W Is for Wasted

confidence,” I said.
    “Fine. You don’t believe me? We can check the off-ramps first to make sure all three Boggarts are accounted for. Camp’s deserted, we go in and grab the stuff. Ten minutes max and we’re outta there.”
    I could feel a roiling anxiety rise through my body like nausea. “This is a bad idea.”
    “You got a better one?”
    When I didn’t reply, she went on in a warning tone. “You don’t help, we’ll just turn around and find someone else. I want that backpack and I mean to have it.”
    “Come on, Pearl. Would you cut it out? This is ridiculous. If you’re that desperate for a backpack, you can buy one at the nearest army-navy store.”
    “Not like this one.”
    “And why is that?”
    She broke off eye contact. “You don’t need to know.”
    “What, like there’s a secret compartment where Terrence kept his Sky King decoder ring?”
    “Go ahead and make fun. That backpack is valuable.”
    “I’m not moving an inch until you tell me why,” I said.
    Felix looked from me to Pearl and back. “Her lips is sealed,” he said, “But mine ain’t.”
    She squinted at him. “Would you shut your mouth? We’re having a conversation here that’s no concern of yours.”
    He leaned closer to me with a proud smile, like a little kid who swears up and down he can keep a secret when he can’t.
    Pearl banged him on the head, but it was too late.
    “Backpack’s where Terrence hid the key to his safe deposit box.”
    “A safe deposit box,” I said, making a declarative sentence of it instead of a question.
    “Like at a bank,” he said, as opposed to those at the laundromat.
    I closed my eyes and let my head sink in despair. If Terrence had a will . . . which Dandy claimed he did . . . he probably kept it in a safe deposit box. Which might also contain information about his ex-wife and kids and any final wishes he might have about disposition of his remains. This was exactly what I’d been looking for for the past four days. “I don’t know how I get caught up in shit like this.”
    Pearl said, “Atta girl! Now you’re talking.”

8
    I slid in behind the driver’s seat. Felix squeezed into the back while Pearl crushed her cigarette underfoot and then settled into the front. I felt a flutter in my chest like I’d swallowed a hummingbird. I turned the key in the ignition, put the Mustang in gear, and pulled away from the curb. I took a right on Milagro and moved into the lane that ran parallel to the freeway, allowing southbound cars to merge with oncoming traffic. In the interest of being thorough, I took the first exit, which emptied just shy of the bird refuge. I’d never seen the bums work that area and I realized now it was because that particular ramp was too close to home. If a patrol car cruised by, there was no way to disappear without the risk of drawing attention to their camp.
    When cross-traffic allowed, I got onto the southbound on-ramp, which was clear of panhandlers just as the other on-ramps turned out to be. I suppose the reasoning was that people getting
onto
the freeway had a fixed destination and were therefore focused on the drive and less inclined to interrupt the journey for donation purposes, whereas those getting
off
the freeway, their progress halted by traffic lights or stop signs, had more time to read the signs beseeching motorists for help and thus were more likely to haul out the old wallet or change purse.
    I drove an elongated figure eight nearly a mile in length, cruising the ramps where the Boggarts typically stationed themselves. I noticed I’d freely adopted Pearl’s term for the panhandlers, which seemed tidy and to the point. I didn’t believe they were “bad fairies.” I wasn’t even sure that they were
bad
, but the word “Boggart” had a certain air to it that seemed to encompass the minigang of thugs. By trekking back and forth, we spotted two of the three bums. I came back around to the Cabana Boulevard off-ramp, slowing as I exited. At the bottom of the slope, sure enough, the third Boggart was standing on the berm, holding a battered cardboard sign. Crudely lettered in pencil, it read:
    Down on my luck and hungry
    Any small donation appreciated
    God Bless
    Pearl said, “That’s the one had the backpack.”
    I gave him points for correct spelling. With just an occasional glance to my left, I kept my gaze fixed on the car in front of me. I already knew the fellow by sight. He was tall, with the muscle mass of an