Overby gave Durant a carefully chilled stare. “That’s how guys both you and I know’d work it.”
“We should hope that much of what both Georgia and Otherguy suggest is true,” Wu said with a small wise gentle smile that Booth Stallings thought some of the smarter saints might envy.
Overby’s answering smile was two parts knowing and one part wicked. “They don’t get it yet, Artie.”
“I think Georgia does—don’t you, Georgia?”
“Sure.”
“Quincy?”
Durant only nodded.
“Booth?”
“Haven’t a clue.”
“When the Goodisons attempt to blackmail Ione Gamble,” Wu said,
“which I now believe they will, what’s the first thing she’ll need?”
“Money?” Stallings said.
“She’ll also need an intermediary,” Wu said.
Stallings nodded. “A go-between.”
“Who do you have in mind?” Durant asked.
“Georgia, of course,” Wu said, sounding surprised that anyone would ask.
“Of course,” Durant said, his voice flat and toneless.
“Get to the good part, Artie,” Overby said. “The money part.”
“It’s occurred to me,” Wu said, “that Wudu, Limited, of Berkeley Square, London, should let it be known it’s in temporary residence in Malibu and anxious to acquire searing, shocking and even salacious true-life tapes— video preferably, but audio in a pinch—for a worldwide, multilingual, expose-type TV show. For the right tape, it’s prepared to pay what? Up to a hundred thousand dollars?”
“Why not pounds?” Durant said.
“Better yet.”
“What’re you going to do, run an ad in The Hollywood Reporter?”
Stallings said.
“I think we should depend entirely on word of mouth,” Wu said.
“And I can think of no one better to serve as our town crier than Otherguy. Any objections?”
Overby sent a glare around the room that encountered no resistance. The glare quickly disappeared, replaced by his familiar hard white grin.
“But please remember this,” Wu said. “We’re being paid to find the missing Goodisons, who obviously don’t want to be found. If Georgia’s theory is correct, and again I’ll say I think some of it is, the Goodisons will try to blackmail Ione Gamble. If they do, they’ll have to deal with one of us as the go-between. If they try to sell tapes, audio or video, we’ll’ve already made what I hope is a preemptive bid—and again they must deal with us. Would anyone like to add or ask something?”
“Who does what?” Durant said. “Spell it out.”
Wu closed his eyes briefly, then nodded at something, which Booth Stallings guessed was the order of battle. After opening his eyes, Wu looked at Georgia Blue. “As I said, Georgia, you’ll be Ione Gamble’s go-between. But until you’re needed for that job, you’ll continue looking into the life and times of Jack Broach. Otherguy, for now, will be our town crier and the putative buyer of whatever the Goodisons have to sell. Quincy and I will follow up on a couple of things, including the license number of the limo that carried the Goodisons off.”
“That leaves me,” Stallings said.
Wu gave Stallings a smile of genuine affection. “You’ll be our Mr. X, Booth—the secretive emissary from the mysterious Mr. Z, who’s retained Wudu, Limited, to scour the world for sensational videotapes.”
“In other words, I sit by the phone and wait for somebody to try and sell me something,” Stallings said.
“The answering machine can take care of that,” Wu said. “What we need is a utility chameleon—someone who can step in and play any role at a moment’s notice. I think you’re ideal. Any objections?”
“None,” Stallings said, “as long as you don’t ask me to handle a juvenile part.”
Twenty-two
The tiny frame house on the eastern edge of Venice sat on a twenty-five-foot lot and the 1982 black Cadillac limousine, parked out front, looked longer than the lot was wide. The limousine license plate read,
“LUXRY 3,” implying that there might be a fleet of them. The implied claim was supported by a small, nicely painted wooden sign that was nailed to a porch pillar. It advertised “Luxury Limos” and listed a phone number that was as large as its name.
