Part 36 (1/2)
”There. I have affixed a spirit seal to the envelope. You are not to open it. Only if the case does not return from the other side may you open it. If you break the spirit seal before then, your uncle will punish you.”
Jack swallowed hard. ”Punish me? How?”
”Most likely he will make the money disappear. But he may do worse.” She wagged a finger at him as she pushed the envelope across the table. ”So do not open it before you return.”
Very clever, Jack thought. She's covering all exits.
”Don't worry. I won't.” He put the envelope in his lap, then quickly transferred that plus her twenty-five-hundred dollars to his side coat pocket. ”Oh, hey, I got a little business trip tomorrow-overnight to Chicago-so I can't come back till Thursday. Will you have ap-whatevered it by then?”
”Apported. Yes, and I believe it will have returned by then.”
You mean, he thought, that you believe you will have been able to replace the gold coins with junk silver by then.
He pushed the case toward her. ”Then fire away. And good luck, Uncle Matt, wherever you are.”
Jack rose, waved to Madame Pomerol, and headed for the door. ”See you Thursday.”
He felt laughter bubbling in his throat as he strode through the waiting room and hurried down the hall, but he suppressed it. He didn't want to arouse their suspicions. He took the stairs instead of waiting for the elevator because a load of s.h.i.+t was poised over a windtunnel fan and he wanted to be out of range when it dropped.
”Lock the front door,” Madame Pomerol said through Jack's earpiece, ”and let's take a look at those coins.”
Jack had made it to the lobby when he heard Foster say, ”s.h.i.+t! Something's up with this lock Something's up with this lock!”
”What's wrong?”
”Like it's jammed.”
Good diagnosis, Carl, Jack thought as he waved to the doorman and stepped out onto the street. He'd broken off a pin tip in the lock of the second case.
Instead of hurrying away, Jack loitered on the sidewalk outside. He wanted to hear this.
”Look at that,” Foster said. ”Wonder how that got in there. No matter, it's out now. Only take me a few seconds to... to... there. Now, feast your eyes on there. Now, feast your eyes on-oh, s.h.i.+t! Oh, no!”
”Let me-” Madame Pomerol cut herself off with a gasp. ”What the f.u.c.k? You told me this was packed with gold coins! Are you f.u.c.king blind?”
”It was! I swear it was! I don't know what-”
”I do! The s.h.i.+t pulled a switch! He was conning us from the get-go! And you let him in!”
”Me?”
”Yes, you, you needle-d.i.c.k jerk! You're supposed to screen these a.s.sholes!”
”I did! I checked out his address, I called the phone number he gave me.”
”Yeah, well, you can bet your sorry a.s.s the Robert Butler at that address ain't the guy we had here today, and the phone you called is not at that address. f.u.c.k! f.u.c.k! f.u.c.k!”
”Hey, let's look on the bright side. He thinks he walked out of here with two-and-a-half large, but all he's got is sliced-up newspaper. And we've still got his five hundred. I wish I could see his face when he opens that envelope. He may have pulled one over on us, but we're the ones that come out ahead.”
”You think I give a s.h.i.+t about that? I don't give a rat's a.s.s about five hundred bucks. What I care about is he scammed us. He's out some cash, but as far as I'm concerned, he came out on top. He walked into our place and f.u.c.king scammed us-in our own place! Like we were punk amateurs. If word of this gets out we'll never be able to hold our heads up. We look like big f.u.c.king jerks Like we were punk amateurs. If word of this gets out we'll never be able to hold our heads up. We look like big f.u.c.king jerks.”
That's right, Jack thought, plucking out his ear piece as he moved on. But soon you're going to look like even bigger jerks.
He hoped they stayed good and mad, too mad to see the barb still waiting at the end of Jack's sting.
He pumped his fist as he danced across the street. This was sweet, and going to get sweeter.
9.
Gia awoke from a dream about blue eyes.
She yawned and stretched in the big leather recliner where she and Jack would often snuggle together and watch one of his weird movies.
She yawned again. She never napped. She'd sat down and closed her eyes, just for a minute, and suddenly it was forty minutes later. Maybe it was the pregnancy, combined with being up late with Jack last night. She remembered being very tired carrying Vicky.
Whatever the reason, the nap hadn't refreshed her. Images of the blond child from yesterday had filled her sleep, her sad, lonely blue eyes calling to Gia, beseeching her...
For what? Why couldn't she get that little girl out of her head?
The pregnancy again. Sure, blame everything on the hormonal s.h.i.+fts. Being alone in the house on a summer day with no prospect of seeing Vicky till the end of the week didn't help either.
Gia pushed herself up from the chair and grabbed her purse. She didn't want to stay in the house. As soon as she stepped out into the warm humid afternoon she knew where she wanted to go.
She'd never liked the subway-the closed-in feeling of the dark tunnels made her edgy-but today it seemed to be the way to go. A quick walk over to Lexington took her to the Fifty-ninth Street station which she knew to be a stop for the N and R trains, known citywide as the ”Never” and the ”Rarely.” She wasn't familiar with the Brooklyn and Queens lines, but the map by the token booth showed her that the N would take her right to the heart of Astoria.
She was just ahead of rush hour and her car was nearly full; the rocking made her queasy until the tracks broke free of the tunnel and into the air. She sighed with relief as sunlight filtered through the spiderweb-fine graffiti scratches on the windows.
The elevated tracks ended at her stop, Ditmars Boulevard. She stepped out of the car and headed for the stairs down to street level. She had a pretty good idea of Menelaus Manor's location in relation to Ditmars. She'd have to orient herself once she reached- ”Gia?”
She jumped at the sound of her name. When she turned she saw a man with long red hair and a mustache approaching her. For an instant she didn't recognize him, then- ”Jack?”
”Gia, what are you doing here?”
His heels beat a staccato rhythm as he strode toward her along the platform. Were those cowboy boots?
He leaned in to kiss her but she held up a hand. ”Without the mustache, please?”
He smiled. ”Oh, yeah.”
He peeled it off and they kissed.
He kept his hands on her waist and looked into her eyes. ”You're the last person I expected to see here. What's up?”
”I'm not sure,” she said.