Callahan's Lady

by Spider Robinson

  Two steps out into the corridor the Professor stopped, spun on his heels and went back in. Mildly alarmed, I followed. What had he overlooked?

  Willoughby too was surprised. “What is it now?”

  The Professor took his gun back out. “Empty your pockets.”

  Willoughby flushed and stalled, but he had no choice. He was carrying a little over a hundred cash. We left again.

  On the way out through the lobby, Prof thanked the guard so effusively for his assistance, with hugs and double-handed handshakes, that the man was sure to recall later that the pregnant lady’s husband hadn’t been carrying anything in his hands. I gave him a peck on the cheek myself, so he could feel my bulging “belly.” Then we hit the street.

  “This time,” the Professor said, flinging up his arm, “I am paying for the God damned cab.”

  A hack idling just up the street roared into life and screeched up before us. It was tricky getting my pregnancy cantilevered into the cab without spraying feathers on the sidewalk, but we managed with some care. Sitting on that roll of feathers was uncomfortable. As the Professor was sliding in beside me, the cab jerked away from the curb, slamming the door.

  “—and not tipping much, either,” he grumbled. “Hey, cap, can’t you see the lady’s in a delicate condition? I haven’t even told you where we’re going!”

  “You don’t know yet,” the driver said. He stood up on the brakes for a red light, turned and grinned over the seat at us.

  Suddenly I had acute morning sickness.

  “That’s one of the things I’ve always liked about you,” the Professor said. “You never just drop in; you always phone ahead first. Alice, you remember my friend Tony.”

  Now I noticed that the rear door- and window-handles were missing. The roll of feathers was no longer a nuisance; very absorbent, feathers. My heart was pounding so loud in my ears that it drowned out even his resonant baritone. I read his lips:

  “Dat my leaflets unda ya dress, Alice?”

  I nodded, twelve times.

  “An’ youse got some udda stuff unda dere I’m gonna like too, like I tol’ ya, huh?”

  I was one of those little toy birds perched over a glass of water, who can’t stop bobbing her beak up and down.

  “Good goil.” He dismissed me. “So ya mark is a bank guy, huh, Professa? Pretty neat: who could move funny paper bedda dan a bank guy? I shoulda figgid when ya said he wuz good fer a mil.”

  Honking horns announced the green light; he faced forward again and accelerated like a carrier pilot.

  “Where are we going, Tony?” the Professor called over the clashing of gears.

  “A ways out onny Island. I know dis mout’piece out dere, he’s got his own beach onna Nawt Shaw, wid a boat parked on it. He sez I can use it any time I want, as long as I don’t make no donuts out of him. I figger I deep-six de play-dough, it’s too hot taday ta boin it.”

  “Sensible. You know, I’ve got to hand it to you, Tony. I kept a careful watch for tails all day after we left you, and I never saw you once. I never imagined a man your size could be stealthy.”

  “Nah. I didn’t bodda tailin’ youse; too much agg’avation. I watched what kinda cab ya took, and later on I went down ta da cab comp’ny an’ ast guys until I knew where ya been.”

  The Professor winced. “Oh Mary, you tried to warn me,” he murmured.

  Even in my paralysis I felt a pang of guilt. The Professor had intended to re-examine his plans last night, to check them for overlooked flaws in dealing with a simple, direct moron like Tony Donuts. But I had decided to pick a fight over his moral shortcomings…

  “And damned nice of you to go to the trouble, Tony. I thought we were going to have to go all the way to Manhattan to post a note at my place telling you where to meet us.”

  “I hate goin’ ova da bridge. Da foist two guys tell me right away. Da toid guy, funny, he gives me a hod time for some reason, an’ by de time he’s ready to talk I can’t unnastan’ him so good. But dat’s okay—once I get him quiet again he don’t need his cab no maw, so I take it an’ wait for youse at de bank today, an’ I get lucky.”

  “He was repaying a favor. Alice gave him a hand, once.”

  One of the things I’ve always admired about the Professor is his calm in a crisis. My father told me once that that single quality has won more battles than any other factor. I like to think I’m not bad at it myself—but here was a master at work. I was too terrified to think, much less speak, and he was making puns.

  More: it was a pun that only I would get. He was talking to me, right under the nose of Tony Donuts, telling me to have courage.

  I agreed with him in principle. Courage was a fine quality intrinsically, and certainly could prove useful here. But I couldn’t seem to find any, rummage as I might. This exchange (the money for the Professor’s life), even if it went smoothly, was going to take place in much too secluded a spot. Tony would want to celebrate…

  It might, I thought, actually be better if he figured out that we were trying to stiff him with real money, and killed us promptly. He probably intended to kill the Professor anyway…

  No, I simply did not have whatever kind of fiber it takes to deliberately anger Tony Donuts. Even if that was the better option, of which I was by no means sure. I was a rabbit in the presence of a tiger: incapable of action, of forming plans, incapable of anything but animal terror and a mindless eagerness to oblige.

  It shames me to recall it, but a small part of my mind was desperately glad that I had dressed as he had told me to.

  CHAPTER 12

  SWITCH AND BAIT

  As the cab crunched over gravel I realized I was repeating a short syllable over and over again. It was the Panic Word, the innocent-sounding code word that will, if whispered anywhere in Lady Sally’s House, bring Mary and Priscilla on the run with weapons. Quite useless here, of course; just a reflex.

  We were somewhere in Nassau County, on Long Island’s North Shore. A secluded private beach, with a boathouse, a dock, and a cabin cruiser. On the overlooking bluff, a single large house could just be seen through the trees. We’d driven past it on our way down here. Tony’s lawyer acquaintance and his family were not home today; there had been no cars or other signs of life. The sun was high in the sky, and the only humans visible were at least two miles offshore in a sailboat. Could I scream that far? If by some miracle they heard me, would they radio for help—or come ashore and get on line?

  The Professor took my hand and squeezed it firmly as the cab came to a halt. “Break a leg, kid,” he whispered.

  “Beat him to it, you mean?” I whispered back as Tony Donuts got out of the cab.

  He grinned approvingly. “That’s my girl. Keep smiling.”

  I tried to smile, but I was disposing of the soggy roll of feathers, and it spoiled the effect. They hit the floor of the cab with a splat.

  Tony opened the door on my side, picked me up and set me down standing. He seemed to leave handprints on my shoulder blade and thighs. The Professor got out after me. “Charming spot, Tony! Simply lovely. Yonder boathouse seems a suitable place to conclude our business.” And the only potential source of weapons around.

  “What wrong wit right here?”

  “Tony, Tony—suppose that sailboat out there were full of Feds with telephoto lenses?”

  Even granting the Feds godlike powers, they could not possibly have guessed where Tony was going to take us. But Tony was a moron. “Yah, ya got sometin dere. Ah’right, let’s go t’da boathouse.”

  It was the size of a two-car garage and stank of mildew and fish. It was utterly empty of what I’d been hoping for, cans of gasoline that could be poured over Tony Donuts and set afire. It contained a wide selection of utensils, but nothing I could imagine Tony considering a threat. A garage-type door at one end opened onto the sea, but it was closed and locked. I wondered how long it would be before my body was discovered, and what the lawyer would do with it. Tony was not the kind to bother cleaning up aft
er himself…

  “Ah’right, sugar, whip it out.”

  I lifted up the front of the maternity smock, worked the pillowcase out from under the skirt, and handed it over. My hands shook.

  He grinned as he took the sack, grinned broader as the maternity skirt, no longer held up by the bulk of the load, fell around my ankles. He lifted up the smock with one finger, nodded his head. “Good cherce,” he said approvingly. “My sista useta have a pair just like dat.” He let the smock fall again. “Wait a minute whilst I check da handbills, okay?”

  I nodded. Take your time. Don’t hurry on my account.

  “Count them if you like, Tony,” the Professor said. “Not one bill is missing.”

  I almost managed to be amused at the notion of Tony Donuts counting to five thousand.

  He tore the pillowcase apart in his hands, spilling the stacks of bills all over the damp floor. I guess he figured he’d have my clothes to wrap them back up in when he left. He nudged at the heap of money with his toe, grunted happily. “I quit countin’ dough years ago. Nobody ever tries ta stiff me. Looks like fifty gees ta me.”

  “That it is. Well, I’m certainly glad I was able to do this favor for you, Tony, and this has certainly been an exhilarating morning, but Alice and I have to go now. Don’t worry about driving us back to Brooklyn, we love to hitchhike. What I was thinking was, just in case those are Feds out there, perhaps it would be best if Alice and I left first and went east, and then ten minutes later you left and went west; that should fool—”

  “Hang on a minute.” Tony Donuts was squatting, poking at the stacks of bills with fingers like bratwurst. He went rigid.

  Was it possible he had noticed the serial numbers were wrong? Was Tony Donuts capable of retaining a ten-digit number?

  He took a crisp bill from his own wallet, glanced at it. He stood slowly…and suddenly he was holding the Professor clear off the floor by the collar with one enormous hand.

  “I’m gonna rip ya head off an’ drink outa da hole,” he said.

  “Iv fumfing w’ong, To’y?” the Professor choked out.

  Tony set him down again. “Dese ain’t my posters.”

  Oh God.

  “What on earth gives you that idea?” the Professor tried. But even his voice was trembling now.

  “Dey all got diff’rent numbers on ’em.”

  The Professor gaped, so astonished he almost forgot to be scared. “You printed all five thousand bills with the same serial number?”

  “I couldn’t figger out da part dat changes de numbers ev’y time. So I figga, what’sa difference? I give a guy a sawbuck, he takes it.” He held up the bill he’d taken from his wallet. “See? Here’s da number I used—an’ yaws is all differnt. None o’ dis is my paper.” He tucked the genuine bogus note into his shirt pocket.

  The Professor closed his eyes. “I never even thought to look. Oh, Mary, you called it again…”

  “Bye bye,” Tony Donuts said, and reached forward—

  “The bank guy wasn’t the mark!” the Professor shrieked.

  Tony stopped moving. “Huh?”

  “I clipped him for fifty large this morning, yes, but he’s not the mark who has your money. Once you kill us, you’ll never find it.”

  “Huh.” I watched rage and greed battle in his tiny mind. He set the Professor down to conserve energy for the struggle of thinking.

  “Let Alice go get it,” the Professor suggested. “She knows where it is. Keep me as a hostage until she gets back.”

  He was lying to save my life, sacrificing himself to get me clear. I opened my mouth to say that I did not know where the funny money was…and could not utter a syllable. I did try.

  Tony thought about it. “Easier ta beat it outa youse.”

  “The mark carries heat, Tony. Being shot five or six times would be a nuisance for you, wouldn’t it? And he’ll give the money to her, he knows her.”

  Tony looked at me thoughtfully. “Youse fond o’ yer cousin here?”

  “He’s not really my cousin,” I heard myself say. “I love him.”

  “Huh,” he said again. “Okay. I buy it. How long does it take youse, sugar?”

  “Uh…” I thought frantically. How long could I stretch it? How many hours of life could I negotiate for my love? Was it any favor to him to drag it out? “I don’t know, three or four hours, maybe more.”

  “Take da cab. I give youse tree hours. Den I break his back a couple times an’ come lookin’ fa youse.”

  My mind was racing. Afternoon shift would just be starting at the House by the time I got there. Suppose I could round up a posse and beat it back here in three hours: how the hell could a posse sneak up on this damned boathouse?

  The Professor caught my eye and smiled a sickly, heroic smile. “Drive carefully, Alice. Tony and I will be fine. I’ll teach him the baritone part to ‘Lida Rose’ and we’ll all have a singalong when you get back.” He stepped up and gave me a goodbye hug, kissed me quickly and stepped back before I could cling to him like a drowner.

  “Prof?”

  “Yes, dear?”

  “I’m sorry I was mad at you last night.”

  “Don’t worry about it. You were right.”

  “I know—but I’m sorry.”

  “Quit yappin’ an’ go get my leaflets,” Tony Donuts said. “An’ rememba: when youse come back, if youse carry true dough, youse’ll be dunes-buried.”

  The Professor and I looked at each other. “God,” he breathed, “a pun that awful is almost worth all of this.”

  “No. It isn’t,” I murmured back.

  “Well, perhaps not.”

  “Bring back some lunch,” Tony Donuts said. “And tree-faw sixpacks.”

  I nodded, pulled up my maternity skirt and left, stifling a sob.

  And of course the cab blew a tire the moment I hit the parkway; and of course there was no spare in the trunk; and even though several helpful Samaritans pulled over when they saw me waving in my maternity clothes and weeping, of course the first half dozen had the wrong wheel size; and once that was taken care of, of course I ran out of gas in Queens. By the time I burst through the front doors of Lady Sally’s House, crying and raving incoherently at the startled crowd in the Parlor, two hours and thirty-seven minutes had elapsed.

  CHAPTER 13

  LADY AND THE

  TRUMP

  It was Robin, of all people, who slapped me across the chops to steady me down, and then got me downstairs to Lady Sally’s office, chattering unnecessary apologies every step of the way. He stood by forgotten while I sobbed out the bare bones of my story to her, and then he truly surprised me.

  “Perhaps I could be of some help, Miss Maureen,” he said.

  I stared at him, “How!” I got a mental image of him mincing up to Tony Donuts, in his maid’s outfit and bondage harness, and slapping Tony to death.

  “I’d be happy to give you fifty thousand dollars, if it would help you and the Professor. I only wish I’d known earlier.”

  I just looked at him.

  “He can certainly afford it,” Lady Sally said. “Heavens, Robin is one of the ten wealthiest men in America—I thought you knew that, Maureen?”

  And he paid for the privilege of living here and doing scutwork under the stern eye and merciless riding-crop of Madame Cynthia. I remembered that Lady Sally pegged clients’ membership fees to what they could afford to pay, guesstimated what Robin could afford to pay, and understood for the first time how this opulent House managed to show a profit.

  And put it out of my mind. Just then I would not have been much interested if someone told me that the pilot light had just gone out on the Sun. “Never came up, I guess. Thanks, Robin, but it wouldn’t help. Even if it was possible to get back in time, it can’t be just any fifty thousand dollars. It has to be genuine fakes.” I glanced down, saw something in my breast pocket, took it out by a corner and showed it to him. “Like this,” I said. “Huh! Now how the hell did I get that?” It was a single co
unterfeit ten.

  There was only one possible way. Con-man and cannon are distinctly different occupations…but so are con-man and bank-robber: the Professor was versatile. He had to have dipped this ten-spot from the shirt pocket of Tony Donuts—as Tony was in the midst of strangling him—and slipped it into mine when he hugged me goodbye. Why?

  Of course: evidence. He intended for me to avenge his murder by giving this bogus bill, with Tony’s fingerprints on it, to the Feds. I began to cry softly again.

  Oh, Willard, I’m sorry! I’ll get him for you, I swear—

  “May I see that, dear?” Lady Sally asked.

  “Just don’t touch it,” I said. “Somewhere on it is the fingerprint that is going to put Tony Donuts in the electric chair.” I set it down on her desk. I had never felt so bleak and helpless in my life; even cold rage was no comfort at all.

  She picked it up with a tweezer and examined both sides carefully. “Robin, would you leave us, please?”

  “Oh, but I want to help. There must be something I—”

  “Thank you, dear, that’s terribly sweet of you…but if you leave this instant, I’ll personally give you the caning of your life later.”

  The sound of the door clicking shut behind him came between the last two words.

  “Darling, don’t give up hope,” Lady Sally said instantly, “there’s a chance.”

  I checked my watch. “No, there isn’t,” I said forlornly. “A guided missile couldn’t get me back there in time, even if I happened to have Tony’s money. And if I did and it did, he’d kill us anyway.”