The Chameleon Fallacy (Big Bamboo Book 2) (50 page)

“
I’ll be right back,” he said.

Her eyes told him that she knew and understood. He walked into Bar Hemingway and took a seat right at the far end of the bar. He ordered another Courvoisier. It wasn’t bourbon, but it would sure as hell do until the bourbon got there. He sipped it speculatively. Somehow it seemed like the right thing to do. He looked at the polished wood and the shiny brass rails, the orderly rows of bottles. It was a bit too just-so for his taste, but what the hell. Asia was loving it, and Crispin was acting like he had his dick stuck in a jelly donut, so what the fuck? Let them enjoy. He let his mind run back to when he had thought he had lost her.
How did that feel, ace? And now how do you feel?
He looked in the mirror at some fool grinning back at him, looking embarrassed.

“
What? Something wrong with being happy, asshole?” he said aloud to his reflection.

The bartender looked concerned. “Somesing is wrong,
monsieur
?”

Baby Joe smiled. “Only that nothing is wrong, pal.”

“
Ah see,” said the bartender, not seeing at all, and he wandered off to his colleague to say something rude about Americans.

Baby Joe sipped the brandy. Was there something wrong with nothing being wrong? Did it worry him because he couldn’t trust it, because he didn’t think it could last? Because he thought he knew so much about life that he was too fucking smart to be happy? Was that it? Well, fuck that shit.
Time for a little naïve hopefulness, pard
.

Baby Joe finished his glass, signaled for a refill, and went to stand in the entrance of the restaurant. A band had started playing and people were dancing. Their table was empty. He looked out onto the floor and smiled as he saw Asia and Crispin waltzing. She looked like she was having so much fun. Crispin was showing off, of course, but he had to admit the fat bastard had some moves on him. He watched as Crispin said something and Asia tipped her head back and laughed. Crispin whirled her around. He watched the way her body moved in the tight confines of her dress.

He turned and walked back into the bar. Two people had taken the seats next to his: Agents Black and White.

***

Monsoon knew he was out of shape, but he didn’t realize until that moment how badly. He was gasping for breath after fifty yards, and at a hundred yards he was sweating and wheezing and he knew he wasn’t going to make it. The Fab 13 was slamming against his ribs as he ran. They were right behind him and gaining. Even the fat one was catching up. He should have known. It was too easy. That perfumed poodle-petting ponce was pulling a fast one. Smart move, too. Using Americans.

Only not smart enough. You had to get up earlier in the morning than that motherfucker if you wanted to put one over on Monsoon Parker. Plus, if you wanted to keep tabs on someone on the sly, you shouldn’t send people who look like refugees from a fucking Star Trek convention.

They’d approached him in the bar the night before.

“
American, huh?” the fat one said.

“
Yeah. Native American. I’m a fucking Mohican.”

“
Hey, pal. We’re just trying to be friendly. Where y’all from?”

“
My mother’s snatch. What about you?” Monsoon said, walking away.

It wasn’t just that he didn’t want company, or at least not
that
kind of company; it was that his infallible heat detector had starting ringing. It hadn’t been anything specific. It was just a feel that you got from the streets, a certain kind of unstated menacing vibe that certain kinds of people gave off when they were trying to play nice. Mob guys had it. So did cops. Either way it wasn’t anything he wanted to play patty-cake with. So he blew them off.

He knew he had been right when, just as his cab was about to pull away on the way to the Louvre, they yanked the doors open and climbed in on either side of him.

“
Well. The last of the fucking Mohicans. How’s it hangin’, Chingachgook?”

“
Lucky for you we need ya, otherwise you woulda stopped one in the kisser for that crack last night. Let’s fucking go.”

The cab driver looked in the mirror, shrugged, and eased into the traffic. They knew what they were doing. They had timed it just right, so Monsoon had already told the cabbie where he was going. They had him boxed in. All they had to do was go along for the ride. Monsoon knew he would be okay while they were moving—they couldn’t very well turn him over in the back of a moving cab—but he knew they thought they had him. In the States they would have. But in France they don’t have wire between the driver and the passengers.

Just as they were pulling away from a light, close to the Louvre, Monsoon rolled into the front passenger seat and ducked out of the door. The cabbie slammed the anchors on and got rear-ended by a Peugeot. He got out of the cab and started cursing and waving his hands about. A truck had them boxed in on the inside, so the fat one had to shuffle over to the off side to get out. The thin one shouldn’t have waited. By the time they made the street, Monsoon had a hundred-yard head start.

Unfortunately for him, there was nowhere to run except into the square. He reached the glass pyramid and looked back. They were only about fifty yards back. At that hour, the square was sparsely populated, but on the other side of the pyramid there were a lot of people. And two gendarmes.

Monsoon stopped running. He knew the others would too. The gendarmes looked at him curiously as he walked past panting, but they didn’t stop him or speak to him. Protecting the national treasures of France was their responsibility. Out-of-breath spades weren’t, even if they did look like they were about to have a coronary. They just hoped the little creep didn’t keel over on their watch.

The entrance was on his left. If he could make it inside he would be okay. It would give him some breathing space, literally and figuratively. They wouldn’t be able to pull anything in there, with all the cameras and the guards, and in those crowds it would be easy to give them the slip. He looked back. They were walking up fast, twenty paces behind. He flipped them the bird and walked in. He could feel them watching him as he paid, and as he studied the floor plan, looking for the Mona Lisa.

His problem was going to be what to do when he got there. He figured the two torpedoes had to be working for Nightingale, who was planning on muscling Monsoon out of the R3. But what if they weren’t? If they weren’t, Nightingale would be his way out. It was ten-to by the time he got to the Mona Lisa room. There was a line of people longer than the wildebeest migration waiting to see it, winding backward and forward through the rope barriers. Monsoon joined the queue. So did the goons. As they shuffled forward, at times they were only feet from each other, close enough to speak.

“
Cute move, miss.”

“
Go fuck yourself.”

“
We don’t have to. We’re gonna fuck you.”

Monsoon was shoved forward by the relentless pressure behind. He was almost at the picture, and it was fifteen after ten. There was no sign of Alphonso Nightingale. Well, at least now he knew. As he got level with the picture, he suddenly went rigid and let out a high pitched keening sound through clenched teeth. He dropped to the ground and started thrashing about wildly, drooling at the mouth. Two guards were on him in seconds, and the paramedics were there within minutes. Two minutes later, Monsoon was being stretchered out. The Americans watched him with stony eyes as he passed on the gurney.

As an impression of someone having an epileptic fit, it wasn’t the best one that you were ever going to see, but it was good enough to get Monsoon out of the room and down the corridor. When the medics stopped in front of the elevator down to the first aid room, he jumped up, ignoring the shouts, and hightailed smartly down the hall. He found his way out the back to where a flotilla of tour buses were parked, disgorging and sucking up lines of tourists like odd, angular prehistoric beasts feeding and defecating.

He joined a line of people who looked like they were all from Kuala Lumpur. As the bus pulled away, he saw Fatback and Spare Rib rush out of the back door into the parking lot and start eyeballing the crowd. As the bus inched its way into traffic, he looked down and saw Alphonso Nightingale sitting in the back of an open-topped Alpha Romeo with his ridiculously pruned pooch. The two front doors were open, and two heavies leaned against them. The Americans started walking in the direction of Nightingale’s wheels.

As he watched, they drew level with the car. Neither group acknowledged the other. Either they were playing it extremely close to the chest, or something weird was going on. Either way, there was a lot to think about. And as far as Monsoon Parker was concerned, anything that needed serious thought needed to be seriously thought about in a bar.

His luck was still running. By the time the tour guide figured out he wasn’t from Malaysia and eighty-sixed him from the bus, he was right outside Harry’s Bar.

***

Asia had to go to the restroom. Crispin plonked himself in his chair. His faced was flushed and happy, and his eyes were sparkling. He reached out and drained his glass of Chablis. He reached for the bottle. It was almost empty. He poured the remainder into his glass and looked around for a waiter. As he did so, one approached, carrying a bottle of champagne. Crispin looked at him.

“
I didn’t order that, young man, but what the fuck? Leave it anyway.”

“
But…your friend sent eet,
monsieur
.”

“
Friend, which friend?” Crispin said, craning his neck. Shit. Maybe he had an admirer. Maybe he had scored.

“
Eem. Ze one ’oo is just leaving.”

Crispin looked over to where the waiter pointed, at a tall thin man in a dark suit who was halfway out of the door. The man stopped in the doorway and turned and smiled. Crispin froze.

Asia came back, smiling. “Crispin, you wouldn’t believe the bathroom. You could live in it, it’s so…Crispin, what’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost. Are you okay?”

“
I saw him again.”

“
Who?”

“
Him. The man from Moscow. The man with no lips.”

***

“
Well, well. Looky here. Small world, Baby Joe,” Agent Black said.

“
It’s getting so it’s too small for the two of us, pal, fucking G-Man or no,” Baby Joe said. His expression was bleak. It said that any attempt at a smart remark would not be very smart.

Agent Black didn’t attempt any smart remarks.

“
Ho. Ease off the gas, there, Cochise,” said Agent White. “This is just a friendly visit.”

Baby Joe looked at her. He saw where the stitches had been removed from her lip. Someone had done a good job, but there would still be a scar.

“
Like the last time, huh?” he said.

“
Yeah, just like the last time,” said Agent Black.

“
So I suppose you’re going tell me this is just a coincidence,” Baby Joe said.

“
Well, kind of. You bein’ here is sure as hell a coincidence. Our bein’ here ain’t.”

“
So you two just came in to wet your whistles, huh?”

“
No, we came to talk to you.”

“
So you knew I was here.”

“
Feds, pal. What can I tell you?” Agent White said.

“
So what do you want to talk about, the Communards?”

“
The Russians are here.”

Baby Joe sighed. “Never mind. Say what’s on your mind, then leave me the fuck alone.”

Agent White pulled out a picture. You could see it had been taken with a long lens because of the depth of field. It was of three men. Two of them were big; the one in the middle was small. And scared. It was Monsoon Parker.

“
I knew it. I just fucking knew it,” Baby Joe said. “Some kinds of shit you just can’t scrape off your shoe.”