That shut him up. Ordell went over to the phone. She said to Louis, "Can I get you anything?" He raised his empty glass.
She said, "It's not too early?" "I'm not working," Louis said.
"So you went shopping." She felt the lapel of his jacket between her fingers. Part rayon and something else. "Who picked this out, Ordell?"
"We don't have the same taste," Louis said. "In clothes."
"Yeah, in clothes."
She went into the kitchen with his glass. Ordell, a few feet away, was saying into the phone, "They might be watching your place. Lemme think a minute. . . . Yeah, go to the public beach. . . . The one over the Blue Heron bridge. Walk up toward Howard Johnson and I'll see you around there. . . . Right now if you want. Get in your car." He hung up and looked across the counter at Melanie.
"I have to go out for a while. Will you be nice to my friend? Try not to assault him? Tear his clothes off? They brand new."
"I wouldn't mind sitting out on the balcony," Louis said. "I could use some sun."
Melanie said, "You aren't kidding." "You're nice and brown."
She said, "You want to see my tan lines?" and sat up straight on the sofa with her back arched, hooked the bra top with her thumbs, and pushed it down from her breasts.
"You're tan, all right," Louis said. "You don't ever let them out in the sun, huh?"
"I used to. I think they look better natural, though, don't you?"
"Yeah, I think you're right." They were big ones. He kept staring at them, seeing little blue veins like rivers on a map. When he raised his glass to take a sip he found there was only ice left.
Melanie said, "Let me fix you up."
Looking him right in the face rather than at the glass. When she did take it from his hand and went to the kitchen, Louis got up and walked out on the balcony.
The building was kind of tacky, faded light-green paint peeling from the concrete, but had all the view you needed of the Atlantic Ocean, right there out the back door, and a white sandy beach that went clear up to Jacksonville. Tiny people down there. Not too many till he looked toward the public beach, to the left, and saw rows of blue wind shelters, or whatever they were called, more people out of them than in. It was a perfect kind of day, enough wind to raise the surf and blow in a cloud every once in a while to relieve the sun heat. Melanie, next to him now at the concrete rail, said, "Keep watching over that way. You'll see Ordell walking out to the beach."
"He's meeting a woman?"
"That's what he said."
"You don't mind?"
"You're kidding."
"I mean if you're living with him."
"He doesn't live here, he stops in. You know Ordell, he does whatever he wants."
It seemed Melanie did too, still exposing herself handing him the fresh drink.
"You don't want to burn those babies."
"I'll keep my back to the sun," Melanie said. "Why don't you stretch out on the lounge, take your shirt off. Your pants too, if you want."
She held the drink while he got out of the shirt, folded it, laid it on a low metal table, and sat down in the lounge. Melanie saying, "Boy, you really need sun. Where've you been?"
"In jail. Two months shy of four years."
It seemed to brighten her eyes, talking to a convict. "Really? He didn't tell me that. What did you do?"
"I robbed a bank."
That got her moving, throwing her head to the side to get her blond hair out of her face. She had an awful lot of hair. She said, "I've thought about you a lot, wondering what you've been doing. . . ."
"We only met that one time. Thirteen years ago?" "Almost fourteen. I know, and when I saw you come in I couldn't believe it. I recognized you right away." She glanced over her shoulder toward the public beach.
He said to her, "What've you been up to?"
Now she was looking at him again, the sun hitting him from directly above her head. He had to squint.
"I lie in the sun."
"That's all?"
"I read."
"You get bored?"
"A lot. You want to fuck?"
Louis said, "Sure," and put his drink on the floor. She was the kind who liked to be on top. She would moan and say Oh God throwing her head back and rubbing her hands in the hair on his chest like it was a washboard, back and forth, or a surface she was scrubbing clean. She had long red nails that scratched him but felt good too. He wanted to get on top and do it right, but the sun got brighter against his closed eyes, red-hot, and it was over before he could get around to it. She hopped off and got into her cutoffs, not wearing any underwear. Louis pulled his pants up, got his drink off the floor, and estimated maybe five minutes had passed.
Melanie said, "Whew, I feel a lot better. How about you?"
Louis nodded. "Yeah, that hit the spot."
"We can relax now," she said, "and get caught up.
Ordell said to Jackie, "I can't hear what you're saying. Come up here and talk to me."
She was facing away from him, standing on wet sand, and letting the surf wash up over her bare feet, the wind blowing her hair. Irritating, this woman
could bug you; but still fine to look at this morning in her T-shirt, her long brown legs coming out of those white shorts.
She said over her shoulder at him, "Take your shoes off."
"What do I do with them?" Four-hundred-dollar oxblood-colored alligator loafers with tassels. "I put my shoes down, somebody gonna walk off with them." He had sand inside his shoes and should've known better than to say meet him here. Every time he walked out on the beach he got sand in his shoes. Ordell would never go barefoot, though, like Melanie and Sheronda. He didn't have a reason other than something in his head telling him to keep his shoes on except when he went to bed. He didn't swim, never went in the water. . . . He said, "Girl, you want to be drug over by the hair?"
Look at her. Wasn't mad, wasn't nervous being here. Coming over to him now, hair blowing in her face. Bathers walked by looking at the ground for seashells.
"You think anybody followed you?"
"I don't know," Jackie said, "I don't do this too often."
Smelling of some kind of powder. Clean and healthy.
"You act like it, you cool."
"I don't think it matters if they followed me or not. They know what we're doing."
Ordell said, "How's that again?" "I told them we'd be meeting."
"Wait a minute. You told them it's me?"
"They already know that. They know more about you than I do. The ATF guy kept talking about guns. I said I can't help you there. . . ."
"But you'd see what you could find out?"
She moved right up on him saying, "Look, the only way I can get permission to fly is if I agree to help them. I have to give them something. Or appear to. But it has to be something they can check, otherwise I could be blowing smoke. So the first thing I give them is what they already know. Do you understand that?"
"What was the next thing?"
"I told them you have money in Freeport and you want me to bring it here. A half million put away and more coming in."
"You told them all that?"
"It's true, isn't it?"
"What's that got to do with it?"
"Is it true or not?"
"I said around that amount."
"They know I was delivering for you," Jackie said. "I mentioned the half million-they're not that interested in the money, they want you with guns. I said, well, if you want proof he's getting paid for selling them, let me bring the money in. I'll make two deliveries, the first one with ten thousand, like a dry run. I said, you watch, see how it works. Then you set up for the next delivery, when I bring in the half million plus."
"How it works," Ordell said. "I come by your place and pick it up."
"I told them you're very careful. You send someone to meet me, and I never know who it is."
Ordell said, "That's an idea. You know it?"
"If you'll listen," Jackie said, "you'll see
it's the whole idea. The first time I do it they're lurking about, they see me hand the ten thousand to someone.
"Who?"
"I don't know, one of your friends." "A woman?"
"If you want."
"Yeah, I think a woman."
"The next trip, when I come with all the money, it'll look like I hand it to the same one I did before. . . .
"But you don't."
"No, I give it to someone else, first."
"And they follow the wrong one," Ordell said, "thinking she's bringing it to me, huh?"
"That's the idea."
"So we need two people, two women."
Jackie nodded, looking as though she was thinking about it, or remembering what else she'd told them. The woman was cool.
"Where does this happen?" "I don't know yet."
"You have two different flight bags and make a switch."
"I guess so."
"You guess?"
"I haven't worked it out yet."
"The woman they think has the money but don't, they gonna come down on."
"If she doesn't have it, what's the problem?" "Has to be a woman won't open her mouth." Ordell paused to look at this idea. "They still know I'm the one it's coming to."
"Once you have the money," Jackie said, "that's your problem. You're on your own."
"You must see a piece of this for yourself."
"Ten percent. Plus, what we've already agreed to. A hundred thousand if I go to jail."
"But you helping them. They gonna let you off." She turned to face the ocean, saying to him, "Maybe." Her eyes closed now, the breeze blowing her hair. Fine looking.
Ordell said, "If they say they gonna let the first run go through, why don't we bring the whole load in that time?"
She said, her eyes still closed, "I don't trust them all that much. Let's see how it goes." She pulled her T-shirt off over her head and shook her hair free.
Ordell saw what looked like a swimsuit bra covering her ninnies. Not much showing, but they looked to be fine ones. He said, "I have to do some thinking on this."
She said, "You should," and walked out to the hard-packed wet sand. Stood there and then looked around at him. "You know someone named Cujo?" What was this now? Man, coming out of nowhere.
"What about him?"
"He's at Good Sam."
"What you talking about?"
She said, "He was shot yesterday," and started walking out in the ocean.
"Wait a minute!"
Ordell yelled it at her, but she kept going. He ran down to the hard-packed sand. "Who told you that?" She didn't hear him, so he moved toward her yelling, "Come back here!" and the surf came in over his alligators before he realized it. Shit. He watched her dive into a wave. Watched her come up and dive into another one, her butt in the white shorts mooning him.
Melanie had the vodka on the coffee table now, close by with a bowl of ice, while Louis finished up a cigar-size joint she'd rolled Jamaica-style, Louis sucking away in a cloud of white smoke. This guy appreciated everything you gave him. Five vodkas so far, with the dope, but very attentive. Head against the sofa cushion, staring at her through deep, dark enlarged pupils as she spoke about their pal Ordell:
How he'd looked at the cocaine business at one time and found it too competitive, all the corners taken; try to move on one you'd get shot. Guns, though, you didn't need a franchise, you could sell guns wherever there was a demand. She told how Ordell saw himself as an international arms dealer when, come on, the only people he sold to were dopers, Jamaican crazies, and now the cartel guys from Medellin.
"Making out though. He's doing all right," Louis said, raising his glass in slow motion.
"Well, so far he is," Melanie said, with some doubt in her tone. She had washed up and put a shirt on, the romance part over for the time being. She said, "You have to admit he's not too bright."
Louis said he wouldn't go so far as to say that. Melanie said, "Louis," in her quietest serious tone, "he puts his fingers on the words when he reads. He moves his lips. Let's say he's streetwise. But that doesn't stop him from being a fuckup."
Louis said, "If you're talking about the kidnapping, I was in it too, you know."
"You weren't in Freeport," Melanie said, "were you, when my provider at the time was told to pay up or he'd never see his wife again? And he'd already filed for divorce, and if he didn't ever see her again it would save him a fortune?" Melanie smiled at Louis. "No, you weren't. They made a movie that was something like it. I've forgotten the title. Danny DeVito's the husband, Bette Midler gets kidnapped?"
Louis seemed to think about it and shook his head. "We happened to see it on TV, not more than a month ago. Ordell's watching, he goes, 'What is this shit? You believe it?' I said, 'Hey, if it doesn't even work as a movie . . .' Now he's talking about it again-I mean the real kidnapping. You know why? Because of this Nazi freak he met."
"Big Guy," Louis said. "I saw him."
"At the white-power rally. That's why he brought you there," Melanie said, "to see him."
Louis nodded. "'Cause he looks like Richard." She kept staring at Louis until he said, "What?" "I understand you and Richard didn't get along," Melanie said. "You wanted to kill him." She watched Louis shrug, it seemed with an effort. "Richard raped the woman you were holding. . . ."
"He tried to."
"You liked her, didn't you?" "She was nice."
"You got her out before the cops landed on Richard. Took her to your apartment?" She waited but he didn't confirm or deny. "Ordell thought you had something going there."
Louis shook his head.
"It would've been pretty weird if you did." Melanie watched Louis sip his drink and lower the glass to rest on his thigh. "Well, Ordell has something going. He must've told you."
Louis said, "About fate bringing us all together?" Melanie slid her shoulder along the sofa toward him. "Fate, my ass. He's bringing you in for one reason. When he goes after the Nazi freak and all his guns, somebody's gonna have to kill him. He wants you to do it."
Louis had his head turned, resting against the cushion, close enough to touch. He stared at her forever before he said, "Why?"
"Who does Big Guy look like? Richard. Someone you wanted to kill."
"I don't know."
"Ordell believes it, he told me. He goes, `Louis, he get out there and see Big Guy, he gonna see Richard and want to shoot him when I say to.'" Louis smiled and she said, "Do I sound like him?"
"Yeah, that was good."
"If you go, don't turn your back on him," Melanie said, moving closer to him, staring into those giant pupils, "or he'll try to leave you there. I mean dead, Louis, the gun in your hand and he's off the hook." "He told you that?"
"It's the way he thinks now, he's changed. The other night he killed a man who worked for him."
"Why?" "Ask him."
"I ought to get out of here. Is that what you're saying?"
Melanie made a face, for a moment in pain. She said, "Oh, no . . . Baby, I want you to stick around. Use him before he uses you, and take what you want." She said, "I can't imagine a guy who robs banks having trouble with that."
She watched him grin, not sure what it meant until he said, "You're serious," and she grinned back at him, close enough to smell the weed on his breath. "You bet I am. What's he ever done for us?" Louis seemed to think about it a moment. "I guess not much."
"Oh, man," Melanie said. "You know how long I've been waiting for this?"
Chapter 15
Gallery Renee was located on the street level of The Gardens Mall, in a dim area between Sears and Bloomingdale's: a deep rectangular space, high ceiling, white walls and turquoise trim that picked up the mall's color motif.
Twelve thirty Sunday afternoon Max was looking through showroom glass at the gallery's bare walls, a few paintings on the floor against the walls, and at three black metal containers spaced down the length of the room. He thought of Grecian urns, then realized what they were: the eight hundred twenty
dollars' worth of olive pots Renee had called about last Monday, wanting him to drop everything and bring a check. There they were, COD, so she'd paid for them. Black rusted metal jars about three feet high. One near the entrance. He moved that way and saw the sign on the glass, SORRY, CLOSED TODAY. Renee's work,
the ornate capital letters, the words underlined three times. Closed-but when he pushed on the brass handle the door opened. Max entered, pausing to look in the olive pot standing close by. Cigarette butts, gum wrappers, a Styrofoam cup . . . A skinny young Latin-looking guy with hair to his shoulders was coming out from the back with a painting, a big one. He lowered it to lean against a library table in the middle of the floor and looked at Max.
"Can you read? We close today."
Now he was going back, through a hall at the rear to a door that was open and showed daylight.
Max walked up to the painting: six or seven feet by five and greenish, different shades of thick green paint with touches of red, yellowish tan, black . . . He had no idea what it was. Maybe a jungle and those were green figures coming out, emerging from the growth; it was hard to tell. More paintings were propped against the other side of the table. Paintings coming down, the ones on the floor, the new ones going up, Renee getting ready for one of her cheeseand-wine shows. She could be in back, in her office. Max looked that way and saw the young Latin guy coming with another canvas.
He said to Max, "I told you we close," and placed the canvas against the first one he'd brought out. Rising, he tossed his hair from his face. Stringy, still more than he needed. He looked familiar . . .
Saying to Max standing there, "What's your problem?"
And Max almost smiled. "I'm Renee's husband."
The guy said, "Yeah? . . ." and waited.
"Where is she, in back?"
"She getting me something to eat."
"You work here?"
Max could see the little asshole didn't like that. He said, "No, I don't work here." Turned and went back to the rear of the gallery.
Max walked around the table to find more green paintings. He stooped to look at the signature, a black scrawl.