“A clown is a kind of mime,” Nutsy said. “For the most part, clowns are silent.”
“I never thought of that,” Lula said. “That’s a fact more people should know about.”
“Okay, I sort of get why you want to help Duncan,” I said. “Explain the part about being in danger if he goes back.”
“You won’t believe me. No one ever believes me. I can’t blame them. I’m Nutsy.”
“You could try being Andrew,” I said.
“Andrew and Nutsy are one and the same,” Nutsy said. “Truth is, I like being Nutsy. I’m okay with it. I’m starting to get a grip on it.”
“Good for you,” Lula said. “I see what you’re saying. I was lucky on account of I was Lula when I was born, and I never wanted to be anyone else. I’ve always been big and beautiful. And I got some complexity to me too.”
I suppose I had a grip on being Stephanie, but I felt that it wasn’t much of an accomplishment. I suspected I was a pretty easy book to read.
We were standing by the front door, and I could hear a television on in the next room. I walked in and found Duncan in his recliner.
“Hi,” he said.
His voice was soft, and his eyes were slightly unfocused.
“How’s it going?” I asked.
“Okay,” he said. “I remember you. You came to the hospital.”
“I work for your bail bondsman. You missed your court date, and you need to reschedule.”
“Now?”
“When you’re feeling better.”
“I guess I have to go back to Trenton to do that. I want to go back anyway. I miss Sissy and my goldfish. I even miss my job. I thought I didn’t like it, but now I miss it.”
“Duncan Dare didn’t like it,” I said.
“You know about Duncan Dare? That’s embarrassing. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“You were test-driving a new you,” I said.
He smiled for the first time. “Yeah. Duncan Disaster.”
I smiled with him. “You should stick with Duncan Dugan.”
“Am I going to jail?” he asked.
“I don’t know. It’s possible that since you were such a complete failure as a criminal, the judge will be lenient.”
His eyes closed for a second. “Sorry I’m falling asleep,” he said. “They gave me a pill at the doctor’s office.”
I left Duncan and returned to Nutsy.
“I need to go back to Trenton, and I don’t have a car,” Nutsy said. “The van has to stay here, so Duncan can get to the doctor. I’d like to ride back to Trenton with you if you have room for me, except you have to promise not to tell Plover I’m in Trenton.”
I wanted more of an explanation from Nutsy, but this wasn’t the time. I’d have to get him alone when Lula wasn’t going to distract him with clown questions.
“Whatever,” I said. “We’ll check out of the hotel and come back to pick you up.”
I looked to the front door. Beyond the door, Bob was waiting in Ranger’s car. If the back seat was intact and there were no more tooth marks on the gearshift, Bob was going to get a double bacon hold-the-cheese burger for lunch.
* * *
We reached Jersey a little after ten o’clock that night. There’d been some long meal stops and a couple shorter snack stops and an accident on I-95. I was numb from the ass down, and I couldn’t blink my eyes.
“Are we almost home?” Lula asked.
“Yes,” I said. “We just left New York.”
“That wasn’t an entirely satisfying trip to Maine,” Lula said. “I didn’t get to shop for charming country crafts, and I didn’t get to eat a lobster roll.”
Bob had a better opinion of the trip because he’d gotten his double bacon burger.
An hour later, I turned onto Lula’s street and my heart skipped a beat when I saw fire trucks in front of her apartment house. There were no flames shooting into the sky, but the air smelled smoky and the street was wet. I got closer and saw that the trucks were packing up to leave. A cop was roping the house off with yellow crime scene tape. The second-floor windows to Lula’s apartment were blackened. A small clump of people stood on the sidewalk.
“That’s my house!” Lula said. “Let me out. I gotta go see my apartment. All my clothes are in there. My Marilyn Monroe wig collection is in there.”
“It looks like they’re sealing the house off,” I said.
“Marilee is one of the people standing on the sidewalk. She has the apartment under me. She’ll know what’s going on.”
I angle-parked next to a fire truck, and we all got out.
Lula rushed over to Marilee. “What happened? I just got here. I was out of town,” Lula said.
“Nobody’s sure, but it looks like the fire started in your apartment,” Marilee said. “Word is your apartment is toast, but the rest of the house mostly only got smoke and water damage.”
“How could it start in my apartment?” Lula said. “I wasn’t even home.”
“Somebody was up there,” Marilee said. “It sounded like the guy who comes to see you every night and stomps on the stairs. I heard him go up and then he was moving around up there. And then the fire started.”
“It was Grendel,” Lula said. “He’s burning and pillaging. It’s one of his specialties. Did he get burned along with everything else?”
“No one got burned,” Marilee said. “Your apartment was empty. Everyone got out of the house.”
“That’s a good thing,” Lula said. “I’m surprised crazy Becky in the attic was able to get out.”
“They took her down in one of those bucket things attached to the fire truck,” Marilee said. “She was screaming her head off. I’m thinking they drove her to the psych ward at the medical center.”
“I’m sorry I missed it,” Lula said. “She always puts up a good show. What about my car?”
“Your car is okay. The lot behind the house wasn’t affected.”
“Have you been back in your apartment?”
“No,” Marilee said. “We can’t go back in yet. I’m waiting for my daughter to come get me. I can stay with her tonight. They said the fire marshal will come in the morning, and then we can get back in.”
“This is terrible,” Lula said. “I can’t believe this. I’ve been curating clothes all my life. I had ruby slippers that were the exact replica of Dorothy’s in The Wizard of Oz. I had two racks of ho clothes from when I was doing erectile engineering. You can’t replace stuff like that. All that stuff’s got memories. And where am I going to stay? I haven’t got a daughter with a house.”
“You can stay with me tonight,” I said. “We’ll figure this out tomorrow when we get to see what’s left of your apartment.”
We all got back into the car, and I drove around the last fire truck and stopped at the cross street. “Where should I take you?” I said to Nutsy. “Are you staying with your parents?”
“I can’t,” Nutsy said. “They already had their car blown up because of me. I can’t go home. And I’m sure Duncan’s house is being watched. And probably Sissy’s. Drop me off at the bridge. There’s a homeless encampment there.”