Gin Palace 02 - The Bone Orchard

I could eat was part of a nectarine and some red grapes. I felt exhausted but tried my best to hide that from her. My thoughts were clouded, fragmented. I felt like a hand in a loose-fitting glove, separated, distanced, a little lost.
    After breakfast Gale rolled up the left sleeve of the oversized T-shirt she had given me and removed the dressing from my shoulder. We both studied the wound. It seemed, oddly, the least of my problems, till I remembered that it had come from a knife. The black, bristly stitches looked good to me, and there was a green stain on the skin around the cut where an antiseptic had been applied. Gale dabbed some vitamin E lotion as carefully as she could along the crease of the wound, then applied a fresh dressing over it. I felt a fever tingle behind my forehead again but said nothing to her about that. It was probably just from the sight of the tear in my skin and from her touching it, from her inadvertently moving the stitches and the freshly split flesh around as she tended to it.
    Sometime after lunch I thought I’d better call George and let him know where to find his car. After that I called Eddie to let him know that I was okay and where I was. Chances were he was probably looking for me. I didn’t see myself leaving Gale’s anytime soon and I knew he would get word of my resurrection out to the few people who would care. As usual Eddie’s wife, Angel, was working the dispatch and answered on the second ring.
    “Eddie’s Cab Company.”
    “Angel, it’s Mac. I need you to get a message to Eddie.”
    “Mac, oh my God, you’re alive. For the love of God, where have you been? Eddie spent all night looking for you. He’s out there now. He hasn’t taken a fare since yesterday. He’s been worried sick. Where have you been?”
    “I’m sorry, I should have called sooner. Radio him and tell him I’m okay so he can get back to work. I’ll call him in a couple of days -- “
    “ -- Mac, you don’t understand, there’s trouble. You’re in trouble.”
    “What?”
    “He told me to find out where you were if you called. He says he has to talk to you, in person.”
    “Angel, what’s going on?”
    “I don’t know the whole story. Eddie’ll tell you when he gets there. Where are you?”
    I glanced at Gale. She had stopped in the middle of washing dishes and was looking at me. The water was running from the tap, a low pitched, steady hiss. Gale looked both concerned and uncertain.
    I told Angel the address. Then I hung up and turned and looked at Gale. Neither of us spoke. I went out to the glassed-in porch and sat in a rocking chair and waited. After about a minute Gale came out and sat in the chair beside me. She didn’t speak. Together we sat and watched the driveway and waited.
    “What is it with you two?”
    “What do you mean?”
    “With you and Eddie. What is it with you two? He does whatever you ask him to. Why?”
    I shrugged. “He left Jamaica for America because he was in trouble. The trouble followed him here. I helped him out of a jam. I just happened to be there when he needed help. I was a kid and ran in blind to help a stranger. I used to do that a lot.”
    “You saved his life.”
    I nodded.
    “And that’s how you two became friends?”
    “It didn’t really happen over night,” I explained. “But over the years we ended up for one reason or another doing things for each other. Most of it was probably chance. For some reasons our paths just seem to keep crossing. We aren’t even friends really, not like Augie and me. We don’t hang out together. He doesn’t pry into my life and I don’t pry into his. The daughter of an ex-girlfriend of mine was kidnapped a few years ago. No one could find her. Out of desperation she asked me to see what I could do. I went out looking, but it was Eddie who told me where to find her. On one of his fares through Hampton Bays he had seen a man and a young girl go into a house that was up for sale. Eddie knew no one was living there. I wouldn’t have known where to start looking for her if it wasn’t for him. But that’s the kind of man he is. “
    “So you found her? Your ex-girlfriend’s daughter, I mean.”
    The answer was there but I wasn’t sure how to speak it.
    “I found her body, yeah. My ex-girlfriend had come to me and asked me to look for her daughter. It was late at night. I told her I would and had a few drinks to work up the courage. A few drinks turned into a few drinks too many. I didn’t end