by Marc Strange
And how did Gritch say you get there? A back stairwell from where? Twelve? No, not twelve, the eleventh floor.
Getting there is an act of will, and it takes a while. I sit, very carefully, on the eleventh-floor landing, outside the fire door, my left leg straight out, the knee so swollen I can see the shape inside my pant leg, my right hand cradled inside my jacket with my ruined tie wrapped around the forearm in a crude sling. If I’ve dropped my keys back on the stairwell below, I’m going to feel very sorry for myself. But the passkey is where it’s supposed to be, and it fits the lock. Then, with a few heaves at the heavy old door, I’m on the eleventh floor.
Floor Eleven is what the hotel’s most exclusive and expensive ballroom, formal dining room, and reception space is called. With the attendant private meeting rooms, conference rooms, powder rooms, kitchens and such, it takes up most of the actual eleventh floor, and on nights when there’s a major function, it requires a special pass simply to get off the elevator. Tonight it’s deserted. There’s nothing scheduled here until next week. The kitchens are empty, the ballroom is a vast echoing space, the dining hall is a landscape of bare tables bearing upended chairs.
And the thirteenth floor? According to Gritch, and I wish I’d paid closer attention, the thirteenth floor is some secret back slice of twelve. There’s another fire door somewhere, not the main one, but where is it? And then I hear Gritch reminding me that the walls near the elevators are different on this floor.
He’s right. I limp out of the ballroom to the reception area, an open space with windows looking down on city lights. The elevator bank is farther along a rich burgundy carpet, past leather chairs and wall sconces, to a wall that shouldn’t be there. On the floors below, or the floors above, I could keep heading in this direction and eventually reach the service elevators. The service elevators! They would have to be accessible to the eleventh floor for delivering food and drink, staff and linen.
Back through the ballroom I go, through the dining hall and kitchen, and into the corridor behind the kitchen, where I find the service elevators. That narrows it down. The thirteenth floor is in this quadrant, the northeast corner. The fire door has to be somewhere close by the dining room.
There are discreetly located ladies’ and gents’, there is a sizable wet bar, unstocked at present, with bar stools and a brass rail in an alcove. I see it in my mind. Images from a more decorous and decadent past. Cigar smoke and cognac, exclusive coteries of privileged men with position and money and an occasional need to indulge in something intemperate, discreetly removing themselves from the ladies and the glad-handing, finding their way to the bar alcove, where an accommodating bartender, privy to the special requirements of his black-tied guests, ushers those with the appropriate password around the end of the bar, through the narrow wine cellar, to … this door.
It opens without a key and leads me to a narrow landing with another short flight of stairs leading up. The railing on my right side is of no help whatsoever. I lean against the wall on my left and slide upward, one leaden step after another.
“I didn’t think you were going to make it,” Dan says. He’s five steps above me by an open door. “Come on up. I’ve got vodka.”
The thirteenth floor. After all the myth and mystery, it turns out to be a cramped, claustrophobic space. A bare hallway with six or eight private rooms, unfurnished, unlighted. Rooms for assignations, high-stakes poker games, sleeping off monumental benders. Dan is in the largest of them. He’s appropriated a pair of lamps from downstairs and has run an extension cord from somewhere. His bolt-hole is lit with Tiffany reproductions of grapes and vines. His bed is a cot mattress dragged up from one of the forgotten storerooms. For furniture he has a couple of empty pails upended on the bare floor. I read the stencilled HOUSEKEEPING logo upside down.
Dan’s jacket is torn, his shirt is dirty, his eyes are bloodshot. He’s running on reserve battery power, movements jerky, voice a rasp. He’s angry, and he’s very sorry for himself. And he’s pointing a gun at my chest.
“Sit down,” he orders. “Grab a pail. You look like shit.”
I don’t mention his appearance, lower myself carefully onto a pail that once held ammonia. I can feel it up my nose. Or maybe the toilets aren’t working. “How long have you been up here, Dan?”
“Off and on most of the week. I had to get out from time to time. You know. Phone calls. Like that.”
“Trip to the island.”
“Ha! We were on the same fucking ferry coming back from Nanaimo. Believe it?”
“How did you get off Gabriola? The Mounties must have been watching the first ferry.”
“I was on the last ferry off. I drove right by you when I landed in Nanaimo. You were waiting to get on. Surprised the hell out of me. I thought for a minute you’d seen me. You were right on my ass and didn’t know it.”
“Why did you stick around in Nanaimo? I didn’t get a ferry to the mainland until noon.”
“Things to do. Negotiations.”
“With?”
“Well, now, that’s just it, isn’t it? It’s the fucking middlemen who kill every fucking thing, isn’t it? I have to deal with shitheads like fat Axe Axelrode when it’s really the big boys I should be talking to. I told him, too. I told him I wasn’t going to sit in some stupid motel room dickering over chump change while he made a sweetheart deal with his superiors. Fuck that. I wanted to talk to Wade Hubble.”
“Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars isn’t chump change, Dan.”
“No? First of all, there wasn’t two-fifty, closer to two, after expenses, after burning a couple of wads in Lloyd’s fireplace. If I split what’s left with Axe, I’m holding a hundred K. And I owe almost that much around town. Can you believe it? I managed to run my tab up close to a hundred K. Fourteen to Randall, ten to Ivan Doncheff, six to the asshole who runs the book for Rolf Kalman out of the staff kitchen. Plus all the vig. That mounts up like you wouldn’t believe.”
Dan transfers the gun to his left hand and rummages behind himself until he locates a half-empty bottle of Absolut. He puts it between his feet to twist off the cap. The gun doesn’t waver. “I was in the hole sixty, sixty-five K.” He takes a drink. “Doesn’t leave much left over with Prana and Doris on my ass. Not enough.”
“Prana’s in the hospital.”
“I know. I feel shitty about that.”
“Who did it?”
“That fat prick at the bottom of the stairs! Fuck him. He still wanted half the money! Can you believe that? Why should I give it to him? He did fuck all. I’m the one who did all the work. I had the whole deal. I knew what I was going to do with it. It was his gun killed the guy. It was his gun Arnie shot himself with. Fuck him. We set up a meet. He told me where, and I told him to screw himself. I was calling the shots, not him. So he went to Prana and tried to beat it out of her where I was. He got what he deserved.”
“How did he wind up here?”
“I called Prana from an outside phone. She sounded so small. She said I should watch myself, that the man who beat her would kill me. I told her to get to a hospital. She waited by the phone to warn me.”
“You knew where he was?”
“Sure, he was crashing with his dumb-ass brother-in-law in Coquitlam. I had his number. I said, ‘Okay, Axe, you win. Come and get it.’ Stupid fuck. He got it.” He has another drink, keeps his eyes on me, keeps his gun on me.
“You want a blast?”
“Sure, why not?” Dan pushes the bottle towards me with his foot, and I have to lean far forward to grab it with my left hand. I sip carefully, avoiding the split in my bottom lip, then take a deeper pull, grateful for the sudden rush of heat, false strength, and pain relief.
“What the fuck happened to you?” he asks.
“Axelrode landed on top of me. Close to three hundred pounds.”
“Yeah. Bet he didn’t feel a thing.”
I take a last moderate taste, put the bottle on the floor, and push it towards him with my
right foot. “How did you track Arnie down?”
“Arnie stole the money, then when he got a chance to sit down and count it, he found out that wasn’t the only thing he had. At first he thought it was just some short story bullshit Buzz was writing. It was in ballpoint for fuck’s sake — pages torn out of a scribbler. But then he started reading, and the stupid prick realized what he had his hands on. Without even trying he’d grabbed the big prize.”
“Then what?”
“He called Neagle and told him he wanted to make a deal. He didn’t care who with. Neagle called Axelrode. Axe called me.”
“Why would Axe call you?”
He shakes his head. “Figure it out. I told you that first night. I used to work for Axehandle Security. Axe grabbed me in the hallway before you got there. He said I should pick my time and snatch the case, then he and I would split the money. He said the guy wouldn’t even care if it was gone. He’d just get more from the bank. He was giving it away, anyway, so why shouldn’t he give some to us? I was up to my eyes in shit and a tidal wave was coming. You kidding? I said done deal.”
“Axe gave you the gun?”
“Stuck it in my pocket. He said, ‘Just in case.’ What do I care? I’m already counting the money.”
“But when you got there the money was already gone.”
“Story of my fucking life.” He holds the bottle for a moment, measuring how much is left of vodka, of everything. He has another pull.
“So Arnie had the money and the will he wasn’t expecting,” I say. “And he wanted to make a deal. And you were supposed to do the negotiations?”
“Arnie said Axe should go to Nanaimo, check into some motel, and he’d call. When Arnie called the room and found out that it was me he was talking to, he relaxed. He asked me to pick him up some food. Lloyd’s fridge was empty.”
“Why did you kill him?”
“Ah, man, he killed himself. I just helped him point the fucking gun. He was so drunk, and he was crying, the fat fuck. He was weeping like a woman.”
“But why? He was no threat.”
“Sure he was. He was the loose end. He was going to get caught. And he was the best alibi.” Dan stands up. “I’ve got to piss. Just sit there.”
He leaves the room, and I hear him relieving himself into a porcelain bowl across the hall. A tap is turned on, and I hear squeaking brass and gurgling water. The plumbing still works up here. He comes back into the room, his face wet, hair slicked back, bouncing on the balls of his feet, trying to pump a few more ccs of energy into his weary body.
“What about Neagle?” I ask.
“That wasn’t me. Swear to Jesus, Joe. Jesus and all his merry men. It was that fat fuck at the bottom of the stairs. He was losing it, going crazy. Didn’t trust anybody, figured I was shafting him, that Neagle was shafting him. He was like a runaway freight train. He accused Neagle of making a deal with me to cut him out of the picture.”
“Were you?”
“Sure, what the fuck? Who needed him? Neagle was the guy I was doing business with. Why would I kill him? He was the one who suddenly had a client again. If he could’ve gotten the will, Molly MacKay would’ve been rolling in it.”
“Be hard to get your money up front, wouldn’t it?”
“Fuck, think I didn’t know that? Having Neagle on the hook just made my position stronger. What I really wanted was to make a deal with Wade Hubble. I knew he could pay cash.”
“How much money did you burn up?”
“Shit, that was fun. Only ten thousand or so, but I made it look like more.”
“You’ve got the will?”
“Yeah, I’ve got it. It’s still my ace in the hole, Joe. It’s my big chip.”
“It’s going to be hard to cash in. There’s a good chance Wade Hubble and Edwin Gowins are going to be investigated for fraud. They won’t be in a position to make any deals with you. And Molly doesn’t have any money to pay you up front. You’ve run out of options, Dan. I think you should start facing it. It’s over.”
He finishes the vodka to the last drop and looks at the empty with sadness and resentment. “It’s that first roll of the dice, Joe. That’s the killer. Hoo-boy! Stay away from that one and nothing can go wrong. But roll them one time, one time, you stupid, gutless dipshit, one lousy time, and you’re in it up to your eyes.”
“What was the first roll?”
“Fuck,” Dan says, so wearily it sounds like a whisper. “The first roll? Who can go back that far? Was it the first time I won a hand at poker and said this was the life for me? Was that the reason I doubled my bets all my useless life, looking for one lousy jackpot to get me off the treadmill, one major score to pay them all off, all the debts, all the goons, all the dumb moves I ever made?”
“I’m sorry it got that bad, Dan.”
“Yeah. You, Mr. Straight Arrow. Never took a dive for money, did you? Never skimmed a nickel from the hotel, never took a kickback from hookers, or liquor salesmen, or laundry service? Not Joe Grundy. No, sir.”
“Tell me what happened with Buzz, Dan.”
“Axe said we were going to split the money, but he wanted the legal document. It was in the new briefcase. Along with the money. But fucking Arnie screwed it up before I even got there. I tore the place apart looking for the will, and that fat prick already had it stashed. That was when the guy came back to the room. He had Phil Marsden from room service with him. Phil was waiting at the door. Me, I was in the fucking bedroom. I heard the guy say, ‘I’ll have to take care of you tomorrow.’ And Marsden said, ‘No problemo. You got me already.’ Then he took off. And the guy came into the bedroom and looked at all the stuff lying around and saw me standing behind the door.”
“What did he say to you?”
“Nothing. You know what kind of day I had? At the track? Before I came in that night? Have you any idea what it’s like to be up two thousand by three in the afternoon and then cleaned out by five? So broke you have to borrow bus fare to get to the pawnshop?”
“He didn’t say anything?”
“He said, ‘Take it all.’”
“Why did you shoot him?”
“There wasn’t anything to take! He was standing there with this stupid smile like he was some kind of fucking higher being and I was this lowlife dipshit. So I thought, This is what my fucking life has come to. I’m standing in a fucking hotel room in the middle of the fucking night like a complete asshole. There was no suitcase, there was no money, I was rooting through this guy’s dirty underwear, my life was fucked, I owed money to ugly people who were going to kill me any frickin’ day, and this prick bastard was smiling at me. So I said, ‘Take fucking what? There isn’t anything, ass-wipe, shit-hole, to fucking take.’ Nothing. Nothing. Crapped out again. And he said, ‘I guess someone got here before you did.’ And so I shot the fucker. He didn’t have to rub it in.”
We hear voices coming up the secret stairs. Gritch’s is among them, and Connie’s, and Weed’s.
“He’s got a gun!” I yell out.
“I’ve got a gun!” Dan shouts at almost the same instant. A warning and a threat in unison.
“You okay, Joe?” Weed asks.
“I’m fine. We’re just talking it over. Tell the others to go back downstairs.”
“I’ve got backup coming,” Weed says. “Uniforms.” His voice is closer now, maybe three doors down the hall. “You’ve got no place to go, Dan. Why don’t you lose the gun and come out? We’ll make it as easy as we can.”
“How’s Prana?” Dan asks.
“She’s going to be okay, Dan. She’s fine. Nothing broken. You want to talk to her? I can arrange that.” “No thanks,” Dan says. “That’s all right.” And then he sticks the barrel of the gun in his mouth and shoots the back of his head off.
chapter forty-two
We’re nicely settled into October now. The Lord Douglas is running smoothly again. Lloyd Gruber managed to hang on to his job, though I get the impression there was an element of grovelling involv
ed. Rachel Golden now pretty much manages JG Security for me. I still pull a few shifts, but mostly I just roam the place and anticipate things. Gritch does his time in the lobby, reading his papers and seeing everything. Larry Gormé is point man for the Emblem’s coverage of the Prescott Holdings/Horizon Foundation scandal.
Both Hubble and Gowins may be going to jail if they can’t come up with a suitable explanation for the evaporation of a hundred million dollars or more. That trial will drag on for some time. Jeremy, the whistle-blower, didn’t automatically become the managing director of the Horizon Foundation — there isn’t anything to either manage or direct just now, other than the traffic jams of forensic accountants, tax assessors, duelling lawyers, and court-appointed overseers. Nonetheless, he appears to have gained a level of celebrity as the Crown’s star witness in the fraud case and should be able to parlay that into some worthy position in whatever new entity Molly MacKay establishes once she’s proven her case. She and Bubba are living in Prescott’s cabin at Harrison Lake. I’ve been invited to the wedding.
The city has seen a succession of vintage days, if you don’t mind a steady west wind keeping the skies clear and the surf all worked up. Stanley Park is showing a fine array of autumn colour, and the bright green grass above the beach is littered with red, gold, and yellow leaves, dry enough to dance in the wind.
Norman Quincy Weed, with his eye for complementary colours, has chosen his wardrobe with care this bright morning — purple tie, brown suit, black shoes. If his socks are blue, I won’t be surprised.
“Can’t we find a better place?” he asks.
“Is there such a thing?”
“Yeah, when the sun shines you forget the two weeks of drizzle that went before. I mean, for sitting down. Last time here I sat on a log. Preparation H didn’t do me any good. What’s that you’re wearing?”
