“Thanks,” Cone says. “I owe you a big one, payable on demand.”
“I’ll remember that, old buddy,” the FBI man says. “Keep in touch.”
By all rights, he should zonk out the moment he hits the loft and sleep until late Monday morning. But he is too wired. Granted he has been a sideliner, not an active player in that raid on United Bamboo headquarters. But the tension and suspense have clutched him. He can still hear the controller’s phlegmatic “Go” and then the eruption of gunfire.
It takes a stiff vodka to soothe the jits, and by that time he’s concentrating on the remainder of the puzzle-the reason he was dumped into this mishmash in the first place.
Why the run-up in the price of White Lotus stock? Obviously because the Giant Panda mob has been buying up shares through Yangtze International with the aim of taking over the company. That’s a perfectly legitimate ploy. So why did Henry Wu Yeh have Cone kidnapped and tell him to stall his investigation or be prepared to knock on the Pearly Gates? That doesn’t make sense.
And where do the blackmailing letter to Claire Lee and phone calls to Edward Lee fit into the jumble?
Groaning, he starts flipping through the White Lotus shareholder list. He pays particular attention to investors owning more than a thousand shares-the people Johnnie Wong said were associated with Giant Panda.
Revelation comes slowly, not in a sudden inspiration. No light bulb flicks on over his head as in a cartoon strip. The answer comes from dry numbers which, the Wall Street dick well knows, can relate a tale as gory as bloodstains, a wet knife, or brain-splattered hammer.
The first step is adding up the holdings of all those thousand-share investors and realizing that no way, no way can they represent 16 percent of the outstanding shares of White Lotus. Yet that is what the letter from Yangtze International claimed-that they owned 16 percent of the stock, with the pledge of proxies by “many other shareholders.”
So how did they come up with that magic number of 16 percent? Timothy knows how. Edward Tung Lee personally owns 16 percent of White Lotus. What a beautiful coincidence. And if you believe that, try the Tooth Fairy on for size.
What it means, Cone realizes, is that Edward Lee is conniving with Giant Panda to make a run on his father’s company. But for what reason? Cone thinks he has the answer to that one, too.
He turns to the first page of the glossy White Lotus annual report. There is the photograph of Edward Tung Lee, Chief Operating Officer. Even with his frozen smile he’s a handsome devil: curved lips, cleft chin, high brow, blow-dried hair.
He could be a matinee idol. And Cone decides that’s exactly what he is.
“Cleo,” he calls, and the slumbering cat lifts its head.
“I’ve been snookered,” Cone says.
He wakes late on Monday morning, sits up on his mattress, yawns, roughs his scalp with his knuckles. He thinks of that punky saying: “Today is the first day of the rest of your life.” If he doesn’t get to work, he reflects sourly, it may be the last day-courtesy of Henry Wu Yeh.
It’s almost ten o’clock before he gets his act together; two Camels, two cups of black coffee, and a tot of brandy bring the roses to his cheeks.
He gives Cleo fresh water and a pickled pig’s foot to chew on. He checks the revolver in his shin holster, makes sure his wallet is stuffed with lettuce. Then he tears the photograph of Edward Lee from the annual report and sticks it in his jacket pocket. He sallies forth, feeling full of piss and vinegar, and not a little vindictive.
He drives directly to the Upper East Side and spends ten minutes wedging the Escort into a parking space that would be jammed with a moped. He walks back to the Hotel Bedlington on Madison Avenue, a few blocks away from the Lees’ apartment on Fifth.
He knows this joint; it’s figured in other cases he’s handled. It’s a staid, almost mousy establishment, with a lot of over-the-hill permanent residents, a cocktail bar that is proud of its Grasshoppers, and a lobby that smells faintly of must and has a magnificent framed lithograph of Grant’s Tomb over the desk.
Cone wanders around a few moments before he spots a bellhop. The guy is short, squat, and has a heavy blue jaw. He looks one year younger than God. Cone figures he belongs in an OTB with a cigar butt stuck in his kisser. He’s got that New York wisenheimer look, and Timothy knows it’s going to cost him.
“Can I talk to you a minute?” he asks.
The bellhop gives him the up-and-down, taking in the black leather cap, ratty corduroy suit, scuffed work shoes.
“Talk is cheap,” he says.
“I hope so,” Cone says. “Anyplace where we can have a little privacy?”
“What’s in it for me?” the guy says. He looks like a tall midget, and his gut is busting the brass buttons on his waistcoat.
“A couple of bucks?” Cone says hopefully.
“G’wan. I don’t even say hello for a deuce.”
“A fin,” Cone says.
The bellhop jerks a thumb toward the door of the men’s room. “In there,” he says. “And make it snappy. I got a job to do, you know.”
They lean on urinals in the empty loo. Cone hands over a fiver.
“You ain’t no cop,” the guy says. “That I guarantee. A private eye? Bill collector? Maybe a reporter for a scandal sheet?”
“Something like that,” Cone says. “What’s your name?”
“Max.”
“Listen, Max, I’m going to show you a photograph. I want to know if you’ve ever seen the guy before. Just a simple yes or no. That’s easy enough-right?”
“Let’s see it.”
Cone pulls out the photograph of Edward Tung Lee and holds it up. The bellhop stares at it.
“Never saw him before in my life,” he says, but meanwhile he’s rubbing a thick thumb against a bent forefinger.
The Wall Street dick sighs, pulls out his wallet. “You already got a Lincoln,” he says.
“It’ll cost you a Hamilton,” Max says. “Look, you’re making a nice couple of Washingtons on your job, aintcha? What am I-chopped liver?”
Cone fishes in his wallet, hands over a ten-dollar bill.
“Yeah, I make the guy,” Max says. “He checks in two, three times a week. Always in the afternoon. Stays maybe a couple of hours.”
“Since when has this been a hot-pillow joint?” Cone asks.
“Since day one,” the bellhop says. “Whaddya think, every hotel in the city don’t do it? It’s easy money-and fast turnover.”
“And how long has this guy been checking in for a few hours of fun and games?”
“Oh, maybe a couple of years now. That’s it; you got your money’s worth.”
“Not yet,” the Wall Street dick says. “Different women-or always the same woman?”
Max makes the same gesture, rubbing his thumb on a crooked forefinger.
“You’re going to wear out your thumb,” Timothy says. “How much?”
“I figure it’s worth a Jackson.”
“A double-sawbuck?” Cone says, outraged. “Are you sure your name’s not Jesse, as in Jesse James?”
“Listen, I know and you want to know. It’s supply and demand-get what I mean?”
Groaning, Cone gives him a twenty-dollar bill.
“Always the same woman,” Max says. “The guy calls the desk before he shows up so he’s got the room number-you capeesh? The Hitler on the desk is on the take. So the guy shows up, no luggage, and goes directly to his room. Then fifteen, twenty minutes later, the dame shows up. She’s got the room number from him, sails through the lobby, and goes straight upstairs. Nice people. Good tippers. They spread it around like they should.”
“Uh-huh,” Cone says. “And I guess she’s a short, dumpy broad with dark hair-right?”
The bellhop looks at him with disgust. “Whaddya think,” he says, “I was born yesterday?”
“All right,” Cone says, sighing. “How much?”
“A Grant. But I won’t testify in court if this is a divorce thing like I
figure it is.”
“This better be good,” Cone says, handing over a fifty-dollar bill.
Max slips the folded bill into a waistcoat pocket. “She’s a beauty, a real sparkler. Tall as you. Young. Blond. Great jugs. Wears expensive clothes. Once I heard the guy call her Claire. Is that what you wanted?”
“It’ll do,” Cone says, nodding. “Now can you tell me where the public phone is-or are you going to hold me up for that, too?”
“Nah, that’s a freebie. It’s on the mezzanine.”
Cone finds the phone in an old-fashioned booth with a folding door. It’s even got a little wooden seat. He calls the corporate offices of White Lotus on Exchange Place.
“Is Mr. Chin Tung Lee in this morning?” he asks the operator.
“Yes, he is, sir. May I ask who’s calling?”
“I have a personal delivery to make to Mr. Lee and just wanted to make sure he’s there. Thank you.”
He hangs up, leaves the Hotel Bedlington, heads for the Lees’ apartment on Fifth Avenue.
There’s a monster standing in front of the Lees’ door with his arms folded. He looks like a young Genghis Khan, with slit eyes and mustachios bushy enough to sweep out a parrot’s cage. Cone decides to play it safe, not knowing if this muscle is FBI, NYPD, or a hired janissary.
“Timothy Cone to see Mrs. Claire Lee,” he says. “She’s expecting me.”
The mastodon unfolds his arms, and the Wall Street dick wonders if he’s going to get a karate chop that will decapitate him.
“You wait,” the guy says in an unexpectedly high-pitched voice.
He disappears and Cone waits in the corridor. In a few moments the door is opened again by the juggernaut.
“You come,” he says.
Timothy follows him through that maze of rooms and hallways. He’s finally ushered through a double set of doors, into a small living room, and then into an adjoining bedroom. The woolly mammoth withdraws.
Edward Tung Lee is seated in a leather club chair. He’s wearing cerise silk pajamas under a brocaded dressing gown. There’s a white handkerchief neatly peaked in the breast pocket of the robe. His feet are bare. Claire Lee is standing next to him. She looks like a pom-pom girl in a middy, short pleated skirt, bobby socks and white Reeboks.
“Mr. Cone!” she carols. “What a pleasant surprise!”
“I was in the neighborhood,” he says, “and thought I’d drop by to see how your husband is doing.”
“Much better, thank you,” she says. “So well, in fact, that he insisted on going into the office this morning.”
“Silly thing to do,” Edward says. “He just won’t slow down.”
They all look pleasantly at each other.
“Now listen,” Claire says, “I really don’t think it’s too early in the morning for a drink. Do you, Mr. Cone?”
“It’s never too early,” he tells her.
“And I know what you like,” she says archly. “Vodka on the rocks with a splash of water. Right? Edward, I think you should have something. Perhaps a brandy. The doctor said it would do you good.”
“A small one,” he says.
“And perhaps a small something for me,” she says gaily. “Be back in a jiff.”
She sashays out the door and Edward says, “Pull up a chair, Mr. Cone.”
But he sits on the edge of the unmade bed. Now he’s facing Lee and the other armchair. He wants them both in his sights when the woman returns.
“You look a little puffy around the gills,” he says, “but none the worse for wear. They give you a hard time?”
Edward is startled. “You know what happened to me?”
Cone nods.
“How did you find out? It hasn’t been in the papers.”
“The grapevine,” Cone says. “The FBI did a helluva job grabbing you out of there.”
“They saved my life. And one of them was critically wounded in the shoot-out-did you know that?”
“I heard.”
“I’ll never forget that,” Edward says somberly. “Never in my life.”
“Yeah,” Cone says.
Claire comes bustling in, carrying a silver tray of drinks. She hands them around: vodka rocks to Cone, small snifter of brandy for Edward, and something green in a stemmed glass for herself.
“Cone knows what happened to me,” Edward tells her.
“Oh, Mr. Cone knows everything,” she says lightly. “Don’t you! Mr. Cone?”
“Just about,” he says.
She takes the armchair, and now he can look at both of them without turning his head from side to side. They lift their glasses in a silent toast, then sip their drinks delicately. Very civilized.
“You two are a nice couple of bums,” Timothy says.
Their faces congeal. Edward’s hand begins trembling. He sets the snifter down on the floor next to his chair.
“What?” Claire Lee says, voice strangled. “What did you say?”
“Bums,” Cone repeats. “Cruds. Both of you. How long did you think you’d be able to have those matinees at the Bedlington? Forever and ever?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says hotly. “And I think you better leave right now.”
“Oh, stuff it,” he says angrily. “I couldn’t care less if you rub the bacon every day of the year. What I don’t like is that you both played me for a fool, each telling me how much you hated the other. I fell for it because it was a classic setup: younger stepmother, older son, both competing for an old man’s inheritance. Only you’ve been rumpling the sheets together for two years.”
“You’re a dirty, filthy man,” Claire says, glaring at him.
“You better believe it,” he tells her, taking a gulp of his drink. “Look,” he says, addressing Edward, “if you want to put horns on your pop, that’s your business. My business is finding out why the price of White Lotus stock has been going up, up, up. Do you want to hear my scenario? It’s a cutie.”
Neither replies.
“It goes like this,” Cone continues. “And don’t interrupt to tell me I’m wrong-because I don’t think I am.
“One: Claire and Edward are shacking up and making jokes in the sack about what a senile old fart Chin is. Two: Edward is still steaming because his father wouldn’t finance his great idea of having White Lotus market a line of frozen gourmet Chinese dinners. Oh, yeah, I saw how riled you got at Ah Sing’s when you told me about it. Three: During those tosses in the hay, Claire eggs you on, and you decide to cut loose from White Lotus, go off on your own, start a new business and make a zillion.”
“Now see here-” Edward starts.
“Shut up, you,” Cone says savagely. “Nothing wrong with your plan, but it’s the way you went about it that sticks in my craw. Your sixteen percent of White Lotus stock at the old price of thirty bucks a share would be worth a nice piece of change if you sold your stock on the open market. But it would take that to open a pizza parlor these days. You needed a lot more loot to start a frozen food operation.”
“Claire,” Edward says stiffly, “maybe you better phone the police.”
“Go ahead and call them,” Cone says. “And tell them to bring along reporters and photographers-you jerk! So your problem was how to increase your capital. The answer? Greenmail! You make a deal with Giant Panda. Those thugs play along because they’re anxious to get into a legitimate business and put all that money to work they’ve made from dope and shakedowns. The scam is this: Fronts for Giant Panda start buying White Lotus stock. The price goes up. When it’s high enough, as it was last week, Giant Panda makes a play for White Lotus, working through Yangtze International.
“Look, both of you know how much Chin Tung Lee loves his company. It’s his whole life. You figured he’d pay a premium to keep control. So Yangtze pretends they want to take over when what they really want is for Chin to pay greenmail-buy their shares at more than the market price. That would yield enough dough for you to start your frozen dinner business.”
“You’re insane,” Edward Lee says in a low voice.
“Sure I am,” Cone admits cheerily. “But I’m also right. Almost everything fits: Your father’s need to hang onto the company he created. Your need to get your new business started and prove you’re as smart an operator as your old man. And Giant Panda’s need to get into a legitimate moneymaker. What was the deal? Were they going to give you a controlling interest? Like shit they were! Those guys are gangsters, even if they work through a financial front on Pine Street. You’d be lucky to end up with thirty percent. Am I right or am I right?”
Edward Lee, stunned, makes no reply, but Claire does. “You said ‘almost everything fits.’ What doesn’t fit?”
“You don’t,” he tells her. “You and Edward could have taken over White Lotus anytime you wanted. Between the two of you, there’s enough stock to elect your own Board of Directors and put the old man out to pasture. But you didn’t go that route. Why not? Mrs. Lee, I make you for a streetwise lady who’s always had an eye on the main chance. You’re a nice-looking woman, no doubt about it, but when it comes to spine, you got short-changed.
“I figure your thinking went something like this: Yeah, I could go in with Edward on his greenmail scheme, but would it really be smart? What if Chin conks out tomorrow from a stroke or cardiac arrest and I inherit? It’s more than possible at his age. So maybe I should play my cards cautiously. If Edward’s plot comes off, and his business is a big success, then I’ll think about dumping the father and going with the son. But meanwhile I’ll play it cozy, let Edward carry the ball and see how far he gets. I’m young; I can afford to wait. If Edward’s a winner, I’ll go with him. If he takes a pratfall, it’s ta-ta, Eddie darling.”
“You’re disgusting,” she says, spitting it out.
“Oh, yeah,” Cone says, draining his drink. “Almost as disgusting as you two upright citizens.” He rises, places his empty glass on a bedside table. “Thanks for the belt. I’ve got to run along now. So much to do, doncha know.”
“Mr. Cone,” Edward Lee says nervously, “you’re not going to tell my father about the Bedlington matter, are you?”
“Like the lawyers say,” Cone tells him, “I’ll take it under advisement. Meanwhile, sweat a little. Now will someone show me how to get out of this damned place?”
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