52 Pickup (22 page)

Alan walked around the desk, looking down at the forms, ledgers and bankbooks. “What is it you want me to do, see if everything's in order?”

“I told you there's nobody here,” Mitchell said. “There's no hidden recording device of any kind. You can look if you want.”

Alan sat down at the seven-foot glass-top desk. It was easier not to say anything than to nose around looking for a bug. He began studying the titles on the forms and statements.

Mitchell stood across from him. “If you know what you're doing, it'll take you three or four hours to go through all this. If you don't know what you're doing it could take you forever and you still wouldn't know.”

Alan grinned up at him. “Don't worry about me, Mr. Mitchell. I bet I can read this quicker
than your own accountant.”

“I had a feeling you could,” Mitchell said. “You took Biz Ad in college and what happened?”

“I found there's more to be made in the film business,” Alan said pleasantly. “But I like to keep my hand in accounting, so to speak.”

“In other people's accounting.”

“Yes sir, pick up a little extra here and there.”

“You going to go through everything?”

“I'll look enough to get the feel of it anyway.”

“The government takes sixty-five percent of my salary.”

“I see that.”

“We live on the rest. The balance of my royalty each year has been going into municipals and other long-term investments. Past royalty income is in trust funds and neither can be touched. You understand?”

“Yes sir. Like so many people who make a lot of money, you don't seem to have any.”

“That sheet in front of you, it itemizes everything, adds, subtracts and comes up with a figure. You see it?”

Alan nodded. “Fifty-two thousand.”

“That's what I can put my hands on right now,” Mitchell said. “Not a dime more than that before next April.”

“That's when your fiscal year ends?”

“When we pledge our allegiance to the I.R.S.”

“What about next year?” Alan said. “Same amount, uh? Unless you can convert some of these other stocks.”

“I'm not worried about next year,” Mitchell said. “There's something about your life-style tells me you probably won't be around. I'm thinking only of the present, and I'm thinking of my family. I've worked hard to leave them something and I intend to do it without selling my company or house or changing my way of life. So I'll deal with you right now, at a figure you'll see is the going rate. Fifty-two thousand dollars. If you insist on more, then I won't pay you anything. If you go through with your threat to inform the police, then I'll tell them everything I know and you'll be up to your neck in it. I think I'd have a fairly good chance of beating the charge. Even better than you'd have. But I don't want to take that chance. Mainly because of what it would do to my family.” Mitchell paused. “So do you want fifty-two thousand dollars or a lot of trouble and a reasonably good chance of going to jail?”

Alan looked at Mitchell but didn't say anything.

Mitchell waited. He said then, “How you split it is up to you. A hundred and five cut three ways is thirty-five thousand each. Fifty-two split is seventeen-three . . . if you split it in thirds, but that's up to you.” He waited again.

“Look at it this way. Whatever you get is better than nothing. I might have shown you a debit balance with all kinds of liens against me, including the I.R.S. You see what I mean? You threaten me with a murder conviction and jail, and all the while the government could have had first crack at me.”

“You never know,” Alan said, “do you? Life is full of surprises.” He was thoughtful again. “How long would it take you to get your hands on the fifty-two?”

“Five days. Something like that.”

“Well, let's take a look at it.”

“You want to come here?”

“Maybe, I'll let you know.”

“One other thing,” Mitchell said. “Keep your buddies out of it. Pay them what you want, but I'm only dealing with you. Otherwise it's off.”

“It's all right with me.” Alan thought a moment and then got up from the desk. “Answer me something. Who was it told you where to find me?”

Mitchell gave him a surprised look. “Your friend Leo. Who'd you think?”

He watched the car drive out of the parking lot, then walked back through the plant to his office, sat down at the desk and wrote himself a note.

Call O'Boyle in the morning. See what his friend can find out about Alan Raimy and Leo Frank.

And went straight home.

“I DON'T KNOW,” LEO FRANK SAID.
“Deal looks clean and simple, then all of a sudden it gets complicated. There must be something. I mean the guy's got some dough, hasn't he?”

Bobby Shy looked over at Alan. Those two were talking. Bobby sat on a pillow with his back leaning against the wall. He was uncomfortable but he was listening, getting it clear in his mind. There was a funny sound in the talk: somebody jiving somebody.

Alan was over by the window that had a tree painted on the shade, a brown heavy line for the trunk and a green circle for the leaves. Alan was home. He was smoking a joint, exhaling with barely a trace of anything coming out of his mouth.

He said, “The man has money. I told you he had money. He can get his hands on more money when he cashes in his stocks and bonds and shit. But the government has got him by the balls. He owes them over a hundred and fifty grand on his income tax the last two years and he's got to pay up. If he doesn't they
make him sell his house, his business, everything.”

Leo said, “Then why did he have money the other day, in the envelope?”

“Because he had to hold us off,” Alan said. “He was afraid we might jump and call the cops on him. So he let us smell the dough figuring we wouldn't do anything right away. That gives him time to set up the meeting.”

“I don't know,” Leo Frank said.

“I know you don't,” Alan said. “Jesus, I'm glad he talked to me and not to you. He might be a fuck-up in business, but he had that much sense.”

No, Bobby Shy was thinking, something is not right. He didn't like the sound of the talk. He didn't like being here in Alan's apartment. The place looked bare, like he'd just moved in and hadn't put anything where it belonged; and yet it was full of all kinds of weird shit on the walls, on the floor, even hanging from the ceiling. There were psycho designs and names and words in bright aerosol paint sprayed all over the white walls and on the shades—like the men's room of a jive joint or a New York subway station. Man had gooseneck lamps you could twist around in every direction, black lights and colored mood lights in white globes, Indian bells and shit, birds and mobile shapes hanging down, balls on aluminum sticks that hit against each other, rugs that looked like they were made out of animal hair, pillows
from India lying around, a couple of straw chairs and all these big red and green and purple and yellow pillows. Like they'd turn the men's room in the
jive joint into a Turkish whorehouse.

“I mean,” Leo said, “if a guy makes that kind of dough, how come he doesn't have any left to pay the government?”

“He invested it. Look,” Alan said, “he's supposed to pay the government quarterly, every three months. If he doesn't he has to pay a penalty at the end of the year, like six percent. But he figures he can put the dough to work and make more than six percent on it. So he invests. Only the stock he invests in goes down. A business he puts dough in folds. So he's not only lost the money he invested, he still owes the fucking government the income tax he didn't pay.”

Leo was nodding, trying to understand it. “Don't they give him time to pay?”

“They call him in,” Alan explained, ready for that one. “He talks to a clerk in the Internal Revenue office. He says look, I'll pay. Give me some time. The clerk looks over the guy's tax return. Shit, he sees the guy spends more on booze than he makes in a year and he throws the fucking book at the guy. Pay up, right now.”

Leo said, “You know this for sure?”

“No, I'm making it up,” Alan said. “Leo, I saw the correspondence with the Internal
Revenue office, their stationery, Department of Internal Revenue across the top. I saw his books, I saw his bank balance. The guy gives us five bucks and they want to know where it went.”

Alan squeezed the joint between his fingernails and got a last suck out of it before he dropped the burned brown stub in an ashtray. He said, “If you want to know something, I'll tell you. I had a gut feeling the guy was too perfect. We wait for somebody like him like a guy waiting for the most beautiful chick in the world. She comes along, man, there she is. But it turns out her fucking breath smells or something.”

“Jesus, all the time we put in it,” Leo said. “And the girl—”

“That brings us to something else,” Alan said. “The girl. This part I don't like, what we have to do.” He looked directly at Leo Frank. “You know why?”

Leo had a puzzled look. “I don't even know what you're talking about.”

“Leo, I asked him. He said it was you told him where to find me.”

“I didn't! I never even gave him your last name!”

“Leo, I ask him. I said hey, who told you where I work? He says who do you think? Your friend Leo. His exact words.”

“Honest to Christ, I
didn't
.”

“Leo,” Alan said, “the show's over, or almost
over. I don't give a shit really, it's done. You let me down. Okay, live and learn.”

Bobby was still watching Alan, wondering why Alan hadn't mentioned this before, first thing when they came in. He was wondering also why Alan was so cool about it. Alan should be stomping Leo with words, cutting him up; but he was passing it over like it didn't matter. Live and learn—shit.

“But,” Alan was saying, “we do have a problem. Somebody got killed. He saw it. At the time he didn't know about us, but now he does.”

Bobby Shy spoke for the first time. He said, “He knows about you two. He don't know about me.”

Alan looked at him. “That's right. That's why you're going to have to do it. You can walk up to him, shake hands and blow him away. Man won't even know what hit him.”

“For what?” Bobby Shy said. “What do I get out of it?”

“Peace of mind,” Alan said.

“I look nervous to you?”

“All right,” Alan said. “You want to take a chance? He knows
she's dead, right? He knows three of us did it. Not just me and Leo, also a spade wears a stocking over his face and packs a thirty-eight Special. Bobby, you been to Jackson. I believe you lived there ten years, armed robbery? You really want to take a chance? His conscience gets to him, he goes to the police and they start ripping the fucking walls out looking for us. Hey Bobby, you want that to happen?”

Bobby Shy grinned. “Listen to the man. Wants me to clean up his mess.”

“I thought you were the pro,” Alan said. “One likes to pull the trigger.”

“Giving me some sweet jive now.”

“Shit, you walk up, ring his bell, he opens the door, it's done.”

“That's how you do it, huh?”

“Why not?”

Bobby Shy nodded. “Maybe. Do it in the man's house. Make it look like a B and E.”

Alan was grinning now. “Hey, possibilities, right? You like it?”

“I'll think on it,” Bobby Shy said.

Alan had him; he could feel it. He said, “While you're thinking I'll do a time-and-motion study on the man and I'll let you know when. In fact, you want, I'll go with you.”

“Hold my hand?” Bobby Shy said. “I appreciate it.”

“We just have to stick together,” Alan said, and looked over at Leo to include him. “I mean we start something, we have to finish it. Then—we got time, we got nothing else to do—we look for another guy. Why not?”

He got them out of there and sat down on a pillow
to smoke another joint and relax. Jesus, all that footwork took it out of you. Slipping and sliding around, juking the spade and fat Leo right out of their socks. Shit, right out of their shares. But the guy could still be pulling something and Alan decided he'd better think on that a while.

The funny thing was he started thinking about the guy's wife again. At home, in the living room standing there mad with her legs a little apart. Getting in the car in front of the show, giving him the show, her legs apart again, nice glimpse of some inside thigh. He said to himself, Now come on, there's a role in this piece for Slim. How about it? He sucked on the joint and pictured her at home, alone again, and started to put something together.

They went out the door of the apartment building and walked around the corner toward Leo's car. Leo expected Bobby Shy to say something, say it and then maybe hit him. He never knew what Bobby Shy was going to do. He always felt uneasy when he was with him—quiet, easy-moving black dude could have a gun on him right now.

Leo said, “You going home or where? I'll drop you.”

“I think over Doreen's,” Bobby Shy said. “I got half my clothes there now. I don't know
where
I live.”

He sounded calm. He didn't sound on the muscle at all. Leo said, “Listen, I'm telling you the truth. I didn't tell the guy where to find Alan.”

“What difference does it make?” Bobby Shy didn't bother to look at him.

“It makes a difference. Alan's trying to blame me,” Leo said, getting a little excited about it now. “If the guy told Alan it was me, then the guy's lying.”

“Yeah, okay.” Bobby Shy didn't see the point yet.

“And if the guy lied about me—for some reason, I don't know why he would—then he could be lying about not having any dough.”

“Alan believed him. He seen the books.”

“Let's say Alan also believes I told on him.”

Bobby Shy still didn't look at Leo, but he began to put it together in his head. “You saying Alan is dumb to believe the man?”

“I'm not saying that. We know Alan isn't dumb. He's got a weird fucking mind, but he isn't dumb.”

“We finding out maybe the man ain't so dumb either,” Bobby Shy said. “So what you trying to say?”

“I'm saying either Alan's lying or the man is.”

Bobby Shy walked on a few paces, thinking about it, before he said, “Or both of them.”

“Or both,” Leo said. “I thought of that.”

“It's a shame, ain't it?” Bobby said. “Everybody trying to mess up everybody.”

“We picked the wrong guy,” Leo Frank said.
“That's the whole thing. We picked the wrong fucking guy.”

It took Bobby Shy the rest of the day to locate a whole lid of Colombian reefer. It was Doreen's favorite. He brought it to her and said he was sorry he doubted her word. No, he hadn't doubted her really, it was only he had to be sure. It turns out, he told Doreen, it was Leo told the man. Because that's what the man told Alan, and why would the man lie about it?

Doreen looked up at him with the eyes, sitting on the edge of the flowery couch, rolling two professional joints, and said, “You never know who you can trust, do you?”

“Deal we been working fell through,” Bobby Shy told her.

And Doreen said, handing him a lighted joint, “I admire you, love, but please don't tell me about it. They some things I don't want to know.”

“Man was going to pay us a hundred and five grand so we don't tell stories on him,” Bobby went on. “But Alan talk to the man, he say he find out the man don't have any money. Owe it all to Uncle Sam.”

“Alan told you that, huh?”

“He's the only one talk to him.”

“You believe it?”

“That's where we're at,” Bobby Shy said.

“Well, you could talk to Alan again, put a pillow over his face.”

“Yeah, I could do that.”

“Or,” Doreen said, “you could go see the man.”

“I could do that too.”

“Ask him, how come if he's broke he's carrying all that money around in an envelope.”

Bobby Shy held the reefer, about to take a drag. “You see that envelope of his?”

“He took it out of his pocket and put it back,” Doreen said. “It was thick.”

“Leo say ten grand in it.”

Doreen nodded. “I believe it.”

“What I want to know,” Bobby Shy said, “why he showed it to you.”

Doreen drew in on the joint. It calmed her and gave her confidence. She said, “He mentioned something about he wanted to give it to Alan. I forgot to tell you that the time you ask me.”

“You forgot to tell me.”

“He just mentioned wanting to see Alan. It didn't seem like any big thing.”

“He showed you the money?”

“Little bit of it.”

“And he gave you some?”

“He took it out, peeled off a hundred. That's when I told him I was busy.”

“That's all, huh? You didn't tell him anything
about Alan. Where he lives or works—”

“Hey, Bobby,” Doreen said. “What're you worried about Alan for? He tell you the deal's off—he's not worried about you, is he?”

“That's a point,” Bobby said.

“Alan saw the man's money? In the envelope?”

“I believe he did.”

“And he's just going to forget about it?”

“That's another point.”

“Something's going on, baby, Alan hasn't told you about.”

“As I said a minute ago, that's where we're at.”

“And as I mentioned,” Doreen said, “you could go see the man. Find out if he's still got his envelope laying around someplace? You understand what I'm saying?”

Bobby Shy nodded. “Could do that.”

“Like at night. Late.”

“After everybody's asleep.”

“Man, that little envelope,” Doreen said. “It holds more than a whole bus full of people, don't it?”

They were back where they had been for twenty-two years and it was even better than it had been for a long time. He wanted to be with her He felt good with her. There was nothing to hide now, no excuses that had to be made.

It was Sunday, sixty degrees and a clear sky, and
they decided not to think of anything or anybody but themselves today. They played three sets of tennis outside, at a high school court near their house. It was a little windy, but it didn't matter. It was good to be out, together. They played hard and perspired, Mitchell more than Barbara, going all out and beating her 6–3, 6–3, then letting up a little and having to put the pressure on again and come from behind to beat her 7–5 in the third set. He shouldn't have let up. If you go out to play you go out to win, even if you're playing your wife. Barbara was glad he felt that way. When she did beat him, once in a while, she knew she had won on her own and had not been given anything.