“And how long has this guy been checking in for a few hours of fun and games?”
“Oh, maybe a couple of years now. That’s it; you got your money’s worth.”
“Not yet,” the Wall Street dick says. “Different women-or always the same woman?”
Max makes the same gesture, rubbing his thumb on a crooked forefinger.
“You’re going to wear out your thumb,” Timothy says. “How much?”
“I figure it’s worth a Jackson.”
“A double-sawbuck?” Cone says, outraged. “Are you sure your name’s not Jesse, as in Jesse James?”
“Listen, I know and you want to know. It’s supply and demand-get what I mean?”
Groaning, Cone gives him a twenty-dollar bill.
“Always the same woman,” Max says. “The guy calls the desk before he shows up so he’s got the room number-you capeesh? The Hitler on the desk is on the take. So the guy shows up, no luggage, and goes directly to his room. Then fifteen, twenty minutes later, the dame shows up. She’s got the room number from him, sails through the lobby, and goes straight upstairs. Nice people. Good tippers. They spread it around like they should.”
“Uh-huh,” Cone says. “And I guess she’s a short, dumpy broad with dark hair-right?”
The bellhop looks at him with disgust. “Whaddya think,” he says, “I was born yesterday?”
“All right,” Cone says, sighing. “How much?”
“A Grant. But I won’t testify in court if this is a divorce thing like I figure it is.”
“This better be good,” Cone says, handing over a fifty-dollar bill.
Max slips the folded bill into a waistcoat pocket. “She’s a beauty, a real sparkler. Tall as you. Young. Blond. Great jugs. Wears expensive clothes. Once I heard the guy call her Claire. Is that what you wanted?”
“It’ll do,” Cone says, nodding. “Now can you tell me where the public phone is-or are you going to hold me up for that, too?”
“Nah, that’s a freebie. It’s on the mezzanine.”
Cone finds the phone in an old-fashioned booth with a folding door. It’s even got a little wooden seat. He calls the corporate offices of White Lotus on Exchange Place.
“Is Mr. Chin Tung Lee in this morning?” he asks the operator.
“Yes, he is, sir. May I ask who’s calling?”
“I have a personal delivery to make to Mr. Lee and just wanted to make sure he’s there. Thank you.”
He hangs up, leaves the Hotel Bedlington, heads for the Lees’ apartment on Fifth Avenue.
There’s a monster standing in front of the Lees’ door with his arms folded. He looks like a young Genghis Khan, with slit eyes and mustachios bushy enough to sweep out a parrot’s cage. Cone decides to play it safe, not knowing if this muscle is FBI, NYPD, or a hired janissary.
“Timothy Cone to see Mrs. Claire Lee,” he says. “She’s expecting me.”
The mastodon unfolds his arms, and the Wall Street dick wonders if he’s going to get a karate chop that will decapitate him.
“You wait,” the guy says in an unexpectedly high-pitched voice.
He disappears and Cone waits in the corridor. In a few moments the door is opened again by the juggernaut.
“You come,” he says.
Timothy follows him through that maze of rooms and hallways. He’s finally ushered through a double set of doors, into a small living room, and then into an adjoining bedroom. The woolly mammoth withdraws.
Edward Tung Lee is seated in a leather club chair. He’s wearing cerise silk pajamas under a brocaded dressing gown. There’s a white handkerchief neatly peaked in the breast pocket of the robe. His feet are bare. Claire Lee is standing next to him. She looks like a pom-pom girl in a middy, short pleated skirt, bobby socks and white Reeboks.
“Mr. Cone!” she carols. “What a pleasant surprise!”
“I was in the neighborhood,” he says, “and thought I’d drop by to see how your husband is doing.”
“Much better, thank you,” she says. “So well, in fact, that he insisted on going into the office this morning.”
“Silly thing to do,” Edward says. “He just won’t slow down.”
They all look pleasantly at each other.
“Now listen,” Claire says, “I really don’t think it’s too early in the morning for a drink. Do you, Mr. Cone?”
“It’s never too early,” he tells her.
“And I know what you like,” she says archly. “Vodka on the rocks with a splash of water. Right? Edward, I think you should have something. Perhaps a brandy. The doctor said it would do you good.”
“A small one,” he says.
“And perhaps a small something for me,” she says gaily. “Be back in a jiff.”
She sashays out the door and Edward says, “Pull up a chair, Mr. Cone.”
But he sits on the edge of the unmade bed. Now he’s facing Lee and the other armchair. He wants them both in his sights when the woman returns.
“You look a little puffy around the gills,” he says, “but none the worse for wear. They give you a hard time?”
Edward is startled. “You know what happened to me?”
Cone nods.
“How did you find out? It hasn’t been in the papers.”
“The grapevine,” Cone says. “The FBI did a helluva job grabbing you out of there.”
“They saved my life. And one of them was critically wounded in the shoot-out-did you know that?”
“I heard.”
“I’ll never forget that,” Edward says somberly. “Never in my life.”
“Yeah,” Cone says.
Claire comes bustling in, carrying a silver tray of drinks. She hands them around: vodka rocks to Cone, small snifter of brandy for Edward, and something green in a stemmed glass for herself.
“Cone knows what happened to me,” Edward tells her.
“Oh, Mr. Cone knows
“Just about,” he says.
She takes the armchair, and now he can look at both of them without turning his head from side to side. They lift their glasses in a silent toast, then sip their drinks delicately. Very civilized.
“You two are a nice couple of bums,” Timothy says.
Their faces congeal. Edward’s hand begins trembling. He sets the snifter down on the floor next to his chair.
“What?” Claire Lee says, voice strangled. “What did you say?”
“Bums,” Cone repeats. “Cruds. Both of you. How long did you think you’d be able to have those matinees at the Bedlington? Forever and ever?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says hotly. “And I think you better leave right now.”
“Oh, stuff it,” he says angrily. “I couldn’t care less if you rub the bacon every day of the year. What I don’t like is that you both played me for a fool, each telling me how much you hated the other. I fell for it because it was a classic setup: younger stepmother, older son, both competing for an old man’s inheritance. Only you’ve been rumpling the sheets together for two years.”
“You’re a dirty, filthy man,” Claire says, glaring at him.
“You better believe it,” he tells her, taking a gulp of his drink. “Look,” he says, addressing Edward, “if you want to put horns on your pop, that’s your business.
Neither replies.
“It goes like this,” Cone continues. “And don’t interrupt to tell me I’m wrong-because I don’t think I am.
“One: Claire and Edward are shacking up and making jokes in the sack about what a senile old fart Chin is. Two: Edward is still steaming because his father wouldn’t finance his great idea of having White Lotus market a line of frozen gourmet Chinese dinners. Oh, yeah, I saw how riled you got at Ah Sing’s when you told me about it.
