Fletch's Moxie by Gregory McDonald Read Free Book Online Page A

backed into me.” Moxie shook her head. “Real careless.”
    “From what Peterman tells me,” Mooney said, “this is a serious matter.”
    In the front seat, Fletch and Moxie looked at each other in sincere wonderment.
    “Peterman?” Moxie asked.
    Through the rear view mirror Fletch saw Mooney indicate he meant Fletch.
    “Peterman,” Mooney said.
    “O.L.” Moxie exhaled. “This man’s name is Fletcher. Peterman is the name of the man what got punctured.”
    Mooney muttered, “I thought he said his name was Peterman.”
    “Dear O.L.,” Moxie commented. “Always very up on my affairs. Makes a point of knowing everyone in my life. A friend to all my friends. All in all, a doting father.”
    “So which one got stabbed?” Mooney asked.
    Fletch said, “The other one.”
    “Then you’re Peterman,” Mooney asserted.
    “No,” said Fletch. “I’m Fletcher. I’m the one who told you about Peterman.”
    “It doesn’t make any difference,” concluded Mooney after a pull on his bottle. “It’s a very serious matter.”
    After a moment, seeing Mooney’s head nod in the rearview mirror, Fletch asked Moxie, “You call your father O.L.?”
    “Only to his face.”
    “I never heard that. You’ve always called him Freddy.”
    “Originally it was O.L.O. Short for Oh, Luminous One. My mother started calling him that when they were first married, young, starting out. Still does. When her poor confused mind churns out anything at all. I visited her last month. At the home. Poor mama. Anyway, over the years it got shortened to O.L.”
    “They call me Oh, Hell,” Mooney announced from the back seat, his voice resonating in the closed car. “For short, they call me Oh, Heck.” He tipped the bottle up to his mouth.
    Moxie looked through the rain spotted window. They had turned north on Route 41. “Where we going?”
    “Dinner.”
    “And what do we do with the superstar in the back seat?”
    “Take him with us.”
    “You’ve never seen Freddy in a restaurant.”
    “No.”
    “People gasp and fall off their chairs. They send over drinks, competitively. They line up to shake his hand and have a few words with him, so he never gets anything to eat. They never seem torealize how drunk he already is. I call it the Public Campaign To Kill Frederick Mooney.”
    “He’s still alive.”
    “Used to find it damned embarrassing, when I was small. Public Drunkenness Being Praised.”
    Mooney said, “I
should e’en die with pity to see another thus.”
    “Oh, God,” Moxie said. “Lear. What got him on Lear? Did I say something Regan-like?”
    “I think it started when I first found him in the bar,” Fletch said. “The first thing I said to him was something like
‘your daughter sent me to fetch you’.”
    “Yes,” Moxie said. “That would be enough of a cue to get him going on Lear. And did he recite to you?”
    “Yes,” Fletch said. “It was marvelous. In thunder and lightning and pelting rain.”
    Moxie reached back and patted Mooney on the knee. “That’s O.K., O.L., I never missed a meal.”
    “Damned right you didn’t,” Mooney said.
    “You put me in school and mama in the hospital but nobody ever missed a meal.”
    Mooney shook his head in agreement. “It’s a damned serious matter. I told Fletcher that.”
    Moxie shook her head and turned around again just as they were passing a sign saying 41. “Damned Route 41. Came here to make a movie and it seems I’ve spent my whole time so far on Route 41. Going back and forth. Vanderbilt Beach to Bonita Beach. Bonita Beach to Vanderbilt Beach. Life’s damned hard on a working girl.”
    “What’s this about a hit-and-run accident?” Fletch asked.
    “You know about that?”
    “Heard a reporter ask you something about it.”
    “I don’t think it’s related,” Moxie said. “I mean, to Steve’s death. It was Geoffrey McKensie’s wife.”
    “Why does that name seem familiar? Geoffrey McKensie?”
    “Australian director.” Moxie