Finders Keepers

Chapter 1

There was a feeling Keith Whipple got every time he walked through the door of Rudy’s Quik-Mart. It was the prod­uct of an array of sensations: the fragrance of strong, fresh-brewed coffee; the sweet aroma of expensive cigars; the pleased spar­kle in Rudy’s eyes when they met Keith’s; the vaguely startling realization induced by this atmosphere that he was retired, without obligation. It made him feel fine, and since he was clear-headed and without serious ailment, it made him feel young again, too.

Rudy turned to the cheerful sound of the bells strung over the opening door. As usual Keith was his first customer.

“Herr Whipple—” he said.

“Stamp your feet,” Keith said, dutifully complying. “I swear, Rudy, you need a new rap.

Hiding a grin, Rudy limped over to his percolators. His left leg was a monstrosity, the result of a mining accident thirty years ago, the skin from the knee down like that of an iguana, scaly, a cadaverous looking gray-brown. Keith had actually felt ill the first time Rudy showed it to him.

“Coffee?” Rudy said, already pouring.

“Black and nasty,” Keith said, completing the ritual ex­change. He joined Rudy at the soda shop-style counter, the only anomaly in the oth­erwise standard convenience store. Behind the counter exotic brews perked on a half-dozen hot plates and a se­lection of cigars stored se­curely under glass waited for the dis­cerning patron. A small magazine rack featured only Smoke and Cigar Aficionado. It was a personal touch, a nod to bygone days, and Keith felt right at home here. A creature of habit, he’d been coming into Rudy’s every weekday morning since his daughter Kate was nine—fifteen years of coffee, conversation and good-natured gossip, Rudy a connoisseur of all three. The only tough part was keeping his mitts off those cigars. Kate had finally browbeaten him into quitting two years ago, after a suspicious opacity on a routine chest X-ray gave them both a scare. It turned out to be scar tissue, the remains of some benign infection he’d picked up as a kid swamping out the hen house on his par­ents’ farm, but Kate had effectively stamped out his pack-a-day habit, including the cigar jones he’d picked up hanging around with Rudy. On the job he’d looked forward to those cigars, com­fortable in his chair in the projection booth at the Grande Thea­ter, Sud­bury’s oldest movie house, alone up there in a haze of flickering light and swirling smoke. When she was younger Kate had often joined him, complaining mildly about the smoke.

He shed his parka and draped it over one of the chrome and red leather stools. Rudy slid over a steaming cup of coffee. “Try this,” he said, wiping his hands on his apron, “but be careful. It’s a man’s brew.” He glanced over his shoulder at the tail end of a news break on the wall-mounted TV, an old black and white Ze­nith that was always turned on; Rudy had scotch-taped a length of plastic garland to the consul, his nod to the Yuletide.

Keith took a cautious sip. “Hot. Delicious.”

“So what do you know that I don’t?” Rudy said, facing Keith now, leaning his big hands on the counter to get the weight off his leg.

“Did I tell you Katie got accepted in the film school at UCLA?”

Rudy said, “Not counting the last twenty times?” and Keith grinned. “Gonna miss her, huh.”

“Sure am,” Keith said. “But it’s long overdue. She’s a gifted writer. The script she just finished? Loved it. It’s a blend of crime, sci­ence fic­tion and black comedy that’s really got legs. But she needs ma­turing. Not to mention the exposure; her work needs to be seen. No way she’s gonna get all that up here in Sudbury. Besides, the last thing I want is to see her hanging around town just to keep her old man company.” Brave words, Keith thought, picturing life without her and not liking it much. Cancer had taken his wife when Kate was six, a protracted, pain­ful death, and he and Kate had been pretty much inseparable ever since. They shared a duplex on Howey Drive, living modestly but in comfort, the last mort­gage payment made three years ago. “She needs to be where the action is,” Keith said. “It’s the nature of that business.”