Dead Boyfriends Page 12

  Mr. Muehlenhaus was sitting alone in the backseat of a black limousine, the car’s engine running and the air-conditioning up full. He was so pale that I wondered if he survived on transfusions of milk.

  Norman held the door open, and I slipped inside.

  “Nice ride,” I said. “I didn’t know you were a limo guy.”

  “My granddaughter’s idea,” he said. “I prefer my old Park Avenue.”

  “Less ostentatious,” I said.

  “Yes, but it doesn’t have this.” Muehlenhaus leaned forward and opened a refrigerator built into the back of the driver’s seat. There were several soft drinks and bottles of water there—Muehlenhaus was not a drinker. “May I offer you something?”

  “Do you have ice?”

  “Of course.”

  Why wasn’t I surprised? I declined a beverage, and Muehlenhaus closed the refrigerator.

  “It seems, Mr. McKenzie, that once again we find ourselves on the same side.”

  “I know I’m going to regret asking this, but what side would that be?”

  “Should we give it a name? How about the Anti-David Tuseman League?”

  “I have nothing against Tuseman.”

  “Tuseman wants to prosecute Merodie Davies for murder to further his political ambitions. You wish to stop him from doing so.”

  “How do you know?”

  Muehlenhaus sat back in his seat, spread his hands wide, palms up, and said, “Mr. McKenzie. Please,” as if I should have known better than to ask. He was right. I should have known better.

  To suggest that Muehlenhaus was a mover and a shaker would be belittling. He was more like the village wise man—if you think of greater Minnesota as a village. It was he who told people what to move, what to shake. He possessed immense wealth, power, and the desire to meddle in the lives of other people. Yet he was no zealot. From what I was able to observe, he had no desire to shape the world into one of his own liking. He had no agenda beyond proving that he was smarter than everyone else.

  “Genevieve Bonalay,” I said. “She’s one of yours.”

  “A lovely young woman, not that it matters to a man my age.”

  “Who’s kidding who, Mr. Muehlenhaus?” He might have been on the other side of eighty, but he wasn’t dead.

  He grinned, and suddenly his face was transformed from the stoic puppet-master to the gregarious uncle that your parents didn’t want you spending too much time with.

  “What’s your angle, Mr. Muehlenhaus?”

  “Angle, Mr. McKenzie?”

  “You juggle governors and U.S. senators. A state senator—that’s beneath your notice.”

  Muehlenhaus’s grin broadened into a full-fledged smile.

  “For decades now, the Democrats have controlled the Minnesota State Senate,” he said. “However, lately their margin has been thinning. A few wins in key districts in the coming election, and the Republicans might take over. If they do, they will have control of both houses of the state legislature as well as the executive branch for the first time in a generation. With that power, they can transform the state. That is decidedly not beneath my notice.”

  “Check me if I’m wrong, but I thought Tuseman was a Republican.”

  “Not the right Republican, if you’ll excuse the pun. I do not believe he can defeat the incumbent. My candidate will, if we can remove Tuseman in the September primaries. You can help.”

  “Why would I want to do that?”

  “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

  “Mr. Muehlenhaus, the last time you spoke those words to me, people got killed.”

  “You didn’t kill them. Neither did I.”

  “You tried to have me killed.”

  “A simple misunderstanding that fortunately was rectified.”

  “Yeah? Tell Norman that.”

  “I have, Mr. McKenzie. Several times.”

  I didn’t like where the conversation was going. In fact, I didn’t like any of my conversations with Muehlenhaus.

  “Mr. Muehlenhaus, I’m going to try to get Merodie Davies out of jail. If that helps you, swell. If not, tough titty, said the kitty, but the milk tastes fine.”

  “I like you, Mr. McKenzie. You’re so colloquial.”

  “I’m just trying to do a favor for a woman who could use one.”

  “Truth be told, that is all I am doing, as well. A favor for friends. In so many ways we are very much alike, Mr. McKenzie. If there is a significant difference, it is merely at the level on which we grant our little favors.”

  “Now you’re just being nasty.”

  The smile on Muehlenhaus’s face changed with my remark. It looked the same as it had, yet the mood behind it was different. I supposed that he thought he was paying me a compliment and was angry now that I didn’t see it his way.

  “Thank you for your time, Mr. McKenzie.” Somehow Norman knew I was being dismissed, because the car door opened abruptly. “I will be following your progress with great interest.”

  I stepped out of the air-conditioned car. The midday heat hit me like a brick, and I actually lost my balance for a few beats. The asphalt beneath my feet was soft; I could cut into it with a butter knife. Norman, in his black sports coat, didn’t seem to notice. He skipped around the limo and opened the driver’s door. He glared at me over the roof of the car, yet said nothing.

  A moment later I was standing alone in the nearly empty parking lot. There were only a few golfers hardy enough to take on eighteen holes in that heat. I figured the smartest thing I could do was get my clubs and join them. I didn’t. Pity.

  7

  I doubted I’d be welcomed at the Anoka County Records Division, so I drove all the way to the public library off Hennepin Avenue in downtown Minneapolis and made use of the bank of personal computers available to the library’s many patrons. I used one to surf the Web for something, anything, on a man named Becker who died of carbon monoxide poisoning twelve years ago in Anoka and another named Richard who might or might not have been dealing drugs from the same address. Nothing. I even tried Googling Richard Becker and discovered a sculptor, an illustrator, a bird-watcher, a film director, and a wine-maker, all very much alive.

  Robert St. Ana, however, was a different matter. I had a number of hits on his name, nearly all of them tied to Cilia. None of them told me much about the man’s life or death, probably because he had died so long ago, but I did learn the exact date he died.

  Fortunately, the library had preserved every copy of the Minneapolis Star Tribune ever printed on microfiche and stored the rolls in a bank of gray metal file cabinets. Next to the cabinets were a number of viewers, provided free. I threaded the appropriate reel of microfiche into a viewer and hit the fast-forward button. About a month’s worth of news events and advertisements whirred past. I slowed the deluge of newspaper pages as I approached the correct date.

  Andover man’s death ruled alcohol related

  A man whose body was found in his snow-covered car at the bottom of a ravine by cross-country skiers Thursday died of carbon monoxide poisoning, according to the Anoka County Medical Examiner’s Office.

  Robert St. Ana, 24, of Andover, died from breathing the deadly fumes after falling asleep as a result of “acute alcohol intoxication, ” the autopsy report said. St. Ana’s blood alcohol level was measured at .187, nearly twice the legal limit.

  St. Ana’s vehicle was found in a ravine near Coon Rapids Dam Park. Evidence at the scene suggests that he drove off of East River Road and plunged 30 feet into the ravine during Tuesday’s record snowfall.

  It is not known if St. Ana lost consciousness before or after his car left the road. The car stayed hidden until discovered Thursday morning by a family of cross-country skiers.

  Authorities believe that the car continued to run even after it came to a halt. An examination of the vehicle revealed that the keys were locked in the “on” position when the car was found, yet the gas tank was empty.

  Sources at the Anoka County Sheriff’s Depa
rtment reported that several witnesses saw St. Ana drinking heavily at the Ski Shack, a popular restaurant and bar in Coon Rapids, the evening the accident occurred.

  St. Ana is the son of Donald St. Ana, founder of St. Ana Medical Co. Donald St. Ana died two years earlier, drowning in his backyard swimming pool. It was reported at the time that he had also been intoxicated when he died, with a blood alcohol level of .163.

  “Carbon monoxide poisoning?” I said aloud, much to the dismay of the other library patrons.

  “Shhhh,” a woman hissed.

  Coincidences do happen, as my pal Bobby Dunston likes to tell me. Still, what were the odds that St. Ana and what’s-his-name Becker both died of carbon monoxide poisoning? I needed more information and decided that Vonnie Lou Lowman would be a good source. A quick glance at my watch told me that no way would she be back from work yet. I decided to pay a visit to the Ski Shack, but first I slid a quarter into the printer. A moment later I had an 8½ × 11 copy of the newspaper story. I folded it and slipped it into my pocket.

  After returning the microfiche, I was out the door, my car keys in hand, and heading across the street toward the nearly full parking lot where my Audi was parked. Along the way I was forced to dodge a knot of young children disembarking from an enormous green van, some of them holding hands. One of the children announced with a mixture of awe and glee, “This is bigger than our school library.”

  In that moment the dream returned.

  There was no sound track, only images moving in ultra slow motion, moving the way they did on NFL replays so the announcer could point out the exact moment when the play went terribly, terribly wrong.

  The glass door of the convenience store swings open. Benjamin Simbi backs out slowly, his attention drawn to something in the store. I shout at him. He turns to face me. He is carrying a Smith & Wesson .38 in his right hand and a bag of loot in the left. I calmly tell him to drop the gun. He raises his hands slowly—slowly—slowly—slowly. They are level with his chest when I squeeze the trigger of the shotgun. The blast catches him in the chest and throws him against the glass door of the convenience store.

  Then the dream repeated itself, starting with Simbi raising his hands slowly—slowly—slowly, raising his gun to shoot me except I shoot him first.

  I had kept walking, stopped, tried again, finally slumped against an SUV—a blind man groping for support. I bowed my head, held it with both hands, closed my eyes, and waited for the memory to pass the way you would a bout of dizziness after getting up too quickly. This had never happened before. Dreaming in broad daylight. It was the first time the memory had crept up like that, and it startled me. I couldn’t imagine what triggered it, either. Certainly not the children laughing; that made no sense. If searching Merodie’s house, breathing the stench of death, or fighting with Officer Baumbach hadn’t initiated a flashback, how could a child’s laugh? What did that have to do with it?

  Maybe you really should think about therapy again, I told myself silently.

  “I could use a drink,” I said out loud.

  I was a half dozen steps away from my Audi when I realized that I no longer held my keys in my hand. I checked my pockets. I checked the ground around me. I retraced my steps.

  The sudden change from the air-conditioned coolness of the library to the hot, humid air outside had brought a shock to my skin. It was at least ninety-five now and still six degrees below what the newspaper had predicted. In those conditions, the slightest physical exertion produced a great deal of perspiration, and just walking through the library’s parking lot, my eyes examining everything that was even remotely shiny, was enough to cause rivulets of sweat to trickle from my armpits down my sides.

  I found the iron grate of a storm drain built against the curb approximately where I had crossed the street after leaving the library. I didn’t even have to look. I knew that my car keys, house keys, firebox key, boat key, everything had gone down the drain.

  I stood there, muttering short, Anglo-Saxon words that attracted the attention of a young, anorexic-looking woman who was crossing the street. She smiled knowingly.

  “Dropped your keys into the storm sewer?”

  I nodded helplessly.

  “Happens all the time,” she said, and motioned for me to follow her.

  I didn’t believe her, but I trailed the woman into the library just the same. She led me to the information desk, leaned over the top, and plucked a telephone from a shelf. She punched in a number without looking it up, calling the Minneapolis Department of Public Works. The woman did all the talking. After she hung up the phone, she told me, “It’ll be a little bit before they can get a guy out here.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Happens all the time,” she said.

  I told her I wanted to reward her for her kindness, but she brushed me off. Instead I stuffed a twenty into a box that sought donations for the Friends of the Public Library and returned to the parking lot.

  I waited for fifteen minutes. It seemed longer. Finally, a panel truck with CITY OF MINNEAPOLIS painted on the side arrived. I walked quickly to the driver’s door. A woman with enormous brown eyes peered out at me.

  “I lost my keys,” I announced.

  “Other than that, how are you?” she asked.

  “Down there,” I gestured toward the storm drain.

  “Let’s take a look.”

  The sewer worker took a long, yellow, rubber-coated flashlight from the cab of the truck and moved to the drain. She squatted next to it and shone the powerful light through the grate. The beams illuminated something silver below, but it was a good fifteen feet away, and neither I nor the sewer worker could testify that the reflection was my keys.

  The sewer worker flicked off the flash and stood up. “I don’t suppose you could call your wife to bring you a spare key,” she said. There was Hispanic blood somewhere in her family tree, but her voice had the flat twang of America’s northern states.

  “I’m not married,” I told her.

  “Girlfriend?”

  “Not at the present time.”

  “Really?”

  The sewer worker smiled again; her face lit up like a hundred-watt bulb, and I said, “Hey.”

  She was in her late twenties, a little more than five foot six, about 120 pounds. Her hair was the same color as her eyes; a bandanna kept it off her neck and shoulders.

  “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Why do you need to know my name?”

  “It’s only fair since I’m about to risk my life for you.”

  She was putting me on, yet she spoke in such an earnest manner that for a moment I couldn’t be sure.

  “What do you mean, risk your life?”

  The sewer worker gave her head a small, sad shake and moved toward her truck.

  “Wait a minute.” I followed her. “What do you mean, risk your life?”

  The sewer worker opened the back of the truck and retrieved a pair of coveralls that she quickly slipped into. The name on the coveralls read BENNY. She put on a pair of knee-high rubber boots and heavy gloves. She said, “If anything happens, my name is Benita. Benita Rosas. Tell them . . .” She bowed his head as if the words were simply too painful to speak.

  “What are you talking about?”

  Benita gently placed her hand on my shoulder. “This is his sewer,” she said.

  “His sewer?”

  “I don’t mind the raccoons,” Benita said. “The bats, the cockroaches, the spiders—I can live with them, as well. And the rats.”

  “Rats? There are rats down there?”

  “Of course there are rats down there,” she replied somberly. “It’s okay. The rats are our friends. Where there are rats, there’s air. It’s just him we need to worry about.”

  “Who’s him?”

  “He doesn’t have a name. We just call him—him.”

  “All right, then. What is him?”

  “A twelve-foot alligator.”

  “An alligator?”
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  “A twelve-foot alligator,” she corrected me.

  “There are no twelve-foot alligators in the sewer system.”

  “Ten-foot, then. You know how people exaggerate.”

  “There are no alligators, period, in the sewer system.”

  Benita looked at me with such an expression of sadness that for a moment I felt compelled to apologize for doubting her. But only for a moment.

  “Seriously,” I said.

  “We’re not supposed to tell the public. The authorities are afraid of panic.”

  “Cut it out.”

  Benita averted her eyes, looking out toward the people moving in and out of the library entrance, many of them children. “See them,” she said, gesturing with her hand. “Kids.” She sighed heavily. “We need to protect the kids.”

  “Oh, brother.”

  Benita took a measuring wheel from the truck. She went to the sewer drain opening and set the wheel at the edge of the metal grate. Without a word, she started walking in a more or less straight line. I followed.

  “Three hundred sixty feet,” she announced when we came to the nearest entryway to the sewer system. “That’s 360 feet through the tunnel to where you dropped your keys and another 360 feet back. That’s a long way—with him down there.”

  “Honest to God, Benita, I wish you’d stop saying that. I know you’re joking.”

  “Call me Benny,” she said, and smiled.

  I liked her smile. I liked her face. She wasn’t so attractive that I would have noticed her in a crowded room, yet the more I looked into her soft brown eyes, the more I liked what I saw.

  “Benny,” I said.

  She smiled some more.

  Using a metal rod with a handle on one end and a curl on the other, Benny pulled the heavy iron lid off the sewer pipe and slid it away. She checked her flashlight by shining it into the palm of her hand.

  “Here goes,” she said.

  She stepped on the rungs of a ladder that led to the entrance of the sewer tunnel and began her descent. Her body was halfway into the sewer when she stopped and gazed into my eyes.