PR02 - The Fourth Watcher

by Timothy Hallinan

  “I gather you had a nibble,” Rafferty says.

  “A nibble? It was like sinking a hook in fucking Moby-Dick.” Prettyman shows a lot of teeth. It is not a smile. “First person I called, wham. All I did was mention the name, and I thought the guy was going to come through the line and grab my tongue. So I think, Whoa, slow down, and I get off the line. And three other guys call me within fifteen minutes.” Prettyman hears the pitch of his own voice and sits back, eyeing the room as though he wishes it were much larger and, perhaps, made of steel. “A number I didn’t think anybody had,” he says, more quietly if not more calmly. Despite the coolness of the room, his shirt is patchy with sweat, and not just in the obvious places.

  Rafferty gives him a minute in the name of tact and then says, “What kind of guys?”

  “Not your problem.” Prettyman seems to be regretting his volatility. He makes a show of straightening his cuffs. A cup of coffee toted in from the bar is cooling in front of him untouched, and a paint-thinner smell announces the brandy it’s been laced with.

  “It certainly is my problem, Arnold. Look, I’m not asking for names and addresses. Americans, Chinese, Thais, military, diplomats, spooks, cops, gangsters—what?”

  “All of the above,” Prettyman says in the satisfied tone of someone who predicted disaster and turned out to be right. “And with a lot of weight—very high-density guys.” He drums the table with his fingernails. “What are those little stars called? The ones that are so dense?”

  “Little dense stars?” Rafferty guesses. His heart isn’t in it.

  “Dwarf stars,” Prettyman says. “A cubic inch of a dwarf star weighs as much as the earth. Think dwarf star. That kind of density.”

  “And what did these very heavy guys tell you?” Rafferty lifts his own coffee, pretends to sip. His hand is not completely steady, so he puts it on the table again.

  Prettyman is still buying time by adjusting his clothes. “From one perspective they didn’t tell me shit. No answers, not even rude ones. What they wanted was to know what I knew. From another perspective, of course, they told me quite a bit.”

  “For example.”

  “The whole world wants to get its teeth into Frank Rafferty. Way it sounded, they’d chew your father up and fight over the scraps.”

  Rafferty’s initial doubts about involving Prettyman suddenly intensify. He pushes his chair back and gets up, feeling the other man’s eyes follow him. Three or four steps carry him to the wall with the photos on it. A younger Prettyman stares out from each of them: in a jungle, wearing fatigues; centered and fuzzy in an obvious telephoto shot, talking to a woman on some Middle European street; posed dramatically in front of the Kremlin in a trench coat that might as well have spy stenciled on the back. The others are all variations on the theme: spook at work.

  “I didn’t know you guys liked to have your picture taken so much,” Rafferty says. “This looks like the wall at a local chamber of commerce.”

  “Fuck the pictures,” Prettyman says.

  “So they’re eager,” Rafferty says, still studying the photos. “So they’ve got a lot of weight. Puts you in an interesting position.”

  “Puts me right up the fecal creek,” Prettyman says. Then he hears the implication. “You don’t actually think I’d shop you, Poke?” Rafferty turns to see him widen his eyes, which succeeds only in making them bigger. They’re still the eyes of someone who could spot an opportunity through a sheet of lead.

  “Please, Arnold,” Poke says.

  “And even if I would,” Prettyman says immediately, “I don’t actually know anything, do I? I’m the guy in the middle, the one all these wide-track trucks think has the marbles, and I don’t even know if the guy is really your father.”

  “Of course you do. There’s no way you haven’t learned that much.”

  “This does not make me happy, Poke,” Prettyman says. He turns his coffee cup ninety degrees and then back again, and wipes sweat from the side of his neck. “It’s not the kind of attention I want to attract. I’m a settled man here, retired from the Company, whatever you may think. The world has passed me by, and that’s fine. A man at my time of life doesn’t need the adrenaline jolts I liked twenty years ago. A little money, the occasional girl, regular habits. The same pillow every evening. A house I can leave in the morning knowing I’ll be coming back to it at the end of the day. No more night crawls, no more tracking boring people across boring cities and then discovering that they’re not so boring after all, that in fact they’d like to kill you.”

  Infected by Prettyman’s anxiety, Rafferty does his own scan of the room, wondering whether there’s a microphone somewhere. He lifts the pictures, crosses the room and looks under the table, comes up, catches Prettyman studying him, and says, “Have you left the bar tonight, Arnold?”

  Prettyman hesitates, just his normal disinclination to part with information. “I went home for dinner.”

  “After you made the calls?”

  “Some of them. I made more from home.”

  “And when you left here, or when you came back, were you followed?”

  The question makes Prettyman shift in his chair, sliding from side to side as though smoothing down a lump in the cushion. He licks his lips. “That book you were going to write,” he says. “How good did you get at spotting a tail?”

  “Obviously not too good.” He sits again. “I still smell like an issue of Vanity Fair.”

  “Then you know,” Prettyman says. “It’s not easy. Give me half a dozen good people and I could follow Santa all the way around the world without tipping him off.” He blinks a couple of times and blots his upper lip with the side of his index finger. “But I don’t think so. For one thing, no one knows where I live.”

  “They didn’t know the phone number either.”

  “No,” Prettyman says grimly. “And don’t think I’m not keeping that in mind.”

  “Because of course you do know something, don’t you? You know that Frank’s in Bangkok and that I’m in contact with him. You know where I live. Not exactly a Chinese wall. You’ve probably operated on less.”

  Prettyman lays both hands flat on the table, as though to rise. “Are you back to that? Suggesting that I’d sell you?”

  Rafferty shoves the table a few inches toward him, trapping Prettyman’s knees beneath it. “You’re on the wet spot, aren’t you? If they tried the stick, which it sounds like they did, there’s also the carrot. Probably a whole bunch of carrots if, as you say, they want him so much. Especially if there’s some sort of contest to take the first bite.”

  “The discussion didn’t get that far.” Prettyman settles, and finally drinks some of the coffee, his eyes on the room again. “Anyway, I don’t

  sell people.”

  It would be silly to argue. “What time did you make the first call?”

  A moment of elaborate consideration that Rafferty automatically discounts as a dodge. Prettyman has a chronograph implanted in his cerebellum, running several time zones simultaneously. Finally he says, “What time did you and I talk?”

  “I don’t know. Nine, nine-thirty. And why are you stalling, Arnold?”

  “Right after that.” Prettyman lowers his voice, imparting a confidence even though they are alone in the room. “You wanted answers, Poke. I got right on it.”

  “Answers from China,” Rafferty says.

  Prettyman starts to answer, hesitates, and says, “I didn’t start in China.”

  Rafferty waits for more and then asks, “Bangkok?”

  Prettyman nods so slightly that Rafferty can barely see it.

  “So let’s say ten. Sound about right?”

  He gets an equivocal shake of the hand, side to side. “Más o menos.”

  “And then the phone started to ring.”

  “The people in China didn’t seem to care what time it was. They were too interested.”

  “And did you mention me? They must have put some pressure on you.”

  An upraised
palm. “Poke. I wouldn’t—”

  “So you say, Arnold, and naturally I believe you. I’m just giving you a chance to convince me.”

  “Think about it, Poke. Even if I were willing to sell your father, which of course I’m not, would I lead them to you? Let’s suppose, just for discussion’s sake, that I’d entertain the idea. I mean, it’s preposterous—” He waits for Rafferty to agree and then plunges ahead. “But just to move the talk along, let’s say I would. If I give you to them, they don’t need me.”

  “That has a certain logic. Then again, if that’s all you have—me, I mean—there might be a price for that. Was there?”

  After a pause almost too short to measure, Prettyman says, “You think too much, Poke.” He sounds like Rose. “As long as you’ve lived here, I’m surprised. Everything isn’t logic, you know. Sooner or later you have to trust your feelings, your instincts.”

  Rafferty does not explain that his instincts are what inspired the question.

  Prettyman lets the silence stretch out before speaking. “I can understand why you’d be concerned. With your family and all.”

  “I’m sure you can.”

  “Maybe I can help,” Prettyman says, his eyes floating toward the ceiling. “I’ve got more experience than you do.”

  “That’s swell of you Arnold, but I think I’ve got it covered.”

  Prettyman nods. “Fine, fine,” he says. “Good to hear it.”

  “When you call them back—”

  “Hold it,” Prettyman says with some urgency. “Let’s not operate under a misunderstanding. I’m going right back into my little hole. This kind of weight I don’t need.”

  “And you think they’re just going to forget you called? Say, ‘Oh, that Arnold, what a tease.’ You duck out of sight and they’re going to send a regiment after you.”

  Prettyman does something with his mouth that, on a child, would be a pout. “I know what I’m doing, Poke.”

  “They want Frank, and it’s obviously not just a whim. You make one call in Bangkok, middle of the night, and the long-distance lines start humming all the way to China. Heavyweights, as you say. Working late, just for you. Dialing a secret number, one they shouldn’t have. These are not people you can wave off, Arnold: ‘Sorry, it’s some other Frank Rafferty.’ Either they’re going to come after you now or they’re going to come after you later. They’ve probably already bought their tickets. Not to mention the ones you talked to in Bangkok. They’re already here.”

  Across the table Prettyman blinks away perspiration that has run down his forehead and into his eyes. Rafferty finds that he feels sorry for the man. He should have mentioned the triads.

  But he hadn’t. “We both need the same thing,” he continues. “Information. You pretend to play with them, keep them busy for a few days, and get whatever you can. That way you won’t be picking up that nice pillow you go home to every night to see whether somebody put a scorpion under it, and when we get back together, we’ll have a better idea what we’re up against.” He waits, and Prettyman’s eyes slide left, toward the door. Rafferty knocks sharply on the table. “And if you don’t play, Arnold, or if you sell me and my family out, I’ll get through it somehow, and when I do, I’ll come after you and kill you myself. Just, as you say, so we’re not operating under a misunderstanding.”

  Prettyman’s eyes go very small, and he puts his hands in his lap. Rafferty knows he is wishing he had a gun there. The one in the plastic box is too far away.

  “So, Arnold,” Rafferty says, shoving his chair back. “Looks like we’ve both got a problem.”

  !21

  He’s More Like Arnold Than He Is Like Me

  fter returning her nod, he silently shares the elevator with Mrs. Pongsiri, the apartment house’s central gossip conduit, whose opinion of Poke has improved with Arthit’s frequent visits. Uniforms, Rafferty supposes, inspire confidence. Given the hours Mrs. Pongsiri keeps—going to work at 6:00 p.m. and returning home around 3:00 in the morning—her occupation is a topic of continuing speculation among the residents. She looks tired tonight, her figure sheathed in a too-tight cocktail dress that is so saturated with stale cigarette smoke that the elevator smells like an ashtray by the time they reach the eighth floor. Once the doors open, they exchange minimal smiles and go in their separate directions. As she walks away, Rafferty sees she has already unzipped the top four inches of her gown.

  The digital clock on his desk blinks a green hello when he finishes double-locking the door and turns to face the living room. The clock reads 2:17 a.m., so Mrs. Pongsiri has come home early. Rafferty has managed only a couple of hours’ sleep in the past two days, and he feels it all the way down to the cellular level.

  He smells smoke, and it isn’t Mrs. Pongsiri. Then he sees the light beneath the bedroom door.

  Rose is sitting up in bed, wrapped in the mandatory towel, a cigarette between her fingers. From the pile of butts in the ashtray, she’s been at it for quite a while.

  “I was worried about you,” she says in Thai.

  “Everything’s under control,” he replies, also in Thai. He kicks off his shoes and climbs up beside her. “I gather Peachy actually went home.”

  “Not happily. I think she’s very lonely since her husband left her.”

  “It’s worse than that. Arthit told me tonight that he killed himself over the debts she ran up.”

  Rose’s fingertips fly to her mouth. “Ohhh, Peachy. How terrible for her.”

  “Another reason for us to be grateful for what we’ve got.” He spreads his arms and stretches. He feels like he’s been shut up in a small box for days. “Every day we’re together is a blessing. You, Miaow, and me. And there’s no promise that it’ll go on forever, so we need to be thankful one day at a time. There was probably a time when things were fine between Peachy and her husband, and they took it for granted. And then things weren’t fine anymore.” He strokes her arm, the skin he loves. “I’m never going to take you for granted.” Then, at what he hoped would be the romantic high spot, he yawns.

  “Poor baby, you’re tired.”

  He shakes his head, half expecting to feel his brain slosh around inside. “This has been the longest day of my life.”

  “I’m so sorry about all that.”

  “It’s not you. Oh, I mean, sure, it’s partly the thing with the bag of money. But I think I can put that on hold for a little while.”

  She runs a finger down the side of his face, and his right side erupts in goose bumps. “If you say so, I’m sure you can. What’s the rest of it?”

  “Give me a minute. Let me figure out what order to tell it in.” He closes his eyes for a moment, lets some of the day’s images pass before his eyes, and the next thing he knows, there’s a tug on his arm.

  “You were snoring,” Rose says.

  “Not a chance.”

  “Like a helicopter.” She leans over and kisses him on the cheek. “Go to sleep. You can tell me in the morning.”

  “No. You need to know what’s going on.” He focuses on what he needs to say for a moment, making sure he has the Thai words at his command. “Okay, okay, let’s start with the relatively easy stuff.” And he tells her about his talk with Arthit, about how happy Arthit was to hear that Rose had accepted Rafferty’s proposal.

  “I finally accepted it,” Rose says. “Before one of us died of old age.” She slides a hand over his shoulder and says, “You’re so tight you’re practically in a spasm. Turn around so I can work on your neck.”

  “It’s carrying this head around,” he says. “Just too many ideas inside.”

  “Not to mention all that bone.” Her fingers probe, stretch, and isolate his muscles.

  “And then,” Rafferty says, and hesitates. “I had a little surprise today. My father is in Bangkok.”

  Her hands stop moving. He feels their warmth against his skin, and he starts to drift off again. “Is this a joke?” she asks.

  “I wish it were. He’s here, and he’s brought
along my half-Chinese half sister and a Southern Chinese guy who seems to be a hired gun.”

  “A sister, too? But this is wonderful for you,” she says. “It’s your chance.”

  “For what?”

  “To make it up with him.” She makes a tsk-tsk noise, a reaction that Rafferty has learned is a lot less mild than it sounds. “We’re talking about your father, Poke. He’s here, in Bangkok. With your sister. He came looking for you.”

  “Yeah? That makes us even or something?”

  She lifts a hand and slaps his back. “This is one of the things that’s wrong with you.”

  “One of them? And, by the way, ow.”

  “One of many. You’re in your head too much. You’re so busy making a judgment that you close yourself off to understanding anything. You talk about being ‘even’ with your father, like you’re making some sort of business deal, like you don’t have any feelings about it. For years it’s been like your father was dead, and now he’s here. You can make things right again. You have a second chance. Do you know what I’d give for a second chance with my own father? Do you know what I’d give to be able to talk to him for five minutes? Two minutes ago you were talking about how it’s a blessing for us to be together. Every day is a blessing, you said. Well, here’s your father, back from the dead. And you don’t think that’s a blessing?”

  “Actually, no,” he says, still in Thai. “I was just fine. From one day to the next, I never gave him a thought. I haven’t seen him since I was sixteen, remember? It’s not like he’s earned a lifetime of love and loyalty.”

  “Your parents don’t need to earn your love,” Rose says. “They gave you life. That’s enough. What did Miaow do to earn your love? You make love sound like money.”

  “At least you get change from money if you give too much of it.”

  She rolls over so her back is to him and lights a cigarette. “You don’t even mean what you’re saying. You’re just stubborn. You’ve gotten used to the idea that your father is no good, and it’s too much work to learn that it might not be true. You’ve been living in your side of the story since you were sixteen. Now you don’t want to hear his side.”