Hugger Mugger (2 page)

“L
AMARR
,
G
EORGIA
?”
S
USAN
said.

She was lying on top of me in her bed with her clothes off, her arms folded on my chest, and her face about six inches from my face. Pearl the Wonder Dog was lying somewhat grumpily on the rug at the foot of the bed, having been displaced, if only temporarily, by me.

“Just an old sweet song,” I said.

“Don't sing. Do you know anything about racehorses?”

“Secretariat gave me a big lap once,” I said.

“Anything less specialized?” Susan said.

“That's about it.”

“And you are being brought in over someone who has heretofore been in charge?”

“Yes.”

“So you are going to Georgia without Pearl, or me, and you'll be gone for who knows how long, and you
don't know what you're doing, and the people you're working with will resent you.”

“Exactly,” I said.

“And you're doing this because you love horses?”

“Because I hate starving,” I said. “I've been doing
pro bono
for you and Hawk so long that I can't afford to buy a new knuckle knife.”

“Too bad virtue is not, in fact, its own reward,” Susan said.

“Or if it really were, the reward would need to be monetary.”

“Well, perhaps we can visit.”

“You and Pearl could come down,” I said.

“Pearl does not, obviously, fly in a crate in the hold of some disgusting airplane,” Susan said.

“It's an easy drive,” I said. “One overnight stop.”

Susan stared at me. Her eyes were so close they were out of focus as I looked up at her. They seemed bigger than human eyes could be and bottomless, like eternity.

“I cannot bear to drive long distances.”

“Of course you can't,” I said. “Maybe Paul would come up from New York, for a weekend, and take care of Pearl.”

“That might work,” Susan said. “Or Lee Farrell, or Hawk.”

“And then you can come to Lamarr on an airplane and ball my brains out.”

“Didn't I just do that?” Susan said. “Except for the airplane part?”

“Yes,” I said, “and brilliantly.”

“I know.”

“However,” I said, “I don't think we've ever done it in Georgia.”

“Well, if you insist on going down there,” Susan said, “what's a girl to do?”

“What she does best,” I said.

“In which case we'll never be able to eat lunch in Lamarr again,” Susan said.

I
SHOWED UP
in Lamarr with some clean shirts and extra ammunition in my black Nike gym bag, checked into the Holiday Inn on the highway outside of Lamarr, and set out to visit my employer.

Lamarr was one of those towns you read about but no one you know ever lived in. It was probably like the town that Jack Armstrong lived in with his sister Betty, when he starred at Hudson High. The downtown was three-story buildings, mostly brick, along the main street, with some stores and restaurants, a pool hall, a movie theater, and a railroad station. There were two cross streets, where more business was done during daylight hours. In the center of the town was a square with a statue of a man on horseback, and some benches. As I drove through the downtown, the streets were lined with trees, and behind the trees were lawns on which sat some nice-looking southern-type houses, mostly white,
with verandas. Often vines grew over the verandas and made them leafy.

At two in the afternoon I was ringing the bell at the Clives' front door. They lived in a white mansion with a wide pillared veranda across the front, which sat in the middle of something that looked like the world's largest putting green. A sprinkler system was producing a fine spray to protect the lawn from the East Georgia summer, and the sun shining through the spray made it iridescent.

Penny Clive, in white shorts and a blue top that didn't quite conceal her belly button, answered the door. All of her that I could see uncovered was a smooth tan. Not the deep-cured kind, but a gentle healthy-looking one that seemed casually acquired, though the evenness of it made me wonder just how casual the process was.

“Well, hello,” she said.

She had a light voice with some kind of rich undertone, which made everything she said imply somewhat more than it seemed to. I had a moment when I thought maybe it wasn't so bad that Susan couldn't be here. I thought about whether I should feel guilty about that and decided I should not since I was simply being human, albeit male human.

“Hello.”

“Please come in. Do you have everything you need at the hotel?”

We stood in a vast, high central hallway with dark floors that gleamed with polish.

“Bed, television, a/c, running water, what more could there be?” I said.

“What indeed?” she said, and the little smile lines at
the corners of her wide mouth deepened. “I was just having some iced tea on the terrace—would you have some with me?”

“Of course,” I said, and followed her the length of the corridor and out through some very large French doors onto a wide white-brick terrace under a green-and-white-striped canvas canopy.

“Daddy's not here,” she said.

“You're more fun anyway,” I said.

“It depends,” she said.

She gestured at a couple of comfortable-looking patio chairs. We sat. There was a big glass pitcher on a serving table and some glasses and ice in a bucket and sugar and lemons and fresh mint.

“On what?” I said.

“On whether you're a business partner or a sex partner,” she said.

She put ice in a tall glass, added a lemon wedge and a mint leaf, and poured me some iced tea. I added some sugar.

“It's probably not the business partners who are voting for fun,” I said.

“No,” Penny said. “Speaking of fun, we're having a little welcome party for you tonight. I hope you don't mind.”

“Most employers hold one when I leave,” I said.

“Daddy thought it would be a convenient way to introduce you to everybody. Very informal, starts around seven.”

“Wouldn't miss it,” I said.

The backyard, if one could call it that, was being
sprinkled too. It stretched dead level toward some sort of outbuildings in the middle distance. Beyond them was a tennis court and, beyond the courts, a paddock and what I assumed were stables. As we sat, a Dalmatian came sniffing around the corner of the terrace, paused, looked up, put his ears back, and came over toward me, moving more slowly, with his head lowered a little and his tail wagging tentatively.

“That's Dutch,” Penny said.

Dutch kept coming until he was in pat range. I put my closed fist out so he could sniff it. Which he did for maybe a full minute, quite carefully sniffing all aspects of it. Then he was satisfied. His ears came back up and his tail resumed full wag. He put his head on my leg and stood while I stroked his head.

“Tell me more about the horse shootings,” I said.

She was turned half sideways in her chair, one leg tucked under her, giving me her full attention. She was clearly one of those especially likable women who made you feel that you might be the most interesting creature they had ever encountered. I knew that everyone she talked to felt that way, but it was no less pleasing for that. Right now it was my turn.

“I'm not sure where to start,” she said. “I know all of us are in something of a tizzy.”

“Well, were all the horses shot with the same weapon?”

“Oh God, I wouldn't know that sort of thing. Jon Delroy might know. Or you could talk with Deputy Becker.”

“Any geographical pattern?”

“All here,” she said.

“How many horses?”

“Three—a stable pony, and two colts.”

She sipped some iced tea, dipping her face into it, holding the glass in both hands, looking at me over the rim.

“Where did they get shot?”

“I just told— Oh, you mean what part of them did the bullet hit?”

“Yes.”

“One in the head, the stable pony. He died. Heroic Hope was shot once in the left shoulder. I don't think he'll run again. Saddle Shoes was shot in the neck. The vets tell us he should be fine.”

“You said ‘bullet'—was each of them shot just once?”

“I believe so.”

Dutch took his head off my leg suddenly and walked away. I saw no reason for it. He appeared to be stepping to the beat of his own drummer. He found a spot on the lawn, in the sun, out of sprinkler range, turned around three times, and settled down and went to sleep.

“Only one died?” I said.

“Yes.”

I nodded.

“You're looking so wise all of a sudden. Have I supplied you a clue?”

“Just a thought,” I said.

“Oh, tell me, what is it?”

I shook my head.

“I assume that's not Three Fillies world headquarters down there,” I said.

“The stables? Oh God no. It's where we keep our own horses. The racing operation is about a mile down the road. Are we changing the subject?”

“Yes, ma'am.”

“So you won't have to tell me your thought?”

“I have so few,” I said. “I like to nurture them.”

She nodded thoughtfully and sipped a little more of her tea.

“You're very charming,” she said. “But you don't actually say very much.”

“I haven't much to say.”

“I don't believe that,” Penny said.

“And detectives get further listening than they do talking.”

“Are you being a detective now?”

“I'm always being a detective,” I said.

“Really? Is that how you define yourself?”

“No. I define myself as Susan Silverman's main squeeze. Detective is what I do.”

“Are you married to her?”

“Not quite.”

“Tell me about her.”

“Smart, a little self-centered, intense, quick, very tough, very funny, dreadful cook, and beautiful.”

“What does she do?”

“Shrink.”

“Wow.”

“Wow?”

“Well, I mean, it's so high-powered.”

“Me too,” I said.

Penny smiled.

“Have you two been together for a long time?” she said.

“Yes.”

“But you've never married.”

“No.”

“Is there a reason?”

“It's never seemed a good idea at the times we've thought about it.”

“Well, I'd love to meet her.”

“Yes,” I said. “You would.”

When the sprinklers stopped, Penny and I took a stroll with Dutch around the grounds, the tennis courts, and the riding stables. The unexplained outbuildings turned out to be a small gymnasium with weight-lifting equipment and two locker rooms. Then I went back to my hotel to think long thoughts. As is usual when I'm thinking long thoughts, I lay on the bed with my eyes closed. Susan says I often snore when thinking long thoughts.

J
APANESE LANTERNS IN
many colors were strung over the dark lawn, defining a patch of light and movement behind the Clive mansion. A number of guests dressed in elegant informality clustered together inside the circling lanterns near a bar set up on a table with a white tablecloth, where a black man in a white coat made drinks upon request. I was there wearing a summer-weight blue blazer to hide my gun, and sipping some beer and eating an occasional mushroom turnover offered me by a black woman with cornrows, wearing a frilly white apron. If you went outside the lanterns into the surrounding darkness and waited until your eyes adjusted, you could look up and see stars in the velvety night.

Walter Clive was there in a straw-colored jacket and a navy-blue shirt. He still had on his aviator sunglasses, probably protection from the glare of the lanterns. A woman in a soft-green linen dress came out of the house
and into the circle of light. She had silvery blond hair, and very worthwhile cleavage, and good hips and long legs. She was standing with a graceful-looking younger man with hair as blond as hers.

“Dolly,” Clive said. “Over here.”

She turned toward his voice and smiled and walked toward us. She had the kind of walk that helped me to think about the soft sound of the linen dress whispering across her thighs. When she got to where we were she kissed Clive, and put her hand out to me.

“Dolly, this is Spenser, the man we've hired.”

“How lovely to meet you,” she said.

Her grip was firm. She smelled gently of French perfume. At least in the light of the Japanese lanterns, her eyes were violet.

“How do you do?” I said.

“Have you met Hugger yet?”

“No, is he here?”

“Oh, aren't you funny,” she said.

There was intimacy in the way Dolly stood and talked, which seemed to suggest that we really ought to be in bed together, and until then we were just marking time.

“Yes, I am,” I said. “Do you have any theories on the horse assaults?”

“Oh Lord no,” she said. “That's not my business.”

“What is your business?” I said.

She nodded at Clive, who was talking with a group of guests.

“Keeping him happy,” she said.

“Which you do well.”

She didn't appear to do anything, but I could feel the energy between us again.

“Which I do
very
well,” she said.

Penny came by and took my arm.

“Sorry, Dolly, the big boss has ordered me to introduce him around.”

“It's best to follow orders,” Dolly said, and drifted away toward Clive.

“Wife?” I said.

“Girlfriend.”

“Where's your mother?”

“Left years ago. She lives in San Francisco with a guitarist.”

“You get along?” I said.

“With Dolly? Oh sure. She keeps Daddy happy and when Daddy's happy, everybody's happy.”

“Who's the younger blond guy she's with?”

“That's her son,” Penny said. “Jason.”

“She's older than she looks,” I said.

Penny smiled brilliantly.

“We all are,” she said.

With her arm through mine she steered me through the guests. We stopped in front of a woman whose idea of easy informality appeared to be gold sling-back shoes with glass heels and a gauzy white dress. She was good-looking. Every woman at the party was good-looking. They all looked as if they had just stepped from the shower and doused themselves with lilac water and taken plenty of time getting ready for the party.

“This is my big sister,” she said. “Stonie. Stonie, this
is Mr. Spenser, whom Daddy has hired to protect Hugger.”

“Well,” Stonie said, “you certainly have the build for it.”

“You have a nice build too,” I said.

“Why, aren't you just lovely to notice.”

The man with her turned away from his conversation and put out a hand.

“Cord Wyatt,” he said. “I'm the lucky husband of this lady.”

He was taller than I am and slim, with the kind of loose build I associated with polo players. Since I had never seen a polo match, my association may not have been accurate. He had the tan and the perfect smile, and so did his wife. Everybody had it. If I were a skin cancer specialist, I'd move right down here.

“And this is my middle sister, SueSue.”

It was getting monotonous. Blond hair, tan skin, white teeth. SueSue's dress was flowered.

“Wow,” SueSue said.

“Wow?” I said.

“No one told me you were a hunk,” SueSue said.

“Sadly,” I said, “no one has told me that either.”

“Well, you surely are,” she said.

“He doesn't look like so much to me,” a man said.

“My husband, Pud,” SueSue said.

I put my hand out. Pud didn't take it. He appeared to be drunk. As I thought of it, maybe SueSue was drunk too. Which was too bad—it took a little something away from the “hunk” designation.

“Pud,” I said, and took my hand back.

Pud looked like he might weigh 250, but it was weight that had collected on a frame designed to support maybe 210. He had the look of a college football player ten years out of shape. He was probably stud duck at the Rotary Club cookouts. I could have taken him while whistling the Michigan fight song and balancing a seal on my nose.

Pud said, “So, how you doing, Hunk?”

“Fine, thank you, Pud.”

I maybe put a little more edge into “Pud” than I had to, but on the whole I was being the soul of civility.

“My wife thinks you're a hunk,” he said.

His tongue was having a little trouble, and “you're” came out as a compromise with “you are.”

“A common misperception,” I said. “You must have the same problem, Pud.”

He frowned at me. Even sober, I suspected, his strong suit would not be thinking.

“You got yourself a problem,” he said, “with my name?”

“Oh, Pud,” SueSue said. “Nobody gives a damn about your silly old name.”

Penny was quiet; she seemed sort of interested.

“The hunk don't like my name,” he said, and stared at me. The stare would have been scarier if he could focus.

“It's quite a lovely name,” I said. “Is it short for something?”

“His father's name was Poole,” SueSue said. “Poole Potter. He called his son Puddle.”

“I see,” I said.

“I don't think I like you talking to my wife, Hunk.”

“Of course you don't,” I said.

“So buzz off.”

He put his hand on my chest and gave me a little shove. It was too little. I didn't move.

“Pud,” I said. “Please don't make a mistake here.”

“Mistake? What mistake? I'm telling you to buzz off.”

“You're drunk,” I said, “and I'm even-tempered. But don't put your hands on me again.”

He had a low-ball glass in his right hand that appeared to contain bourbon. He took a bracing pull on it.

“I ought to knock you on your keister.”

“Sure,” I said, “but you can't and you're just going to look like a goddamned fool. Why don't I apologize and you accept and we'll go our separate ways?”

“You think I can't?”

Neither Penny nor SueSue made any move to intervene. There was something a little unpleasant flickering in SueSue's eyes as she watched.

“Pud, I've been doing this for a living since before you started pickling your liver. It's not a good match for you.”

He stared at me. Some part of him got it. Some part of him knew he'd gotten in where he didn't belong. But he was too drunk to back down. He looked at SueSue. The unpleasant glint was still in her eyes. She smiled an unpleasant smile.

“Don't you let him push you around, Pud Potter,” she said.

He frowned as if he were trying to concentrate, and put his drink on a table next to him. It came the way I
knew it would, a long slow looping right punch that I could have slipped while writing my memoirs. I blocked it on my left forearm. He threw a left of the same directness and velocity. I slipped the left, put my hand behind his shoulder, and used the slow force of the punch to continue him around. When he was turned, I put my foot against his butt and shoved. He stumbled forward and fell on the lawn, and got up with deep grass stains on the knees of his white slacks.

Walter Clive detached himself from the group he was entertaining and walked over. Dolly came with him.

“What seems to be the problem?” he said.

“Pud is drunk,” Penny said.

Clive nodded. “And being Pud,” he said.

“Yes.”

Pud was standing, looking a little disoriented, ready to charge.

“SueSue,” Clive said. “Take Pud home.”

He turned to me.

“I apologize for my son-in-law. He's a little too fond sometimes of that sippin' whiskey.”

“No harm,” I said.

Clive never looked to see if Pud was leaving. Which he was, led by SueSue away from the bright circle of Japanese lanterns. Dolly smiled at me warmly. The smile made me think of perfumed silk. I was pretty sure I knew what she did to make Clive happy.

“Penny,” Clive said, “introduce Mr. Spenser to our trainer.”

“Sure thing, boss,” Penny said, and put her arm through mine again and led me toward another part of
the terrace. Clive went back to his guests with Dolly beside him.

“You handled him like he was a little boy,” Penny said. She hugged my arm against her.

“It's what I do,” I said. “As in most things, there's a pretty big difference between amateurs and professionals.”

“I'll say.”

“Sorry that had to happen,” I said.

“Oh, not me,” Penny said. “I'm thrilled. I think Pud needs to be kicked in the ass every evening.”

“In your experience, am I going to have to do it again?”

“I don't know. He may not even remember it in the morning.”

“Perhaps SueSue will remind him.”

“You don't miss much,” she said. “Do you?”

“Just doing my job, ma'am,” I said.

“Most of the people Pud picks on are afraid of him.”

“Given his fistic skills,” I said, “he would be wise to ascertain that in advance.”

She smiled and gave my arm an extra squeeze and guided me through the cocktail crowd.

I
T WAS TEN
minutes to six in the morning. I was at the rail with Hale Martin, the Three Fillies trainer, at the east end of the Three Fillies training track with the sun on my back, drinking a cup of coffee from the pot in the trainer's room. A big chestnut horse was being ridden around the soft track by a small girl in jeans and a lavender T-shirt that read
THREE FILLIES
on it. A whip was stuck into the top of her right boot. Under her funny-looking rider's cap, her hair was a long single braid down her back. The girl was an exercise rider named Mickey. The horse was Hugger Mugger. He was beautiful. There were four other horses being galloped in the morning. They were beautiful. As I went along I discovered that they were all beautiful, including the ones that couldn't outrun me in a mile and a furlong. Maybe beauty is skin-deep.

“How much does he weigh?” I said.

“About twelve hundred pounds,” Martin said.

I'd always imagined that trainers were old guys that looked like James Whitmore, and chewed plug tobacco. Martin was a young guy with even features and very bright blue eyes and the healthy color of a man who spent his life outdoors. He wore a white button-down shirt and pressed jeans, a silk tweed jacket, riding boots, and the kind of snug leather pullover chaps that horse people wore, I think, to indicate that they were horse people.

“And that hundred-pound kid controls him like he was a tricycle.”

Martin smiled. “Girls and horses,” he said.

“It's probably a sign of city-bred boorishness,” I said. “But all the horses look pretty much alike.”

“They ought to,” Martin said. “They're all descended from one of three horses, most of them from a horse called the Darley Arabian.”

“Close breeding,” I said.

“Um-hmm.”

We were alone at the rail except for the Security South guards in their gray uniforms, four of them, with handguns and walkie-talkies, watching Hugger Mugger as he pranced through his workout.