Tropical Depression (Billy Knight Thrillers 1)

“Bloody fucking hell,” he mumbled, rubbing his neck and spasmodically twisting his head to one side.

“Sorry, Nicky,” I said.

“Put the Neighborhood Fucking Watch back ten years, mate. Can’t go ’round pulverizing fellas.”

“Sorry, Nicky,” I said again. But I knew there was really only one way to apologize, and surprisingly, I suddenly felt like company. “How about a beer?”

His leprechaun face lightened a little. “Too bloody right, a beer,” he said. “Reckon you owe me a fucking brewery for that one, mate.”

He shook himself like a terrier, said “Right,” to himself half under his breath, and led me up to my front door. I unlocked it and he pushed past me, making a beeline for my ancient refrigerator. By the time I caught up with him he had one of the bottles of St. Pauli Girl open and one-third drained. He was staring dismally into the back of the refrigerator, shaking his head with very real pity. “Oh, mate,” he said sadly.

Half-annoyed and half-amused, I stared past him into the refrigerator. I didn’t see anything to object to, but then I didn’t see much of anything at all.

Still, what there was was very neatly organized. I was a firm believer in Tupperware, and the largest shelf was neatly stacked with five containers. They all had labels: Two of them said CHILI—JULY 5. Another one was LASAGNA—MAY 23. The other two labels had somehow gotten smeared and were no longer legible. But I was sure that once I opened them I could probably figure out what was in them.

There was also a quart of Acidophilus milk, half-gone; a quarter stick of margarine, a lump of very questionable but neatly wrapped cheese, and a jar of jelly someone had given me for Christmas almost two years ago. It was all very well ordered and about as appetizing as a gravel driveway.

“What’s wrong?” I asked Nicky. He turned those two high-powered lamps on me full blast.

“Billy, lad, old son,” he moaned sadly, handing me the other beer. “This is fucking close to tragedy here.”

“Why is that, Nicky?”

“The Frigidaire, Billy,” he said, raising a finger into the air and then pointing it at me. “The Frigidaire is the window to a man’s soul.”

I looked at him, his eyes gleaming mournfully. Sometimes, when he went off on his monologues, it was hard to remember how much shorter than me he was. I sipped my beer. “That’s the eyes, Nicky. The eyes are the windows to the soul.”

He shook his head forcefully. “Never say it, mate. It’s the fucking Frigidaire. If old Johnny Keats had one, we’d be off on it all day long, ’stead of those bloody awful Grecian urns.” He stretched out the last word in his uniquely Australian way, eeeeehhhhrrrrnns, making the word into a long moan against all that was prissy and awful. “’Course, ’Strahlians”—he meant his countrymen—“our lot have that all figured out. Look in the Frigidaire and you know a man’s soul. And, mate—” He shook his head again. “Mate, your soul is on the shit-heap. Aside from the fact,” he added sadly, waggling a finger at me, “that I will now have to run off to the Seven-Eleven and get more beer, and something decent to eat.”

That reminded me of my mutton snapper, still sitting in the sink. “Uh, Nicky, I got a good piece of fish here—” I stopped since he was shaking his head again, eyes closed to shut out my nonsense.

“A piece of fish. He’s got a piece of fish. Billy, old sport,” he said, reaching up to put a hand on my shoulder, “a piece of fish is not something decent to eat.”

“I like fish,” I said.

“Yes,” he said with kindly logic, “but you’re a bloody loony. Where’s your veggies, Billy? And some rice? To say nothing of all the proper and necessary nutrients found only in beer?”

“You’re drinking my nutrients,” I pointed out.

“That’s mean and low,” he said with rising indignation. “You half-killed me and now you grudge me one of your horrible, tiny, watered-down beers. No, Billy,” and he held out his hand to me, palm up, “the only thing for it is for me to buzz down and grab some decent grub. Otherwise you’re going to harm yourself, and I can’t allow that.” He shook a finger so I would know he was telling the truth. “You need looking after. So fork over, mate.” And to my surprise I found myself handing him twenty bucks, even as I wondered what the hell it had been about his company I had thought I wanted tonight.

“Fry up the fish, Billy,” he admonished as he capered out the door. He vanished, then stuck his head back in again. “You have got an onion, haven’t you, mate?” he said, and then he was gone.

I turned back to the sink and rinsed off the fish. Every now and then I wondered why I actually liked Nicky, but I always ended up shrugging it off. I liked him. He was such an improbable guy. He seemed to move at about twice the speed of everybody else and was so full of manic rationality it was impossible to stay mad at him. He always had everybody’s best interests at heart, and never stopped telling us all about it. Nobody could stay mad at Nicky, even after watching him eat.

He was one of those tiny people, clearly evolved from the ferret, who must eat twice their weight every day, and Nicky was not refined in his attack. He ate with both hands and a wide-open mouth, spraying crumbs in all directions. He had a lot to say on most subjects and could not sit without wanting to talk. That usually made for problems at the table. I spent most of my dining time with Nicky dodging crumbs, trying to keep them off my food as they flew out of his mouth and across the table, rocketing high in the air, bouncing off the saltshaker, careening everywhere.

Still, there was an incredible charm to the man. I had seen women twice his size fall helplessly into those gigantic, luminous eyes and follow quietly, without struggle, as he led them off to his battered cottage next door. I didn’t think he could make an enemy if he wanted to.

I put the fish into a large baking dish and squeezed some key lime juice onto it. I’d let it soak in for a minute before I put it under the broiler. I smeared on a couple of pats of margarine. As an afterthought I sprinkled some cumin on top, then sliced on my last onion.

As I put the dish in the oven, the front door banged and Nicky was back with a paper bag under each arm. The bags looked bigger than Nicky. He roared into the kitchen and flung the bags onto my rickety kitchen table, already unloading them and opening two fresh beers before I could even open my mouth to speak. “Here we go. Not much to choose up there, bloody awful store, but thank you Jesus, they had two last six-packs of Foster’s. Not that Foster’s

is my first choice, you understand, but it’s the best we can hope for in this benighted cultural backwater. Cheers, mate,” he said and drained off about half of the squat blue-labeled bottle. He slammed open the oven door, slammed it closed again. “Fish in? Lovely. Now piss off,” he finished, shoving me out of my kitchen. He had things flying out of the bags and into pots and pans before I even made it to my chair.

I sat. I was suddenly exhausted, whether from Nicky’s unbelievable take-charge energy or from the letdown of my total screw-up with Roscoe, I couldn’t tell. I leaned back in my chair and held the beer bottle without drinking for a long moment. The racket from the kitchen was near the noise level of a Concorde taking off, plenty loud enough to bring complaints from the neighbors except that they, like me, were used to Nicky, totally charmed out of their natural hostility by his wide-eyed dazzling animation.

I let my mind drift. I still felt bad about Roscoe. I knew I should have found him. This was my island and I knew pretty well where he might go. But my first two guesses had been bad and I no longer had the energy. I gave up. I never used to give up. Something had changed in me; the thing that used to drive me was no more than a torpid passenger now.