A Few Minutes Past Midnight Read Online Free PDF

said formally. “Toby, I just finished translating an article for The Atlantic Monthly. By a Czech scientist. He says the Nazis are working on a super weapon. He is convinced.”
    “I’ll check it out with Juanita,” I said, looking up as the door opened and Juanita came in with a brown paper bag in her hand. “Talk to you later, Gunther.”
    “Check what out with Juanita?” she asked, putting the bag down in front of me and sitting.
    “You’re the fortune-teller,” I said, reaching into the bag for a warm, greasy taco.
    She put her hands behind her head and looked up at the ceiling while I ate.
    “Nothing comes,” she said.
    “Think big Nazi super weapon,” I said, with a mouthful of food.
    “Oh, you mean the bomb. Supposed to be a super bomb they’ll stick on the front of their rockets and drop on London. They’re losing, but they think they’ll have us begging when we see the damage.”
    “What else do you see about it?”
    “I don’t see anything,” she said. “I’ve got a client, Lars Kirkenbard. You know, the big Dane with the glasses.”
    I didn’t know.
    “Well, Lars told me about the bomb,” she said. “Everybody knows about the bomb. We’re working on one of our own.”
    “Lars told you?”
    “Nope,” she said. “I saw it in a vision. Boom, great big explosion, big enough to knock a hole in the ground the size of Zeus’s ass. Yeah, he told me. How’s the taco?”
    “Good,” I said. “Thanks.”
    Juanita closed her eyes. I didn’t like it when Juanita closed her eyes. When they opened, she looked straight at me and said,
    “Five are gone,” she said. “I saw names, five had lines through them. You have a list of names?”
    “No,” I said, wolfing down my second taco.
    “You will,” she said, getting up. “I got my Greek waiting. I better go.”
    I grunted and waved what remained of my second taco and Juanita closed the door behind her. I could hear her say something and Shelly shout and then she was gone. A second or two later Shelly came wobbling through my door, his glasses slipping, a narrow bloody metal instrument in his right hand.
    “Did you hear that?” he asked pointing to my door. “That Brooklyn gypsy. You hear what she said?”
    “No.”
    “She told my patient to get out or risk an infection she might not recover from. That’s what she said. And my patient pulled off her towel and went out the door. I don’t want that woman in these offices again, Toby.”
    “The patient or Juanita?”
    “Juanita,” he said. “The patient’ll come back. I’ve got her purse. She never liked me. Juanita.”
    “You ever work on her teeth?”
    “No,” he said. “I offered once. She laughed. Then she told me Mildred was going to leave me. And you know what happened.”
    It wasn’t a question. His wife, Mildred, had left him or, more accurately, Mildred had found a good lawyer, kicked Shelly out, and kept everything. Shelly had lived in nearby hotels for a few months and then considered moving into Mrs. Plaut’s, a consideration I discouraged. Now he had a two-room apartment a few blocks off Melrose in a four-story courtyard building. It was my opinion that Sheldon was far better off without Mildred, but my opinion was colored by the fact that Mildred hated me. Actually, Mildred hated almost everyone. It was her nature to get mixed up with con men, shady real-estate salesmen, has-been and never-was actors, and almost any man who showed interest in her and could wring her for some of the money Shelly had provided for her.
    Shelly did not share my opinion of Mildred, who had bullied, berated, and blasted him since he had married her. Mildred, who reminded me of a cross between Gale Sondergaard and Margaret Hamilton, was the love of Sheldon Minck’s life. Losing her had created in Shelly a relentless desire to invent something that would make him millions and bring Mildred back to him.
    The phone rang. I picked it up.
    “Toby,” said Jeremy. “I can give you three