After Midnight

Just kidding.

I half expected it to say that, but it didn’t.

I don’t remember what the hell the headline was. It had nothing to do with me.

As I carried the Tribune down toward the house, though, it gave me an idea.

28

YVONNE

Until I’ve had a cup of hot, black coffee, I’m useless in the morning. And this qualified as morning, even though I’d never gone to bed.

Back inside the house, I tossed the Tribune onto the kitchen table and set to work making a pot of coffee. I knew right where to find everything. Before long, the cozy aroma of coffee filled the kitchen.

I had to wait for the pot to fill, though, so I sat at the table and looked through the newspaper. It didn’t contain a single story about anything I’d been involved with last night.

Nothing in the Obituary section, either.

None of which came as much of a surprise.

When the coffee was ready, I poured myself a mugful. I almost took it outside to drink it by the pool. That would’ve been nice on such an early, lovely morning. On my way to one of the back doors, though, I remembered what the prowler’d done. That changed my mind. So I returned to the kitchen table and looked at the newspaper again while I enjoyed my first mug of coffee.

I went straight to the movie ads. I like movies. Chester had a cineplex with six theaters. Not bad for such a worthless little town. Some good stuff was playing. I checked the times on a couple of them, and wondered about going to a movie today.

Why not? I deserved a treat, the way I’d toughed it out and taken care of so many problems.

One problem still needed to be dealt with, though.

Tony’s redial.

I now had a plan.

If it works, I thought, I’ll take in a movie afterward to celebrate.

When I went for a refill on my coffee, I checked the clock on the kitchen wall.

6:20.

I should probably wait until after 8:00 to try out my idea.

To help pass the time, I decided to make myself a huge breakfast. Normally, I don’t have any breakfast at all—just coffee. But I’d had a long, hard night. I’d gotten enough exercise to kill off a high-school football team, picked up scads of minor injuries (food heals), and must’ve burnt off one or two zillion calories. I deserved a feast.

While a skillet full of bacon was sizzling on a burner, I made myself a Bloody Mary. I prepared it my special way—half tomato juice and half vodka, double the usual amount of Worcestershire Sauce and Tabasco to give it a real bite. After stirring it around with ice cubes, I squeezed a slice of lime into it. Then I sprinkled ground pepper over the top.

It tasted so fine.

I sipped it while I finished tending to the bacon, made some toast and fried a couple of eggs. After buttering the toast, I topped each slice with an egg. Then I sat at the table and devoured it all.

One of the best things you can put in your mouth is a piece of buttered toast that’s dripping with egg yellow. Try it by itself, or with a chunk of egg white and a bite of bacon. Wash it down with coffee or a Bloody Mary. Mmmmm.

I hated to see the last of it go.

After breakfast, I did the dishes and skillet by hand and put everything away. I was tempted to have another Bloody Mary, but resisted the urge. One had been enough to make me feel pleasant. A second might knock me off my feet.

I needed to have my wits about me—and my feet under me—for taking care of the redial problem.

Before leaving the house, I hung the saber on the wall where it belonged. I also hung Charlie’s robe in the bedroom closet and put on my swimsuit from yesterday. The swimsuit was all I had to wear, because I didn’t want to use Tony’s clothes again now that they’d been washed. In the laundry room, I emptied the drier and stuffed everything into a grocery bag.

Carrying my bags, my purse, and the Chester Tribune, I left the house and went up to my room over the garage.

It was nice to be in my own place again. It felt so safe and cozy. I wished I could stay—climb into bed and bury myself under the covers and sleep for ages.

Maybe later.

A lot later.

First, I needed to hide Tony’s things. I hung up his shirt in my closet, just as if it were my own. I folded the cut-offs and slipped them into a dresser drawer where I kept other pairs of shorts. The handkerchief and bandana also went into drawers. I put the note pad and both sets of keys in my purse. I hid the cassette tape in a chest pocket of an old flannel shirt near the back of my closet.

That left nothing except the severed denim legs of Tony’s jeans. They certainly weren’t incriminating, so there was no reason to hide or destroy them. I decided to take them out to the car with me. They might make good rags. So I folded them and set them near my purse.

Next, I took off my swimsuit. I put on thong panties and a bra, then stood like a dope and wondered what else to wear.

Making the decision wasn’t easy. Mostly because I didn’t really know what I’d be doing. Also, maybe, because I needed sleep. And the Bloody Mary might’ve had a little to do with it.

Finally, I made up my mind and got dressed.

With my purse, the morning newspaper and the denim legs, I hurried downstairs and let myself into the lower part of the garage.

I took Judy’s car.

I didn’t like the idea of driving it around. I wanted to dump it somewhere and be done with it, but using my own car for a mission like this would’ve been idiotic.

Judy’s car, at least, couldn’t be traced to me.

And I doubted that anyone would recognize me. Not in my sunglasses and red wig.

Yeah, I had a wig on.

I kept a small collection of them, just in case. A gal never knows when she might want to alter her appearance a bit. Or a lot.

The curly red hair looked pretty damn gawdy, but that was the idea. Gawdy all the way. My lipstick was too bright, too red. My gold hoop earrings were the size of bracelets. If people saw me, that’s what they would see. They’d never stand a chance of recognizing—or identifying—me, Alice.

I drove to the busy area near the highway. Some of the locals call it “motel row.” But it had a lot more than just motels. Along both sides of the highway were tons of restaurants and gas stations, and even some fruit stands and gift shops.

There were also scads of public telephones.

You hardly ever find phones in enclosed booths, anymore. I didn’t want to deal with highway noise, so I parked the car and went into a restaurant called Pokey’s. The hostess was busy seating a family, so I went straight for the restrooms. Near the end of the corridor, I found two public phones between the doors marked Guys and Dolls.

Nobody was using them.

I took the note pad and a pen out of my purse. After checking the newspaper, I jotted down a number I’d found on the masthead.