fourteen or fifteen erroneous statements for every correct one, the sitters were unfazed. Even with the evidence of a poorly done cold reading staring them in the face, they remained impressed by the handful of correct guesses and disregarded all the wrong ones.
The will to believe...
Jack saw two options. He could show the women his remote and tell them he'd rigged the lights to expose Madame Pomerol as a fake. But he doubted very much that he'd sway them.
The will to believe...
The other was to play it cool and return for another go at the Fosters.
He decided on number two.
'Shit!' Jack heard Foster say. 'Look what I found in the light box!'
'What's that?'
'A remote control on-off switch!'
'Fuck me! You've gotta be kidding!'
'Believe me, I know these switches.'
'You think it's that new guy?'
'Could be, but how would he have got in here to install the switch? And don't forget, he paid us in gold.'
'Gotta be those niggers then! Fuck!' She then began stringing together innovative combinations of every four-, ten-, and twelve-letter expletive known to humankind.
'You think so?' Foster said when she ran out of breath.
'Fuck, yes! They're the ones who tied us up last night and-'
'That was a white guy.'
'Did you see him!'
'No, but-'
'Then what the fuck do you know?'
'It was a white guy's voice.'
'It was them, I'm telling you! They must've taken our keys and come here and fucked us up. Who knows what else they've done! They're gonna pay for this. Oh, are they gonna fucking pay!'
This wasn't going the way Jack wanted. The whole idea of coming here had been to distract them from the Kentons.
'All right,' Foster said. 'Let's just say it was them. After what happened, do you really want to risk going back to Astoria? Our car's impounded, all our credit cards are gone, not to mention the humiliation of having to walk around Lower Manhattan dressed in cardboard.'
'They're gonna pay! Maybe not this week, and maybe not next, but first chance we get, we're gonna fuck those niggers over good!'
Conversation between the two Fosters stopped, and Jack assumed that the Mrs. had stomped off while Carl reassembled the light switch.
Jack and the four women hung out for another ten minutes or so, then Foster reappeared to welcome them back into the reading room.
Jack hung back.
'Is something wrong, Mr. Butler?'
'Yeah. I think I've seen enough.'
'I hope there's no misunderstanding here. You see-'
Foster thought Jack was bailing out. He cut him off to put him straight.
'I think that was real gutsy of her to pull that stunt. That shows me she's got real confidence in her powers. I'm totally impressed.'
Foster switched gears like a Formula One driver. 'Well, I took you from the start as a man of intelligence and discrimination.'
'So when's the soonest I can book my own private session with the lady? You told me you had half an hour open Tuesday afternoon. Nothing at all tomorrow?'
Foster pulled the appointment book from the desk drawer and thumbed through the pages. He frowned.
'I'm afraid not. Tuesday is the soonest. Is three o'clock good for you?'
This lady was doing gold-rush business.
'I guess it'll hafta be. I'd really prefer an hour but, maybe a half-hour session for starters is best. You know, to see if she can make the right contact.'
'Oh, she can, I assure you.'
'Okay, see you then.'
Jack let himself out and made for the elevator. Once inside and headed down, he slammed a hand against the wall of the car. Damn. He'd read this one all wrong. He saw what his mistake had been: He'd tried to strike at the Fosters indirectly, through their clientele. Wrong angle. He knew now he'd have to take the battle directly to them.
He had a half-formed plan of how to do that. He'd need the Kenton brothers' help to fill in the rest. He just hoped Madame Pomerol wouldn't be able to wriggle free next time.
6
Jack stood outside the screen door and watched Lyle's cautious approach.
'Can I help you?'
'Lyle, it's me. Jack.'
Lyle stepped closer, his expression saying, Who is this fool kidding? Then he grinned.
'Well, I'll be damned. It is you. Come on in.'
Jack stepped inside. 'Didn't have time to change my clothes.' He started to peel off his wig. 'Man, this thing is hot.'
'And beat ugly too.'
He turned to see Charlie popping in through the front door behind him.
'So you're back,' Lyle said to his brother. He glanced at his watch, thinking. 'Finished your good works for the day?'
Good works? Had he been to church?
'Yowzah.' Charlie turned to Jack. 'Yo, G. How'd it go down?'
He hated reporting less than complete success, but they had a right to know.
'Well, the good news is the remote light switch worked perfectly...'
They all had a good laugh as he described exposing Carl in the act of waving fake ectoplasm through the air, then...
'But the rest didn't pan out. The lady cooked up some lame story about setting all this up in advance to demonstrate how other fake mediums will try to fool them.'
'And they bought it?' Lyle said.
Jack nodded. 'She's pretty glib.'
'Aw, maaaan,' Charlie said.
Lyle's voice took on a bitter edge. 'So last night was all for nothing then?'
'Not quite. I've got an afternoon appointment Tuesday, and there's a lot I need to do between now and then if I'm going to bring them down.'
'More electronics?' Charlie said, his eyes lighting.
'Not this time. This is going to be all manual-sleight of hand stuff. But I need your help with the setup. Do you subscribe to the Blue Directory?'
Lyle's expression was blank. 'Blue...?'
'The medium I worked for used to subscribe to a book that had all sorts of information on hundreds of sitters.'
