Badger Games (15 page)

“Not that they tumbled to Frank Oberavich, for that matter,” Helen pointed out. “We should get the colonel to check both names out.”

“The next, obvious question,” Joe said, “is, Where do we go from here? Where is Paulie, assuming he's the guy we're after? We've got to be gentle with Frank. He's a little skittery.”

“A little! I kept cringing every time you brought up the subject of buying land.”

“I didn't think I even mentioned it,” Joe said. “Did I? Was it obvious?”

Helen said it was obvious to her that he coveted Oberavich's property, but Frank might not have noticed. “He was bombed,” she said. “Anyway, you didn't push it, thank heaven.”

“It's true, though,” Joe said. “I'd love to get a foothold back in there on the Forkee.”

Helen thought it would take some doing. Joe agreed. It was obviously a delicate issue. But he thought it could be done.

“How?” Helen asked.

“You,” Joe said. “He's got the hots for you.”

“Oh, bull,” Helen said. “The guy's probably gay,” and she cited Carmen's hint. “He didn't display it, but he's probably one of those deeply closeted guys, afraid of his attraction to men. If anything, he's probably got the hots for you. He was hanging on your every word.”

“I thought you said he didn't notice my hints about buying land? No, no, there were no vibes. Hey, I've been around gay guys,” he said. “I know when I'm being hit on. Frank is just one of those guys who are so leery of attachments of any kind that they find it much more congenial to be a hermit. There are plenty of guys like that. But that doesn't mean that he wasn't attracted to you. I saw the way his eyes followed you around the room. He pitched almost all of his talk at you.”

“I wonder why it is that men so hastily reject the idea that another man could be gay and might be interested in them?” Helen observed. “Is it some fear of homosexuality in themselves?”

Joe scoffed and reiterated his belief that Frank was interested in her. She didn't like where this was heading.

“What are you suggesting?” she demanded. “I should seduce him? So you can have a place in the bush?”

“Hey, I'm not pimping you,” Joe said. “You don't have to go to bed with the guy…. But if the attraction is there, why ignore it? Every guy is in a more agreeable mood when a woman he likes is being nice. It's an angle, that's all.”

Helen's glance was severe enough to convince him that it was a topic that had better be dropped.

In Butte, while Helen took a shower Joe went down the street to an outdoor phone booth with a pocketful of quarters, to check
in with Tucker. But for some reason, once they were connected, Joe didn't report their success to the colonel. He merely suggested that the Lucani use their contacts to check out Oberavich as a variant name for Franko. He said nothing about their meeting with Frank, or about Paulie. A check on the name would do for their purpose. Other than that, he told the colonel, they had just gotten started in Butte. The colonel seemed satisfied, even pleased.

In the afternoon, Joe checked in with Carmen Tomarich. He was curious about the property across the creek from Oberavich, he said. He told her he'd met Frank, who wasn't his old buddy, but they'd gotten along quite well. Frank had mentioned something about plans to develop property up that way. She said she hadn't heard anything about that, but she'd check it out.

“Are you thinking of building?” she asked. “I've got loads of good building sites, private and picturesque, but much more convenient than clear out on the Forkee—accessible roads year-round, with power, wells already drilled, sites laid out.”

Sure, he was interested, he told her. He meant it. But he told her that the inaccessibility was part of the attraction. If there was one such place like Frank's, perhaps there were more. You just had to look. Montana was a huge place. As for commercial power, Frank got along without it. In fact, Joe pointed out, Frank's system was probably less likely to fail than the power company's.

Carmen was skeptical. “To me, power is something you get when you plug into the wall. He probably didn't tell you about all the days in the winter when the sun doesn't shine.”

Joe assured her that he had. But, he conceded, he wasn't as obsessed with self-reliance as Frank was. “I like good groceries,” he said.

“Well, I'm glad you guys got along,” Carmen said. “I'm just sorry Frank didn't turn out to be your long lost pard. But it's funny, last night I bumped into my friend Trudy at Gamer's restaurant?
And she says when she called around for me, to find out where Frank was? Well, somebody else is looking for him, too.”

“No kidding?” Joe said. “Coincidence, I guess. But then, Frank is pretty reclusive. Probably a bill collector.”

“It didn't sound like it. Some guy like you, an old acquaintance. Trudy said her friend, the guy who knows Frank, said when she asked that Frank must be getting popular in his old age, somebody else was asking about him.”

“Maybe it's his high school reunion organizer,” Joe said. He didn't want to seem too interested. After all, his ostensible reason for finding Frank had gone bust. Unless, it occurred to him, there was another Frank Oberavich in town. “Or maybe there is more than one Frank Oberavich,” he said.

“There's plenty of Oberaviches,” Carmen said, “but no other Frank, that I know of. There's Gary, Vic, Jim, and, let's see … Bill.”

“How about Paul?” Joe asked.

Carmen didn't think so. “Who's Paul?”

“I was just thinking,” Joe said, “my pal used to talk about a cousin, or maybe it was an uncle, named Paul. But now that you mention it, there are a lot of possibilities, aren't there? Frank never said he was from Butte, just from Montana. I imagine the Oberaviches have spread out to other cities. Oh well, this is getting to be too much trouble. Heck with it.”

“Sorry it didn't work out,” Carmen said. “But you might want to call Gary. His wife, Selma, is one of those whatchacallems, always tracking down ancestors and relatives. If there is another Frank on the planet, or a cousin Paul, Selma would know where. I've got her number.” She looked it up and gave it to Joe. “When do you want to look at some of these other properties?” she asked.

“I'm beat today,” Joe said. “We're going to do some sightseeing, go to the mining museum, that sort of thing. I'll give you a call in the next few days.”

There was no Paul Oberavich listed in the phone book. After a few moments of thought, he dialed the number Carmen had given him for Gary and Selma. A woman's recorded voice on an answering machine said that Gary and Selma were unable to come to the phone, but if this was Publishers Clearing House calling to tell them they'd won a million dollars, leave a message. Or anyone else, the voice added.

Ah well, it was good to be patient, Joe thought, hanging up. He'd give it a try later. But now he felt the old urge to dig. He considered making contact with someone from the mob. If Frank was dealing marijuana, no doubt the local mob could at least give him an angle on him. They might even know Paulie. It might be worthwhile to make some tentative inquiries.

An answering machine in Chicago told him to leave a message. He gave the number of the phone booth and said he'd return in fifteen minutes. That would allow his contact on the other end to make some contacts of his own, and it would also relieve him of the necessity of waiting around the phone booth, which was located on a street corner near a bank.

He took a little stroll around town, just to get some fresh air. To his horror he almost encountered the one person in Butte he didn't want to see: Cathleen Yoder, better known as Cateyo. She was a nurse at St. James Hospital. She was walking down the street toward him, some two hundred feet away. He looked for a handy store entry, but nothing was available. He had just about decided to brave it out and was preparing an eager grin, when she turned into the entrance of the power company, a look of concentration on her pretty face. He exhaled in relief. She hadn't noticed him. He turned about and walked back to the phone booth, where he huddled with his back to the door, pretending to look up a number in the book until the phone rang.

“Joe,” his contact said. “Whattaya doin' in Montana? Last I heard, you was in jail, or the hospital. You all right?”

“I'm fine, Deke,” Joe said. “Just hangin' out, coolin' it. I'd appreciate it, though, if you didn't spread the news.”

“Hey, you know me, Joe. What can I do you for?”

Joe asked for the names of some contacts in the area. Deke told him that the only guy he knew about who was connected out that way was a Smokey Stover, who ran a bar. Deke could find the number if he wanted it. Joe said that was all right—he wasn't planning to be in town more than an hour or two, so maybe it wasn't worth calling the guy.

Deke was a good friend. Joe knew he wouldn't broadcast the news about his whereabouts, unless somebody important asked him. That was about the best Joe could hope for. He also learned that there wasn't any particular interest in him, as far as Deke knew. That was good. Deke didn't mention DiEbola, or Mitch, or any of the other people with whom Joe normally did business. Good.

Joe hung up and took off, keeping an eye peeled for a blond who might be out and about, relieved that the mob had little concern with him, despite his problems with them. Presumably, DiEbola had squared him with the mob, reinstated him, so to speak. He felt considerably easier, even more confident and somehow more … what? Connected. He realized that for some time, without thinking about it, his world had become more constricted, less connected.

He strolled down to a bar on Park Street and had a beer, asking the barkeep if he knew this Smokey Stover. “Ask Smokey who told Father Nick he stole the wine,” the guy said. He gave directions. Joe left and walked another four blocks down the hill to a place called Smokey's Corner. It was an old-fashioned neighborhood joint—smoky, reeking of beer, not very well lit, with pool tables, a pressed-tin ceiling, a long oak bar with a brass footrail, and a high, ornate, beveled-mirror back bar. An older man with a bit of a paunch and smoking a corncob pipe stood at the end of the bar, talking to the bartender, a young, muscular fellow. The older one
looked at Joe with baby blue eyes under a polished bald dome. He smiled at Joe and made a rueful grimace that was evidently an attempt at an ingratiating smile.

“I'll be goddamn,” he said. “You don't know me, but I'm Bernie Stover.” He held out a big, calloused hand. “And you're Joe Service. I knew your boss. Sorry to hear about his passing. I guess you guys made up, eh? Let me buy you a drink.”

He signaled the bartender and had a couple of shots of Jack Daniel's poured, with beer chasers. He tossed his back, saying, “Here's to Humphrey—may he be safe in heaven while the devil's busy in Butte.”

Joe said, “Here,” and took a sip of the whiskey. He wasn't fond of whiskey.

“What can I do for you?” Stover asked.

“Just stopping by, Bernie,” Joe said. “So you knew the Fat Man? He was … well, he was all right. Things went a little sour for him, finally. That's all. But you're looking all right. I met a guy, said ask you who told Father Nick you stole the wine.”

“Jim Tracy, that rotten bastard.” Stover laughed.

They chatted like this for several minutes, establishing carefully who they were and making it clear that there was no animosity, no issues between them. But at long last, Joe asked about Frank Oberavich.

“Weirdo” was Stover's opinion, and it was plain that he didn't have much use for him. “He grows a little weed, I hear. I don't mess with that shit, you know? It's a pain in the ass. The cops are too freaky when it comes to even a little of that.”

“Weed?” Joe didn't know much about the trade. “What's all the beef about weed?”

“It's the entry drug, the cops say, where the kids start. Anything with kids is poison. Anymore, the cops get so much of their funding from the drug program that it's all they think about. What
do you want to know about him? Christ, don't tell me you're thinking of getting into that shit.” He puffed his pipe, emitting little clouds of not very aromatic smoke.

No, no, Joe assured him. He'd never had those kinds of interests. He was just looking for some property to build on.

Stover hastened to assure him that he'd had nothing to do with Joe's place getting trashed, down in the Ruby. This was surely a lie, but Joe had never gotten the full story from DiEbola. It had to have been Stover or his men who'd done the job. Some of them, of course, had perished in the process. It was a topic worth avoiding. But Joe was glad to plant the notion that he was looking for property.

Stover knew the Oberaviches, all of them. A couple of different families, he said they were. Frank was wacko, but the others were okay. Gary, for instance, he was a straight hand. Worked for the railroad. He didn't know what his relationship with Frank might be, but he thought they were uncle and nephew. Paulie? Never heard of any Paul Oberavich. The only Paulie he could think of was Paulie Martinelli. Nice guy, a professor or something. He might be a friend of Frank's, although Paulie was a bit older. Stover didn't know him well. If he had to guess, he'd say Paulie was at Montana State, over in Bozeman.

Joe listened to all this with an air of casual interest. Finally, he said, “You know, Bernie, I'm glad I came in here. I want you to know, as far as I'm concerned, all that stuff with Humphrey and those other guys—I don't even know who they were!—to me, it's all history. You know what I'm saying? That was Humphrey. He's gone. I got no beef with you. Okay?”

Bernie shrugged and drew on his pipe. “Okay with me, Joe,” he said. They shook hands again.

“I'm retired, Bernie,” Joe said. “I'm not doing any business around here. All I'm interested in is my own peace and quiet.” He looked Bernie in the eye.