The old man blinked from behind his thick eyeglasses, looking like an owl aggravated at being awakened by the sun. 'Because I'm not a brave man.'
'What's that supposed to mean?'
The Cantor calmed down and looked dolefully at Bobby. His face was speckled with age spots, and he was barely above five feet, even in his elevated alligator loafers. His sparse white hair was matted with straw, and his wattled neck quivered. 'You know why they call me the Cantor?'
'I don't know. I figured maybe you went to seminary, or whatever you call it.'
'Yeshiva? Not me. I'm the Cantor because every time I'm arrested or subpoenaed, I sing like it's Yom Kippur. Like it's Kol Nidre, I sing.'
'What are you saying?'
'Once the line moved, I couldn't lay off your six hundred dimes, and I've been afraid to tell you. I like you Bobby, so I couldn't look you in the eyes and tell you that I let you down. And now, I'm scared to death Vinnie LaBarca's gonna make you into chopped liver.'
Bobby tossed the pitchfork into the pile of straw, and the brown horse whinnied. ' You're scared? What about me?'
'What I can't figure out, why'd LaBarca place a bet like that with a little pisher like you? For that kind of money, why didn't he go straight to the sports books in Vegas?'
It's a question Bobby had asked himself, but he thought he'd figured it out. 'You bet that kind of money out there, they withhold taxes, report it to the IRS. He wanted to go incognito, that's all.'
'Yeah, maybe.' The Cantor removed his eyeglasses and dusted the lenses with his shirttail. 'But all week long, the line keeps moving and I keep asking myself, 'Why did Vinnie LaBarca come to Bobby Gallagher, whose ex- father-in-law just happens to own the Dallas Mustangs?''
'Okay, Saul, tell me.'
'I don't know Bobby, but if you ask me, something ain't kosher in Dallas.'
13
Saturday, January 28-Dallas
Martin Kingsley drummed his lacquered nails on his mahogany desk and scanned the financial reports in front of him. Attendance figures, quarterly revenues, annual projections, income from local radio and network television, even sales of nachos and salsa. Revenue up a healthy thirteen per cent. But expenses…expenses were killing him.
Signing the free agents last year, then re-signing the veterans ready to bolt, gave him highest payroll in the league. Kingsley's file cabinets were stuffed with players' contracts so complex it would take a room full of Philadelphia lawyers to figure out how he was circumventing the salary cap, if not outright violating it.
The financials showed he was losing buckets of money on America's Team. But to hell with it! It's worth every last dollar, he told himself. They were just one win away from the Big Dance, the Super Bowl, and he could feel the atmosphere at Valley Ranch crackling with anticipation. Tomorrow was the NFC championship game, and his senses tingled with an electric buzz.
Damn, it's a fine day to be alive and be a Texan.
He'd had his annual physical earlier in the week, and the doctor pronounced him a remarkable specimen for his sixty-seven years. 'You've got the heart of a lion and the prostate of a teenager.' His long mane of white hair was brushed straight back, and today, wearing a tailored jet-black suit coat with silver piping, he felt vigorous enough to spar a few rounds in the gym or rope and brand some ornery livestock.
He considered himself a man who had damn near everything. There was only one missing element needed to fulfill his life.
I gotta get me a Super Bowl ring…the biggest, brightest Texas-sized ring they ever made.
All his energies were directed toward that one goal, and his assets were being drained for it. If they beat Green Bay tomorrow, they'd be on the threshold. But something else was gnawing at him, distracting him. The unfinished business of Robert Gallagher. It should have been finished two years ago. He'd crushed the little turd into dust and expected him to blow away like a West Texas tumbleweed. Would have too, if Christine hadn't agreed to that asinine split custody deal.
What a damn fool settlement! With Judge Bonifay-my golf partner for Christ's sake-we could have stripped the bastard of all his rights to Scott.
He still fumed thinking about it, Christine playing King Solomon with his grandson. He'd warned her there'd be trouble. Now, the shyster was refusing to return Scott from Florida and send him to boarding school. This time, he'd take care of Gallagher his way. Kingsley toyed with telling Christine his plan, then decided against it. She was too sentimental, too weak where the son-of-a-bitch was concerned. But she'd know soon enough, and when it was over, there'd be a barbed wire fence-or 'bobwire' as they say hereabouts-between Scott and his loser father.
Kingsley shot the French cuffs on his custom-made shirt and glanced at his watch. No Rolex or Piaget. This was a solid gold number shaped like a Mustangs helmet and encrusted with diamonds. Two smaller versions of the helmet were fashioned into cufflinks.
Nearly noon. The plane was scheduled to leave for Green Bay in an hour. But it could wait. It was, after all, his own Gulfstream 5, the silver and blue 'Point After.'
'Let's cut back expenses,' Christine had told him in their breakfast meeting that morning. Filled with pride for his little girl, he watched her expertly dissect the financials.
'You're a one-man oil shortage, Daddy. Why in the world do you need a jet with a five-thousand mile range?'
'Who knows, darlin', we might play an away game in Buenos Aires.'
'I'm serious. If the bankers knew how cash poor you are, they could call your loans and wreak havoc.'
'I'll let you and the accountants worry about it,' he said. 'I'm more concerned with beating Green Bay.'
'Please don't brush me off like that. You get the monthly statements. You know what I'm talking about.'
Yeah, he was leveraged to the brim of his handmade Stetson. While he could throw lavish parties with flowing champagne and mounds of imported caviar, he also gave express instructions to hand out pay checks after the banks had closed on Fridays.
'Once we re-finance, we'll be fine,' he told her. He knew he was still paying the price for buying the team years before for a wildly inflated sum. Then, he'd poured millions more of borrowed money into improved facilities, salaries, and promotion.
Christine patiently went over the spread sheets, explaining that going to the Super Bowl would cost him money, the travel and entertainment expenses exceeding the payoff. 'Especially the way you entertain, Daddy.'
But what the hell? Winning is what it's all about. He'd let her figure out where the money would come from.
Over coffee and cinnamon buns, he listened as Christine kept leading him through the columns of numbers, endless digits revealing growing liabilities that piled up quicker than manure in a corral.
'Living large,' he told her, 'is important to my image. It's expected. It's what I'm all about.'
'Maybe you could live a little more economy sized,' she suggested gently.
Kingsley watched her, thinking of the resemblance to Dolores, his wife, who had died in a car accident at thirty-nine. Christine had the same fair skin, and with her blond hair pulled back, the same high forehead and widow's peak. Her green eyes were tinged with gold and seldom revealed what she was thinking. He'd raised a fine daughter and he'd raise a fine grandson, too, especially once he got that crackpot ex-son-in-law out of the picture.
'Did you see the P.I.'s report on your ex?' Kingsley asked.
She frowned, wrinkling her nose just as she had done when she was five years old. 'I'm hoping we won't
