Turn Signal (23 page)

I jostle and finesse my way toward my destination. By the pocket map I bought yesterday, it looks to be about 14 blocks away
.

Unless David has actually lied about that, too, Gerald Prince arrives at 9 on the dot every morning
.

I walk faster
.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Gerald Prince is humming to himself as he turns to walk down Fifth Avenue, pink and radiant among the wind-pummeled and winter-weary.

His tan camel-hair coat, which weighs less than Jack Stone's corduroy jacket, keeps the relentless chill almost completely at bay. His black fedora looks good when he glimpses himself in the store window, a perfect fit. His sunglasses, which cost more than the used car he took away to Duke in the fall of 1970, reflect back the weak sun overhead and give him, he thinks, a kind of cold-blooded killer aura, raffish yet intellectual.

He is almost certain one of the junior editors wants to sleep with him. She is a lush, dark-haired young woman—he can't resist thinking of her as a girl—one year out of Swarthmore, subsidized in a Manhattan apartment by her rich father. She reminds him of Monica Lewinsky on SlimFast.

Gerald never ceases to be amazed at the power of power. Power makes people want you. Power makes you know they want you, sprays you with the fine, precious mist of entitlement. Six days shy of his 48
^th
birthday, he realizes that his 40s, a decade in which he rose like cream to the good graces and best offices of one of America's largest book publishers, have been the most sexually exciting of his life. Power.

He wonders, sometimes, if Caitlin would even mind all that much if she knew that he had spent a few afternoons in a midtown hotel with the occasional such fledgling over the last few years. Wouldn't she expect it? Isn't that what people like Gerald Prince do? He is only mildly embarrassed to realize he is thinking of himself in the third person, like some pro football player or halfwit politician. He has learned, over his years in Manhattan, to be easy on himself. If you can't love yourself, you cannot love others.

There are times when he thinks the battered, frightened little bit of humanity he was at 18 has been completely exorcised from his being. Everybody knows that it's all over by the time you're five years old, or three, or six months, whatever, that all you'll ever be is already set in stone, by nature or nurture. But he can find scant evidence, most days, of little Jerry Prince from Speakeasy, Virginia.

He did think he might have felt a slight stirring from that long-buried coffin when he went back for the reunion and saw all those bullies of yesterday, laughing and swaggering as if they owned the world instead of one tiny, fourth-rate, forgotten—no, never-known—corner of it, masters of all they can see from atop the piss-ant hill where he grew up. On the way back north, he promised never to go back other than to see his mother, never again to invite into his realm the leering, snickering Ghost of Humiliations Past.

When Gerald Prince came to New York 24 years ago with a master's from Harvard and a couple of short stories published in journals that paid in free copies of the magazine, he aimed to immerse himself in the world of books. He saw himself laboring away for a few years as a poorly paid editor (and, yes, his errant father subsidized him, too) before achieving glory when his talent as a writer was finally, inevitably recognized.

His one published novel, bought by a woman editor he knew at a smaller rival house, got a good enough review in Publisher's Weekly, a so-so one in Kirkus, and a Books in Brief mention in the Times that said he “shows some promise despite a tendency to overstate the obvious.” The book, which had an initial run of 10,000 copies, sold less than 3,000. Gerald still has 100 of them boxed up in the basement.

The promise was not realized in two other manuscripts, neither of which was published, but something amazing happened. He discovered he had a talent for finding talent and developing it. He touted a couple of first-time novelists who soon were Mayfair cash cows. He became known as someone who could not only spot future stars but also gain writers' trust and get them to believe Gerald's ideas were their very own, thus ensuring that the changes Gerald sought were realized with a minimum of tantrums and threats to change houses.

The boy who had to screw up all his courage to ask a girl to the Senior Prom—and was laughed at for his trouble—found himself unbound and reinvented in Manhattan. Over the years, he talked now and then about writing another novel, but he knew finally that he never would. He was what he was, and what he was, was damn good.

This first day of February, he is on the verge of landing a writer of suspense thrillers whose books make the best-seller list just by bearing his name. Gerald has almost convinced the man that his star can—will—shine even brighter with the determined, relentless commitment of Gerald Prince Books and Mayfair. One more lunch at Le Cirque ought to seal the deal. The
pièce de résistance
will be when Gerald shows him a proposed cover for his next work-in-progress, with the author's name approximately 50 percent larger than the title.

Gerald turns right off Fifth to walk the half-block to his office. He has gone only a few yards when he encounters a ghost.

He doesn't recognize him at first, just knows that he should.

Then it hits him, and he begins to feel the cold for the first time this bright morning as the sweat that has suddenly erupted from his armpits begins to instantly chill.

Jack Stone is facing him on the sidewalk, which is not nearly as crowded as the one on the avenue was. He is wearing some kind of lurid green toboggan and a jacket that wouldn't warm a person this far north in April, let alone February. He has some kind of bag slung over his shoulder.

He seems, from the way his right hand juts out of the coat's pocket, to be carrying something. He doesn't look like the guy did the one time Gerald has been robbed in New York. That one was shaking a little, making Gerald nervous with his nervousness. That time, Gerald finally got his wallet out of his hip pocket with a trembling hand and gave it to the robber without even asking him to leave the wallet itself and the credit cards.

Jack Stone just looks determined, focused, his bloodshot eyes unblinking.

When he moves closer, and Gerald can feel the poke of the gun, Jack tells him that they have to talk.

Gerald Prince wonders how a morning that seemed so promising just two minutes ago could cloud over so suddenly.

On the way to the address he had memorized, Jack had to stop on two occasions to duck into a building, just to escape the fierceness of the wind and cold. Finally, just north of Penn Station, he found the toboggan lying on the street, next to a garbage can. He stopped and picked it up, causing a minor pileup on the sidewalk behind him. People glared as they moved past and regained speed.

He was almost running the last, long east-west block. His watch read 8:53. If he had been late, he didn't know how he might get into the building and to Gerald Prince's office uninvited. He doubted that his charm would be enough to carry the day.

He was across the street from the main entrance, catching his breath, when he saw Gerald Prince round the corner from Fifth Avenue. After all this time, there was something in Gerald's walk that reminded him of Jerry Prince, something that couldn't be hidden by a black fedora, a tan camel-hair coat and 30 years.

Feeling a little less frozen for the exercise, Jack slipped between two cars and was on the sidewalk walking east before Gerald knew he was there.

Now, with the snub-nosed .38 poking into Gerald Prince's ribs just enough to let him know it's there, he knows his moment has arrived. No matter what, it's going to happen.

“There's something I need to talk to you about,” he tells Gerald, whose eyes are wide and white.

“Just don't shoot. Be calm. Remain calm, Jack. Please.”

“Yeah, sure. I'm calm. But we really need to get inside, to your office. I'm freezing my ass off.” Jack smiles, but from the look on Gerald's face, the effect has not proved to be reassuring.

“All I want to do is talk, and get you to look at something, read something,” Jack continues. “That's all I ask. Just get us up to your office. I'll be right beside you, and I don't really want to shoot you, if I don't have to.”

Gerald nods his head vigorously.

“Come on,” he says, and Jack follows him the several yards to Mayfair Publishing's front door.

In the lobby, they have to be buzzed up by a disembodied voice of an individual Jack assumes can see them. A guard sits 10 feet away, talking to a young woman. Gerald explains to the voice that Jack is a new writer, “a new talent,” he calls him.

“New talent,” Jack says. “I like that.”

They ride the elevator alone to the 17
^th
floor. Just before they exit, Jack reminds Gerald again about the need to be circumspect, poking him with the gun.

Jack is surprised and a little disappointed at what he sees on the 17
^th
floor. Most of it seems to be a dark warren of small cubicles, separated by partitions no more than four feet high. Once or twice in their journey to Gerald's office, Jack sees an editor rise out of his chair in an effort to see someone or something else in another part of the building, like prairie dogs on a TV nature show, popping out of their holes to sniff the air.

And Gerald Prince Books does not even occupy the whole floor. Gerald's empire seems to take up a quarter or so of it, at most. As they enter into Gerald's quarter, the people in the cubicles start calling him “Mr. Prince” as he passes by. He does not stop to introduce Jack, and they glance at him with only the mildest curiosity.

Surrounding the warrens are the few precious offices with actual walls and views of something outside the building. Gerald, Jack sees, at least has one of these.

There is a reception area outside Gerald's office, and here Jack gets to at last, actually, meet David.

“David,” Gerald says, looking back anxiously to his guest, “you've talked with Jack Stone over the phone. Well, here he is.”

Jack is surprised. He had imagined David to be a man about Gerald's size, or smaller, on the pallid side. But when David stands to offer a firm handshake, he sees that Gerald's assistant is larger than he is, six-three, maybe 200 pounds. He has blond, wavy hair, and looks as if he works out regularly and has a membership in a tanning salon.

“Delighted,” David says, “we were actually talking about you just a couple of days ago, wondering when we could get you up here.”

Jack can see the younger man is puzzled. What the hell, he must be asking himself, is Jack Stone doing here? Don't we have security any more?

“Hold my calls for the next hour,” Gerald tells David, and he leads Jack into his office.

The office itself is a large step up from the prairie-dog town outside. The noise drops off, and Jack is confronted with a mahogany desk that dominates the room. The ceiling in here is higher, too. Photos of authors and Gerald's family adorn the corners of the room. Jack spies a picture of Arlene Prince stuck in one subtle nook, almost obscured by a row of books. The one window appears to be in need of cleaning. It looks across the street to another office where Jack can see a woman sitting across from a desk similar to Gerald's, apparently taking notes.

The only visible whimsy in the office is a dart board on the wall facing the reception area and a single dart stuck into the acoustic tile overhead.

Gerald sees Jack looking at the dart. He tells him that a writer whose name Jack barely recognizes but whom Gerald seems to revere threw it into the ceiling in a pique over a rather drastic editing change Gerald suggested.

“He eventually thanked me for that change,” he adds.

“So, Jack,” Gerald says, sitting down carefully as Jack closes the door, “what can we do for you?”

Jack locks the door and sits in the room's only other chair.

“I got your message,” Jack tells him, and Gerald looks puzzled.

“The one about me. The one you meant to send to your wife. ‘Old friends with no talent?'”

The little blood remaining in Gerald Prince's face seems to drain away, and Jack thinks for a moment that he might faint.

“The message?” he manages at last, weakly. “The e-mail?”

Jack nods.

“So,” he says, “I had a fresh copy, and I thought I'd just bring it up here for you to read. I've got plenty of time. Just let me know when you're through.”

Jack reaches into the bag and takes out the block of paper. He drops it on Gerald's desk and sits. Then, he takes the gun out of his pocket and lays it across his lap. He crosses his legs.

“But, I've already read it,” Gerald says, then stops when he sees the look in Jack's eyes, the way his hand moves just slightly toward the gun's trigger.

“Right,” he says. “Right.”

They've been there for 45 minutes when Gerald's phone rings.

“OK,” he says. “Put her on.”

“Caitlin,” he whispers to Jack, who is pointing the gun directly at him now.

“Yes, I think that'd be great. Yes, 7:30 like I said. We need to be there by 6:30, latest. Tel Aviv Taxi. Can you call them, please? Thank you.”

The conversation goes on for perhaps five minutes, and then Gerald tells his wife that he has to go, that he's with someone.

“Love you, too,” he says, and hangs up.

“We're going to Virgin Gorda tomorrow,” he says. His voice is shaky, as it might have been 30-some years before, trying to talk his way out of some casually inflicted humiliation. “Were going,” he corrects himself. “Jack, just don't shoot me, OK? I've got two kids and a wife. I'll do whatever you want.”

“I want you to read the goddamn book,” Jack says, not raising his voice. He is surprised to be so calm, much calmer than he thought he might be. He's here now. Talent will out.