The Door Into Summer

Chapter 35

Father Joe's looked like it was four hundred years old and Old Padre Road had been built around it. "Well, at least I understand why Roscoe told me I should come armed. Why don't the people he knows ever hang out in better-looking places?"

Kookie chuckled. "Because those places are better-lit. Roscoe only knows bugs and vermin and they like the dark. We can always turn around and go home," he offered hopefully.

"No. I'm not going to spend the next four to six weeks looking over my shoulder for that piece of . . . "

"Crap?"

"That's nowhere near as vile as it should be." Stu found a parking space and the two got out of the car. Father Joe's looked better on the inside than it did the outside, which wasn't saying much. The bar was, of course, dimly lit, and it took a few minutes for their eyes to adjust to the darkness. Roscoe and a slimy-looking fellow were all the way in the back. From the number of empty glasses on the table they'd been drinking for quite a while. "Who's your friend, Roscoe?" Stu asked with all seriousness.

"Joey, this is Stu. Stu Bailey, this is Joey." Stu offered his hand to shake but Joey just looked up and blinked. Kookie cleared his throat to attract attention. "Oh yeah, and this is Kookie." Kookie did nothing more than nod.

"What are you drinking?" Stu asked. Stu had tried to figure that out already from the size and shape of the empty glasses, but it was impossible to tell. Near as Stuart could determine, it could be anything and everything.

"Beer," Joey croaked. His voice sounded like metal scraping over cut glass. How reliable was this character? Better yet, how much did Roscoe trust him?

"No waitress?" Kookie asked.

"Too early," Roscoe answered. Kookie got up and stacked the glasses one inside the other, then gathered as many as he could and took them back to the bar. When he came back to the table for the second load Stu slipped him a twenty-dollar bill.

"Bring us four beers, would you, Kookie?"

"Sure, dad."

When Kookie returned with the beer he set them down in the center of the table. Joey practically jumped up and grabbed one of them. Stu took one and Kookie the third. Roscoe left his sitting by itself on the table. "I understand you have some information for me, Joey. About a mutual acquaintance of ours. How much do you want for it?"

Joey had already finished one beer and grabbed for the last one sitting on the table. Stuart moved the still full glass out of Joey's reach. "How much?"

The degenerate whined and looked at Stu. "How much for what?"

"Tony Daggett's location," Stu growled softly.

Kookie watched the interplay between the two men and wondered what it would take for Bailey to get the information he was seeking. Not much, as he soon found out.

"Well?"

"Just . . . just the beer," Joey responded.

Stuart slid the full glass of beer across the table, into Joey's waiting hands. When he had gulped almost half of it down, Stu pulled the remainder in the glass away again. "Daggett's location."

"Don't know the address," the man mumbled, "but I can take you there." Stu gave him back the glass.

"If you can get me there without our being seen, I'll give you this and you can buy all the beer you want." Stu held up a twenty-dollar bill, enticingly. Joey's eyes got big as he attempted to figure out how much beer that could buy him. "A lot," Stu explained, once he knew just what their source was trying to calculate.

Joey nodded his head, furiously. "Tomorrow," he croaked in response. "I'll take you tomorrow."

"No," Stu demanded. "Now."

"I, but I . . . I just . . . now?"

"That's what I said. Now."

"Will you bring beer?"

"Yes," Stu replied. He handed the keys to the T-bird to Kookie. "You drive this, and follow us. And get us a six-pack to go." Kookie took the keys and headed for the bar. Stu turned to Roscoe. "We're taking the rental. You and Joey sit in the back seat with the beer and I'll drive." Kookie returned with the six-pack and left it on the table, then proceeded outside for the T-bird. "Get him on his feet, Roscoe," Stu instructed, and he picked up the beer and headed for the door. Roscoe and a very inebriated Joey followed behind.

Once the three men were settled in the rental car, Stu looked at Joey. "Where to, pal?"

"Uh . . . "

"Give him a beer, Roscoe," Stuart instructed. "But only let him drink about half of it."

"Go down this road," Joey pointed to Old Padre Road. "Turn right at Friar's Road."

Stu did as he was told, and the caravan started off.

Twenty minutes later they were closer to Tijuana than they were San Diego. Surprisingly, Joey seemed to know where they were going. Stu made one turn after another until they came upon a small apartment complex that looked like it had been there since the beginning of time. "That's it," Joey pointed. "He's in the third one from the right. See that old gray Chevy parked on the street? That's Daggett's car."

"You're sure?" Stu asked, amazed that Joey could remember anything considering the amount of beer he'd consumed by that point.

"Yes. I ran into him at the liquor store on the corner. He pointed it out to me. Said Bailey and Spencer would never find him."

Stu turned off the engine. "Take him back to San Diego," he told Roscoe, "and give him this," and he handed Roscoe two twenty-dollar bills. "Drive the rental car and drop him off wherever he wants to go, then go back to Hollywood. I'll be back . . . eventually."

"What do you want me to do, dad?" Kookie asked after Roscoe and Joey had pulled away.

"Stay in the car. If something happens to me . . . you'll know what to tell Jeff."

"But, dad . . . "

"No buts, Kookie. I can't risk your life as well as mine. This is my fight – Daggett made it that way. If I come out of it alive . . . he won't."

"You're sure, dad?"

Stu nodded. "I'm sure." Stu pulled his gun out of its holster and headed for the apartment. Kookie watched him go, dodging between cars and across the landscape, until he finally disappeared behind a garbage dumpster. Stu showed up again at Daggett's door, and although Kookie couldn't hear anything, he saw Bailey push open the front door of the apartment. It was quiet for almost a minute; then there were six or seven gunshots in succession. Once again everything was deathly still, and Kookie sat in the convertible as long as he could stand it.

When Stu didn't come back out the front door, the young man jumped out of the car and raced towards the apartment. It remained quiet while he ran. Across the lawn he went, fervently praying for a sound of any kind. There was none. When he got to the front door he could smell it in the air – cordite, gunpowder, blood, urine, a myriad of odors. There was no sound and Kookie pushed the door open a little wider. It was deathly silent, and Kookie paused for a moment before stepping inside. "Stu?"

TBC