'A million,' Louis said.
'A million dollars?'
'He's got it. I thought I told you that.' There was a silence. Louis said, 'What're you thinking? What happens if he doesn't pay?'
'What did you tell him you'd do?' Mickey said.
Louis hesitated. 'We told him he'd never see you again.' He stared at her face in the darkness. She didn't move, didn't make a sound. She seemed to be staring at him. He said, 'Let me ask you. Is there any reason he won't?'
'I'm his wife,' Mickey said.
'That's not an answer.' Louis waited, but it was all the answer he got.
Ordell was on the phone. Louis went into the kitchen and dropped the tray in the sink and told Richard to get some putty and fix the goddamn holes in the doors. How many times was he supposed to tell him? Richard said, 'I'm eating.' He sure was, sitting with his bare arms on the kitchen table, head low to the plate, shoveling with a biscuit and sucking in the noodles. Ordell appeared in the doorway and Louis went out to the living room with him.
'Mr. Walker say the man's up in his apartment, hasn't left the place all day. The young lady went out, bought two bags of groceries at Winn-Dixie, like they gonna hole up there.'
'Maybe he phoned the bank.'
'I phoned the bank,' Ordell said. 'Wasn't any deposit made.'
'I mean since then,' Louis said.
'Bank closed at three o'clock.'
'Maybe he's sick,' Louis said. 'It could've affected him, his nerves maybe.'
'It's gonna affect his wife what it's gonna affect,' Ordell said.
'Well, call him again,' Louis said. 'What can you do?'
'Have her say something?'
'Yeah, let him hear her voice again. See if we can get the guy off his ass.' Louis said then, 'That goddamn Nazi, he still hasn't fixed the holes.'
'Here, look,' Frank said. He clicked his silver pencil and jotted figures on the back of a magazine, in a clear section of a Marlboro ad, as he continued. 'The building costs a hundred grand. I put about forty grand worth of materials and appliances in it and have it reappraised at two-hundred grand.'
'Wow,' Melanie said, crouched next to his chair, his little girl, resting her chin on his arm.
'Okay. I've only put ten percent down, right? And the forty-grand worth of materials only cost me about four or five grand. But I'm writing off depreciation on two-hundred grand. Then, on the rentals, I only declare about sixty-percent occupancy. It's all paid in cash--'
The phone rang and he stopped.
'Excuse me,' Melanie said. She went over to the marble-top dry bar that was open, the louvered doors pushed back to show bottles and crystal, and picked up the phone.
'Mr. Dawson's residence.' She waited a moment. 'I'm sorry, but Mr. Dawson's out. Would you care to leave a message? ... No, I'm afraid you're mistaken. Mr. Dawson left the island earlier today and didn't say when he'd return. Good night--' in a pleasant telephone voice. She hung up.
'I used to be a receptionist for a p. R. guy in Los Angeles. He was a real asshole, a friend of my father's, but I met some interesting people.'
'At the moment I'm a little more interested in who just called,' Frank said. He was feeling mellow and didn't sound drunk, though he showed it when he weaved from his favorite chair on his trips to the bathroom and, coming back, would make a dive at Melanie if she happened to be on the sectional sofa that could be arranged to form a playpen. The apartment was done in shades of beige and neutral raw silk, with touches of wicker and aluminum and graphics Melanie had picked up at the International Village.
'He really didn't say anything. He asked for you, then said he knew you were here.'
'How would he know that?'
'He's guessing.'
The phone rang again, several times before Melanie picked it up.
'Hello.' She waited, listening, picking at the front of her white caftan. 'That's very interesting, but I can't very well put him on, sport, if he isn't here, now can I?' She was losing her receptionist manner. 'Yes, it is. And who are you?' She listened again, rolling her eyes now. 'I'm sorry, he's gone and didn't say when he'd be back. Ciao.' She hung up.
'He knew my name.'
'What'd he say?'
'He said your wife wanted to talk to you. So--'
'She was on the phone?'
'No, it sounded like a black guy. He said tell him his wife wants a word with him.'
Frank was thoughtful, silent now.
'So what does that tell us?' Melanie said. 'They can be faked out. You didn't pay and they haven't done anything about it.'
The phone rang again.
'I better talk to them,' Frank said. He put his hands on the chair arms to push himself up.
Melanie raised the receiver and then replaced it, breaking the connection. She said, 'What did we decide, Frank?'
'I know, but--maybe if I talked to them I could find out who they are.'
'What difference does it make? If you start listening to them--it's like with hijackers and the PLO and all those guys. You start to give in, Frank, and they've got you. You don't have anything to say to them, do you?'
'I guess not,' Frank said.
'I don't know, I had a feeling,' Louis said. 'But you're the one had it first. Somebody in it you hadn't planned on, you didn't know about. I guess that started me thinking.'
'She pick up the phone, they no way to get past her.'
'Well, he's sitting there,' Louis said. 'She isn't doing it by herself. So--what're they doing?'
'Seeing if we serious,' Ordell said. 'We got to impress it on the man some way. Go down there and sit on him, say look here ... show him something, huh, like maybe his wife's baby finger.'
'He knows we got her,' Louis said.
'Impress it on him. Hey, we serious.'
'Either he cares what happens to her or he doesn't give a shit,' Louis said. 'The finger isn't gonna do anything. He gives us the finger. Stick it.' He didn't like to hear Ordell talking that way. Maim the woman for nothing, that wasn't a good idea. That was getting into something else and it would no longer be clean and simple. 'But you're right,' Louis said. 'We got to put him against the wall.'
'So we go down there,' Ordell said. 'Leave Richard with her.'
Richard, Louis thought, Jesus. He said, 'If you go, you got this guy Cedric Walker. I mean if you go alone and I stay here. I think one of us's got to be with her and not just Richard. In fact I'm gonna insist on it.'
'You want to stay, that's cool,' Ordell said. 'I'll do it. Me and Mr. Walker.' Ordell thought a moment, watching Louis. 'You worried about Richard?'
'No, we get along. If I don't have to talk to him.'
'Then you got nothing to worry about, have you?'
'No, I'm not worried about anything,' Louis said. 'I've never been happier in my life.'
Chapter 15
MELANIE ROSE TO HER ELBOWS brushing hair from her eyes, the tips of her bare breasts resting on the lounge, and said, 'Hey!' to the black guy walking off with her straw bag. She was alone at the pool and saw, now, there were two of them.
