'We'll be fighting them, sir.'
'Yes,' the commissaris said gently.
14
'But that's not the firm we are trying to locate,' the commissaris said, stooping to read the clumsily written sign hanging askew just inside the entrance of the long dark corridor: SYMONS TOY AND NOVELTY COMPANY, IMPORT AND EXPORT. 'This is some wholesale company. Ah, here we are.' He adjusted his glasses and peered at the business card that had been fastened to the sign's corner with two thumbtacks: BOSTON BETTER HOLDING, JAMES D. SYMONS, PRESIDENT. 'SO we did come to the right address after all.' He straightened up. 'Symons. Same name, must be the same man. A versatile businessman, our Mr. Symons. But to judge from the sign his wholesale business must be the more important of the two. Amazing. Let's become acquainted with him.'
A dirty bulb further along the corridor seemed to be the ramshackle building's only illumination. The commissaris limped ahead slowly, tapping the cracked floor with his cane.
They climbed a flight of stairs and faced a door that had been painted pink a long time ago. The commissaris knocked.
'Welcome, gentlemen. The door is open.'
The voice was gravelly, and the words teetered off into a squeaky cough.
They went in. There were shelves and tables loaded with cartons. Part of the floor had been used for a display of miniature electric trains, but two locomotives had hit each other head-on and a disorderly heap of railway carriages was garnering dust between a tin station and a mountain over-grown with faded plastic evergreens. A torn mask, presiding over a row of other smaller masks, stared at them from the rear wall. They all depicted the same old female face, toothless, pimpled, wrinkled. The faces were green, the string wigs orange. They smiled from drooling, wormlike lips and the eyes, made of cut glass, were glittering with insane delight.
De Gier stopped and studied the array.
'Yes, gentlemen? The masks are of interest, are they? I only have the one model left, in various sizes, and as I can't offer a selection I will discount them, of course. But I think I should start off by showing you my new items. This box, for instance, a most profitable proposition, and there will be immediate delivery for limited quantities.'
The commissaris and de Gier turned to face Mr. Symons. They saw a fairly young and fairly well-dressed man with red-rimmed eyes. He had walked across the room so that the masks stared over his shoulders and his own face became part of the display of demented creativity.
'Look at this box, gentlemen. Here, let me open it. What do you see? Little plastic building blocks, nothing new, Germany has been marketing them for years, good steady line, the kiddies love it, and at every Christmas and birthday party everybody in the family gives the little dears additional boxes so that the wunderkinder can build bigger cranes and tractors and trucks and what have you. Bread and butter line, right? But expensive and not too much margin. The Krauts have patented the stuff and they can call the cards. A-ha! But this box doesn't come from Germany, gentlemen, it comes from Taiwan, and the price is half of what you are used to paying. You've been happy to pay the German prices so far, so how happy will you be when you pay the Taiwan prices that are half of what the Krauts have been daring to ask? How happy will you be? I ask again, and the answer comes to mind immediately. You will be doubly happy. A moneymaker, gentlemen, sell it for ten percent less than the German stuff and it will shoot across the counter. And the quality is excellent. Beautiful stuff, gentlemen, I've a thousand boxes in stock and mote on the way, delivery early next year. Well? What do you say, gentlemen?'
'Interesting, Mr. Symons,' the commissaris said, 'but you must be mistaking us for somebody else.'
Symons smiled politely. 'Yes? You aren't from the Total Toys chain stores?' He checked his watch. 'Ten o'clock, they said they would be here at ten-thirty. I thought you had come early. Never mind, gentlemen, you can buy my Taiwan boxes too. I'm not reserving them for anybody special, first come first served.'
'No, Mr. Symons. We are not in the toy business.'
Symons' smile hardened, then disappeared. 'No? You wouldn't want to sell me anything, would you? I'm not buying these days, I'm clearing my stocks for a while. The times are hard, gentlemen, and the competition is tough and capital-need I mention capital?-is scarce.'
'The Boston Better Holdings Company,' the commissaris said. 'We've come to see that company, and you are its president I believe.'
Symons walked to the back of the room and sat down under a tattered wire mobile dangling small cardboard hands from its rusted extremities. The hands had long, bent fingernails and pointed in different directions as the draft in the room moved the mobile. Symons waved at two low chairs. 'Sit down, gentlemen. That company has been so dormant for so long that I had almost forgotten its existence, but it's true that I am its honored president. What would be your interest? The company owns this building and pays me a flimsy wage for serving as its janitor. You wouldn't want to buy the building, would you? That would be good news indeed. Do the insurance companies want to build another sky-poker? Can I tell my shareholders that fortune is smiling at last?'
'No, sir. We are not after Boston property. We are after a property called Cape Orca on the Maine coast.'
Symons shook his head. 'Tell me another, sir. Nobody knows where Cape Orca is. I know where Cape Orca is, but I am a most exceptional man, widely read and widely traveled. You would be a foreigner, sir, am I right?'
'From Amsterdam, the Netherlands.'
'Exactly, so how would you have come across Cape Orca, a little splinter of the large solid block that is die U, S, and A?'
'I will tell you,' the commissaris said. 'My sister owns a house and some land on Cape Orca. Her husband died recently, and she asked me to come out and liquidate her estate. It so happens that I am interested in her property myself, as an investment. I have some surplus capital in the Netherlands, waiting to be invested in a country where taxes are still payable. I like Cape Orca-I think it could be developed profitably-but I want more than just my sister's few acres. I walked around the cape a bit and noticed that there are some empty houses, some of them wrecked and burned. If I buy I would buy the whole strip. The town clerk was good enough to inform me that the properties were registered in the name of a Mr. Astrinsky, but Mr. Astrinsky wasn't around when I went to look for him. He is traveling I believe. But yesterday morning I ran into the Jameson town clerk again and he told me that he had just found out that your company now owns the properties. And as I had some business in Boston anyway I thought I might see you. The shore strip would be for sale, wouldn't it?'
Mr. Symons had been listening while he played with the contents of the Taiwan box. He had also opened and closed the drawer of his desk a few times.
'Yes,' he said. 'I see. Well… How about a small drink to start the day properly, gentlemen? You are talking big business, and I always find that a small drink heightens my powers of perception. Some fine whiskey perhaps? I happen to have a bottle on tap and if you reach out to that shelf on your right you'll find three clean glasses.'
'Surely!' the commissaris said. 'That would be a splendid idea indeed, sir.'
'But it'll have to be a small one. I'll have those sharpies from Total Toys here in a minute and I really must convert my junk into greenbacks. It'll be a miracle, but miracles have come my way before, the Lord is good and must be blessed from time to time, although a good kick into his divine ass can be recommended too sometimes. One of my pet theories, it has a lot of details and twists and turns, but we don't have the time to discuss it fully now. Here we are, gentlemen, three of the best, your very good health!'
'Now,' Symons said a few seconds later. 'Now, about Cape Orca. It so happens that the shareholders of Boston Better Holdings did discuss their interest in Cape Orca recently. They have been holding the land for a while now, but I only sent in the deeds a few days ago, for registration. The properties were bought for development, of course, but the shareholders are old, and hard to prod into activity. That's why nothing has been done. Now if you were willing to pay a price…'
'Yes,' the commissaris said, 'the price. What would be the price?'
Symons held up a hand with three rings, each with a different-colored stone. The hand dropped by its own weight, grabbed the bottle on its way, and poured a little more whiskey into its owner's glass.
