19 Purchase Street (58 page)

Yellow Shirt teed his ball. Took a couple of practice swings, choppy, not enough back swing or follow through.

Darrow rolled his eyes up intolerantly.

Horridge remained expressionless.

Yellow Shirt stood to his ball, measured it, sighted down the fairway, measured his ball again and was about to drive it when he motioned for Darrow to move away from his field of concentration.

Darrow stepped back without looking.

The heel cleats of his right shoe came down on the toe of the other, older man, the white-haired one in the green sweater.

The cleats left an ugly, muddy imprint on the man's immaculate white shoes.

Green Sweater said nothing.

Darrow was disgruntled over having been made to appear clumsy. “Go ahead and hit, for God's sake,” he told Yellow Shirt.

Yellow Shirt decided he didn't like the ball he was about to drive. He went to the pocket of his golf bag, took his time choosing another.

They seemed to be deliberately stalling, Darrow thought, as Yellow Shirt was now undecided on where to plant his tee.

Meanwhile Green Sweater had stepped aside and off a ways with Horridge. He and Horridge were faced away, exchanging quiet, covered words.

Darrow thought Green Sweater was probably apologizing.

Finally, Yellow Shirt and Green Sweater played their tee shots. They thanked for the courtesy, got into the golf cart and proceeded down the fairway.

Horridge shoved his driver back into his golf bag, slipped the protective leather cap over its head. Looked at his watch.

“It wasn't just that you dirtied his shoe,” Horridge said.

Darrow was perplexed.

“Nearly every morning he pays some attention to the television news on Bill Paley's network. This morning CBS made quite a show of a pack of rabble scrambling and clawing for money that someone literally threw away yesterday—several million in cash. Most unfortunate for you that he saw it, and drew his own natural conclusions about where it came from.”

“Who?”

There was disdain for Darrow's lack of knowing. “In the green sweater, Gordon Winship.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

T
HE
funeral of Edwin Lawrence Darrow.

On Sunday, September 27, at Saint James Episcopal Church in Harrison, New York.

Forty-seven persons attended. More than half were security men and other employees of Number 19, required to be there. Hine and wife Lois sat in the front section reserved for family, along with Mrs. Barbara Darrow, who showed up an hour before the ceremony with an entourage of six, including her companion Millicent Buckley and a muscular Mexican cliff diver.

Horridge sat in the rear row apart from everyone. He had returned to stay on at Number 19 and oversee the return to normal functioning. His first recommendation influenced the appointment of Hine as Temporary Custodian.

Gainer and Leslie were there, for no reason other than Gainer wanted to see first-hand that Darrow was truly dead and gone. They had what were comparable to excellent orchestra seats: tenth pew, center. Leslie chose to wear a bright red Cardin suit, claimed she had nothing else more appropriate.

Darrow, the centerpiece, was surrounded by tall creamy tapers and such an abundance of white trumpet lilies that he appeared to be afloat in a marsh. His gray-bronze casket was half open and tilted for a better view of him. Its white satin acetate lining would have played up Darrow's tanned complexion if the blue cast of death had not set in, and if the mortician had not tried to compensate for that with a thick application of pinkish based pancake make-up. As a result Darrow would be last seen looking rather mauve. The mortician evidently hadn't had one of his better embalmings. While shaving Darrow he'd nicked him badly above the lip and the collodion he used to glue the wound built up visibly, giving Darrow a scar he had never had.

Another thing.

Darrow was positioned with his arms at his sides, extended beneath the lower closed section of the casket lid.

That hid his hands.

If Darrow had not already been dead, he would have died.

A flutist and an organist played almost continually, a sort of funeral version of Muzak, and one of Darrow's old Yale Law School chums delivered the eulogy, saying sad, complimentary abstractions about Darrow and pausing after only a few sentences to blow his nose to demonstrate sincerity. He knew less of Darrow than anyone there, outside of the Mexican cliff diver. Hadn't seen Darrow in nearly forty years.

It was during the eulogy that Gainer's glance locked momentarily with the glance of Millicent Buckley.

“Who's that?” Leslie wanted to know.

“What's-her-name.”

“Millicent?”

“Yeah, that's it.”

“Cradle robber.”

Gainer no longer saw any resemblance at all between Millicent and the mother photograph. It was ridiculous that he ever could have. Not even the vaguest resemblance. He ignored her.

Final respects.

Barbara Darrow at the casket plucked a two carat diamond stickpin from her husband's silk tie, said a ten-second prayer and told the funeral director, “Close the damn thing.”

The pallbearers, six security men, carried the casket with irreverent haste out to the waiting hearse, rolled it in and tossed a lot of lilies in with it.

Black Cadillac limousines waited.

The Episcopal minister consolingly tried to capture Hine's hand. Hine shoved his hands into the safety of his pockets, backed off when the minister stepped within reach.

Hine beckoned to Gainer.

They walked around the side of the church and into an old graveyard.

“Nice going,” Hine said. It was their first contact since.

“Thanks.”

“Any regrets?”

“None.”

“Where's the money?”

“In a room somewhere.”

“Why don't you just say where and I'll have my people pick it up.”

“I haven't sliced off my end yet.”

“I thought you would have by now.”

Gainer and Chapin had enjoyed figuring ways to wash their money. Chapin knew a lot about it. Offshore would be easiest, best. And not all in one place. Liechtenstein, Andorra, the Channel Islands, even Hong Kong.

“Anyway,” Hine continued, “just as well, I've decided to increase your take.”

“To how much?”

“An extra ten, fifty million altogether. How does that appeal to you, Andrew?”

“Make it sixty.”

“No.”

“Fifty's fine.” Another ten million just like that, Gainer thought. It caused him to distrust Hine that much more. No matter, he had to take his chances with Hine, and there was the Southampton tape for protection, the tape with Hine on it making the proposition. For safety's sake he should make Hine aware of that tape now.

Lois Hine came over to them. The spike heels of her black sandals in the grass made the going difficult for her. One sandal came off. She swore, retrieved it, used a weatherworn gravemarker to steady herself while she slipped the sandal on, hiked her knee way up to do it.

No rule about having to wear underthings to a funeral, Gainer thought.

“I just snapped your picture,” Lois told Gainer.

“What do you want?” Hine asked her brusquely.

“You're holding up the whole sorry convoy,” Lois said.

“I'll be a minute more,” Hine said.

Her smile was crooked. “I like you at a funeral,” she told Hine. “We ought to have one more often,” and then returned to one of the limousines.

“No reason why we shouldn't settle our deal today, is there?” Hine asked Gainer.

“What would be a reason?”

“I mean, the money's there, isn't it?”

“It's there.”

“Sweet will take you, or follow along if you prefer. I'll send some help with him to handle the billion.”

“You'll also need a boat.”

“No problem. Just tell Sweet. By the way, here, I almost forgot this.” Something from his jacket pocket.

Gainer's passport.

“The guy who substituted for you on that carry was hit by a wine truck in Zurich.”

“Hit?”

“He was you.”

Gainer pictured it.

“At four in the morning on Birmansdorferstrasse. He'd been drinking. Do you know Birmansdorferstrasse?”

“No.”

“Dead, practically no traffic at that hour. It was as though someone stood him up in the middle of the street, held him there until the last second.”

As good a way not to go as any, Gainer thought. Well, with Darrow in the ground, he'd no longer have to be bothered about that. Nor would there be trouble of that sort with Hine. “Before we go any further, Hine, there's something you should know.”

“Just see that I get the money—”

“That day when we were out in Southampton, the second time, I got it all on tape.”

Hine did not believe it.

“Every word,” Gainer said.

Hine thought for a long moment, then smiled. “Great!” he said. “Play it for me sometime.” Before another word he turned, hurried to the limo and was gone.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

L
ATE
afternoon of that funeral day Gainer and Leslie were at the rendezvous point: out in the harbor, midway between the tip of Manhattan and Governor's Island.

Sweet and his detachment were just now coming into view. Gainer had expected them down the East River, but they came the opposite way, up through the Buttermilk Channel off the waterfront of Brooklyn.

A fifty foot red tugboat, wide beamed and pugnacious looking. Escorted by four
Cigarettes
, those incredibly fast speedboats built in Florida by Halter Marine. The
Cigarettes
were thirty-five-foot “Awesome” models, each worth two hundred thousand dollars. Powered by dual four hundred horsepower engines, they could do eighty-five miles per hour. All four were painted black, no contrast striping or trim, entirely matte-black. There were two security men in each of the Awesomes. Four others were aboard the tug with Sweet.

Gainer was taken aback by the sight of such an ominous flotilla. He had anticipated one fair-sized boat, Sweet and a couple of men. He had Leslie pull the Riva alongside the tug so he could talk to Sweet. “No go,” Gainer told him over the idling sputters of the engines.

“Why not?” Sweet asked.

“The odds are out of line.”

“I brought some help—to get this over with soon as possible, that's all.”

“Too many.”

“You tell me, then.”

“Three counting yourself, no more.”

Sweet agreed. Two of his four men on the tug were transferred to Awesomes. The Riva and the tug remained where they were while the Awesomes headed in the direction from which they had come. Gainer watched them until they were specks lost among the textures of the Brooklyn waterfront. Gainer waited ten minutes longer before instructing Leslie to throttle the Riva and lead the way across the upper harbor to Ellis.

As they approached the seawall on the south side, Gainer saw no sign of the outboard skiff Chapin and Vinny had been using. He had left them with the money around nine that morning. Probably, he thought, they'd been gone only minutes, had noticed the Riva and the other boats headed that way and took off in order to keep their involvement unknown. Chapin had said that was how he wanted it.

“I'll leave it up to you to collect the forty million,” Chapin had told Gainer.

“Whatever's best for you.”

“We'll split later at my place, how's that?”

“You trust me that much?”

“What the hell, we haven't got anything if we haven't got trust.”

The Riva came in alongside the seawall and tied up. From shore Gainer shouted to Sweet aboard the tug, had him maneuver it close to the corner, most convenient to the building where the money was. Sweet jumped ashore. He was very much in charge. He told the two security men to stand by while he went into the building.

Gainer and Leslie went ahead of him up the steps to the porch and on in. Sweet was a bit startled by how run-down the interior was, glanced leerily around. The place certainly didn't look like a billion, he thought. Smart of them to stash it here. He followed to the doorway of one of the side rooms.

Gainer and Leslie were already in that room, standing amidst a bunch of old, mildew-stained mattresses.

Gainer shook his head sharply as though they might correct what his eyes were registering. The mattresses weren't piled as before. Where the billion had been was now … nothing.

“It's not here,” Gainer murmured incredibly.

“What the fuck do you mean it's not here?” growled Sweet.

Gainer had never found it so difficult to think fast. “Wrong room,” he said, “these rooms all look alike.”

“They always mix me up,” Leslie added.

Sweet stepped aside for their exit. “You don't remember where the fuck you put a billion dollars?”

“Sure, I mean, I thought I did.” Gainer tried to act only slightly peeved with himself. He indicated several rooms across the way. “You look into those and we'll try these.”

Sweet kicked aside a large round lightbulb reflector that went skittering over the plaster-dusted surface and clanged against a wall. The first room he looked into had only one old cast-iron radiator sitting in the middle of it. The door to the next room was stuck shut. He put his weight to it, crushed it open.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the building, Gainer and Leslie crawled out a window, hurried through the high weeds to the commissioner's house next door. They ran up the four flights to the attic.

Leslie practically tore off her red Cardin suit. A target she might soon be, but at least she wouldn't be one so obvious. She legged into jeans and a chambray shirt and sneakers. When Gainer had last worn his sneakers, he had, as always, pulled them off without untying and now he was desperately picking at a knot. He wouldn't survive if he had to slide around in the dressy leather soles and heels he'd worn to the funeral. Leslie grabbed the sneakers from him, coaxed the knot with her fingernails.