TWENTY-THREE

EVEN BEFORE I opened my apartment door I knew Jellyroll was gone. A dog’s consistency ingrains itself in one’s consciousness like a familiar piece of music. He should have responded to the sound of my key in the lock with a single bark; then I should have heard him run headlong at the door, skid to a stop, toenails clattering on the hardwood foyer floor. When I opened the door, he should have jumped at my face, attempting to lick it in midair. I would have ruffled his ears to elicit his smile, roughhouse for a while. A dog’s greeting is a gift of nature.

“What is it?” said Sybel.

“Jellyroll’s gone.”

“How do you—? Calabash, maybe Calabash has him out for a walk?”

“No. There’s his leash, on the hook.” Weariness vanished. “Someone took him,” I said. I saw myself trembling, but I didn’t feel it. I felt myself stepping over the edge. I tore Cobb’s device from my chest and smashed it on the floor.

“Artie—” said Sybel from far in the distance.

I turned and made straight for Jerry’s shotgun in the bedroom closet. I flipped dirty clothes and unused sports paraphernalia out between my legs until I got to the gun. I liked its feel, its heft and balance. It felt like a friend. What did I intend to do with it just then? Pump some shells through the mechanism, lend a little palpability to my revenge fantasy? I don’t know.

“Artie, careful—” Sybel, I only sort of recognized, was cowering against the wall in the foyer. God, how I wanted to kill the man who took my dog. Did that mean I was cracking up or was that a perfectly reasonable response?

I heard a key in the door lock. I shouldered the shotgun and leveled it the peephole.

Sybel screamed, “No!”

Calabash opened the door. At the sight of me, he spun away from the doorway and out into the hall, shouting, “It’s me, it’s me!”

From that same far distance, I watched myself lower the gun and sag against the wall.

Calabash peeked in.

“Somebody took Jellyroll,” Sybel told him. Then she came to me, took the shotgun from my hands, and hugged me. Calabash came over and enfolded us both in his arms.

“Okay, we tink dis ting out. I couldn’t come back here till the cops left, so that’s how they got to Jellyroll. Now you tell me what happened at the jailhouse, you tell me what’s what. Den we figure out real calm what we doin’.”

The phone rang. Calabash answered. He listened for a moment, then held the receiver for me. “Pine,” he said.

“Hey, Arthur, doesn’t do a man’s business standing in the community a bit of good when his employees get themselves arrested.”

“Do you have my dog?”

“You ought to get that dog out of town more often. He’s having a ball. Out on the runway right now chasing sticks with Chucky.”

“If you hurt that dog, I’ll devote my life to killing you and everyone you know.”

But Pine just chuckled. “This dog is so sweet he breaks your heart. I wouldn’t think of hurting him, but I need a little employee incentive, and he’s it.”

“Incentive for what?”

“We need to sit down, drink a beer, and figure out where our mutual interests lie. I got a few questions; you name a price for the answers.”

“Then Jellyroll and I walk away?”

“Sure, but one thing, Arthur, don’t let my affable exterior mislead you. I’m in deep shit. I got feds, cops, and smarmy hoods coming at me from everywhere but up. I’m a desperate old man, Arthur, and I don’t want you showing up here wearing wires and other such devices, not Cobb’s, not Watson’s, nobody’s. That clear?”

“Yes.”

“And by the way, they had a tap on your phone. My people cleaned it up.”

Oh. “Where do you want me to go?”

“There’s a yellow cab waiting out in front right now. You just get in, leave the driving to us. Now. By the way, Arthur, you should have told me you wanted a bodyguard. That’s covered in my employee benefit program.” He hung up.

“I’ve got to go.” I related the conversation.

Sybel was leaning against the wall. “He knew about these tape recorders?”

“Both sets. And the phone tap.”

“How?”

“I don’t know.”

Calabash left the room with a somber look on his face. Sybel was putting on her jacket.

“What are you doing?”

“Putting on my jacket.”

“Why?”

“Why? Because we’re all going together.”

“No, you don’t need to do that. Why would you do that?”

“Because I have a feeling you’ll be safer in a crowd.”

Calabash returned with a battered canvas gym bag full of heavy objects. “Dey ain’t seen de mean side to Calabash yet. Let’s go.”

On instinct I retrieved the Family Snaps and Billie’s note from T.S. Monk’s record jacket, put them in an envelope, and hid it in the torn lining of my rain jacket. Then we left, the three of us, together.

There was indeed a cab waiting curbside. Dickie, hair slicked back and greased down, sat behind the wheel with the engine running. Sybel and I got in back. Calabash sat in front beside Dickie, who cowered. “Hey,” said Dickie, “I didn’t hear nothin’ about all youse going. It was supposed to be just him. I got to clear it with the boss.” A radio was mounted where the fare meter should have been, and Dickie reached for it. Calabash got there first. A wrench, a twist, a final yank, and Calabash had extracted the radio; he rolled down the window and dropped it in the street.

“Hey, pal, take it easy, see, I just drive, that’s all. Drive.”

“Den do it,” said Calabash in a menacing whisper.

Dickie drove. I watched to see who would follow. I detected no one, but they had to be there somewhere.

Calabash reached into his gym bag to remove a big black gun, cocked it ostentatiously and stuck it in Dickie’s ear. “You know what I do if tings feel funny when we get dere? De teeniest ting don’t look just so, you know what I do?” I think Dickie knew, but Calabash elaborated. “I ask myself where’s dat skinny kid wid de shiny hair? Den I shoot your brain out on your shirt.”