Going South Read online

  Lena takes the chair opposite. Harry’s hands are folded on the table and he looks wrung out. She folds her own hands just for balance.

  “So?”

  “I can’t do it anymore.”

  “Do what?”

  “This!” he holds out his hands to include the kitchen. “The fucking work-a-day wank, how ‘bout it? It’s not me, Lena. And it’s not you either.”

  “What are you telling me?”

  “Look, we have, what? A couple of grand in the bank and a mortgage we’ll never live to pay off? Not much to show for working your life away.”

  “So,” Lena squeezes her fingers. “What do we do instead?”

  “I’ll tell you what,” Harry leans in. “We live by our wits. We lay it on the line.”

  Lena gives herself another whack. “Now why didn’t I think of that?”

  Harry reaches for her hand. “Hey, listen to me, okay? The sad fact is that your current moron husband is worth a lot more dead than alive.”

  “Okay, this pipedream sounds familiar.”

  Harry settles back, arms folded. “So okay, things break your way and you have nothing to worry about. When I go you’ll be set. Good for you.”

  “Oh, I hardly ever think about that.”

  “What about me? What do I get?”

  “All that life insurance was your idea.”

  “I do it for you. It’s all I can do for you,” he leans into the light. “But what do I get? Me.”

  “The satisfaction of knowing your widow will be rolling in it,” Lena shrugs.

  “Come on, Lena. I want some.”

  She gets up from the table and turns on the light. “Harry, we’ve been down this road a hundred times. You can’t fake your own death without a body. No body, insurance smell a rat.”

  “So,” Harry turns off the light, “we get a body.”

  “You know what? I’m going to hear this out, just to see how your twisted mind works. Start with the body.”

  Harry’s voice comes from the shadows. “First we go to Mexico.”

  “That goes without saying.”

  “If I die in Mexico you’ll be the only one who can identify me. So you make a mistake, who’s gonna notice? See what I’m saying? Cremate the body instead of shipping it back. Come home; hold a little service and Bingo! You’re the rich, grieving widow.”

  “Getting back to the body. Where do we get it?”

  “Yes, well, that’s the hard part. Only one way, really.”

  “Murder? You? The guy who catches spiders and lets them go outside?”

  “Spiders have no insurance.”

  “You know the little rant of mine that starts with ‘you must be crazy’?” Lena does a little bongo on the table. “Save me the trouble and run that one through.”

  “Sure, it’s crazy, but it can’t fail.”

  “And when you get to the part where I leave you for the next moron, pay close attention.”

  “You don’t have to make up your mind right away.”

  Lena gives him a pat on the back. “You just sit and sulk, slugger. I’ve got soaps to watch.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  The elevator opens on an overweight patient with a goofy smile and a huge erection. Alice locks on Lena’s arm.

  “Mercy!”

  “That’s very good, Dennis,” Lena gives him a nod. “Go show Dot.”

  “Be still my heart!” Alice fans her face with a clipboard.

  “Charlie!” Lena calls over her shoulder. “Get Dennis his Hustler before he impales someone.”

  Down the hall Eddie sticks his head out. “Yo Lena, Henry Walters wants to see you when you get a chance.”

  “Who the hell is Henry Walters?”

  “The new CEO. Third floor, west, you can’t miss it,” he gives a wink. “Big dollar sign on the door.”

  A pitiful moan rises from somewhere down the stairwell. Tish shuffles past clucking like a chicken. Across the hall a television blares to the beat of Lorenzo’s head against the wall. Lena looks to Alice.

  “You heard. When I get a chance.”

  “I’m thinking, September.”

  “2023.”

  ***

  The morning passes in a noisy blur. A maintenance man shatters a fluorescent light setting off a stampede. NASCAR roars all afternoon and Larry the Lip stabs the Shadow with a ballpoint, standard stuff, run of the mill.

  “Anybody seen Dennis Carney?” Eddie pages the lunchroom. “Lena?”

  “He was in the lobby this morning waving it around. And forget what they say about white men, honey,” Alice purrs. “That one has the apparatus.”

  “Why Alice Long,” Eddie wags a finger, “I do believe you’re smitten.”

  “Well, how psychotic can he be? Maybe you could learn to live with it.”

  Lena stirs her coffee with a plastic fork. “Tell me something, Eddie. You’ve seen them do autopsies before. How involved is it?”

  “What’s the matter Lena? The living starting to get to you?”

  “I know they cut them up, but do they check dental records or anything?”

  “You serious? Half this lot don’t even have teeth.”

  “How about fingerprints? DNA?”

  “We already know who they are.”

  Dot squeezes past them rolling her eyes. “He want you upstairs right away, Lena. Mr. Powers That Be.”

  Lena looks to Dot. “How about this guy? What’s he got an early tee-off?”

  “Be nice,” Big Dot warns her. “Heads are rolling.”

  ***

  Henry Walters studies the Titleist logo, picking at the lint from his pocket. He is tall and tweedy, richly tan and silver at the temples. He palms the golf ball as Lena enters and gestures to the chair facing him.

  “Ah, Mrs. Watts.”

  “Mr. Walters.”

  “Have a seat, please.”

  “That’s okay, I can’t stay.”

  Walters slips the Titleist in his pocket. “Mrs. Watts, it’s a real pleasure to meet you at last. Tell me, how long have you been here at General?”

  “Six years in February, and you?”

  Walters smiles weakly. “Doubtless you are aware that the hospital has undergone a change in management.”

  “I’m aware alright.”

  “Miss. Watts, it has been brought to my attention that certain staff members disapprove of these changes.”

  “That’s Mrs. Watts and I can’t say I’m surprised.”

  “I’ll come right to the point. There have been an inordinate number of complaints regarding, shall we say, the abrasive attitude of the nurses on the psych unit? Yourself, in particular.”

  “I wouldn’t take them too seriously.”

  “I do take them seriously. In fact, I have no reason to doubt the veracity of these complaints. I might add that your confrontational reputation proceeds you.”

  “Think of it as a low tolerance for stupidity.”

  “Yes, well as head of personnel I’ve decided to assign John Strickland to oversee psych operations. Mr. Strickland and I feel that an alignment is necessary to ease budgetary constraints. This assignment will go into effect immediately and continue until such time as a determination can be made about the program’s viability.”

  “Strickland?”

  “That’s right.”

  “With the pocket pal.”

  Walters squirms slightly. “Mr. Strickland is the Efficiency Coordinator and Operational Liaison for the Metro Medical Group.”

  “Do tell.”

  “I sense a note of hostility, Mrs. Watts.”

  “Let me get this straight. Metro thinks that my unit is a money hole. As an ‘efficiency’ measure management will appoint a six figure bean counter to deal with malcontents. What else . . . ? Oh yeah, any confrontational or abrasive behavior will be dealt with severely. How am I doing?”

  Walters taps his fingertips together. “I’m cur
ious, Mrs. Watts. Do you like working here?”

  “Is that a requirement?”

  “According to your evaluation your former superiors seemed to think quite highly of you.”

  “My former superiors were in the medical profession.”

  “Meaning?”

  Lena shrugs. “Their primary concern wasn’t turning a profit.”

  “Can I tell you a story, Mrs. Watts?” Walters drums his hands on the armrests. “Several years ago a promising young surgeon applied for a position over at Mount Sinai. The hospital courted this particular doctor with the aim of setting up a first rate cardiac program. It was a controversial courtship in that many on the staff believed the money could be put to better use. The hospital persisted despite a number of significant resignations.”

  Lena stares holes in his skull.

  “But this doctor was a thorough young man. He looked into fiscal projections and concluded that, given labor unrest, the hospital couldn’t afford him. In the end Mount Sinai lost their doctor and, at last report, is now poised on the verge of bankruptcy.”

  Full bore lasers right between the eyes.

  “You see, Mrs. Watts, as distasteful as it may seem profit margins fuel the medical industry. This is a fact of life. Metro didn’t invent the system, but we fully intend to prosper in it.”

  Lena pauses for a few beats.

  “That’s a terrific story. Now I’ve got one for you. There’s a bloke downstairs, Randy Hewitt? I don’t expect you know him, but he’s a good kid. A little paranoid sometimes, but he knows the program and he’s making progress. In fact, he’s doing so well his insurance company is switching him to out-patient.”

  Walters sneaks a peek at his watch.

  “Now anyone familiar with his situation can tell you that Randy isn’t ready, but tomorrow we have to discharge him. Another fact of life, but one that won’t show up on your pie charts and bar graphs. This morning I found a note in my mailbox. Randy wishing me good luck, can you beat that?”

  ***

  Lena comes home to find Harry digging through the file cabinet. She passes him by without a word and gazes out the kitchen window.

  “Don’t you want to know what I’m looking for?” he calls to her.

  “Not yet.”

  “In theory, this cabinet is a repository for all our important papers. In truth, the sum total of our important papers could fit in a single manila envelope. But I like the repository idea. There’s a measure of satisfaction in rolling back the drawers and perusing the contents. It’s so, I don’t know . . . grown up.”

  Lena makes her vision go blurry.

  “So, let’s see,” Harry pulls a pile from the drawer. “A random sampling of our important papers would include, but in no way be limited to, take-out menus, meter reader regrets, various and sundry catalogues, letters from your mother – unopened, a program for the Nutcracker, circa 1998.”

  “Here’s an idea, Harry. Let’s make believe we already had this out and now we’re giving each other the silent treatment. How about it?”

  Harry sets the papers aside and joins her in the kitchen.

  “Bad day?”

  “I feel like a human drain pipe. Everything swirling around waiting for me to suck it down.”

  “Interesting analogy.”

  “I’m tired, Harry.”

  “In Brazil everything swirls in the opposite direction.”

  “Remember when everyone was dealing drugs and living in nice places and nobody worked? We always thought we’d end up in Paris. How come we didn’t?”

  Harry shakes his head. “It was a combination of things. You were still married to Joey then Gerry died. After that I guess the years just flew by.”

  “I need rest, Harry. I need to crawl into bed and sleep for weeks.”

  “There, there,” Harry rocks her in his arms until Lena goes limp. “Buck up, lady. Someday you’ll look back on these as the good old days.”

  “Sleeep.”

  “So we didn’t make Paris. There’s always Atlantic City.”

  Lena shoves him away and grabs the vodka bottle. Harry turns and stares into the sink.

  “Hey, we gave it a good shot, Lena. We kept our shoulders to the wheel and our noses to the grindstone, eh? Traded the best years for the small bucks, just like the rest of them. We did what you’re supposed to do and what did it get us?”

  “Don’t start Harry.”

  “Look at your Uncle Ray, laying back in Lauderdale for the last twenty years. What are the chances we’ll have that?”

  “You hate Florida.”

  “That’s not the point. Look at my pension, look at Social Security. We’re the generation that gets screwed and we sit back and take it. Unless . . .”

  “Unless what?”

  “Unless we screw them first,” Harry looks out at the rain. “We’re in a good position to pull this off, baby. Those policies are six years old now. We have good credit and we pay our bills.”

  “Yeah sure, I’m maxed out and your car is a moving violation.”

  “Forget about that, will you?”

  “Okay, let’s pretend you’ve convinced me. Murder somebody and we live happily ever after. Just how do we go about it?”

  Harry takes a long pause. “It would have to look like natural causes, of course. Heart attack would be ideal, given the family history. One of those lunatic fringe websites could probably tell you how.”

  “I know a way.”

  “Or I could just ask my wife.”

  “When I worked at Mercy we had this cardiac arrest. A woman with terminal brain cancer, her husband did her in. The pain was driving them both crazy and the bills were eating them alive. He used potassium chloride. Said it was painless and undetectable. Mr. Prince was his name.”

  “He confessed?”

  Lena nods. “He would have gotten away with it, but he broke down and told me in my office. I don’t know why he picked me. He was a sweet old guy in a black fedora. A pharmacist.”

  “You never told me this.”

  “He injected her right there in the room then tossed the syringe in the wastebasket.”

  “What did you do?”

  Lena looks away. “I told him he did the right thing. His wife wasn’t going to get better and the pain would get worse. I told him to go home and get some rest.”

  “Then you took care of the syringe.”

  “I knew he’d never think of it.”

  “You made him get away with it.”

  “I never told a soul.”

  Harry reaches around her for the bourbon. “This potassium chloride, where do you get it?”

  “They sell it in the drug store.”

  “You checked.”

  “What about our victim, Harry? Who is he?”

  Harry pokes at the smuts in the drain. “This is strictly hypothetical, right? Okay, we need a guy who resembles me. Doesn’t have to be a dead ringer, but in the ballpark, same hair, same body type. Say the guy’s in Mexico by himself, cruising the hotspots, hoping to get lucky. And who does he see sitting alone by the dance-floor?”

  “Who?”

  “You.”

  Lena knots her eyebrows. “That’s the plan?”

  “Oh, I suppose we could come up with something more complicated. But I think we should stick to what we know. We know bars.”

  “So, I sit by myself in a Mexican dive until some stranger who looks like you tries to pick me up.”

  “It’s like riding a bike, baby. You don’t forget how.”

  “When do you get to do something?”

  “I’ll be at the bar keeping an eye out.”

  “And then, let’s see . . . stranger takes me home and what, I slip him a mickey? Then when he’s out cold I shoot him up with potassium chloride.”

  “That’s about it.”

  “Gee, we’re a real team. Hey, why don’t I turn a few tricks on the side, you know, for mad money?�
��

  “Look, if it will make any difference I’ll do the injecting. You’ll have to show me how.”

  Lena smiles and shakes her head. “That’s a first rate plan, Harry. I mean what could go wrong?”

  “You tell me.”

  “Well, for starters, injections usually leave a bruise. So your body goes to autopsy with a fresh puncture wound. No reason to suspect foul play there.”

  “So we inject him where no one will look, between the toes or under the scrotum. The guy had a heart attack. They won’t go groping around down there.”

  “They’ll do a tox screen. Guess what? The poor sap was dosed.”

  “So I was mixing pills and alcohol. Not advisable but certainly not unusual, or illegal.”

  “Can I turn the lights on now?”

  “You’re just being squeamish. And I can understand that. Fact is, the plan is foolproof. Worst-case scenario? The mark’s a runt or he’s too hot to trot, I just get rid of him. We start over someplace else.”

  “What about the police?”

  “They have no reason to suspect anything. You’re a distraught American tourist in a tourist town. And remember, once they burn the body you can’t be proven guilty. Ever.”

  “You’ve given this a lot of thought.”

  “Years of thought. I’ve got it figured down to the last detail.”

  “So, if Harry’s dead, who are you?”

  “I don’t get you.”

  “You can’t be Harry anymore. You have to be someone else. How do you do that?”

  “Easy. I’ve got Gerry’s ID. I renewed his driver’s license and his Visa card. Believe me, Lena, I’m way ahead of you.”

  “You always make it sound so easy. What about the local authorities?”

  “Come on, it’s Meh-hee-co. Wave a few bucks and all obstacles disappear.”

  “I’m going to bed now.”

  “You know it’s foolproof. Admit it.”

  Lena yawns mightily. “I’m already sleeping. I’m dreaming this.”

  “Dream this while you’re at it, a little house in the country, nothing to do and a million bucks to do it with. Tell me you haven’t had that one before.”

  “Lately I dream about being single.”

  “In ten years we’ll be too old to pull it off. What do you think happens to us then? Think about growing old and never giving it a shot. If we get caught I’ll take the fall. No big deal. What’s a life sentence to a fifty year old loser with a history of heart disease? Hell, the worst that could happen is you would be single again.”