2 Grand Delusion (18 page)

20

But it's a lot easier to stick out your tongue at a cop than it is to prove he committed two murders and is now trying to frame you for them.

Fortunately I didn't have a chance to sink into the slough of despond, because Leonardo and Raphael needed me to be strong for them. After the cops left, Andrea and I ran around cleaning up as much as we could before the boys came home from their friend's house. We didn't want them to know that the cops had torn our house apart.

When our Ninja Turtles did come home, and there were still huge piles of stuff everywhere, we told them we were just rearranging a few things. They believed us. It's amazing how gullible kids are.

So we tried to act normal during dinner and fake the kids into thinking everything was okay. But acting normal was hard. I kept getting visions of Cole sitting in his cop car, smoking his evil-smelling cigars and contemplating new ways to do me dirt.

Needing a break from all this
sturm und drang,
I decided to go to chess club. Aside from having sex and doing B and E's, playing chess is the one activity that gets me to totally immerse myself and forget all my cares.

The kids weren't enthusiastic about my leaving, but I took the sting away by practicing karate moves with them before I left. Andrea wasn't too enthused either, since it meant she'd have to finish cleaning up from the cops all by herself, but she eventually went along with it. I told her a little white lie about needing to meet Malcolm at the club, so we could consult on legal strategy.

As it turned out, though, Malcolm wasn't even there that night; he was playing in a chess league match down in Albany. So I spent the night playing with Dima, a Russian Jewish immigrant who must be at least a hundred years old but still kicks my ass routinely at chess. Not only is he one heck of a player, but he has a very distracting habit of picking his nose when he plays. He has the biggest nostrils I've ever seen. That night I tried a new defense against him, an aggressive variation of the Sicilian called the Accelerated Dragon, and he whupped me with ease. Maybe I should just stick with the Hedgehog.

Despite my ignominious loss, which was followed by two other even more ignominious losses, chess club was intensely relaxing, just like always. Even Hal Starette's presence didn't bother me; we just stayed at opposite ends of the room and ignored each other.

The great thing about chess club is, no one ever talks about anything besides chess. I'd been going there for years now, seeing the exact same men week after week and month after month; but I still knew basically nothing about them, like what their jobs were or how many kids they had or how much money they made. All I knew about them was which openings they preferred, and if they liked to castle queenside, and how they handled rook and pawn endgames.

I really believe that, in some strange way, this very lack of knowledge about the facts of each other's lives is what made us all feel so close to each other. Our relationships were totally existential.

Whenever I try to explain this to my wife, she just shakes her head and says it's further proof men are from Mars.

That night, even though all the men there undoubtedly knew I was a murder suspect, no one bothered me about it. The closest anyone came to even mentioning it was the moment I came in. A manic depressive guy in his twenties named Billy, who plays very well when his medicine is properly adjusted, looked up from his game and mumbled, "Good luck."

I nodded, then looked over at his board. "Queen-side majority. Tough endgame."

"Yeah," he said, moving a pawn, and that was that.

Okay, maybe we
are
sort of Martian.

I played Dima until midnight, then realized I was so tired the bishops were starting to look like pawns. So I bade everyone good-night and headed for the parking lot.

"Jacob," I heard someone call.

I turned. It was Hal; he'd followed me outside. Now I caught a quick sour whiff of him as he stepped toward me and said, "I've got something for you."

I blinked. "What?"

Hal registered my surprise. "Look, maybe you're guilty, maybe you're not. But I can't just show up at chess club with you every Tuesday night without telling you what I know. I play lousy when I'm distracted by stuff like that."

"Sorry," I said.

He nodded. "So here it is. One chess player to another, right? You know Manny Cole?"

My skin prickled. "Sure as hell do."

"Okay. Sal, the bartender at the harness track, says Cole was in there Sunday night waving hundred-dollar bills around, making huge bets and buying drinks for everybody."

"How intriguing," I said, and it was. Further proof of Cole's newfound wealth since Pop's murder.

"Cole wasn't one of the cops who owned the Grand Hotel building," Hal went on, "so whatever he did, it had nothing to do with me."

Wait a minute. I looked at Hal's shirt. It was
drenched
with sweat.

Why was Hal busy implicating Manny Cole? Was he really just helping out a fellow chess player—or was he trying to divert my attention from something?

And what would that something be?

"Okay, Jacob, now I've told you everything. Take care," he said, and walked off toward his car.

I watched him go. His smell went with him. Had
Hal
killed Pop?

I shook my head, feeling dizzy. Dennis, Dave, Hal . . .

Next thing I knew, I'd be suspecting Max Muldoon. I better go home and get some serious shuteye.

By the time I got home it was already 12:30. There were no bothersome cop or media vehicles parked out front, and 107 was dark—Dave's house was dark too, I noted. So I looked forward to a quiet night of sleeping and letting my subconscious do its best to piece this whole thing together. I unlocked the side door, walked in—

And heard a noise in my study. Someone knocking against something. "Andrea?" I said.

No answer.

It must be Leonardo, I thought. The kid has a tendency to sleepwalk when under stress, and God knows he was under plenty of stress lately. "Hey, Leonardo," I said, turning the corner into the study.

It wasn't Leonardo.

Whoever he was, he was way too big to be Leonardo. He snarled at me,
"Where's your fucking money?"

In the darkness, I couldn't make out his face. I could see his eyes, though, and unless it was my imagination they held a wild gleam. There was no question about the other gleam in the room; it belonged to a long curved knife the guy was waving at me. It looked exactly like Zapper's. Could this be Zapper's ghost?

"Where's your fucking money?" the ghost repeated, coming closer with the knife.

I backed away. "What? What money?"

"Don't play with me, asshole! I know all about it! The kid told me!"

It finally clicked: This must be Dale, Zapper's partner. And that's why his knife looked just like Zapper's—the two of them must have bought their knives together. How sweet.

Dale took a swipe at me with the knife. Not so sweet. I jumped backward, but not before the blade caught a piece of my jacket and ripped it. "You killed Zapper! You
shot
him!" Dale screamed shrilly. "We were gonna buy a shitload of dope together and go to Schenectady and get rich!"

He came at me again. Calm him down, I thought.

"Listen, Dale, that's a beautiful dream, and I'm sorry it didn't work out, but—"

"But you smoked him! You owe me, motherfucker! Where's your money?"

"Look, I don't have any money—"

Suddenly Dale swooshed down with his knife. This time he caught more than just my jacket. The blade ripped into my right shoulder, maybe an inch deep.

Intense, jagged pain flew through me. I could feel the blood flowing out. I started to scream, then forced my mouth shut. The last thing I needed was for Andrea or the kids to come downstairs and get stabbed by this drug-addled madman.

My strangled scream, or maybe the smell of my blood, got Dale excited. He made a gurgling animal noise in his throat and lunged forward.

I leapt sideways. Dale brought his knife around and attacked again. "I'll give you the money!" I said quickly. Dale's knife stopped just short of me.

My arm was killing me, but the truth was I was lucky he'd brought his knife instead of his gun; otherwise I'd be dead by now. Maybe he was using the knife as a sort of tribute to Zapper. I backed up and walked out of the room, with no particular plan in mind, and he followed close behind. I felt his blade against my back. "Don't try anything, asshole."

"Okay, man, okay." I led him into the kitchen. I didn't turn on the light, because I didn't want to look at my blood. I've never been good at that. My eyes searched around the dark room frantically for a bread knife or some other kind of weapon—but just my luck, when Andrea cleaned up from the cops, she put away everything I might be able to use in the cabinets.

Unless . . .

There was a big metal pot on the front burner of the stove, with the handle sticking out. Once someone had knocked me senseless with a pressure cooker. Maybe now I could do the same thing, if I could somehow just get hold of that handle.

"Where's the goddamn safe? Come on, where? Where?" Dale's voice was fast and high-pitched, like a record album playing at the wrong speed.

"It's down there." I pointed to the cabinet just to the right of the oven. "Back of the bottom shelf."

I was hoping he'd bend down to open it, giving me a chance to grab the pot handle. But he was too smart for that. His knife tickled my ribs. "Get down and open it.
Open it!"

Shit, now what? "I need the key. It's under the pot here." I lifted up the pot, but then hesitated. I could feel his blade at my side. By the time I brought the pot back far enough so I could get leverage for a good solid swing at him, he'd figure out what I was doing, and his knife would be through my ribs in half a second. I felt horribly miscast, like Woody Allen trying to play a role meant for Arnold Schwarzenegger.

"Fuck are you doing?"

"Take it easy, will you? The key is inside the stove here, under the burner. See, the burner doesn't work." Keeping one hand on the pot handle, I used my other hand to remove the iron ring from the top of the burner. Moving as slowly as possible, I set it aside.

"Hurry up!" Dale barked, prodding me with the flat of his knife.

"I'm going as fast as I can, man, you busted my arm!" I did some exaggerated wincing to convince him of how pained and helpless I was. Meanwhile I removed the inner metal ring from the burner, moving at a snail's pace. Then I bent down toward the burner and peered around, as if searching for the key.

Whatever drugs Dale had ingested were clamoring for his attention, making him desperate to see that damn safe already. He opened the cabinet and stooped down, looking for it—

And I brought that big pot down as hard as I could on top of his head.

But his head was moving downward and to the right, so the pot glanced off him without doing much damage. He stood up and roared. I couldn't think what to say to him. "Sorry, just kidding" didn't seem to cut it. Then he charged at me knife-first.

Instinctively, I lifted up the pot to shield myself. The knife hit with a clang and bounced off.

But the collision between knife and pot sent a jolt of pain through my wounded right shoulder, and I dropped the pot. Now Dale had his knife ready again. He was about to attack me.

My left hand closed around the iron ring from the burner. As he rushed at me, I lifted the ring and flung it desperately in the general direction of his head.

Bull's eye!

The guy went down like he'd been karate chopped by Splinter himself. Then he just lay there, breathing peacefully.

I grabbed his knife and a telephone, planning to call the police. But then I stopped.

Would the cops believe me about what had happened? Or would they pin this on me somehow and revoke my bail?

Based on my recent experiences with the cops, maybe I better take care of this situation by myself.

So when Dale came back to life about thirty seconds later, I had his knife and was standing over him. He looked up at me and gave a confused groan. I held the knife where he could see it better. His eyes widened with fear.

"That's right, sucker," I told him. "I got the knife now. So why don't you just go on home and make yourself a nice hot cup of tea."

He nodded nervously and started to get up. But then I kicked him hard in the head and he went back down. I wish I could say I kicked him just to scare him some more, so he wouldn't get any ideas. That wouldn't be totally honest, though. I kicked him because it felt good.
Real
good. I reared back my foot to do it again.

But then it hit me that with my luck, the bastard would probably up and die on me. So I let him go without committing any further acts of violence. I did, however, give him a parting word as he stumbled out the door.

"Oh, and one more thing," I told him. "Forget Schenectady. It's a beat town."