“Thank you so much for coming all this way,” I say. “You will find that all of our paperwork is in order and that our lawyers have done their due diligence. We know what we are getting and we are pleased that you have been so transparent with respect to some of the catastrophic mistakes you have made along the way that have put your business in the place that it is right now. Welcome to Nylo. I hope you don’t mind if I don’t stick around for the gory details of the evisceration?”
I excuse myself from the meeting, countering his belligerence with imperiousness. I have sized him up, taken his measure, and defeated him.
I take the stairs back down to my office and am pleasantly surprised to find Pez there waiting for me. He is holding his hat in his hand while talking on the phone to someone in soothing tones. I know the sound of Pez trying to cajole information out of one of his sources. He holds up a finger as I enter and he steps into the corner to finish his conversation in symbolic privacy.
I find myself weeping gently, thinking about Henley, thinking about my father. I wonder when I will ever have the time to process all of this. Part of me hopes that time never comes.
20
“I have news about Henley in China,” Pez says, finishing his phone call. “It comes too late, I am aware. But it might explain what we are dealing with. I’m not sure. I don’t know much about Playqueen yet, but it may come as no surprise to you that Playqueen is only accidentally successful. It was created as a laundromat for some New Orleans Sicilians, as a present to the daughter of someone quite family oriented. She turned out to be unexpectedly good at designing games. Some say that Playqueen has been intentionally tanking itself for years, despite quality product.”
“That does come as a bit of a surprise,” I say, glancing up, where on the floor above the acquisition is being finalized. Perhaps it will be possible to get this young Southern-Sicilian games girl genius to work for me after I take over her company.
“Anyway, the big news is about Henley and China,” says Pez.
He stops, tentative.
“How are you doing, by the way? You don’t look so good. I don’t expect you to look good, but you look terrible. Are you eating?”
“No less than usual,” I say.
“I want to see you eat something,” says Pez. “It will do my heart good.”
I call Peter and ask him to go upstairs to get us salmon, bagels, and cream cheese.
“So listen, I was able to get in touch with Henley’s latest ex-girlfriend, Sheila,” he says. “I was correct that he has been seeing her while he has been back in town. She was devastated when I told her that he was dead and she wouldn’t even believe me until she saw the Post online. I promised her that she would be compensated for her trouble if she told me what she knows. She needs some cash. Henley has been paying her rent and now she doesn’t know where she will go and what she will do.”
“I’ll make sure that she is taken care of,” I say. Just then my phone rings. “Excuse me for a moment.”
I take an emergency call about Playqueen. Our bagels and cream cheese arrive while I’m handling a decision about assets. After it’s settled, I hang up and stare at my bagel, while Pez stares at me staring at my bagel. Dutifully, I take a big bite, squirting some cream cheese down my chin. I wipe it off, lick my finger, and chew, actually enjoying it. My stomach grumbles and I realize that Pez is right: I do need to eat. Also, my hangover is fading, which means it’s probably time to get drunk again. I walk over to the sideboard and pour myself a bourbon on ice.
“None for me, thanks,” says Pez.
“So what did she tell you?” I ask. “Is the Chinese government murdering my family because of something Henley did?”
“Henley definitely got in trouble in China, but it wasn’t with the Chinese,” says Pez. “It was with plain old, boring, basic Americans. Midwesterners, actually, the most brutal and resentful people. He fell in with a bunch of small-time importer/exporters from Michigan who became his drinking and carousing buddies. I guess he was lonely on account of not being able to speak the language. According to his ex, he rarely even left the hotel where he was staying.”
“And what went wrong with these importer/exporters?”
“According to his ex, it wasn’t Henley’s fault. But I only have his side of the story filtered through her. I’m attempting to get some corroboration, but that will take time. Anyway, according to her, they got in way over their heads while gambling and they started moving from the importing/exporting business into the straight-up smuggling business, which in the new militant version of modern China is extremely forbidden and not at all as fun and easy as it used to be before Xi Jinping started cracking down on corruption. Once upon a time, you could bribe a Party official rather easily to help you transship anything contraband through Russia. Not anymore. However, making smuggling harder has made it way more profitable, as these things go.”
“What were these boring, basic Midwesterners trying to smuggle?”
“Pornography, at least according to Henley’s ex. The Party allows a certain amount of latitude, but when it comes to gay or trans porn, they are severe, you know? Evidently, these boring, basic, affable Midwesterners knew at least one CIA agent who was willing to help them out on the American end
