When Old Men Die (11 page)

"What old times?" I asked.

"You know.
 
The old times when Dino's uncles had a free hand and there was a slot machine in every cat house in town."

"I didn't know you went back that far."

"Hell, I'm BOI, Smith.
 
You know that.
 
I wasn't in business then, but I was old enough to know what was going on."

"Do you know what's going on now?"

"I know
Braddy
Macklin's dead, if that's what you mean."

"Do you know why?"
 
It was worth a shot.
 
He might even tell me.

"If I did, I'd be over at the cop shop spilling the beans," he said.
 
"You know us bondsmen.
 
Always at the service of law and order."

There were a lot of people who would argue with that.
 
They want to get rid of bail bonding companies because they see the chance that county courts can be victimized.
 
A week or so back, there was a mild outcry in Houston when someone found out that a couple of bonding companies were posting bonds against the estimated value of property rather than the assessed value.
 
Zintner
would never do anything like that, or at least I didn't think he would, but he wasn't exactly what I thought of as the police force's best friend.

I did think, however, that I might as well play along with him.
 
"I'm glad to hear you're so eager to help out the forces of good.
 
It makes it easier for me to ask a little favor of you."

"Uh-oh," he said.
 
"Here it comes."

"Here
what
comes?" Dale Becker asked, looming in the doorway to the cubicle.

Becker looked like a pro wrestler -- huge and beefy with long blond hair, a gold loop in his right earlobe, and a mean mouth that twisted in a perpetual sneer.
 
He wore an L. A. Raiders cap that he'd turned backwards so that the bill covered his red neck, and his jeans were so tight that you could count the money in his wallet.
 
Becker didn't like me, which made us even.
 
I didn't like him, either.

"Smith here was just about to ask me a favor,"
Zintner
said.

Unlike me,
Zintner
thinks Becker is the greatest thing since tail fins on cars, and even I have to admit that Becker is good at what he does.
 
He always gets his man, and usually without too much of a struggle.
 
Of course the fact that he looks as if he could break your back with one hand tied behind him makes things easier.

"He wants you to let me help him find old Outside Harry," Becker said.
 
"I bet that's what it is."

"So you're looking for Harry?"
Zintner
said.
 
He didn't sound surprised.
 
"What the hell for?"

"Yeah," Becker said.
 
"What the hell for?"

"I don't remember inviting you in here," I said.

Becker laughed.
 
It came out something like, "
Hunh-hunh-hunh
."
 
Beavis and Butt-head without the charm.

"You might as well tell us, Tru,"
Zintner
said.
 
"It'll be all over the Island by noon."

It seemed as if it were all over the Island already, so I told them.
 
I didn't mention that Macklin's death might be connected; after all, it might not.

"I didn't know Dino was into helping out old bums that scrounge in trash cans," Becker said.

"Dino likes to help his friends," I told him.

Becker snorted.
 
"Some friend."

Zintner
went on as if Becker hadn't spoken. "And you want some time off to help out.
 
Is that it?"

"You guessed it."

"What about me?" Becker said.
 
"I bet I can find him in fifteen minutes."

"I'm sure you could," I said, not meaning a word of it.

Oh, Becker could find people if he got a tip, and he had plenty of people who were eager to feed him information, but no one was going to tip him to Harry.
 
He could also bring people in if someone else located them by phone, and lately that someone else was always me.

"I don't know that I can give you any time off, Smith,"
Zintner
said.
 
"Tomorrow's Tuesday.
 
Check-in day.
 
We'll need you on the phones."

On check-in day, the clients, well over a hundred of them, would be calling in to report their whereabouts.
 
All of them would call, because
Zintner
had a hand on their pocketbooks.
 
Something like that got their attention in a way that a probation officer never could.

"What about Dale?" I asked.
 
"He could take a few calls."

Becker laughed again.
 
"I don't do calls," he said.
 
"I nab the bail jumpers."

"You might as well give it a shot,"
Zintner
told Dale.
 
"Why not?
 
It wouldn't hurt you to do a little phone work.
 
Nobody's jumped, as far as I know.
 
But if I need you here, Smith, you better get your ass back whether you've found Harry or not."

"No problem," I said.

"You think there's any connection between Harry and what happened to Macklin?" he asked.

"Macklin?" Becker said.
 
"
Braddy
Macklin?
 
Didn't somebody ice him last night?"

That's the way Becker talks.
 
He thinks it makes him sound tough.
 
Maybe it does.

"Yeah, somebody whacked him,"
Zintner
said.
 
"You know, Harry has been around a long time.
 
He was as old as Macklin, or maybe older.
 
Two old guys like that, one of 'em dead and another one missing, there might be some connection."

"Who cares?" Becker asked.
 
"Two dudes that old, they got no business taking up space."

I wondered if he'd feel that way if he happened to live as long as Harry and Macklin had.
 
He was a sensitive guy, Becker was, and it was no wonder I didn't like him.
 
But at least he hadn't asked about my face.
 
I had to give him credit for that.

"Tell you what, Smith,"
Zintner
said.
 
"You can take all the time you need.
 
I didn't know Harry, but I've been seeing him on the streets since I was a kid.
 
And if you need any help, give Becker a call.
 
He might as well be out and doing something as sitting on his ass here.
 
After tomorrow that is.
 
I gotta have somebody on the phones tomorrow."

Becker started to protest at the mention of the phones, but then he changed his mind.
 
He just grunted, turned in the doorway, which wasn't easy considering his size, and walked back into the main room.

"Listen, Smith,"
Zintner
said, "you don't want to go getting mixed up in anything that might get you killed.
 
Braddy
Macklin was a tough old bird."

"I'm not going to get killed," I said.
 
"I'm just looking for Harry."

"Sure.
 
You got a gun?"

"Not with me," I said.

He opened the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled out a
Glock
17.

"You carrying?

"No," I said.
 
"It's against law."

"Better safe than sorry."

He sounded like something out of Poor Richard's
Almanac
.
 
He must have been really worried about me.
 
Maybe he knew something I didn't know.
 
But when I asked him, he denied it.

"I just don't believe in taking chances," he said, putting the
Glock
back in the drawer and closing it.

"Me neither," I told him.
 
And I meant it.

I
was on my way out of the building when Nancy Lamb called me over to her desk.
 
Her client was gone, and she was holding the phone.

"Telephone for you, Tru," she said, and handed it to me.

"Truman Smith," I said into the mouthpiece.

"Good morning, Mr. Smith."
 
The voice was a little shaky, and had a wheeze in it.
 
An old man's voice.
 
"This is Patrick Lytle."

"Good morning, Mr. Lytle."
 
I tried to keep the surprise out of my voice.
 
Lytle was a member of one of the oldest families on the Island.
 
I couldn't imagine what he could possibly want with me, unless some member of his family needed bail money.
 
"What can I do for you?"

"I understand that you're looking for Harry Mercer," he said.

"Harry Mercer?"

"You might know him better as 'Outside' Harry."

"Oh," I said, always quick with a comeback.
 
Until that moment, I hadn't even known that Harry had a last name.
 
"That's right."

"I'd like to talk to you about Harry if it's convenient," Lytle said.
 
"Like you, I'm quite interested in his whereabouts."

Harry was getting more popular by the minute, which was a little surprising, but I wasn't going to question my good luck.
 
Maybe Lytle had some information that I could use.
 
I didn't have anywhere else to look.

"I'd be glad to talk to you," I said.
 
"When and where?"

"I don't get out much these days," Lytle wheezed.
 
"Would it be convenient for you to come by my home this morning?"

"Any time," I said.

"Fine.
 
Let's make it eleven o'clock.
 
Do you know where the house is?"

I told him that I knew.

"Very well.
 
I'll see that the gate is open."

When I hung up, Nancy was looking up at me.
 
"Was that
the
Patrick Lytle?" she asked.

"The one and only."

"And you're going to his house?"

"At eleven o'clock," I said.

"I'd give a lot to see the inside of that place.
 
You need any company?"

I wouldn't have minded having Nancy along, but for some reason I didn't think Lytle would approve.

"You think
Zintner
would give you the time off?" I asked.

She sighed and lit a cigarette.
 
"Probably not.
 
But I've wondered about that house since I was a kid."

"So have I," I said.
 
"I'll tell you all about it."

She exhaled a stream of smoke that rose to join the rest of the pollutants collecting near the ceiling.

"You'd better," she said.
 
"Or I'll make you really sorry."

"He's pretty damn sorry already," Becker said from the desk where he was sitting.

"What's the matter with him?" Nancy asked.

"Jealous of my good looks," I said, and left before he could get out of his chair and ruin them with his baseball bat.

L
ytle's house was in one of the older parts of the city, where some of the houses looked as if they would be right at home if they were removed to San Francisco.
 
They were narrow, several stories tall, and so close together that the neighbors could have reached out their windows and shaken hands.

Lytle's house, however, wasn't like that at all.
 
It wasn't even what I'd call a house.
 
It was a mansion, and along with its grounds it occupied about half of an entire block.

If you were just driving by, you might think that no one lived there.
 
The grounds were enclosed by a rusty wrought iron fence about five feet high, and the house was hard to see from the street because it was surrounded by huge palms that grew closely together and by giant magnolias and oaks that hadn't been trimmed in forty years or more.
 
The oaks were the oldest of the trees, and Spanish moss hung from them like long gray beards.
 
They must have been older than the house itself, and that dated from somewhere just after the turn of the century.
 
The magnolias weren't much younger.