Prodigal Son | Page 5

ones run by old couples or twenty-year-old kids. I marked off the grab joints because my instincts told me Andy was a hustler, not a food salesman. Finally there were three names left and A. Gresham looked like the best bet.
At the moment A. Gresham's balloon-breaking concession was being run by a thirty-year old woman with dark hair and prominent breasts, wearing a stained tan tank top. She Gould have been Andy's girlfriend, or she could have been A. Gresham herself. In any case it was time to move. I'd been there over an hour and I was starting to draw a kind of attention I didn't like.
I settled down at the booth next to Gresham's and watched a scrawny man in his seventies hustle a pair of soldiers. He was running a big board laid out like a roulette wheel, with silver dollar sized holes by each of the numbers. When the bets were down the old man dropped a white mouse into the middle of the board. It walked around with its nose in the air while the soldiers shouted at it, and then it suddenly darted into one of the holes.
"Well," the old man said, "better luck next time, fellas. I could see he was close to feeling your number--did you see how he was sniffing for it? So I'll tell you what I'm gonna do..." But it was too late. The soldiers had wandered off. "How about you, young man? Fifty cents to win any prize on the second shelf."
I moved in, catching a quick whiff of ammonia. I'd read somewhere that a mouse would follow that smell, thinking it was the urine of other mice. An easy way to rig whatever hole you wanted.
"No thanks," I said. "I was kind of hoping to see Andy, next door, but he doesn't seem to be in."
The old man looked me over and I had about decided I'd blown it when he said, "Yeah, he's had Melissa in there all day. So you know Andy, do you?"
I nodded, trying to keep it casual. "Met him a few years back. Him and his boy..."
"Tommy?"
"Yeah, that's the one." My heart was thudding so hard I was afraid the old man would see the front of my shirt shaking. Tommy, was it? Then Andy did know the kid's real name. "Blond, good-looking kid."
"Yeah," the old man said. "A goddamned shame."
"How do you mean?"
"I guess you wouldn't know. Poor kid died about two years ago, while we was wintering in Florida. Pneumonia. Like to broke ol' Andy's heart."
*
By the time I got away from the old man I had it complete in my mind. I used a pay phone to call Burlenbach and told him to bring some cops and meet me at the main gate. "He's here," I said. "I'm sure of it. The kidnapper's named Andy Gresham and he runs a pop-the-balloon joint on the midway."
I stopped then and wondered if I should tell him the rest of it. No, I thought. Not over the phone. "The kid is one of them," I said. "It's not going to be easy to get to him."
"Maybe he'd be better off staying there," Burlenbach said, and then stopped himself. "Forget I said that, okay? I've been under a lot of strain."
It was hard to hear him over the noise. "Sure," I said. "But get those cops here. This could get ugly."
"We're on the way," he said.
I hung up the phone and started for the front gate, detouring for a last glance at Andy's booth. It was a mistake. The curtains were parted and somebody was watching me from the darkness.
I looked away and started walking faster. When I turned my head again Buddy was standing next to the woman, staring at me. As he watched he shook his head slowly, twice. And then he screamed, "Andy!"
I started to run. I could see them in my peripheral vision, vaulting their counters and coming after me. I made it almost halfway to the gates before the carny running the Tilt-A-Whirl saw me and saw who I was running from. He was young and tough-looking, with ragged hair and a Fu Manchu moustache, and as the ride slowed to a stop he stepped out to block my way.
I tried to shift around him, but he was ready for me and a fist came out of nowhere and caught me in the stomach. My momentum took me past him and down, ripping the knees out of my pants. Before I could get back on my feet they had me.
There were about ten of them, and they made a ring so that the townies couldn't see what they were about to do. There should have been cops on the midway but I couldn't see them and now they