a letter faxed. I wandered down toward one of the big beachfront hotels where he directed me. I had my suit jacket off, tucked under my arm with my briefcase. I looked into the windows, as if I was shopping, but I was thinking solely about myself, wondering who I was, what I was going to be. A guy getting ready to cheat on his wife has to feel like this, examining the island curios and the fancy knits, the scuba gear in vivid colors, seeing but not seeing, senses focused mostly on his heart and pondering why this is necessary, what this hunger is that he just has to feed, how he'll feel forever after, with some fraction of him cringing whenever he hears words like 'faithful' and 'true'.
U You, I know what you think: usual Catholic upbringing, the only sin not forgiven is sex. But I'm looking at a bigger picture than that. Okay, it's true, most people's secrets are sexual; that's still the realm where a soul is most often unknown. Just ask Nora. Or Bert. We tell ourselves that nobody's hurt when the wishes become real, it's consenting adults, so who cares, but you can't sell that story to Lyle — or to me. Hurting happens. But we still have our needs. That's the point. Whatever it might be, sex or dope or stealing things, everybody's got some weird not- oughta-be that lights them up when it crosses their brain. Nora,
Bert, and, in a few minutes, me — we were all members of a teensy-weensy minority group, having fulfilled our sly, unspeakable yearnings. For most people it goes the other way, hanging on that fulcrum where the greatest despair is not really knowing if misery is larger in the realm of fulfillment or restraint. Me, I'd about had it with that balancing act.
I was down at the Regency on the Beach now, and I walked through the hotel, its lobby of fronds and air like dry ice. I sat on a cane chair to think, but I was frozen up, unable to feel much. I asked the concierge to direct me to the secretarial service, and he introduced me to the attendant of their Executive Center. His name was Raimondo, short, sun-coppered, perfectly groomed. I told him I needed a typewriter and a fax machine and gave him fifty Luan. He took me to an area in back, right next to the hotel offices. Raimondo set me up in a small booth that resembled one of the firm's library carrels; an old IBM reposed there like a roosting bird. He offered to arrange for a typist, but I declined, and he left me alone after pointing out two phones and the John around the corner.
I ducked into the head then and studied myself in the mirror one last time. I was still me, a big graying galumph in a suit rumpled up like some elephant's knees, with this gone-to-pot face. I knew I was going to do it.
'Well, well,' I said, 'Mr Malloy.' Then I looked around to make sure nobody was lurking in the stalls who could overhear me.
Back in the carrel, I withdrew a piece of TN stationery from my case. I typed:
TO:
International Bank of Finance, Pico Luan
Please immediately wire-transfer the balance of account number 476642 to Fortune Trust of Chicago Pico Luan facility, Final Credit Account Number, 896–908.
John A. K. Eiger
In my briefcase I found the letter from Jake I'd brought along. I didn't remove it, just spread the sides of the case to get a good look, eyes reminding the hand, then signed Jake's name, the way I customarily do, a perfect imitation. Examining my work, I felt an odd flare of pride. I really am world-class. What an eye! Someday, for amusement, I'd have to take a whack at G. Washington on the dollar, frame a copy for Wash. I smiled at the thought and then below the signature wrote 'J.A.K.E.' I was guessing, of course. As a code, Jake could have used his mother's maiden name, or whatever was written on his last mistress's shoulder tattoo, but I'd known him for thirty-five years now and this didn't feel much like gambling. If he needed a password, he was hard-wired to come up with only one thing: J.A.K.E.
I gave the letter to Raimondo and watched him feed the paper through the machine. My heart suddenly bolted.
'The origination line,' I said.
He didn't understand. I tried smiling and discovered my mouth dry. On the fax, I explained, there was a line printed on the top to identify the sending machine. Some of the people I was dealing with were under the impression I was Stateside. I wondered if he'd be able to block that line out.
Raimondo went mutton-mouthed and hooded his eyes. This was C. Luan, nobody had names or a sure point of origin. He just shook his head in silent reassurance that no one around here would even consider setting that feature.
At the other end, they wouldn't know if the fax had come from around the corner or from west Bombay.
After watching the letter buzz through the machine, I felt like a drink. I wandered out through the garden. I laid my jacket over my lap as I took a seat by the pool. The waitress came by in sort of a safari outfit, pith helmet and khaki shorts, and I ordered a rum punch, no rum. I wondered if I could stand this for the rest of my life, this nation of rock hounds, archaeologists, inland tribes, and sunning exiles.
Around the pool at this time of day there was pretty much nobody, a few scuba widows and a number of the babes who various big buckeroos stash down here and shtup whenever they pay a visit to their secret, hidden dough. These young ladies, each one generally better-looking than the next, naturally attracted my attention, but in a somewhat abstract way. They spend their days working on their tan, oiling down their perfect flesh, reading or plugged into headphones, and then when the heat is too great, they strut to the shower and cool down so that the nipples peak up in the tops of their skimpy little string suits. They excite the few guys around — the towel boys, the old goats like me — and, having made sure that they're still full of magic, lie down again for another couple of hours. I've never been in another place like C. Luan, where the cookies on the side all gather and are laid out together as if on a baking sheet, and it makes you wonder, What do these gals think, twenty-five or twenty-six years old, who are they and where do they come from? How does a person settle for life as a trinket? What do you tell yourself? This is great, this old guy's only here to paw me every other week, I'm living rich and free. Do they all need daddies? Or do they wish they'd had the luck and stuff to get through law school? Do they puzzle about where they'll be when they turn forty-three? Do they hope the guy is going to sack the wife, like he's always saying, that someday soon they'll have babies and a house in New Jersey? Do they figure they're just the same as an athlete, in great shape till the body goes? Or do they think, as I think, that life is neither sensible nor fair, that this, however objectively miserable it may be as an outcome, is the best that luck will allow and they'll enjoy the moment, since there will be time to suffer down the road?
I sat there about half an hour, as long as I could stand it, and then went back to the Executive Center to call the Fortune Trust office where I'd been today.
'Tim's Boy, checking a deposit by wire transfer to account 896–908.' I thought the voice on the other end belonged to my girlfriend, the glamorous young Aussie. The image of her, longhaired and lean, deeply tanned with eyes so light they verged on yellow, lingered — but there was a coy absence of recognition and I was simply shifted to hold, that electrical nowhere, as empty as whatever is between the stars. Up until then I'd been in control. A day in the life. But at that point, where I was, hoping and having no real connection, my bloodstream froze over and I was sure I'd lost my mind. I knew this was never going to work. Please, please,
Now I could see it had to unravel. Jake in all likelihood had adopted a different code word, or had long ago transferred the money somewhere else. Maybe I'd miscalculated and the money was not even Jake's. It was Bert's after all. Or Martin's. In any case, Mr George, the General Manager at the International Bank, was probably out on the street, frantically waving to attract the police. This was not a casual infraction. They would ransack the nation. Bank secrecy was a national treasure, the key to an entire people's way of life. I remembered Lagodis's words with a painful clarity that felt like somebody was putting a brand to my heart: Watch where you step, mon.
I had escape plans, naturally. Sitting up late on Saturday night I'd thought of several and I comforted myself by remembering them now. I'd say I was investigating, trying to pierce bank secrecy only to confirm the commission of a crime and restore the funds to their rightful owner. I'd have Brushy phone the Embassy and her buddy, Tad the K. He'd think I was a hero when he heard how I was saving TN's money; he'd call his Governmental Relations folks and his lobbyists who knew half the pols in this country; they'd get me out in an hour. And who, anyway, was going to catch me? There was bank secrecy here, designed even to protect thieves, and no one knew my name. I didn't care what anyone said to lure me back on the premises at any of these banks. That there were problems with the
