Powder Burn - Carl Hiaasen [118]
The black man who stood there seemed seven feet tall, an effect encouraged by a gigantic wide-brimmed hat topped by a gaily trailing ostrich plume. The hat matched the leisure suit and the shoes. They all were shocking pink. A heavy gold medallion peered comfortably from the rippling black chest. The black man froze the restaurant.
“Good evening all,” he proclaimed to no one in particular and strode to the table by the window. He bussed the solitary Latina firmly on the cheek, ran proprietary fingers lightly across her lap and squeezed into the chair opposite her.
Victor came quickly. The evening was becoming bizarre.
“My good man. A planter’s punch to match my suit, if you please, and a cup of black coffee to match my true love’s eyes.”
Victor felt giddy. At the Gómez table the tension was suddenly electric. The two distinguished men in the far corner took no heed. They were talking business.
“Arthur,” asked Terry from between her teeth, “where did you get those clothes?”
“Chris told me to be ostentatious.”
Terry suppressed a giggle.
“What time is it?”
Arthur ignited a quartz watch, and the numbers glowed fiercely against his wrist.
“It’s exactly five minutes to takeoff. Sit back and enjoy the ride.”
“I’m nervous as a cat, Arthur.”
“Honey, when Chris Meadows builds something, it stays built. Everything will be fine.”
“Those men are animals, swine.”
Arthur looked over at the four men. They looked back through angry obsidian eyes. Arthur smiled and waved a big left hand, a gesture of greeting or contempt.
“When I was playing my way through college, it took more meat than that just to slow me down. Here, drink from my glass—that’ll make them even madder.”
VICTOR WAS UP to his arms in salad when a voice at his back surprised him. He whirled, and two handfuls of Bibb lettuce and fresh-cut cucumber flew like confetti.
“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you,” said the intruder, a tall man with sandy hair and cool green eyes. He wore a gray workman’s shirt with Dade County stitched over the pocket.
“What are you doing in my kitchen?” Victor blustered. “Who are you, anyway?”
“The name is Kelly, and I’m with the county building department. We had a call about a possible structural problem on your side of the building. Apparently one of the beams buckled. I knocked a couple times, but no one answered. The kitchen door was open.”
“I’ve got a roomful of customers out there,” Victor said irascibly. “Come back tomorrow afternoon.”
“You the owner?” the inspector asked.
“Of course.”
“This afternoon one of your people told the other inspector to come back tonight. Here I am. I won’t disturb your customers; it’ll be quick.”
Victor dried his hands on a towel. Structural problems, he fumed. Nobody had mentioned a word to him.
“Look, Inspector,” he said reasonably, “why don’t you have something to eat here with us in the kitchen and a nice cold glass of wine and then we can work out a more suitable time?”
“You offering me a bribe?”
Victor foamed. “No, of course not. But I do have an obligation to my customers. Inspection tonight is quite out of the question.”
“OK, wise ass, we’ll play it your way. I find this building to be structurally unsound. Shut it down. Now.”
“But, but…” Victor surrendered with what little grace he had left. “Please go ahead and do your inspection. I am sure you will find everything in perfect order.”
With a grim bureaucratic shake of his head Chris Meadows strode through the swinging doors of the kitchen at the rear of the dining room. He turned hard left and walked the seven paces to where the blueprints had told him the small men’s room would be. Luckily it was empty.
Meadows locked himself into the only stall. He spun the combination locks on each side of the expensive brown leather briefcase and took from it a small laundry bag. It took only a second to strip off the inspector’s shirt. It went into the bag.
From the briefcase he extracted a bright yellow T-shirt. The rococo lettering on the front read Viva Me. He put it on and added