -- "the perfect time to do it, and you give him the day off instead of me?"

  Jimmy was shaving now.

  "They got an insectarium there with bugs in it you wouldn't fucking believe. Grasshopper as big as a fucking bird. You know stick bugs, they look like sticks? They got one must be a foot long. They got these big fucking beetles with horns--"

  Nicky shot him in the back of the head. He didn't say to himself, I'm going to shoot this son of a bitch. He didn't have to think. He aimed the Targa at the back of Jimmy's head, saw Jimmy in the mirror holding the razor to his face looking at him and then with the noise didn't see him as the mirror turned red and shattered, both at the same time.

  They had eye contact now, not more than five feet between them. A waiter came over and asked the Zip if he'd like another iced tea. The Zip shook his head. The waiter asked Raylan if he'd like something. Raylan said, "Give me about three minutes and come back."

  They still had eye contact.

  "You don't look at your watch," the Zip said. "How do you know it's three minutes?"

  "I'm estimating. Now it's two minutes."

  "You don't know that!"

  "Why's it upset you?"

  "You don't have the permission, what you're doing, the authority."

  "An officer of the law tells an undesirable like yourself to get out of town. It's done all the time. If you don't choose to leave, then we have to play by your rules."