friendly at night but in the daytime looks tawdry and forlorn. It reeked of last night’s cigarettes, the fashion for clean lungs having yet to reach Tucson. The only other patrons seemed to be the two blobs sitting at the bar, one in a stetson, the other in a John Deere cap.
“The United States,” Owen said. “We’ll be crossing the Great Divide in a couple of days.”
Roscoe shook his head again. “Australia,” he told them, “is home to the Great Dividing Range.”
“Well, now that we’ve passed Geography,” Max said, “perhaps we can get down to work.”
“We’re not waiting for Pookie?”
“Pookie won’t be joining us on this outing,” Max said.
Roscoe looked from Max to Owen, and back to Max.
“You may not want to join us either,” Owen said.
Max gave him a sour look.
“You have to tell him,” Owen said.
“Pookie seems to have gone astray,” Max said. “We’ve not been able to raise him, and he’s made no effort to contact us.”
“That’s alarming,” Roscoe said. “That’s not like Pookie. You think he’s …”
“Crossed the Great Dividing Range? I’ve no idea.”
“You think maybe he got pinched?” Roscoe said.
“That’s another possibility,” Max said.
“It’s okay if you don’t want to come with us tonight,” Owen said. “It might be a little riskier than we thought.”
Roscoe stared out the window at the parking lot. “You pay me half if I bail now?”
“Expenses. Not half.”
“It’s not my fault Pookie’s … whatever.”
“How do we know it’s not your fault?”
“You’re not calling me a rat, I hope.”
“Roscoe, I have called you many things over the years-base Hungarian, cutpurse, and once I believe a rhesus macaque-never a rat. But perhaps inadvertently you mentioned our adventures to someone less discreet than yourself-possibly you were overheard.”
“I’m not an idiot, Max.”
“Well, I don’t know what happened to Pookie. But I do know I’m not paying you for a job you don’t do. As I say, expenses for getting here, and even your overnight, but the whole fee? Only if you play your part in the show. Look, help us pull this one off and we’re off to bigger and better things in Dallas. Maybe we could cut you in for a one-time percentage on that one.”
Roscoe raised an eyebrow. “What kind of percentage?”
“Five. Am I not the world’s most reasonable man? Mind, this is strictly a one-time offer. And you have to do this show as well.”
“I’m in.” Roscoe shrugged. “I need the dough.”
Bradford Blake had made so much money in hedge funds that even a self-confessed glutton like himself really couldn’t use any more. Once you’ve got the fourth house, the racehorses, the sports team, what can you do? Buy a fifth house? Consequently, he now put his money into political causes, that is to say, the campaign funds of extreme right-wing Republicans. Name it-gun lobby, missile shield-if it upset liberals, Bradford Blake was all for it. Lately he had developed a taste for owning newspapers.
He was aided in this by his pretty wife, Cassandra, a conservative columnist ten years his junior, who had recently become a favourite on the talking-head circuit. She was a piquant presence, not afraid to heap scorn upon the poor and praise upon the lucky. Most liberals were reluctant to appear on camera with her. Somehow those sparkling blue eyes, those erotically swollen lips, rendered greed sexy and concepts such as world peace synonymous with erectile dysfunction.
Owen had gleaned most of this from an unflattering biography. The author had revelled in the details of the couple’s extravagant parties, their sailing adventures, and most of all Cassandra Blake’s insatiable lust for jewels.
The party tonight was to be a relatively subdued affair of eight people, nothing like the San Francisco show. There would be no point trying to sneak in as caterers. This time, speed would be the crucial factor. The plan had originally been for Max, Pookie and Roscoe to work with the guests in the dining room once everyone was seated. Owen would be upstairs emptying everything of value from Cassandra Blake’s jewellery box into a pillowcase. With Pookie out, it was more risky but still doable.
Owen and Max waited for Roscoe in the parking lot of the shopping mall where they were supposed to meet, but Roscoe didn’t show. Five minutes after the appointed hour, Max said, “Our valiant friend must have had second thoughts.”
“The odds
“Pookie didn’t know what our next show was going to be, so despite his having vanished in a puff of smoke, the odds remain exactly what they were: favourable. How many people know when Bradford and Cassandra Blake got married? Or that they always celebrate their anniversary in Tucson, where they met and where they still keep a house? We do a lot of research, young man, which is why we always come out on top.”
“How do we know it wasn’t the Subtractors who grabbed Pookie, and now they have Roscoe too? And Roscoe
“How could the so-called Subtractors-who don’t exist in the first place-have got on to Roscoe?”
“Maybe he and Pookie had already decided on a hotel. If they got Pookie, Pookie could have told them where they were planning to stay.”
“Rubbish,” Max said, and started the car. “Absolute twaddle.”
The Blake house was in the exclusive Foothills area, with the Santa Catalina Mountains rising up behind it. Unlike their Connecticut colonial, or their London townhouse, or their Fifth Avenue penthouse, the Blakes’ Tucson abode was a long, low bungalow, mostly glass, with a central living area and two wings branching off to the east, giving it an unexpected, asymmetrical look.
Max himself was looking a little asymmetrical, as this time he had opted for an utterly hairless pate that reflected the street lights as they drove. He finished it off with a straight nose that made him look rather like a window mannequin. Owen was wearing a dark wig, medium long, and an artful goatee, almost perfectly square. With the darkened eyebrows he looked roguish, an up-and-coming film director you might see on the cover of
Max stopped the car just before the Blakes’ driveway. He switched off the radio and the air conditioner and they were plunged into a deep hush. No houses were visible, not even the Blakes’. The evening light crept across the hills in a thousand shades of gold and red.
“Any questions before we make our entrance?” Max said.
“This is scary, Max. We need at least two guys in the room where they’re eating, and we don’t even have Roscoe. It’s too easy for someone to make a break for it-and then we’re in big trouble.”
“We have the cellphone jammer, do we not?”
“It’s not enough, Max.”
“Here’s what we do: you enter the far end of the house-couldn’t be easier with this Swedish modern monstrosity-you liberate the goodies and come back out.”
“Good. We skip the dining room altogether.”
“We do no such thing.”
“Max, we almost always get more from the bedrooms than from the guests.”
“But Cassandra Blake is a jewellery horse. Her friends will try to outdo her.”
“How do we cover kitchen staff and the dining room at the same time?”
“After you come out, we go in through the kitchen and bring them into the dining room with us.”
“Max, last week this was a four-man job. This morning it was a three-man job. We’re making a mistake here.”
