“The day I take it off,” I said. “It’ll snow within twenty-four hours. Guaranteed.”
“So leave it on.”
“I’m not hauling a twelve-hundred-pound snow-plow all the way to Detroit and back.”
“So take it off.”
We took the snowplow off. In the light from a single bulb outside my cabin, we took the snowplow off and left it sitting there in its springtime resting place behind the little utility shed, a block of wood holding the mount off the ground and a big plastic tarpaulin covering the whole thing.
By the time we got to bed, the snowflakes were already flying.
CHAPTER 5
The next morning, eight inches of new snow lay on the ground. After Randy got done rolling around in it, he helped me put the plow back on the truck, which only takes about forty times as much effort as taking the damned thing off the truck. You have to line it up just right, because technically I don’t have the right kind of front mount to carry that plow. After an hour of monkeying around with it, we got the stupid thing on and plowed the road. Then we tore the stupid thing off again and put it back in its spot behind the shed. The sun was just coming up by then.
“Come on,” I said when we were all done. “Let’s get out of here before it starts snowing again.”
“Don’t you want some breakfast?”
“We’ll grab some on the way,” I said. “We got old flames to find, remember?”
We jumped in the truck and gunned it through Paradise. The sun shone on the new snow and blinded us. “Snow in April!” Randy said. “I love it!” And then he started singing again. “L’amour, l’amour… Oui, son ardeur… Damn it, Alex, what is the next line to that song?”
“You just keep singing the one line you know,” I said. “All the way down to Detroit. That’ll make me very happy.”
We made Mackinac by 9:30, rolled through a McDonalds, where we picked up breakfast and hot coffee. Then we settled in for the long haul on 1-75, right down the middle of the Lower Peninsula. Ten minutes south of Mackinac, all the snow was gone.
“What did you say you’re doing now?” I asked him. “Commercial real estate?”
“Yeah, you know, office buildings, retail space, that kind of stuff. My father started the business, did pretty well with it. I never thought I’d take it over, but when he died… I mean, I was already out of baseball.”
“What do you do, build these places?”
“No, just make money off them,” he said. “Buy and sell, talk on the phone, have lunch with the investors. That kind of thing.”
“Sounds fascinating.”
“It has its moments,” he said. “Good and bad. Hey, I told ya about my youngest son, Terry, right? The catcher?”
“You mentioned him, yes.”
“God, you should see him hit the ball, Alex.”
“You mentioned that he’s a good hitter.”
“He drives that ball. Not bad behind the plate, but he’s not a human sponge yet like you were.”
“Uh-huh.”
“That was you, Alex. The human sponge.”
I rubbed the swelling over my right eye. Human sponge indeed.
“How long until we get to Lansing?” he said.
“Three hours maybe.”
“God,” he said. “Three hours.” He laid his head on the back of the seat. Within five minutes, he was snoring. I kept drivin
“Wake up,” I said.
“What? What is it?”
“We’re here,” I said. “We’re in Lansing.”
“Lansing?”
“Yeah, the capital of Michigan,” I said. “Didn’t you learn your state capitals in school?”
He sat up and looked out the window. The truck was parked in a lot next to a complex of tall gray buildings. “Wow, we’re here already?” he said. “I slept that whole time? You should have woken me up and made me drive some.”
“It was the only peace and quiet I’ve had in two days,” I said. “Come on, let’s go.”
We left the truck and went into the first building.
“Where are we going?”
I looked through the papers Leon had sent with us. “State Office of Vital Records,” I said. We looked on the board by the elevator and found it. VITAL RECORDS, THIRD FLOOR. On the ride up the elevator, Randy started humming.
“Positive thoughts,” he said. “Confidence. Charm.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“Make sure you mention that you’re a private investigator. That should help, right?”
“I’m not telling anybody I’m a private investigator,” I said.
“Well, then just look him right in the eye and smile. Or her.”
It was a her. Maybe fifty years old, glasses on a chain around her neck. She looked like the attendance officer at a junior high school.
“Can I help you gentlemen?” she said.
“Yes, ma’am,” I said. “I’m a private investigator. I’m looking for some information.”
She looked at me.
“Here’s my card,” I said. I took out one of the cards Leon had given me, the cards with the two guns on them. I put it down on the counter in front of her.
She looked down at it, then back up at me. “What did you do to your eye?” she said.
“A little accident,” I said.
“What kind of information?”
“There’s a woman,” I said. “We believe she was born in Detroit in 1952. Her name is Maria Valeska. Or was. It may have changed.”
“Nice name,” she said.
“Yes,” I said. “We were wondering if we could see her birth certificate. It’s extremely important.”
“Birth certificates are not public records,” she said. “Not in the state of Michigan.”
“I understand that,” I said. “I was hoping…”
She kept looking at me.
“You see, it’s very important…”
Nothing. She was a statue.
“We really need to find her…”
A statue carved in white granite. Wearing a blue cashmere sweater.
“I understand that marriage licenses are public,” I finally said. “Could we try that?”
“Year of marriage,” she said.
“I’m not quite sure of that,” I said. I looked back at Randy.
“After 1971,” he said.
“After 1971,” I said.
“It costs seventeen dollars to do a search on a particular year,” she said. “Four dollars for each additional year.” She produced a form and put it on the counter. “Fill this out.”
“Thank you,” I said. I took the form and looked at it. The first line was for the name of the bride, the second for the name of the groom. “Do you need the groom’s name?”
