A Stone's Throw by James Ziskin (best story books to read .txt) 📗

As polite and helpful as the Bell Telephone Canada operator was, she could locate no Everett Coleman in Winnipeg. Or in Brandon, Steinbach, or Thompson for that matter. Flin Flon—yes, that’s a town in Manitoba—also came up snake eyes. There were plenty of Colemans, all right, but none who answered to the name Everett. I tried a couple of subscribers anyway—those with the initial E—until I ran out of change. None knew anything about Everett Coleman or his redheaded bride.

I considered other options. In the morning, I would ask Norma Geary, my industrious gal Friday, to search the morgue—that was what we called the archives at the paper—for any stories on Everett Coleman. I doubted that would lead to anything, but I had to cover the bases. I also wanted her to check all the nearby phone directories for Robinsons. Individuals and businesses. The lone initial S bothered me, of course. If it stood for Robinson’s last name, there was no chance of finding who it was. Maybe Johnny Dornan had left off part of the name. Or maybe it hadn’t transferred through the paper. No, that wasn’t it. The appointment day of Friday followed the initial too closely. Not enough space for any missing letters. I made a mental note to examine again the newspaper Fadge had swiped from Johnny Dornan’s room. In the meantime, I still had a trick up my sleeve, even if I was loath to pull it. I knew a fellow at the Department of Motor Vehicles who could look up the license registration for me. But there might be a price to pay for the information. Benny Arnold would surely take the opportunity to extract a date in exchange for his help. Dreading the consequences of such a transaction, I half-heartedly flipped through the phone directory in the booth. What if Mrs. Coleman lived in Schenectady County? It was possible, after all. Her car was registered in New York State.

I couldn’t find her in the Schenectady book, but, lo and behold, there was a “Coleman, E.” in Halfmoon in the Saratoga County directory. I dialed the number without enough change, unsure of what I would do if someone answered. No one did. The number had been disconnected.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“About time you showed up,” I said, leaving the kitchen door open for Fadge.

I lived on the second floor of a duplex, above my intrusive and judgmental landlady, Mrs. Giannetti.

“I’ve got a business to run,” he said, dumping an unwieldy paper bag and a pizza on the table, dropping the copy of the Racing Form he’d pinned under his arm in the process.

“There’s your business,” I said, motioning to the paper.

“Hey, I didn’t come over here to take grief from you. I came over to get you drunk and have my way with you.”

“Give me that pizza. I’m already two drinks ahead of you.”

Lounging on my sofa in the parlor, me with my glass of Scotch and Fadge with his quart of beer, I asked him what he’d brought along this night.

“Something I picked up at the Blue Note in Albany last Thursday,” he said, reaching into the paper bag. “Nina Simone. Forbidden Fruit. How about you?”

In recent months the two of us had begun our own ad hoc music appreciation society. Each of us would bring a new record to our Sunday night pizza party in my apartment after he closed up the store.

“One from my father’s collection,” I said, producing an LP I’d stashed next to the leg of the sofa. “Villa-Lobos’s Bachianas Brasileiras. You’re going to love this.”

Fadge frowned. “That’s what you said last week about Janaslov.”

“Janáček,” I corrected. “Don’t worry. You’ll like this better. I promise. It’s Brazilian.”

“What news of Johnny Dornan?” Fadge asked me as we listened to Nina Simone and sipped/gulped our beverages.

“Nothing much so far. I tracked down his date to an apartment in Rensselaer. A professional girl named Micheline, hired by Lou Fleischman as a treat for Johnny. Dropped my story and film off at the paper a couple of hours ago.”

“You spoke to his date?”

“No. To her roommates. They insist she’s in Montreal.”

“And you think she’s on a slab in the morgue.”

“Could be. But then I spoke to someone at the Friar Tuck Motel on Route Fifty in Saratoga. Do you know the place?”

He coughed up a laugh. “What a dump. A good place to crash with a two a.m. beauty queen you picked up in a saloon.”

I fired my most judgmental glare at him, and he quickly changed his tune.

“Not that I would know, of course,” he said, sitting up straight and offering to refill my glass.

“Apparently someone fitting the description of the dead woman from Tempesta was staying at the Friar Tuck,” I explained as Fadge handed me my drink.

“How can you be sure? You said she was burned to a crisp.”

“Except for three things. A bit of red hair survived, an earring, and a scrap of burned fox stole.”

“Anything else?”

“A shrimp.”

Fadge took a swig of beer and popped the last crust of pizza into his mouth. “Shrimp like the cocktail?”

“Like a jockey. The man she was staying with at the Friar Tuck was a shrimp.”

“Sounds like a good bet to me.”

“The description of the redhead at the motel sounded a little older than Micheline. Of course she might have been trying to disguise herself.”

“You should find out who the lady at the motel is instead of trying to make her fit your solution.”

Fadge was right. It was too easy. If I could shoehorn Micheline into the barn with Johnny Dornan, my story would be halfway done. But I knew deep down that it was laziness on my part. The pieces didn’t fit together. More likely than not, it was someone else.

“I’m going to drive out to Halfmoon tomorrow and try to get to the bottom of this,” I said with a sigh. “There’s a man living there with the name the desk clerk provided.