Or maybe he should just go home and get Ilya and the diamonds and head for the airport. It was too much for him to work out. He needed Ilya. She was a very smart Russian and he was far out of his depth. He would do whatever she wanted him to do.
Cosmo took his killing bag and went out to his car. He had never been so demoralized in his life. If the Cadillac failed to start, he would just take the pistol from the bag and shoot himself. But it started and he drove home to Ilya. When he was only two blocks from their apartment his cell rang.
He answered and the driver’s voice said, “Mister, I am at Gregori’s with the car. No problem. Everything okay.”
The stolen car was okay, but of course everything else was far from okay.
At 7:15 P.M. Farley was released from the holding tank and told that he was free to go.
Bad cop said to him, “We know you’re connected to those computers, but right now we’re gonna let you walk. I suspect you’ll see us again.”
“Speaking of walk,” Farley said. “My car’s there where you grabbed me. How about a ride back up there?”
“You got a lotta ’tude, dude,” bad cop said. “We’re not running a taxi service.”
“Man, you hassle me, you keep me here for hours when I ain’t done nothing wrong. The least you can do is take me back to my car.”
The Oracle heard the bitching and came out of the sergeant’s office, saying to Farley, “Where do you need to go?”
Farley looked at the old sergeant and said, “Fairfax, just north of Hollywood Boulevard.”
The Oracle said, “I’m going out now. I’ll give you a lift.”
Fifteen minutes later, when the Oracle dropped him at his car, Farley said, “Thanks a lot, Sergeant. You’re okay.”
The Oracle offered the Hollywood mantra: “Stay real, Farley. Stay real.” But he knew that this tweaker would not. Who in Hollywood ever did?
“Teddy?” Mrs. Chang said when Hollywood Nate had a Latino busboy call her from the kitchen. “He eat here?”
“He’s a bum,” Nate said.
“Bum?” she said, grappling with the English meaning.
“Homeless,” Wesley said. “Street person.”
“Oh, street person,” she said. “Him I know. Teddy. Yes.”
“Does he come here?”
“Sometime he come to back door,” Mrs. Chang said. “Come at maybe seven o’clock, sometime later. And we give him food we got to throw away. Teddy. Yes. He sit in kitchen and eat. Nice man. Quiet. We feel sorry.”
“When did you last see him?” Wesley asked.
“Tuesday night maybe. Hard to remember.”
Nate began writing in his notebook and said, “When he comes again, I want you to call this number. Ask that Six-X-Seventy-two come right away. I’ve written it down for you. We don’t want to arrest him. We just have to talk to him. Understand?”
“Yes, I call.”
The house was dark when Farley got home, and the garage door was open. Why would Olive go in the garage? There was nothing in there but junk.
He unlocked the front door and entered, yelling, “Olive! You here?”
She was not, and he went into the kitchen to see if there was any orange juice left and found the back door kicked open!
“Son of a bitch!” he said.
This was the first time that burglars had struck his house, although several houses on the block had been hit by daytime thieves in the past two years. But the TV was still there. He went into the bedroom and saw that the radio-CD player was still there. Nobody had ransacked the bedroom drawers. This wasn’t like house breakers. It wasn’t the way he worked when he himself was a daytime burglar fifteen years ago.
Then he saw the note on the kitchen table. Mabel. He should have known. The fucking old ghost probably was reading tarot cards for Olive and time had gotten away from the skinny moron. He went into the bedroom to strip down and take a shower and then he saw that something was different. The closet was half empty. All of Olive’s clothes were missing, including the jacket he’d shoplifted for her Christmas present. He opened the drawer and saw that her underwear and socks were gone too. She’d bailed on him!
The note. He ran out the front door and across the street to Mabel’s. It was such a warm evening that her door was open, and he could see that the TV was on. He put his hands up to the screen door to peer inside and said, “Mabel!”
The old woman shuffled in from the back bedroom of the cottage, wearing pajamas, a bathrobe, and fuzzy slippers, and said, “Farley? What’re you doing here?”
“Do you know where Olive is?”
“Why, no.”
“She left a note saying she was having supper with you.”
“Yes, she did. And Olive found Tillie under your house where she’d made a nice little den for herself. Tillie’s in my bedroom now, the little brat. I never have completely domesticated her.”
“Did Olive say where she was going when she left?”
“Yes, home.”
Farley had to sit down and ponder that when he got back to the house. Everything was going wrong lately. His entire world was upside down. Without a dollar to her name, that toothless fucking scarecrow had abandoned his ass! This was impossible! That imbecile Olive Oyl had actually dumped Farley Ramsdale, who’d given her everything!
This time it was Cosmo who was lying on the bed trying to quell a throbbing headache. He had quickly briefed Ilya on what had happened and then fell on his knees beside her chair and kissed her hands.
He is beaten, Ilya thought. Cosmo is crying for Mommy. He would never strike her again.
Ilya prepared her third glass of hot tea and lit a cigarette with the butt of the last and finally said, “Cosmo, all is a fuckup.”
“Yes, Ilya,” he murmured painfully.
“I think we must pack the suitcase and make ready to fly away.”
“Yes, Ilya,” Cosmo said. “What you say, I do.”
“On other hand,” she said, looking from one palm to the other for emphasis, “we do not know for absolute truth that Farley has our money.”
“Ilya, please!” Cosmo said. “The money is gone. Farley is gone. I cannot get to Farley with cell. Farley always have cell with him. He is addict. Addict must have cell.”
“One way we find out,” she said. “Sit up, Cosmo!”
He obeyed instantly.
“Call Farley. Go with plan. Tell him Gregori need key cards. Many more. Will pay top money. Let us hear what he shall say.”
Cosmo’s head was aching too much for this but it was impossible not to obey her. He felt as though he was back in Soviet Armenia and the Comrade Chairman himself had spoken. He was afraid of her now. He dialed.
“Hello!” Farley yelled into his cell.
Cosmo was stunned. He couldn’t speak for a moment and Farley said, “Olive? Is that you?”
Looking at Ilya, Cosmo said, “Is me, Farley.”
“Cosmo?” Farley said. “I thought it was Olive. That fucking tweaker has up and disappeared!”
“Olive?” Cosmo said. “Gone?”
He saw the wry smile turn up the corners of Ilya’s mouth, and he said, “You know where she go to?”
“No,” Farley said. “The cunt. I ain’t got a clue.”
Ilya was mouthing the words “Ask him,” and Cosmo said, “I very sorry, Farley. You know Gregori? He need more cards right away.”
“Key cards? Cosmo, you forgot that you and me got a little business deal coming up? You think I’m gonna keep waiting? You think I’m gonna fuck around with key cards?”
“Please, Farley,” Cosmo said. “Do this for me. I owe big favor to Gregori. Just drop off cards at his junkyard tonight. He work to midnight. He will give you fast hundred fifty. You buy crystal.”
The word “crystal” struck a chord with Farley. He wanted to smoke ice more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life. This was the kind of deal where he desperately needed Olive. If she were here, he’d drive her over there to the junkyard and send her in. If Cosmo had a plan to waste them, he’d have to settle for Olive. Goddamn her!