Free Ransom Game by Howard Engel Page A

first time it rained. To the right of his small office were two large bays, with cars drawn over the pits. In back, he had an acre of wrecks. They looked like the remains of a metal-eater’s lunch.
    I drove on to the edge of the lot and put on the emergency brake. I was far enough from the pumps so I wouldn’t be confused with business. I got out and walked toward the office.
    Half an hour earlier, I’d got a call from the Regional Police telling me that a yellow Volkswagen had been towed to Steve’s Garage on the Lakeshore Road near Niagara Street. I found Steve Tokarski in the back of the garage looking through a parts catalogue in an aluminum binder bolted to a workbench. He was a stocky, grease-covered man in his thirties, in a peakless peaked cap and a pair of overalls the colour of the last muffler I passed on the shoulder of a highway. He had a chubby face, and a one-sided smile that hoisted the left corner of his mouth into the cheek. His metal-framed glasses were streaked with oil as was the stub of a cigarette in the middle of his face. He didn’t remove the cigarette to remove the ash, just blew hard without dislodging the butt. He had an oily rag to wipe his hands on when he saw company. When he saw me, he didn’t touch it, but went on looking for the part he needed in the catalogue. A man with a safety light on the end of an extension cord glared at me. I waited and watched a crankcase drain its last oozings into a hubcap.
    â€œAre you Steve Tokarski?”
    â€œYeah, I’m Steve. But I’m pretty busy right now, can it wait? I got both trucks out.”
    â€œIt’s about the car towed in earlier, the Volkswagen.”
    â€œYeah,” he grinned his lopsided grin. “What about it?”
    â€œWell, I’d like to see it and hear where you found it.”
    â€œWho are you?” He had got suspicious suddenly. It sat well on his normal conservatism.
    â€œCooperman’s my name. The car belongs to a client of mine.”
    â€œYou a lawyer, eh? I spotted you for a lawyer. As soon as I saw that car, I knew there was going to be lawyers. You want to take it away with you? There’s towing and storage on it. To hell with the storage. Let me have twenty bucks and you can drive it out of here.”
    â€œI didn’t walk from town. I’ve got my own car. You hang on to it for a couple of days, and the lady who owns it will come for it. Where is it?”
    â€œI’m not going to leave that heap of bones out front. Are you kidding? It’s in back with the rest of the junk. I spotted it a week ago, off the road beyond the first lock of the canal. You know where the picnic ground are? Well it was in the bushes there. It hadn’t driven off the road or anything, it was standing there with the keys on the floor. I took a look, but didn’t think too much of it. Then after a couple of days I started to get curious, wondering why it had been left there, you know? So I called the cops and I had Walter bring it in on Monday night. I haven’t seen the cops yet. In the summer, that’s a regular lovers’ lane down there. If the car wasn’t a wreck, I’d have figured it was hot, you know? But you couldn’t hardly give away this heap of bones.” He indicated that I was welcome to take the air and let him get on with his work, so I nodded my appreciation and walked around back.
    It was a mustard-coloured VW with tattoos of rust everywhere. The winter had taken its toll a couple of times over on its poor blemished carcass. From the front, it looked solid enough. It hadn’t bumped into anything, and there were no recent dents that I could see. Through the windows, everything looked in order. A religious medal dangled from the rear-view mirror. The back seat looked crowded but ordinary. I opened the door on the driver’s side. The seat had been pushed back so that some long legs could be freed from confinement. I looked at