Middle Man (9 page)

P
re-Marines and on the road, it happened that I grew tired of parks and hostels and unlocked cars for sleeping. Sometimes I would pick a house and watch it from about six
A.M
. until the adults left for work, and if there were no kids, I would break in and eat, set the alarm clock, and fall asleep. Most home alarm company signs were just beware-of-dog signs in disguise; if there was a home alarm system, it wasn't hooked up. I tried hard to get security companies to give me the codes: I was a son home from college and couldn't reach my parents, a new renter being cheated by the owners, a repairman on the job, a repairman who left his tools behind. Nothing worked. Another homeless kid, Vic, had a different approach. Vic was working as a busboy at a steakhouse near the marina in San Diego and he overheard people talking about a monthlong trip they were taking to Europe. He found the house, broke in. All he took was one extension of the cordless phone. That afternoon he stood in the yard and canceled the alarm service. The security companies think if you call from the home number, you're legit. Though they'll usually start the service from any number. It was a good plan, but Vic was paranoid and greedy.

Vic worried that someone else was going to try to usurp his new turf, so he bought a new keypad for the alarm system, put in his own code, then called a new security company and signed on with them, using the family's credit card, of course. His paranoia was justified, but being right did not help him. Within a week, there was a break-in, some other guys from the steakhouse. Cops came. The robbers ran away, Vic got hauled away.

I guessed right one time on a house that had the security sign but no alarm. A single woman lived there. Fifties, short dark hair. She left for work every morning about seven thirty. I went in the back door, ate cereal, cleaned up, then went to sleep in a guest room. I was always out before five. On the sixth day, I woke up at about noon and there she was, staring at me.

“Please don't call the police,” I said. I got up slowly and straightened the bed covers, trying not to look at her.

“I thought it might be my husband. Hoped, anyway. I saw the Cheerios. They were almost gone one day and full the next.”

“I replaced them.”

“And you changed the alarm clock. I use this one sometimes because it makes me get out of bed to turn it off. Otherwise I go back to sleep. He left three years ago. I don't even know if he's alive.” The tears started. She was blocking the doorway and I wanted very much to get through it, but the sobbing got worse and she was not going to move.

I hugged her. She just stood there. Arms limp. Eventually she said, “Thank you. That's enough.”

“I'm very sorry,” I said and I edged around her so I had a way out. “You should turn on that alarm. It's all rigged up. Probably worth the money. Not everyone will replace the Cheerios.”

“I turned it off after he left. After a few months. He could never remember the code and I didn't want him to come back and not be able to get in.”

“He'd probably just call you and complain, say, ‘Why the hell's the alarm on?'”

“You talk like you know him.”

Everybody knows him, but I did not want to say that. I could tell she was going to offer to let me come back, so I got out of there fast as I could without running.

______

Websites gave me an overview of the Runnymeade property, and the virtual house tour was still up on the listing realtor's site. Eight bedrooms, a ballroom, and a basketball court, indoors, to help the goons ward off boredom between kidnappings. I called ADT, claiming to be the landlord, and told them to reactivate the alarm system at nine
P.M
. I planned to be inside the house by then.

The mist reached critical mass and became a soft, light rain. The headlight beams scattered their power in the drops. Two young couples, teenagers, got out of a white BMW and came inside and took the booth next to mine at the Delta Diner. The girls were pretty, a little heavy, wearing shorts and sandals. The guys wore jeans. One had a small tattoo on his wrist. They had been to the movies, something scary, and they were still feeling the excitement. A girl said, “Why would she go back to the lagoons? I would never go to lagoons. Why do they even have lagoons anyway?”

A boy answered, “She heard the voices. She felt guilty. She thought she could help her friend.”

The girl said, “There's always something in a lagoon that's going to hurt you. A creature or something.”

Another boy said, “Not if you get out fast, or outsmart it.”

The girl said, “Right. You know you're gonna slip or trip or get sucked into the muck. Why do they even have lagoons anyway? Can't they just be filled in?”

The other girl said, “I could see going, but not alone.”

A girl and a boy said together, “Right.”

The King's phone rang; Zoran calling. When his tirade died down I said, “I'm just waiting for them to contact me. I'm going to arrange to give them the rest of the money and then Maya will be freed.” I said it loud enough for the teens to hear and they must have, because their talking stopped. Zoran went on a bit, but I would not tell him where I was or what the plan was, only that I was waiting for the other side to call.

The other side called fifteen minutes later. This time I spoke more quietly. I let them dictate the terms of the meeting. When they said they were not bringing Maya along, that she would be released later, I protested a bit for show. I was hoping they would pick a spot miles away, but they chose a restaurant just a mile from the diner. One hour.

As I was leaving, I heard one of the girls say, “Maybe we should call the police.” I turned back and glared to give her a thrill.

______

The gate at Runnymeade opened and two black SUVs barreled through the mist. Their windows were dark, so I could not see how many men were in each one. I had plenty of time to slip through the gate before it closed. It was 8:50.

Two guesthouses stood to the right of the big house. I cut behind them, hoping I could avoid any motion-detecting lights near the front entrance. All the structures were made of light, chalky looking stone, with sharply slanted roofs. The main house spread out away from the guesthouses, then curled back, forming a
J
. Plenty of downstairs lights were on. The only upstairs light was at the far end of the house before the curl. At the end of the
J
, I found an unlocked door and I entered a small room furnished with wicker and cushions, a sun room.

I stepped across the room and waited for a full two minutes, just listening. The staircase was straight ahead. The lights were on in the hallway to my left and I thought I could hear a TV somewhere down that way. They had brought six goons to the failed exchange in the park. I was hoping six went out to meet me this time. I figured no more than four stayed behind at the house. I wanted to deal with as many of them as I could first, before I found Maya.

The hallway was so long it needed a moving walkway. I passed two doors on the right and two on the left. All were closed and I left them that way. Large action photos of the basketball player who owned the house lined the walls. His feet never touched the floor, so the pictures gave the impression he was skipping along on air.

The TV grew louder as I got closer. Its light flickered against the walls as the scenes shifted. Someone shouted on-screen and a man laughed in the room ahead of me. I stopped and leaned tight to the wall. I peeked in. An enormous television was playing some historical action movie.

A man's voice said, “Do come in, Mr. Hewitt. No need for caution anymore. Actually, there wasn't any need for caution at all. We've been watching you all along.”

I checked behind me: Two goons in suits materialized down the hall. I might have been able to take them and get away. But I did not want to get away yet.

I entered a large den. The man doing the speaking stood behind a love seat, made of beige fabric, which was perpendicular to the television. Maya was sitting on the love seat. This man was not the Mr. Clark I heard on the phone. This man had a singsong Welsh accent. He was tall and big: big chest, big belly growing out under the chest. His head was shaved. His cheeks were flabby. That combination made him look like a gigantic, overgrown baby. A baby who played rough; he wore a patch over his left eye. At first I thought he was holding a gun, but he jabbed his right hand toward the enormous TV and paused the movie that was on-screen.

The goons behind me closed in and positioned me in front of the love seat, in front of Maya. Her expression was indecipherable. I was looking for panic, pleading, pain, hope. But I must have been looking for the wrong things. I could not break through.

The bald man sat down next to Maya and crossed one leg over the other. He spread his arms across the back of the love seat and smiled as if to taunt me.

“I was watching Stanley Baker. Well, I was watching Stanley Baker and you alternately. Know him?”

“No.” I looked at the TV. A thin-faced, dour looking leading man in a red British Army uniform, top button undone, was staring out into the distance at grassy hills. His dark hair was mussed up. He held his rifle casually in his left hand.

“Great actor. This is
Zulu
, one of his best roles. When I was a boy, I saw every Stanley Baker film. Mostly on TV by then. Sometimes sneaking into theaters. I wanted to be Stanley Baker. Joined the armed forces. But life isn't like the movies, is it? No, it is not. In the movies, the hero doesn't lose his eye. The hero's wounds always heal quickly on film. But I still enjoy a Stanley Baker film whenever I have the time.”

I looked at the screen again. The real Stanley Baker looked the opposite of the man on the couch. “I can see the resemblance,” I said.

He didn't smile. “Now about you, Mr. Hewitt. The alarm trick is a good one, though a bit unusual for someone with your résumé. Don't suppose you spent too much of your youth breaking into houses, did you? Not with that résumé. Here's a test. When you break into a house equipped with an alarm system, do you prefer to find an open or a closed circuit system?”

“When you kidnap women, do you prefer they struggle or do you prefer they pretend to like it?”

Maya's eyes flickered and her mouth tightened.

Stanley Baker said, “I enjoy a good lie, Mr. Hewitt, as much as the next man. A lie well told is a powerful tool, but like any tool, it must be used at the appropriate time to be most effective. I know who I am. I am comfortable with it. Comfortable enough to accept all the different aspects of my—”

“Oh, c'mon. It's a simple answer and no one cares what you say anyway. I was just asking to be polite.”

He nodded and a fist landed hard in my lower back. Before I finished grunting and trying to straighten up, Stanley Baker resumed his speech about being who he is, virtues and all, like it or not. He droned on, entertaining only himself, holding all of us hostage. The goons must have heard it a thousand times. They were the kind of hostages who pretended to like it. Maybe by now, they convinced themselves they did like it. At last, Stanley Baker finished by saying, “So, of course, I prefer them to be afraid because that's the honest response. And honesty is essential for knowing who someone is.”

I thought both responses were honest but decided not to press the point. Maya fell somewhere in between, detached, in the wings, waiting for her moment.

He went on. “Now, open circuit or closed?”

“I don't know.”

Stanley Baker said, “Sure you do. You know the answer. I'll prove it.” He nodded.

A goon hit me in the kidney again.

“That, by the way, is Mr. Clark, with whom you spoke on the phone.”

I could not see the advantage in stretching this out. “An open circuit. I prefer to find an open circuit. I would, if I broke in anywhere.”

“And why is that?”

I heard movement behind me. Two goons entered from the side nearest the front entrance. I figured they were the ones I saw leaving in the SUVs. That put eight of them in the room, plus Stanley Baker. I wasn't going to fight my way out.

“When you trip the alarm, the circuit closes, but you just have to snip the wire to reopen it,” I said.

“You're right. You're absolutely right. I knew you knew. I just don't know how you knew, but I'll get to that in due time. All in due time. Those were great days, the days of breaking into houses. Responsible only for myself. Free. A free agent in the world of minor crime. Minor crimes and major dreams. I could dream of one day being like Stanley Baker. Ever see him in
The Criminal
? You must, you really must. I used to ponder this question: Do we define ourselves by those crimes, or by the dreams? Well, we know the answer, don't we, you and I. I encourage all the boys to ponder that as they proceed with their lives. Don't let the little crimes define you, I say. I know you agree, or you wouldn't be head of an investment firm. Oh well, just for future reference, I told the security company to call me directly before turning the system on. Now, I see you didn't bring the money.”

“You could have started with that. I forgot the money,” I said.

“No matter. I thought you might. We went to your car and helped ourselves.”

He nodded toward one of the goons behind me. I turned. The goon held up my briefcase. But the briefcase is not what held me. The goon's eyes seemed to be smiling at me, eyes I had seen before. And he fit the description: shorter than me, thicker, dark complexion. The moment passed quickly and I tried to convince myself it was wishful thinking. If it was Mask Man, then my cover was blown. My cover was not blown, so it must not be him.

I turned back to Stanley Baker and said, “Does that mean you'll let Maya go now?”

He was waiting for that. He slid his arm down around Maya's shoulder. He didn't draw her close and she didn't move. “I have a lot of questions to ask you, Mr. Hewitt,” he said. “And it will take some time. So I'm going to allow you one question, any question, which I will answer as truthfully as I can. You have my word.”