“Good, good,” said Roy, once again the jovial host. “I wanted to see how much you knew. You’ll forgive me. You’re pretty good, Walter.”
“It wasn’t much. You flatter me.”
“Just want to know that we both know what we’re doing here.”
“Look, Roy. I’m chasing a killer and I’ve been running toward a certain revelation in Frederick Lacey’s personal journal-something that has absolutely nothing to do with you or your family. Then, all of a sudden, Lacey’s wife comes up, then her father-your great-uncle-and I begin hearing about the gold and thinking maybe who I’m looking for has no connection to what I’ve seen revealed in Lacey’s confession, and instead has everything to do with the gold. If that’s true, I may be after the wrong person. I was hoping you could help me.”
“A killer?”
“Yes.”
“As in murder?”
“As in murder.”
“You’re not the police.”
“I’m not. You really should stop asking questions. Let me ask them. The more you know, the more you know what you shouldn’t. It serves no purpose. Do you understand me?”
“I do,” answered Roy Messadou. “It amazes me when you say you are after a killer, when you tell me you are really talking about murder. I assume this murder has already taken place.”
“Correct.”
“You know, of course you do, that I am just a stocks-and-bonds man. A good one. Well, what the fuck-a great one. But one nonetheless. I am a Messadou, proud to be one too. But my family’s history is a subject for great misunderstanding. I assure you whatever murder you are involved in, it has nothing whatever to do with Djemmal- Eddin Messadou. Do you know why?”
“Your sister doesn’t feel that way,” said Walter. “She came to see me and she was quite interested. The family fortune-your family fortune-was put someplace by Frederick Lacey. He never told any of you, according to your sister. After his father-in-law died, he kept the secret himself. Lacey surely didn’t spend it. The last thing he needed was more money. So, it must still be there-wherever he put it. Your sister says your family has a claim on that gold. I make no judgment about that. As I said earlier, I don’t care about the gold. But, if someone you know is killing people to get to Lacey’s document, to find the Czar’s coins, I will find them. I will.”
There was an earnestness in Walter’s voice, a serious nature to his bearing, a level of agitation Roy Messadou could not miss.
“Walter,” he said. “You’ve been misinformed.”
“Yeah, about what?”
“There is no gold. So far as I know, there never was. My great-uncle was a great man, a man who has been slighted by history. But he was a simple man and so was my grandfather a simple man. There was no gold then and there is no gold now.”
“That is not what your sister has to say.”
“Which one?”
“Aminette. Aminette Messadou, who your father named after Lacey’s wife.”
“I have a younger sister, Piper, who lives here, in the New York area, in Far Rockaway, Queens. She is slow, if you know what I mean. Retarded they used to call it. She lives in a special home, a wonderful place really, directly on the beach out there. I pay for it. I visit every week. Sometimes she remembers who I am. Sometimes she doesn’t. I have another sister, Jean. She lives in Houston. She’s married to some sort of financial executive. He does all right. Nothing like this, but okay. Jean is proud. Will not take a penny from me. She doesn’t want anybody’s gold. My sister Aminette came to see you? I have no sister named Aminette.”
“What does your sister Jean look like?” Walter asked, a sickening feeling creeping up from his stomach, looking to shut his lungs down tight as a drum.
“She’s forty years old and forty pounds overweight.” For a moment, Walter stopped breathing.
It’s never cold on St. John. Rarely is it too hot. When the rains come, people like it. True, a hurricane in September or October can make things unpleasant for a while, but the storms are never as bad as the television news says they will be. Most days in February are the same-seventy-something degrees, bright sunshine, sea breezes. Light, wispy clouds float across St. John’s blue skies, most often in small bunches on their way in from St. Thomas to the west. The hotels are full. The houses are rented. The beaches are packed and so too are the restaurants and bars in Cruz Bay. Dinner reservations, in February, are a must.
Walter’s visit with Roy Messadou presented a continuing puzzle. The solution evaded him. He thought about it late into the night. Walter was a late riser at home. Often he liked to drop in a DVD and watch a movie at one or two in the morning. These days getting to sleep at three-thirty, even four, was not unusual. He wondered if his heart attack and bypass surgery had affected his sleep patterns. By nine or nine-thirty, ten at the latest, he was up. Denise knew to have a fresh pot of coffee ready. She also knew he would have his breakfast at Billy’s, even in February.
On Sunday he walked into Billy’s a little after ten. Billy was still in back checking the meat and fish. Ike was eating a bowl of something, sitting alone at his table out front near the sidewalk. He smiled at Walter and Walter smiled back at the old man. He was not in his seat five minutes when Helen brought him some scrambled eggs and buttered toast-lightly buttered-and a cold bottle of Diet Coke. The New York Times, Sunday edition, was within reach, sitting unopened on the bar at the far end near the kitchen where Walter always sat. Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons played on Billy’s superior sound system. “I love you, baby.” This Sunday began no differently than many others.
“Best oatmeal I had since…” Ike was searching for a time. A man as old as he was had a lot of time to sort through. He blew out an amazing amount of smoke from his mouth and nose, holding the cigarette, fast approaching butt size, up in front of him like it was some kind of pointer. “Since the Army,” he finally said.
“Thank you very much, Ike,” said Helen, truly pleased the old man had enjoyed her out-of-the-ordinary choice of a breakfast for him. Most mornings he ate a single hard-boiled egg and three or four pieces of bacon. Today, she brought him oatmeal saying, “You know, all that pork you eat doesn’t go well with that tobacco.”
“Huh?”
“What I mean Ike is, that stuff will kill you. Either one probably. The pork or the cigarettes.”
“Damn, Helen,” said Ike, a man whose dignity could absorb substantial assault without damage. Still, he said, “You married him, but it looks like you got a attitude transplant from him too. You and Billy, now one of a kind.”
“Why thank you Ike,” she said with a gracious smile and curtsy, certain there was more pride than truth, more humor than hurt feelings in his protest.
“When were you in the Army?” Walter asked from across the bar. He knew perfectly well Ike had never been in the Army.
“The Army? Did I say I was in the Army?”
“Yes you did,” Helen said.
Walter said, “The oatmeal, Ike. The best you had, you said, since the Army.”
“Oh, that. I didn’t mean I was in the Army. ’Cause I wasn’t. Nope. Tried to be, but I didn’t make it. Didn’t want any more Negroes, they said. Had enough. I believe I said since the Army. I was in the Navy, you see. Officers’ Cook, Second Class. And, let me tell you, that’s what we was back then-second class.”
“What about the Army and the oatmeal?” Helen asked.
“I was slaving on that ship, colored boy hidden away in the very bowels of that fine vessel. Until we made port in Ireland. I met up there with these Negro Army troops, 92nd Infantry. Brave young men. Wouldn’t let them fight, so they sat there, in Ireland, where there was no Nazis, drinking and messing with the local women. Serving their country, in their way. I hung around them as much as I could back then. Anything to stay off that ship. One morning I went over to where they had this mess hall. That’s where the oatmeal comes in. I ate that oatmeal, sitting there with maybe fifty Negroes. First good meal I had since I left St. John. This one,” he said pointing to his empty bowl, flashing one of his trademark grins, “second only to it.”
Billy came out of the back, into the bar. He carried a cup of coffee in one hand and a receipt in the other. “Sonofabitch,” he muttered. “He shorted me on the red snapper.” He handed the receipt to Helen. “You call him and tell him to get it over here-all of it-right now-or I’ll call him and he won’t like that one bit. This is not the first time,
