open the garage door and made a flat-handed gesture at the headlight, as if to say, see what I mean?
“I have the car about three hours, and this happens—some idiot in a parking lot, just bashed me and took off. Didn’t even leave a note.”
On closer inspection, it wasn’t bad. The metal wasn’t torn, the way it usually was in these rear-enders. There was just a nice, soft dent. And of course the headlamp.
“A couple of hundred,” Jack told him, running his fingers along the inside of the dent—around a car, it seemed, every man had to pretend he was an expert. “They can just pound this out.”
“You think so?”
“Oh sure.”
He walked all the way around, opening a door to look at the upholstery, making a production out of admiring the hell out of it. People didn’t show you their cars if they didn’t expect you to like them. At least, most people didn’t.
“Nice,” Jack said, meaning it. “Looks like they took good care of it.”
While they walked back, Jack told him about the newspaper ad and the inquiries he had had so far.
“It takes time with commercial property,” he said. “You don’t have buyers coming at you from every side, but at least you don’t have to put up with the housewives who just want to kill an afternoon looking at other people’s houses.”
He laughed, and then Owings laughed, perhaps to cover the sound of a window being opened somewhere. Very faintly, Jack could hear the noise of water running—perhaps a shower, up on the second floor.
Looked like Owings had himself a house guest, which might explain why he hadn’t invited his broker inside. Jack wondered who she was, and if she was anyone he might have recognized. It didn’t figure he was going to find out.
Why had Owings shown him the car, he wondered. Because of her? It didn’t figure. Pride of ownership, perhaps? Maybe, since that seemed to be why he was fixing up the Moonlight. Or because he figured he had seen it already? But a car wasn’t exactly a state secret.
“Well, I’d better be running along,” he said—one thing you learn in the real estate business is not to overstay your welcome.
“I wish you’d come and paint my house sometime.” The smile was to let Owings know that he was just joking. “You do nice work.”
Owings shrugged his shoulders, which somehow, under his tee shirt, looked impossibly weighed down.
“That’s the great advantage of white. When you get sick of it, it covers so nicely.”
“And you’ve chosen a good color,” Jack went on, turning away with a little wave of hsi hand—thinking to himself what a waste of time it had been coming out here. “That’s a nice shade of gray. It goes well with the house.”
And it was the simple truth, too.
He was all the way out to his car before it hit him. No wonder that color seemed so perfect—he remembered from when he was a kid, right after the war, when things were still under George Patchmore’s management and operation.
It was the restaurant people who had painted the place white. In George’s time, the Moonlight had always been just that gray.
Chapter 9
Detective Lieutenant Spolino had left a stenographer on duty in Leo Galatina’s hospital room, and she had taken down every word the old man said while he drifted in and out of consciousness. He seemed to have a lot of say, if one only knew how to interpret it. The transcript made for very interesting reading.
As the brain dies it appears to lose control over time, so that as it relives the events leading to its final few snatches of memory the past and present grow jumbled together. Sometimes Leo was an old man, walking his dog as he had every evening for the past ten years, and sometimes he was a young hoodlum on the rise. It was a tangled skein. None of it was admissible in court and a lot of it was nearly unintelligible—which was probably just as well for certain people’s peace of mind,
“I have the car about three hours, and this happens—some idiot in a parking lot, just bashed me and took off. Didn’t even leave a note.”
On closer inspection, it wasn’t bad. The metal wasn’t torn, the way it usually was in these rear-enders. There was just a nice, soft dent. And of course the headlamp.
“A couple of hundred,” Jack told him, running his fingers along the inside of the dent—around a car, it seemed, every man had to pretend he was an expert. “They can just pound this out.”
“You think so?”
“Oh sure.”
He walked all the way around, opening a door to look at the upholstery, making a production out of admiring the hell out of it. People didn’t show you their cars if they didn’t expect you to like them. At least, most people didn’t.
“Nice,” Jack said, meaning it. “Looks like they took good care of it.”
While they walked back, Jack told him about the newspaper ad and the inquiries he had had so far.
“It takes time with commercial property,” he said. “You don’t have buyers coming at you from every side, but at least you don’t have to put up with the housewives who just want to kill an afternoon looking at other people’s houses.”
He laughed, and then Owings laughed, perhaps to cover the sound of a window being opened somewhere. Very faintly, Jack could hear the noise of water running—perhaps a shower, up on the second floor.
Looked like Owings had himself a house guest, which might explain why he hadn’t invited his broker inside. Jack wondered who she was, and if she was anyone he might have recognized. It didn’t figure he was going to find out.
Why had Owings shown him the car, he wondered. Because of her? It didn’t figure. Pride of ownership, perhaps? Maybe, since that seemed to be why he was fixing up the Moonlight. Or because he figured he had seen it already? But a car wasn’t exactly a state secret.
“Well, I’d better be running along,” he said—one thing you learn in the real estate business is not to overstay your welcome.
“I wish you’d come and paint my house sometime.” The smile was to let Owings know that he was just joking. “You do nice work.”
Owings shrugged his shoulders, which somehow, under his tee shirt, looked impossibly weighed down.
“That’s the great advantage of white. When you get sick of it, it covers so nicely.”
“And you’ve chosen a good color,” Jack went on, turning away with a little wave of hsi hand—thinking to himself what a waste of time it had been coming out here. “That’s a nice shade of gray. It goes well with the house.”
And it was the simple truth, too.
He was all the way out to his car before it hit him. No wonder that color seemed so perfect—he remembered from when he was a kid, right after the war, when things were still under George Patchmore’s management and operation.
It was the restaurant people who had painted the place white. In George’s time, the Moonlight had always been just that gray.
Chapter 9
Detective Lieutenant Spolino had left a stenographer on duty in Leo Galatina’s hospital room, and she had taken down every word the old man said while he drifted in and out of consciousness. He seemed to have a lot of say, if one only knew how to interpret it. The transcript made for very interesting reading.
As the brain dies it appears to lose control over time, so that as it relives the events leading to its final few snatches of memory the past and present grow jumbled together. Sometimes Leo was an old man, walking his dog as he had every evening for the past ten years, and sometimes he was a young hoodlum on the rise. It was a tangled skein. None of it was admissible in court and a lot of it was nearly unintelligible—which was probably just as well for certain people’s peace of mind,
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