Put a Lid on It

by Donald E. Westlake

  The bank of pay phones was clustered in a little campground of its own off to the side of pedestrian traffic. One Buster stood off to the right, the other equally to the left, and Jeffords paced back and forth in the near distance, getting in the way of people carrying heavy luggage.

  By necessity, Meehan's telephone directory was kept in his head. He dialed the number, pumped in change, and the nasal voice that he knew was female only because he'd seen its owner a few times over the years said, “Cargo.” Cargo Storage was the name under which Leroy worked.

  “Leroy, please.”

  “Who shall I say?”

  “Meehan.” It always bothered Meehan to speak his name aloud on the telephone, but sometimes you had to.

  “Leroy isn't in at the moment,” she said, which is what he'd known she would say. “Can he get back to you?”

  “I'm at a pay phone at Norfolk International Airport,” Meehan told her.

  “What a weird place to be.”

  “You don't know the half of it,” he said, and read the number off to her, and hung up.

  Both Busters immediately moved toward him, but he held up both hands, one to either side, to deter them, so they backed off to position A, glancing toward Jeffords to be sure it was okay.

  Meehan pretended to be actively using the phone for the next seven minutes, holding the receiver to his ear while keeping the hook depressed with his other hand. Then at last, once Leroy had reached his own secure phone, this one rang. Meehan lifted the hook, and a different nasal voice said in his ear, “What the fuck you doin in Norfolk fuckin Virginia?”

  “I hope to tell you some day,” Meehan said. “For right now, I want to know, if I happened to come into possession of some antique guns, all American, Revolution, Civil War, would you be interested?”

  “Antique guns? So you mean a collection.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Lemme think, lemme think. Is it Lewes-Moday?”

  “What?”

  “Which collection is it? Who owns it?”

  “I dunno yet.”

  “You're a strange bird, Meehan,” Leroy told him. “When you find out whose house you're in, call me back.”

  “No, hold on, I'll find out.” Gesturing to Jeffords, he said into the phone, “What was that name you said?”

  “Lewes-Moday. If it's Lewes-Moday, I don't want it. They got photos of every fucking piece, they injected bird DNA in the stocks, nobody's gonna dare go near a piece of that.”

  “Okay, hold on.” To Jeffords, now next to him frowning deeply, he said, “Whose collection is this?”

  Jeffords looked shocked, then mulish. “I can't tell you that, not at this point.”

  “Is it Lewes-Moday? Just tell me if it's Lewes-Moday.”

  “I've never heard of Lewes-Moday,” Jeffords said, as though he felt obscurely as though he'd been accused of something.

  Into the phone, Meehan said, “It isn't Lewes-Moday. What I think it is, I think it's somebody in the northeast, a rich guy, political, probably an estate or some—”

  “Oh, Burnstone!” Leroy said. “Absolutely! You get your hands on Burnstone, you got a deal.”

  “One second.” Meehan looked at Jeffords, who was practicing his poker face. Looking deep into those eyes, Meehan said, “Burnstone.”

  “I can't tell you—”

  Meehan said into the phone, “It's Burnstone. See you soon.”

  14

  HER PLANE WAS thirty-five minutes late, which isn't bad for an airplane, and at first he didn't recognize her among the passengers drifting brain-damaged into the terminal. He'd only seen Elaine Goldfarb three times in his life, always in the MCC, she on the other side of the black metal desk, dressed like a yak, so it took a few seconds to realize that this woman was that woman.

  She presented herself differently out here; not more attractive, more aggressive. Her skinny body was encased in fairly tight black slacks and clacking black leather boots and a gleaming black leather jacket, with an open zipper. Her steel-wool hair was controlled by a golden barrette at the back in the shape of a narrow bouquet of roses, and large gold hoop earrings dangled to both sides of that sharp-nosed sharp-jawed face, making her black-framed eyeglasses look more than ever like spy holes in a fortress wall.

  So this is how she dresses to go on the road; challenging. Don't dare fuck with me. Interesting. A woman wouldn't want to offer any challenges in the MCC.

  She had as much trouble recognizing him as he'd had with her, apparently, because she looked right through him until he raised his hand as though to attract teacher's attention. But that was okay; again, the context was different. She'd only seen him in the brown jumpsuit, probably looking as crappy and defeated as he'd then felt. Out here, in his own clothes, with a little scheme working, operating with people who turned about as rapidly as a battleship, he not only felt better, he no doubt looked better as well. Other, anyway. So he raised his hand, and when she furrowed her high brow at him he said, “Yeah, it's me, after all.”

  So she came over to him, there in the middle of the terminal, people all over the place going on about their own business, and she said, “You're out?”

  “Kinda,” he said.

  “Francis Meehan,” she said, as though to double-check her data.

  “The same,” he agreed.

  “You want to be called Meehan.”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “Well, you're the last person I expected to see here,” she said. “I'll call you Meehan if you'll tell me what the hell is going on.”

  “Listen,” he said, “could you spring for coffee? They only gave me three bucks, and it's gone, and it's okay if we go to the coffee shop and sit down and get on the same page here.”

  “Everything you're saying,” she told him, “comes within a whisker of making sense.”

  “Coffee,” he said. “You buy.”

  “That figures,” she said. “Lead on.”

  So he led on, aware of the Busters on his flanks, watching him like carnivorous sheepdogs, knowing Jeffords also lurked somewhere in the vicinity, and they went to the open-fronted coffee shop that the Busters had already checked out, to be sure there was no back exit. They sat at an empty table in the front row, just off the pedestrian area, which was also part of the deal. While waiting to be waited on, Meehan said, “You had no trouble. Flights and all.”

  “All I know is,” she said, “I got a call at the MCC this morning, five minutes after I arrived, hadn't even seen my first client yet, I'm told to forget my caseload for today, other people are taking over, I'm to go home and pack for a trip, certainly overnight, maybe longer, a Mr. Eldridge will come pick me up at ten-thirty.” She gave him a suspicious look. “Who's this guy Eldridge?”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “Really? Very strange guy,” she told him. “Nervous, skinny, young, talked all the time, didn't say a single solitary useful thing.”

  A very very old waitress arrived then, to ask them what they wanted, and turned out their desires were modest: black coffee for him, a diet decaf cappuccino for her. The waitress tottered away, and Meehan said, “What the hell's a diet decaf cappuccino?”

  “A state of mind,” she said. “Tell me what's going on.”

  “Well,” he said, “there's a presidential election coming up, pretty soon.”

  “Stop right there,” she told him. “I'm forty-one years old, I don't have the life expectancy for this.”

  “It's short,” he promised. “The people working to help the guy get reelected, they found out there's an October Surprise coming up—You've heard of October Surprises.”

  “Everybody's heard of October Surprises,” she assured him.

  Not bothering to correct her, he said, “They want to stop this October Surprise, and to do it they need a burglary, and—”

  “Oh, my God,” she said. “Watergate? Don't they ever learn?”

  “Well, yeah, they learn,” Meehan told her. “This time, they learned they oughta get a pro
—”

  “So they look in prison,” she said sardonically.

  “Go ahead, have your cheap joke,” he said. “The fact is I'm pretty good at what I do.”

  “Usually, maybe.”

  “Nobody's good all the time,” he said.

  “In your business,” she told him, “you have to be.”

  “Well, that's true. Anyway, they get access to federal things, like the MCC, and some Parks Department place they've kept me in since then, and they want me to go get this October Surprise for them.”

  “And what am I supposed to do?” she demanded. “Start preparing your insanity defense?”

  “I told them I wanted you,” he explained. “These people are politicians, I don't trust them, they make me uncomfortable.”

  “Well, your instincts are good, anyway,” she said.

  “So we're negotiating,” he went on, “and I felt I didn't want to be alone in the room, and you're the only lawyer I know, so I said, get me Elaine Goldfarb or there's no deal, and they said okay.”

  “Well, whoever they are,” she said, “they've got clout. They got you out of the MCC, and they got me. But what am I supposed to do?”

  “Watch my back. Isn't that what lawyers do?”

  “In a way,” she said, then frowned at him. “But you're still in serious trouble with the law,” she pointed out. “I'm surprised you didn't just tell these people, sure, no problem, then run for the hills.”

  “They've got two sturdy ex-cops bird-dogging me,” Meehan told her. “Unfortunately, I'm not running anywhere.”

  The waitress returned, bowed beneath the weight of their coffees and the check, in a big leatherette book. She distributed all, faded away, and Elaine Goldfarb said, “I see one of them, over there. Oh, and there's the other one.” She frowned, which created unfortunate gray vertical lines between her thick black eyebrows. “Who's the one lurking over there?”

  “A politician,” Meehan told her. “Named Jeffords. He's the one got me out of the MCC.”

  “I'm surprised they let him out,” she commented, and sipped cappuccino. “So what happens now?”

  “You got luggage?”

  “Of course I've got luggage. What do you think I am, a Camp Fire girl?”

  “Okay, fine,” he said. “If you agree to be my lawyer, we call oley oley infree, collect everybody, collect your luggage, and go back to the Outer Banks.”

  “The Outer Banks!” She reared back to look him up and down. “You get around more than the average federal prisoner, I'll give you that,” she said.

  15

  SHE HAD TWO bags, and they were both heavy, even the one on wheels; especially the one on wheels, because the wheels were stuck. She stood next to the revolving luggage carousel, with its endless variety of parcels, far more various than the passengers waiting for them, and silently looked at Meehan, both bags at her feet. He hefted one, then the other, then looked around for a Buster. Catching one's eye—who did not want that eye caught—he gestured for the guy to come over, and when he did, glowering in Meehan's face as a way not to acknowledge the presence of Elaine Goldfarb, Meehan said, “These things are very heavy.” The Buster continued to look at him, so Meehan expounded: “If you and your pal shlep them, I won't run away.”

  The Buster looked at the bags, and back at Meehan: “And if we won't?”

  “We'll see who wins the marathon.”

  Disgusted, the Buster gave the other Buster a wave, and when number two arrived he explained the situation in quick irritated fashion.

  “Fuck it,” said number two. “No big deal.”

  So each Buster carried a bag, followed by Meehan and Elaine Goldfarb, out of the baggage area and the terminal and through the sunshine toward their car. Midway, Jeffords caught up, hissing, “That is not in their job profile.”

  “Mine neither,” Meehan said. “Elaine Goldfarb, may I present Pat Jeffords? He played you yesterday.”

  “I wondered what happened yesterday,” she said.

  Jeffords made a face. “A lot happened yesterday,” he said. “And I'm beginning to think it isn't over yet.”

  The next question concerned seating in the car. Jeffords wanted to sit in back with Meehan and his lawyer, but Meehan said, “We're gonna have an attorney-client discussion back here. Ride up front with the muscle.”

  Elaine Goldfarb said, “If we're operating here anywhere within the shadow of the umbrella of the law, my client is right. He and I have to talk, and I take it you don't have two cars, or a nearby conference room.”

  “There isn't enough space up front,” Jeffords complained.

  Meehan looked, and it was a bench seat up there, not buckets, so nobody would have to sit on anybody's lap. “Plenty of room,” he said.

  Meanwhile, the Busters had stashed the luggage in the trunk and were waiting around to see what next. Exasperated, Jeffords said, “Very well. I sit by the window.”

  So they did; the Busters and Jeffords presenting a solid wall of shoulder, slightly crumpled together, up front, while Meehan and Elaine Goldfarb luxuriated in all the room in the back seat. They remained silent back there awhile, he looking out at the scenery, wondering what he was doing here, wondering what the alternatives were, wondering why the only known alternative in the world was the MCC, while beside him she had taken out of the big saggy black leather shoulderbag she carried in addition to those two heavy suitcases a ballpoint pen and a small pad, in which she took the occasional note, meantime chewing the wrong end of the pen.

  Once they were on the interstate, she leaned closer to him to say, “You're gonna have to tell me about this October Surprise.”

  “All I know is—”

  “Hold on,” she said, and leaned forward to where Jeffords had turned into one giant ear, straining toward them. Tapping the wet end of her ballpoint against the shoulder under that ear, she said, “Turn on the radio.”

  The look he swiveled to give them was almost innocent: “Sure. What kind of music do you like?”

  “Music you can't hear over,” she said.

  He gave her a very-funny grimace, but leaned forward, displacing all those shoulders, to switch on the radio. Soon, nasal laments of untrustworthy lovers met in bars filled the car with the sorrows of trying to get through life while unutterably stupid, and Elaine Goldfarb leaned close again, to murmur beneath the anguish, “Go ahead.”

  “They say it's a package of bad evidence that could hurt the president,” he told her. “A videotaped confession, and supporting documents. They wouldn't say what the topic was.”

  “Videotaped confession.” She pursed her lips. “It's no traffic ticket.”

  “I don't think so, no. And Jeffords and these people are part of something called CC.”

  “Oh, sure,” she said. “The Campaign Committee.”

  “Whatever that is.”

  “The campaign apparatus for the president. All his speech writers, planners, travel organizers, advance men, spokespeople, the whole crowd that goes to make up a campaign. And sometimes, like now,” she said, “the campaign has to do something a little off the books.”

  “This is a little off the table completely,” Meehan suggested.

  “Sure, but it's the problem they've got. And, given the circumstances, they're smart to come to you.”

  “They said ‘outsource.’”

  She grinned. “That's right, you're an outsource. So your job is just to go where this package is hidden, and get it, and bring it back.”

  “Right.”

  “Well, that's fine,” she said. “What you're doing is technically illegal, but it isn't a major felony, so I think we can—” She peered at him. “Am I missing something?”

  “Um,” he said.

  She pointed the glistening pen-end at him. “I am an officer of the court,” she told him. “Do not tell me if you plan to commit anything really illegal.”

  “Count on it,” Meehan said.

  16

  THIS TIME, THERE was no problem getting thr
ough the gate. Pointing at the sign, Meehan said, “NPS?”

  “National Park Service,” she said.

  “Ah.” So this CC wasn't exactly government, but it could use government stuff. Not bad.

  When they got out at the same building as before, there was a brief pause while the Busters got the luggage from the trunk, during which Meehan managed to sidle close to Jeffords and, from the corner of his mouth, mutter, “We don't need to talk about antiques.”

  Jeffords gave him a surprised smirk. “Wheels within wheels,” he said.

  “Whatever.”

  They went into the building, and while the Busters stomped upstairs with the bags Jeffords led the way down to the big office at the end of the hall where Meehan had had breakfast with Benjamin, who was there again, standing from the desk as they entered, smiling his avuncular stockbroker smile, saying, “Ah, all went well.”

  “So far,” Jeffords said.

  Benjamin came around the desk toward Elaine Goldfarb, hand out: “Bruce Benjamin.”

  “Elaine Goldfarb.”

  “And you have agreed to represent this scalawag. Very warmhearted of you.”

  “But softheaded, you mean,” she said, returning his smile and his hand.

  “Not at all.”

  Meehan said, “She gets paid.”

  “Well, of course,” Benjamin said, and Jeffords said, “By the State of New York, isn't it?”

  “By your CC,” Meehan told him. “You were gonna get me a lawyer from Washington, right? Who was gonna pay him?”

  Benjamin said, “Yes, Francis, I take your point. Ms. Goldfarb, we will certainly pay you for your time in this matter.”

  Meehan said, “The lawyer from Washington; how much would he have charged?”

  Jeffords, outraged, said, “Oh, really!”

  Laughing, Elaine Goldfarb said to Benjamin, “Apparently, Meehan and I represent each other.”

  “So it would seem,” Benjamin said. Jeffords was the excitable one, but Benjamin remained calm.

  Meehan said, “How much?”