Sinister Shorts

“He's still confused. But he'll come out of it.” Paul didn't know if that was true; he watched for a reaction, but missed it when Taylor turned away to adjust something on a shelf behind him.

Paul began to ask him a few questions, which Taylor answered. As they talked, Taylor moved stock on shelves, dusted for invisible dust, rearranged a sagging sign that read “If you look under a hundred years old, we want to see your ID for liquor purchases,” and sprayed his counter with what smelled like poison gas, wiping it all down with an immaculate new sponge.

“A hundred?” Paul asked. “That's about how old I feel some days. You wouldn't really ID me, would you?”

“No,” said Taylor.

“So why the sign?” Paul persisted.

“I put that sign up so maybe some people would quit making such a stink. You'd think they would be flattered I want to check their ID, but they get really ticked off.”

The man's sudden show of anger piqued Paul's interest. “Ticked off enough to shoot someone?”

“No!” Taylor looked shocked. “That's ridiculous.”

“So why make such a big deal about ID?”

“The penalties for selling to minors are fierce. Plus I'm not about to get in trouble so some sixteen-year-old can get loaded on my beer and crack up his mom's car.”

Taylor swore Roman Maldonado had never worked for him. He said there were some rowdies who'd threatened him about being in the wrong neighborhood, but he wasn't about to cop to bullies. He'd opened a “dialogue,” he said, and was working on making friends in the neighborhood. In general, he appeared to be a good-natured guy with nothing to hide. Only when he talked about Roman did he show his defensiveness.

“Look, I've seen him around, okay? I can't keep the kids from hanging around in front of the store. It's public property once they are out there. I've tried chasing them off, but I don't like to alienate anybody, especially potential customers. I turn a blind eye. But some of them are out there selling drugs, I know it and you do, too.” He looked hard at Paul. “I bet you experimented when you were young. Most kids do.”

“You're saying he was mixed up in a drug deal gone bad?”

“I wouldn't suggest that. I'm just trying to help you out, help you understand. He didn't work for me. If he had an income, that's one way people get it around here.”

“When the Maldonados came by, you said you didn't know Roman. You lied, Bert. Why'd you lie?”

“They were upset. They remember wrong.”

Paul wondered if they did.

On the way out of Taylor 's, Paul ran into the stroller. Baby now sat quietly, calm as a cow chewing her cud, face covered with chocolate.

“ Taylor sure keeps the store nice,” Paul said to the baby's mother.

“Yeah, I hardly recognized it today. I'm here at least once a week. You notice when things change.” She riffled for something in a voluminous straw bag, found what she was looking for, and brought out a crumpled cigarette.

“He really fixed it up, huh?”

“When he bought it, he put in the fresh food and painted the inside. I noticed today, the place is real clean.”

“Ever see a big kid named Roman working the counter in there?”

“I don't want to get Bert into trouble.”

“Kid got shot here a couple of days ago. Bert said it was a drive-by.”

“Here?”

“Right in front of the store.”

“Shit.” She sighed, lighting up. “Might as well go out smoking.”

Long shadows crept along the street shading the building opposite Paul's office, blurring as twilight hinted its approach. The shoppers were going home. If he wanted to make his evening walk on the beach, he would have to hurry. The thought, which ordinarily made him happy, irritated him for a moment. He didn't like routines. And he was tired of walking alone.

He called Taylor 's insurance company, then pumped a workers' compensation lawyer he knew in Salinas for information. He had tried earlier in the day to talk with Roman again, but had another brief unenlightening conversation. The boy was in pain and too sick to talk on the phone.

But Paul was satisfied he had a solution. This wasn't the standard whodunit. The facts in the case had been deliberately muddied but he thought he knew now what had happened to Roman Maldonado.

Hurrying to his car, he clocked his trip to the hospital at four minutes. Another record.

Up in his room, Roman lifted himself out of his fog long enough for Paul to hammer the final nail in his solution: Taylor had a baseball bat he resorted to in a pinch to cool down hotheaded patrons.

He made the trip back up to Taylor 's store, only once having to slip out of cruise control when a middle-aged flea marketeer cut him off at the Red Barn intersection.

“You again,” Taylor greeted him. “Like Columbo. ‘Oh, let me ask you one last thing.'” He laughed.

“That's right.” Paul smiled. “I'm back and I'm bad.”

“What's on your mind?”

The store was quiet, perhaps as quiet as the day Roman got shot. “Where are all your customers?”

“They come in waves. Sometimes we get ten people, then nobody for ten minutes.”

“That way on Sunday?”

“Always is.”

“That's right. There were no eyewitnesses. It was just you and Roman here, all alone. Just you two and a little under-the-table job, and a baseball bat.” Paul strolled around picking a few things off the shelf, placing them carefully, neatly back. Behind the counter, he caught sight of the bat. “Self-made man,” said Paul.

“That's right,” Taylor said, wanting to throw him out, but nervous about it. “Nothing wrong with that.”

“Self-sufficient. Hate hiring people. Bet you get worked up around tax time. Want to keep the government out of your business. Avoid insurance like the plague.”

“Who doesn't?”

“I like that sign you've got in your window there. ‘Survival of the fittest.' I've got to get one of those.”

“Something I can help you find?” Taylor said impatiently.

“You know, I don't think so. This last thing I want to see here, I'll swear you haven't got.”

It took him a long time to wear Taylor down, but in the end he admitted it. Taylor just didn't carry what Paul was looking for.

The Maldonados were due in his office at about four o'clock. Stuck at a long light, he spent an extra minute on the return trip there, and ran up the stairs to make up the time. He was going to have to stop all these little games he played, find something a little more satisfying than competing against himself.

Puffing hard and inspired by the thought, he punched in the number for the medical examiner. Since that morning on the beach, he had thought a lot about Susan Misumi and that pip-squeak dog of hers.

She wasn't part of his grand plan, but dreams had a way of changing on you.

“Fancy an evening walk?” he asked.

She did.

The Maldonados arrived on the button. They took seats across from Paul. The long afternoon light from the window behind his desk slanted through blinds, striping their faces gold and gray.

“Did Roman tell you anything? We can't get him to talk. His mother cries when she goes there. It's tough, seeing him like that.”

“He's confused about the details of what happened,” Delilah said. “He remembers working behind the counter and he's sure he never stepped out that front door. Says he always used the back door. Too many smokers and winos hung around in front.”

“So what the hell happened?”

“Victor!” his wife reprimanded.

“I'll send you a written report,” Paul said. “But this was no drive-by shooting. There was no spatter on the wall, and at least some of the blood he lost ended up somewhere besides the sidewalk in front of Taylor 's store.”

The parents looked at him, flummoxed. The father slammed his open hand down on the Formica. “ Taylor shot him! I didn't like him the moment I saw him.”