“Just tell her what’s in your heart, Jer. Women can tell when you’re being honest.”
Jerry nodded earnestly. “Okay, fine. Yeah, call her. Call her and tell her Jerry wants to talk to her. No, scratch that. Don’t tell her anything. Um, or better yet, tell her an old friend wants to talk to her. Yeah, that’s better. Though she’ll probably hang up the moment she recognizes my voice. Um…”
Johnny placed one of his ham-sized hands on his friend’s back. “You think too much, Jer. That’s your problem right there.” He dialed Marlene’s number and waited for her to pick up, giving his friend a reassuring smile. Jerry was nervous, which was a good sign. It meant he wouldn’t say anything dumb. He’d think before blathering like a silly fool.
“Marlene?” he said, the moment Jerry’s ex-wife picked up with a melodious, ‘This is Marlene, and who are you?’ “It’s Johnny. Johnny Carew.”
“Oh, it’s you,” said Marlene, not exactly sounding over the moon with joy.
“Yeah, it’s me. Listen, Marlene, Jerry and I are back in the country.”
“I didn’t even know you were out of the country.”
“Ha ha. Still as funny as ever. Listen, Jerry and I have joined Jehovah’s Witnesses.”
“You did what now?”
“They were the only ones prepared to let us do our community service.”
“I should have known. What did you do this time? Rob a bank?”
“How did you know?”
“Oh, Johnny,” Marlene sighed.
“Listen, Jerry wants to talk to you.”
“Well, I don’t want to talk to him.”
“Yeah, but he’s found religion, see. He’s a changed man, Marlene. A religious man, if you see what I mean.”
“Tell him he still owes me six months’ worth of alimony.”
It didn’t really sound encouraging, but Johnny was an eternal optimist, who believed in the essential goodness of all people. So he handed the phone to his friend. “She’s very eager to talk to you, Jer,” he said, adding a little fib to the mix, just to keep the ball rolling.
Jerry’s little face lit up like a Christmas tree as he eagerly grabbed the phone. “Marlene?” he bleated. “It’s Jerry!” He paused for a moment, then cried, “Marlene?” He glanced up at Johnny, his face falling. “She hung up on me. She actually hung up on me.”
Johnny listened for a moment, then bellowed, “Marlene?” When no response came, he had to concede that Jerry had a point. “Must be a bad connection,” he said. “We’re probably too far from the nearest cell tower. Lemme give it another shot.”
But Jerry made a throwaway gesture with his hand. “Nah. Don’t bother. Obviously she’s still mad at me for landing my ass in prison again.”
Johnny placed his hand on his friend’s shoulder and squeezed, causing Jerry to wince. “Don’t give up, Jer. Marlene will come around, I just know she will. You just have to keep to the straight and narrow and all will be well. Just you wait and see.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” said Jerry dejectedly, and followed his friend to the next house, where they proceeded to try and interest a pensioner in the word of Jesus.
Chapter 17
“What do you want?” asked Charlene, as her hands were tied behind her back and her ankles to the legs of her chair.
“Where is it?” asked the guy again. He was waving some sort of gun in her face, and as far as she could ascertain it looked real enough.
“Where is what?”
“The collection of gold coins,” said the guy.
Charlene bit her lower lip. Of course. She should have known that those gold coins would lure the unsavory element to her office at some point. When her predecessor had shown her the coins with a sense of pride, he’d advised her to transfer them to a safe place, something he felt he should have done a long time ago. So she had a safe installed only the week before, and had transferred the coins to the safe, figuring it was safe there.
The gold coins had once been donated to the town by the Duke of Middleforth, an English nobleman, whose life had been saved by local fishermen when his yacht had gotten in trouble off the coast of Hampton Cove. As a token of his appreciation the Duke had awarded the town with the coins, bearing his likeness. They’d been worth a great deal of money at the time and now, after nine decades had passed, even more, due to inflation and the particular history related to them.
Charlene gestured with her head to the other side of her office, where a wood-paneled wall hid a door into a secret room. “They’re in the safe,” she said.
“Combination,” barked the gangster.
“1234,” said Charlene, a little shamefacedly. She hadn’t gotten round to changing the factory-installed code yet. Not that it mattered now.
The crook immediately walked over to the panel and opened it, drawing a surprised gasp from Charlene. Obviously these gangsters were well informed, if they knew the location of the secret room. The crook strode inside. His colleague, meanwhile, kept an eye on the Mayor, telling her not to try any funny business.
She glanced at the door of her office, hoping someone would walk in and notify the police. But the crooks had probably locked the door from the inside.
Very brazen, she thought, to rob the mayor in broad daylight. And she wondered how they thought they’d get away with it.
Moments later, the gangster returned from the secret room.
“Did you find them?” asked his colleague, waving a gun in the vicinity of Charlene’s ear.
“Yup. All good,” said the guy. “Let’s get out of here.”
“You won’t get far, you know,” said Charlene. “So you better give up while you still can.”
“Oh, be quiet, Madam Mayor,” said the tallest of the two, and then pulled a bag over her head. She listened intently, and heard the two men conduct a short whispered conversation, then open the door of her office and walk out.
She wriggled against her restraints but it was no good. They’d tied her up pretty good. And with a sigh, she settled back, hoping someone would walk in and find her.
Alec Lip had been trying Charlene’s phone for the past fifteen minutes but for some reason his call kept going to voicemail. She simply wasn’t picking up and he was starting to get worried. Had he upset her in some way? He didn’t think so. Being in a relationship was a new thing for him, since being widowed fifteen years before, and sometimes he felt a little out of his depth.
Though Charlene made things really easy for him. She had a good heart and a great sense of humor and everything simply flowed when they were together. In fact it was if they’d known each other forever, and every day he felt blessed they’d met.
And now this. She’d never ignored his calls before. Even if she was busy doing whatever politicians did, she took the time to send him a message. So this radio silence took him by surprise.
He’d glanced in the direction of her office a couple of times but could see nothing out of the ordinary. Often when he called she would appear in her office window and give him a wave. And he kept expecting her fair-haired head to appear but so far nothing.
After fretting for a while, he decided to call her secretary and ask her if Madam Mayor was busy. Normally he would never do that, but he was getting anxious and more than a little antsy. If she was breaking up with him, better he find out sooner rather than later.
“Um, hi, Imelda,” he said when Charlene’s secretary picked up. “Do you have any idea if Madam Mayor is busy at the moment. It’s just that… I’ve been trying to reach her about, um, something important—police business, you know—and she’s not picking up.”
“Well, she did have two visitors just now,” said Imelda. “But they left ten minutes ago, so she should be free. Do you want me to go check?”
“Yeah, could you?” He felt increasingly silly now, like a schoolboy with a crush, asking a girl’s parent to see why she wasn’t answering his calls.