Fat Man Blues: A Hard-Boiled and Humorous Mystery (The Tubby Dubonnet Series Book 9) (6 page)

“I hate to disagree, Padre, but your showing up at a game to have a private meeting with us really wouldn’t work. Everybody knows who you are. You would attract far too much attention. It would be better if you just told me your message, just as you always do, and I’ll deliver it.”

“My message is that you boys should do something other than raise little babies, for God’s sake,” Escobar lamented. “All of you should remember that you carry the banner of the movement. Take all of those guns we gave you and use them.”

Cisco gasped. “Father…”

Escobar continued his rant. “You’ve all been trained to be leaders. Your forebears are too old to fight anymore.”

“I got it Father,” Cisco said. “I’ll deliver the message. You’ll see some action, I promise.”

“Do that, and the next time we meet you can tell me what steps you and your compatriots are taking to further our grand ideals.”

“Okay, okay. I said I got it.”

“Before you know it, the tourists will be taking ferries from Miami to Havana.” The priest’s voice trailed off. He was running out of steam.

“I’d better be going,” Cisco said soothingly. “You look tired.”

“I am tired, but I want to know about the Rosary Box.”

“The Box is fine. It’s all fine. We’re still making money.”

Escobar groaned. “That’s not the point. The money is not for you to get rich with!”

“I know. The point is to further the movement, but nevertheless there is nothing to worry about.”

“It’s a good thing I trust you, Cisco,” the priest muttered.

“You can always trust me,” Cisco assured him, and reached for one of his host’s Cuban sugar cookies.

“But I think I want to see our money,” Escobar said. “Next week or the week following, I want you to take me to look in the Rosary Box. Just to be sure everything is on the up and up.”

“Of course, Father,” Cisco quickly agreed.

But he would have to think of some reason to delay that trip or prevent it altogether since, at this particular moment, the Box was more than a little light.

* * *

After Cisco left, Escobar lifted his black telephone handset, which weighed a pound, and dialed a number he knew by heart. The Night Watchman answered.

“Hello, Father,” the man said softly.

“There’s unfinished business to talk about,” the priest said.

“The lawyer?”

“Of course! He’s never been properly dealt with. The man had the audacity to violate the sanctity of my house!”

“I’m working on it,” the Night Watchman said. “How are your little altar boys doing?”

“They’re not little. They are the next generation. They just have to be continuously prodded down the right path.”

The Night Watchman scoffed. “They haven’t got what it takes, Father, and they never will have.”

“Don’t worry about them. You’ve got your own job to do.”

“Don’t we all?” The Night Watchman let a second pass and then hung up.

He liked to do that. He wasn’t a pretty man. A pitted face had made him an angry adolescent, and knife fights as a kid followed by almost four decades of gritty police work in the family tradition had left him mean and bitter. Not to mention that throughout it all he was an underground, angry, anti-government subversive and hooligan in the cause of defeating international socialism. This was also in the family tradition. He was barrel-shaped now, like the seedy ex-cop he was, but it was all muscle and, despite his appearance, he was cerebral as hell. He read very frightening political essays, and was secretly writing his own. His wife of twenty-five years quivered at the sight of him, and it wasn’t from desire.

Angelo was deeply in love and enthusiastically looked forward to the simple things, like going to work every day, because he was building a future for himself and Aimee. And he was also motivated— and this was the wonderful thing— because he was certain that his Holy Water actually worked.

But over his world dark clouds began to appear. The first sign of trouble was that one of Angelo’s bicycle delivery men got pushed off the street by a panel van on Dumaine. The bike rider crashed into a group of tourists who were taking a haunted-house tour. A couple of people were knocked to the sidewalk, and Angelo got calls from lawyers threatening to sue. Angelo hung up on them.

The next day some graffiti artist spray-painted an obscenity in bright blue over the “Angelo’s Elixir” sign on the fence outside.

Then someone threw a dead possum over the fence. It didn’t endanger the well, which was now covered by a clever aqua top with hinges and handles molded from acrylics, but the carcass stunk up the yard. The possum’s throat had been cut. Someone was clearly bent on disrupting Angelo’s peaceful life.

The Fat Man had been a criminal recently enough to know how these things worked. Personal protection was required. But because of his police record for armed robbery, he couldn’t just take a bus to Walmart and buy a handgun. He had no such difficulty, however, getting one from the old man who ran the laundromat around the corner and who had several pieces to select from. For $300 Angelo got a heavy piece of metal, a European American Armory 9mm made in Turkey, and a couple of boxes of bullets.

“Somebody is screwing with me,” he told his financial backer, E.J. Chaisson.

After listening to Angelo explain the situation, E.J. insisted that he call the lawyer Dubonnet.

But Angelo held out for a few more days. Lawyers were part of the system, and the system had always been out to get him.

Then the same man who had tried to buy his Holy Water business walked through the gate a second time, and Angelo thought about shooting him right then and there.

After saying hello with his big smile, Frenchy Dufour asked Angelo again whether he had developed any more interest in selling the well.

“No, I like what I do! Alone!” the proprietor said forcefully.

“I could make it worth your while. You’d get a lot of money right off the bat. We could keep you on the payroll, too, as the ‘esteemed founder’, the face of the brand.”

“You just get the hell out of here!” Angelo yelled. “I like my business just the way it is.”

“You could become a lot bigger,” Dufour persisted. “You could get more wells. Maybe we could even use city water. People say it tastes good.”

“Screw that! My water heals people.” Angelo had turned off his music and risen from his stool.

“Really.” Frenchy Dufour looked at him and smiled even more broadly. “Really?” he repeated.

Angelo pushed him in the chest. “I told you to get out of here. Do I need to get rough with you?”

“No, no,” the man said, shaking his head and raising his palms. “But I’m truly sorry. Maybe you will change your mind when things get too rough for you.” He turned and calmly left by the gate.

Angelo went back into his shed and picked up his phone. He stared at it angrily, then punched in the number that E.J. had given him.

* * *

In anticipation of the call from E.J. Chaisson’s well-water friend, Tubby had been making a historical study of the drinking water supply in New Orleans. He learned that there had once been many, many wells, and naturally dozens of statutes and regulations dealing with them. No surprise there. New Orleans had from its earliest days been devoted to passing an abundance of ordinances.

In olden times, people had also relied on natural springs or on the rain water they collected in wooden cisterns, which they allowed to settle out in large pots. Then innovative entrepreneurs figured out how to make ice, and the city flourished, but that’s another story.

Nowadays people were stuck with drinking the Mississippi River, unless they preferred to drink wine. The river’s murky fluids were thoroughly fluoridated and chlorinated on their way to the customer. Despite these measures, some citizens had come to view the entire public water system as a fearsome public enemy because of the frequently issued “boiled water advisories” which caused many to avoid the tap. These “advisories” were to avoid subjecting the population to brain-eating amoebas.

Maybe the city was ready to rediscover its roots, Tubby thought. Artesian water could be the real deal. So he was prepared when Cherrylynn announced that Angelo Spooner, E.J.’s associate, was on the phone.

“Hey. Angelo here. This dude, Chaisson, said I should call you. I have a water business. It’s called ‘Angelo’s Elixir’. I’m the owner.” The voice was gruff— no nonsense.

“Why, sure, Mr. Spooner. E.J. said you might be in touch. What can I do for you?”

“I have some questions, uh… I’m having some trouble.” He stopped there.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Tubby said sympathetically. “Would you like to come to my office?”

“I could do that.”

They made a date.

As Angelo hung up he remembered that he was supposed to pick up Aimee at work. He ran out of his shop and unlocked the borrowed purple Cadillac.

* * *

When Angelo walked into the Subright at four o’clock to get his date, loud hip-hop was playing on the sound system. There were no customers in the restaurant. Behind the counter a pimply-faced kid with a chipped tooth was being ordered around by a heavy-set man with a rectangular mustache. Angelo figured the older man to be Mr. Momback, the boss.

“Is Aimee here?” he asked, bristling with hostility. “I’m her ride.”

“Yeah, she told me you’d be here,” Momback said without appearing the least bit perturbed. He sneered and Angelo sneered back.

“Are you her boss?”

“That’s me.”

“Well, I’m her boyfriend!” Angelo said with meaning.

“So I hear, fatso,” the manager said with a grin. He turned to the kid. “You’re in charge for a while,” he told him, and the boy’s head bobbed up and down. “I have to run an errand.” He walked calmly out the front door.

Angelo started after him, but then controlled himself.

He turned on the kid. “Why do you play this junk music?” he demanded.

“The manager likes it. Me, I’m into electronics like Datsik.”

“Crap,” Angelo muttered.

“Do you want to order anything, sir?” the boy asked pointedly.

“No. I wouldn’t listen to that junk for all the Subright sandwiches in the world. I’m just picking up Aimee. Is she ready?”

“She should be,” the boy said. “You can check in back.” He indicated the narrow doorway by the bread oven.

Angelo rapped loudly. “It’s me, Aimee,” he called.

He heard sobs and kicked the door open. Aimee was standing by a metal desk with her back to him. She was straightening out her dress, and she was crying. He rushed to put his arms around her tenderly, but she recoiled.

“Oh, no, no!” was all Angelo could say. “I’ll kill that son of a bitch!”

“You’re squeezing me too tight, baby,” she said, adjusting her bra.

He loosened his fingers, helped her with her shoes, and escorted her out the door. The kid was rocking to Ghostland Observatory and barely noticed them leave. If Angelo had taken a moment to stop and listen, he might have liked the music, too.

* * *

It was time to call it a day, and Tubby went to retrieve his Camaro from the seventh floor of the Place Palais garage. Lost in pleasant thoughts, he didn’t realize he was being watched by the driver of another vehicle parked nearby. Backing out of his reserved space and proceeding tediously down the ramps to the street and St. Charles Avenue, he never picked up the red Impala that was slowly following behind him.

Tubby Dubonnet was headed home, and he hoped there would be a woman there. He was pretty sure that there would be. Peggy O’Flarity had been spending two or three nights a week with him on Henry Clay. The rest of the week she stayed in Folsom with her horses. Their schedule wasn’t well established, however.

Sure enough, Peggy’s Porsche was parked in front of his house. She left the driveway to him.

He found her sitting on a plastic chair on the back porch wearing a wool sweater, for the evening was cool, and sipping a mug of Chai tea. In Tubby’s estimation Peggy was an extremely attractive woman— youthfully middle-aged.

“It’s very nice to see you here.” He waved at her from the back door.

“Is it?” she looked at him for confirmation. She still wasn’t sure where things stood between them.

“Absolutely,” he said, and meant it. He stepped onto the deck to rub her shoulders. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

“That feels so good.”

“Any dinner plans?”

“I had a business luncheon with the Arts Council, but I’ll do whatever you want.”

“We could go out. We could stay here and order a pizza.”

“If you keep rubbing my back, I won’t care what we do.”

“I think I’ll shower off,” he said.

She stood up, breaking his grip, and turned around. Running her fingers into his hair she kissed him tentatively. Her breasts just grazed his chest.

“Maybe I’ll join you,” she said with a sheepish smile.

“Well, you would be welcome,” Tubby replied— also with a smile— but not a sheepish one.

Alone, he climbed the steps to his bedroom, relieved that his occasional maid had deigned to come just that morning and the sheets would be fresh and the bathroom spotless. Not that he usually worried about such things. But since his divorce and the purchase of his new home, he had invested in certain luxuries— like the rain forest shower with multiple, strategically-focused shower heads. With hopes of good things to come, he turned down the sheets before stepping into the shower.

Tubby soaped up and was rinsing with the pulsating water when he heard a timid knock at the bathroom door. “Come in,” he boomed, over the flowing water. It opened and Peggy walked slowly into his foggy field of vision wearing nothing but her birthday suit, a very alluring birthday suit, in Tubby’s opinion. He extended a dripping hand, “Come on in, the water’s fine.”

She stepped into the shower and into his warm and wet embrace. He accepted her softly, their bodies relaxing into each other as the water worked its magical charms.

“Here,” he said, pushing her gently away, “let me help you wash up.” He picked up the bar of soap and began the long journey down her voluptuous body, spending a bit of extra time soaping her hard nipples and soft belly. Peggy seemed transfixed. He leaned over and whispered in her ear, “You could spread your legs a bit.” She protested but he was encouraging, “Come on, baby, just a little bit.”