very uncommonly concentrated. He serves a purpose, that’s the most important thing. The second most important thing is recognizing when something does not serve a purpose… and getting rid of it. If something does not serve, don’t keep it around you. This is a very clean way to live.”
A few more steps, the rolled program still in his left hand, his right hand in his pocket.
“So,” he said, as if everything had been explained, “I want to make sure Graver stays away from me. You want to have a little bite of my business so you can make a load of money. It’s clear to me that we can serve each other well.”
Kalatis stopped talking as they passed other night strollers, all talking softly as though viewing art from out of the darkness was an act of inherent holiness.
“What I propose is this,” Kalatis resumed. “For the next five days I want to know immediately if Graver learns of my existence. After five days other arrangements will come into play, and it will not be so important. Now, if you do this… I will make it possible for you to retire… with a generous ‘pension.’”
As they continued walking, Kalatis reached into the breast pocket of his jacket, took out a small paper booklet, and handed it to Burtell.
“This is a Belgium bank account in your name. It is empty now. At the end of five days, if you have done as you were asked, it will contain five hundred thousand American dollars. Only three people in the world will know about it. Me, the Belgium bank officer with whom I opened the account, and yourself. After I make the deposit, only one person in the world will be able to touch it-you.”
Burtell was stunned. Unaware of the act of walking, he could only feel the weight of the little paper booklet in his hand, as heavy as thirty pieces of silver.
“I doubt that’s likely to happen,” he said.
“What?”
Burtell realized his mistake. “Graver-it’s not likely he’ll get that far in the investigation.”
“Fine, but if he does I want to know about it.”
Burtell was still wary. He thought he hadn’t yet seen the whole picture. Kalatis wanted something more for his five hundred thousand dollars.
‘This is a lot of money for such a small service. Just a telephone call,” Burtell said.
They walked a little farther together before Kalatis said:
“Well, some men think betrayal is no small thing.”
Burtell’s face burned. It was like Kalatis to be so cruel as to refuse to use euphemisms. He could have let it pass, but he wanted Burtell to know, to be reminded just what it was he was doing for his money. Burtell could live with it, but he hated Kalatis for being the kind of man who would go out of his way to corrupt another man, who would entice him with a fortune for only a moment’s effort, and then when the man took the bait, ashamed and groveling, would pull his head back and shove a mirror in front of his face. There was something carious at the very core of Kalatis’s dark life, something that brought out the worst in people who associated with him. Art Tisler had discovered that with tragic results.
Chapter 27
The dense foliage of the overarching trees that covered the serpentine street where Arnette lived reflected Graver’s headlights so that it seemed as if he was being drawn into a coiling green tunnel, a meander that led to the Sibyl’s cavern. If ever he needed a necromancer it was now, someone like Arnette to summon Tisler’s spirit for an interview or, failing that, to summon the next best thing, his former thoughts from whence he had locked them in a timeless silence, embalmed to perfection inside another kind of memory, not of man, but of man’s making, hundreds of thousands of words in a few minuscule coffins of silicone.
This time Mona Isaza answered the door. Graver had missed her earlier that day, so they embraced in the dark screened room as he had embraced Arnette earlier, and Mona called him “bah-BEE” and kissed him on the neck. She smelled, as always, of cooking, of something oniony and of the cornmeal masa she used almost every meal to make fresh tortillas. Mona was about the same height as Arnette, though heavier, despite which she was in many ways the more feminine and graceful of the two women. She was pure Zoque Indian from southern Oaxaca, with the finely defined lips, heavy eyebrows, and black eyes that were often seen in the sculptures and drawings of Francisco Zuniga’s beloved Indian women. Whereas Arnette wore her hair in one thick braid, Mona wore two long ones, each falling in front of her shoulders over heavy bosoms. She customarily wore simple, cotton dresses, thin from long use, as if she were a poor campesino.
“The Lady wants you next door,” Mona said, smiling and perhaps mocking just a little bit the imperious manner Arnette sometimes employed to control the cadre of eccentrics who worked for her. Closing the door behind them, she and Graver entered the twilight of Arnette’s living room. “It has been such a while since I have seen you,” she said softly, unhurriedly. “I was sorry to miss you yesterday.”
Graver chatted with her and followed her through the twilight and out a back door into the dark again. Mona moved slowly and loved to talk, which she did with the same lack of urgency as she did everything else. Her speech was heavily accented, but markedly precise, each word a whole thing separated beautifully from its neighbor. Though she preferred the domestic role, Graver knew that Mona had a university education and was actually more widely read than Arnette. He always enjoyed her company and was fond of the sound of her voice, to which he now listened with pleasure as they entered an arbor covered with grapevines and walked the short distance to the next house. They entered another screened porch there and with a few words and another kiss, Mona left him to enter the back door to the house alone.
The large room that he stepped into presented a dramatic change. It was brightly lighted with half a dozen computer work stations sitting against the surrounding walls. Two of the stations were occupied by matronly women who appeared to be data input clerks. A third station, a more complex system with an oversized screen that was jumping with colors and what seemed to be a series of continuously changing graphs, was being operated by a young man with a ponytail and a General Custer mustache and goatee. He wore a black T-shirt with a brilliantly embroidered parrot on the back, khaki pants, and tennis shoes. His right leg was bouncing hectically as he slumped back in his chair and occasionally jabbed at the keyboard as he sipped coffee from a Styrofoam cup that, for some reason, had a bent paper clip laced through the side of it like an earring. In the center of the room Arnette sat at a long table with a blond girl who looked like a college student, too young to be doing this kind of thing, Graver thought.
“Hey, baby,” Arnette said, looking up as he came in. She and the college girl, who was wearing a headset with a thin wire microphone that curved around in front of her mouth, were poring over the contents of a pile of ring binders. Every once in a while the college girl, who was wearing a bandanna-patterned halter top and, Graver presumed, a pair of shorts under the table, would turn her head aside and speak sotto voce into the microphone which was attached to a large transmitter that occupied one end of the table. With her left hand, she would touch this or that dial lightly, without looking at it, almost without thinking, as though it was an old habit, fine-tuning whatever it was going into her head. The room hummed with the white noise of electronic equipment.
“You have the tapes?” Arnette asked, putting a pencil behind her ear and reaching out her hand.
Graver retrieved them from his coat pocket and handed them to her along with the piece of paper with the parameters.
Arnette looked at the parameter notations and then handed everything to the girl.
“Get Corkie,” she said. The girl hit a button on the receiver’s control panel and muttered something into the thin mouthpiece. ‘’There’s nothing to tell you,” Arnette said to Graver. “Apparently Ginette didn’t go to her office. Her car was home when my people got there about four o’clock. We called her office. She had called in sick that morning. But Dean didn’t show up there until half an hour ago.”
Graver looked at his watch.
“What time did he leave the office?” Arnette asked.
“Must’ve been around three or three-thirty.”
“Five hours out of pocket, more or less,” Arnette calculated.
Graver felt the chest-constricting frustration of having lost the first move, though at the time he hadn’t seen those few hours as especially critical. He had moved as quickly as he had thought prudent. But now prudence
