The other man was trouble. He was the A male, the leader of the pack. This was his table, his party, and his guests; his Allie.
He was of medium height, wide, stocky build-rugby type. He wore a pale khaki suit over a plain black T-shirt; no socks under soft brown loafers. A tiny stone that looked like an emerald adorned his left ear, and three fresh shallow cuts ran straight down from his left eye to his cheekbone. They had just scabbed over and Neal guessed they were self-inflicted. He was drinking something that looked like a tall gin, and he sipped at it as he looked over his glass at Allie and smiled. He was trouble: major league.
He uttered some fresh snippet of wit that sent Fuck the World into a new paroxysm of laughter. This was for Allie, and FTW probably didn’t realize the joke was on him.
One very pissed-off waiter came to the table. Neal saw from his look that the staff here would like nothing better than to throw this punk quartet out into the alley and maybe set fire to them if the chance arose and they had a spare match. But the punks had money and lots of it. The manager probably just wanted to get them fed and get them out before the regular customers got the idea that this was more than a fluke. The other customers were already getting nervous but looked too intimidated to complain.
The Suit ordered for all four.
Neal stepped back for a minute to think it over. He had a choice to make here: stand back and follow them or move in. Following was probably the safer choice. There was a small chance that the smart one could make him, but he doubted that. He could follow them through the night, get an address, and then make a nice slow move. But there was a chance, as there always was with a one-man tail, that he would lose them and he might never get another shot.
On the other hand, if he moved in unprepared, he might blow it for good.
He took a deep breath, edged his way through the crowd on the sidewalk, and entered the restaurant. The headwaiter greeted him with the wooden smile reserved for lone diners that says, “I have to seat you but you ought to have gone to a counter, where you wouldn’t take up a whole table, so please, at least run up a big liquor tab.” That smile.
“Table for one, please.”
“Yes, sir. Follow me, please.”
Neal pointed to an empty deuce across the aisle from Allie. “How about that one?”
“Really, sir?”
“Honest to goodness.”
The man shrugged. “As you wish, sir.”
He seated him at the table and handed him the menu. “Enjoy your meal.”
Now what? Neal thought. Come on, genius, what next? You could reach over, tap her on the shoulder, and say “Gotcha.” You could explain that you’re on a scavenger hunt and you have to bring home a seventeen-year-old girl to a Vice Presidential candidate and get twenty thousand points, you could… actually smell her perfume, which was some wicked variety of musk. You could suddenly understand how some poor prep school teacher could…
Steady, lad. Let’s take it easy. Let’s wipe the sweat off your palms. Christ, you’ve only done about a thousand undercovers, and the basic rule is always the same: Get close, stay close, wait for an opening.
He studied the menu. Might as well get a good meal out of this. But there was nary a cheeseburger to be found. He decided on the lamb. “Waiter. Oh, waiter!” he heard the Suit say. So he was local East End. But he did a fine parody of an Oxbridge twit. The harried waiter came over.
“Where are our steaks?”
“Cooking, sir. Did you want them raw?”
“When I want any shit out of you, I’ll squeeze your head.” His eyes narrowed. He didn’t like being fucked with.
“Kill ’im, Colin,” laughing boy said.
A name. Colin. Thank you, baby Jesus. “If sir isn’t satisfied…” said the waiter.
“Sir isn’t leaving, if that’s what you’ve got on your mind. Now get us our bloody food. Wimpy’s have better service.”
“Better food, too.” Laughing boy was serious.
“Run along,” Colin said.
Laughing boy chimed in dutifully, “Now!” The shout lifted every head in the place.
“Easy, Crisp,” said Colin. “There’s an art to this. Eat your salad.”
“If you don’t, I will. I’m starving.” Oh, Allie, if you knew how long I’ve waited to hear you say that… or say anything.
Crisp pushed his plate to her. “You’re always hungry. How come you don’t get fat?”
“Yeah, Colin, how come?” she asked. It was a joke between them. “Better living through chemistry, love,” Colin said. “Better loving, too.”
Oh boy.
“Have you decided, sir?”
The waiter startled him,
“I’ll have the lamb, please.”
“And the wine, sir?”
“You decide.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Colin was playing to a full house and loving it. He knew just how much he could bait the crowd of locals and tourists without forcing the manager to toss him. He had just the right edge, loud and sharp enough to disrupt the place. Putting it to the middle class he was, and no mistake.
“Well,” Colin asked his mates, and anyone within earshot, “have you ever met a bloke from Oxford who wasn’t a buggerboy?”
Crisp tried to keep up with him. “Have you ever met a bloke from Oxford?”
“Not me. I hate buggerboys.”
“Or do you just hate Oxford boys?” asked Allie.
“Oxford boys, Cambridge boys, Eton boys, Arundel boys… they’re all buttjockeys. What they get up to between the sheets when the lights go out would make me mother weep.”
“Your mother’s dead.”
“All the same.”
“I need to hit the loo,” Allie said.
“Again?”
“It’s been a while.”
Do I detect a slight tinge of the defensive? Neal asked himself.
“So go.”
“Come with me.”
“You’re a big girl now. It’s the one with the frock on the door.”
“You know what I mean.”
Their voices had dropped. This was private business. Neal saw that Colin didn’t like his act interrupted.
“Later,” Colin said.
“C’mon, Collie. Now.”
Collie? As in Lassie, as in woof-woof, come quick, Timmy fell down the well?
“C’mon, please?”
Neal checked out her eyes. He could never remember whether the eyes were supposed to be the windows or the mirrors of the soul. Maybe both, like those one-way mirrors they use in precinct houses and your finer department stores.
Allie’s eyes were tilting toward teary. Moist and soft, and Neal could swear they had been sharp and clear when he came in. A look like that on Seventy-second Street would draw the sales force for blocks around.
Colin took control. “Have another beer.” Allie’s fingers started doing a Buddy Rich imitation on the bottle. Her nostrils, as they say in the romance books, flared. Then she turned on the charm she’d learned from Mom and Dad.
“Maybe just a little something for my cold. Runny nose?”
Is it ever thus? Neal wondered. He had a friend at Columbia who claimed that life was just a stack of record albums on an automatic drop. Problem was, they were all the same record.
Colin smiled back at her. A compromise had been reached. “Yeah, those summer colds are always the worst. Got a bit of a sniffle meself.” He stood up. “Come on then, love. You two hold the table, eh? You can go when we get back.”
The loos were in the basement at the end of a dark, narrow corridor. Allie leaned against the corridor wall as Colin screened her from view and held the spoon to her nose. She steadied it against one nostril and rested her finger against the other to keep it closed. She inhaled sharply and deeply and held her head back while Colin carefully dipped another spoonful from the vial in his hand. She snorted this one and shook her head gently back and forth.
Colin dipped into the vial again for a quick hit. Then he ran the little finger of his right hand around the rim of the vial, and with his left hand pushed Allie’s shirt up and over her breasts. He gently rubbed a little coke around each nipple and bent over and licked it off. She bit down on the knuckle of her index finger and whimpered once, softly, as her right hand found his crotch and rubbed. He pulled her shirt back down. Her nipples stood out against the thin black fabric.