It was almost pleasant, until I felt something sharp, like the point of a pen, press into my ribs.

I froze. Something moved behind me. A hot breath washed over my right ear.

“Take the dollars,” said a soft, accented voice with a pronounced lisp, “and put them in your pocket.”

“My pocket?”

“Your pocket.”

“Shouldn’t it be your pocket?”

“Shut up and do as I say.”

I did as he said.

“Now turn this way, and together we walk down the street.”

I turned, and as I did, I caught sight of him, and whatever fear had lodged in my ribs from the feel of that pen point blossomed like a beastly rose when I recognized Sandro, Gregor Trocek’s Cadizian thug.

His left hand was in the pocket of his leather jacket now, with something very much like the shape of a knifepoint pushing out the leather. He jabbed me in the ribs again and indicated that I should walk west.

I walked west.

He followed close behind. I tried very hard not to collapse into a heap as I walked, but even so, my legs felt strangely rubbery, like the bones were melting. I thought of the fingers on ice in upstate New York, and I wobbled.

“Keep going,” said Sandro. “It’s over there.”

And there it was, the predatory gray Jaguar, parked aslant, headfirst in front of a hydrant. As we got closer, the rear door opened, and Sandro pushed me roughly toward it. I ducked my head so as not to slam it into the roof, and there, inside the car, now face-to-face with me, was Gregor Trocek, smiling warmly.

“What’s wrong, Victor?” he said. “Why you avoiding me? You don’t want hear my funny story?”

25

Sandro drove. He drove slowly, through the narrow streets of Philadelphia, turning here, turning there, going no place in particular, which just then was about the worst place I could imagine.

“I was waiting for your call,” said Gregor Trocek. “It was so lonely, waiting like that. My feelings are bruised.”

“I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I’ve been a little busy.”

“And I hope your busyness was profitably spent. So what have you found for me?”

“Not much.”

“Ahh, Victor, you disappoint,” he said, sitting uncomfortably close to me in the rear of his Jaguar. “I don’t enjoy being disappointed.”

“Join the club.”

It was quite a car, that Jaguar, with its new-car scent, its ivory leather seats, its burled-wood trays and flat screens in both front headrests. Even as I felt the fear he wanted me to feel, I also felt the old longing to get my piece of the pie, my seat at the table, my own damn Jaguar. Nothing slakes fear like raw greed. Gregor Trocek was leaning on me to get back his one point seven million dollars. How many Jaguars would a piece of one point seven million buy? One was enough, with cash left over for down payments on a town house here and a vacation home in Florida and half enough gas to get me from one to the other.

“So now, Victor, are you ready to hear my funny story?”

“Sure, I guess.”

“Okay, so there was woodcutter in my country named Ivan. Ivan is biggest cuckold in village. Every afternoon Ivan’s neighbor, he strides into Ivan’s house and lies with Ivan’s wife, and Ivan does nothing. Nothing, you understand. So one afternoon Ivan comes into his house with ax in hand and finds neighbor’s bull in bed with his wife. Ivan, he raises ax over his head and slams it down, just missing bull and chopping bed in two. The bull, he quickly jumps out of bed and says, ‘Why you get so angry? My owner, he come in here every afternoon to fuck your wife, and never from you a peep.’ And Ivan, he says, ‘But you I can eat.’”

A cackle came from Sandro in the driver’s seat, and Gregor joined in with a hearty guffaw that sent shivers of saliva flying about the backseat.

“Yes,” I said. “Funny.”

“You don’t like?” said Gregor. “Then how about this one? A friend, he calls me and asks me to kill you. Yes, you. You are in this joke. I ask why? He says because he thinks you are fucking his wife.”

“I told you already it wasn’t true.”

“Yes, you did, and I chose not to believe word of it. But even if true, what does it matter? Especially when I learn that maybe he wants to kill you for different reason. Maybe he thinks you stole something from his good friend Gregor.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about money, my money, invested in partnership with some stranger and which is now inconveniently gone. I informed you already, Victor, that I am willing to kill for someone else’s pittance, so don’t even think of what I won’t do to get back what is mine.”

“I don’t have your money.”

“Are you sure? Or do you maybe know where it can be found? I have been told that things are going now well with you. A new flat-screen television, new paint in the office, a new couch. Leather.”

“Pleather.”

“All the better,” said Sandro from the front seat. “Easier to care for, and if it rips, you just melt it back together.”

“Thank you for that interior-decorating advice, Sandro,” I said.

“So where has your new affluence come from?” said Gregor. “I wonder if it has come from my ass.”

“It came from a case. And whoever’s been whispering in your ear is playing you for a fool. I don’t have your money. Miles Cave has it, and I’m trying to find him just as much as you are.”

“With no luck.”

“No.”

“Convenient. Did you talk to Julia?”

“Yes. She said she didn’t know him, truly. But I did find out that a great deal of money was transferred to him as Wren Denniston’s business was collapsing. And I know for sure that if he’s ever found, he would lose the money, either to you, through Sandro’s happy knife, or to the government, through litigation. He had one point seven million reasons to run. One point seven million reasons to kill Wren to keep from being found. And one point seven million reasons to try to divert the search for him to someone else.”

“Like who?”

“Like me. Which is a laugh, because if I had taken off with your one point seven million dollars, Gregor, I wouldn’t be hanging around on my pleather couch. I’d be in Belize.”

“Ever been to Belize?”

“Yes, actually.”

“A little boring for my taste. It is the British influence. They think violence and warm beer make a good time. They are half right.”

“Who told you that I might have your money?” I said.

“A little bird.”

“Probably the same little bird that’s been whispering to the police and that’s been trying to set me up from before Wren was murdered. What was it, a letter? A phone call?”

“Phone call.”

“Did you get a name or a number?”

“Just a number on my phone. Who you think?”

“I’ll tell you who I think. I think it’s your boy Miles Cave. He probably heard all those Victor Carl stories that Wren was dishing and figured I was the perfect patsy. I think Miles is setting me up, I think he decided to set me up from the start. And if he can convince you and the police to concentrate on me, then he’s free to flit away and live fat off your money. What do you know about the creep?”

“He was old friend of Wren. He had an in at bank, was able to handle cash payments without filing usual documents with government.”

“Cash?”

“Yes.”

“You gave him one point seven million in cash?”

“Why not? A small satchel is needed, that is all. I handed it directly to Wren at his house. The terms were all agreed to, including using Miles Cave’s name for the investment.”

“Was there a written agreement?”

“Yes, of course. We were limited partnership. Youngblood, LP. I came up with title myself.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

“The agreement was written quite carefully.”

“By your lawyer?”

“No, by Cave’s. But my lawyer, American working in Lisbon, looked it over.”

“You have a copy here?”