“You discussed this with CEO-and-hubby?”
“Sure, while he was screaming, throwing my stuff out the window, reminding me how badly I’m expected to come out of this. A nice adult discussion.”
Matrimonials. What is there ever to say? “Just don’t forget about the loss carry-forwards and all that, OK?” Running a quick EHA or Eyeball-Humidity Assessment, Maxine thinks for a minute Tallis is about to go all mushy, but instead she’s relieved to see, as if jump-cut to, the reliably annoying Fingernail, cycling toward and away from her lips,
“You’ve been discovering secrets about my husband… any you’d like to share?”
“There’s no proof of anything yet.”
An unsurprised nod. “But he is, I don’t know, a suspect in something?” Gazing toward a neutral corner, voice softening to edgelessness, “The Geek That Couldn’t Sleep. A make-believe horror movie we used to pretend we were in. Gabe was really such a sweet kid, a long time ago.”
Off she goes goes on the time machine, while Maxine investigates the liquor inventory. Presently Tallis is recalling one of several memorial services after 11 September she was at representing hashslingrz, standing there among a delegation of dry-eyed wisefolk who looked like they were waiting for it to be over so they could get back to which stock to short next, when she observed one of the bagpipe players, improvising grace notes on “Candle in the Wind,” who seemed to her dimly familiar. It turned out to be Gabriel’s old college roommate Dieter, now in business as a professional bagpiper. There were catered eats afterward, over which she and Dieter got into conversation, trying to avoid kilt jokes, though whatever he’d grown into, it wasn’t Sean Connery.
Demand for bagpipers was brisk. Dieter, filing as an S-corporation these days, teamed up with a couple of other classmates from CMU, had been swamped since 11 September with more gigs than he knew what to do with, weddings, bar mitzvahs, furniture-store openings…
“Weddings?” sez Maxine.
“He sez you’d be surprised, a funeral lament at a wedding, gets a laugh every time.”
“I can imagine.”
“They don’t do cop funerals so much, the cops apparently have their own resources, most of it’s private functions like this one we were at. Dieter grew philosophical, said it got stressful from time to time, he felt like a branch of emergency services, being held in readiness, waiting for the call to come in.”
“Waiting for the next…”
“Yeah.”
“You think he might be some kind of a leading indicator?”
“Dieter? Like bagpipe players would get a heads-up before the next one happens? That would be so weird?”
“Well, after that—did you and your husband get together socially with Dieter?”
“Uh-huh? He and Gabe might have even done some business.”
“Natch. What are ex-roomies for?”
“It looked like they were planning some project together, but they never shared it with me, and whatever it was, it didn’t show up on the books.”
A joint project, Gabriel Ice and somebody whose career depends on widespread public bereavement. Hmmm. “Did you ever invite him out to Montauk?”
“As a matter of fact…”
Cue the theremin music, and you, Maxine, get a grip. “This split could all turn out to be a blessing in disguise for you, Tallis, and meantime, you… have called your mother.”
“Do you think I should?”
“I think you’re overdue.” Plus a related thought, “Listen, it’s none of my business, but…”
“Is there a fella. Of course. Can he help, good question.” Reaching for the Hypnotiq bottle.
“Tallis,” trying to keep as much weariness as she can out of it, “I know there’s a boyfriend, and he’s nobody’s ‘fella’ except maybe your husband’s, and frankly none of this is as cute as you’re hoping…” Giving her the abridged version of Chazz Larday’s rap sheet including his wife-sitting arrangements with Ice. “It’s a setup. So far you’re doing exactly everything hubby wants you to.”
“No. Chazz…” Is the next part of this going to be “… loves me?” Maxine’s thoughts wander to the Beretta in her purse, but Tallis surprises her. “Chazz is a dick with an East Texan attached to it, one being the price of the other, you could say.”
“Wait a minute.” Out at the edge of Maxine’s visual field, something’s been blinking for a while. It turns out to be an indicator light on a little CCTV camera up in one dim corner of the ceiling. “This is a motel, Tallis? Who put this thing in here?”
“It wasn’t in here before.”
“Do you think…?”
“It would figure.”
“You got a stepladder?” No. “A broom?” A sponge mop. They take turns banging at it, like an evil high-tech piñata, till it comes crashing to the floor.
“You know what, you should be someplace safer.”
“Where? With my mom? One step away from a bag lady, never mind me, she can’t help herself.”
“We’ll figure out where, but they just lost their picture, they’ll be coming here, we need to be gone.”
Tallis throws a couple of things in an oversize shoulder bag and they proceed to the elevator, down twenty floors, out through the gold-accented Grand Central–size lobby, with its four-figures-per-day floral arrangements—
“Mrs. Ice?” The doorman, regarding Tallis with something between apprehension and respect.
“Not for long,” Tallis sez. “Dragoslav. What.”
“These two guys showed up, said they’ll ‘be seeing you soon.’”
“That’s it?” A puzzled frown.
Maxine gets a brain wave. “Doing Russian rap lyrics, by any chance?”
“That’s them. Please be sure and tell them I gave you the message? Like, I promised?”
“They’re nice guys,” sez Maxine, “really, no need to worry.”
“Worry, excuse me, does not begin to describe.”
“Tallis, you haven’t been…”
“I don’t know these guys. You however seem to. Anything you’d like to share?”
They have wandered out onto the sidewalk. Light draining away over Jersey, no cabs around and miles to the subway. Next thing they know, around the corner on apparently new hydraulics and up the block comes, yes, it’s Igor’s ZiL-41047, gussied up tonight into a full-scale shmaravozka, gold custom spinner rims with blinking red LEDs, high-tech antennas and lowrider striping—screeches to a pause next to Tallis and Maxine and out leap Misha and Grisha, wearing matching Oakley OvertheTop shades and packing PP-19 Bizons, with which they gesture Tallis and Maxine into the back of the limo. Maxine gets a professional if not exactly courtly patdown, and the Tomcat in her purse goes on the unavailable list.
“Misha! Grisha! And here I thought you were such gentlemen!”
“You’ll get your pushka back,” Misha with a friendly stainless grin, sliding behind the wheel and pimpmobiling away from the curb.
“Reducing complications,” Grisha adds. “Remember Good, Bad and Ugly, three-way standoff? Remember how much trouble even to watch?”
“You don’t mind my asking, guys, what’s going on?”
“Up till five minutes ago,” sez Grisha, “simple plan, put snatch and grab on cute Pamela Anderson here.”
“Who,” inquires Tallis, “me?”
“Tallis, please, just— And now the plan’s not so simple?”
“We weren’t expecting you too,” Misha sez.