Blue Belle

'A grand a day. Until I find out how he does it or you call me off. Another ten if I get the proof for you.'

'Mr. Burke, with all due respect, that's triple the rate charged by the finest security firms. And you'll only be working a couple of hours each day.'

'In cash. In front. Nothing bigger than fifties. No consecutive serial numbers. No new bills,' I told him. 'You know how it's done.'

The lawyer looked at me, watching my face for the first time since I'd climbed into the limo. 'What makes you worth so much?'

'Ask Mr. C.,' I suggested.

He dropped his eyes. 'We won't need you every day. Just those days when something comes in. We'll call as soon as . . .'

'No.'

'I don't understand.'

'I need to work this guy every day, okay? I need to  know him. I need to know when he's changed his pattern. You don't need to call me when the information comes in. I watch this guy long enough, I'll know.'

'That could take weeks . . .'

I nodded agreement. 'Maybe longer. Who knows? I probably won't get him the first time he moves anyway. Depends on when you get something for him to trade.'

'And you may not get him at all?'

'And I may not get him at all.'

The lawyer pretended to think it over. Maybe he was better at pretending to be honest. 'We need to get started on this. This is Friday; could you be on the job Monday?'

'Sure.'

'All right, Mr. Burke. I am prepared to pay you one thousand dollars in cash right now. For Monday's work. In advance, as you requested. We will meet each evening - you'll give me your report and we will decide if you are to continue.'

I just shook my head. Why they sent this fool to do business with me was a mystery: he was a pin-striped shark, but he couldn't bite people who never went near the water.

'You have another suggestion?'

'Yeah, pal. Here's my suggestion. You hand me twenty thousand dollars, like we agreed. Okay? That buys you twenty days, unless I pull it off quicker. I pull it off before ten days, you get a refund. Nothing jumps off in twenty days, we meet and see what you want to do. Got it?'

'That's outrageous,' the lawyer said, his face a halfstep out of sync with his words. 'You expect me to just . . .'

'I'm tired of this. I'm tired of you. If Mr. C. really sent you out here to do business, you've got at least twenty large in that pretty briefcase of yours. And if you're a fucking little errand boy, go back and tell your boss that he sent the wrong messenger.'

He sat there, staring. I lit another cigarette. 'When this smoke is finished, so am I,' I told him, waiting.

The lawyer tried to smile. 'I'm no errand boy,' he said, holding his head stiff. He opened another compartment in the briefcase. The money was neatly stacked, a paper baid around the fifty-dollar bills. He counted off twenty little 'tacks, tossing them contemptuously on the broad seat between us, making sure I could see there was plenty left in the briefcase.

Telling me they would have paid more. That he had the last laugh.

'Can I drop you someplace?' he smirked.

I threw an empty pack of cigarettes back over my shoulder, out the window. 'Thanks anyway,' I told the lawyer, shoving the cash into different pockets of my coat, 'I'll call a cab.'

A battered gypsy cab rolled up next to the limo. The rusty old hulk was so filthy you couldn't even see through the windows. The lawyer's mouth dropped open. I nodded to him, backed out of the limo and into the gypsy. The driver dropped the hammer, and we moved out in a cloud of black smoke.

3

I spotted the insider when he was still a half-block away.

Watching him for days tuned me in - l could pick him up in a crowd just by the way he moved. Heading for the switchman, like always. I zoomed the binoculars in on the switchman's hands. He was still working on his charts, face bent over in concentration. When the insider got close, I focused in on the three bowls, flicking past the one that held the pens to the second one - the one with the cigarettes. I locked into the last bowl in the triangle - the one with the coins. There was nothing else in my vision. I breathed gently through my nose, my elbows pressed into my chest.

Silver dropped into the switchman's bowl. Some coins. And a flat-folded piece of aluminum foil. I reached one hand up to the window shade and pulled it straight down. I dropped to the floor and raised the shade an inch at the bottom, so I could peek out without the binoculars.

A kid in a striped T-shirt shot around the corner on a skateboard. He lost control and spun out; the skateboard took off by itself and crashed into a parked car. The kid was ready for the crash: gloves on his hands, thick pads covering his elbows and knees. His head was hidden under a white plastic mask - the kind hockey goalies wear. He shook himself off, dazed.

Then he charged right at the switchman, snatched the coin bowl in both hands, and flew up the block, the bowl tight against his chest. The switchman started to come off his blanket when one of the winos stumbled into him from behind. The wino's long floppy raincoat blocked most of my view, but I could see the switchman whip an elbow into his chest, knocking him backward. The wino grabbed at the switchman to break his fall; they fell to the ground together. The switchman wrenched himself loose, stopping for a second to kick the helpless wino in the chest.

When he turned around, the kid was gone. I saw the gypsy cab pull away, heading for the river.

The switchman did a full circle, knowing he was too late. The wino crawled away, his hands wrapped around his ribs. The switchman pulled the corners of his blanket together, held it in two hands, and spun it around a couple of times to form a sack. Re threw the sack over his shoulder and ducked into the subway.

It took me less than a minute to throw everything I had with me into the battered suitcase and head out the door.

I went out the side door on Chambers, and walked back through the park. The street was the way it was before the crash. Even the kid's skateboard was gone.

4

My Plymouth was parked on West Street, near one of the construction sites. The guy who built it years ago was trying to create the ultimate New York taxicab, but he died before he got it done. I threw my suitcase in the trunk and started the engine. The two-and-a-half-ton dull gray machine started right up, the way it always does. I hit the switch and my window slid down. Lit a cigarette and pulled away, heading for the pier.

I was there tirst. I backed in until the bumper tapped the base of the pier, shoved a Judy Henske tape into the slot, listened to 'If That Isn't Love' for the thousandth time. Waiting again. If Linda Ronstadt is a torch singer, Henske's a flame thrower.

A couple of guys walked by, hand in hand, talking just to each other. An overmuscled beach boy posed against a burned-out abandoned car. A black man was adding a few touches to an oil painting of the riverfront. A man with a teenager's body cruised the scene on roller skates, wearing mirror sunglasses to hide the truth. The whores don't work this pier. Some zoning regulation the City Council would never understand reserved it for gays.

Nobody came near the Plymouth. I was into my third smoke, and Henske was breaking chops with both hands on 'Good Old Wagon' by the time the gypsy cab pulled in at an angle next to me, its nose aimed at the Plymouth's