by Parnell Hall
Sure enough, that’s who the two guys hanging out proved to be, and in no time at all I had signed up my fourth case of the day and was tooling back to Manhattan to keep a rendezvous with the fair Marlena.
Which was not entirely kosher. It was, in fact, the very thing Richard had warned me about. Specifically, he had told me if something like this happened, to call him first.
Only, Richard always left the office by four, so by the time I got the phone call from Marlena, he was long gone. And his home number was unlisted and I didn’t have it, so there was no way I could get in touch with him. That may seem strange for a lawyer, but Richard wasn’t a criminal lawyer, he was a negligence lawyer, and accident victims weren’t going to be calling up at three in the morning wanting to be bailed out of the hospital.
Anyway, there was no way I could reach him, so I had to make the decision myself. Which was not that hard. After all, I hadn’t agreed to do anything except meet her. And it was either that or turn her down. In agreeing to the meeting, all I’d really decided was to postpone the decision.
Or so I told myself as I sailed over the Brooklyn Bridge, curved around the southern tip of Manhattan and headed up West Street. I went crosstown on Fourteenth, then back down Seventh Avenue to Sheridan Square.
She was right where she’d said she’d be, on the corner in front of United Cigar. I pulled into the curb, leaned over and opened the passenger door. She jumped in, slammed and locked the door, then turned to me breathlessly.
“Drive,” she said.
That was a little much.
“Hey,” I said. “What’s the big deal?”
“Damn it, don’t talk. Just drive.”
I gave her a look, but pulled out from the curb and headed on down Seventh Avenue.
“All right, what’s the deal?” I said. “Are you being blackmailed, or threatened, or what?”
“You don’t understand.”
“I certainly don’t. I’m not sure I want to. You wanna tell me why all the cloak-and-dagger stuff?”
“I don’t know if I’m being watched.”
“By whom?”
“I don’t know.”
I let that sit there, continued to drive. Seventh Avenue turned into Varick. I kept on going downtown.
“Where are you going?” she said.
“I have no idea,” I said. “You told me to drive. You wanna name a destination, I’ll head for it.”
“No. Just drive. I’ll tell you when to turn.”
“Nice of you.”
“Damn it,” she said. “Don’t tease me. I’m scared.”
“So I gathered. You realize I have no idea why.”
“I told you. It’s Barry. He has more pictures. And the negatives.”
“I understand. But why does that pose a physical threat?”
“It doesn’t, but ... I don’t know. I’m just scared.”
“How’s Canal seem?’“ I said.
“What? Oh yeah. Fine.”
I hung a left on Canal, headed for Chinatown.
“All right, look,” I said. “You wanna tell me what you want?”
The big floppy purse was on her lap. She reached in and pulled out a sealed envelope. A fat one.
“I want you to take this and give it to Barry.”
“In return for?”
She looked at me. “What do you think? The negatives and the prints.”
“Well, that’s a bit of a switch.”
“Why?”
“Before, I was buying a sealed envelope. No questions asked. Now I’m buying negatives and prints. Am I supposed to verify the fact that what I’m buying are the negatives and prints? I mean, if Barry doesn’t open the envelope this time, should I open it?”
It was hard to watch her closely and drive down Canal at the same time, but I think her eyes faltered some at that. But I could have just imagined it, ’cause I happened to be negotiating a yellow light.
“Barry will show you the negatives,” she said.
“What if he doesn’t?”
“Why do you ask, what if he doesn’t? He will.”
“I haven’t agreed to do this yet,” I said.
“What are you talking about? Of course you’re going to do this.”
“I never said so. We’re just talking here.”
“Why wouldn’t you do it? It’s exactly the same thing.”
“No, it isn’t,” I said. “Which is exactly the point I’m making. You hired me before as a delivery boy. Deliver one package and pick up another. I didn’t even know what they were. Now I do know, and it’s very specific—negatives and prints. Now, does that become my responsibility, or am I still just a delivery boy, bringing you back whatever this creep chooses to give?”
“You’re responsible for the negatives and prints. Because that’s what he’ll give you.”
I sighed.
I pulled the car over to the curb and stopped.
“What are you doing?” she said.
“I’m stopping the car.”
“Why?”
“Because I am a free and independent human being. And that is what I choose to do.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Me neither. I am wondering if you are a free and independent human being, doing what you choose to do.”
“I’m being blackmailed.”
“Aside from that.” I shrugged. “I know that sounds stupid, but try the concept. You’ll pardon me, but you sounded like you were parroting instructions someone had given you. If this is the case, we have little to discuss, and I would like to talk to that person. Because I am not prepared to proceed the way things are. I am asking for specific instructions to govern certain eventualities. If these things can’t be discussed, that ends my involvement in this affair.”
She put her hands on my shoulders. “No, no. I’m sorry. We can get by this. What was your question again?”
“If Barry doesn’t show me the negatives and the pictures, do I open the envelope myself to verify that’s what they are?”
She took a breath, exhaled, seemed to be making up her mind. “Yeah,” she said. “Do that.”
“And if the negatives aren’t in the package, I don’t hand over the money?”
“They will be,” she said. When I looked at her, she added hastily, “But if they aren’t, of course not. Then you wouldn’t pay.”
“I see,” I said. “So, I’m right.”
“About what?”
“About this being an entirely different transaction. I’m no longer just a messenger. I’m being employed to take charge and deal with the situation.”
She frowned. “I suppose so. What’s the difference?”
“The difference,” I said, “is that the added responsibility would of course command more money.”
She’d had trouble with what I’d been saying before, but she had no trouble with that.
“Of course,” she said.
And she pulled open the top of her drawstring purse, took out her wallet, and calmly counted out ten one-hundred-dollar bills.
9.
I KNOW I SHOULDN’T HAVE done it. But as I said, I couldn’t reach Richard. And you have no idea how big that stack of hundred-dollar bills looked to a family man trying to support a wife and kid in New York City.
And, what the hell. Richard’s advice had been to make the first blackmail payment. Well, not really. Actually, his advice had been not to make the first blackmail payment. Once I’d chosen to do so anyway, his opinion was that I probably wouldn’t get into any trouble doing it.
And this was really just the same thing. Even though it wasn’t. Not with me empowered to insist on the negatives. Though that probably wouldn’t matter, since Barry’d probably show them to me anyway. After all, he’d showed me the pictures the first time.
And he wasn’t supposed to.
That was the unsettling thought. He’d shown me the pictures when he wasn’t supposed to. So what would he do when he was supposed to? Show them to me because
he liked showing them to me? Or not show them to me, because he liked being contrary?
Why was I indulging in such profitless, idle speculation? Perhaps because I had nothing better to do. Because tonight Barry didn’t happen to be in unit twelve of the motel, the nice, convenient motel just off the Saw Mill River Parkway. The one that was a piece of cake to get to and that I felt comfortable with and that I wished I was driving to right now. But no, that would have been entirely too easy.
So what was I doing instead? Hanging out on a street corner next to a pay phone waiting for it to ring.
Did you ever do that? Probably not, unless you’re a pimp or a dope peddler or a member of some other profession who naturally uses a pay phone in the normal course of your business. But in case you don’t happen to fall into that category, let me tell you it’s no fun.
What made it worse was the pay phone didn’t happen to be anywhere near Canal Street, which was where Marlena and I were when I agreed to do it. Or anywhere near Sheridan Square, which was where I dropped her off again. No, the pay phone happened to be way the fuck uptown, right by the George Washington Bridge. Well, not by the bridge exactly, that would have made it in the water, but on Broadway in front of the bus terminal. Which is right where the bridge comes out, which is probably why the bus terminal is there.
Why I was there was beyond me. Now don’t get me wrong—from my point of view, I was there for the stack of hundred-dollar bills Marlena had counted out. I meant from Barry’s point of view. Why of all places did he have to send me there?
But he had, and he’d been very specific. Marlena had given me not only the location of the phone booth but the phone number as well, so I could double-check that I was at the right phone. Which I had and I was, so there I was, standing on the corner like an asshole, waiting for the damn thing to ring.
Which, Marlena had told me, might take some time. She had been instructed to have her representative there by eight o’clock. She didn’t necessarily mean the phone would ring by eight o’clock—I was to be there between the hours of eight and ten. That seemed pretty damned excessive to me, but then I guess blackmailers have never been noted for their consideration. All I know is, I got there at a quarter to eight, and no matter what I’d been told, I expected the phone to ring at eight o’clock, and when it didn’t, I was pissed.
I was also somewhat hassled. See, by virtue of being right outside a bus station, this particular phone happened to be rather popular. Since I had to keep the line free for an incoming call, I was forced to stand there holding the receiver and surreptitiously pressing down the metal lever that hangs up the phone, and pretending to talk.
This did not fool one little old lady with a suitcase almost as big as she was who wanted to call a cab. She was most insistent, and I might have had to give in to her if a vacant taxi hadn’t happened to drive by and I wasn’t able to hail it for her. With a great feeling of relief, I helped her load her suitcase into the back of the cab.
Just in time to see the meter maid coming down the block toward my car. I was at a meter, my time had just run out, and I was suddenly thrust onto the horns of a dilemma—I had to either risk losing my precious phone or concede a parking ticket of at least twenty-five dollars.
Not that tough a choice. I had already been paid for making the blackmail payment, and I was not on an expense account.
I ran down the block, screaming and waving my arms.
The meter maid, a plump, black woman, laughed and said, “All right, all right. Put your quarter in.”
And the phone rang.
If the meter maid thought I was funny before, she had to love me now, because I flipped her the quarter and then did a pretty fair impression of a cartoon character whose legs start going faster and faster before he takes off and starts running. I raced to the phone booth, scooped up the phone on the fourth ring.
It was Barry.
“Hi, champ,” he said. “Pretty slow picking up the phone. What’s the matter, you got something better to do?”
“Cut the shit, Barry. What’s the deal?”
“Hear you like the pictures.”
“I love ’em. Why?”
“I understand you like ’em so much you’d like to buy some more.”
“Actually, Barry, I was thinking about the negatives.”
“Me too. Good thinking. I can tell you’re a class act. It’s a pleasure doing business with you.”
“Cut the shit. What do you want?’
“I want the envelope you have in your jacket pocket. The one Marlena gave you. The one with all the money in it. The one you’re supposed to give me.”
“Then why aren’t you here? Why are we just talking on the phone?”
“Well, that’s a problem.”
“What’s a problem?”
“Well, you may find this hard to believe, but I don’t trust you.”
“Aw, Barry.”
“Hey, don’t take it personally. I’m sure you’re a perfectly nice guy. But you can’t be too careful. Now, I’ll tell you what I’d like. You got your car there?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Then you’ll have no problem getting around.”
“Around where?”
“I dunno. How does Queens sound?”
“I was just there this morning.”
“Were you? Then this will be a breeze. Northern Boulevard and 193rd Street. Northeast corner. One hour.”
“You’ll be there?”
“No. You’ll be there.”
“What is this, another pay phone?”
“You’re a very smart man.”
“What if it isn’t working?”
“Good point. If the phone is broken or has not rung by ten o’clock, you wash it out and you’re back here by eleven.”
“Back here?”
“To this phone. The one that is working.”
“Oh, great.”
“You got that?”
“Yeah, sure. Look, couldn’t we just pretend the phone in Queens doesn’t work and we’re back here at this one?”
“Sorry, that would be highly irregular,” Barry said, and hung up.
I got in my car, took the bridge over to the Bronx, took the Major Deegan to the Triboro and over into Queens. I don’t know how long Barry had counted on it taking me, but I was on the designated street corner inside of half an hour. In other words, by nine o’clock.
So I’m standing on another street corner staring at another pay phone that didn’t necessarily have to ring until ten.
Some days you get lucky. The call came through at nine-fifteen.
“Gee, champ,” Barry said. “You made good time.”
“Pretty good,” I said. “I’ve been hanging out here for almost twenty minutes.”
“Well, aren’t you the early bird,” Barry said. “The early bird catches the pornographic prints. Not to mention the negatives.”
“Right,” I said. “Now, you wanna tell me where we’re supposed to meet?”
“Obviously not, or we wouldn’t be doing this.”
“Doing what?” I said. “Just what the hell is it that we’re doing?”
“Actually, I’m just making phone calls and you’re driving around like a lunatic.”
I took a breath, said nothing.
“Losing your sense of humor?” Barry said.
“It’s your show. I’m just waiting to see what happens next.”
“Fair enough. Actually, I think you’ve been a good boy and you deserve a break. So I’ll tell you what I’m going to do.”
“What’s that.”
“I’m gonna send you some place you know.”
“And where might that be?”
“You know that motel just off the Saw Mill River Parkway?”
I think I paused a moment before I said, “I believe I do.”
“Fine. Try unit twelve,” he said, and hung up the phone.
I was pissed driving out there. It was like I was being blackmailed by contestants on the �
�Amateur Hour.” First Barry runs me all over creation for no earthly reason, and then he sends me back to the place we met before.
Rendering the runaround useless. I mean, what was the point of me going to Queens and back if I was going to wind up at the same motel? What was the point of me going anywhere if I was going to wind up at the same motel? The point of the runaround had to be to keep me from knowing where the actual meeting and transfer would take place. So I couldn’t set Barry up by bringing the cops into the deal. So what does he do? He tells me where it’s gonna take place. What was to stop me from hanging up the phone on him, dropping in a quarter, and calling the cops?
Well, he could have been watching. There was always that possibility. He could have been pulling this runaround from Queens, inside some diner that overlooked the corner with the pay phone. He could have been in there all night making the calls, waiting to see just what I did after he told me to go to the motel. And if I had picked up the phone and made another call after I had hung up on him, he could simply have not shown up and then contacted Marlena and said, “Hey, what’s with the double cross?”
But I hadn’t done that. I had hung up the phone, hopped in my car, and headed back over the Triboro Bridge. By all counts, I was playing it on the level. So if Barry was playing it on the level, it should go off without a hitch.
At least, that’s what I told myself as I turned into the entrance of the motel.
There was no car in front of unit twelve. Of course there hadn’t been the first time, but as I pulled in it seemed to me the unit looked dark.
I walked up and knocked on the door.
There was no answer.
I leaned my head closer, listened for sounds from within.
There were none.
I knocked again, listened.
Nothing.
I tried the doorknob.
It was locked.
That was a relief.
I didn’t like this at all.
That’s when I saw the paper. It was folded up small and wedged in the crack in the door.
