Chance (99 page)

He collected the paperwork in a slim leather case with a zipper and a shoulder strap and returned to his car. He had not yet heard from Big D. The three hours he had promised Blackstone were only now about to be up as he turned onto the Great Highway. There were still, of course, his fellow citizens. He looked upon them as he had the streets, both familiar and strange. Most were in cars but there were still a few on foot, people out and about, surfers calling it a day, dog walkers,
the last of the beachgoers, life going on . . . Might one say as usual? God only knew what sorts of fires, wrecks, and love nests lay beneath the apparently mundane or in what chambers of the heart men would in the end be brought to the dance, their steps in time from the day of their birth till that of their death the number by which they might one day be called before the Bar of Heaven. Or not. At which point a call arrived. “It’s looking good,” the big man told him. “What’s your twenty?”

Chance told him. “Here’s the deal,” D said and it was all pretty perfect. The motel was a little ways inland but close to that stuff they had looked at, the Cliff House and Camera Obscura, and he asked if Chance remembered and Chance said that he knew them well, that the Cliff House was just that, a building on a cliff with the sea below and the Camera Obscura just behind it—a smaller building shaped like a giant camera with a little red pyramid atop its roof—a trick done with the light wherein tourists might observe their surroundings in a somewhat altered form and D named it as the place, that he had checked angles and lines of sight, that there was plenty of parking along the street and that if Chance could get Blackstone to meet him there, and most specifically, to join him on the path leading from the sidewalk at the street to the Camera Obscura, at least as far as the first little turnout that would be obvious when he got there, it was a done deal and a sixty-foot fall to the water and rocks below.

Chance asked if he had seen them yet, one or both.

“Negative on that,” D said. “But I’ve got eyes on and I can see the room and it’s the number she gave you. Place is one of those old-fashioned motor courts. Separate room, no adjoining walls. They’re on an end in the back. Curtains are all drawn but the Crown Vic is parked in front next to some other car that could be hers. There’s a black Mercedes sedan parked around back and I saw some guy come out from the back door about ten minutes ago with a bucket to get ice. Looked like the twin of that fucker I sent away. Game’s on, bro.”

Chance could feel the string going from the backs of his knees even as he drove. “Plan’s good though,” D told him. “Weather’s getting the whole place ass raped right on time so there aren’t that many people out there by where you need to go but you can still pitch it as a public place. You make that happen, I can probably see his play. He won’t come by himself but he’ll try to make it look like that’s what he’s doing . . . maybe give me a moment alone with whatever asshole follows him out.”

The Cliff House rose in the distance, a pale edifice above seawater the color of asphalt.

“You copy?”

Chance did.

“Eyes in the back of your head, Doc. Wind shifts . . . don’t wait to be the receiver. You good for the call?”

Chance said that he was, rolling up on Ocean Beach, the Pacific nothing but wind chop, salt spray blowing in as far as the highway, mixing with the fog, finding his windshield. He set his wipers to intermittent as the big man spoke once more. “Roll the dice, brother.”

Chance got Blackstone on the phone. “She’s giving you up, pal.” Saying it and hearing himself say it and the voice he was hearing not altogether his own. “There’s no point in killing me ’cause that’s just one more thing you’ll do time for because believe me, you will do time.”

“The hell is this?” Blackstone asked.

“It’s me,” Chance told him.

There was a moment of silence on the line. “For Christ’s sake,” Blackstone said. “Are you insane?”

Chance went on. “Only way out of this is for us
all
to walk and never look back.”

“Way out of what?”

“And that involves me giving you this shit you asked for and for you to give me whatever it is she has there with her.”

“Where are you?”

“I’m in front of the Cliff House.”

He could hear Blackstone breathing. “You need to quit fucking around,” Blackstone said, and hung up.

Chance had made the call on the dead man’s cell phone, his own resting on the seat beside him, both set to Speaker so that D might listen in. “He hung up,” Chance said.

“You’re doing great, now call the play.”

Chance got him back. “I will meet you on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant.”

“And why would I do that?”

“Here’s the deal,” Chance said. “I’m not walking into that room and you should be smart enough to know that but what I will do is sit outside and call the cops and we can all burn ’cause as of right now my daughter is safe which is what I care about and this is what I’m willing to do.”

Blackstone said nothing.

“We settle this today, one way or another.”

“And where’s your knife-throwing pal in all of this? Where’s he on bringing in the law?”

“What friend?”

“Right.”

“It’s just me and you,” Chance said.

“Tough guy.”

“It was all I could think of.”

He could hear Blackstone laughing. He laughed for a bit then coughed. Chance could hear the soft hiss of the tank. “And why am
I
supposed to trust
you,
tough guy?”

“It’s a public place. We meet in the open. We say what we have to say and we trade what we’ve got to trade. I’ve got what you wanted.”

“Yeah, you said that.”

“I can tell you right where I am. I’m on the sidewalk south of the restaurant, at exactly the place where the pathway starts that leads down to the Camera Obscura.”

This was followed by one more beat of silence. “What I’d like to know is this,” Blackstone said at last. “How has someone like you managed
to live so long?” He did not wait for Chance to respond but ended the call once more.

Chance was unclear as to where they stood.

“That was fucking great,” D said.

“How do you know?”

“He’ll be there. Trust me.”

Chance parked more or less where he had told Blackstone that he already was and got out. The wind hit him full in the face. It was sharp and cold and as D had predicted there were very few people around. It was getting on in the day with the sun low and the fog rolling in to mute even that. The air was damp and cold and you could hear the seals and sea lions going crazy out on the rocks amid the crashing of waves that were largely unseen amid the watery gloom, the shriek of gulls. He watched as a young couple bundled for caroling made their way into the restaurant and felt the cell phone vibrate inside his pocket.

“We’re on,” D said. “I’m at the motel.
Your
guy is getting into the Crown Vic and there are two other guys coming out and getting into the black Mercedes.” Chance asked if he could see her but he couldn’t. “It’s just the guys,” D said. “There’s going to be some kind of play but I’m on it. Just get to your spot and stay there.”

“Copy that,” Chance said.

“Good man. I’m staying on the Mercedes because I think that’s who’ll make the move. Your guy’s window dressing but I will tell you this . . . you get him alone anywhere along that path and you see a move, don’t wait. Go first. Trust your training . . . land the money shot, help him over the railing, then circle out and head for the park at Lands End. . . . Look for Carl.”

Really?
Chance wanted to say but Big D was on again before he could. What D said was “Hooya, Big Dog.” And what else
was
there to say to that? The big man was gone. Chance was alone. Time passed and precious little of it before the Crown Vic arrived on the scene. He watched as it pulled in and parked. He saw Raymond Blackstone getting out. It was really happening.

Now Chance had hoped to see Blackstone
with
something, a briefcase or satchel, anything by which to carry his own incriminating material, the stuff she claimed to have and Blackstone
had
said something about a trade . . . but there’s nothing in his hands as he climbs from the car. There’s no oxygen tank but Chance knows he might be past having to drag that with him everywhere he goes. The thought occurs that he might have something in his pocket . . . that the stuff she had spoken of might be stored electronically. There are times when one needs to believe in something. It’s standard advice for the terminally ill.

Chance has his stuff, of course, the old paperwork in the leather case D told him he should only pretend to bring but this is
his
plan now, the unspoken one forged in hope, so that he’s not really pretending about anything. He doesn’t know where D is and he doesn’t see any black Mercedes. He supposes that any deviation from the plan agreed upon might well upset his friend but knows too that this is his time. He imagines the triumph of reason, a path to understanding.

He’s still where he said he would be with maybe fifty yards between himself and Blackstone and his heart beating so loudly he can barely hear the sea. There’s some construction equipment nearby, a backhoe and some kind of small cement mixer where they are doing repairs to the wall that runs along the sidewalk to keep pedestrians from falling off and the stuff is situated about halfway between Chance and Blackstone. The machinery is using up a number of parking spaces. Chance had taken a spot near the restaurant but Blackstone has parked farther down, south of the equipment, and the weird thing is . . . he’s still there, still standing at the side of his car. He’s where he began except he hasn’t begun. Is he waiting for Chance to come to him? Does he even know Chance is there? Chance considers waving but this seems absurd given the circumstances so he continues to stand with the leather case hung from his shoulder and D’s double-edged blade in the pocket of his slacks that D has rigged for him with one of those little sheaths like what he fixed for Carl with the wires on it so
that when and if Chance reaches into his pocket to draw the blade, the wires will catch on the pocket’s lining and the blade will come free but he has no real intention of ever doing it.