and it might be fun to see everyone fighting over the bathroom. But then, maybe not. I drove past the office. No lights on. Connie never came in this early. I cruised past Morelli’s house. No one on the front lawn. His SUV parked at curbside. A single light on upstairs. Morelli was most likely moving a little slow this morning. I avoided my apartment building. It was too soon to get in, and I knew the sight of the fire-blackened windows would make me feel sad.
That left me with Myron Kaplan. I returned to the center of the city and parked across the street from Kaplan’s house. It was Monday morning and some houses showed signs of life, but not Kaplan’s. If I was a television bounty hunter, I’d kick the door down and go in guns drawn to catch Kaplan by surprise. I elected not to do this because it seemed like a mean thing to do to a guy who just wanted to return his teeth, I wasn’t any good at kicking doors down, and I didn’t have a gun. My gun was home in my cookie jar, and it wasn’t loaded, anyway.
So I hung out in Ranger’s brand-new Cayenne, watching Kaplan’s house, telling myself I was doing surveillance. Truth is, I was snoozing. I had the seat reclined and was feeling very comfy inside the big car with the dark tinted windows.
I woke up a little after nine and saw movement behind Kaplan’s front window. I got out of the car and rang Kaplan’s bell.
“Oh jeez,” Kaplan said when he saw me. “You again.”
“I’ll make a deal,” I said. “I’ll take you to breakfast if you go to the police station with me when you’re done.”
“I don’t want to go to breakfast. I haven’t got any teeth. I have to gum everything to death. And if I swallow big chunks of stuff, I get indigestion. Can’t eat bacon at all.”
“You got your money back. Why don’t you go to another dentist and get new teeth?”
“I called some other dentists and couldn’t get an appointment. I think they’re all in cahoots. I’m on a blacklist.”
“Dentists don’t have blacklists.”
“How do you know? Are you sure they don’t have blacklists?”
“Pretty sure.”
“Pretty sure doesn’t cut it, chickie.”
“Okay, we’ll go to plan B. Let’s pay a visit to your old dentist.”
“The quack?”
“Yeah. Let’s talk to him about your teeth.”
“Do you have a gun?”
“No.”
“Then it’s a waste of time,” Myron said. “You’ll never get in.”
“Trust me, I’ll get in.”
WILLIAM DUFFY, DDS, had an office suite on the fifth floor of the Kreger Building. The waiting room was standard fare. Durable carpet, leatherette chairs, a couple end tables holding artfully arranged stacks of dog-eared magazines. A receptionist desk presided over one wall and guarded the door that led to Duffy.
“That’s her,” Myron said. “Miss Snippity.”
Miss Snippity was in her forties and looked pleasant enough. Short brown hair, minimal makeup, blue dental office smock with the name Tammy embroidered on it.
“Don’t come any closer,” Tammy said. “I’m calling Security.”
“That’s not necessary,” I told her. “We aren’t armed.” I glanced over at Myron. “We aren’t, right?”
“My daughter took my gun away,” Myron said.
“We’d like to talk to Dr. Duffy,” I said to Tammy.
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No.”
“Dr. Duffy only sees by appointment.”
“Yes,” I said, “but you just opened for the day and there’s no one in the waiting room.”
“I’m sorry. You’ll have to make an appointment.”
“Fine,” I said. “I’d like an appointment for now. Do you have that available?”
“Dr. Duffy doesn’t see patients until 10 A.M.”
“Okay. Give me an appointment at 10 A.M.”
“That’s not available,” she said, thumbing through her appointment book. “The next available appointment would be three weeks from now.”
“Here’s the deal,” I said to her. “Poor Mr. Kaplan has no teeth. He’s getting indigestion, and he can’t eat bacon. Can you imagine a life without bacon, Tammy?”
“I thought Mr. Kaplan was Jewish.”
“There’s all kinds of Jewish,” Mr. Kaplan said. “You sound like my daughter. Maybe you want to tell me to get a colonoscopy, too.”
“Oh my goodness, you haven’t had a colonoscopy?”
“No one’s sticking a camera up my rump,” Mr. Kaplan said. “I never like the way I look in pictures.”
“About Mr. Kaplan’s teeth,” I said to Tammy.
“I have no appointments,” Tammy said. “If I break the rule for Mr. Kaplan, I have to break the rule for everyone.”
Tammy was starting to annoy me.
“Just this once,” I said. “No one will know. I know Dr. Duffy is in. I can hear him talking on the phone. We want five minutes of his time. We just want to talk to him. Five minutes.”
“No.”
“I told you,” Mr. Kaplan said to me. “She’s snippity.”
I put palms down on Tammy’s desk and I leaned in real close to her. Nose to nose. “If you don’t let me in, I’m going to picket this building and let everyone know about the shoddy work Dr. Duffy is doing. And then I’m going to run a personal computer check on you and get the names of all your high school classmates and tell them you have relations with ponies and large dogs.”
“You don’t scare me,” Tammy said.
So that was when I went to plan C and broke into my imitation of Julie Andrews, singing, “The hills are alive, with the sound of music…”
Dr. Duffy almost immediately stuck his head out the door. “What the heck?”
“We’d like to talk to you for a moment,” I said. “Mr. Kaplan is very sorry he held you up, and he’d like to discuss his teeth.”
“I’m not sorry,” Mr. Kaplan said. “This office gives me a pain in my behind.”
“You aren’t armed, are you?” Dr. Duffy asked.
“No.”
“Come back to my office. I have a few minutes until my first appointment.”
Myron stuck his tongue out at Tammy, and we followed Dr. Duffy down a short corridor, past dental torture rooms.
“What would you like to discuss?” Dr. Duffy said, settling himself behind his desk.
“Do you still have Myron’s teeth?”
“The police have them. They’re evidence.”
“Can they be fixed so they fit him and they’re comfortable?”
“They seemed to fit him when he left my office.”
“They were fine, and then a week later, they were terrible,” Myron said.
“You should have made an appointment to get them rechecked,” Dr. Duffy said.
“I couldn’t get an appointment,” Myron said. “Your snippity secretary wouldn’t give me one.”
“It would be really great if you could drop the charges against Mr. Kaplan and fix his teeth,” I said to Duffy. “He’s not a bad guy. He just wants teeth. And for the record, your secretary is snippity.”
“I know she’s snippity,” Duffy said. “She’s my wife’s first cousin, and I can’t get rid of her. I’ll see what I can do about getting the charges dropped, and I’ll call you as soon as the police release your teeth.”
“That would be real nice of you,” Myron said. “I’m getting tired of oatmeal.”
Ten minutes later, we were in front of the courthouse. “I have to check you in,” I said to Myron, “but Connie is
