The Hell With Hernando, This Is Gerard's Hideaway.

Canned Voice:  No one is available to take your call at this time.  Please
leave a message at the sound of the tone.  BEEEP

Billy:  Punk, you better be on the damn horn the minute you get this damn
message.

Canned Voice:  No one is available to take your call at this time.  Please
leave a message at the sound of the tone.  BEEEP

Billy:  Baby, where the hell you at?  Call me, dammit.

Meantime...

Deb:  Elmore's taking us to lunch?

Beth:  That what he wants.  Says we can pick the place.

Deb:  But he's driving a twenty year old car with a terminal oil leak...

Beth:  Which is why we're going to Denny's.  Don't worry.

Deb:  Thank God!  He's too cute for words.  Hee-hee.

Beth:  Keep an eye open for big black Suburbans...

Deb:  What for?  Trouble's in San Angelo.

Beth:  When you least expect him, expect him.

Deb:  I shouldn't have had to ask.

Beth's former landlord was just finishing up a little minor painting in
the bathroom when he heard the front door of the now empty rental unit
smash in.

Landlord:  STRANNIX!!  She's gone!  You owe me for that door!!

Bill stormed through to the bathroom, picked up the landlord by both arms
and stuck him to his wet paint.

Billy:  What is this shit?

Landlord:  What shit?  She moved!

Billy:  Where?

Landlord:  I don't know.  She didn't leave a forwarding address, just paid
an extra month's rent and moved out!

Billy:  When?

Landlord:  Day before yesterday.  Sold everything she owned that wouldn't 
fit into a box or plug into the wall.  Had some woman on crutches trying to 
help her and mostly getting in the way.

Billy:  Damn Punk.  Somebody's gonna need a pad for her ass when I get my
hands on her.  You see anybody else around here?  Big stuffed shirt lookin'
bastard?

Landlord:  Sam hasn't been around for a few days, but there was some guy
with a Camaro...came by once and moved the heavy stuff.

Billy:  Elmore Pratt.  Little shit better hope I don't get the drop on his
ass.

Billy dropped the landlord, effectively turning the minor touch-up job
to a major repaint of the entire wall.  He left the bathroom and did a quick
check through the rooms, even going so far as to look in the closets.  
Nothing, not even as much as a stray button or hairpin remained on the floor
to mark the years she had spent in the place.

Landlord:  Strannix!!  My door!!

Billy:  Damn thing's busted again!  Ya might wanna fix it before ya rent the 
place!!

Billy strode out, a man on a mission now.  Something was being done
behind his back, and he didn't like it.

Elmore:  You two order up anythin' ya want, now...it's on me.

I could think of a few things I wouldn't have minded having on Elmore.
Beth read my expression, kicked my good leg under the table.

Beth:  Down, girl.

Deb:  You're no fun anymore.

The waitress came to take the order.  Elmore made her giggle, flirted
shamelessly with her.  Beth ordered Moons Over My Hammy, a breakfast.  By
that point I was in such a state I decided to play it safe and ordered only
soup and a salad.

Elmore:  You sure all you want's that soup, ma'am?

Deb:  Yes, Elmore, thanks.  And don't call me ma'am.  I feel like an old
woman.

Elmore:  Yes, ma'am.

Beth sputtered into her water, gave me another shot under the table.  We
had a fine time over lunch, the three of us, thought my shins started to
feel like hamburger near the end of it.  Beth was periodically knocking
me in the leg, her way of reminding me to ignore the fact that Elmore was
exuding male hormones at an alarming rate.

Elmore:  You sure you don't want some dessert?

Beth gave me three quick whacks.  The woman read my mind and damn, what a
dessert that big boy would have made.  Elmore heard the impact of Beth's
foot on my leg.

Elmore:  You tryna bust her other ankle, Darlin'?

Beth:  It's either that or somebody else'll bust her ass.

Deb:  Forgot about him for a minute.

Beth was driving again and I happened to be trying to catch a last peek
at the divine Elmore as we went around the corner at the opposite end of the
street from the restaurant.  Instead of Elmore, I saw the Suburban.  It had
to be Billy's Suburban, and even if it wasn't I had no intention of taking
any chances.

Deb:  Beth, punch it.

Beth:  What?

Deb:  Just do it.  Put your foot in it.  If that's not Billy down the block
it's close enough for rock and roll.

Beth looked in the mirror, made an awful face.  We went like hell,
finally reaching the house.  We hid the truck in the garage just in case he
might have latched onto our trail, went into the disordered house, collapsed
on the floor in the master bedroom.  That had been too close for comfort.

Billy saw Elmore's beater going in the opposite direction, and he was ready
to swear he saw the Punk's Ford down at the end of the block.  He was
closer to Elmore's piece-a-shit Camaro but there was not room even to make
an illegal turn and by the time he could have got the Suburban pointed in 
the right direction Elmore would have been gone.  The Ford was already out
of sight.  Billy did a slow count, forcing his blood pressure back to 
acceptable levels.

Billy:  Okay, Elmore.  Ya got lucky.  Later for you.

Billy had been making the rounds of the utility companies, periodically
stopping to call the Punk.  If that was the Punk's Ford, then it explained
why she wasn't calling him back, but it still didn't explain where the
Pipsqueak was.  Billy fought down rising panic - what if something had
happened to his girl, something worse than what he'd just managed to get
her out of.  He coldly surpressed the fear, the way he'd been taught at the
Shop.  The Pipsqueak would turn up, she always did.  and when she did, his 
face would be the first one she'd see.

The utility companies had been no help.  All they'd been able to do, in
essence, was confirm what he already knew, that her service had been 
discontinued and she had moved.  They hadn't wanted to tell him that
much, tried to hide behind their bullshit regulations, but going over the
desk had its usual positive effect.  Tongues had been loosened.  What he'd
been unable to learn was the new service address.  There was no new account
in her name, or he'd have got it out of them.  The final bills were being
forwarded to the blind drop he'd made her keep.  He'd asked if there was
new service in the name of Samuel P. Gerard, but not even his formidable
powers of persuasion had got that information out of anybody.

So now...he was cruising, aimlessly.  Watching.  Waiting.  For the Punk, for
the Dawg, for the Pipsqueak...to trip, to make a mistake.  One of them
would.  Civilians always did.

Beth:  So, let's paint for awhile.  That's relaxing.

Deb:  Fine.  Paint.

Beth:  I'll paint.  You siddown.

Deb:  Dammit, I got a busted flipper, I'm not in an iron lung.  I can sit
on my butt and paint the moldings.

Beth:  Pretty soon you'll try to go up that stepladder.  No.  Go in the
bathroom, retile the floor.

Deb:  Oh, yippee.  Grout.

We worked in companionable silence for an hour or more, until Sam
surprised us both.  Beth hadn't expected him back so soon, had thought he
might be kept in San Antonio for a few more days completing his transfer.
She had wanted to get most of the redecorating done, so she could surprise 
him with it.  I gathered up the end of a tile box and the label off the
grout bucket.  I would go buy more - I was running out.  And if I couldn't
remember the name of the store where Beth had got the stuff, so much the 
better.  I would have to hunt for the place.  And it would keep me out that
much longer.

TO BE CONTINUED...Billy really gets peeved...