“Oh, no, Victor, I couldn’t do that. I tell him everything. He’s my dentist. Did Mr. Takahashi hire you yet?”

“He tried, but I had to turn him down.”

She hit me, hard.

“Ouch.”

“It wasn’t easy for me to get you that job.”

“I had no choice,” I said. “I had a conflict. The guy he wanted me to send into bankruptcy court is a witness in my murder case.”

“And you couldn’t finesse it.”

“No.”

“If you want to succeed in business, Victor, you need to become a little more unscrupulous.”

“I lose any more scruples, I’ll end up in the Senate.”

“I told him you were the best lawyer in the city.”

“You told your client a lie?”

“That’s what I do. Public relations.”

“Maybe I should put you on retainer.”

“I’ll write you up a proposal in the morning.”

“I’m kidding.”

“I’m not. I don’t kid about business. You know what we should do next?”

“No, what?”

“Something I’ve been wanting to do with you from the first moment I saw you.”

“Throw me on the ground and suck on my neck?”

“No, don’t be silly. I want to help you pick out a new pair of shoes.”

43

Tommy’s High Ball, midday.

I stepped inside from the bright sun, squinted into the smoky, neon-tinged dusk, made my way to the bar. It was busy for that time of day. Two men were shooting darts, a card game was going on, Motown was playing softly. A couple of old-timers were talking baseball at the bar. I wasn’t thirsty, but I ordered a beer. I wasn’t hungry, but I grabbed a handful of peanuts and rattled them in my fist. Wearing a suit as I was, I didn’t exactly blend, but it didn’t take long for interest in my presence to subside.

“Is Tommy around?” I said to the barkeep with the white hair when I ordered a refill. He was way tall and way thin, and his frame was curved like a question mark, as if from a lifetime of trying to avoid hitting his head on low-hanging fixtures.

“Tommy who?” he said.

“Tommy from Tommy’s High Ball.”

“Mister, that Tommy’s been dead for twenty years.”

“Then why don’t you change the sign outside?”

“They call me Whitey.”

“I guess that explains it. Rumor is, a man who might be interested in finding a chess game could do worse than coming here.”

His eyebrows rose. “You any good?”

“Not really.”

“Then you’re out of your league.”

“Still, it might be fun, don’t you think?”

“No, no fun at all, unless you think sitting in the dunk tank at the fair is fun. You bring any money?”

“Some.”

“That might be enough.” He lifted his head to call over my shoulder. “Hey, Pork Chop, you got time to teach this fellow a lesson?”

I turned around. Alone in the booth closest to the door, a chessboard with its pieces arrayed in front of him, a thick green paperback in his hand, sat Horace T. Grant.

“I don’t got time for fools,” said Horace T. Grant, staring at the board. “Tell him the grade school down the block has got a chess club first Tuesday of every month. That might be more his level.”

“He says he got some money,” said the bartender.

“With that suit? He don’t have enough.”

“But the tie is nice,” I said. “Don’t you think?”

“How much?” said Horace.

“Let’s say five a game?”

“Get your skinny ass over here to my office,” said Horace T. Grant. “And make sure you bring me a cold one, too. Whipping white boys sure builds a thirst.”

I bought the beer, slid into the booth, watched as Horace set up the board for a game. A few men ambled over to watch.

“What’s the book?” I said.

“Alekhine.”

“God bless you.”

“Here’s an idea. Why don’t you keep your mouth closed so we don’t learn just how stupid you really be?” A chuckle from the onlookers. “I’ll let you move first, seeing as you’ll need every advantage you can take.”

“You know, I’ve played before,” I said.

“I suppose you probably screwed before, too, don’t mean you know what you doing.”

The men watching laughed out loud.

“Go ahead,” he said.

I surveyed the board, nodded a bit, pushed the pawn in front of my knight two spaces.

“You might as well give me that five right now,” said Horace with a chuckle.

“I made one move.”

“One was enough,” he said, and then proceeded to beat me bloodless in just a few short minutes. The men around him cackled as his queen sliced through my defenses with alarming savagery and checkmated my king.

“Again?” I said as I held out the five.

Horace shrugged, snapped up the bill, set up the board. The men who had been watching shook their heads at my stupidity and dispersed. My chess had been so ugly they couldn’t bear to stand through another game.

“Go ahead, boy,” said Horace. “Make your move.”

I reached into my jacket pocket, took out a folded document, dropped it on the board.

I watched carefully as Horace T. Grant read the order appointing me as counsel to Tanya Rose, a minor, location unknown. There was something in his face, something soft where I had never seen softness in him, something trembling just beneath the surface.

“I need your help,” I said.

44

It could have taken me weeks to find the exact location of the fortune-teller named Anna that Julia Rose had told me about. I would have called some cops I knew in the district, I would have checked out the Yellow Pages under “Tellers, Fortune,” I would have gone door-to-door in the general vicinity asking the question, and let me tell you, going door-to-door as a stranger in a strange neighborhood asking about someone who’s a stranger to you and a neighbor to them is not the most pleasant or efficient way to maintain your teeth. It could have taken me weeks to find her, if I found her at all.

I gave Horace T. Grant my phone, and he had the exact address in ten minutes.

“She’s in that there house,” barked Horace.

I had followed his directions, had parked where he told me to park. Now we sat in my car across the street from a sagging brick row house with a long stoop. “The old lady’s got herself the entire first floor.”

“Does she know we’re coming?” I said.

“Don’t be a dumb cluck. Of course she does. She’s a fortune-teller.”

“I meant, do you think any of the people you talked to might have tipped her as to what we were after?”

“I didn’t tell none of them what we wanted with her. Just said I had a fortune that needed telling. You think the girl’s in there?”

“I don’t know,” I said, “but if the old lady knew we were looking for her, I’m pretty sure she would have packed her off somewhere before we showed up. You get any more information about this Anna other than her age?”

“Just that she’s got deep connections in the spirit world.”

“Why don’t I find that comforting?”

“Because,” said Horace, “you don’t believe in anything beyond your own infinite ignorance.”

“And you, I can tell, are much more at one with the great mysteries of the universe.”

“I like to think I have a spiritual dimension to my nature. I’m a churchgoing Baptist, if you need to know. Besides being good for the soul, it helps keep me regular. And let me tell you this, boy, you been on this earth as long as I have, you learn there ain’t nothing much more important in life than keeping regular.”

“Thank you for that advice.”

“No charge for it neither. But this Anna, she’s nothing but a charlatan. The only fortune worth telling is that we’re all going to die, and I don’t need no witch to tell me that.”

“Let’s go,” I said. “And, Horace, let me do the talking.”

“Oh, I intend to. Nothing more entertaining than watching a young fool trip all over his own damn self.”

We stepped slowly up the cracked cement stairs and then across the bending floorboards of the porch. Beside her door was a clay medallion of a cherub’s face. The cherub was smiling, but its expression was more doleful than glad, and its eyes were blazing with some awful certainty. It was disconcerting seeing it sitting there staring, as if it were looking into my soul and not liking what it found. Hell, I didn’t blame it, but still. I looked away as I pressed the doorbell. I didn’t hear anything inside, so I banged lightly on the door. I was about to bang harder when it slowly opened just a crack.