“Sorry.” He shrugged at me. “The only alternative is Budweiser.”
“I’m easy to please. Thanks for the ticket, by the way.”
“Trust me, you’ll earn it. Hate to skimp on foreplay, but we’ll be having lots of company in forty-five minutes or so. We need to discuss things while we still have some privacy.”
“It’s your party.”
I followed him to the two rows of leather-cushioned, theater-type seats at the front of the suite, where you’d sit if you actually wanted to watch action on the field. He gestured toward the two seats at the far end of the first row. Didn’t like it. Minimum visibility, zero mobility, maximum vulnerability. I sprawled into the end seat anyway. He sat down next to me, taking a long hit on his Guiness as he did.
“We need to make a deal.”
“I’m game.” I tried to look game. “What are the terms?”
“Terms. Yes.” He took another deep swallow. “Clause one: I will give Transoxana Insurance Company some extremely useful advice at no charge.”
“Sounds good so far.”
“Clause two: Alma von Leuthen is off the table for good. No gumshoes, no keyhole-peepers, no et ceteras.”
“Transoxana is already out of the Alma von Leuthen business.”
“I need it to stay out. Drink up, I feel conspicuous.”
I swallowed a respectable measure of crisp ale.
“I can take a no-Alma guarantee up the ladder, Dany, but I’m a very small cog in a very big machine. If Transoxana puts another loss-prevention specialist on this case tomorrow morning, he could reopen the von Leuthen can of worms without a by-your-leave from me. Or she could, if there were any shes in TO’s Loss Prevention Department. Which there aren’t, but anything can happen.”
“Ah, so you’re not Transoxana’s CEO. That disappoints me.” He drank some Guiness, and I felt weirdly compelled to do the same, as if I were sixteen years old again and we were down by the quarry after midnight. “I’m joking. What you can promise is that you will tell me whether Transoxana has rejected the policy the Museum wants to buy; and also whether you’ve picked up any hint that it’s looking at von Leuthen again.”
“I suppose. That’s not exactly in the employee manual, but I can play an angle here and there and try to stay in the loop.”
He grabbed my right bicep in a fierce, steely grip. Hard enough to smart. I snapped my head toward him and found myself looking into intense, burning eyes.
“No ‘suppose’ about it, Judas Macabeus Davidovich. There is no ‘try.’ There is only ‘will.’ I need your word on your honor as a Jew that you will find a way to let me know if Transoxana goes back on von Leuthen’s trail.”
“Dany, for starters, let go of my arm.”
He relaxed his grip and sheepishly dropped his hand.
“Sorry.”
“Now, I’ll give you my word on whatever you want that I will do my damn level best to let you know about any developments on the von Leuthen front. But no guarantees. I’m not going to overpromise.”
“Thank you for that. Half-a-loaf is better than bullshit, as Americans say—or would say, if you had a little more imagination.”
“The best way to keep Transoxana on the sidelines as far as von Leuthen is concerned is for you to give me a bullet-proof reason for us not to issue the policy.”
“Yes, yes, you’re absolutely right.” He finished his Guiness, crushed the can in his right hand, and tossed it over his shoulder in the general direction of nothing in particular. “I promised you valuable advice, and I’ll deliver. First, though, I need another libation—and perhaps one for our new arrival.”
As Dany sprang nimbly to his feet, I looked back into the interior of the suite. The new arrival, whom Dany must have heard even though I hadn’t, was wearing a black coat, black trousers, black hat, white shirt, and black beard dominated by ringlets of hair. Standard Hassidic male outfit, except for a recently damaged nose that wasn’t in any hurry to heal.
“Jay Davidovich, Aram Himmelfarb.” Nesselrode said this in a perfunctory voice as he cruised past “Himmelfarb” and headed for the mini-fridge. “Aram Himmelfarb, Jay Davidovich. The ‘J’ stands for ‘Judas’. Jay’s full given name is Judas Maccabeus. So don’t give him any shit.”
I worked my way out of the seating rows to three leather sofas arranged in an open square around a glass-topped table to form a conversation space. “Himmelfarb” had parked himself on the couch at the bar side of the square.
“You’re the loss-prevention specialist Dany has been telling me about?”
“On the nose, Reb Himmelfarb.” I touched my own nose as I spoke.
I would have spotted Halkani even without the injured nose. As disguises go, a fake beard falls somewhere between mediocre and pathetic for someone with any cop experience at all—and I’d had all I wanted of that. Halkani gave me the kind of hard look that Warner Brothers used to hand out from its prop box to actors in gangster flicks. It lasted a nano-second before he managed to smear a smile over it. Nesselrode slapped a beaded can of Guiness in Halkani’s hand and remained standing while I sat down opposite the guy.
“Question,” Nesselrode said. “Suppose Transoxana refuses to insure Eros Rising on this Vienna boondoggle. Could the Museum find some other insurer?”
“Yep.”
“Suppose that insurer asked Transoxana why it had turned down the policy. What would Transoxana say?”
“‘Go to hell.’ We’d put it a little more politely. ‘Company policy and concern for the privacy of the insured precludes us from making any comment except to confirm the fact and dates of past coverage.’ But, basically, go to hell.”
Nesselrode nudged Halkani’s shoulder with the back of his left hand.
“So you see, Himmelfarb, someone will insure the venture, and as long as the insurer isn’t Transoxana, neither the amateurish bullshit up to now nor the sudden pursuit of von Leuthen should interfere with anyone’s plans.”
“A master of subtlety—just what you’d expect from the son of a diplomat!” Halkani rolled his eyes theatrically and shook his head. “What are you going to do next—hand him ten thousand dollars in a white envelope?”
“Of course not. I’m going to hand him something else in a white envelope.”
Nesselrode drew a standard business envelope from inside his suede sport coat. I noted with considerable disappointment that it was way too thin to hold a hundred C-notes. Instead of tendering it to me he held it horizontally a couple of inches below his chin. No name on the outside.
“You know Willy Szulz?”
“I’ve met him.”
“The document inside this envelope is for him. It is very important to him. I am asking you to put that document into his hands. Not in his mailbox, not in his lawyer’s hands or his girlfriend’s hands: his hands.”
“This would be clause three of the deal you want to make?”
“Yes.”
“When do I get the bullet-proof reason for my employer to blow off a high six-figure premium?”
“You’ve already gotten that, you dumb goddamn yid,” Halkani said. “What have you been doing for the last ten minutes—watching batting practice?”
“Thanks for the hint. I was hoping for something a little more concrete.”
“Use your imagination.”
“I’m trying. I’m imagining that there’s a coherent connection between giving a piece of paper to Willy Szulz and saving Transoxana a fifty million-dollar loss. I’m not getting anywhere.”
“There is no connection,” Nesselrode said. “That’s the whole point.”
“Then the point is way too sophisticated for an American putz like me.”
Halkani sighed. He set his Guiness, still unopened, on the table. Leaning forward and resting his forearms on his thighs, he looked directly at me.
�
�Let me tell you a parable.”
“Okay.”
“There was a shiksa who had a way with men—especially men who were powerful or famous.”
“You’re missing an excellent opportunity to keep your goddamn mouth shut,” Nesselrode muttered.
“One day, she happened on a man who had no fame whatever but, in his own way, had a modest but impressive kind of power. This man happened to be a Jew.”
“Feel free to ignore him,” Nesselrode told me. “He’s one of those Israelis who like to play ‘I’m a better Jew than you are.’”
Halkani continued unperturbed, as if Nesselrode hadn’t said a word.
“Well, this thing went on as these things do, and by and by the woman got herself knocked up and discovered that she had conceived a son. Not an immaculate conception—apparently only Jewesses have those. The powerful Jew was the boy’s father—with the catch, however, that he would stop being powerful very quickly if it got out that he had been whoring with the goyim.”
Nesselrode bristled. Halkani and I simultaneously flicked our eyes to see whether Nesselrode was about the throw a punch. No, as it turned out, but it struck me as a pretty close question.
“This shiksa, for some goddamn reason that I can’t imagine, didn’t abort her pregnancy. When the half-breed was born, she took him to a rabbi for a little knife-work on his tiny schvance. She managed to find a family that, for a reasonable price, would raise him as a good Jew. She arranged for his father to see him now and again when he wasn’t too busy protecting the Temple Mount.”
I kept my mouth shut, with one eye on Nesselrode and one on Halkani. If I had been Nesselrode, either Halkani or I would have been on his way to the hospital five minutes ago. Or the morgue. Did Nesselrode’s restraint come from cowardice or calculation? Or both? Or something else?
“As you would expect in light of this background, our boy has spent most of his life overcompensating for his mother’s lack of Davidic genes.” Halkani raised his eyebrows and flicked his head toward Nesselrode. “Any second now he’s going to say, ‘Fuck you.’ That’s his idea of snappy patter.”
“Very interesting.” I kept my eyes focused on Halkani. “Tell me something: Where were you Wednesday and Thursday of last week?”
Halkani threw his head back and laughed like I’d just told the knee-slapper of all time.
“Nowhere near Vienna, my friend. Since the World Trade Center attack, I’ve found it prudent not to leave the United States unless absolutely necessary. Getting back in can be an adventure.” He leaned forward and favored me with what I think was supposed to be an earnest expression. “Look. This is what we do. You and I. This is business. Our business. Take a punch, throw a punch. No hard feelings, right?”
My policy is actually Throw a punch so you don’t have to take one, but I figured saying so might seem impolitic. So instead I nodded and said, “Sure.”
Nesselrode strolled a few feet away, then turned back to Halkani and me. Some random light penetrating the suite caught one of his onyx cufflinks just right and flashed a little starburst at us.
“You know what I find interesting about the completely fucked-up attempt to steal that bill of sale from you at the Museum? How could anyone possibly have imagined that it would work? And yet, it almost did. It’s as if Caleb, the spy that Moses sent into Canaan, were a blithering klutz who made it back safe and sound anyway.”
I stood up. Halkani started to do the same, but apparently thought better of it. I held out my right hand toward Nesselrode.
“I’ll take the envelope. I’ll get the document to Szulz.”
Nesselrode gave me the thing. I folded the envelope in half and stuffed it into my rear trouser pocket, next to my comb and handkerchief. Then I headed for the door. I glanced over my shoulder on the way.
“Thanks again for the ticket. Enjoy the game.”
As I reached the door I heard feet moving rapidly toward me across the carpet. I pivoted, halfway expecting that I’d have to block a flying fist. Halkani, though, stopped just outside of effective range for either of us.
“Can I give you a ride back to your hotel, Judas Maccabeus Davidovich?”
“No, thanks, I’m in a hurry.” You can get almost anywhere in New York City faster on foot or on the subway than you can in a car.
“Fair enough. Before you leave, though, let me tell you a parable.”
“Okay.”
“Fuck with me I’ll kill you.”
Chapter Thirty-eight
Jay Davidovich
Once past the guard desk as I exited the luxury suite area, I transferred the envelope from my back pocket to the right side pocket of my khakis. Making my way in a bustling, self-important hurry—in other words, like a New Yorker—I took two flights of stairs down to ground level and then scampered to a window-fronted counter inside the special entrance for people with suite tickets. Lettering above the circle in the glass window read VALET PARKING.
At that point I slowed down a little. I handed one of my Transoxana business cards to a grizzled African-American who had “retired cop” written all over the features under his fuzzy, salt-and-pepper hair.
“What’s this supposed to be?”
“Hi. Jay Davidovich from Transoxana. Could you call a taxi for me?”
He gave me that puzzled/intrigued New Yorker look—the one that says, “Is this asshole just jerking me around, or could there possibly be people in the world this fucking stupid?”
“Sir, do you have a car valet-parked with Stadium Parking Services?”
“No, that’s why I need a taxi.”
“We don’t do taxis here, sir. Call nine-one-one and tell them you’re a mental case.”
I raised the first two fingers of my right hand to my right eyebrow for a mini-salute.
“Thanks a lot. I really appreciate it.”
I strolled casually out the door to the driveway where the valets pull up cars they’re returning to their owners. While pushing through the door, I dug out my wallet to search for a five as if I intended to give someone a tip. I crossed the driveway, turned back toward the suite-ticket entrance, and nodded casually at a couple of dudes in valet-parking jackets. They nodded back, but I got the feeling they didn’t really have their hearts in it.
I got to feeling real conspicuous about forty-five seconds into the charade. I sucked it up. Finally a car pulled up to be valet-parked for the big shot driving it. The moment it came to a full stop I turned around and started down the sidewalk, heading away from the suite-ticket entrance. Three more or less normal strides, and then I clicked into full run. It took me less than a minute to reach the subway entrance. Tokens ready, through the gates, down the stairs, on the platform, waiting for a train that would take me back to midtown Manhattan.
It would have been a nice gesture for New York to have a train pulling into the stop just as I reached the bottom of the stairs, but the city apparently had other things to worry about. I had a three-minute wait. I used the time constructively. Specifically, I kept my eyes laser-focused on the stairs leading down to the platform, seeing if I could spot anyone who looked like he (or, in theory, she) had gotten a cell-phone call about spotting the tall blond guy and looking for an opportunity to knife him and relieve him of a compromising envelope—and who hadn’t been led astray by my Oscar-caliber performance at the valet parking station, and who could then somehow keep up with me while I was running like a scalded chicken.
None of the eight people who came down during the wait fit the bill. None of them even glanced in my direction. When the train arrived I held back. All eight of them got on, even though they couldn’t know which car I’d choose. So, ninety-nine-point-nine-percent chance I was home free.
Even so, a tenth of a percent ain’t zero. I boarded the last car, sat with my back against the bulkhead at the far end, and kept an eye on the door leading from the car ahe
ad. No one came through during my twenty-five-minute subway ride. That didn’t mean it was time to let down my guard. I got off a stop early and walked the rest of the way to the Millennium Broadway Hotel.
Almost certain that Nesselrode’s envelope handoff had surprised Halkani. Almost no chance that Halkani would have had some accomplice ready to do unpleasant things to me if the need happened to arise. Almost. But I’d seen that sonofabitch’s eyes. Not stone cold. Lively and excited, as if he were enjoying himself. He wasn’t some wounded soul working out pent-up hostilities beaten into him by abusive parents or ass-grabbing uncles. He was just your basic greedy bastard with his eyes on a big payday and quite ready to kill to make it happen. So until I was inside the hotel room with the door bolted, I’d be on Defcon Four.
TV Voice:“…played winter ball with Harry and I in the Dominican Republic after last season. Man, they love baseball down there!”
Rachel: “Or ‘…played winter ball with Harry and me,’ as educated people sometimes say.”
Weird. As if I’d somehow triggered this snarky little dialogue just by carding open the door to Room 1125. Taking the kind of deep breath you do just before going out for a full dress inspection, I opened the door all the way and strode into the room. Rachel had flown up to New York with me to share this trip, and apparently she’d brought a dose of Rachel-tude along with her. I snapped the security lock into place.
“Hi, I’m back.”
“…see him lying prone on the field on the tape there.”
“Hi. Excuse me a second. ‘lying supine on the field,’ you semi-literate cretin. He’s on his back, and what he’s doing is intransitive. How was the game?”
“Hasn’t started yet—which is why MSG is still running that inane pre-game blather you’re savagely criticizing.”
Rachel scissor-legged nimbly off the bed and ran over to me. Wrapping me fiercely in her arms and ungently pulling my torso down toward her level, she serially kissed me: lips, cheekbone, chin, eyelids, then lips again—the second one long, slow, deep, and hungry. It must have taken her half a minute before she came up for air on the last one.
Collar Robber: A Crime Story Featuring Jay Davidovich and Cynthia Jakubek Page 15
