The Broken Scarlet Sky

I walked into Henry Cimoli's health club down in the waterfront. It was full of gleaming chrome and complicated exercise machines populated by people in color coordinated work out gear. Henry was supervising a frizzy haired woman in a too tight leopard leotard along with one of the dead eyed trainers he employed to cater to his new clientele. 

"You doing great Izzy. Just one more rep." "It's too hard." 'Now I know you can do it. I can already see the improvement. Anyone can see the definition in your arms. Just one more." She pushed up the bar as she huffed and puffed like a horse on the last leg of a mile and quarter at Churchill Downs. She slowly pushed it up half way. There wasn't any weight on the bar at all so it didn't make a clang after she let go and it dropped down. More like a tinkle than a clang. "It's too hard." "Good job. Allison is going to take you to the next machine."

Henry strolled over to me looking like Hercules who had been left in the dryer too long and had shrunk down ten sizes. He was all muscle and a yard tall.

"Spenser." "Henry. I bet you never heard that before." "What's that?" "It's too hard. I don't think you ever had that problem." "Funny guy. No wonder you have a mug like Carlton Fisk's old mitt. Everybody just wants to wail on it.  Waddaya want?" "Is Hawk around?" "Yeah he is where he always is when he comes in. The boxing room."

Henry used to be a trainer. In fact he had trained me for a while. When he went upscale and threw out most of the mugs from the old days he kept a room for old times sake. A heavy bag. A speed bag. A couple of mats and a jump rope. When I walked in Hawk was working the heavy bag. His bald head was covered in a sheen as he put combinations and shook the bag from side to side. He hit it for a solid two minutes until a timer dinged and he stopped. He looked over at me.

"Hey whitey. What are you doing," "Racial invective. So woke of you. I wanted to talk to you for a moment when you get a chance." "Ok last round."

Hawk reset the timer and started to wail away on the bag. Two of the young trainers walked by and sneaked a glance at Hawk. They were young nubile hotties in skin tight leotards that Henry hired for the financial types who came in to pretend to exercise. Hawk smiled to himself as he finished with a three punch combination that made the bag sway like it was hit by a train. The timer dinged and he stopped and took off the training gloves.

Hawk took a towel and wiped his face and then his sweat soaked head which was a bald as a egg. Or as bald as a strippers snatch if you want to use a more appropriate metaphor. He was a large man who moved like a cat. You often came across a big guy. Or a fast guy. But you seldom come across a big fast guy. That is what made Hawk dangerous. Well one of the things that made him dangerous. There were a whole lot of them.

"So what's up?" "Nothing much. Say are you still dating that professor at MIT?" "Who Stacey? Well I wouldn't exactly call it dating. More like fucking. Occasionally. Why?" "I need to ask her  a few guest ions. Can you set it up?" "What do I get out of it?" "My eternal gratitude." "That ain't enough. I don't work cheap." "Dinner at the Ritz?" "Fair enough. I will call her. Bring Susan. I don't think she would appreciate it if you were the only one to show up." "I was planning too so don't worry about it." "I will let you know." "Thanks."

I turned to leave and Hawk went on to the speed bag. He made it sing. Now I just needed to get his girlfriend to do the same and give me an idea about what goes on at MIT. It was a start.

 

John D MacDonald was way ahead of his time

 

 

It is especially chilling when a work of fiction predicts real live happenings It happened for me when Tom Clancy predicted a suicide bomber flying a plane into the US Capital in one of his Jack Ryan books. Long before 911 Clancy laid it out and the Muslim mutts just followed his ten plate. When the planes hit the towers I had an eerie sense of deja vu. 

The same thing happened with the recent condo collapse in Miami. One of my favorite authors of the seventies was John D. MacDonald. I always ran out and got every one of his Travis McGee novels as soon as it came out. He is one of my heroes and models in writing crime fiction and I have read just about everything he has ever written as I have done with Elmore Leonard, Robert B. Parker and Lawrence Block. One of his non McGee books also became a best seller. It was called "Condominium" and was about the collapse of a condo in Florida. Albeit it was during a hurricane, still the shoddy workmanship and the criminal malfeasance seems to have predicted what happened in Miami. I remember when it came out and all of the builders in Florida swore up and down that they complied with all the codes and what not. There was a minor scandal here and there but it all went back to normal. I wonder if they examine the structure and what went on if they will find what I think they will find. 

Once again life follows art.

The Broken Scarlet Sky

 I decided to start from the place where most things start. At the beginning. At least the beginning of Meyer's visit to Boston. He was staying at the Boston Ritz Carlton across from Boston Common.

I walked into the main lobby and went up to the reception desk, A beautiful young woman of about thirty years looked up with an smile that she must of given everyone that entered the hotel. I gave her half of my smile. The one that charmed women from coast to coast. I didn't give her 100 Watts. Then she would have started to disrobe.

"Hello and welcome to the Ritz Carlton at the Boston Common. How might I help you? Are you checking in?"

"No not today. I would like to speak to the head of security. I thought it was Mike Callahan? Is he still the man?"

"Yes he is sir. I will call him. If you have a seat in the Lobby he will be with you shortly."

I walked over and sat down in one of the overstuffed chairs in the lobby. A few minutes later a tall Irishman with red hair that had gone grey walked into to the lobby. He limped from a wound he had from a shoot out with the Winter Hill mob. I knew him for years. Ever since he came up with Marty Qurik. 

"Spenser. What do you want." 

"Why would I want anything Mike?"

"You always want something when you come by so lets cut the crap and tell me what it is before I run your ass out of my hotel."

"Easy does it. I just want to know about a guest of yours that went missing a couple of weeks ago. He was a professor. A older gent. Name of Meyer. Ludwig Meyer."

"Not much to tell. He checked in. Called for room service. Left for his conference and never came back. We tried reaching out to his contacts but got no reply. After a week we needed the room so we boxed up his belongings and turned the room over. I notified BPD but they didn't seem very interested so that's where we stand. That's exactly what I told his friend."

"His friend? Let me guess. Older gent who looks like he was the first runner up in a George Hamilton bake off?"

"Yeah that's him. From Florida. He came by a couple of days ago. I refereed him to Belson."

"Thanks Mike. I owe you one." 

"One. That's about the tenth one you owe me. Do me a favor and make yourself scarce unless you are spending money in the bar. Say hello to Susan for me."

That's me. Spreading joy wherever I go.

The Broken Scarlet Sky

 "So tell me about your friend."

"He lives a couple of slips down from me at the Bahia Mar Marina in Fort Lauderdale. He has a small motor boat stuffed with books. We have been friends since the sixties. He is like a big amiable bear. Hairy and clumsy and comical in some ways. But a good friend none the less. The smartest man I know. Well book smart."

"Not street smart?"

"No. Not in the least."

I sat back in my chair for a moment. McGee sat still in my client chair. Confident and still. He didn't feel the need to fill the conversational void. I think we know some of the same things. Susan would shake her head and be amused at what she would call macho posturing. Still it was true none the less.

"So you think he walked into something that he couldn't handle?"

"Without a doubt. Look Meyer was a smart guy. He had developed a couple of algorithms that could predict how stocks would behave. When to buy and when to sell. Something like that would be worth a lot of money."

"So he went to MIT to sell it?"

"No I don't think so. Who would have the money to buy it there? He either went there for the last piece of the puzzle from one of his fellow math geeks or to connect with one of those Silicon Valley types who had the dough to buy the algorithm and do the real work of putting it to practice. I think he wanted to sell it. Look we have a great life down in Florida. We are retired. Do a little fishing. A little partying. At least as much as we can these. Meyer is even older than I am. Somehow it didn't happen. Somebody else must have gotten involved. I need you to find out who."

I thought about that for a minute. I didn't know anybody who had any connection to MIT. Susan was wired into Harvard not MIT. But that wouldn't be a problem.

"I guess we have to talk to someone who knows something about MIT. Luckily enough I know somebody who has connections there."

"Who a professor?"

"No. A leg breaker."