Geezer Paradise

Contents

Chapter-One

Chapter-Two

Chapter-Three

Chapter-Four

Chapter-Five

Chapter-Six

Chapter-Seven

Chapter-Eight

Chapter-Nine

Chapter-Ten

Chapter-Eleven

Chapter-Twelve

Chapter-Thirteen

Chapter-Fourteen

Chapter-Fifteen

Chapter-Sixteen

Chapter-Seventeen

Chapter-Eighteen

Chapter-Nineteen

Chapter-Twenty

Chapter-Twenty One

Chapter-Twenty Two

Chapter- Twenty Three

Epilogue

GEEZER PARADISE

by R. P. Gannon

(A Senior Mystery)

Chapter One

South Florida August 2008

IF YOU'RE AN old man with lots of money, you're sexy.  But if you're an old man without any money, you're just a d
irty old man.  I'm the latter. I'm Barney McGee, a retired newspaper reporter transplanted to South Florida in search of the Golden
Years
. 
I've been here over a year now and I'm still searching.  I think money has something to do with it. 

             
I was sitting at my small kitchen table reading the latest threats from the electric company, and wondering if I could get by using oil lamps when my phone rang.  It was my next door neighbor, Willey.  He was upset, something about Freddy, our lawyer.  It sounded like something was wrong with Freddy, but Willey was sputtering so much I couldn't figure out what he was saying.  Finally I heard him say, "Taken out in the middle of the night."  That was bad news.  I told Willey to come over. 

             
I live in the Blue Orchid Mobile Home Park in Citrus Bay, Florida.  It's a 55+ park.  No young folks here.  I call the park Geezer Paradise.  Freddy was our lawyer, he had been representing the park residents in court against the park owners.  The park owners wanted to sell the park to a developer.  The developer, of course, wants to build high rise condos on the land.  Land on the Gulf coast of Florida was selling at a premium, but if the owners sold out we would be homeless.  There's no such thing as respect for the elderly anymore.  As Charlie Chan would say, "When money talks, few are deaf."  It was a fight we had to win, but what would we do without Freddy? 

             
While I was waiting for Willey I went out to my carport and dumped a bag of trash into the barrel.  The tiny lizards that live under the units were already cavorting on the driveway, and the heat was starting to become oppressive, even though the day was just beginning.  I was wearing khaki shorts, a pullover short sleeve shirt, and flip flops, and I still felt overdressed.  August is a broiler of a month in South Florida, but at least we don't have to shovel three feet of snow in January, in the biting cold like we did up north.  It's a trade-off we all make . . . all except the Snowbirds that is.  The snowbirds are those of us who can afford fly up north to spend the summer with relatives.  I looked around at all the empty units, that's what they call the houses in a mobile home park, units.  If you value your life don't ever call them trailers.  There are only about fifty houses in the park that are occupied year round.  Those are the people like Willey and I who can't afford to escape the summer heat.  I suppose it could be worse, like if we lived in Key West.  Now that's hot.

             
I'm originally from Massachusetts.  Up there we say there are only two seasons, dead of winter and bad sledding.  And that's only a slight exaggeration.  I try not to tell people I'm from Massachusetts because they laugh at me.

             
"You have all those crazy politicians," they say.  They're right of course, that's why we call the place, "The world's largest asylum." 

             
I went inside and started a pot of coffee.  A minute later Willey came crashing in.  Willey's a scruffy old elf with a white beard and a mop of white hair that looks like he combs it with an eggbeater.  If he stood still on your lawn your neighbors would want to know where you got the spiffy garden gnome. 

              "Barney," Willey said, all out of breath.  "They took Freddy out in the middle of the night, dead as a doorknob. What are we going to do now?"

             
We were in trouble.  Freddy had been our only hope.  He was one of the few lawyers in Florida who hadn't retired to a seaside mansion in Naples.  That was because Freddy got caught up in the stock market bubble and got wiped out.  Since then he had been living with us regular folks here in the park.  Freddy had been our crusader in the fight against the park owners.  We were trying to stop the sale.  Now we no longer had anybody to represent us in court.               

             
I was able to calm Willey down and sat him at my kitchen table with a cup of coffee.  I poured one for myself.  My head was spinning.  In Florida we have hurricanes, sink holes, and more than our share of tornados.  It's also the lightening-strike capital of the world.  Life here is precarious enough without someone trying to sell the land out from under us.  Besides, we pay a hefty rent to the park owners each month, but they want the fast money.  That's what keeps the old folks down here awake at night, that, and having to pee every two hours.  No wonder old people are cranky.                                                                                               

             
Willey said, "I don't know what we're going to do now, Barney.  Freddy was our last hope.  We can't raise enough money to hire a lawyer, and none of us can afford to buy a house or even pay the rents they charge these days."  I shook my head in frustration.  We couldn't just pack up and move, we had nowhere to go. 

             
"What happened to Freddy?" I asked.  "Did he have a heart attack?"

             
"Must have been a heart attack," Willey said, as he poured about half a cup of sugar into his coffee.  "He didn't look sick yesterday when I saw him, but in the middle of the night he called 911--and then he dropped the phone.  You never know when your time will come . . . unless, of course, they killed him.  I wouldn't put it past them."  He was talking about the Flaherty Development Corp., the construction company that wanted to buy the park.

             
"Willey, I don't think they'd kill somebody just to make money."  The words were barely out of my mouth when I realized how foolish I sounded.

             
"Are you kidding, Barney?  They'll make millions on the deal.  Flaherty would kill his own grandmother for that much money."                                                  

             
"Won't they have an autopsy?" I asked.  "Don't they usually have one when somebody dies suddenly?"  Willey looked at me like I was a particularly slow five-year-old.                                                 

             
"Barney, do you have any idea how many old geezers keel over every day in South Florida?  Why do you think they call this place 'God's waiting room?'  The cargo holds of passenger planes that leave Florida every day are filled with caskets headed up north for the dirt nap.  How much do you think it would cost to autopsy every one of them?"

             
Great, now if I have to fly somewhere I'll be imagining sounds coming from

underneath the cabin
floor.  The undead trying to get out.

             
"So you really think they killed Freddy?" I asked.

             
"Like I said, Barney, I wouldn't put anything past them.  Remember when they bought Crescent Park up in Palm Harbor?  They went in there and tore up the landscaping so bad the place looked like Dresden after World War Two, saying they were making repairs.  Then they harassed those people until they couldn't take any more, shutting off their water and electricity, telling them it was necessary to make the repairs.  And when one resident started getting in their face and calling the newspapers, he suddenly disappeared.  Nobody ever found out what happened to him.  I think they killed him and fed him to the 'gators in the Everglades.  In the end they offered the residents a few bucks to leave, and they took it.  They're not what you'd call 'decent people', Barney."

             
Willey's cell phone rang.  He took it out of his shirt pocket, opened it, and looked at the screen.

             
"Hi, Mary," he said.  "What's going on?"  He was silent for a few seconds, and then, "And he's going to do it, huh?  Good.  Thanks for calling.  And let me know what happens, okay? Bye."                                                                                            

             
"That was Mary," Willey said.  "She was there last night when they took Freddy out.  You know she works at the coroner's office in Tampa, don't you?"  I nodded.  Mary was Willey's cousin.

             
"She told the coroner she thought Freddy's death might have been the work of Flaherty and his crew.  She told him if Freddy was killed because he was helping us, then she could be in danger, too.  She had been fighting Flaherty right along with Freddy.  For that matter, Barney, so had you and me.  She begged the coroner to at least have a look at Freddy to see if anything looks suspicious.  The coroner said he would." 

             
That was good news, because if Freddy was murdered I would want to know about it for my own safety.  John Flaherty, the owner of the construction company, was the largest and most treacherous developer in the area.  He was capable of anything.  His slimy deals were legendary.  It was widely known that he always got what he wanted, legally or otherwise.  And now he wanted our homes, or rather, the land under them.

             
Willey said, "You know, Barney, if we could find a way to look through Flaherty's books we might find something we could pin on him . . . , bribes maybe.  He must be bribing everybody and his brother.  What do you think?"                        

             
"There's no way they'll let us look through their books, Willey.  Get real."  

             
"I know they won't.  Maybe we'll have to do it without their permission.  Maybe break into their offices.  I think that's the only way we can save our homes." 

             
Sometimes I think Willey's elevator doesn't go all the way to the top.  "Are you crazy?" I asked.  I was upset, too, but Willey was going over the edge.  I might not be the brightest star in the sky, but I'm smart enough to stay out of jail. 

             
Willey rubbed his beard.  "Well, I guess you could always stay in a homeless shelter when they throw you out of here." 

             
He was exaggerating.  We would still have our pensions, but we'd have to move to Tampa or Saint Pete, and live in one room, and share a common bathroom with maybe a half-dozen strangers.  I didn't want to think about it.                                                                                                                                                    Willey asked, "Barney, what's the worst they would do to us if we got caught breaking in?  We're a couple of senior citizens trying to save our homes.  We've never been in trouble before.  We're upstanding citizens who are rebelling against the system.  The worst that would happen to us would be a slap on the wrist and a year's probation.  Look at me, Barney.  Do I look like a criminal to you?"

             
"Are you kidding?  You look like a lunatic.  They'd throw you into a rubber room and swallow the key."

             
"Do you have a better idea?" Willey asked.  I didn't, but I didn't want to end up in jail, either.  Willey could always plead insanity, he looks the part, but they'd throw the book at me.  

             
"Forgetaboutit," I said.  "It's a bad idea."

Chapter Two

AFTER WILLEY LEFT
I went out to my Florida room to think things over.  We didn't have any options.  The units we live in are not easily moved.  The Florida rooms have concrete foundations, and the carports are securely attached.  Even if we could move them it would cost a fortune.  And there was no guarantee that the park we moved into wouldn't be bought out from under us, too.  We were somewhere between a rock and a hard-place.

             
I turned when I heard a noise.  Eddie the egret was tapping at my glass door with his beak.  I never should have started feeding the little moocher.

             
"Wait a minute, Eddie," I yelled.  I went into the kitchen, chopped up half a hot dog into small pieces, and brought it out to him on a saucer.  Eddie is a snowy egret, they're pure white birds with long necks, long black legs and jet black eyes.  They look a lot like flamingos.

             
"You're a pest, Eddie," I told him, as I put the saucer down on the doorstep.  I don't let him come into the house because birds have a habit of indiscriminate pooping.  When the hotdog was gone Eddie lifted his long white neck and trained his beady, black eyes on me looking for more.  He had a good appetite for a bird.  I went back inside and chopped up the rest of the hot dog.  I talked to Eddie until the heat got to me, then I told him to go mooch off somebody else.