Woman with a Blue Pencil (21 page)

Your biggest fan,

Maxine

THE REVISED—CHAPTER EIGHT

What do we truly look for in the face of our beloved if not, above all else, redemption? And, frankly, what a forlorn enterprise is that?

—Greta Garbo in
Silver Screen Magazine

It was half past nine when Sumida paid the hack and climbed out onto Ocean Avenue, across the street from the Pike. The cabbie, who had brought Sumida here after curfew only after Sumida flashed Czernicek's police badge and told the driver he was on official business, pulled away from the curb. Watching the big Checker cab disappear into the gloom, he reached back to touch the .38 Special he had slipped into the waistband of his trousers. Then he turned toward the darkened seaside amusement park, where, according to the police report that Czernicek had stolen a few hours before, the Orchid was to be found in a fortune-telling concession. The sound of calliope music, the roar and swoosh of the big, wooden roller coaster, the Cyclone Racer, and the happy exclamations of Saturday night revelers filled the night air. Sam had fond memories of this place, having grown up only a few miles away. He recalled that along the Walk of a Thousand Lights, which led to the midway, you'd find Sea Side Souvenir Photography, McGruder Salt Water Taffy, the Plunge bathhouse, and dozens of pitch and skill games of such wide variety that their only common trait was their deceptive simplicity. But this was no time for nostalgia. Besides, this wasn't the same place with the Walk of a Thousand Lights shut off, along with the lights on the Ferris wheel, the roller coaster, the midway, the pier, and all the other rides and attractions. In all, the Pike gave off little more light than a scattering of tiny campfires around which hovered a thousand fireflies—useless to any Japanese planes approaching the mainland at ten thousand feet.

He started across the street.

Excerpt from chapter thirteen of
The Orchid and the Secret Agent
, a novel by William Thorne

Metropolitan Modern Mysteries, Inc., New York, N.Y., 1945

. . . Jimmy closed the door to Madame Belinsky's tiny, one-room establishment, shutting out much, but not all, of the racket of the crowded pier outside. Now, the only light came from the center of the shack, where a pair of candles flickered atop a round café table that was covered by a dark velvet cloth. Seated at the table, watching him, her appearance a play of shadows, was Madame Belinsky. Weathered and dark complexioned, her face
looked
like that of a real Gypsy, as did her lavishly layered clothing, headdress, and bejeweled neck and forearms.

“Will it be tarot cards or a palm reading?” she asked.

Her accent
sounded
Eastern European (though Jimmy's linguistic expertise did not extend to Slavic languages). Then again, the whole presentation might as easily be described as quintessentially “carny” as “authentic Gypsy mystic”—Jimmy wondered if there was any difference between the two anyway?

One thing was clear: she was not the Orchid.

“Tarot or palmistry?” she repeated.

Jimmy didn't answer but silently took in the room. The lavish decor suggested Madame Belinsky might have obtained her furnishings from props left over from the old silent movie,
The Sheik
.

“I like what you've done with the place,” he said.

She seemed to miss his irony. “We Gypsies have had more than a millennium to develop a true sense of style.”

“You're Madame Belinsky?”

“Who else would I be?”

Jimmy knew enough to be cautious when his questions were answered with other questions, even of the seemingly harmless, rhetorical variety.

“You still haven't answered
my
question, sir,” Madame Belinsky pressed.

“About the means of fortune-telling?”

“What else?” Again, she answered with what
seemed
a harmless rhetorical question.

“I can't choose the method of divination, Madame Belinsky, because I'm not here to dictate terms.” He assumed his words were being heard clandestinely by the Orchid. Likely, there was a microphone hidden somewhere in the small room. “I'm here tonight only to listen humbly to whatever propositions
you
offer, by whatever means you deem appropriate.”

“Good answer,” Madame Belinsky affirmed. “Sit down.”

Jimmy sat at the small chair across the table from the soothsayer. “How much for a reading?”

Madame Belinsky smiled, her mouth revealing half-a-dozen gold teeth scattered among the rot. “Tonight's reading will be free of charge.”

“That's very generous.”

The smile disappeared as she shook her head. “I am not generous, but knowing. You see, should you return after tonight to learn more of your future,
then
remuneration will be quite substantial. Virtually all you can afford. Is that clear?” She didn't wait for an answer. “But, of course, you will return only if you deem worthwhile what I say to you tonight.”

“That sounds pretty much like standard carnival patter, Madame,” he said, dismissively. “The usual ruse. I expected something a little more personal. Even unique.”

“Ah, you're a bold young man,” she responded, rolling her eyes momentarily heavenward. “Brave. But it takes no soothsayer to see you're courageous. After all, an Oriental out after dark walking among hundreds of whites . . .”

“If you're a true seer, then you know I'm not Japanese,” he interrupted.

“I didn't say you were,” she sneered. “But you know well enough that there are many Caucasians who do not ask for ID to confirm your ancestry before beating you.”

She was right.

“In fact, you had just such a close call earlier this evening,” she added, looking him hard in the eye. “Yes, I see how your reminiscence of the confrontation colors your aura. And I can see the actual scene, six threatening hulks in an alley, imprinted upon the iris of your mystic third eye.”

Initially, Jimmy wasn't impressed. Mr. Barratt had told him that the incident with the college boys was already in the news. But how could she know it had been Jimmy who'd beaten the six boys? Unless, perhaps, the Orchid's organization had sent the six in the first place and had been observing all along. . . . But turning a half-dozen American college boys to evil Japanese Imperialist collaboration? Impossible. Even his “mystic third eye” was a more likely explanation. In any case, he hadn't time to fret over parlor tricks. “Look, there's no need for you to waste my time with your usual hokum. I'm not just some sucker from the pier. You know that. So let's get down to business.”

“But you have not yet chosen. Tarot or palmistry?”

The last thing he wanted was to give her the opportunity to ham it up with cards. “Palmistry,” he said.

“Good. Give me your palms.”

He extended his right arm, setting his hand palm up at the center of the small table.

“Both hands please.”

This didn't feel right. But if the Orchid wanted him dead, she'd have finished the job by now. So he set his left hand palm up beside his right.

Madame Belinsky touched his hands, studying them as she lightly ran her index fingers along the creases in his palms. “I see great opportunity ahead for you,” she said.

So this was how the offer to betray his country would be made, he speculated.

“Go on, Madame Belinsky.”

But before she could say more, a loud explosion from far above rattled the pier and shook the Gypsy's tiny structure to its nuts and bolts. Startled, Jimmy pulled back his hands.

His first thought was that the Japs were bombing.

Two seconds later came another explosion and then another and another, accompanied by the unexpected roar and cheers of revelers along the midway and the pier. Suddenly, he understood. It was a fireworks display.

He sighed, relieved. Then his breath caught in his throat.

Fireworks during a black-out?

Besides, even before the war the Pike had only displayed fireworks on summer nights. He looked at his watch. It was almost ten p.m. Too late for many of the amusement park's prime clientele, children, who'd already been taken home. This made no sense.

Unless, of course, it was the work of the Orchid.

Had he simply been lured to the center of a bombing target?

Madame Belinsky raised her voice to be heard over the continuing explosive din. “Are you as distractible as a small child?” she inquired critically. “Will you be so weak as to allow a mere light show in the sky to distract you from our profound work in
here
!” She indicated with her hands that Jimmy was to return his palms to the table.

Meanwhile, the pier shuddered with each explosion.

The amusement park patrons roared their approval.

Jimmy raised his voice to be heard, even as he leaned toward Madame Belinsky. “Maybe we should wait until it's over.”

She shook her head. “Give me your palms,” she insisted, her voice screeching. “Now or never.”

He did as she asked, returning his palms to the table.

The Gypsy woman resumed running her index fingers along the lines in his palms, silently.

Outside: “Boom! Boom! Boom!”

Then she looked up at him, grinning widely—all gold and rot.

That's when he felt the muzzle of a gun at the back of his head.

“Don't move, Jimmy Park,” said a woman, with a sultry, unaccented voice. “I wouldn't want to have to put a hole in your head before we've even had the opportunity to meet properly.”

It wasn't hard to guess whose voice it was.

Meanwhile, Madame Belinsky dexterously slapped a pair of handcuffs on Jimmy's exposed wrists.

He took a deep, steadying breath.

The game was on. It was early yet, he thought. First quarter . . .

But he was already losing.

“You used the fireworks as distraction,” Jimmy observed, without turning his head.

“Yes,” she answered. “They are quite expensive, but effective. Americans love loud noise and bright lights. It's like the Fourth of July out there tonight, ha! And by the time the authorities realize that the glittering extravaganza has not actually been arranged by the amusement park but by some mysterious benefactor, we'll be long gone.”

“And the din allowed you to follow me through Madame Belinsky's front door,” he speculated.

“We didn't use the
front
door.” Her voice communicated both calm and sensuality. “No, we came in through a trapdoor beneath Madame Belinsky's old, blue Turkish rug.”

Jimmy closed his eyes in frustration. He should have examined the room more closely before sitting down, he silently chided himself. But then he reflected: the point of the evening was to make contact with the Orchid.

And here she was.

Sure, there was a gun at his head, but nobody said it was going to be easy.

“The little trapdoor opens to a ladder that leads under the pier to a catwalk suspended eight or ten feet over the sea,” she continued. “It's how we'll be going out. You'll see it soon enough, Mr. Park.”

Two large Japs dressed in black, like burglars, approached from behind and took hold of Jimmy's arms.

“How many of you are there in this little shack?” Jimmy asked, unable to turn around to look. “Are we crammed in here like sardines?”

“Just us three,” the Orchid answered, pressing the gun harder against his skull. “My associates, Shinji and Kento, and me.”

“Us
four
,” Madame Belinsky corrected.

The big Japs gripped Jimmy's arms harder, securing him firmly.

The Orchid lowered the gun from Jimmy's head and stepped around the table. At last, Jimmy got a good look at her. She wore a slinky silk gown and moved with exquisite grace. Her skin was flawless, her hair as rich and silky as a black cat's fur, marked by the streak of white. Despite what Jimmy knew about her, his heart leaped, unwarranted, at her sight.

Who knew evil could be so beautiful?

The height of deceit . . .

The Orchid moved behind the seated fortune-teller, placing both hands gently on the woman's shoulders. “Actually, Madame Belinsky, from this point forward it's just us
three
. Shinji, Kento, and me. Or four, I suppose, if you count Jimmy, depending on how things turn out with him. But who knows what choices he will make? Regardless, you're no longer necessary to the team.”

“But . . .” Madame Belinsky murmured.

“Oh, you
were
helpful,” the Orchid interrupted. “But you're descended from a mongrel race and so you could never be considered one of us. And yet you're here . . . a witness to everything . . . so what is to be done?” The Orchid tightened her grip on the fortune teller's shoulders so that she could neither rise nor turn around.

“I helped you,” Madame Belinsky said, her fake accent disappearing as her panic rose. “You promised me money. But you needn't pay, just let me go.”