was jabbering. Going on about New York, the Chosen People, how both of them were victims of Zionist censorship. The grinning man just standing there, bottle in one hand, knife in the other. Listening.
'We can work together, Doctor. Tell your story, the way you want it told, a big book, no one will ever know who you are, I'll protect you, once we're out of this stinking country no more censorship, I can promise you that. Hollywood's crazy for the idea?'
The grinning man didn't seem to be listening anymore. Distracted. Wilbur moved his aching eyes down from the off-kilter face to the asshole's hands: the Turkey bottle in one hand, the knife in the other. He decided to go for broke, wondered which one to grab.
The knife.
He readied himself. A long moment of silence. His heart was racing. He couldn't breathe, was suffocating on his own fear? Stop that! No negative thinking-buy time.
Distract the asshole again.
'So,' he said, 'tell me a little about yourself.'
The grinning man came closer. Wilbur saw his eyes and knew it was useless. Over.
He tried to scream. Nothing came out. Struggled to get up off the bed and fell backward, helpless.
Paralyzed with fear. He'd heard that animals about to be ripped to shreds by predators slipped into protective paraly-
The mind shut off. Anesthesia-oh, Lord, he hoped so. Make me an animal, numb me, take away these thoughts, the waiting
The bearded face hovered over him, grinning.
Wilbur choked out a feeble squeak, covered his face so as not to see the knife, scrambled to fill his mind with thoughts, images, memories, anything that could compete with the pain of waiting.
God, how he hated knives. So unfair-he was an okay guy.
The hand with the knife never moved.
The one with the bottle did.
The Ali Baba closed at midnight, but Al Biyadi slipped the waiter some dollars and he and Cassidy were allowed to sip another pistachio milk as the lights went out around them.
Quite a few dollars, thought Shmeltzer, as he watched the waiter bring them a plate of cookies topped off by a sonata of bows and scrapes.
Cassidy took a cookie and nibbled on it. She seemed bored, no expression in the sexless face. Al Biyadi drank, consulted his watch. Just another couple out on a date, but Shmeltzer's instincts told him something was up-the shmuck had looked at the watch fourteen times during the last hour.
The more he studied them, the more mismatched they seemed-the sheikh in his tailored dark suit and shiny shoes, Cassidy trying to feminize herself with that upswept hairdo, the dangling earrings and lacy dress, but ending up far short of success. Touching the sheikh's arm from time to time but getting only half-smiles or less.
Shmuck was definitely nervous, his mind somewhere else.
A young dark-haired woman dressed in white work clothes and equipped with a mop and pail emerged from the back of the restaurant, knelt, and began cleaning off the sidewalk.
Al Biyadi and Cassidy ignored her, kept playing out their
, little scene.
Waiting? For what?
The Latam couple had paid their check and left the restaurant ten minutes ago, conferring briefly with Shmeltzer before walking off hand in hand, north on Salah E-Din. To the casual observer a goyische twosome, headed for fun in a suite at the American Colony Hotel.
Al Biyadi looked at his watch again. Almost a nervous tic. Cassidy put the cookie down, placed her hands in her lap.
The scrubwoman dragged her mop closer to their table, making soapy circles, then right up next to them.
She knelt, kept her hands moving, her narrow white back to Shmeltzer. He half-expected Al Biyadi to say something nasty to her-guy was class-conscious.
But instead he looked down at her, seemed to be listening to her. Tensing up. Nodding. Cassidy making a grand show of looking off in the distance.
The scrubwoman dragged her pail elsewhere, scrubbed for a few seconds, then disappeared back into the restaurant. Half the sidewalk was still dirty. Al Biyadi slapped down more bills, pinned them under the candle glass, got up, and brushed off his trousers.
Cassidy stood too, took his arm. Squeezed it-through his binoculars, Shmeltzer could see her fingers tightening like claws around the dark fabric.
Al Biyadi peeled them off, gave her a tiny shake of the head, as if to say not now.
Cassidy dropped her hands to her sides. Tapped her foot.
The two of them stood on the sidewalk.
Moments later, Shmeltzer heard sounds from the back door of the restaurant. The door opened, freeing a beam of ocher light and kitchen clatter. He pressed himself into a dark corner and watched as the scrubwoman, now dressed in a dark dress, walked out and fluffed her hair. Short girl-petite. Pretty profile.
