Figaro motioned Dave towards a sofa, checked through the notes that were stuck to the edge of his walnut partner's desk, and waited for Carol to hike across the floor with the file she was carrying.
'Is that Mister Delano's file?' asked Figaro.
'Yes, it is,' she said and, laying it neatly on the desk in front of him, glanced at the man sitting down on the sofa. Carol was used to seeing all kinds of characters -- that was the politest word for who and what they were -- appearing in her boss's office. Mostly they were walking mugshots, blunt faces in sharp suits, knuckle-draggers with silk shirts and ties as loud as Mardi Gras. This particular character appeared to be a little different from the rest. With his matching gold earrings, Laughing Cavalier beard and mustache, and Elvis-sized quiff he looked like a pirate who had borrowed some clothes after swimming to shore. But he had a nice even smile and even nicer eyes.
'Would you like coffee?' she asked Figaro.
'Dave?'
'No thanks.'
Smiling back at him as she went out of the office, Carol decided that with a haircut and a shave and a change of clothes he might look younger and a little less like someone who was on his way to the gas chamber. Cute was what he would look. The door closed behind her and she knew that the feeling she had got on her tightly skirted butt had been from those big brown eyes.
Figaro sat down opposite Dave and flipped a sheet of paper across the glass coffee table towards him. His eyes still on the room, Dave made no move to look at the paper.
'Cigar?'
Dave shook his head.
'They give me a throat. Could use a cigarette, though.'
Figaro helped himself from the box of Cohibas on the table -- a present from Tony -- and then fetched Dave a cigarette from a silver cigarette box on his desk.
'It was the smart move, Dave,' he said through a speech bubble of blue smoke. 'Keeping your mouth shut.'
Dave smoked his cigarette silently. He figured it had been Figaro's advice and Figaro's mistake, so let him do the talking now.
'It was too bad the Grand Jury decided to construe your silence as complicity in what happened. I guess maybe the judge was taking your previous conviction into account. But even so, five years, for something you had nothing to do with. It seemed excessive.'
'And if they pinch you for something, Jimmy? Even if it's something you had nothing to do with. And they want you to finger one of your clients. Maybe your biggest client. What will you do?'
'Keep my mouth shut, I guess.'
'Right. It's not like you really have a choice, you know? You're dead for a lot longer than five years, let me tell you. It's a big consolation when you're in the joint. There's not a day passes when you don't say to yourself: this is hell, but it could be worse. I could be doing time at the bottom of the ocean wearing Jimmy's $10,000 overcoat.' Dave jerked his head at the work of art occupying a corner of Figaro's office and grinned coolly. 'It is a conversation piece, just like you said it would be.
Yes sir, I can see how that is going to come in very handy. But more object lesson
than objet d'art, I'd say. Keep your mouth shut, or else.'
'You're a talented guy, Dave.'
'Sure. Look where it got me. A lifetime achievement award at Homestead. Talent's for people who play the piano, not the angles, Jimmy. It's not something I can afford to indulge.'
'You can afford,' said Figaro, and tapped the sheet of paper meaningfully. 'Just look at this balance sheet. In consideration for your time and inconvenience --'
'That's a nice way of icing a five-year slice of cake.'
'Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, like we agreed. Paid into an offshore account and then invested at 5 percent per annum. I know. Five percent. That's not much. But I figured that under the circumstances, you'd want zero risk on an investment like this. So that comes to $319,060, tax free. Less 10 percent for my own management services, which comes to $31,906. Leaves you with $287,154.'
'Which works out at $57,430 a year,' said Dave.
Figaro thought for a moment and then said, 'Is the right answer. There's no end to your talents. Math too.'
'In case you ever wondered, that's how I got started in the rackets. I used to do numbers for a living. When I was a kid. Harvard Business School was not an option. I was the only heebie in our neighborhood and the Italian kids thought it would be cool if they had a Jewish banker.'
'It figures.'
'Well figure me this, Figaro. I never charged more than 5 percent for my financial services. Ten percent seems more like vig than commission.'
'Most clients who pay five percent will also pay tax. And they'll usually take a cheque.'
'Point taken.'
Figaro stood up and went behind the desk. When he returned to the sofa he was carrying a sports bag. He dropped it beside Dave and sat down again.
'You do prefer cash, don't you?'
'Doesn't everyone?'
'Not these days. Cash can be hard to explain. Anyway, have you thought what you're going to do with it?'
'This isn't exactly fuck-off money, Jimmy. Three hundred grand minus the change doesn't buy you a lifestyle.'
'I could recommend some things. Some investments maybe.'
'Thanks Jimmy, but I don't think I can afford the green fee.'
'Consider it waived. You know, now is a perfect opportunity to get onto the property-owning ladder. There's plenty of good value real estate throughout the county. It so happens I have an interest in the development of some country club homes on Deerfield Island.'
'Isn't that the island Capone tried to buy?'
Figaro grimaced through the cigar smoke.
'This is fifty years ago you're talking.'
'Maybe, but I thought that was all zoned as a nature reserve. Racoons and armadillos and such like.'
'Not any more. Besides racoons aren't nature. They're pests. You should really think it over. Go and take a look. Nine-foot ceilings, gourmet eat-in kitchens, a fitness center, intercoastal views. From as low as two-ten.'
'Thanks a lot Jimmy, but no.' Leaning over the arm of the sofa Dave unzipped the bag and glanced inside. 'I need this money to set me up in something. Something that feels a little more real than landfill real estate.'
'Yeah? Like what for instance?'
'I've got some ideas floating around.'
Figaro shrugged.
'Would you like to count it?'
'And leave myself with nothing to do this evening? No thanks.'
Dave decided to skip lunch with Jimmy Figaro. The sight of Jimmy's car, his two-thousand dollar suit, and the wide-eyed look on his secretary's face had been enough to remind Dave of how out of place he now appeared. The Lucifer beard and the curtain rings in his ears might have helped keep his ass out of trouble in Homestead, but things were different on the outside. In the kind of respectable, wellheeled places Dave expected to be going, maintaining the don't-fuck-with-me image would not be good for what he had planned. It was like Shakespeare said: the apparel proclaimed the man. He was going to need a complete makeover. But first he had to find a car, and well aware that he stood zero chance of driving away in something leased or rented, it made sense to keep the mean-as-shit look going for a while, at least until he had his wheels sorted. That way he figured he wouldn't get sold the kind of fucked-up automobile that might have to bring his bad ass back to the showroom.
Now that he was out of Homestead he wanted to spend as much time in the open air as possible. That meant a convertible; and in the sports section of the Herald he found what he was looking for. A Mazda dealer offering a selection of keenly priced sports cars. A cab took him west of Downtown, along Fortieth, to Bird Road Mazda, and thirty minutes later he was driving back east toward the beach, in a '96 Miata with CD, alloys, and only 14,000 on the clock. He had just started to enjoy the fresh air, the sunshine, the sporty stick shift, and the music on the radio -- he didn't own any CDs