Don't Ask

by Donald E. Westlake

  But there were times when this resource should not be lightly dismissed, and this was one of them. Stan drove, slow and easy, passing a lot of excellent vehicles that Max would really appreciate, but the fact was, Stan had his heart set on dark green Mercedes with fawn upholstery tonight, and there it was] Perfect. The same car. Stan stopped the lemon, got out, incur sed the new Mercedes, backed it out of its slot, drove the lemon into that location instead, and briefly considered switching license plates. There was nothing to be gained from that, though, except the long-distance scrambling of a onetime Mercedes owner's brain, so Stan left the lemon intact and drove to the exit, where the toll taker looked at his ticket and said, "You weren't in there long."

  "I realized," Stan told him, "I don't want to go anywhere. I'm going home and tell the little woman everything, and see can we work it out."

  "Good idea," the tolltaker said. He took Stan's money, and when he gave him his change he also gave him some advice: "Probly," he said, "you don't have to tell her everything."

  "You may be right," Stan said, and drove the new Mercedes--a cream puff, a delight--to Maximilian's Used Cars, lighted, after dark, by what appeared to be all the night-game lights from the former Wrigley Field.

  A little discussion with Max provided a dollar figure they could both be happy with, and then Stan took the subway home to Canarsie, where his Mom, eating a pizza before taking her cab out for some of the late-night airport action, said, "Sit down, Stan, have a slice. Pepperoni."

  "Thanks, Mom." Stan got a paper plate from the shelf and a beer from the refrigerator and joined his Mom at the kitchen table. "You gonna be late tonight?" he asked.

  "Nah," she said. "Just a couple hours. Go over to Kennedy, take a fare to Manhattan, hang around the hotels, the next one brings me out to the airport, I call it a night."

  "I was at Kennedy a while ago," Stan said. 'Traffic wasn't bad. You could do a Hundred-thirtieth Street, get there like that." He tried to snap his fingers, but they were full of oil from the pizza slice and just slid around together, not making any noise at all.

  "Thank you, Stan," his Mom said. Companionably, they ate some pizza, drank some beer, and then she said, "Before I forget. Actually, I already forgot, but now I just remembered."

  "Yeah?"

  "Tiny Bulcher called. He'd like a meeting tonight at midnight."

  Stan glanced at the wall clock; not yet ten. "I guess so," he said. "He say who's gonna be there?"

  "John, he said, and Andy, and some other guy."

  "AttheOJ?"

  "No, he said the other guy got drunk after the meeting last time and kind of broke some things at the OJ, so Rollo eighty-sixed him."

  "Eighty-sixed Tiny›"

  "No, the other guy. I didn't get the name."

  "Grijk Krugnk."

  His Mom gave him a concerned look. "You coming down with something?"

  "No, that's the guy's name. Grijk Krugnk. I may not be pronouncing it exactly right."

  "Well, you won't get an argument from me," his Mom said. "Anyway, Tiny says, you should meet at his place."

  "Yeah?" Stan finished his pizza and smiled. "Tiny's place. Okay. Be nice to see J. C. Taylor again."

  Taylor looked at herself in the mirror and saw how the frown lines detracted from her hard beauty. Knowing that anger ruined her looks only made her angrier; with her pale skin and heavy brunette hair and hard eyes and now these deep frown lines all over the place, she was beginning to look like the Queen in "Snow White " when she looks into her mirror. However, instead of asking who was the fairest of them all, J.C. glared past her own reflected shoulder at the reflection of Tiny on the other side of the bedroom and said, "A party at midnight. I haven't had so much fun since I was the sweetheart of Iota Kappa Rho."

  "Come on, Josie," Tiny said. He looked right now like a baffled bear, disturbed in his hibernation by a census taker, wanting to answer the questions but having trouble getting the situation into focus. (He was also the only person on earth who called J. C. Taylor Josie.) "It ain't a party," he tried to explain, "it's a meeting. And you don't have to be there, you don't want."

  "Oh, sure," J.C. said. "You're bringing John and Andy and Stan into the house, the whole crowd from the Avalon caper, and when they say, Where's J.C.?' you'll say, 'She didn't want to see you guys, she went to the movies.'"

  "Eighty-sixed Tiny)"

  "No, the other guy. I didn't get the name."

  "Grijk Krugnk."

  His Mom gave him a concerned look. "You coming down with something?"

  "No, that's the guy's name. Grijk Krugnk. I may not be pronouncing it exactly right."

  "Well, you won't get an argument from me," his Mom said. "Anyway, Tiny says, you should meet at his place."

  I C. Taylor looked at herself in the mirror and saw how the frown lines detracted from her hard beauty. Knowing that anger ruined her looks only made her angrier; with her pale skin and heavy brunette hair and hard eyes and now these deep frown lines all over the place, she was beginning to look like the Queen in "Snow White " when she looks into her mirror. However, instead of asking who was the fairest of them all, J.C. glared past her own reflected shoulder at the reflection of Tiny on the other side of the bedroom and said, "A party at midnight. I haven't had so much fun since I was the sweetheart of Iota Kappa Rho."

  "Come on, Josie," Tiny said. He looked right now like a baffled bear, disturbed in his hibernation by a census taker, wanting to answer the questions but having trouble getting the situation into focus. (He was also the only person on earth who called J. C. Taylor Josie.) "It ain't a party," he tried to explain, "it's a meeting. And you don't have to be there, you don't want."

  "Oh, sure," J.C. said. "You're bringing John and Andy and Stan into the house, the whole crowd from the Avalon caper, andTiny shrugged, an impressive movement. "So you come to the meeting."

  "Looking like this?"

  "You look great," Tiny told her, with such sincerity that she had to accept the compliment as real, if ignorant. She knew what she looked like.

  Tiny came around the bed to stand behind her, his head now above hers in the mirror, and grin at her reflection. "You're terrific, Josie," he rumbled, his usual airplane engine of a voice modulating down to a kind of heavy purr, like a well-fed lion. "Any room you walk into," he said,

  "you own it."

  She loved it when he talked like that, but she didn't want entirely to give up her bad mood. "Not dressed like this," she said, and the doorbell sounded at the other end of the apartment. "Go on, Tiny, I've got to change."

  "Okay." He patted her head and her back--she braced herself against the mirror--and left the room.

  He'd sprung this party/meeting on her at the last minute, of course. She was still dressed for the office, in a demure long sleeved white blouse and full-cut black slacks and soft leather black boots; which would not do. (She'd been working late, filling orders.) Oh, well. She crossed to the closet, opened the door, and stood looking disconsolately into its interior like a teenager into a refrigerator.

  Nothing to wear, not a thing, as anyone on earth except Tiny would realize at a glance.

  After some little time, with deep reluctance, J.C. began to reach into the refrig--into the closet, and toss vague possibilities onto the bed.

  Then she put some back. Then she took some others out.

  When, a mere twelve minutes later, J.C. entered the living room--this had been her place originally, which Tiny had moved into, rather than the other way around, so it looked like a normal apartment in a building on Riverside Drive and not like a hollowed-out tree--she was dressed in charcoal silk slacks, chartreuse silk blouse, and black satin slippers.

  Also, she'd changed to more dangling earrings, the ones with the diamond chips, chosen a slender silver bracelet, and rearranged her hair to more of a Rita Hayworth look. All makeup, naturally, had had to be redone, to go with the new outfit. And all this, she knew in her heart of hearts, for a bunch of slobs who wouldn't notice if she walked in
wearing a poncho and shower clogs.

  We do it for ourselves, not for them, she reminded herself, as them got to their feet, smiling in pleasure, and cried, "J.C.! Hey, J.C.! Long time no see!" So. John looked as hangdog as ever, Andy as chipper as ever, and Stan as bluntly serviceable as ever. They'd been sitting with beers, and now Tiny offered her one, which she accepted. "In a glass, please." It was provided, she sat in the black slipper chair in the corner--Grijk Krugnk was in her normal morris chair, over by the view of the river and New Jersey--and settled herself to listen.

  Normally, J.C. didn't concern herself about Tiny^s business, nor did he concern himself with hers, except to wish out loud every once in a while that she'd drop her best-selling line, which she had no intention of doing. From a two-room midtown office, J.C. ran a mail-order business; in fact, three of them. There was Super Star Music, which would--depending on the customer-- put music to your lyrics or lyrics to your music, at a really very moderate cost, when you consider the salaries of people like Mick Jagger and Early Simon. There was the allied Commissioners' Courses, which was a book that taught you how to be a police detective; bonus handcuffs and badge were included with every order. And there was Intertherapeutic Research Service, a profusely illustrated marital sex manual allegedly translated from the Danish but with here and there a somewhat younger J.C. identifiable in the persona of the "wife." (Guess which line Tiny wished she'd drop.) So, being a one-person operation, she had plenty to think about without worrying about Tin/s business. But, as long as she was here--or they were here--she might as well listen. And John was now saying, "So all of a sudden you got money."

  He'd said that to Grijk Krugnk, but it was Tiny who answered, saying,

  "Not all of a sudden, Dortmunder. It was hard for this tiny country."

  "Bud we have American recognition," Grijk said, raising a fat finger.

  "Wery helpful."

  John turned toward him. "You don't mind my asking," he said, "you guys were dirt-poor last time we talked, didn't have any whatchacallit currency--"

  "Hard," Grijk said, nodding his big bald head.

  "Right. So where'd you get the money?"

  "We took a loan," Grijk told him, "from Citibank."

  That astonished everybody. "From a bank›" Andy said. "InNew Torkr "Wery easy," Grijk assured them all. "Wery simple. Our first tought was da International Monetary Fund, but dey god too many forms you fill out, inspectors come to your country, dey look at your fi-w«w-cial records, id's just too much trouble. So da hell vit it, we vent to da bank."

  "Banks won't give loans to people" Stan said in the tones of outrage he usually reserved for traffic jams. "My Mom knows some cabdrivers, can't get any kind of loan. Working stiffs, good credit. Taxi loan, house mortgage, home improvement, refinancing, you name it, you can forget it."

  "Oh, no, no," Grijk said, "not if you're a pipple. Pipples don't ged no money from a bank. Bud if you're a country, no problem."

  Tiny said, "I looked into this with Grijk, and it's true. There's countries haven't even paid the vigorish on their loans in nobody remembers how long, never mind the main money, and the banks go ahead and loan them some more, anyway."

  J.C., more interested in this conversation than she'd expected to be, said, "How do I get to be a country?"

  Grijk took that as a serious question, having recently gone through the experience himself. "First," he answered, "you have a var."

  John, ever the pessimist, said, "Uh, Grijk, you got an okay, or you got the money?"

  "Da money," Grijk announced.

  "That's good," John said. "So you can actually pay us for this operation."

  "Ten tousand dollars a man," Grijk said, and slapped his palms down onto his thighs, as though he'd just said something really terrific.

  The others exchanged glances, and J.C. sensed a little discrepancy here.

  John said, "Uh, well, Grijk, last time we talked it was fifty thou.

  Remember?"

  "Bud dat," Grijk pointed out, "was in draffs."

  "Still."

  "In Tsergovia."

  This was apparently an irrefutable argument. J.C. watched the troops silently consult among themselves, with much shrugging and grimacing and eyebrow waggling, and then John turned back to Grijk and said, "How much in front?"

  "One tousand dollars," Grijk told him promptly, as though it were a number he was proud of. "Each man."

  John looked at Tiny. "Tiny," he said, "are you putting this guy up to this?"

  "I told him, Dortmunder," Tiny said, "and he wouldn't listen to me, and I accept no responsibility." To Grijk, he said, "Didn't I tell you?

  They're gonna want fifty percent, I told you."

  Grijk spread his hands, showing bewilderment. "You give a man half da money, he's doing nutting," he said, "den he's supposed to do everyting, and all he gets is anodder half? Why don't he just take da first half and quit right dere?"

  "Because, Cousin," Tiny said, sounding like somebody on the brink of relative trouble, "I guarantee them to you, and I guarantee you to them.

  You got a problem with my guarantee?"

  Grijk studied his American cousin. He could be seen to weigh the pros and cons of certain alternatives. He said, "Okay, Diny." With a big smile at the troops, showing more spaces than teeth-- That's why he doesn't smile very often, J.C. realized, having previously guessed at other motivations--he said, "Half da money. Okay?"

  "Fine," John said.

  Grijk sat back, still smiling, pleased, ready to go on, and the troops sat there and looked at him, and the silence grew. J.C. was almost beginning to feel sorry for the guy, as Grijk finally noticed that something was still wrong and said, "Okay? Not okay?"

  "You're paying us half," John said, "in front."

  "Yes, yes, I agree to dat."

  "When?"

  "Vad?"

  "When is 'in front'?"

  Grijk looked toward Tiny for guidance: "Now?" he suggested.

  "No time like the present," Tiny told him.

  It was then J.C. noticed the big old-fashioned brown leather briefcase sagging on the floor beside the morris chair. Grijk brought up this collectible, put it on his lap, undid both leather straps, unhooked the central brass clasp, opened the wide-mouth top, and let his fingers do the walking down inside there for a while. He brought out a thick manila envelope, studied it, put it back, did more vamping inside there, brought out another thick manila envelope (or maybe the same one, doubling in a second role), put that on his lap, and returned the still-open briefcase to the floor. He unclasped and opened the manila envelope and shook a lot of wads of bills onto his lap. Tucking the empty envelope into the space between his thigh and the chair arm--the narrow space, even when he hunched over a bit--he held up one of these wads, with a Citibank band on it, and said, "Fifty twenty dollar bills.

  One tousand dollars. Five each man. Okay?"

  "Sounds good, Grijk," John said.

  Grijk smiled at John. "You da only one can say my name right," he said.

  "Oh, yeah?" John didn't seem to know exactly how to handle this information. "I'm glad," he said.

  "So lemme gi-your money."

  "Okay," John said.

  Grijk struggled and floundered, having trouble getting out of the soft morris chair with all the wads of money in his lap. After he got nowhere for a few seconds, Andy said brightly, "Let me help with that," and bounded out of his chair and across the room to grab up a lot of cash.

  "Tanks, Andy."

  Andy turned to Tiny, but Tiny waved him away, saying, "I got a different deal. Not a better one, Andy, believe me. Believe me."

  "I believe you, Tiny."

  Andy distributed wads of money to John and Stan and himself, and it was fascinating to J.C. how all that paper just seemed to disappear. Very soon, the three were sitting there just as they had been before, beers in hand, expectant expressions on faces, money nowhere to be seen.

  "Before we start," John said, "I know this doesn't have anything to
do with the job itself, the job itself is we just go in and get the bone and come out and hand it over, but before we start I just got to ask you: How can a bone get you into the UN›"

  Grijk would have answered, but Tiny stopped him with a raised hand, saying, "Let me, okay?" To the others, he said, "I had the same question, and I asked Grijk, and he told me, and an hour and a half later I understood. So you could hear his version, or you could hear my version that leaves out all the wonderful details."

  "Your version," John said, and Stan and Andy nodded. Grijk looked sad.

  "Okay. In twelve hundred and something, this girl got killed and eaten by her family, all except the leg with the gangrene. So when the Catholic Church decided she was a saint, that leg--or the bone, there was just a bone by then--it was a relic."

  "A relic with gangrene," John said. "Not by then," Tiny said. "I'm just giving you the highlights here, Dortmunder."

  "Okay, Tiny."

  "By that time," Tiny went on, "the bone was in the cathedral at a place called Novi Glad, that was the capital of one of the provinces of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. That province was half Tsergovia and half Votskojek."

  Grijk made a weird sound in his throat, almost like a growl. J.C. blinked at the sound, but no one else paid any attention to it.

  Tiny continued: "Also by that time, you got two religions involved. You got the regular Roman Catholic Church out of Rome, that said that leg was a saint to begin with. I mean, the girl was the saint, the whole girl. And then there was a schism, the Eastern Unorthodox."

  Stan said, "Jewish, you mean."

  "No, no," Tiny said, waving a big meaty hand. "There's no Jews around there."

  "Dere was vun," Grijk said, "bud he vent to Belgrade. Or Lvov, maybe.

  Somevere. Anyway, now we godda ged our suits from Hong Kong. It ain'd da same." "That's the long version, Grijk, do you mind?" Tiny said, and turned back to his audience. "The Catholic Church split up," he said,