The Black Mercedes by Sue Latham A balmy February evening around 5:00
Hershel Hornby mopped his forehead with a handkerchief and congratulated himself on yet another day of a job well done. Although it was February, it was almost 80°. But everything in the garage was ship-shape. Well, almost. He stooped to pick up a scrap of paper. Hershel had been the building manager here for slightly more than a year. In that time, he had transformed this elderly high-rise from a slightly seedy old pile into a grande dame. He had certainly earned a game or two of Solitaire in his office—behind closed doors, naturally—and then he was going to go home and pour himself an ice-cold glass of White Zinfandel. But then he saw old Mrs. Templeman striding toward him purposefully. An encounter with Mrs. Templeman was never a good thing. “Mr. Hornby!” she screeched. “Mr. Hornby, I need a word with you.” Hershel took a deep breath and mustered up his sincerest smile. “What can I do for you, Mrs. Templeman?” “Come here please, Mr. Hornby. Please explain this.” She was pointing indignantly to a car that was parked in a numbered space. It was a black Mercedes, a few years old, and it was covered with a thick layer of dust. “It’s just a car, Mrs. Templeman,” he said. “Don’t get smart with me, young man. I can see that it’s a car.” She wiped a finger across the car’s dusty surface and held it up inches from his face. “How do you explain this?” “You know, Mrs. Templeman,” he explained patiently, “there are a lot of property owners in this building who keep a principal residence somewhere else and are only here occasionally. They are entitled to the same parking spaces as anyone else. If you look around you will see plenty of cars here in the garage that are a little dusty.” “Young man, this car has not been moved in almost a year. Look!” she said pointing to the car’s license plate. With dismay, Hornby realized she was right. The car had a paper dealer’s tag dated the previous May. This car had been sitting here, in a prime parking space, for eight months. “When I asked you sometime back about a more convenient parking space, you told me there were none available. I’m not as young as I used to be, Mr. Hornby. I put in a request for a closer parking space more than a year ago. Is it your policy to give the best parking spaces to people who are never here? When you get to be my age, maybe you will be a little more understanding.” She waved a cane to emphasize
her point. Hershel promised to look into it right away. And indeed he did. He spent half an hour digging through spreadsheets old and new. But he could find no record of the car’s owner, or any indication that it had ever been registered with the office. If there was anything that got Hershel upset, it was not being able to put his finger right away on information. In fact, it had been a point of pride with him to have whipped his files into shape within just a few months of getting his new job. And now, here was a car that had been sitting parked in his garage for almost a year and he had no idea who it belonged to. He was so flustered that he didn’t even feel like playing Solitaire. The rules were very clear on this point–all vehicles must be registered with the office within 10 days of move-in. He took a worn copy of the rules and regs off the shelf and with satisfaction, found the passage he was looking for. “Unregistered cars are subject to a fine of $25 per day.” As far as he knew, no one had ever been fined for not registering their car. Well, there was always a first time for everything, thought Hershel. He would show them, whoever it was, for making him look bad in front of Old Lady Templeman. Early one morning, the previous May
Halee glanced at her dashboard and silently cursed, once again, the unknown coworker whose colossal screwup meant she had to work late last night. And on the Friday night before Memorial Day weekend, no less. She was supposed to be in Austin last night. And now she was half a day late and to top it off was going to have to stop for gas. One of those little signs was coming up that showed what kind of amenities are available at the next exit, and as she glanced over at it she saw what looked for all the world like somebody lying by the side of the interstate. Although it wasn’t completely daylight yet, and the grass badly needed mowing, she was sure she had seen a man lying there. How could he have gotten there? Perhaps he had been trying to cross the freeway and been hit by car. Halee decided the most likely scenario was that he had run out of gas somewhere and was walking when he got hit. If he was dead, there really wasn’t anything she could do, was there? Certainly somebody would find him. Maybe he was alive. In that case, would Halee be accessory to a murder if he did die and she didn’t stop to help? But that would mean further delays. Maybe she could just call and say what she found and leave? Was it even possible to place an anonymous 911 call anymore? From a cell phone probably not. Maybe he was just drunk. But how drunk would you have to be to decide to take a nap beside a busy interstate? The exit was coming up and she made a split decision to get off, making a mental note of the Shell station right there on the right. But she stayed in the left lane and looped around. To get to the exit she had to go rather farther back up the road than she’d anticipated, and almost regretted her decision to go back, but she knew it would bug her all weekend if she didn’t at least have a look. Anyway what was five minutes? Unless there was a lot of traffic around Waco she could make it in plenty of time for lunch. The girls would wait for her– they wouldn’t be leaving for the lake until that afternoon anyway. A few minutes later she was back where she had been, scanning the grass beside the shoulder until she found the spot. She parked and got out and sure enough there was somebody beside the road, about 10 feet away. Halee stared at him for a long time. He was Hispanic, and looked kind of short, although it was hard to tell from this angle. He wasn’t wearing a wedding ring, and she couldn’t see his face enough to guess his age. He didn’t move, and stare as she might, Halee couldn’t tell if he was even breathing. She looked around for a stick or piece of plastic or something that she could poke him with, but there wasn’t a stray bit of garbage anywhere. For once the Texas highway department had done their job. She
picked up a handful of gravel, and hesitated before tossing a pebble. Suppose he wakes up and decides to sue me for assault? she thought. But the pebble bounced off the man’s shoe, and there was no sign of movement. Just then she became aware of red and blue lights flashing around her and the crunch of tires on gravel. A state trooper pulled up on the shoulder in front of her and parked. The driver got out and strolled purposefully toward her. “Morning, ma’am. Is there anything wrong?” Halee pointed mutely toward the body. With a flourish the cop snatched a two-way radio from his belt and muttered something into it. The radio squawked something unintelligible in reply. Halee wondered if cops had to take some kind of classes to be able to understand radio-talk. His partner got out of the driver’s side and tromped through the grass toward the body. “Why were you throwing rocks?” There was nothing friendly now about his tone of voice. “Just trying to figure out if he’s asleep.” “Beside an Interstate?” “Maybe he’s drunk,” answered Halee lamely. The trooper stepped over to her car and shone his flashlight inside, which irritated Halee to no end. “Where’re you headed this morning, ma’am?” Jeez, what an officious little prick, she thought. But replied meekly “Austin.” The partner joined them. “He’s asleep alright, but it’s the kind of sleep that you don’t wake up from. He’s been dead for hours.” Then the first state trooper said “I’m going to need to ask you a few questions. Would you just step over here for a minute?” motioning to the cop car. It was then that Halee knew she wasn’t going to be in Austin in time for lunch. The previous evening
Buddy Berris had a problem on his hands. And it was most likely about to turn into a big problem. Some real serious shit was about to go down, and somebody was most definitely gonna have to take the fall for it. He glanced over at Beto, who was leaning against the rickety porch railing, smoking a doobie. It was a hot day and Beto was wearing the same thing he wore every day: long baggy shorts and a wifebeater. Beto had a tattoo of the Virgin Mary on his shoulder, of which he was very proud. It was situated just so, so that the ever-present undershirt didn’t hide it. The Virgin Mary seemed to dance any time Beto moved. Buddy was mesmerized—he had a hard time taking his eyes off it. It would be a damn shame, thought Buddy. He was going to miss that tattoo. Beto wasn’t bad for a Meskin, but if push came to shove and it was him versus Beto, well, it would be hasta la vista Beto. Beto took a deep toke then pointed toward the street. “Hey Boss, look there.” Buddy came reluctantly out of his reverie. A shiny black Mercedes was creeping slowly down the street. It stopped, then began easing backwards into a tight space on the curb between a white van and a rusty Toyota Camry. The Mercedes stuck out like a sore thumb on this street full of battered trucks and beat-up old Chevys. Beto examined what was left of the doob closely, then scowled and tossed the remains on the floor, grinding it into the wooden board with his heel. “Is that who I think it is, Boss?” Buddy tried to focus, but it was hard to see the driver through the tinted glass. “Now, how’m I supposed to know who you think it is?” “It’s that little guy that made that—ahem—delivery for us last week,” said Beto patiently. “You paid him cash.”
“No shit? What the hell is he doing in that?” Buddy prided himself on his ability to keep a low profile. Now, wasn’t that just like a typical beaner to go buy a fancy-ass car the minute he gets his hands on a little cash? He might as well have been waving a red flag, he thought, with extreme annoyance. Now well and truly irritated, he tossed back the last of his lukewarm Bud Light and dropped the can on the porch, where it joined its brethren. Then suddenly an idea occurred to him, and with awesome clarity he realized that all his problems were solved. “Beto, how would you like to go for ride in a Mercedes?” A few hours earlier
Sydney Clifford strolled into the lobby of the car dealership where he worked, his hands in his pockets and a big smile on his face. He was the new kid on the block, having been but recently employed there. His coworker Demetrius laughed out loud. “Well, look at you. Where I come from, that’s what we call a shit eatin’ grin. What you been up to?” “You’ll never guess what I did,” said Sydney. Without waiting for Demetrius to answer, he said, “I done made my first sale. I sold that black Mercedes.” “No shit?” responded Demetrius. “To that little Hispanic dude?” “One and the same,” responded Sydney. “Well, I’ll be a son of a bitch. That thing’s been on the lot for weeks.” “Yeah, and there’s what he traded in.” Sydney pointed to a rusting Pontiac that now sat forlornly at the edge of the lot. “Hmmm, bit of a step up in the world, ain’t it? ‘Course that Mercedes did have a few miles on it.” “He sure didn’t look like the Mercedes type,” Sydney agreed. Demetrius raised an eyebrow. “Well, you never know. Just about anybody can get a loan on a car these days…” “He paid cash,” said Sydney. “No shit?” said Demetrius, rubbing his chin thoughtfully. A knowing look came to his eyes. “Little dude like that ought not to be going around flashing all that cash. It’s not smart. Not in this neighborhood anyway.” Sydney shrugged. “Hey, it ain’t none of my business, as long as I get my commission. Look, it’s almost that time. How about we go for a beer or two….or three to celebrate. My treat.” Demetrius slapped him on the back. “You’re going to make a great salesman.”