Gone, Baby, Gone - Dennis Lehane [59]
I turned toward him as he came out from behind his gleaming black horseshoe desk. He was young and lean, and he had a finger rudely pointed in my direction.
The businessman pushed the women out of the building and pulled a cell phone from his inside pocket, extended the antenna by gripping it between his teeth, but kept walking up Washington.
“Come on,” the security guard said. “Turn around and go out the way you came in. Right now. Come on.”
I swayed in front of him and licked my beard, came back with eggshell. I left my mouth open as I chewed on it and it crackled.
The security guard set his feet on the marble and placed a hand on his nightstick. “You,” he said, like he was talking to a dog. “Go.”
“Uh-ah,” I mumbled, and swayed some more.
The elevator bank dinged as another car reached the lobby.
The security guard reached for my elbow, but I pivoted and his fingers snapped at air.
I reached into my pocket. “Got something to show you.”
The security guard pulled his nightstick from its holster. “Hey! Keep your hands where I can see—”
“Oh, my God,” someone said as the crowd exited the elevator and I pulled a banana from my trench coat, pointed it at the rent-a-cop.
“Jesus Christ, he’s got a banana!” The voice came from behind me. Angie.
Always the improviser. Couldn’t stick to the script.
The crowd from the elevator was trying to cross the lobby, avoid eye contact with me, and still see enough of the incident to have the day’s best story at the watercooler.
“Sir,” the security guard said, trying to sound authoritative and yet polite, now that several tenants bore witness, “put the banana down.”
I pointed the banana at him. “Got this from my cousin. He’s an orangutan.”
“Shouldn’t someone call the police?” a woman asked.
“Ma’am,” the security guard said, a bit desperately, “I have this under control.”
I tossed the banana at him. He dropped his nightstick and jumped back as if he’d been shot.
Someone in the crowd yelped, and several people jogged for the doors.
At the elevator bank, Angie caught my eye and pointed at my hair. “Very hot,” she mouthed, and then she slipped into the elevator and the doors closed.
The security guard picked up his nightstick and dropped the banana. He looked ready to rush me. I didn’t know how many people remained behind me—maybe three—but at least one of them could be thinking about heroically rushing the vagrant as well.
I turned so that my back was to the horseshoe desk and elevators. Only two men, one woman, and the security guard remained. And both men were inching toward the doors. The woman seemed fascinated, however. Her mouth was open, and one hand was pressed against the base of her throat.
“Whatever happened to Men at Work?” I asked her.
“What?” The security guard took another step toward me.
“The Australian band.” I turned my head, locked the security guard in a kind, curious stare. “Very big in the early eighties. Huge. Do you know what happened to them?”
“What? No.”
I cocked my head as I stared at him, scratched my temple. For a long moment, no one in the lobby moved or even breathed it seemed.
“Oh,” I said eventually. I shrugged. “My mistake. Keep the banana.”
I stepped over it on my way out, and the two men flattened against the wall.
I winked at one of them. “First-rate security guard you got. Without him, I’da busted up the place.” I pushed open the doors onto Washington Street.
I was about to give a covert thumbs-up to Poole, who sat in the Taurus on the corner of School and Washington, when the heels of two palms hit my shoulder and chucked me into the side of the building.
“Out of my way, you fucking derelict.”
I turned my head in time to see Chris Mullen walk back through the revolving doors, gesture toward the frozen security guard in my direction, and keep walking toward the elevator bank.
I broke into the stream of pedestrians filling the street, cleared the walkie-talkie from my pocket, and turned it on.
“Poole, Mullen’s back.”
“Affirmative, Mr. Kenzie. Broussard’s contacting