Flood Abatement Page 12

  Morning light shone around the edges of the window shade and into Bernie’s eyes. “Sure, call her first.”

  While she called her grandmother, Bernie found the simple act of dressing to be a grueling experience. Muscles he had no idea existed complained at every casual twist. The effort of pulling a Marquette University T-shirt over his head caused him to sit down on the bed to catch his breath. He hoped they were muscles and not dislocated ribs or something like that.

  Rhonda hung up the phone. “How ya’ doin’?”

  “Just slow. Everything aches.”

  “That’s good.”

  “What’s good about it?”

  “Aches are okay. It’s the sharp pains that tell you there’s a big problem.”

  He concentrated on slipping into a pair of jeans while she bounced into the bathroom singing about “Long beautiful hair - Flyin’, Streamin’, Gleamin’, Flaxin’, Waxin’.” When she came out he decided that he could slip on a pair of sandals much more comfortably that tying his shoes.

  Ponytailed in cutoffs and his rugby shirt, Rhonda strolled across the bedroom. “Let’s go.”

  “You gather the coins and put them back in the box.” He stood with a wince. “I’ll meet you at the front door.”

  She touched his right shoulder. “Sure you can do this?”

  “Yeah, I’ll make it. Things should work better as I move around.”

  She nodded and knelt to collect the treasure.

  He thought she looked very good. Maybe better than that, but, he should keep his mind on the treasure he had fought four men to recover. This was all confusing to him. “Hey, what’d Nana say?”

  “Not much. I just told her that we were coming over with a surprise. She said it better be something important. If not, I was wasting a perfectly good evening just to keep company with an old lady when I should be jumping your bones.”

  “She said that?” He was heartened by Nana’s good will.

  “Not exactly, more like screwing each others brains out.”

  Well, a pleasant thought, but he could hardly walk, let alone go another round with Rhonda’s athletic ability and varied tastes. Though Nana could be tight fisted with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, he always liked her. He restarted his journey to the front door and tried to think of something clever to say. Nothing came so he said, “Hmm.” He looked at the pistol on the night stand.

  Rhonda picked up the coin case. “You think we need that?”

  He looked closely at the .45 automatic. “With the way I moving I’d probably shoot myself in the foot.” He knew she could have easily outrun him. The only way he could have stopped her would have been to shoot her. He just wasn’t going to do something like that to Rhonda and left the gun where it was.

  Chapter 56

  Nana whistled, “Sweet Jesus and his Blessed Mother.” The collection was spread out on the kitchen table. The old lady picked up a twenty dollar gold piece from 1929. “And, this was buried in my basement all along?”

  “Yup,” Rhonda said. “It’s all yours.”

  Nana put the coin back. “How much do you think its worth?”

  “We need to get it appraised,” Bernie said. “I’ll talk with Sam in the morning.”

  Nana picked up another coin. Sam might be family, but she saw no reason to tempt him. “No need to show him the entire thing. Five or six should due for starters.”

  “Good thought,” Bernie said.

  They sat there for an hour while Nana examined every piece of her treasure. When she looked at the last one she turned to him. “Take them back to your place for tonight and then find a safe place tomorrow.”

  “You sure?” he asked.

  She nodded. “Too many of the wrong people know about this house.”

  Chapter 57

  “What’s that noise?”

  Bernie half rolled over, but couldn’t open his eyes. “Someone’s ringing the doorbell.”

  Rhonda shifted in bed. “Go tell’em to stop.”

  “You do it.”

  “It’s your house. You’re the man.”

  He rolled onto his back. “You can be the man.”

  “That’s not what you wanted last night.”

  “’Want’ and ‘get’ are two completely different things.”

  She hit him in his good shoulder.

  “Uhn!” He sat up on the edge of the bed. “Go away!”

  The ringing stopped and he flopped back on the bed letting his right arm fall back over his head. His left hand touched something warm and muscular that he knew instantly was Rhonda’s thigh. With a twist of his head and shoulders and he rolled his eyes up until he saw her naked profile. Someone started banging on the door.

  Without a move Rhonda said, “Bernie, tell them to go away.”

  He got up on his elbows. “Go … the hell … away!”

  The pounding stopped. He smiled. The doorbell began ringing again and was immediately joined by the pounding. The phone rang.

  He reached for the old black phone on the night stand. “Hello.”

  “Bernie, this is Maxine, next door. If you don’t answer the God damn door this instant, I’m coming over there and castrate you with a rusty spoon.” She hung up.

  He put the receiver back in the cradle. His neighbor, Mrs. Mauer, might just do that. She was one to keep her promises.

  “Alright!” he yelled. “I’m coming.”

  Rhonda rolled over on her back. “You’re amazing.” She put her hands behind her head. “Last night. Now this.”

  Bernie knew sarcasm and threw a pillow at her head. He also knew what was good for him and missed. “If it was that good for you, I hope I remember it someday.” Life was exhausting, but he was getting used to the feeling of moving through it like he was swimming in pancake batter. The ringing resumed. He picked a pair of jeans from the closet doorknob and stumbled into them as he made his way to the front door. “I’m coming!” His image in the cheap mirror on the bedroom door stopped him. The bruises on his chest were fading to green and yellow from blue and purple.

  He zipped his fly as he looked through the peephole. Rhonda’s attorney and his boss, Sam, stood on the other side of the door. He barged through as Bernie cracked the door open.

  Sam’s tie was twisted to the side and the collar of his shirt was open. “What the hell have you gotten me into?” His complexion lacked its healthy color.

  Bernie stumbled back. “Slow down, Sam, and remember I didn’t want this job in the first place.”

  “Yeah, take it easy.” Rhonda stood in the bedroom door holding a yellow bed sheet to her chest. “And, Bernie, you seemed to want to be involved plenty last night.”

  Bernie made a mental note. “Can this wait for a minute? I need to use the john.” When he came out Sam was making coffee and Rhonda sat at his kitchen table wrapped in his sheet. “Okay, what’s the problem?”

  Sam plugged in the coffeepot. “Was that license plate number you gave me the real thing?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You didn’t misread it or transpose any numbers?”

  “No, it’s California GLH – 1542.” Bernie looked at Rhonda. “Right?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re sure.”

  “Christ, I have the car if you want to see for yourself.”

  Sam banged the kitchen counter sharply with his fist. “Damn, I was afraid of that. You were always a good detail guy.”

  “What’s the big deal?” Rhonda asked her cousin.

  He rubbed his chin. “According to my guy at California DMV, that plate number doesn’t exist. Never has!” He stopped and looked and the rainbow of bruises on the both of them. “Christ, you guys look like hell. Hope the sex was good.”

  Rhonda roared. Bernie sat and held his ribs as he tried to stifle his laugh.

  After a combined one dozen cups of coffee, the three of them stood in the shade of a parking-ramp two blocks away and looked at the rear license plate of Rudolph’s Caddy. Sam squatted down and touched
the plate. “It’s real, raised numbers, painted with a spray gun. Shit!”

  “What are you driving at?” she asked.

  Sam stood. “Nothing good.” He walked around to the side of the car. “Authentic, un-recorded license plate means the feds.”

  “Which feds?” Bernie asked.

  Sam opened the front passenger door. “Does it matter?”

  Bernie and Rhonda didn’t say anything.

  “Did this guy, Rudolph, identify himself as a law enforcement officer?”

  Rhonda walked up behind Sam. “No, never.”

  Sam took the few papers out of the glove box. “Open the trunk, Bernie.”

  He fished the keys out of his jeans and complied. “Showroom clean.”

  “Look under the spare.”

  He did and found a 9 mm Beretta along with a snub nose .38.

  “What do you think, Sam?” Rhonda asked.

  “Not good. Either of you ever do anything to piss off the CIA, NSA or anybody like that?”

  Bernie looked at Rhonda. Working with her had always been a high reward, high risk proposition. Still, it was a rude awakening.

  They walked back to Bernie’s house to discuss the situation. Sam sat in the recliner. Rhonda grabbed a spot on the couch while the host brought six coins out from the bedroom and placed them on the coffee table. Sam picked one and examined it.

  “Tell me about it,” he said.

  Rhonda did.

  Sam waited until she finished, mostly because she was paying his bill. After a few moments to think he looked at Bernie. “What do you think?”

  “From what I can see so far this entire episode is about an antique coin collection.”

  “How much do you think it’s worth?” Rhonda asked.

  Sam picked up another little envelope and held the coin up to the light. “Don’t know. It needs to be appraised.”

  Rhonda stood and looked down into the street. “We want to have it done professionally.”

  “Somebody discrete.” Bernie examined another coin.

  “I’ve worked with a guy in Kenosha on this sort of thing. He should be okay. How many coins are we talking about?”

  Bernie sat up slowly. “Couple a dozen.”

  “Do we leave them with this guy?” Rhonda asked

  “You vouch for him, Sam?” Bernie asked.

  Sam hesitated. “Sure, if I have to.” He went to the desk and wrote on a piece of paper then handed it to Bernie.

  He looked at the paper. “It’s your brother, Milt?”

  “Yeah.”

  Sam and his brother were talking again. That was news. “I’ll give him a call.”

  Sam left.

  As Bernie fell asleep on the couch Rhonda said, “I think Milt stole my First Communion money.”

  Chapter 58

  The librarian said that A Guide to United States Coins – 1974 and Coins magazine were good sources to determine the value of their collection. Using a list of coins that Rhonda compiled, it took them half an hour to establish that the worth of the tray ran around $237,000. Rhonda and Bernie leaned back in the heavy wooden chairs to consider this information.

  “Doesn’t make sense,” he said.

  Rhonda looked at her notes and re-added the figures. “No, the number’s right.”

  “Oh, I think the dollar amount is fine. I just don’t think the entire thing makes sense.”

  “Why not?”

  “Well, it’s a significant amount of money, but it doesn’t seem like enough for all the trouble everybody’s going through.”

  ”Such as?” Rhonda asked.

  “The big guy.”

  “What?”

  “Rudolph”

  A “Shh!” came from the next library table over.

  He nodded to Rhonda. “Let’s go someplace where we can talk.”

  In the car she asked, “Where do you want to go?”

  “There’s a coffee shop on Downer that has great carrot cake.”

  As they drove she asked, “What’s your problem with Rudolph?”

  “I never thought of him as particularly bright or aggressive.”

  “He seemed belligerent enough to me.”

  Bernie turned onto a side street and parked in front of a row of 1930’s apartment buildings. “He was …” Rhonda furrowed her eyebrows at him as they got out of the Olds. “… inappropriate?” he said to finish the thought. They walked in the bright sun under the yellow leaves of the street side locust trees. “Okay, he drove a fed car.” Bernie held the door to the shop open for her. “At any time did Rudolph ever strike you as a federal officer?”

  “You think somebody put him up to it?” she asked.

  “Yeah. And then we have two murders, Ollie Chubituski and Al Waldoch.”

  Bernie got his carrot cake and two coffees at the counter while Rhonda grabbed a table in the back. Before he could sit down she took the fork from his plate and carved a piece of cake for herself.

  “Hey, I can get you your own piece.”

  “No, I just want a taste.” She stuffed it in her mouth.

  He sat and waited for his fork to be returned. “Then there’s the two hundred and thirty-seven grand.”

  She swallowed and handed him his fork. “Yeah, I see what you’re driving at. It doesn’t seem like enough money.” She used the little finger on her left hand to wipe a smear of cream cheese frosting from the corner of her mouth onto her tongue.

  “If Rudolph was acting alone, it might be. People have killed for less. But, if he’s just muscle there’s probably more.”

  “You’re right.” She sipped her coffee while he ate his cake, then took the fork out of his hand. “That is good cake.”

  She cut herself another chunk as he reiterated. “I can get you your own piece.”

  “No, this is fine.”

  He was not winning the cake battle. He watched her eat two forksful while he finished his coffee. He stood to get a refill. “Can I get you more coffee?”

  She nodded. When he completed his errand she said, “Let’s see Sam’s brother,” and wiped her mouth with his napkin then stood.

  Bernie stood. “Hold on, I’m still hungry.”

  “You had cake.”

  “You ate most of it.”

  She crossed her arms. “I did not.”

  This was a no-win situation. “Stay put. Take it easy. I’m getting more cake.”

  “You’ll get fat,” she muttered. Teasing him was fun, always had been. Leaning back in her chair she watched him buy another piece of cake at the counter and smiled.

  He smiled as he paid the clerk. It was a game they’d played years ago. It used to be Oreos. Today it was cake. He always liked the game.

  Chapter 59

  “Milt’s” was a bar across the street from the American Motors plant in Kenosha near the Wisconsin-Illinois border. The tavern was a barn red building that had been a neighborhood grocery store back in the ‘20’s. Rhonda stood next to the Oldsmobile. She raised her sunglasses slightly and squinted as she looked around the neighborhood while keeping a firm grip on a black briefcase.

  Bernie took his broad lapeled suit coat from the backseat of his car, looked up at the sun in a cloudless sky and returned it. He looked at Rhonda rooted at the curb. “Is there a problem?”

  “No,” she sighed.

  “We don’t have to deal with Milt,” he said.

  “No, we need someone like him.” She lowered the sunglasses to her nose. “And, he is family.” She stepped toward the bar and Bernie followed.

  The place was dimly lit and in need of a good sweeping. The smell of stale beer from this morning’s third-shift patrons was yet to be replaced with the greasy burgers for the lunch crowd. An unshaven kid in a red, “Fuck’em Bucky” T-shirt leaned on the back-bar and studied a racing form. A large floor fan droned from across the room.

  “Morning,” Bernie said. “We’re looking for Milt.”

  The bartender sucked on his toothpick and revealed a set of stained teeth th
at needed dental work. His arms were so skinny that his eagle tattoo circled the left bicep.

  A guy with a mop of curly brown hair stuck his head around the back room door. “Who wants to know?”

  Rhonda said, “Hey Milt.”

  Dressed in a lime green paisley shirt and polyester bellbottom pants, Milt waved them in with a “Come on back.”

  He stood next to an army surplus desk. “Close the door.”

  Bernie and Rhonda would have taken a seat, but the only chair was the one behind the desk. An oscillating fan swept the room from atop a battered filing cabinet as an air conditioner groaned in the window.

  Milt whistled tunelessly as he opened Rhonda’s briefcase. “This is gonna take a few days. You’ll have to leave ‘em.”

  “We’ll need a receipt,” Rhonda said.

  Milt played with the heavy gold chain on his neck. He looked at a coin in its envelope and wrote something in a dirty notebook.

  Rhonda dug a pack of cigarettes out of her macramé shoulder bag. “Mind if I smoke?”

  Milt looked up. “It’s a bar.” He studied her face. “Anything wrong?”

  She stopped fishing for a smoke and stared back at him. “Yeah, Milt, yeah. You stole my First Communion money and that pisses me off.”

  He looked at her. “So what?”

  “I want it back.”

  “How much was it?”

  “Sixty-five bucks.”

  He took his wallet out and counted three twenties and a ten onto the desk. “Will that do it?”

  “Plus interest.”

  Milt peeled off another twenty. “Christ.”

  Rhonda picked up the money and jammed it into the shoulder bag.

  “Okay?” Milt asked.

  “Okay.” She lit her cigarette up as he wrote a description for each of the six coins.

  Sweat trickled down his backbone to the waistband of his pants. “How much is there, you think?”

  Milt shrugged. “Give me some time here.”

  “Make a guess.”

  He dropped his pen on the notebook. “I don’t know, thou maybe ten.”

  “That’s quite a range.”

  “I’ve gotta make some calls.”

  “You got a safe place to keep these?” Rhonda asked.