And 47 Miles of Rope (Trace 2) (2 page)

He looked out across the noisy room toward the kitchen, where Trace and Marks were still talking.

Chico walked over to join him.

“Anything I can get you, Bob?”

“Michiko, my darling, the only thing I want in the world is you.” He sipped his drink. “And a new heart, new lungs, and a liver transplant.”

Chico allowed her gaze to follow his out into the kitchen.

“Do you detect a smile, however subtle, on the face of Walter Marks?” Swenson asked.

“A smile or a gas attack,” Chico said.

“I’ve seen his gas attacks,” Swenson said. “His brows lower. No, that’s a smile. I’ll have his ears for that. He’s not supposed to smile on company time.”

“Maybe he’s finally figured out a way to dethrone you as president,” Chico said. “Today, vice-president for claims; tomorrow, the world.”

“Too short,” Swenson said. “No one looks up to little executives. No. He’s up to something sneaky and duplicitous.”

“I can’t believe it,” Chico said. “At an insurance-company convention, something sneaky and duplicitous? It’s hard to believe.”

“It’s something,” Swenson said stubbornly, still looking into the kitchen.

“Why don’t you just ask him?” Chico asked.

Swenson shook his head. “Bad management practice. The way to deal with people like Walter is to ignore them. That constantly fills them with a sense of their own worthlessness. Act as if you know they’re alive, and sooner or later they’ll start to believe it, and
that’s
when they try to dethrone you. Trust me, girl.”

Affectionately, he put a fatherly arm around her shoulder, then asked her suddenly, “How many days to Trace’s birthday?”

“Four.”

“And then he’s forty?”

“Right.”

“And you’re twenty-six?”

“Yup.”

“He’s over the hill, girl. Too old for you,” Swenson said. “But it’s not all over for you yet. You could have me. Rich, powerful, handsome, intelligent…”

“And booked for tonight,” Chico said.

“Ah, you noticed. Well, yes, Flamma and I do have an appointment. She promised to show me how she belly-dances with Sterno in her navel. Scientific research, you understand, in case we ever write a policy on her. But any night after tonight. Every night. I’ll be chaste and loyal and pure. People will say of us, The perfect couple. They’ll write songs about our romance.”

“What about your wife?” Chico asked.

“Actually I was hoping that she’d never find out,” Swenson said.

Chico shook her head. “Thanks, but no thanks,” she said, and nodded toward Trace, who was just walking out of the kitchen. “He’s a poor thing but he’s semi-mine.”

“Forty. He’s done for.”

“You know it and I know it. I don’t think his body knows it yet,” she said.

“Wait till I put saltpeter in his vodka. Don’t come sniffing around to me then, girl, pleading and begging. Then it’ll be too late.”

“You wish,” Chico said, and giggled. “I snap my fingers, you’d slither across the desert on your belly for me.”

“God, it’s true. Remind me to give Trace a raise. So he can treat you right.”

“I will,” Chico said. “By the way, you’re doing just right.”

“What do you mean?”

“You’re acting just drunk enough so that none of these people bother you with insurance nonsense,” she said. “Keep it up.”

“I retract my offer. I can’t stand women who can see right through me,” Swenson said.

Chico saw Walter Marks talking earnestly to someone who had been introduced to her as the head of Garrison Fidelity’s West Coast operations, so she excused herself from Swenson and began drifting around the room, talking to people, working her way closer to Marks, approaching him from behind his back.

He was talking softly when she got there, but she could hear a few words.

“…to hang himself. I’ve got the bastard now.”

The other man was about to answer when Trace came up alongside Chico and said, “I’ve got to talk to you.”

Marks heard Trace’s voice and Chico saw him nod to the other man to be quiet.

Chico took Trace’s arm and walked away.

“Your timing is, as ever, impeccable,” she said.

“Speaking of timing,” Trace said. “Right now, I’m thirty-nine and you’re twenty-six.”

“Right. You remembered.”

“But in four days I’ll be forty and you’ll still be twenty-six.”

“And lovely. Don’t forget lovely,” Chico said.

“Right, lovely. Did you ever think this might be the start of a trend? Another dozen years and I’d be fifty-two and, God, you’d still be twenty-six, half my age.”

“I don’t think it works that way.”

“No? Then how come you haven’t had a birthday in three years?” Trace asked.

“Oh, you’re vicious,” she said. “And a liar to boot. Why is Walter Marks looking like a Cheshire cat?”

“Groucho? I don’t know. Is he?”

“He is,” Chico said.

“He ruined our party by giving me a job to do. I’ll never forgive him.”

Chico had no chance to comment because the door to the apartment swung open and a bull-elephant roar filled the room.

“All right, you degenerates, you’re all under arrest.”

Standing in the doorway was a tall, burly, gray-haired man with big powerful hands. His face was weathered and handsome. Behind him was a woman who seemed all bosom. She wore a hat that gave her the general configuration of a Coast Guard ice-cutter.

The thirty people in the room looked toward the door and Trace called out, “Okay. The party can start now. My father’s here.”

“And your mother,” said the warship standing behind the man in the doorway.

“And my mother,” Trace admitted reluctantly.

Chico slapped Trace hard on his bare stomach.

“Ouch. What’s that for?”

“That’s for getting me into this,” she said. “You saw those insurance looneytoons tonight. I’m going to have to put up with them for a week. A week of fighting off Bob Swenson.”

“You love it. Don’t lie to me,” Trace said. “Imagine. You. Official convention hostess to five hundred of the noblest of God’s creations: insurance men. I don’t know if you’re really deserving of the honor.”

“I’m underpaid,” she said.

“You’re getting two thousand dollars for four days’ work.”

“Exactly. I make five hundred dollars a week dealing at the Araby, and no heavy lifting. I should get five thousand for having to look at Walter Marks’ pissy little face.”

“Don’t look at him.
Then
you’ll be overpaid,” Trace said.

“And it’s wonderful that your folks are in town,” she said sarcastically.

“I thought you liked Sarge.”

“I love him. You know that, even if he is as bad as Swenson. It’s that mother of yours.”

“A peach,” Trace said. “A veritable peach.”

“You’re like all smart people who learned to read young,” she said. “You know the words but you mispronounce them. What your mother is is not pronounced ‘peach.’ Not unless you grew up in Puerto Rico.”

“I’m shocked,” Trace said. “My mother?”

“She wasn’t here ten minutes, you saw her, she was rearranging the dishes in the closet. Then she started to rewash all my clean glasses. It’s a good thing the party broke up, she’d be cleaning my oven. Why does that woman hate me?”

“She can’t forgive you for being Italian,” Trace said.

“I’m only half-Italian. I know, that’s why she only half-hates me. Anyway, I’d watch myself if I were you.”

“What are you talking about?”

“With Felicia’s jewel robbery and all,” Chico said. “Marks is up to something.”

“What makes you think that?”

“I saw that look on his face when he was giving you that job. It was a nasty look.”

“He always looks nasty,” Trace said. “He hates me like my mother hates you.”

“This was a special kind of nasty look. Then I was listening to him talk to that cretin who runs your West Coast office.”

“What’d he say?”

“I was just finding out when you came stumbling along, yapping a mile a minute, and he clammed up. But he said something about somebody hanging himself and he said, ‘I’ve got the bastard now.’”

“He couldn’t have been talking about me. I can’t recognize myself in that reference at all,” Trace said.

“He was talking about you. He’s got something going on. Even Swenson noticed it.”

“What’d he say?” Trace asked.

“He didn’t know what Marks was up to either.”

Trace said, “Then it can’t be important. Groucho wouldn’t do anything important without clearing it with Swenson.”

“I don’t know. Just watch yourself.”

“I will. You know, the worst part is having to talk to R. J. Roberts.”

“Who’s he?”

“He’s a grundgy private eye who works in town. The insurance company’s got him working on the jewel theft.”

“What’s wrong with him?”

“He’s not a nice person,” Trace said. “I don’t like dealing with those elements. I’ve got my standards.”

“Trace, you’re an alcoholic, degenerate gambler. You’d hump a hamster if it smiled at you. How bad can this R. J. Roberts be?”

“He wears plaid shirts, for Christ’s sake. Listen, we going to make love or are you going to talk all night?”

“I was thinking of talking all night.”

“I know how to stop that,” Trace said.

“Trace, it’s the phone. Bob Swenson.”

“I didn’t hear the phone ring,” Trace said. He put a pillow over his head.

Chico removed the pillow and put the telephone next to his ear.

“You don’t pay me enough to take this abuse,” Trace growled into the phone.

“Rise and shine.” Swenson said “Today’s the first day of the rest of your life.”

“Test it out for me and call me back in twenty-four hours,” Trace said.

He snaked out a hand to replace the phone, but Chico took it from him and put it again on the pillow next to his head.

“You’re all against me,” Trace mumbled.

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” Swenson said brightly. Even the tone of his voice annoyed Trace. Swenson could drink for a weekend and after two hours’ sleep sound as fresh as if he had just come from spending a month in meditation at a monastery.

“What?” Trace asked.

“Marks is up to something, but I don’t know what it is yet.”

“You and Chico. Maybe you should both start a mind-reading act,” Trace said.

“Maybe,” Swenson said. “But he’s got something on his mind.”

“Well, you’re the boss,” Trace said. “It’s your company. Ask him what he’s got on his mind. Tell him to get it off his mind.”

“I can’t do that,” Swenson said. “I get involved in things like that, and before you know it people will start coming into my office, asking me questions about rate structures and advertising and what kind of paper we ought to print policies on. And before you know it, I won’t have time to do anything except think about insurance. Being president isn’t easy, Trace. Let your guard down for a moment, and right away they start thinking you give a rat’s ass.”

“All right, skip it,” Trace said. “How’d you make out with Flamma last night?”

“Does a gentleman tell? Did you know she can really dance with Sterno in her navel?”

“Doesn’t it run out?” Trace asked.

“Well, it would if she stood up, I guess,” Swenson said. “Basically, she just stays horizontal most of the time. Keep an eye out for Walter.”

“I will.” Trace said.

“And tell Chico I’ll see her at the luncheon.”

He clicked off and Trace replaced the phone and started running down his check list of functioning body parts, preparatory to getting out of bed.

When he finally made it to the kitchen, Chico was there, standing at the stove cooking eggs, incongruously wearing a blood-red long gown. There was a cup of coffee on the small breakfast table and Trace tipped at it. The first sip of coffee made him feel better, and so did watching Chico. He wondered how many people had this mistaken impression of Japanese women as white-faced, sickly, sort of tubercular Kabukis. How wrong they were. Chico’s complexion was tawny, vibrant with life, vitamins, and good genes. He felt healthier just looking at her and told her so.

“Don’t worry, it’ll pass,” she said. She slipped eggs from the skillet onto a plate, plopped it in front of Trace, and poured him a glass of orange juice from a container in the refrigerator.

“Eat it all,” she said. “Your mother will probably ask questions later. Oh, and thanks.”

“For what?”

“For staying sober last night.”

“I’m going to stay sober forever from now on,” he said. “That’s part of the new me.”

“There was nothing wrong with the old you,” she said, “but keep sober anyway.”

“You off now?” he asked.

“Yes. I’m off to my new career as zoo keeper. Official convention hostess for the ninth annual convention of Garrison Fidelity Insurance Company being held this year, to my great joy, in my home city of Las Vegas, Nevada. I am off to get my ass pinched in as many ways as he can think of by Robert Swenson and to go look at Walter Marks’ curled lip. I’ll talk to you later, if I’m still talking to you for getting me into this, and you be careful today.”

She stood in front of Trace, her neat little dancer’s body separated from his face by only a few inches and a few thin scraps of fabric, and he grabbed her around the hips and said, “Want to fool around?”

“Your fortieth birthday’s in three days,” she said.

“I promise we’ll be done by then,” he said.

“You ought to think about tapering off,” she said, but she made no move to pull away. “You’re entering the fifth decade of life.”

“No, I’m not. I’m going to be forty.”

“Exactly,” she said. “There was the zero decade, age oh-one and oh-two and like that. Then the teens and the twenties and the thirties. Thursday starts your fifth decade.”

“Only a Japanese-Sicilian with a warped mind could think of a grisly way of looking at it like that.”

“And I’m still twenty-six,” she said, and leaned over and licked his neck.

After she left, Trace pushed his eggs around his plate for a while before eating two forkfuls and dumping the rest in the sink disposal unit. He sipped orange juice and decided he would tell Chico to buy grapefruit juice from now on, grapefruit juice being more corrosive and better able to blast away the residue on the inside of his mouth.

He drank all his coffee, was very proud of himself, and thought of leaving Chico a note telling her that he had finished all his coffee, but he couldn’t find anything in the kitchen to write with.

Trace spent a long time in the shower, thinking about his upcoming birthday. It was one thing to joke about it, but was he going to go crazy like a lot of people he had known, buying gold chains for his neck, a little Italian convertible, and hanging around schoolyards handing out chocolate bars? He thought that maybe Chico would keep him sane, and the thought instantly depressed him. Swell. All that stood between him and middle-age lunacy was a twenty-six-year-old Eurasian blackjack dealer who occasionally turned tricks to supplement her income. And who was just too smart by half.

Before dressing, he went to a plastic bag hidden on the top shelf of a bedroom closet. From it he removed a small portable tape recorder and a roll of surgical tape. He tore off two long strips of the tape and fastened the recording unit to the back of his bare waist, just over his right kidney.

He inserted a wire into the machine, then dressed and drew the wire through the front buttons of his shirt. After he put on a tie, he pressed the wire through the back of the tie into a slit in a tie clip fashioned in the shape of a golden frog. The frog’s open mouth was covered with a thin golden mesh and under the mesh was a tiny, sensitive microphone.

Trace tested the device.

“Devlin Tracy donning the tools of ignorance one more time. Am I live or am I Memorex?”

He pressed another button through his shirt and the recorder repeated his message into the empty bedroom.

Satisfied that he was still live, he rewound the tape and turned the recorder off, then put on his jacket and drove downtown.