Full Circle (25 page)

“Well,” Tate admitted, pushing his plate away and signaling the waitress for a second bottle of beer. “For a greasy-spoon Mexican restaurant, those were pretty good tacos.”

“You must’ve liked them,” Bernhardt said. “You ate four.”

“I want to try my folks again.” Paula slid out of the red Naugahyde booth.

“Do you want coffee?” Bernhardt asked.

“No, thanks.” She walked to the rear of the restaurant, where a pay phone hung on the wall. Bernhardt saw her dial, then saw her smile as she began to talk. Good; she’d connected with her parents. He’d always known that Paula was especially fond of her parents, especially proud of them. Just as, for as long as she’d lived, he’d been especially proud of his mother. Was it because they were both only children, the entire focus of their parents’ love?

“I’ve been thinking. You sure we want to get involved with dogs?” Tate asked.

Bernhardt shrugged. “Why not?”

“How do we know they’ll get the game plan right? How do we know they won’t tear the throat out of the wrong party? Me, for instance?”

“Because you’re on Paula’s side. Besides, Paula’s going to ask whether she can bring them to stay with us tonight and tomorrow night. By Tuesday we’ll all be buddies.”

Tate shook his big, shaven head, doubtfully stroked his close-cropped, gray-flecked beard. “I don’t know about this. I’ve never been real fond of dogs. They sense these things, you know.”

“I thought you were touting a rottweiler yesterday.”

“That was hypothetical. This is the real thing.”

“Crusher thinks you’re great.”

“Crusher and I go way back. Besides, Crusher’s an Airedale. I trust Airedales. I don’t trust German shepherds.”

“You don’t know anything about dogs, C.B. You already admitted it. Don’t worry. We’ll get some meat. Steak. You can feed them. That’s a very big deal with dogs. They like whoever feeds them. By Tuesday they’ll be willing to die for you. Trust me.”

“Hmmm.”

Smiling, Paula was back at their booth, sliding in beside Bernhardt, her thigh warm against his. “It’s all set. When we get back to the house, I’ll take the van and pick them up. It’ll take twenty minutes to Pasadena, and I’ll have to spend an hour, at least, with my folks. But I think we should get the dogs as soon as possible, so we can all get acquainted.”

Bernhardt nodded agreement. “I was saying the same thing to C.B. Be sure and bring some dog food, and steak. Lots of steak for C.B. and me to feed them.” Then, after a moment’s appraising silence, he asked, “Do you want me to come with you?”

She first looked apologetically at Tate, then seriously at Bernhardt. “I don’t think this is the time for you to meet my folks. I think we should come down especially for you to meet them. It should be dinner, with a white tablecloth and the best silver. And then we should sleep in the guest room. That’s what I think.”

Conscious of the relief the words brought, a surge of appreciation, of gratitude, he nodded agreement. In Paula he’d found a winner, a class act. “I feel the same way. Exactly.” He looked at Tate, whose bottle of beer was still half full. Reading the look, Tate said, “You want to go, I’m ready. How about if I ask the waitress where there’s a supermarket. We should lay in some provisions, seems to me.”

Bernhardt nodded agreement, and laid his credit card on the dinner check.

“W
HAT WE GOTTA DO
,” Tate said, “is write it down. The whole thing, day by day, hour by hour. Which is why I bought these at the supermarket.” He gestured to a Big Five tablet and two ballpoint pens arrayed on the dining room table.

Sitting across the table, Bernhardt nodded. “Good idea.” He headed the first page
Monday.
“First thing, we’ve got to call Consolidated Insurance in New York, and make sure John Graham is who he says he is.” He wrote
8 A.M., check out Graham.
“I want you to do that, C.B.”

“Aw, man, that’ll be an hour in a phone booth, at least. More like two hours. Plus, I might sound too Afro to those New York suits. How about Paula?”

Bernhardt shook his head firmly. “I’ve decided to take Paula out to DuBois’s place. I’ll tell DuBois I want to crate up the paintings, and I’ll need Paula to—”

“What about me going with you, and Paula doing the phoning? If there’s heavy lifting, I’d be better than—”

“There’s no heavy lifting. Besides, you’re too big and too black and too tough-looking. I don’t want DuBois to feel intimidated.” He wrote
8–12, talk to DuBois, crate pix.

“I want to be finished by noon, so that people can come back into the house to take care of DuBois. Then, at twelve-thirty, we’ll meet here.” He wrote
12:30, home base.
“Hopefully, C.B., you’ll’ve checked Graham out in New York. If he’s okay, I’ll call him by noon at the Hilton. That’ll be three o’clock in New York. By that time, we’ll know whether we’ve got a deal, whether Graham can get the money.”

“If he can’t get the money, all your work crating will be wasted.”

“Not necessarily. Don’t forget, DuBois has to get rid of those paintings before the grand jury meets on Wednesday. That’s nonnegotiable.”

“Ah …” Tate nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, I see.”

“Assuming that Graham gets the money, he’ll have to have it converted into cash. That’ll take time—an afternoon, at least. While he’s doing that, we’ll rent another car, a sedan. We’ll go buy a shotgun and some shells and a hacksaw.” He wrote
12–3, gun, car.

“Will Graham have someone with him? A guard or two?”

“I’m not sure. Why? You want the job?”

“No, man. At this point, I’m not into changing anything. I’m just wondering, is all. I mean, all that money, it just isn’t logical that he wouldn’t have some backup.”

“I don’t expect him to tell me his game plan. He’s interested in getting the paintings to a safe place in good shape. I’m interested in collecting the money, taking it to DuBois, and taking our cut. Then I want to get out of town as soon as possible.”

“Okay.” Tate pointed to the tablet. “So go on. What’s next?”

“By, say, three o’clock tomorrow, five at the latest, it’ll be either a go or a no-go for Tuesday. Assuming it’s a go, then I’ll probably go back to talk to DuBois and Grace Campbell and James one last time, make sure there’s no loose ends. Then—”

A sudden metallic rumbling began, somewhere in the house. Tate’s head jerked up, his whole body tensed, muscles taut.

“It’s Paula,” Bernhardt said. “The overhead door opener.”

“Ah.” Tate sank back in his chair, instantly relaxed, half smiling. The door mechanism growled again; moments later an interior door opened and closed.

“Hello,” Paula called out to the accompaniment of toenails clicking on the hallway floor and restive canine whining. Then, flanked by the two German shepherds, one on either side, she stood framed in the kitchen. “This is Duke,” she said, ruffling the dog’s neck and ears. The dog moved appreciatively closer to her—but kept his eyes fixed on Tate.

“And this is Duchess.” She stooped, grasped the smaller dog behind the front legs, and hoisted the animal up to stand on its rear legs. “They’re brother and sister.”

“What about meat?” Tate asked. “Did you bring the meat?”

“I left it in the car.” She dropped the female dog to all fours as she said, “Stand up, Alan.” As he obeyed, she stepped close, gave him a big robust hug. Both dogs watched intently.

“Pat me on the tush,” she ordered. “Not too hard. Medium hard.”

Eyeing the dogs, he obeyed.

“Okay.” All business, she pulled away. “Now pet them. First Duke. Otherwise he gets jealous. Maybe you should get down on your knees. Duke responds to that.”

Moving slowly, Bernhardt sank to his knees, stared into the unblinking yellow eyes.

“Call him by name.”

“Hi, Duke. I’m Alan. I hope we’ll be great friends.”

“Now pet him.”

Gingerly Bernhardt touched the dog’s ruff, just below the ear. The dog remained motionless, staring fixedly into his eyes. Still on his knees, digging into the thick brown fur with his fingers, he inched forward until his face was a little less than a foot from the dog’s face.

“He likes that,” Paula coached. “Keep going.”

Now the dog began to softly whine. Then, suddenly, he leaned forward, licked Bernhardt’s cheek and nose with a large, thick, rough tongue.

“
Excellent
.” Now Paula turned to Tate. “Okay, C.B. Your turn. You can pat me on the back, instead of the tush, gentleman that you are. Alan, you start petting Duchess.”

As Bernhardt turned to the female, Tate said, “Listen, Paula, how about that steak first? You know my ancestors were slaves, and sometimes they’d get a notion to run away. So the massa, he hunted them down with dogs. So there’s an imprint on dogs’ genes and black folks’ genes that—”

“Oh, come on, C.B. That’s bullshit and you know it. Genetic imprints are eye color. They’re—”

“That’s not true. They’re just discovering that, over a few generations, learned behavior can be inherited. I read it in the
New York Times
just a couple of—”

“Listen, you two.” Bernhardt gave Duchess a final pat on the head, then rose to his feet. “Genetics can wait.” He pointed to an empty chair at the table, then pointed to the Big Five tablet. “Sit down, Paula. Let the dogs check out the house while we go over the plan. We’re doing a timetable, and we’re already to tomorrow evening.”

“But it’ll just take a few minutes for C.B. to—”

“It’s after ten,” Bernhardt said firmly. “The schedule’s more important than petting the dogs. Besides, I want your input, run everything by you, see what you think.”

As he’d known it would, the last argument prevailed. Most of all, Paula wanted in on the action.

“So,” Bernhardt said, speaking to Paula as he pointed to the tablet. “What d’you think?”

“As I understand it,” she said thoughtfully, “whenever DuBois visits his secret collection, everybody—
everybody
—has to be out of the house. Even the trusted secretary and the chief of security and the indispensable nurse. It’s routine.”

Bernhardt nodded. “Right.”

“And yet he made an exception in your case.”

“He didn’t have a choice. I thought I already explained that.”

“You did explain. And I realize he didn’t have a choice. But what makes you think he’ll let me inside?”

“The same reason he’s letting me inside. He doesn’t have a choice. A couple of those paintings are big, three by four feet, at least. I’ll need help just taking them down from the wall, not to mention taking them down to the workshop and crating them and hauling them back to the gallery.”

“Is that where they’ll be Monday? In the gallery?”

“Yes.”

“What’re the odds,” Tate asked, “that the people who work for DuBois—the secretary, for instance—know all about the secret gallery?”

“The odds’re very good. But knowing is one thing; acting on the knowledge, doing damage to the master, that’s something else. Think back to the old English families, with their faithful retainers. Belowstairs, all they talked about was who the master was screwing, or how many plates the mistress threw at the master. But that’s belowstairs. They’d never think of repeating the gossip outside the manor house.”

“That’s merry old England,” Tate said. “We’re talking the Hollywood Hills, USA.”

“Let’s get back to the plan.” Bernhardt tapped the tablet. “It’s Monday evening. We’ve got the van, we’ve got the Taurus I rented. We’ve got the shotgun, and we’ve sawed off the barrel and the stock. New York says Graham is everything he says he is. I’ve talked to Graham at the Hilton, and he’s sure he’ll have the money by Tuesday morning. Meanwhile, C.B. and the dogs have become fast friends.”

As Tate grimaced, Bernhardt wrote
6 P.M. everything set.
Then he wrote
Tuesday
on a fresh sheet of paper. “So now it’s Tuesday morning. First thing, I go to a pay phone and call Grace, who’ll put me through to James. I’ll tell James that we’ll be picking up the paintings sometime in the next few hours. Then I’ll call Graham, and confirm that he’s got the money.” He wrote
Call Grace, James, Graham, et al.
“We’ll take the van and the Taurus, and we’ll go to DuBois’s place. Paula and I’ll be in the van. C.B., you’ll be driving the Taurus. James will open the gate for us, and both cars will enter the compound. James will open the garage, which will be empty. We’ll drive the van inside. C.B., you’ll stay outside in the Taurus, on guard. You’ll park the Taurus so it blocks the driveway to the garage. James will close the garage door, with Paula and me inside. Paula will wait in the van, inside the garage, while I enter the house through an inner service door.” He looked inquiringly at Paula, who nodded to signify that, so far, the logistics seemed reasonable.

“I’ll check in with Grace, and tell her to get everyone out of the house, including herself. When that’s done, I’ll let Paula into the main house.” He looked at her and smiled. As he did, the two dogs entered the dining room and began meticulously sniffing him. He put out his hand, which the male dog perfunctorily sniffed, then ignored. Turning to Tate, the male repeated the ritual while the female began sniffing Bernhardt.

“Put out your hand, C.B.,” Paula urged. “Like Alan did.”

Warily Tate obliged. Just as warily the dog sniffed—and sniffed. Then, finally satisfied, Duke rounded the table and lay down beside Paula. “Ah.” Pleased, she smiled broadly. “Good. I think he likes you.”

“Think?” Tate asked dubiously. “Is that the best you can do? Think?”

Declining the gambit, she turned to Bernhardt. “So it’s Tuesday morning, and we’re inside the mansion, alone with DuBois. So then what?”

“We take the crated-up pictures up to the first level from the fourth level down, and we put them in the van. You’ll stay with the paintings, Paula, while I get Grace Campbell back inside the house. Monica Gross, too. She’s the nurse. Then I’ll contact James. At that point I’ll give him the plan.” He wrote:
Noon, caravan ready.
“What’ll happen, C.B.’ll move the Taurus out of the driveway, and James will open the garage door with his opener. I’ll back the van out onto the turnaround in front of the house. You’ll get out of the van, Paula, and trade places with C.B., who’ll get out of the Taurus and get into the van. At that point, we’re ready. Paula, you’ll go first, in the Taurus. Obviously, you’ll keep us in sight, in the mirror. If there’s any trouble, anyone tries to hijack us, they’ll probably try to block our way in front, then come up on us from the rear.” He broke off, looked full at Paula. “That’ll be up to you, if someone tries to block us.”