From the collection “Stories of Far Places” by William Estabrook
I am in a whole new situation, and I’ve been there for some time now. To be precise, for a span of exactly three and one half minutes. It all started after I succeeded in extricating from a large brown envelope that just arrived in the morning mail the certificate that has transformed me into a new person, and now I am busy admiring it.
What I have lying before me is a diploma. It is the third such document that I have received so far in my young life, and it is the one of which I am the proudest. The first I earned in high school, and the second for college. I acquired both of them because that was what my parents expected of me, they and just about everybody else on the planet. But this marvelously printed piece of paper that I am gazing at now represents something that I have done all for myself and totally by myself. It attests that I have completed a correspondence course in the science of criminal investigation. I am now officially qualified to present myself to the world as a private investigator.
Wonderful, I tell myself, as I read and re-read the magic words. This is simply marvelous. I am standing, or sitting actually, on the threshold of a whole new life.
“Scarlett Rose,” I whisper. “Scarlett Rose.”
That is my name, and I have not seen it ever before displayed in a nicer place. Believe me, I will never again scoff at those advertisements on the covers of match books.
For a person with my qualifications, I could not be in a more advantageous position. I am an employee of Mr. Osmond T. Kellerman, the man who owns and operates OK Services, an investigative agency. Technically, one might say that I am not actually an operative but more of a gofer and answerer of the telephone when nobody else is around to do that and generally a person for whom things must be found to do. Mostly I listen to what people are saying and smile a lot. But as of a few minutes ago a different future is beckoning to me, and a brighter one. After all, I am a mere twenty-two years old, eager to work, reasonably alert and in excellent physical condition. I also just happen to be the boss’s niece.
My job was intended to be just for the summer, a gift from my uncle merely to keep me more or less occupied, and not a serious thing at all, but now there has been a sea change in my prospects. I plan to seize whatever opportunities may come my way and make the best of them, with an eye toward future employment. Life is after all what a girl makes of it.
I shall be free to chart my own course, because Uncle Ozzie places very few demands on my time, practically none. He is usually underway, full steam ahead, doing the things that he has to do. Occasionally, however, he does pause briefly in mid charge in order to ask me how I am faring. Sometimes he even pats me affectionately on the head. He loves me, and he wants to take good care of me. If I were a flower he would see that I was watered regularly and have someone check me for aphids.
I turn the diploma over and admire the clean unsullied back of it. That pretty piece of paper is just one more thing that I admire about the PI business. True, I am still a novice and basically unfamiliar with Uncle Ozzie’s exact methods, but I can see what his life is like. He is his own man, a completely independent operator. He takes on the cases he wants to accept, and he handles them just as he sees fit. He does not smoke, nor does he touch alcohol. He eschews strong language. He is strong and he is also sweet. He is a lion and he is a pussy cat. He is my hero, and when I grow up I want to be just like him.
The only thing that stops me from running to my Uncle Ozzie at this very moment and telling him all about my new diploma and also of my desire for an official change in status from flunky to operative is the fact that he is not in the office today. He has gone down to San Francisco on a case. OK Services is in Sacramento, and the distance between the two cities is about one hundred miles. He will be back later this evening, probably long after I have gone home. But of course I will see him tomorrow, and he will be delighted when I tell him of my new plans. I’m almost sure of it.
I would tell our secretary about my accomplishment but she is not in the office today either. She called in first thing to say that she would be taking a sick day, which explains why I am sitting in for her, answering the phone and taking messages and generally being in charge of things. It is in fact the first time that I have taken the helm of our little enterprise and I have to tell you that it feels absolutely fabulous. I have the whole place to myself. There is no one here but me. No one to start me and also absolutely no one to stop me.
I tear my gaze away from the diploma. I look around the room. I obey a sudden urge to stand up and stroll about. OK Services occupies two large rooms that are side by side and connected by a doorway, and each room has a door that opens out onto a hallway. Uncle Ozzie’s secretary and I share one room, and he reserves the other one for himself.
As I meander about, I stroke the furniture with my finger tips, first my own modest little desk and then the secretary’s. Hers is large and fashioned of very dark and quite solid oak. With my manual digits still extended, I walk down along one of the walls, as far as the window where our one giant potted plant is performing sentry duty. I touch its broad green leaves and marvel at how shiny and free of dust they are.
“It’s just you and me, kid,” I murmur into the foliage. “As far as today goes, the two of us are OK Services.”
I walk across the room and over to the door that leads into my uncle’s office. I twist the knob and it yields to me, and when I tug at the door it opens. Slowly, holding my breath like a naughty child, I enter the sacred space. I have been there before, of course, but never all by myself. I sit down at his desk. I run the palms of my hands across his huge green blotter. I begin to poke about among the collection of objects spread out before me. I pick up pieces of stationery and read what is on them. I seize the telephone and raise it to my ear and listen for a second or two, reveling in the sound of my uncle’s dial tone.
And then, reluctantly but inevitably, I leave the room. I walk to my own desk and sit down and sigh. It is here, at this desk, where I have experienced many a restless impulse, similar to the one that is running through me now. With absolutely not one thing to do and all day long to do it in, I find myself abubble with undefined desires and seething with undischarged energy. I lean back in the chair and stare at the wall. It stares back at me. I think, and then I think some more. Gradually, an idea presents itself to me.
You have to do something, it is saying, and right now. Seize the moment. Today is the first day of a whole new way of life for you. It is the time for which you have prepared yourself. You are pregnant, if that is the correct word, with promise and potential.
I look down along the wall, farther and farther, until my gaze falls upon the large round clock that is suspended there. I note the position of its slender hands. They indicate that the time is 10:32 and a few seconds, and then a few more. I have six and a half more hours of completely unsupervised freedom stretching out before me. I try to think of something to do with it, something inaugural and if at all possible daring. After a half minute more or so of intense clock-staring, I do hit upon something.
There was a routine phone call when I first came to work this morning, from a woman who wanted to speak to an investigator on a matter of great importance to her. I wrote the number down and told her that someone would get back to her as soon as possible. I go to the secretary’s desk and open the log book where I wrote down that phone number. It is just lying there and looking up at me, not unlike an infant begging for attention.
Why not? I ask myself. It won’t hurt to talk to the lady. It’s just a simple phone call.
I slide down into the chair and pull the telephone over toward me. I draw in a deep breath, and then one by one I peck at the buttons.
“Hello?” a woman answers, the same woman, obviously, from earlier.
“Mrs. Gundarsson?” I ask, in my best professional tone.
“Yes.”
“This is Scarlett Rose, at OK Services, returning your call.”
“OK.”
I pause. She pauses.
“I’ll be handling your case,” I tell her.
“Oh, good,” she responds.
Obviously, she does not recognize my voice. All the better.
“How can I help you?” I ask.
“Well,” she begins, “it’s about my husband.”
Mrs. Gundarsson proceeds then to tell me about Mr. Gundarsson. We are talking on the telephone and not face to face, and that makes it easier for her to unburden her soul to me. She is providing much more information than I need to know, or even want to know, about her marital situation. She dredges up grudges from eons ago, the kinds of intimate details of her private life that one can reveal only to a perfect stranger. It’s the kind of thing I’m going to be dealing with from now on, so I sit and I listen.
Ultimately she works her way around to the actual point of our conversation. She would like me to go to a certain apartment here in the city. Once there, I am to wait outside in the parking lot for what should be just a half hour or so and see who leaves the residence. She has reason to suspect that it will be her hubby Olaf, who is actually supposed to be somewhere else. He is an architect and has told her he will be at a construction site, conferring with a client. The apartment is, she believes, occupied by a woman named Betsy or Boopsie or something like that, who is, she also believes, Mr. G.’s girlfriend. She provides me with a detailed description of her hubby, but all she can tell me about Boopsie is that she is a tall skinny blonde.
“You’re certain of the address?” I ask.
“Oh yes. I saw it on his desk and I memorized it.”
“Fine. Well then, I’ll get right on it.”
She thanks me and I thank her and we both hang up. The whole matter is quite clear and linear. And if things should not go precisely as planned, I’ll simply have to improvise. The good PI is always prepared to react to changing situations. That’s in Chapter Three of my text book, I think, where they discuss what to do when things go grievously wrong.
I flip on the answering machine. At the door, just before stepping out, I pause. I trot quickly over to the full length mirror and check myself out. The person I see peering back at me from the glass surface is a redhead in a green dress. She is five feet seven inches tall and fairly slender. Although the casual observer might not realize it, all those workouts in the gym have imparted to that cute little chick considerable physical strength.
Down in the parking lot I perform my customary search and seizure operation, trying to recall where I parked my car. It is one of those mouse gray sedans that half the nation seems to be driving these days, but eventually I spot mine. As I approach it from the side I glance in through the passenger’s window. I discover to my extreme annoyance that I have left the keys in the ignition lock again. But at least that saves me the necessity of rummaging about in my purse for them. Luckily I also forgot to lock the little beast. I leap in, and a few seconds later I am on my way out of the lot. When I reach the address that my client has given me I observe that the building is quite modest in size. In the parking lot I notice that the cars there are generally old and ratty and in need of washing. A few are perched up on concrete blocks. The building and the landscaping surrounding it appear in need of a little tender loving care. Speaking of which, I am a little surprised to see that this is the sort of place where Olaf Gundarsson the prosperous architect has chosen to attend to his emotional needs.
I back into the first available space. In the most casual way possible I stroll over to the building and ascertain which of the apartments is the supposed love nest operated by Boopsie. I return to the car and check out my equipment. Binoculars, camera with zoom lens, chewing gum and a couple of good CDs – it’s all there. A half hour passes. No one enters the apartment and not a soul leaves it. My mind becomes more and more concerned about not where I am but where I ought to be, which is back at the office, being in charge of things. I believe that I am now drifting into the midst of one of those changes in plans. I decide to stop waiting and start acting.
I leave the car and walk to the apartment. I ring the bell. Who answers? Not Olaf, of course, but some young woman. I observe that she is not tall, and neither is she skinny, nor even blond. She is a curvaceous little brunette in skimpy red shorts and a purple halter top. Her feet are bare, exposing bright green toe polish. Obviously, I have been sent on a wild goose chase.
“Yeah?” she asks.
“Is Jason Hartley at home?” I inquire.
It is a name that I have just made up on the spur of the moment.
“Who wants to know?”
“I’m a friend of his.”
She turns and looks back into the room behind her, apparently to whoever it is who is lurking back there. Olaf, perhaps. She turns back toward me. It seems that she has received a signal.
“Come on in,” she offers.
This, of course, is not the plan. The little cutie was supposed to say there was no one named Jason Hartley there, and I would return then to the parking lot and drive away and return to the office and call Mrs. Gundarsson and give her my report. But an alternative scenario occurs to me. Perhaps my client has the correct address but the wrong girl. There may be a new amour in the picture. I decide to investigate further. I enter the apartment.
The room is not well lighted, but I can discern a few sticks of furniture and a television set that is turned on with the sound off. The air is charged with the stench of stale tobacco smoke. The person whom I am hoping to find here is to be of medium height and weight. He will be wearing brown corduroy trousers and a yellow short sleeved shirt. His hair must be blond and his eyes blue and his mustache tending toward red. What actually steps forward out of the gloom, however, is something that is well over six feet tall, two hundred and eighty pounds, clad in faded blue jeans and a scarlet tank top. It has a shaved face, shaved head and an extraordinary display of tattoos.
“Hi,” I murmur to it.
The giant does not respond. He merely twirls the control rod on the Venetian blinds and floods the room with light. The hulk looks me up, and then he looks me down. He hitches up his jeans. I note that his massive forearms are immensely hairy. I can see also that he is more beer bloat than muscle. But, after all, two hundred and eighty pounds of anything is an imposing mass.
“You from Fitzgerald’s?” he snarls.
I’m not sure whether it would be better to say yes or no. I remain silent.
He folds his arms across his chest and nods. Apparently, he has taken my lack of response as a yes.
“You guys think you’re pretty cute, don’t you?” he continues. “Comin’ around and spyin’ on me.”
I open my mouth as if to speak. I close it again.
He turns toward the other woman.
“OK, Rhoda,” he growls, “in the other room.”
“But Frank,” she protests.
“Rhoda,” he repeats, pointing to what is perhaps a bed room door.
She obeys him, leaving the two of us alone, the giant and yours truly.
“Now me and you are goin’ to have a little chat,” he says with a grimace that is perhaps intended to be a smile.
Well, I tell myself, chatting is good. I can do that.
In college I was an English major, with a minor in Rhetoric. I have had scads of practice in the use of language, and I feel confident that I shall be able to match wits with this large person. I arrange my lips in a smile and project it up at him. He glares down at me.
“I don’t know where you get off,” he tells me, “sneakin’ around like this. Like I told them other guys, when I get mine you’ll get yours.”
He pauses, as if to allow his thinking processes time to catch up.
“I also let them know,” he continues, “what I was gonna do to the next one who shows up.”
As he falls silent again I can see the next message forming itself behind his eyes.
“I believe there has been a slight error here,” I offer, with my most engaging smile.
“You shut your trap.”
I shut it.
“It’s bad enough,” he presses on, “when you people go to my place, but when you come bargin’ in here at Rhoda’s and try to show me up, that really takes the cake.”
I have of course not a clue what this titanic air-head is talking about, and I can see that he is not in a humor to provide much in the way of detailed explanations. In fact, huge Frank appears more and more, with each passing second, to be preparing himself for some sort of non-verbal communication. He starts to smash his right fist into his left palm, over and over. I interpret that as a bad omen.
Scarlett, I tell myself, I believe you have accomplished as much here as you are going to. It is time to stage a strategic retreat.
I turn and take one step toward the door. The ogre moves with amazing swiftness to block the way. He spreads his tree trunk legs and places a hand on each hip, elbows far apart.
“You ain’t goin’ nowhere,” he assures me. “Not till I’m through with you.”
If I have learned anything about physical confrontations, it is that when one of the parties works himself up into a crazy rage and the other remains cool, the one who is thinking calmly and logically will have the stuffing knocked out of him every time. It is now crystal clear to me, as I observe big Frank, that he is way ahead of me in the rage department. There is no way that I am going to catch up to him and achieve a level playing field in the last few seconds that remain of my life here on earth. Thinking in a way that is both calm and logical, I reach down and grasp the hem of my very full and feminine dress.
I perform then a maneuver not unlike that for which many an old geezer has run into serious trouble with the police. Frank halts in mid flex and looks down as if he can not believe his eyes. While my opponent is thus occupied in an intense test of his visual acuity, I perform another maneuver. It is the sort of operation that I have seen athletes execute on Sunday afternoons in the National Football League. I take one step toward Frank. My right leg rises swiftly. My right foot comes to an abrupt and solid stop. I see in my mind’s eye a ball sailing high between the goal posts. But the sound that comes to my ears is not the cheering of the crowd. It is a great “oof!” from the maw of Frank. He doubles over, his hands clasped just south of body mid point and his legs drawn in tightly together. Not wishing to wait around for the next play to develop, I leave the field with the greatest possible haste.
Down in the parking lot, as I am waiting at the exit for traffic out on the street to clear, I glance into the rear view mirror and see giant Frank hobbling across the asphalt. He climbs into a red pickup truck. The tires send up a cloud of gray smoke as he backs from the parking space. Traffic clears and I step firmly on the accelerator pedal and disappear into the land of gray sedans.
There is much to think about as I drive back to the office, casting frequent glances into the rear view mirror. My first case has been a success, all things considered. My client gave me an address to go to, and I did indeed go to it, and I ascertained ultimately that her husband was not there. Perhaps not everything went as smoothly as it might have, but here I am, safely back in my own little car and driving back to my own little office. It has been a learning experience.
As I enter our parking lot, I see that a car is backing out of the very space that I had vacated all those minutes earlier. I pull right in. And then something odd happens. As I extract the key from the ignition I notice a detail that has escaped my attention up to now. The little plastic tag that is affixed to it has changed color. It used to be red, but now it has turned blue. And another thing – the name in it is now Sue May Chang. I open my purse and look into it. I see some keys. I pluck them out. They are attached to a red plastic tag that bears my name. I sigh.
I replace Sue May Chang’s key in the ignition lock of her car and step out, careful not to lock the door behind me. I choose a circuitous route out through the lot, glancing frequently around me. There suddenly I see it, my car, and it is parked exactly where I now recall having left it this morning. It is the exact twin of the car that I just left. I continue walking.
As I approach the exit to the lot, I note that a black and white police cruiser is just pulling in. It stops and an officer steps out. A middle-aged Asian woman approaches him. She appears to be quite distressed, and they begin to converse quite earnestly. She points over toward a certain section of the lot, the area that I have just left. A look of absolute amazement comes over her face. I turn my gaze straight ahead and continue walking.
I enter the office. As the door closes behind me, the telephone begins to ring. I run to it.
“OK Services,” I say into the mouthpiece.
“Oh, thank goodness,” a female voice says. “I’m glad you’re still there. This is the lady who called earlier.”
“Mrs. Gundarsson?”
“Yes. Well, I’m embarrassed to call you again like this, but there’s been a change in plan.”
“Oh?”
“You see, what happened is my husband came home only a little bit after I talked to you. His meeting was called off. Anyway, I was still all worked up from our conversation, yours and mine, and I said some things to him and then of course he said some things back to me and we really got into it but then we ended up talking everything through and I see now that I was wrong about him and what’s her name.”
“Boopsie.”
“Right.”
“I see.”
“So everything’s just fine now. Better than ever.”
I can hear the purr in her voice.
“So,” she goes on, “there won’t be any need for you to go over there after all. I’m sorry to have bothered you.”
“No problem. Thanks for thinking of us.”
I set the phone down. Carefully, I erase Mrs. Gundarsson’s name from the phone log. I stroll over to my desk and sit down. I lean back in the chair.
So, I tell myself, that was my very first case, and it all went so ..., I don’t know, so ...
I can not find precisely the right word.
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