“For that you need Tony's fists?”
“Make sure you get the idea.”
“Maybe Grimaldi didn't get my idea,” I said. “I put a transaction to him this morning of mutual benefit to all parties.”
“You tried to squeeze him,” Nash said. “Thing like that, Mr. Grimaldi don't take from nobody. You especially, guy like you.”
Nash waved a hand as if something unpleasant had come to the notice of his ample nostrils.
“A guy like who?” I said.
“Guy doesn't show respect,” Nash said. “Comes to a man's house, no appointment, nothing, man's brother's visiting, and shit, you're looking to jam Mr. Grimaldi.”
Nash crossed his legs in the chair, as casual as if the gun in my hand was part of the furniture.
“Reason Mr. Grimaldi sent me,” he said, “you forget everything you said about a deal. None of that bullshit, and Mr. Grimaldi wants the papers you said you took out of the office.”
“Or what?”
“I'll slam you.”
“That didn't work right here this afternoon.”
“Slam you when you're not looking. Professional.”
“Without Tony?”
Nash turned his flat gaze on the floor. Tony's chest heaved and little bubbles of saliva floated out of his slightly opened mouth. Eyes shut, fists clenched, he was as immobile as the end table that lay across his shoulders.
“Kid was a good driver,” Nash said.
I clutched the gun and kept it aimed at Nash's breastbone. It still felt insubstantial.
“Something's wrong with your gun,” I said.
“Safety's on,” Nash said. “Won't fire that way.”
I looked at the gun and back to Nash.
I said, “How come you haven't tried to take it away from me?”
“Figured you knew how to push it off, the safety.”
“You figured incorrectly.”
“Dumb fuck.”
“You or me?”
Nash didn't uncross his legs. I held on to the gun.
Nash said, “What're you talking about, gun's got something wrong?”
“Too light,” I said. “Tony down there told me you carry a cannon.”
“Sometimes.”
“Blows holes through people.”
“That ain't it, gun in your hand,” Nash said. “Forty-four Mag you're talking about.” His voice had grown instructive. “It's for when I go see tough guys. Guys who I need to make an impression on, you understand what I'm saying.”
I didn't know whether to feel insulted or relieved.
“That one you took off me, that gun,” Nash went on, “it's for pussycats.”
I said, “One thing about us pussycats, we land on our feet.”
Nash shrugged.
“You got lucky,” he said. “Gimme back the gun.”
“You'll shoot me.”
“Not till somebody says I should.”
I turned the gun over in my hand.
“How do you unload this thing?” I said.
“Little switch at the bottom of the barrel, thing your hand's on, push it.”
A clip of six bullets slid from the barrel. I flicked them out of the clip, put the bullets in my jeans pocket, and handed Nash his unloaded gun.
“You bluffing about the papers?” he said, returning the gun to its holster. “The ones Mr. Grimaldi wants back? You really got them?”
“I've got them,” I said. “In a secure place.”
“No place's secure somebody wants them bad enough.”
Nash was right. The invoices and Harry Hein's computer printouts were still in the trunk of the Volks. I wouldn't call that secure. I could transfer them to a safety deposit box. Or maybe secrete them down the hollow in the third tree from the left in the park across the street.
“I'll tell you something,” Nash said. “Mr. Grimaldi's screwing up here. Between you and me, there's too much commotion going on. You, shit, you're not worth all the jacking around.”
“Sol,” I said, “you can't keep buttering me up this way.”
“I'm talking to you confidential,” Nash said. He uncrossed his leg. “You oughta go away quiet on this thing. It isn't like you're arguing a parking ticket for some guy. This is something where there's serious money involved and certain people's jobs.”
“Yours, for instance.”
“Yeah.”
“And part of your job was to take the documents back to Grimaldi.”
“Yeah.”
“You failed.”
“For now.”
As Nash spoke, he bent from the chair, picked up the wallet on the floor with his left hand, and came up fast with the back of his right hand. It was aimed at the side of my face. Nash wasn't quick enough. Maybe advancing age, maybe he'd underestimated me. I hadn't underestimated him. Instinct or fear had me suspecting a snaky move from Sol, and as he swung, I slipped inside the arc of the punch and it passed over the top of my head. I backed away and held my hands in front of me.
“Don't do that again, okay?” I said.
“Just so's you know this ain't over,” Nash said. He was holding his jacket by the lapels and shaking it. “Fucking wrinkles.” He buttoned the jacket and patted its pockets. Apparently our conference had concluded.
“What about Tony?” I asked.
“You put him to sleep,” Nash said. “You wake him up.”
He walked to the top of the stairs.
“Tell the kid he's fired,” Nash said. His feet made thumping noises on the stairs and he slammed the front door.
I went into the bathroom and looked in the mirror. Same face, marginally smarter. I filled the sink with cold water and submerged my head. George Raft used to give himself the same treatment in the movies after somebody punched him. The cold water hurt the sore spots on my cheek and jaw. Or it might have been Jimmy Cagney who soaked his face. One of those guys I shouldn't pick as a role model.
I rinsed a washcloth in the water and spread it on Tony Flanagan's forehead. He was holding firm on the living-room floor. I lifted his head, slipped a pillow under it, and raised the end table off his shoulders. Tony's jaw looked whole and unbroken, but I didn't envy him the headache that would greet his awakening.
Out in the kitchen, I poured three inches of Wyborowa in a glass with ice and took it to the chair that Sol Nash had so recently vacated. I sipped, watched a vein throb in Tony's neck, and contemplated my lame try at putting pressure on Charles Grimaldi. I'd disturbed him sufficiently to send Sol and Tony on a mission to retrieve the invoices but not enough to make him cut a bargain with me. Hadn't nudged him close to a deal. The vodka nipped at the inside of my mouth. Tony's punches must have torn something in there. I'd take another crack at Grimaldi. Give him an irresistible reason to trade with me. This time out, I'd be sneaky clever. Somehow put Grimaldi in a corner. Tony gave off blubbering noises and opened his eyes. I swallowed a long tug of vodka. Tony's eyes were glassy, but he managed to fix his gaze on me.
“Here's the good news, Tony,” I said. “Sol thinks you're a hell of a driver. The bad news is he fired you.”
Tony got on his feet without a wobble.
“Fired?” he repeated.
“That's what the man said.”
“Guess I should of kicked you,” Tony said.
He asked for a drink of water, and when he finished it, he left my apartment. He was wearing his straw hat.
R
AY GRIFFIN
was as good as his threat of that morning. He phoned. The call came thirty minutes after Tony had made his exit and I was applying a cold compress to a small lump on my cheek. I gave Griffin a warm welcome. He sounded surprised at the reception. He was more surprised when I said I planned to invite him over for a drink that evening. Major matters to discuss. He said he'd make it about eight o'clock, as soon as he'd wound up an interview. Wonderful, I said. By the time he hung up, Griffin's surprise had acquired a tinge of suspicion. Perceptive of him. He didn't know I had him ticketed for a key part in my latest surefire scheme.
He arrived closer to seven-thirty than eight. Suspicious but eager. He was wearing white pants with bell bottoms and a black tank top that showed the pimples on his shoulders.
“Want a vodka?” I asked. I oozed solicitation. “Sorry, it's all I have in the place.”
“Sure,” Griffin said. He was carrying a notebook. “What've you got to go with it?”
“Ice.”
“Seven-Up? Or Sprite? Something to give it taste?”
I made him a Bloody Caesar and sat him at the kitchen table.
“I'm going to ask two things of you, Ray,” I said. “One, you make a phone call. Two, you wait a couple of days before you print anything.”
“Print what?”
“They'll stop the presses for this one.”
“Unions'd go bananas if anyone stopped the presses.”
“Give you a National Newspaper Award then.”
Griffin's mouth puckered when he tasted his Bloody Caesar. I'd gone heavy on the Tabasco.
“Who do I phone?” he asked.
“Your old sparring partner Charles Grimaldi.”
“So,” Griffin said, “the story I get at the end is what's going on at Ace Disposal?”
“Terrific guess, Ray,” I said. “But after the phone call, you hold your horses on the article until I say go. No speculation on your own, no digging around at Ace, no requests for interviews.”
“And you'll give me the whole picture?”
“Exclusive.”
“What do I say to Grimaldi?” Griffin asked.
I slid a piece of paper across the kitchen table. It had three names written on it in my own round hand. Laidlaw Construction. Stibbards Wire. Soward Brothers Concrete. I'd culled the names from one of Harry Hein's computer printouts. Beside the names was the magic number. 837.
“When you get Grimaldi on the line,” I said to Griffin, “tell him you're following up on your garbage series from last year. Say you've got fresh leads and want to check out your facts with him. Read off these names on the paper and ask if it isn't odd the three companies were charged an identical amount for a day in the third week in June. That's the 837. Quote him the figure.”
Griffin listened, his mouth hanging a shade open.
“Let Grimaldi talk,” I said. “He'll have some kind of explanation.”
“A glib guy, all right,” Griffin said.
“Wait till he's winding down,” I said. “Then say, well, you think you might have access to invoices that'll make things clearer.”
“After that, what?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Grimaldi'll have heard his fill.”
“You're not going to let me in on what these names mean?” Griffin said. “And the significance of the 837?”
“Just dollars.”
Griffin studied the sheet of paper for clues.
“I could follow this up myself,” he said. “The companies are customers of Ace's, that's easy, and something's wrong with them getting billed 837 dollars.”
“It'd take you weeks to get past what I've put in front of you,” I said. “My way, you get the complete bundle in a couple of days.”
I was exaggerating. Maybe lying. I couldn't tell what Grimaldi's reaction would be. He might bluff it out. He might catch a plane for Brazil. He might send Sol Nash around for another visit. Do it to me professional this time.
“Where's the phone?” Ray Griffin said.
Grimaldi was at home, and after Griffin exchanged happy memories of past interviews with him, he popped the questions.
“Uh, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said, “I've got some names here I'd like to try out on you for background on the story I'm researching. Laid-law Construction's one. Stibbards Wire. That's with two âb's in the middle. And the last is Soward. S-o-w-a-r-d. A concrete company.”
As he talked, Griffin kept the receiver cradled between his left shoulder and his ear. He wrote in the notebook with his right hand and held the notebook in place with his left. I sat across the table with the soggy vodka and ice I'd been nursing along most of the evening.
“All customers of yours?” Griffin said into the phone. “That's what I understood. Well, the thing is, Mr. Grimaldi, it's come to my attention, these three, kind of a coincidence here, they were all charged 837 dollars by your company for work done on the same day in June. Wonder if you could explain that for the story.”
Grimaldi talked for five minutes without allowing space for Griffin to butt in. Griffin kept himself busy writing in his notebook. The writing covered six pages before Grimaldi took a break.
“Sure, it makes sense, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said. “Good business practice, yeah, like you say.”
Griffin and Grimaldi alternated talking in spurts. I listened to Griffin's end. I could imagine Grimaldi's end.
“Well, anyway,” Griffin said when he had a space, “I believe I have a backup on this. Nothing definite, but a source of mine might make available the relevant invoices, the ones for the three companies I mentioned a minute ago.”
Grimaldi took a turn. He raised his voice loud enough for me to make out two of his words.
“Fucking nerve,” Grimaldi said. He repeated it a couple of times.
“Just running down my leads, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said. He was good on the phone, guileless, and a dangerous hint of information held in reserve. “If I get the invoices, you know, it'll be a matter of nailing down the answers. Confirm what you've explained.”
Griffin let the phone fall from his ear. Grimaldi had geared up to a shout.
“That's getting serious, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said when it came back to talking time for him. “Nobody's threatening your company. Any event, I can't reveal my contact. He hasn't said he'll definitely come through with the invoices. It's up in the air right now.”
Griffin got off the phone and flipped his notebook shut.
I said, “You care for another Bloody, Ray?”
Griffin shook his head.