Page 68 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Road Kill

to admit she was right in bringing me; what was about to transpire
needed a sober and credible American witness.
We entered the house, another official residence with all the
familiar but impersonal character I had come to expect from interior
decoration unintentionally collaborated on by Foreign Service
procurement agents and Jolibanan contractors. The card party was in
full swing, as Labelle had predicted. About six or seven men in their
twenties and thirties sat around a standard issue dining table heaped
with cards, poker chips, ashtrays, beer bottles and bowls of peanuts
(local) and beer nuts (imported). Hard rock music chugged along in
the background, providing an atmospheric counterpoint to the
smoke in the room and the odor of the Peace Corps director’s spicy
potato chips. Most of the players did not look up when we came in,
including a young wispy-bearded fellow who affected a green eye-
shade. This was machismo, not pure rudeness; we were not part of
the inner circle, therefore not worthy of attention.
Harry Hofbrauer, however, mindful perhaps of his almost vestigial
role as host, caught sight first of Labelle and raised one hirsute paw
in greeting. “Hi, Labelle. Didn’t know you cared to spend your free
time with the gang. We can deal you in, or you can check out the
kitchen: Cheryl and Lee Anne are cooking up something good in
there.” Then, squinting through the haze, he saw me and his joviality
slipped a couple of notches. “Dick Tate. Now I know this is a special
occasion.”
At the mention of my name, everyone stopped playing and froze
into a cinematic tableau, like a table full of outlaws in a saloon when
the bounty hunter suddenly appears at the bar and asks for the
whereabouts of their leader. Ben Dover was there, Jolibrew in hand, a
scowl on his unshaven face. His nemesis, Frank Bean, sat across
from him, one hand shielding his cards from view. Facing us, too,
was Ben Durer, three or four empty bottles standing like trophies by
his small stack of chips. The others were probably PCV’s, definitely
not among Labelle’s so-called principals in the case. The game had
been interrupted while bets were being placed; did one of the players,
I couldn’t help wondering, hold the “dead man’s hand”, aces and
eights?
“We’re not here to play cards, Harry.” Labelle’s voice was low, but
it competed successfully with the Rolling Stones. “It’s time to wrap

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