The Best American Mystery Stories 2006 Read online

  “Cherry,” Vladdy said, “I feel bad inside that I cannot pay rent.”

  Cherry waved him off. “You pay the rent in other ways,” she laughed. “My floor and windows have never been cleaner. Not to mention your other...services.”

  Vladdy looked over his shoulder to make sure Tony hadn’t heard his mother.

  “I am serious,” Vladdy said, trying to make her look him in the eyes. “I’m a serious man. Because I don’t have a job yet, I want to work. I wonder maybe if your neighbor Bob needs an apprentice in his work. Somebody who would get mud on himself if Bob doesn’t want to.”

  Cherry shook her head and smiled, and took a long time to answer. She searched Vladdy’s face for something that Vladdy hoped his face had. When she finally spoke, her voice was low, for a change. She leaned her head forward, toward Vladdy.

  “I told you I’d heard some things about Bob at the K-Bar,” she said softly. “I heard that Bob is a bio pirate. He’s a criminal.”

  “What is this bio pirate?”

  He could smell her whiskey breath, but he bent closer. “In Yellowstone, in some of the hot pots and geysers, there are rare microorganisms that can only be found here. Our government is studying some of them legitimately, trying to find out if they could be a cure for cancer, or maybe a bioweapon, or whatever. It’s illegal to take them out of the park. But the rumor is there are some people stealing the microbes and selling them. You know, bio pirates.”

  Vladdy sat back for a moment to think. Her eyes burned into his as they never had before. It was the whiskey, sure, but it was something else.

  “The metal briefcase,” Vladdy whispered. “That’s where he keep the microbes.”

  Cherry nodded enthusiastically. “Who knows what they’re worth? Or better yet, who knows what someone would pay us to give them back and not say anything about it?”

  Vladdy felt a double-edged chill, of both excitement and fear. This Cherry, he thought, she didn’t just come up with this. She had been thinking about it for a while.

  “Next time he’s at the K-Bar, I’ll call you,” she said. “He doesn’t bring his briefcase with him there. He keeps it next door, in his apartment, when he goes out at night. That’s where it will be when I call you.”

  “Hey,” Tony called from the couch, “what are you two whispering about over there?”

  “They talk fornication,” Eddie said with a slur, making Tony laugh. As far as Vladdy knew, it was Eddie’s first American sentence.

  ~ * ~

  Vladdy was wiping the counter clean with Listerine — he loved Listerine and thought it was the best disinfectant in the entire world — when the telephone rang. A bolt shot up his spine. He looked around. Eddie and Tony were watching television.

  It was Cherry. “He’s here at the K-Bar, and he ordered a pitcher just for himself. He’s settling in for a while.”

  “Settling in?” Vladdy asked, not understanding.

  “Jesus,” she said. “I mean he’ll be here for a while. Which means his briefcase is in his apartment. Come on, Vladdy.”

  “I understand,” Vladdy said.

  “Get over there,” Cherry said. “I love you.”

  Vladdy had thought about this, the fact that he didn’t love Cherry. He liked her, he appreciated her kindness, he felt obligated to her, but he didn’t love her at all. So he used a phrase he had heard in the grocery store.

  “You bet,” he said.

  Hanging up, he asked Eddie to take Tony to the grocery store and get him some ice cream. Eddie winked at Vladdy as they left, because Vladdy had told Eddie about the bio pirates.

  ~ * ~

  The metal briefcase wasn’t hard to find, and the search was much easier than shinnying along a two-inch ridge of brick outside the window in his shiny street shoes with the mad river roaring somewhere in the dark beneath him. He was happy that Bob’s outside window slid open easily, and he stepped through the open window into Bob’s kitchen sink, cracking a dirty plate with his heel.

  It made some sense that the metal case was in the refrigerator, on large shelf of its own, and he pulled it out by the handle, which was cold.

  Back in Cherry’s apartment, he realized he was still shivering, and it wasn’t from the temperature outside. But he opened the briefcase on the kitchen table. Yes, there were glass vials filled with murky water. Cherry was right. And in the inside of the top of the briefcase was a taped business card. There was Bob’s name and a cell phone number on the business card.

  Vladdy poured the last of the Jack Daniel’s that Cherry had stolen into a water glass and drank most of it. He waited until the burn developed in his throat before he dialed.

  “What?” Bob answered. Vladdy pictured Bob sitting at a table in the K-Bar. He wondered if Cherry was watching.

  “I have an important briefcase, full of water samples,” Vladdy said, trying to keep his voice deep and level. “I found it in your flat.”

  “Who in the hell are vow? How did you get my number?”

  Vladdy remembered a line from an American movie he saw at home. “I am your worst nightmare,” he said. It felt good to say it.

  “Where are you from that you talk like that?” Bob asked. “How in the hell did you get into my apartment?”

  Vladdy didn’t answer. He didn’t know what to say.

  “Damn it,” Bob said, “what do you want?”

  Vladdy breathed deeply, tried to stay calm. “I want two thousand dollars for your metal briefcase, and I won’t say a word about it to anyone.”

  “Two thousand?” Bob said, in a dismissive way that instantly made Vladdy wish he had asked for ten thousand, or twenty thousand. “I don’t have that much cash on me. I’ll have to get it in Cody tomorrow, at my bank. “

  “Yes, that would be fine,” Vladdy said.

  Silence. Thinking. Vladdy could hear something in the background, probably the television above the bar.

  “Okay,” Bob said. “Meet me tomorrow night at eleven p.m. on the turnout after the tunnels on the Buffalo Bill Dam. East entrance, on the way to Cody. Don’t bring anybody with you, and don’t tell anyone about this conversation. If you do, I’ll know.”

  Vladdy felt an icy hand reach down his throat and grip his bowels. This was real, after all. This was American business, and he was committed. Stay tough, he told himself.

  “I have a partner,” Vladdy said. “He comes with me.”

  More silence. Then a sigh. “Him only,” the man said. “No one else.”

  “Okay.”

  “I’ll be in a dark Suburban, parked in the turnout.”

  “Okay.” Vladdy knew the vehicle, of course, but he couldn’t give that away.

  “If you show up with more than your partner, or if there are any other vehicles on the road, this deal is over. And I mean over in the worst possible sense. You understand?”

  Vladdy paused, and the telephone nearly slipped out of his sweaty hand like a bar of soap.

  “Okay,” Vladdy said. When he hung up the telephone it rattled so hard in the cradle from his hand that it took him two tries.

  ~ * ~

  Vladdy and Eddie sat in silence on the couch and listened as Bob crashed around in his apartment next door. Had Vladdy left any clues next door, he wondered? Eddie looked scared and had the broken .22 pistol on his lap. After an hour, the crashing stopped. Vladdy and Eddie watched Cherry’s door, praying that Bob wouldn’t realize they were there and smash through it.

  “I think we’re okay,” Vladdy said, finally. “He doesn’t know who took it.”

  ~ * ~

  Vladdy kept his cheek pressed against the cold window as they left Yellowstone Park. He closed his eyes temporarily as the van rumbled through the east entrance, then opened them and noted the sign that read entering shoshone national forest.

  Eddie was still talking, still smoking. He had long ago worked his way into the front so he sat next to the driver. A second marijuana cigarette had been passed back and forth. The driver was talking about democra
cy versus socialism and was for the latter. Vladdy thought the driver was an idiot, an idiot who pined for a forgotten political system that had never, ever worked, and a system that Vladdy despised. But Vladdy said nothing, because Eddie wouldn’t stop talking, wouldn’t quit agreeing with the driver.

  They went through three tunnels lit by orange ambient light, and Vladdy stared through the glass. The Shoshone River serpentined below them, reflecting the moonlight. They crossed it on a bridge.

  ~ * ~

  “Let us off here,” Vladdy said, as they cleared the last tunnel and the reservoir sparkled beneath the moon and starlight to the right as far as he could see.

  The driver slowed, then turned around in his seat. “Are you sure?” he asked. “There’s nothing out here except for the dam. It’s another half-hour to Cody and not much in between.”

  “This is our place,” Vladdy said. “Thank you for the drive.”

  The van braked and stopped.

  “Are you sure?” the driver asked.

  “Pay him, Eddie,” Vladdy said, sliding across the seat toward the door with the metal briefcase. He listened vaguely as the driver insisted he needed no payment and as Eddie tried to stuff a twenty in the driver’s pocket. Which he did, eventually, and the van pulled away en route to Cody, which was a cream-colored smudge in the distance, like an inverted half-moon against the dark eastern sky.

  “What now?” Eddie asked, and Vladdy and Eddie walked along the dark shoulder of the road, crunching gravel beneath their shoes.

  “Now?” Vladdy said in English, “I don’t know. You’ve got the gun in your pants, right? You may need to use it as a threat. You’ve got it, right?” Eddie did a hitch in his step, as he dug through his coat. “I got it, Vladdy,” Eddie said, “but it is small.”

  ~ * ~

  Vladdy’s teeth began to chatter as they approached the pullout and he saw the Suburban. The vehicle was parked on the far side of the lot, backed up against the railing of the dam. The car was dark.

  “Are you scared?” Eddie asked. He was still high.

  “Just cold,” Vladdy lied.

  Vladdy’s legs felt weak, and he concentrated on walking forward toward the big car.

  Vladdy said, “Don’t smile at him. Look tough.”

  “Tough,” Eddie repeated.

  Vladdy said to Eddie, “I told you to look professional but you look like Eminem.”

  “Slim Shady is my man,” Eddie whined.

  At twenty yards, the headlights blinded them. Vladdy put his arm up to shield his eyes. Then the headlights went out and he heard a car door open and slam shut. He couldn’t see anything now but heard fast-moving footfalls coming across the gravel.

  Vladdy’s eyes readjusted to the darkness in time to see Bob raise a pistol and shoot Eddie point-blank in the forehead, right through his stocking cap. Eddie dropped straight down as if his legs had been kicked out from under him, and he landed in a heap.

  “Some fuckin’ nightmare,” Bob said, pointing the pistol at Vladdy. “Where are you boys from?”

  Instinctively, Vladdy fell back. As he did so, he raised the metal briefcase and felt a shock through his hand and arm as a bullet smashed into it. On the ground, Vladdy heard a cry and realized that it had come from inside of him. He thrashed and rolled away, and Bob cursed and fired another booming shot into the dirt near Vladdy’s ear.

  Vladdy leaped forward and swung the briefcase as hard as he could, and by pure chance it hit hard into Bob’s kneecaps. Bob grunted and pitched forward, nearly onto Vladdy. In the dark, Vladdy had no idea where Bob’s gun was, but he scrambled to his feet and clubbed at Bob with the briefcase.

  Bob said, “Stop!” but all Vladdy could see was the muzzle flash on Eddie’s face a moment before.

  “Stop! I’ve got the —” Vladdy smashed the briefcase down as hard as he could and stopped the sentence. Bob lay still.

  Breathing hard, Vladdy dropped the briefcase and fell on top of Bob. He tore through Bob’s clothing and found the gun that shot Eddie. Bob moaned, and Vladdy shot him in the eye with it.

  ~ * ~

  With tears streaming down his face, Vladdy buckled Eddie’s and Bob’s belts together and rolled them off of the dam. He heard the bodies thump onto some rocks and then splash into the reservoir. He threw the pistol as far as he could and it went into the water with a ploop. The briefcase followed.

  He found a vinyl bag on the front seat of the Suburban that bulged with two thousand dollars in cash. It puzzled Vladdy for a moment, but then it made sense. Bob had flashed his lights to see who had taken his briefcase. When he saw two out-of-place guys like Vladdy and Eddie — especially Eddie — Bob made his choice not to pay.

  ~ * ~

  Vladdy drove back through Yellowstone Park in the Suburban, thinking of Eddie, thinking of what he had done. He would buy some new clothes, new shoes, one of those fleece vests. Get a baseball cap, maybe.

  He parked on a pullout on the northern shore of Yellowstone Lake and watched the sun come up. Steam rose from hot spots along the bank, and a V of Canada geese made a long graceful descent onto the surface of the water.

  He felt a part of it, now.

  A setting from a dream of nature, he thought.

  <>

  ~ * ~

  JAMES LEE BURKE

  Why Bugsy Siegel Was a Friend of Mine

  From The Southern Review

  In 1947 nick hauser and i had only two loves in this world — baseball and Cheerio yo-yo contests. That’s how we met Benny, one spring night after a doubleheader out at Buffalo Stadium on the Galveston Freeway. His brand-new Ford convertible, a gleaming maroon job with a starch-white top, whitewall tires, and blue-dot taillights, was stuck in a sodden field behind the bleachers. Benny was trying to lift the bumper while his girlfriend floored the accelerator, spinning the tires and blowing streams of muddy water and torn grass back in his face.

  He wore a checkered sports coat, lavender shirt, hand-painted necktie, and two-tone shoes, all of it now whipsawed with mud. But it was his eyes, not his clothes, that you remembered. They were a radiant blue and literally sparkled.

  “You punks want to earn two bucks each?” he said.

  “Who you calling a punk?” Nick said.

  Before Benny could answer, his girlfriend shifted into reverse, caught traction, and backed over his foot.

  He hopped up and down, holding one shin, trying to bite down on his pain, his eyes lifted heavenward, his lips moving silently.

  “Get in the fucking car before it sinks in this slop again! “ his girlfriend yelled.

  He limped to the passenger side. A moment later they fishtailed across the grass past us. Her hair was long, blowing out the window, the pinkish red of a flamingo. She thumbed a hot cigarette into the darkness.

  “Boy, did you check out that babe’s bongos? Wow!” Nick said.

  But our evening encounter with Benny and his girlfriend was not over. We were on the shoulder of the freeway, trying to hitch a ride downtown, flicking our Cheerios under a streetlamp, doing a whole range of upper-level yo-yo tricks — Round the World, Shoot the Moon, Rock the Cradle, and the Atomic Bomb — when the maroon convertible roared past us, blowing dust and newspaper in our faces.

  Suddenly the convertible cut across two lanes of traffic, made a U-turn, then a second U-turn, horns blowing all over the freeway, and braked to a stop abreast of us.

  “You know who I am?” Benny said.

  “No,” I replied.

  “My name is Benjamin Siegel.”

  “You’re a gangster,” Nick said.

  “He’s got you, Benny,” the woman behind the wheel said.

  “How you know that?” Benny said.

  “We heard your name on Gangbusters. Nick and me listen every Saturday night,” I said.

  “Can you do the Chinese Star?” he asked.

  “We do Chinese Stars in our sleep,” Nick said.

  “Get in,” Benny said, pulling back the leather seat.