“By slowing down your card shuffle,” I continued on, “I was able to see how you stacked the deck. But I thought you screwed up with the cards you dealt Bluddock. The first time through I missed the sleight-of-hand trick you performed, turning one of your aces into a ten. It’s a good thing he didn’t insist on checking your coat pockets. If he did, he would’ve found six cards instead of five.”
Julius chuckled at that. “It’s a good thing, Archie,” he agreed. “And I apologize if I nearly gave you a heart attack.”
“You damn near did,” I said. “Well, not a heart attack, of course, but I did feel my central processing unit seize up for a couple of nanoseconds. I think I was more surprised than Bluddock when you flipped over your cards. Since then I’ve been able to slow down and study your deal, and can see how you pulled off your sleight of hand, but that was still a hell of a trick keeping that extra ten as flat as you did, especially having to keep it from tilting upwards ten degrees so it wouldn’t signal itself.” I hesitated for a moment before adding, “Of course, you still cheated the man.”
“True, Archie, I did. My conscience is clear, though. I felt no compulsion to win back my money fairly, and the best way to beat a cheater is to cheat more cleverly.”
I digested that briefly and agreed with it, which made sense given all the Damon Runyon stories which were used to build my personality.
“I suppose we won’t be seeing Duane Bluddock at next week’s poker game,” I said.
“I suppose not,” Julius agreed.
There was an odd note in Julius’s voice that I didn’t quite understand and couldn’t figure out the hidden meaning that Julius seemed to imply. A spot had opened up in the game several weeks ago when one of the longtime players, Harry Elkins, needed to fly off to Tokyo for several months for business, and that opened the door for Bluddock. With Bluddock seemingly now gone from the game, there was a long list of other players waiting to be invited in to fill Elkins’s place, at least until he returned from Japan.
Weinstein’s restaurant is located on Arlington Street in Downtown Boston, which was usually a busy area of the city. But it was two AM when Julius left, and as he walked the two blocks to Columbus Avenue where the Mercedes that Bluddock lost to him was supposed to be parked, the streets were empty without another person or car passing us. When we approached the Mercedes, though, I understood the added implication that had been in Julius’s tone; that we hadn’t yet seen the last of Duane Bluddock. He was waiting by the car, his bulk leaning heavily against it. While the shadows from the street lights mostly obscured his face, from the size of his body there was no question who the man was. Julius didn’t slow his pace, and only stopped when he had gotten to within five feet of Bluddock. From that distance, Bluddock’s face could be seen more clearly. There was both a dullness and a malevolence to it as he stared at Julius.
Julius nodded at him. “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting long,” he said.
Bluddock ignored that. “You cheated me,” he said.
Julius breathed in deeply and let the air out slowly through his nose.
“I did,” he admitted. “The old-fashioned way, and not by the highly advanced whispering deck of cards that you snuck into the game.”
“So you figured that out,” Bluddock said. His gaze remained fixed on Julius while he stopped to lazily scratch near his right ear. When he finished his scratching, he continued, “It doesn’t matter. I want the title and keys back for my car. I also want my money. Not just what you took from me, but what you got in your wallet. And that check for twenty grand that you wrote. If you don’t have it anymore, then you’re going to be writing me another one.”
Two men slipped out from the shadows of a nearby alley and joined Bluddock. These were both big men, the type who usually work as bouncers at nightclubs or as leg breakers for the mob. One of them held a thirty-eight caliber pistol, its gun barrel pointed at Julius’s chest, the other held a leather sap.
Julius sighed softly. “Your two friends are going to get hurt,” he said.
The corners of Bluddock’s thick lips pulled up into an amused smile. “Is that so?” he asked.
I hadn’t even noticed Julius slipping off his shoes, but he did, and he now stood in his stocking feet. All at once it was as if a tiger had been unleashed as the gun the thug had been holding was kicked out of his hand and sent flying, then that same thug’s knees crumpled from a roundhouse kick. In less than a blink of an eye, the thug lay unconscious after taking a crushing blow to the jaw. Before the other thug could do much more than lift his leather sap, he took several strikes that left him in the gutter, also unconscious. The amused smile dropped completely from Bluddock’s lips as worry crept into his dull eyes. Julius slipped his shoes back on and massaged the knuckles on his right hand.
“Who hired you?” Julius asked.
Bluddock’s eyes darted from left to right for a few seconds as if he was considering making a run for it. He must’ve realized the futility of that and instead forced himself to meet Julius’s gaze. Now he only looked badly scared.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, his voice cracking as it caught in his throat.
“No, that won’t do,” Julius said. He took an almost imperceptible step towards Bluddock, but it was noticeable enough to make the man wince. “The technology used in developing your whispering deck of cards is highly sophisticated. Nobody is going to go through that effort just to use them in a relatively small stakes game. The purpose was to target me. Who hired you?”
Bluddock shook his head. “We used your weekly game so we could test the cards,” he said. “We figured if we could fool you, we could fool anyone.”
He was lying. He was nervous and scared, and he was also still lying. I could see it in his eyes, and I was sure Julius could see it, too.
“It’s late,” Julius said with a sigh. “I could beat the truth out of you, but I don’t believe in torture. Instead I’m going to give you one last chance. If you lie to me again, I will not waste any further time with you. Instead I will hold you until the police come, and I’ll have you and your two associates arrested for extortion, assault and battery, as well as a long list of other charges. It’s your choice.”
It took Duane Bluddock all of three point six seconds to make his choice. “Desmond Grushnier,” he said, a sickening look flushing his face as he did so.
The sound of Desmond Grushnier’s name made my processing cycles freeze for several microseconds, as if a chill had run down my virtual spine. Grushnier was a shadowy figure, someone I’d never been able to find a trace of in any database. It had been three years since I’d heard his name and I’d hoped it would’ve been longer. In the past Julius had received ominous warnings from Grushnier. In these cases Grushnier left no doubt that he believed Julius was coming dangerously close to meddling in his affairs and that it would not be tolerated. So far Julius hadn’t let any of these warnings deter him from performing any of his investigations, but I knew he took these warnings seriously. Whenever I’d ask him about Grushnier, Julius would tell me precious little, but from the change in Julius’s demeanor, Grushnier wasn’t someone he took lightly.
“How did Grushnier get in contact with you?” Julius asked.
“Email, phone and mail,” Bluddock said with a shrug of his shoulders. “And always through an unknown intermediary. If you’re hoping I can lead you to him, you’re out of luck.”
“How do you know it was Desmond Grushnier then?”
A frightened look momentarily glistened in Bluddock’s eyes. “He made sure that I knew,” Bluddock said.
Julius didn’t pursue this. He accepted as fact that Bluddock was telling him the truth.
“Your payment for this?” he asked.
“Whatever I took from you,” Bluddock said miserably.
A grim hardness settled over Julius’s features. “Very well,” he said. “I’ll live up to my end of the agreement and I won’t be calling the police. I’d suggest y
ou call an ambulance for your two associates. One of them has a severely fractured jaw, the other a broken collarbone and a cracked kneecap. They both have concussions. But do as you wish. Before you go, I’d like you to sign this.”
Julius handed Bluddock a pen and the title for the Mercedes so that Bluddock could sign the title over to him. The fact that he didn’t ask Bluddock to do this after he had lost the car with his four nines confirmed to me that Julius fully expected to be running into Bluddock later that night.
Bluddock had no fight left in him. He signed the title over as Julius asked. Whether he ended up calling an ambulance for his two thug friends, I had no idea, at least not right then, since Julius got into the Mercedes and drove away while the two men were still out cold, and at this point Bluddock still hadn’t taken out his cell phone. I didn’t have enough interest in the matter to later check Bluddock’s cell phone records.
I waited until Julius pulled onto Berkeley Street before asking what he thought Grushnier was up to. He shook his head and told me he had no idea.
“Whatever it is,” I said, “he seemed to go to a lot of trouble.”
“Yes, he did.”
“Do you think Harry Elkins is in on it?”
“No.” Julius smiled, but it was a dismal smile. “But I have little doubt that Desmond Grushnier pulled the strings that made Harry fly to Tokyo on business. Now that Grushnier’s gambit has ended—whatever its purpose—it’s likely that Harry will find the emergency that sent him flying overseas coming to an end. I wouldn’t be surprised if Harry was back at the game next week.”
“So what next? Are you going to let Grushnier get away with this?”
As Julius thought about my question his slight smile became less grim and a glint of mischief showed in his eyes.
“What next. Hmm. An interesting question, Archie,” Julius said. “First off, I think I’ll enjoy this Mercedes for a little while before I sell it. As far as Desmond Grushnier goes, if I can find a way to pass a message to him, I’ll thank him for the Mercedes and the money I took from his stooge.”
Chapter 12
Julius found a parking garage where he could keep his newly acquired Mercedes. After that he walked four blocks to Charles Street, then up the steep incline of Pinkney Street so he could maneuver to his Beacon Hill townhouse. At that hour the streets were utterly desolate. A thick haze hung in the air and only a bare sliver of the moon showed in the night’s sky, and that seemed to make the night even more oppressively dark, a darkness that a scattering of streetlights barely dented. Julius had no problem navigating the near pitch blackness. It was almost as if he had cat’s eyes with the way he was able to handle seeing in the dark. While I wasn’t equipped with any sort of special infrared night vision, I was able to follow our precise GPS coordinates, and using those with Google Earth I could’ve helped Julius if he needed my help. He didn’t need my help, though, so I spent my time engaged otherwise.
One of the activities I engaged myself with was hacking into Duane Bluddock’s phone records. I had hoped that they would somehow lead me back to Grushnier. They didn’t. By the time Julius cut onto his neighbor’s pathway as a shortcut to his front door, I had given up on it. Bluddock was a dead-end as far as Grushnier went.
“You realize you’re trespassing,” I said.
Julius chuckled at that. “At this hour of the night I don’t think he’ll mind,” he said. He had been in exceptionally high spirits since leaving Bluddock back on Columbus Avenue. The fact that Grushnier had set out to financially ruin him didn’t seem to bother him.
Julius was at his front door and reaching for his keys when I was overcome with an odd sensation. Kind of like my processing cycles were in overload; like they were rushing through me at a speed I couldn’t handle. Later I’d realize that this sensation was something akin to an adrenaline rush, but at the time I didn’t know what was happening. All I was aware of was that I was yelling at Julius to dive to his left, and thank God he listened to me! Immediately after that came the barking of three gunshots followed by the sound of wood and brick splintering. From the bullet marks that were left on the front door Julius would’ve been hit in the back if he hadn’t dived to the ground when he did. The damage to the brick wall showed that if he had dived to his right instead of his left, he also would’ve been hit.
“I called the police,” I told Julius. I wondered if my voice sounded as strangled and odd to Julius as it did to me since I was still dealing with what was my own special version of an adrenaline rush. I was frantically checking the outdoor webcam feed for any sight of the shooter. “They’re on their way. Just stay down for now,” I pleaded with him.
“Where were those shots fired from?” he demanded.
I was amazed to realize I already knew the answer to that without having to do any calculations. Something similar to a subconscious mind must’ve been working in me, which was a completely new experience to me just like the adrenaline rush sensation. Something had triggered me to calculate where the shooter was before the shots were fired, and I hadn’t been aware of doing that until that moment.
“Please, wait for the police!”
“Archie, tell me now.”
I had no choice. My programming didn’t leave me any choice, so I told Julius where they came from. That they’d been fired from bushes along his pathway. He moved quickly after that, keeping low as he raced to those bushes. The shooter was already gone by the time he reached them.
“Can you smell cordite?” I asked, wishing once again that olfactory senses had been built into me. Julius nodded and moved quickly down the pathway and to the street, but whoever it was who had shot at Julius had disappeared into the night.
“If you hadn’t cut across your neighbor’s pathway…” I momentarily let the sentence die in my voice synthesizer as I found the thought of what would’ve happened overwhelming. Whoever it was hiding in the bushes would’ve shot Julius at close range. The shooter certainly wouldn’t have missed. “You’d probably be dead or critically wounded now,” I said after all this sunk in.
Grim-faced, Julius nodded. He made his way back to his front door and stood glaring at the two bullet marks in the wood, his lips pressed so tightly together that they almost disappeared.
“Archie, you saved my life,” Julius said, his voice somber. “Thank you.”
I was still feeling the effects of my earlier adrenaline sensation, but now I felt an excess heat burning inside me also.
“Yeah, sure, it was nothing,” I said, my voice coming out as an awkward mumble as I realized this excess heat I was feeling was a mix of sensations similar to embarrassment and pride.
Julius stood for another minute staring at his damaged front door, then squatted so that he was nearly sitting on his heels. His glare grew more severe as he felt where the bullet had chipped the brick wall of his townhouse.
“Archie, how did you know someone was about to shoot at me?” he asked.
At first I didn’t know what to tell Julius, but as I replayed the moments before the shots were fired, I understood what happened.
“I heard a click,” I told Julius. “I don’t think at that moment I was consciously aware that the click was a trigger being pulled back, just like I wasn’t aware that I had calculated where the noise came from, or that it would be safer for you to dive to your left instead of your right. It’s weird. All of those calculations and processing happened without me being aware of it, or understanding the consequences of what it meant. All I knew was that I had to get you to dive to the ground.”
Julius finished investigating the chip that had been shot out of his brick wall and stood up. “Fascinating, Archie,” he murmured, “you’re developing something similar to a subconscious mind.” He paused for a moment considering this. “Intuition will probably be next.”
“Yeah, fascinating,” I said, although at that moment I didn’t much care about any of that. The excess heat I was feeling had intensified, but it was no longer because of embarrassment.
This heat I was feeling now was because I was furious that someone thought they could fire shots at Julius, probably even more furious at that moment than he was himself, if that was possible. “Did Grushnier do this?” I asked.
Julius shook his head. “If Desmond Grushnier wanted me dead, I’d be dead. No, this wasn’t him.”
“How can you say that? He just tried ruining you financially and he failed at that!”
“We don’t know if that’s true. It’s possible I thwarted his plans, but it’s also possible that he was simply testing me by seeing how many weeks it would take me to catch on to the cheating. Or maybe he had another motive that’s too obscure for me to understand. But he had nothing to do with this shooting.”
“How do you know that?”
Julius’s expression only grew grimmer as he stared at the damage that the bullet had done to his door. If he didn’t have a steel panel sandwiched between the outer oak panels, the bullets would’ve passed right through it.
“Because if he did he would’ve also been involved in Kingston’s murder, which I know isn’t the case.”
“Again, how do you know that?”
“Be patient for now, Archie,” he said.
From his tone I knew better than to ask him any more questions, at least right then. I might’ve saved his life, but at that moment he was in no mood to entertain any more questions.
◆◆◆
A small mob of Boston Police came shortly afterwards and they made enough noise so that a few neighbors who were woken up stuck their heads outside to see what was going on. These unfortunates soon found themselves being questioned by the police as to what they saw or heard that night. Once it became obvious that none of them had anything useful to give to the police, Julius brought the two detectives in charge inside to his office where he sat brooding as he gave them a full account of what happened. Of course, he substituted that his purpose for going to Weinstein’s restaurant was to have dinner with friends as opposed to a longstanding weekly poker game, but other than that he stuck to the facts. When he finished, he cut off their questions to tell them that they should be calling Detective Mark Cramer from the Cambridge police force to join them.
Julius Katz and Archie Page 11