The Lovely Chocolate Mob (18 page)

“What’s that?”

“Why did you do it? And why didn’t you include me?”

“That’s two questions.”

“Okay, it’s two questions. Now why and why?”

“Fair enough,” he said. “I didn’t include you because there wasn’t time; the money was going to be changing hands today, and I only found out about it last night. I had to move fast. I didn’t have time for amateurs. No offense, Randall.”

“No offense taken.”

Walter smiled at this. He was reassured that our friendship was still in tact.

“And as for the first ‘why’…” he continued. “I figured that if Susan Lovely were broke, she might not be such the totally desirable woman that Dr. Frank Burke thought she was, and then he’d stay with his wife, the mother of his four kids.”

We rode in silence for a minute. I pondered this over.

“That’s logical thinking on your part, Walter. I can see your point.”

“Thanks!”

After a few more moments of silence, I said, “But this brings up a problem.”

A quizzical look covered Walter’s face. “Problem? What kind of problem?”

“The money. What do you plan to do with the money?”

After a bit of silence, Walter said, “I haven’t got that far yet. And that doesn’t seem to be a problem to me.”

“I mean, after all, what you’ve done is taken money from some poor girl to whom it rightfully belongs…”

Walter burst in with “Some poor girl! She’s been a successful bikini model; she’s not hurting…!”

“Let me explain,” I continued. “When I said ‘some poor girl,’ I didn’t mean to say that she was broke. I meant to say, in the arena of finances, she has done no wrong. The money is legally and rightfully hers. It was left to her by her grandfather, who built a chocolate empire and earned it fair and square.”

“She’s dating a married man!”

“Yes, she’s seeing Franklin Burke, but that doesn’t mean she has no right to her family fortune. It’s what Old Man Lovely wanted, and he hasn’t done anybody any wrong. Quite the contrary, he’s created jobs and employed thousands!”

Walter hunched over the steering wheel. “I’m listening,” he said. To him this was all new.

“Plus, what are your intentions with those billions? To keep it for yourself?”

“I thought about that. I thought about keeping it, but then decided we’d split the billions between the three of us.”

I said nothing here. I couldn’t. The idea of a billion dollars just falling into my lap was something to consider. But what would I do with it?

“Walter, we didn’t earn it!”

“I’m not finished! I said I thought about it; I didn’t say we’d actually do it!”

“Sorry. Well, what were you thinking, then?”

“I thought I’d just hold onto this money for a while, for just a little while, until the dust cleared and Dr. Frank Burke saw reason enough to go back home to be with his wife and children, where he ought to have been in the first place.”

“How long is a little while?” I asked.

“I haven’t got all that worked out just yet. Mebbe long enough to make some dough off the interest?”

He glanced over to where I was sitting, but could tell by my face that it probably wasn’t a good idea.

“Keeping the interest is stealing. It’s not ours to keep,” I said.

“Well, it’s all in my possession now,” said Walter, “and I’m the only one who knows where it’s all at, so technically, it’s only in
my
possession.”

“So, we’re back to square one. What do you intend to do with it?”

Walter grinned. “I finally came to the conclusion that I’d put it all back into Susan Lovely’s account, all at once from the different banks, under guise, of course.”

“Of course.”

“That way she’d get it all back, with interest. It’s just out of her control for a little while, a tiny bit, until everybody does the right thing.”

“I’m proud of you, Walter.”

That last remark seemed to cheer him up a bit. I’m not sure I could say that I was proud of what he did, but I was happy with the conclusion he came up with, and all on his own.

“Just one more thing bugs me though, Walter.”

“What’s that, Rand?”

“That’s an awful lot of money. Are you sure you couldn’t be traced?”

“Heh! Not a chance.”

Just then a white light hit Walter’s RV, so bright we couldn’t tell from which direction it came. Everything was lit up, and Walter brought the RV to a screeching halt. The sound of helicopter rotors appeared and was getting louder, and the white light was getting even brighter.

We looked at each other, saying “the cops!” at the same time. A loud voice crackled over a loudspeaker, “Freeze! FBI! Don’t move; we have you under surveillance!”

Freeze? When anyone says that to Walter, he takes it as ‘Charge!’ or ‘Mush!’ or ‘Giddyup!’, because he floorboarded the gas and off we went. I was petrified, felt my heart and stomach sink, and yelled, “What are you doing? They’ll shoot us!” whereas Walter was yelling also, saying, “I’m not going back to the big house!” We screamed and yelled and the RV gained speed through the city streets, with the bright light following us from above. I hoped and prayed Walter wouldn’t have a wreck, and visualized us sprawled out all over the street like so much roadkill. Fortunately, it was late and there was no traffic; Walter ran stop signs and red lights, and I could see myself in handcuffs, being booked and fingerprinted and photographed, wearing orange jumpsuits and appearing in court and losing all my freedoms for the rest of my life, making license plates in the rehabilitation facilities furnished by taxpayers. This wasn’t something I wanted to experience either. I continued screaming, “Look out! Stop! Watch that pole!”

Walter came to a bridge, stopped the RV under it, and said, “Take the sewer!”

“What?”

“The sewer! Go underground!”

“What sewer?”

Walter had unbuckled himself and stepped out of the vehicle and swung open a compartment on the driver’s side.

I unbuckled and got out and ran around to see what he was doing. When he stepped back, I could see he was pulling something from the side compartment, something that looked like a bazooka.

“The sewer!” he yelled. “Look, see the manhole, go down the drain and disappear! Here, catch!” With his free hand, he had reached back into the compartment and tossed me some sort of a giant key, a manhole cover key. “Get going! Move!”

I stood there under the bridge with the key in my hand, and could see Walter was walking toward the opening, the way we had come in. He was moving into an offensive position.

I ran to where he was. “What are you going to do?” I said.

“I’m not going back! Get out of here!”

The bright light had bounced around on both sides of the bridge, and we could hear the helicopter coming back our direction, but Walter was in complete charge. This was his situation. The light and helicopter had been looking for a large object, the RV, and had searched the far end of the bridge. It was probably hovering about 70 feet high, and seemed to be circling.

The light hit me at that point, and I froze in place, staring at the big white spot. However, it then moved off me, and so I was in semi-darkness once again. The helicopter must have thought a big vehicle carried many passengers and was looking to round them all up.

“What about you?” I said.

“I’ll be all right! Move!”

That was all I needed. I ran to the man-hole cover, and, feeling around, located the hole where the big key was supposed to fit. I put the key in and gave it a heave and the cover came up. Laying the heavy lid to one side, I went down into the hole, hoping that Walter would soon follow. I heard him yell, “Pull the cover back!”

“What?”

“Pull the cover back over the hole! I’m going to make a run for it!”

“You can’t outrun a helicopter!”

“I don’t have to!” and with that Walter lifted the bazooka to his shoulder and took aim. I saw the bright light hit Walter, lighting him up for the FBI.

I dragged the manhole cover back over me and found myself completely in the dark. I was fumbling around on the wet concrete, knowing that I had to get away from this entry point as soon as possible. I didn’t know which way to go and didn’t care; I just wanted to put space between me and that flying spotlight. I leaned over and walked quickly, to the north I thought. Soon I found I had to crawl on all fours; these drains weren’t as big as they used to be when I was a kid. After about 30 yards, I took my shoes off and tied the laces together and hung them over the back of my neck, and took my socks off and tied them around my knees; at least this would give them some protection. I couldn’t hear the helicopter anymore, but oh-my-gosh Walter was a billionaire who just shot a helicopter out of the sky. Would this make him a murderer, too? And not only an anybody murderer, a cop-killer, on the scale of the FBI, which is a federal crime, for sure! The type to whom the courts show no mercy. I was crawling on my knees in the sewer, and Walter had blood on his hands. But I had been with him, which made me an accomplice. How low had we sunk?

It was dark, and it stank. I was wet all over, especially my hands and feet. Good thing I had decided to wear jeans; any regular pants would have been ruined in no time. I estimated I had crawled the length of nineteen football fields, or 5,700 feet, or well over a mile. I’d been counting my knees; every time they touched concrete that was considered to be a foot. I was somewhere around 5,700, but I’m sure I had skipped a number or two. We hadn’t been too far from my part of town, in the RV, so if I had picked the right tunnels, perhaps I’d make it back to my own bed sometime in the next 24 hours. I was tired, it was slow progress, and I didn’t like being underground, not one bit. I wondered if it was the next day already, and decided to check the time, so I pulled my new cell phone off my belt to view, and it lit up the whole tunnel! I should have thought of it earlier; I’d use the telephone for light, shining a green glow ahead of me every now and then, because there were bound to be other creatures down there. Fortunately, I hadn’t run into anything bad yet. I supposed they scattered when they heard me coming. I was hoping I wouldn’t run into any alligators; if I yelled there’d be no one else down there to help; I was completely on my own. Isolated. And lonely.

It had been hours since I’d left Walter upstairs, and while crawling at a pace I could handle, I was hoping my nerves would settle down, giving me a chance to think clearly.

Maybe we shouldn’t have gotten involved in Helen and Franklin’s situation; after all, who were we to try to solve their problems? We could barely solve our own problems! We weren’t God, nor the church, nor the courts, nor the marriage counselor, nor their family; how could we fix what man decided to destroy?

While reflecting on this, I decided that the courts didn’t really fix anything either; that wasn’t their role. They just divided assets in a fair and equitable manner, or gave the appearance of it, when there were differences in divorce court. I supposed the judges tried to make sure a deserted wife and kids didn’t go without some support, or income, but why the heck was there so much divorce in our country, anyhow? It’s almost as though we’re children; we start something and somehow find that we’re not able to carry it on to completion. And it wasn’t a both/and situation anymore; all it took was for one person to act up, as Franklin was doing, to destroy a marriage.

My mind had plenty of time to wander while being buried underground. I considered this problem further, thinking that if we were to just sit back and let things play out, how would I feel about myself whenever I looked into the mirror to shave, brush my teeth, or comb my hair? Who would be looking back from the mirror? That’s something I’d have to live with. Would it be some coward who didn’t lift a finger to help preserve a family, to help keep some stability to the community, to keep a home for some kids? If so, then there would be another ruined marriage on the trash heap of romance, thanks to any non-involvement on my part. No, I’m not sorry I scared Franklin! He needed scaring! He deserved a whole lot more than that, but violence is something I considered unprofessional. It’s messy, and there’s just no excuse for it. I started talking to myself, muttering, “No, I’m not sorry; I’m glad I did it!” and after a while, started yelling it. I listened for an echo, but there wasn’t much of that down there. The tunnel probably needed to be bigger. It was just me talking out loud in a concrete tube underground. It wouldn’t help thinking too much about my situation, since I didn’t want to risk getting claustrophobic. I hoped the ground wouldn’t cave in on me.

I could have married Helen, but that possibility slipped through my fingers; those children could also have been mine. I had dreamed of a quiet, peaceful, tranquil family life, with a beautiful wife who loved me and children who were all honor roll students with blond hair and blue eyes and straight teeth. Maybe I could have had a happy life. Maybe I could have been one of the beautiful people, and if not that, then perhaps one of the socially approved types. There was a lot of “coulda, shoulda, woulda” in that underground tunnel. I thought about it some more and decided my children wouldn’t have been as handsome as Franklin’s; obviously he had the superior “pretty-boy” gene to pass along to his children.

Life was like this tunnel, in that I had no choice but to keep crawling forward. I could have gone backwards, I supposed, but I knew what was back there. I kept going forward even after Helen dumped me for Franklin, and here I was still stuck in a fix. Maybe it was better for Helen to marry Franklin instead of me; he could probably handle things better. If she had married me, she’d have to keep her expectation levels down, and not push me too hard to be successful and acquire stuff so she could live the life she wanted. I’m not sure I could be “out there” too much in the public eye. I’ve never been good at selling myself.

Those kids. They were all genetic wonders. I know my family, and we’re not picture-perfect. The kids that Helen and I would have had would have been a watered-down version of what she had now; perhaps they’d all come with my character flaws as well.

Those kids! What beautiful kids. I could never have done as well. Maybe it was better that I’d never married; I could never have sired such great-looking kids like that. And they were all bright, too, and seemed happy. It sure would be a terrible thing for their family to break up; this would shatter their little worlds.