The Way of All Fish: A Novel (29 page)

Michael’s was a good fifteen-minute ride from the Spurling Building, if the cab sprouted wings and flew over downtown traffic. Arthur said he seriously doubted Wally and Rod would bother with a one-hour lunch. It would take them that long to put away drinks.

Four of the girls in the firm of Snelling, Snelling, Borax, and Snelling were floating about in their designer dresses apparently looking for the runway. The receptionist was motionless, at least for the moment, behind her half-moon marble station.

“Biosphere Electronics, ma’am.” Arthur placed one of the business cards they’d had made up, with a Nicholas Ferrari printed on the card as manager. The telephone number, in case anyone wanted to call, was Karl’s.

Wide-eyed, she said, “Oh? Is there a problem?”

“You got trouble with your security system/telephone linkup.”

“Oh. Someone called AT&T about that.”

“We know that, ma’am; the telephone company isn’t equipped to handle this job. That’s why they notified us. It’s complicated. Apparently, the trouble is in a Mr. Hale’s office?” Arthur was reading from a small notebook with last year’s bets for his bookie.

The receptionist, whose name was Sang-Lu Wong, according to the brass plate on the counter, called over to the tall black-haired assistant, Sigourney (whose name Arthur and Candy didn’t believe for a second). Sigourney was dressed in another bloodred outfit and had the advantage (for Candy and Arthur) of being a know-it-all. “Biosphere Electronics?” She glanced at the bogus card. “Oh, yes, I remember, Mr. Hale called. Come this way, please.”

With only the silent trudge across the deep carpet and the whisper of silk from dress and hose, Sigourney opened the door and they were in.

Unfortunately, so was Sigourney, who made no move to exit. She stood, arms crossed beneath breasts, as Candy and Arthur set down their toolboxes and looked over the room, concentrating on the ceiling.

Arthur turned, as if a little surprised to see her there. “Oh, that’s okay, ma’am. You won’t need to walk us through the system. We can tell what the setup is here.”

She nodded. “We prefer that someone stay in the office when workmen are around. Just pretend I’m not here.”

Fuck-all. Arthur glanced in Candy’s direction. Candy made certain he was facing away from Sigourney before he removed his dark glasses and set up his ladder. Arthur shrugged. “As you please, ma’am. Just be careful you stay outside of the five-foot perimeter.” Out of his back pocket, he pulled two white masks and tossed one to Candy, who did a brilliant back maneuver to pull the mask out of the air. They should have been in Vegas, helping out at Cirque du Soleil.

Seeing them with masks while she was short of one, Sigourney was looking uncertain. “What’s this five-foot perimeter?”

“The radioactive particles, ma’am. Don’t have an extra mask, but you’ll probably be okay if you keep your distance.” He said to Candy, his voice mask-muffled, and with a brief laugh, “Remember that job Dynamics was doing at the Trump? One of the girls broke the barrier and wound up in the ICU at Presbyterian.”

Candy whistled. “Not funny, man. That was a close call.” He liked the mask; it hid most of his face.

Obviously unnerved but still trying to do her in-charge turn, Sigourney said, “I can’t believe what you’re doing is that dangerous. If it is, you should alert the people when you’re going to do a job.”

“We do. Always. Mr. Ferrari takes care of that personal. Since there’s usually no one in the room but us, no one can get hurt.”

“But us,” added Candy.

Arthur turned on his ladder, his hand on the casing of the little red eye and the closed-circuit system. “You want a shock, just try putting your hand on one of these babies.”

Sigourney was checking her watchlet, a band of tiny glittering stuff. “Oh, dear, I see it’s time for me to make a call to London. Excuse me.” She was out the door.

Arthur was off his ladder and around the desk, firing up the computer. He did not sit down. “Come on, come on. Why the hell turn it off in the middle of a workday?”

“You think they work?” said Candy, off his ladder, too, and over at the door, listening.

Arthur tried plugging in two different passwords. Neither worked. He was about to try the third when Candy whispered, “Someone’s coming!”

They were both at the bottoms of their ladders when the door opened. Sigourney was there again. “You finished?” She did not set foot inside.

“Nearly. A couple more things to check.” Arthur had whipped out a tiny flashlight and was running it over the ceiling.

Sigourney made a disapproving sound and shut the door. They waited. They pulled off their dust masks.

“Hell,” said Arthur, “we can’t get into the files with her around. God knows who she might send in here to certain death. It’s down to Oscar.”

“Oscar’s backup.”

“Yeah, C. That’s what we need right now. For Christ’s sake, you’ll get the fish back.” Arthur was back at the computer, switching it off.

“Who knows? Look at the size of some of them.” Candy was once again standing before the aquarium.

“There’s nothing in that tank bigger than my thumb.” He reached for the toolbox. “You want me to do it?”

“What? No. It’s my job.” Candy opened the box and pulled out the water-filled bag in which Oscar was pumping around and looking dissatisfied; at least that’s the way Candy read him.

Arthur said, “Hold on a minute while I get the door, see if anyone’s
going to butt in.” He slid the door open a crack, looked out. “Okay, go ahead.”

Candy lowered the bag into the water, opened it, and let that water blend with the water in the tank and Oscar with it. A bright blue fish shimmied up to Oscar, and they swam off together.

“Hey, look at that. He’s already making friends.”

“He’ll do swell in there. Look how clean they keep the tank. That water’s clear as crystal. Come on, let’s get our gear and get the hell out before Sigourney starts searching her PC for Biosphere.”

They folded their ladders, closed their toolboxes, and made their way out, telling Sang-Lu that Mr. Hale would be getting a report.

“He’s a hostage to fortune,” said Karl, inhaling what felt like the breath of a volcano, “so stop whining. Be proud of him.”

“Fuck’s sake, Karl, Oscar don’t know he’s a hostage. What’s to be proud of? It’s a dirty deal.”

“Play the hand you were dealt,” said Arthur, eyes closed.

“Since when did you both get so philosophical?” said Candy.

Karl held up one of Lena’s cigarettes by way of answer.

Candy grunted. He was on his second cigarette, and it wasn’t having the effect he needed.

Lena had come back into the room with a bottle of cognac. “You need something stronger than a cigarette. This is quite a unique cognac and very hard to get.” She set out some snifters.

“How’s it mix with these?” Karl pointed to his cigarette and smiled.

Lena returned the smile, then said, “Now. Tomorrow we go, or at least I go, to see Wally and Rod. What names. We’re short one or two people, aren’t we? Are you confident the assistant won’t recognize you? You say she was in the office for some moments.” She was addressing Arthur as she poured cognac into the snifters.

“People never recognize me. I’m like smoke or mist. And we were dressed in all kinds of crap.” Arthur and Candy were still wearing their vests. They’d come to Lena’s straight from the Spurling Building. “Anyway, she was thinking more about radioactivity than what the two of us looked like.”

Candy had taken first a whiff of and then a drink of Lena’s cognac. “Oh, man.”

“It’s too bad you couldn’t get into the files and had to use poor Oscar. But I assume he was easily managed?” said Lena.

Candy laughed. “He’d be real flattered you remembered his name.”

“Of course I remember his name. Oscar is a key player.”

They all drank their cognac and wondered where their heads were.

Except Lena, who knew where hers was.

H
e’s trying to rationalize everything. Trying to convince himself it’s eye trouble, stuff like that,” said Paul.

“How in the hell,” asked Clive Esterhaus, “do you make an optical illusion out of an alligator that’s pushing you into a boat?” They were gathered again in Bobby Mackenzie’s office for an update, smoking and drinking coffee, for once.

“Well, not that,” said Paul, dusting one of Bobby’s Cuban cigars across the quarter acre of an ashtray.

“This guy,” said Bobby, “has got a weird view of reality if he can rationalize all of those episodes, which, by the way, were pretty damned inventive.” With the hand holding his own cigar, Bobby gave Paul a thumbs-up.

Paul said, “He just phoned me and told me he’s convinced the alligator was sick or too ancient to realize there was a human being on his back.”

“Talk about mental,” said Karl.

Paul continued, “He’s been reading up on alligator behavior on the Internet.”

“What the fuck?” said Candy. “This guy thinks he’s going to find the answer on Discovery about what happened in the Everglades?”

“What about the burning bush?” asked Karl, trying to blow a smoke ring but ending up with smoke fuzzing his face. “How in hell could he rationalize his way out of that?”

“His ophthalmologist,” said Paul. “Dr. See—I didn’t make up that name—Dr. See told him that the retina, or some layer of it, was rife with
deposits. I can’t remember, except it seemed to be the same thing that happens with macular degeneration.”

“Oh, please,” said Bobby. “Tell me another. Have you ever heard anyone suffering from macular degeneration walk into an eye doctor’s office and say, ‘I think I’m getting AMD. I saw an alligator’?”

Candy pumped his fist in the air. “But that’s an extra, man. Now old Bass has to worry maybe he’s going blind.”

“He’s caught between a rock and a hard place. It’s either accepting he’s had a heavenly vision or tapping along the pavement with a white cane,” said Clive, pouring himself another cup of coffee, adding cream.

“What about the Wilkie Collins Redux?” This was Bobby’s personal favorite. “I always knew Bunny had the makings of a Sarah Bernhardt. I wish I’d been there.”

Paul smiled. “Yeah. It was some show.” As if reminding himself of the view from the office, he wandered over to the enormous window.

“So your overall plan is to have him checking in to Bellevue, but he’s balking?” asked Clive.

“No. Hess is already crazy; if we got him installed in a psychiatric facility, he’d be rationalizing that, too. He’d be revamping reality and get out in no time. Nope. This guy needs a whole new way of life.” Paul looked around at them. “Oh, don’t think he’s really convinced himself none of this happened. His mind is like a pinball machine: balls rolling around, falling here, there, Bass in control only insofar as he can pull back the plunger and pray.”

“So,” said Karl, finally managing a perfect smoke ring, “what you do with a pinball machine is, you tilt it without making the lights go out.”

“That metaphor works,” said Bobby. “Meaning he needs a good scare.”

“What? You think the guy hasn’t already had one? That scene in the junkyard, that’d be enough to put my lights out, buddy.”

Bobby chortled. He picked up his coffee cup, regarded it as if it were an unfamiliar beverage, and set it down again. “That girl is wasted in this office. She should get a promotion, except I don’t know what to promote her to. Why should she spend her precious time taking down what Jack Sprague and those others blather on about. It’s like listening to a fucking knitting contest. That’s what it’s like up there, knitting needles going on,
rat tat tat.” He did an awfully good imitation of clattering needles. They all laughed, especially Paul, who then said, “Bobby, you’re rarely wrong, but in the case of Bunny—”

“I’m never wrong.” Which was supposed to come off as a joke.

“In the case of Bunny Fogg, you don’t get it. You think she wants to be something else? You think she hates having to listen to Jackson Sprague? She thinks it’s fun; she likes hearing their meaningless legal banter. And what would you promote her to? Assistant, associate editor? Oh, that’s always fun. Editor? Ask Clive. The only job around here that’s not a downer is yours.”

“Oh, I dunno,” said Bobby. “Don’t forget the Good-bye Boys. They’ve got an even sweeter deal. They’re never here.”