A Perfect Crime (18 page)

22

“A
h, right on the dot,” said Roger, standing beneath the statue of George Washington, Sunday at ten. “Punctuality is the courtesy of kings.”

“It is?” said Whitey, red-eyed, yellow-faced, blue-lipped, rumpled, as though he’d spent the night drinking and then slept, or passed out, in his car. But he didn’t have a car, and where had he slept, come to think of it? An unknown factor, quite certainly inconsequent; still, it was a relief to remember that Whitey wouldn’t be around much longer.

“Just an expression,” Roger explained, at the same time calculating with some precision the time remaining to Whitey—thirty-three hours, at most, thirty-two and a half, at least. A romantic concept, in a way: hadn’t innumerable potboilers been based on the conceit of a character given only a short, fixed time to live? Although not, Roger thought, a character like this. He found himself smiling at Whitey.

“Never heard of it,” Whitey said. Not a conventionally likable character, but a character nonetheless, in his silly leather jacket and pointy cowboy boots, beyond vulgar.

“No matter. How about some coffee?”

“Now you’re talkin’,” said Whitey.

They walked out of the Public Garden, waited for the light to change. Just as it did, Roger caught sight of a large, well-dressed family coming out of the Ritz across the street: an unmatronly mother with upswept blond hair, two tall young adults, some teenagers, one smaller child, and then the father. Something familiar about the father, and in that instant, Roger said, “Go.”

“Huh?” said Whitey.

There were people in front of them, blocking at least their lower selves from view. Roger ground his heel on the toe of Whitey’s cowboy boot. “Fast. Be back in one hour.”

“What the fuck?”

But then the light changed and Roger had no choice but to step off the curb and start across the street, couldn’t look back to see whether Whitey was following instructions, or tagging after him and thus aborting his plans, possibly forever. Roger’s path intersected that of the monstrously teeming haut-bourgeois family, and in its rear guard the father—Sandy Cronin—spotted him and said, “Hello, Roger.”

But therefore, if spotting now, hadn’t spotted him earlier, as he waited for the light. “Sandy. Well, well. And all the little ducklings. Merry Christmas.”

“And to you, Roger. You and Francie both.”

“Thank you, Sandy. I’ll make a note to pass it on.”

Roger walked on, across the street, along the side-walk, to the awning of the Ritz, and there, passing behind a top-hatted doorman, he glanced back. The Cronins were well inside the park now; the little one had tossed a chunk of ice at one of the bigger ones, and they all seemed to be laughing. Sandy himself, in his camel-hair coat, was patting a snowball into shape. What kind of justice was this, that a mediocrity like Sandy could so prolifically pass on his mediocre genes, while he, Roger, had been denied? Beyond justice, for justice was merely a human construct, after all, what kind of science was it? How could nature select Cronins over Cullingwoods, unless the degradation of the species was the goal? In his mind’s eye he saw again that ineradicable microscopic image of deformed sperm—his—twitching spastically in the petri dish. Ineradicable, yes, but also ineradicable was his suspicion that somehow, in some way yet unknown, it was Francie’s fault: Francie, with her babbling of adoption, missing the whole point.

Roger noticed that the Cronins were gone. Noticed, too, that there was no sign of Whitey. The Cronins hadn’t seen Whitey—more important, had not seen the two of them together. The plan remained viable, but it had been a near thing. Roger recalled chaos theory, how a butterfly fluttering its wings in the wrong patch of sky could destroy the world. No amount of planning could permanently overcome the inexorability of the natural forces. But all he required was thirty-three hours, to keep those butterflies at bay for thirty-three hours.

Whitey wandered around for a while, at one point sensing he was close to the old Garden, but failing to see any sign of it or its replacement. He did find a bar in the shadow of an overpass and, gloveless, hatless, feeling the cold through his leather jacket—not as warm as he’d expected—went inside. Had a beer. Two. Three. And a shot. He didn’t like being stepped on. What was the word? Literally. He’d been stepped on, literally. Why did he have to put up with that shit? He was a free man.

Whitey, pissed, looked around the bar, hoping for some customer who might rub him the wrong way. But he was almost alone, the only other drinkers being a few old drunks with disgusting faces. Stepped on, literally. He knew why, too, had figured it out immediately: Roger hadn’t wanted to be seen with him, not by his buddy in the camel-hair coat. A buddy of some kind, no question: screened by the statue of George Washington, Whitey had watched them gabbing in the middle of the street. Roger couldn’t have been ashamed to be seen with him, or why would he have offered the assistant’s job in the first place? A legitimate assistant, and therefore someone who should be introduced to camel-hair-coated buddies crossing the street. Instead he’d been stepped on. Why? Whitey couldn’t figure that out.

He checked his watch, had one more shot to ward off the cold, laid a fifty on the bar. A fifty: that made him think. Just days back in the world, not the halfway house world but the real one, and already making good money. And it wasn’t like Roger was some kind of dangerous dude—he was in the art business, for Christ’s sake—while Whitey had known many genuinely dangerous dudes, had spent almost half his life with them. Roger: not dangerous, a well-paying employer—but maybe not to be trusted either, not completely. That was all, Whitey told himself. Just be smart. He left the bar feeling much better.

“You’re a bit late, Whitey.”

Back under George Washington, temperature falling, refreezing the snow below snowball-making range, condensing the breath that rose from Roger’s mouth with his words.

“Got a little lost,” Whitey said, playing it smart.

Roger looked at him for a moment, thinking. For the first time it occurred to Whitey that his boss might not be the brightest. Talked fancy sometimes, but that didn’t make him bright.

“Thought that was your point,” Whitey went on, “for me to get a little lost.” That was pretty funny, and he laughed at his own joke.

Roger did not laugh, clearly didn’t get it; for sure, not the brightest. He licked his lips, his tongue bright red in contrast to the cold chalk color of his face and lips. “Remember how we spoke of discretion, Whitey? How important it is in this business?”

“Yeah.”

“And I’m sure you realize that competition is a factor in all businesses.”

“Like McDonald’s and Burger King.”

“So you won’t be taken aback to learn that I have competitors, too.”

“In the art recovery business?” Whitey said. Just to nail it down, that that was the business.

Roger smiled. “Sharp today, Whitey, are you not?”

At least Roger had the brains to see that. Whitey shrugged. “No more than usual.” Roger’s smile broadened. Whitey wondered whether this was too soon to ask for a raise.

“That’s why I hired you,” Roger said. “But wouldn’t it be foolish to show every card to the competition?”

“That guy on the street’s a competitor?”

“He thinks so.”

“And I’m one of the cards?”

Roger put his gloved hand on Whitey’s shoulder. “You’re my ace in the hole.”

Roger’s car was parked nearby.

“What tunes have you got?” said Whitey as they drove along the expressway in light traffic.

“None.”

“With a CD player like that?”

Roger said nothing. Whitey flipped on the radio.

“—Ned Demarco, reminding you we won’t be in our usual time slot tomorrow, but please tune in for the annual Christmas—”

Roger jabbed at the control buttons. Metallica came on, “The Shortest Straw,” one of Whitey’s favorites. “That’s more like it,” he said, glancing at Roger with surprise; he wouldn’t have taken him for a metal fan. Roger stared straight ahead.

They got on 93, followed it northwest through the suburbs, toward New Hampshire. After a while Roger turned down the radio and said, “Can you take care of yourself, Whitey?”

“Take care of myself?”

“This business has rough edges sometimes.”

“The art business?”

“Any business where big money’s involved.”

“Big money?”

Roger glanced at him. “I may have an assignment for you, Whitey. Its successful execution would most probably lead to a substantial escalation in your salary.”

Execution? Escalation? Whitey kept mum, playing it safe.

After a period of silence, except for the radio—White Zombie doing “Warp Asylum,” another favorite—Roger said, “A raise, Whitey. Of sizable proportions.”

“Big, you mean?”

“I do.”

How big was big? Whatever it was, he deserved it, was worth every penny. Watching the scenery go by, very cool, very something else he couldn’t remember the word for, started with “non,” Whitey said, “What’s this, like, assignment?”

“We’ll get to that, but first—are you hungry?”

“Nope.”

“Thirsty?”

“No.”

“Need to use the bathroom?”

“Soon.”

Roger nodded. “After that we’ll talk.”

Pit stop. Roger gassed up, Whitey took a long piss, picked up some Reese’s on the way out, a little hungry after all. Back on the highway, Roger switched off the radio.

“Listening, Whitey?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I’m going to describe a painting to you.”

“Shoot.”

“It’s called
oh garden, my garden
.”

“About hockey?”

Roger’s eyes shifted toward him. “Why would you think that?”

“No reason.” Except for Boston Garden, now gone. It made a kind of sense, didn’t it? But maybe not the kind he could get across to Roger. They’d faced Xaverian the only time he’d skated on Garden ice, and Whitey had scored their only goal, before being ejected in the third period for spearing.

“. . . grapes,” Roger was saying, “and in the background, or more accurately the middle ground, a girl on a skateboard. Can you visualize it so far?”

What was this? Grapes? Skateboard? Girl? “What’s she wearing?” Whitey said.

Roger paused, and again Whitey reflected that he might be a little slow. What the girl wore would have been the first thing he himself would have noticed. “I’m not certain,” Roger said. “Perhaps a tunic of some sort.”

Tunic? What the hell was he talking about? At that moment it was clear to Whitey that Roger was a little out of touch, and he made a decision, then and there: he was working for Roger, yes, would follow orders, but—would use his own . . . discretion! Discretion. Wasn’t that what Roger was always going on about, the importance of discretion in this business? Everything was coming together.

“Tunic,” Whitey said. “Gotcha. Anything else?”

Another pause to think. Jesus, discretion and plenty of it. “You’re sure you’ve got it so far?” Roger asked.

“Yeah. I mean, what’s to get?”

“The name of the painting, for example.”

“My garden.”

“Oh garden, my garden,”
Roger corrected.

“Whatever.”

Silence descended for some miles. The Merrimack appeared, frozen but snowless, the color of the low clouds overhead. Whitey occupied his mind with the lyrics of Metallica’s “Harvester of Sorrow,” those he could remember. He ate the last of the Reese’s. No Reese’s on the inside, for some reason; he realized how much he’d missed them.

They crossed to the west bank of the river, left it behind. Roger spoke at last. “Do you know the word provenance, Whitey?”

“Providence?” said Whitey, thinking of the girl on the bus, the snake between her breasts, her breasts themselves.

“Provenance,” Roger said, a little slower.

“Sort of.”

“No matter,” said Roger. “It’s a technical term, specific to our business. The reference is to the chain of ownership of a given work, establishing authenticity, you see. In the case of
oh garden, my garden
, the chain has been broken.”

“Yeah?” said Whitey. He pictured a thick gold chain, the kind pimps wore. A diner came into view. It had a red neon sign—Lavinia’s—and an old Bronco parked out front. “Still haven’t had that coffee,” Whitey said.

“Perhaps on the way back,” Roger said. “I’d like to beat the weather.”

Whitey glanced up at the sky. “No snow till tomorrow,” he said.

But it made no difference. Roger passed the diner by, took a back road, then another, came to a gate in the middle of nowhere. He got out, unlocked the gate, then drove on, crunching snow on a track thawed and refrozen, up a long hill. He stopped at the crest. Below lay the river, frozen but snow-blown clear by the wind, with an island in the middle and a single cottage on it, sheltered by trees. A stone jetty jutted from the near bank, two dinghies tethered to it, caught in the ice. Roger sat there in silence, waiting for—what? Whitey didn’t know.

At last Roger made a sound, a kind of laugh, maybe. “Ever been married, Whitey?”

“Nope.”

“Not unwise, in the final end. But without marriage, we’d be out of business.”

“We would?”

“The dissolution of marriage leads to conflict when it comes to the ownership of material objects. Take our little painting, for example. Its rightful owner is our client, a woman who lives in Rome.” Roger nodded toward the island in the river. “Whereas this little retreat now belongs to her former husband. Not enough for him, apparently—he made off with the painting, too, sometime in the past, oh, few weeks, say. According to information we’ve developed, he intends to secrete it away in the cottage. Do you see where this is headed?”

“Sure,” Whitey said, opening the door. “Won’t take five minutes.”

Roger grabbed Whitey’s arm, held on to it hard; Whitey didn’t like that at all. “Intends, Whitey. I said intends.”

“What the fuck does that mean?” Whitey said, shaking free of Roger’s grip.

For one moment, Whitey saw a strange look in Roger’s eyes, as though he was about to take a shot at him or something. Cold wind blew in the open door. Roger covered his eyes with his hand, rubbed them hard, and the look was gone. “My apologies, Whitey. This business can be . . . intense at times. Perhaps it’s led me to be unclear somehow. What I’m saying is that the painting in question is not at present in the cottage. Not now, at this moment.”