Soul Hostage (10 page)

     I stood up, and Joey brushed by me on his way to the register.  An overwhelming sense of anxiety suddenly pressed down on me as I watched him approach the two policemen.  Louis stood next to me as if he too were anticipating some event worth witnessing. 

     Joey strolled up to the register and actually squeezed between the cops to hand the check to the waitress.  My teeth were clenched tightly as I awaited an explosion.  Louis and I were standing just close enough to hear some of what was being said. 

     “That was summa the best chicken fried steak I’ve had in a long time!” Joey said smiling at the waitress.  He handed her a wad of bills that she smoothed out as she put the bills into the register.

      The waitress muttered something like “Glad you liked it”. 

     Joey spun around to face the two officers standing right behind him. “Good morning, officers!”  The cops seemed to have been caught a little off-guard by the energetic greeting.  “How’s it going with the
to
protect and to serve
gig?” 

     The younger officer replied with a touch of sarcasm, “Well, it’s been pretty quiet until now.”

     Joey chuckled. “As a concerned citizen, I think you may wanna question the two guys over there.  They definitely look like a coupla suspicious characters.” 

     The older officer stepped closer to Joey, “Well, thanks for that tip.  But maybe you oughta just be on yer way.”

     “Sure thang, officer.  Just tryin’ to do my part for law enforcement.”  Joey let out a full-throated roar of laughter which seemed completely out of place.

     Everything in the restaurant seemed to freeze as we all stood there and waited for the laughter to stop. I could not say exactly how long we waited.  I’m sure it was nowhere near as long as it seemed to be. It couldn’t have been, because it sure seemed like about an hour.  Anyway, after a while, Joey quit laughing.

     Before anybody could do or say anything, Louis stepped up and said, “Please excuse my friend, officers.  I think he needs to switch to decaf.”  He smiled toward the cops and then grabbed Joey’s arm just above the elbow to guide him toward the door.  “Time to go, Joey.  We’ve got a long drive ahead of us.” 

     I followed them out of the restaurant.

Chapter 5

     No one said much until we were a few miles down the highway. Even the usually active the mint in Lou’s mouth was silent. Then hell broke loose. I was driving again, and Joey was in the passenger seat. 

     The voice from the back seat sounded casual and calm at first.  “So, Joey, what exactly were you trying to do back there?” 

     Joey grinned at the question. “Whadda you mean, Lou?  I was just messin’ ‘round with them cops.”

     “’I was just messin’ ‘round with them cops’!”  Stoaffer’s voice was high-pitched and mocked Joey.  “You do understand we have been very fortunate and the authorities are not currently searching for us?  This little fact didn’t get lost in the vast, empty space between your ears, did it?” 

     I fully expected to Joey to turn and begin firing the Glock into the backseat.  I had certainly seen him go off on people for much less. This is what made his response so astonishing. 

     “Sorry, Lou.  I didn’t mean no harm.  Like I said, I was just messin’ around.” 

     I heard the words but didn’t really believe I had heard them correctly.  I figured when I turned to look at Joey he would give me a grin and a wink before turning to the backseat to unload his gun.  I glanced over at Joey but could not believe it was him. He was sitting up straight and looking very serious. Well, not exactly serious, more like a child trying not to cry after being scolded.  Of all the strange things I had seen over the last couple of days that may have been the strangest.

     The silent tension rode with us a few miles before Louis said, “Aw, what the hell! No harm done, I sup-pose.  Those local yokels didn’t know what to think.”  He chuckled a little before continuing.  “But I still don’t think it’s wise to call attention to ourselves when there is no need.”

     Joey responded almost immediately.  “Yer right, Lou! I shouldn’tuh done it.” I looked over to see Joey’s sheepish but hopeful smile.

     A somewhat fatherly sounding voice came from the backseat. “Well, you know, we all make mistakes.  The important thing is to learn from them.”

     Given the situation in which murder and revenge were being proposed, I had to snicker a little at the folksy wisdom being offered. 

     I didn’t look in his direction, but I felt the glare from Joey on the side of my face.

     As much to break Joey’s scowl as genuine interest, I asked, “So, Louis, why don’t you tell us all about this big payoff  we’re gonna get for helping you out?”

     “Certainly, Thomas!” The energy in Stoaffer’s voice sounded genuine and made me wonder at the sudden shift. “But the recompense is not solely for assisting me.  It is for having faith in the story told by a broken-down old man and then the commitment to act solely upon faith.  You would be surprised at how difficult it is to find such devotion these days.   Brings to mind Jeremiah searching the streets of Jerusalem for one honest man.”

     I immediately found myself in a small, cluttered room with posters of brightly-colorful Biblical scenes on the walls.  It was the room used for Sunday school at the Tabernacle Baptist Church.  It was the room  I was forced into once a week until I was fifteen and old enough to stop being forced into that room once a week.

     “Look at this picture.” I saw the small, emaciated, old woman in charge of the Sunday school and heard her high-pitched, condescending voice. She was standing at the front of the room holding a large picture book. It was open to a colorful drawing of a long-haired man in a whitish robe pushing through a crowd of people in an outdoor market.  She stepped closer and moved the picture for Thomas and the faceless other children squirming on wooden chairs in the room.

        “This man is Jeremiah.”  She put a long, bony finger next to the man in the picture.  “The Lord told him the city is going to be destroyed unless he can find an honest man in Jerusalem.”  The old woman made a clucking sound. “Do you know why he appears so frightened?” She did not wait for a response and none was coming. “He is scared because not a single honest man can be found in the entire city!”  Her shrill cackling pushed me out of that chair and out of that room and back behind the steering wheel of the old Chevy. 

     As luck would have it, no other cars appeared on the highway since the Chevy had drifted into the oncoming lane. I guided the car back to the right lane hoping the move went unnoticed.  A glance into the rearview mirror showed Stoaffer’s smiling face.

     “Is everything all right, Thomas?” He asked with what seemed like genuine concern.                                                                                       

    “Just dandy, Louis.”  I snapped. 

     “Well, as I was saying, there is going to be a big reward for having faith in me. Within the house in San Pietro are a number of caches containing valuable assets.” Stoaffer was glowing with pride.

     “Whadda yuh mean?”  Joey jumped in.  “Say it in English, please.” 

     “Inside the house are stashes of cash and gold coins!”  Louis answered with a big grin.

     “Lou, yuh rascal!” Joey spun around to face the backseat. “Yuh pulled one over on all of ‘em!” 

      With a mischievous grin, Stoaffer said, “I prefer to think of it more as being cautious.”

     “You’ve got my attention.”  I looked at his happy face in the mirror. “Just out of curiosity, what is the value of these
valuable assets
?”

     “It is difficult to say with complete confidence,” he answered. “It depends on the state of the gold market when dealing with old gold coins.”

     “Say you were forced to give a ballpark amount. What would that ballpark be?” I asked.

     “As I stated, it is difficult to say with accuracy, but I would have to say between six and six point five.”    

     “Six point five?”  Joey asked.  “English, Lou, English.”

     “The cash and coins should be worth somewhere around six and a half million dollars.” 

     Joey let out a whistle.  “Are you shittin’ me?”

     I had to follow Joey’s lead on this one.  “Yeah, Louis, are you shittin’ me?”

     Stoaffer enjoyed the attention he was getting.  He sat up straight and put a serious expression on his face. “I assure you both I am
shitting
no one.  I intended to be prepared in the event of someday being required to make a rapid exit from the country and so kept the necessary funds at hand.” 

     “Six and a half million dollars would definitely work as
necessary funds
!” I glanced once again at Stoaffer’s beaming face in the mirror. “So, Louis, you never mentioned what sort of business you were in.”

     “I was in the note-brokering business.”

     “Hmmm, six and a half million dollars extra just to stash,” I commented. “This note-brokering business sure sounds like a good gig.”

     “Yeah, Lou, how does somebody get to be in that biz?”  Joey asked.

     “Well, do you have any experience with notes?” Louis asked in a somewhat condescending tone.

     “Do we seem like guys who’ve had experience with notes, Lou?” Joey snapped. “What the hell are you talkin’ about?”    

     After a moment, Louis said, “Sorry for offending you. The notes to which I refer are financial notes. Financial notes are in effect formal promises to pay a set amount over time.  A mortgage is a common example of a note.  Rather than requiring a person to make a single payment in order to purchase a home, a financial or promissory note is created to allow the person to make payments over time.  A court settlement or lottery winnings can also result in a note being created.”      

     “Okay, I can get my head around this.” I commented with a certain amount of satisfaction at understanding what Louis was talking about. “These notes are deals to make payments over time. But I don’t understand how you can make money off them.”

     Joey broke in, “Hold on! This is like loan sharkin’!  Were you a loan shark, Lou?”

     The old man chuckled.  “No, Joey, I wasn’t a loan shark.  But, Thomas, you are correct. I’m talking about an arrangement to pay over time or to be paid over time.  The way I made money was by relying on people’s inability to wait for the payments.  Suppose you hit the lottery, carried the paper on a house you sold, or had some sort of court settlement.  All of these events promise big returns. However, you aren’t going to receive your money as a single lump sum.  The amount is going to be divided into smaller payments over five, ten, or twenty years.  Many people, or perhaps I should say most people, are not willing to wait for these smaller payments.  The reason may be the result of some financial emergency or simple greed, but most people want the money now even if they receive less.”  Louis paused, and I glanced in the rearview mirror.  He seemed to be waiting for any questions. 

     “Okay, let’s see if I’m following you, Louis.  Say I won the lottery for ten million bucks. Of course, I’m thrilled and dreaming of spending my days on some beach and having every damn thing I’ve ever wanted. But the problem is I want to be on my dream beach now not later so I agree to sell you the deal … the note … I have with the lottery people.  Instead of ten million over twenty years you offer to pay me now, and you’re going to pay me about … six million?”  I looked to Louis in the mirror for some input.

     “On a note worth ten million?  Yes, an offer of six or seven would be about right.” He answered with another huge smile. “However, if the noteholder had some pressing need for the money, we might offer less in return for making the funds available immediately.” 

     “So then I agree to sell my note to you for six mill, and I’m happy on my beach.  Then you what?  Wait around for twenty years to make four million?  No… Wait.  You turn around and sell it to some patient soul who wants the security of regular income for eight mill.  The buyer gets security plus a two million dollar profit over twenty years!  You get two million dollars right away all for shuffling some papers!   You, sir, are a genius!”

     “Well, thank you, Thomas.  You show a keen grasp of financial dealings.  However, as much as I would like to take credit for coming up with the idea, it has been around in one form or another for thousands of years.”

     “So yer sayin’ you made millions by buyin’ and sellin’ IOUs?”  Joey asked hesitantly.

     “Exactly! It took me all this time to explain what you boiled down to one sentence!” Stoaffer was once again sounding like a very proud teacher. “You would be surprised by just how many of these impatient note-holders are out there.” 

     “So I guess with all those payments coming in and going out, it wouldn’t be tough to keep some of it off the books and tuck it away.”  I smiled as if I had just solved some difficult riddle.

     “Not difficult at all since I was overseeing the accounts.  Gary seemed to be satisfied with this arrange-ment as long as we were both making a very nice income.  Besides I was doing it to protect both of us.” 

     “So what changed?”  I wondered out loud.

     “Did Theresa know about it?”  Joey yelled the ques- tion.

     “Whoa, settle down there, Joey.”  Louis laughed.  “I think she may have had some suspicion but no definitive knowledge.  Like Gary, she seemed happy not knowing too much as long as we enjoyed a healthy income.  

     Joey shook his head. “No, Lou!  She musta known somethin’!  She betrayed you!” The rage on my partner’s face was clear.