Solomon Gursky Was Here (29 page)

“Don't worry. It doesn't stain. Just pour yourself another.”

“Didn't Ephraim ever tell you anything about his stay in Van Diemen's Land?”

“Let's be frank. If he talked to anybody in those days it was Solomon. Once he kidnapped him, you know. What was that?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“Sh.” Mr. Morrie went to the window and peeked out from behind the blind. “Bernard and Libby are going out. That's odd.”

“Is it?”

“‘Dragnet's' on tonight. Oh, I get it. He must have got them to send him a copy of the film in advance. Once, you know, he couldn't wait to see how a Dick Tracy turned out, it was killing him, and so Harvey Schwartz had to fly down to see the people at King Features and bring back the comics before they were even printed in the newspapers. Oh you should have seen Bernie after Harvey came back with the goods, nobody the wiser. We were in the middle of a board meeting. Should we buy this vineyard just outside of Beaune for X million or should we build the office tower in Houston for Y million? Everybody's making their pitch, quoting facts and figures, watching Bernard's face. ‘Hey,' he says, suddenly perking up, ‘I've got a hunch how Dick Tracy bails out of his latest jam and about exactly what happens to Pruneface. I could be right, I could be wrong. But I'm willing to bet a ten spot on it. Who's coming in?' Well, naturally, everybody forks out their ten bucks, not because they're afraid of my brother, that's nonsense, but because they adore him. And then Harvey, that little devil, he says, ‘I raise you twenty, Mr. Bernard.' So everybody digs into their pocket again. I suppose you know Harvey Schwartz?”

“Yes.”

“Such a brilliant boy. Loyalty should be his middle name. I can't tell you how lucky we are to have him here. And devoted to his lovely talented wife? You better believe it. You know she couldn't get her book published at first. So Harvey goes to Toronto, meets with
the number-one publisher there, invests in the company out of his own pocket, and that beautiful book comes out.
Hugs, Pain, and Chocolate Chip Cookies
. But Ogilvy's book department here orders only four copies. Becky's in tears. She's got cramps. Her period is late. Harvey gets on the phone rat-tat-tat to the chairman of Ogilvy's board and he says ahem ahem this is Harvey Schwartz speaking. I'm in charge of special projects for Jewel Investment Trust, and my boss Mr. Bernard Gursky just asked me how come your book department has taken only four copies of my wife's book? Bing bango bongo. They order another four hundred and display them in the window. I understand that in the end they had to burn just about all of them, but I don't have to tell L.B.'s son that art isn't the fastest moving commodity in this country. Don't worry. It doesn't stain. Just pour yourself another.”

“Did you say Ephraim once kidnapped Solomon?”

“He sure did. Solomon is only nine years old and Bernie and I get out of school just in time to see Ephraim riding off on his sled with him. Okay, why not? Only now it's seven o'clock at night, we are sitting down to supper, there's a blizzard blowing out there, and where are they? God forbid an accident. Finally a messenger comes from this Indian fella, George Two Axe, saying Ephraim said to tell us Solomon is spending the night with the Davidsons. Fishy. Very fishy. Because only an hour earlier the Mounties have paid us one of their friendly visits. There's been trouble out on the reservation where Ephraim is shacked up with this young Copper Indian woman. Let me tell you she was something to look at. Anyway Lena has been stabbed and somebody has shot André Clear Sky's father dead. Have we seen or heard from Ephraim, the corporal wants to know. Why? Just asking, he says. Yeah, sure. The next question is does Ephraim have any friends in Montana? How in the hell would we know? To make a long story short, my grandfather has taken the boy all the way back to his old haunts in the Arctic with him. They are gone for months, and that's where Solomon learned how to speak Eskimo and hunt caribou and God knows what else. And that was the last we ever saw of my grandfather, aged ninety-one, buried out there somewhere, according to Solomon, who also expects us to believe he made
his way home all alone. From the Polar Sea? Tell me another one, my father says. Well, Solomon says, he had a map with him and he had marked a tree with a gash in each of their camps on the way out. Sure, my father says,
and what about before you reached the tree line?
A raven led the way, Solomon says with a straight face. Ask a foolish question, my father says,
and what did you eat all that time?
I hunted and I fished and, besides, Ephraim had left food caches for me underneath each of my marked trees, and before we parted he gave me this. Ephraim's gold pocket watch. Tell me if I'm boring you. Ida says that once I get started I'm worse than a broken record.”

“Did Solomon ever mention anything in his journals about that first trip north?”

“Boy, speak of the third degree. You know, you could tell me something. What's poor Henry doing out there?”

“Poor Henry is happier than you know.”

“My mother used to say that there's nothing like a religious education, but Henry, my God.” Mr. Morrie sighed. “The children, the children. We made all that money, more than you can spend in three lifetimes, and my Barney just can't settle down and my Charna now lives in a commune with a bunch of nut-cases and calls herself Sunflower Dark-Crystal.”

“I suppose control of McTavish will eventually fall into Lionel's hot hands.”

“Listen here, I love Barney. I understand what a blow it was to him that McTavish would never be his to run. So I forgive him his mistakes. He walks in here right now I'd hug him. Wait till you're a father. But, let's face it, Lionel is the only one of his generation with a touch of Bernard's genius and I don't blame him he doesn't trust anybody. The thing very few people appreciate is the rich have their problems too. You come from our kind of money you're a marked man. If Lionel hadn't had Fenella followed how could he have known that she was having an affair with a
schwartze
yet, which must have been very humiliating for such a proud fella. And have you any idea what that marriage cost him, it didn't even last a year? The alimony. The diamonds. The sables he never got back. Some people say it's bad taste, but I don't blame him for one minute that he now has each new
wife sign a divorce settlement before he marries her. All that gossip about receipts for gifts, however, is highly exaggerated. I can assure you Melody doesn't have to sign a return-on-demand voucher for anything valued under one hundred thousand dollars. But that's not why she insisted on the cheaper tiara at Winston's. She did that because it's not in her nature to be a grabber. Now tell me something. Is it true that Henry has some
meshuggena
theory about a new ice age, a punishment for the Jews?”

“Certainly not,” Moses said.

“To be orphaned so young.
Oy vey
. You know it breaks my heart to this day that Solomon died in the prime of his life in that frightful plane crash. I still suffer from the nightmare. I dream of that Gypsy Moth exploding, Solomon's body blown to bits, the white wolves of the Arctic carrying off his bones.”

“What if he wasn't blown to bits, but parachuted out before the explosion and walked out of the barrens?”

“What are you talking?”

“He'd walked out of the barrens once before, hadn't he?”

“Oh come on. Please.”

“And I'm told he had to parachute twice out of his Sopwith Camel during the First World War.”

“So where has he been all these years?”

“Damned if I know.”

“His bank accounts were never touched, not a penny withdrawn. I'm surprised to hear you talk such foolishness. Listen!” Mr. Morrie leaped up and peeked out from behind the blinds again. “The car's back. They're going to watch ‘Dragnet' after all. I think I'd better switch it on. Moses, I've been keeping you too long. I'm sure you have more important people to see.”

“What do I tell Lucy about Solomon's journals?”

“If I had them,” Mr. Morrie said, “it would be my sincere pleasure to pass them on to her. Tell her that and give her a big kiss for me.”

“What do you think happened to the journals?”

“God knows. But I'll tell you the best thing that could have happened is that they were burnt in the plane crash. I got a peek at some pages once and boy oh boy Solomon could tell some real
whoppers in his day. If those journals, should they still exist, ever fell in the wrong hands they could be dynamite. Do you mind if I turn on the TV?”

“No.”

“Bless you. And now I'm going to ask you a favour. May I?”

“Of course.”

“My Barney, he has had such bad luck in so many of his ventures, poor boy, has decided to become a writer and has written a book. But nobody in New York will print it for him. Do I have to explain to L.B.'s son how difficult such things are?”

“Certainly not.”

“It's a detective story, maybe a little too sexy for my taste, but what do I know? Barney's in Mexico now, partners with this doctor in some kind of cancer clinic, and he has asked me to try the manuscript on publishers in Toronto. But first, what I'd really appreciate is somebody of your education, not to mention the literary background, to read it and tell me what you honestly think.”

“I'd have to take it with me to London.”

“I knew I could count on you. Now come down to the garage, I'll give you the manuscript, and my driver will take you back to your hotel.”

“I can walk.”

“No, it's my pleasure. Ida will be jealous that she missed you. L.B.'s son in our house. You know what they say, don't you?”

“The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.”

“Such a nice boy. To be your uncle one day would be a genuine honour for me. Don't stand in front of the lamp, please. It casts a shadow on the blind. Come, Moses, and let me hear from you soon.”

Five

It was sort of Friday afternoon, late, time to close down the office. Send Myrna home. Pile into my heap and tool down to Nick's Bar & Grill on the main stem for a quick snort. Nick and I have been through hell and back again together. Sweeping Normandy clean of Nazi punks.

Normandy.

Where Nick's right leg is buried and they pinned the Military Cross on my chest, to go with the rest of the fruit salad, forgetting that I was a Hebe, born and bred. “For valour beyond the call …” Forget it, kid. War's over. With my MC and fifty cents I could buy myself a burger and fries and a cup of java.

Time for a snort.

Maybe two.

Trouble was my tab at Nick's was already longer than a night in a fox-hole and my cash box emptier than my .45 after I had pumped six of the best into Spider Moran's fat gut. But that's another yarn.

Anyway there I stood, six foot two, reaching for my chapeau, when Myrna opens the door. “There's a dame here to see you.”

I was in no mood for another splitsville case, tailing some henpecked sucker until I caught him with a bimbo in a motel room. “Tell her to come back Monday morning.”

“She's got gams that go all the way and then some, and I think she's in trouble, Hawk,” she opinioned.

Next thing I knew in sashayed Tiffany Waldorf smelling like the day the swallows came back to Capistrano. Flaming red tresses you want to walk through barefoot. Blazing green eyes. Class written all over her, but stacked. Breasts fighting her tight silk dress. Hour-glass waist. Curves in all the right places.

“Sit down,” I said

Tiffany shook off her sable wrap and poured herself into a chair, crossing those million-dollar legs. Then she opened her handbag that cost some poor alligator its skin and peeled off five c-notes. “Will this do as a retainer, Mr. Steel?”

“That depends on how many rats you want me to exterminate. Tell me about it, kid.”

“There's a body lying on my bedroom floor with a shiv planted where his heart used to go pitter-patter.”

“Then you've been a naughty girl.”

“I am a naughty girl,” she said, tossing her head high, “but I didn't do it.”

“Then why don't you go to the cops?”

“Because that shiv happens to belong to yours truly. It's a priceless, diamond-studded sixteenth-century dagger worth one hundred thousand dollars. It was presented to me by Crown Prince Hakim at Monte Carlo last season.”

“For services rendered?”

“I ought to slap your face,” she said, casting her eyes at me.

“You look good when you're angry.”

“I didn't get in until very late last night and there he was lying on my bedroom floor. The body was still warm.”

“I take it you recognized the hombre?”

“I was his chick until I found out what a louse he was.”

“What's his monicker?”

“Lionel Gerstein.”

I had bought myself trouble. A ton of it.

Lionel Gerstein was the number-one son of old Boris Gerstein, a former bootlegger, worth zillions, who had crawled out of his sewer and gone legit some years back. But he was still connected. You could bet the farm and your beloved Granny's Maidenform bra on that one. Old BG was meaner than a rattlesnake with a hangover and just as dangerous.

Originally there had been three Gerstein brothers. Boris, Marv, and Saul. Marv, no more than knee-high to a mouse in his elevator shoes, was weaker than a bar Scotch. A born boot-licker. But Saul was a
hell-raiser. So old BG, who didn't care to share the wealth, had him taken out. Erased. He had a bomb planted on Saul's private airplane.

“I hope,” Tiffany said, “taking on the Gersteins isn't too much for you, Hawk.”