The Extortionist

by Vincent Zandri

  “Can I help you?” comes a tinny, female voice over a hidden speaker.

  “Yes, I have an eight o’clock appointment with Principal Simon,” I say with a smile, since I assume I’m being secretly filmed. “Oh, and I have donuts.”

  There comes a loud electronic buzz along with the mechanical noise of the door being unlocked remotely. Cradling one of the large coffees in my left arm along with the donuts (why the hell didn’t I think to ask for a tray?), I somehow manage to open the door with my right hand, even though I’m using it to hold the second coffee.

  Stepping inside, I’m immediately transported back in time. The vestibule is large with high ceilings, the plaster walls are covered in framed photos of graduating classes going back at least thirty or forty years. The floor is black and white marble, and the smell is industrial strength disinfectant.

  To my right is an office that contains a couple of desks with old desktop computers sitting on top. Each desk is occupied by a middle-aged woman, the one closest to me, gray haired and somewhat frumpy, the one farther away, a brunette with a slim build and attractive eyes. They both smile at me.

  “You’re the detective?” Frumpy asks.

  I set both coffees and the pink box of donuts on a file cabinet to my right. I pull out my wallet, show my ID for the New York State Unemployment Insurance Fraud Agency. Frumpy puts on a pair of reading glasses and stares at it with squinted eyes.

  “I don’t get it,” she says, sitting back down. “Thought you worked for the Albany Police?”

  “I do,” I assure her. “But my main job is insurance fraud for the state. Sometimes, the cops call me in on special cases like the one your lunchroom lady is involved in.”

  Cute Brunette makes a kind of harrumphing noise.

  “Oh, God,” she says, “don’t get us started on her.”

  Frumpy giggles.

  “Is your name really Steve Jobz?” she asks.

  It’s the same question lots of people ask, eventually.

  “It’s short for Jobzcynski,” I say.

  “Ellis Island,” Cute Brunette says. “They did that to a lot of immigrants with long names.”

  I pick up the box of donuts while a woman enters the office. She’s a short woman, but somehow, her mere presence seems to suck the oxygen right out of the room as she enters. It’s the principal. She gazes up at me and offers not a smile but what more closely resembles a sly grin. Like it’s her nature to be suspicious of anyone associated with the law.

  “You must be Detective Jobz,” she says.

  “He’s not an actual detective,” Frumpy interjects.

  “He’s an insurance fraud man,” Cute Brunette offers. “And he brought donuts.”

  “And coffee,” I add, grabbing one of the two large Styrofoam cups, handing it to the principal.

  “How very thoughtful of you, Mr. Jobz,” she says, stressing the Mister part now that she knows I’m not a real detective. “I’m Anita Simon, principal of Loudonville Elementary School.”

  “I recognize you from the website,” I say.

  Frumpy gets up, approaches us. She’s pulled a paper plate from the bottom drawer on her desk and she proceeds to arrange the donuts onto it. A quick glance tells me there are three jelly donuts, three blueberry cakes, three plain, and three long crullers. I grab myself a blueberry cake while the principal grabs one of the crullers.

  How very interesting, I think. Then, get your mind out of the gutter, Jobz. There are little kids running around.

  “Shall we head into my office, Mr. Jobz?” she asks, her coffee and donut in hand.

  “We shall,” I say.

  On my way out, I make sure to catch some eye contact with Cute Brunette. I also offer her a wink. Her face goes beat red as I exit the office.

  Principal Simon’s office is located directly across the vestibule from the general office. It’s a small room with a large double-hung French window that looks out onto the school’s front green. Beyond that is a chain-link fence and the main neighborhood road. Set in the center of the green is a white flagpole. At present, a couple of kids are raising the flag. A boy and a girl.

  “Now, that’s quite the sight,” I say while sipping from my still too hot coffee.

  Principal Simon carries her cruller and coffee around her desk and glances out the window.

  “That’s one tradition I pray never dies,” she says, taking a seat in her black, ergonomically designed swivel chair. “Take a seat, Mr. Jobz, won’t you?”

  Her comment about the American flag takes me a bit by surprise considering this is New York State, the most leftist state in the Union next to California. From what I’m told, educators usually lean left. Far left. But then, who says you can’t be a lefty and a staunch patriot?

  “Microwave,” I say.

  “Excuse me,” she says like a question.

  “Blueberry cake donuts are so much better heated up.”

  She offers a conciliatory smile.

  “Sorry,” she says, “can’t help you there.”

  “Bet the lunchroom lady could.”

  “Excellent segue,” she says. “Now then, what would you like to know about Mrs. Carter?”

  She opens the plastic lid on her coffee, attempts a careful sip, then sets the cup down on the desk in a narrow space between her phone and laptop. While the flag is being raised, she holds the long thick cruller before her open mouth. She places it slowly, almost lovingly into her mouth. When she bites down on it, I feel a slight pang in my mid-section. Opening her top desk drawer, she reaches inside and pulls out a white napkin, sets it on the desk to the right of the computer and places what’s left of the cruller onto it. She chews the donut thoughtfully, and then swallows. When her stare meets mine, the expression on her face is like, are you enjoying the show?

  I clear my throat.

  “You’ve accused Mrs. Carter of stealing more than half a million dollars,” I say. “If it’s true, she’ll go to prison for the rest of her life. She’s seventy-seven years of age.”

  “Her age is inconsequential to me, Mr. Jobz,” she says.

  “Call me Steve,” I say. “Or just Jobz. Everyone else does.”

  “She knew what she was doing, Steve,” she explains. “It was a careful and calculated act. She methodically and purposefully stole from the till, as it were, and I have it all on film.”

  “I see,” I say. “Then, am I to suppose this isn’t just a gross accounting error?”

  She laughs aloud. “Now, that’s quite funny,” she says.

  The two kids who’ve raised the flag now head back into the school. It’s breezy outside. The stars and stripes fly proudly. Americana at its best. My guess is, if Anita Simon could also raise a flag bearing the colors of the rainbow, she would. Jobzy the cynical.

  “Let me guess,” I say, “Simon Says Mrs. Carter should be arrested and arraigned immediately if not sooner.”

  It’s a question for which I already know the answer.

  “Clever,” she says. “I was wondering how long it would take you to do the Simon Says thing. Ironic coming from a man with a name like yours.”

  “It’s always the white elephant in the room,” I point out.

  “I know the feeling.”

  Raising both her hands, she positions them on the laptop, and types out a couple of quick commands.

  “Simon says come around my desk, Steve,” she jokes. “Let me show you something.”

  Principal Simon has a sense of humor after all, I whisper to myself.

  Standing, I go around her desk, coffee in hand. Gazing down at her laptop, I see that she’s opened up a video. Using the laptop’s curser, she then clicks on the video’s Play icon. It’s grainy, black and white CCTV footage shot from up in a far corner of the lunchroom. It shows a smallish woman with white hair pinned up in back. It’s Gladys Carter. Rather, it’s a woman I assume is Gladys Carter since I can’t actually see her face. She’s seated on a stool at an old-fashioned cash register. Her hair is so gray it
’s almost white.

  “Wait for it,” Principal Simon says. “Wait for it.”

  Her face still very much hidden, Mrs. Carter quickly glances over one shoulder and then the other, like she’s making double sure she’s alone. When she’s more than convinced she is, indeed, alone, she peels off a couple of bills and slips them into the pocket on her slacks. She then quickly closes the drawer. The video stops.

  “Now are you convinced?” Principal Simon says.

  I feel a small pit in my stomach for Gladys Carter. The video is pretty conclusive if not damning.

  “Because if you’re not,” Simon says, “then check this one out.”

  She opens a second video showing Mrs. Carter walking away from the camera inside a narrow corridor. She’s carrying what looks like a plastic bag that comes from the local mega-mart. Her purse is slung over one shoulder. When the old lunchroom lady comes to a metal door, she unlocks it and steps inside. That’s when the CCTV footage being shot in the corridor ends and picks up again inside the square office. We see Mrs. Carter sit herself at a metal desk. Like in the lunchroom, her back is to the camera. Placing her purse down on the floor by her feet, she dumps the contents of the bag out onto the desk.

  “She know she was being filmed inside the office?”

  Principal Simon steals a sip of coffee, then shakes her head.

  “No,” she says. “That’s one of the spare offices down in the basement near the boiler room. I’m sure she assumed she was all alone from prying eyes and close circuit television cameras and free to steal anything she wanted in there. That’s why she chose that spot to count the day’s cafeteria take.”

  “You let her use that room?” I ask.

  “She requested it,” she says. “Mrs. Carter thought it would be safer if she counted the cash in a secluded place where she could lock the door behind her.”

  “She was safety conscious,” I say.

  “She was stealing,” Simon says. “I made sure to have the camera installed in the ceiling as soon as I became suspicious of Gladys Carter’s thievery.”

  Thievery, I think. Now there’s a word you don’t hear much anymore. Leave it to a grade school principal to use the fancy words.

  “Let me speed this up to the good part,” she insists, placing her fingers on the computer keys and tapping a command that makes the digital film go much faster.

  When she comes to the place she wants to slow things down, she taps the keys once more. That’s when sweet old Mrs. Carter takes one of the stacks of bills she’s neatly counted out and sorted on the desk and slips it into her purse. She then places the rest of the cash and the stack of coins into a canvas banker’s bag and zips it up. She manually enters an amount into an old-fashioned paper ledger, opens the top desk drawer, and slips that inside. She then grabs her purse, gets up, and leaves the office making sure to turn the light off behind her. Again, it’s impossible to make out a face.

  “Well, I’ll be dipped,” I say, running my free hand over my facial scruff.

  I drink some finally cooled coffee while Principal Simon closes the video app on the laptop and sits back in her chair.

  “Now are you convinced, Steve?” she asks.

  “Any chance you can forward those videos to my email?” I say.

  “I don’t see why not,” she says.

  She asks me for my email. Digging into my pocket, I give her my New York State Unemployment Insurance Fraud Agency card which has my email and cell phone number embossed on it. Gazing at the email address without the aid of reading glasses, she types it in, adds the two video attachments, and presses send.

  “Simon says done,” she adds, once again sitting back in her chair.

  That’s when I can’t help but notice how her short skirt has risen far up on her smooth, milky thighs. Also, from where I’m standing, I can’t help but make out the rather generous cleavage she’s revealing behind her white button-down blouse and the red, lacy pushup bra under it.

  “Cat got your tongue, Steve?” she says.

  I shake my head, as if to break myself out of my spell. I casually make my way back around the desk.

  “Guess I should have a little meeting with my boss at the APD,” I say. “In lieu of these videos.”

  She smiles, sits up in her chair, drinks some coffee.

  “I’m not that privy to law enforcement procedures and protocol,” she says. “But that sounds like the right move to me, Steve.”

  That’s when she picks up the cruller, and slowly, almost adoringly, takes it in her mouth again. She steals a generous bite and sets the bit that remains back onto the napkin.

  “Don’t you just love crullers?” she says.

  “They taste good,” I say. “But I feel strange eating them. In public, anyway.”

  Grinning. “Why, Steve, you’re not homophobic are you? This is the twenty-first century, after all. We’re presently going through a period of cultural enlightenment, despite that horrible orange-haired beast of a man who occupies the White House.”

  Suddenly, I feel like a little kid blushing in front of a girl older than him and far more experienced in the ways of love and romance.

  “Hey,” I say, “I’m as open as the next guy or gal.”

  She licks the sugar from her fingers, then licks her lips with her long pink tongue. Heart be still.

  “You don’t say,” she says. “Maybe one day Simon will say, ‘Prove it.’”

  My mouth goes dry. My pulse picks up.

  “That would be nice,” I say.

  Her intercom buzzes. Saved by the bell, so to speak. She presses a button on the phone console.

  “Yes, Chris,” she says.

  “Billy Anthos is on his way to your office again,” comes a tinny, but nice, voice. It’s the voice of Cute Brunette.

  “Making trouble again, is he?”

  “You have to ask?”

  “Okay, make sure he grabs his schoolwork.”

  She shifts her hand from the telephone console back to her coffee cup.

  “Never fails,” she says. “Just when I think I have the office all to myself, some overwhelmed teacher sends some obnoxious brat to my office for the day. Now, I gotta listen to him snort and fart all day.”

  The more I look at her, the more I think about how there are worse things in life than being sent to Principal Simon’s office. A knock on the door.

  “Come in,” the principal barks.

  The door opens, and a scrappy, tall, dark-haired boy of twelve or thirteen walks in. He’s holding two spiral bound notebooks and a textbook. He’s not saying anything, but he does have a sly smile on his face like he knows precisely what he’s doing when he gets himself into trouble.

  “Assume the position, Billy,” Simon says.

  “Thanks, Miss Simon,” the kid says, his voice doing one of those puberty, high to low pitched cracks. “I’ll try to be real quiet.”

  He looks at me. My life flashes before me. I suddenly see myself as a scared to death eleven or twelve-year-old, marching in horror down to the principal’s office, then facing down Lead Foot herself. I would nearly pee my BVDs when she’d whack me with a ruler, then force me to sit in silence right in front of her desk for an entire day.

  But this kid seems genuinely happy. I glance at Principal Simon as she runs her hand through her thick red hair and can’t help peeking at how her perfectly shaped breasts fill out her tight-fitting blouse.

  “Lucky you, kid,” I say.

  He flashes a grin. “Yeah,” he whispers, “lucky me.”

  On my way out of the school, I toss the two ladies in the general office a wave.

  “See you soon, girls,” I say with a wave.

  “Hope so,” says Cute Brunette Chris.

  “Thanks for the donuts,” says Frumpy.

  I head out the front door, feeling like I’ve still got it after all these years. But that’s when I’m reminded of Brit and our impending date. It also dawns on me that I haven’t set us up for anything yet. No coff
ee or dinner date, that is. As I walk around the red brick school, I feel myself torn between the two ideas. A coffee date seems like a whole lot of nothing. But on the other hand, a full-blown dinner date right off the bat might be too much.

  “Maybe we should meet for drinks and tapas,” I say to myself.

  Just the sound of it encourages me enough to retrieve her card from my jacket pocket. Slipping behind the wheel of the Mustang, I dial her cell phone. She answers after two or three rings.

  “This is Brit,” she says in her official nurse voice.

  For some reason, I feel myself freezing up. I try to speak but no words will come. I’m suddenly no older than that scrappy kid sent to Principal Simon’s office.

  “Hello,” my mom’s nurse says. “This is Brit.”

  I clear the major frog from my throat.

  “Uhhh, Brit,” I say. It’s like talking through wet cement. “It’s Jobz. Steve Jobz.”

  Finally, the words come.

  “Oh, Mr. Jobz . . . umm, Steve,” she says. “How nice to hear from you.”

  Okay, she’s happy to hear from me. I clear my throat a second time. Just then, a loud roar behind me. A quick glance into the rearview mirror reveals a semi pulling into the lot. The name on the side panel reveals Field’s Food Service. Must be the cafeteria is stocking up for the week, or the month, or however they do it.

  “Thanks,” I say. “It’s nice to hear your voice, too.”

  “Where are you?” she asks after a beat. “It sounds like you're standing outside an airport.”

  “That’s a big truck your hearing,” I say. “I’m actually at a grade school in North Albany, working a job for the APD.”

  “The APD?”

  “The Albany Police Department,” I say. “Sorry. Me and my acronyms.”

  “Oh, duh,” she says.

  I ask her about my mother, because I don’t want her to think I’m just thinking about me and my love life. She tells me Mom is pretty much the same. Says she nibbled on a bagel and cream cheese this morning, but barely. She’ll keep on keeping a sharp eye on her, and if anything gets desperate, she’ll call me right away. The conversation pauses for a beat then.