The music ended. Gasping for breath, the couples headed for the table. Yoko was there in an instant, handing out bottles of beer. “Chug a lug!” she giggled.
Chai upended his bottle and was the first one done. He held it up triumphantly. Wu was a close second.
“And the winner is…John!” Nikki screamed as Jambalaya started playing on the Wurlitzer. “C’mon, let’s dance!”
“I need to sit this one out,” Chai mumbled.
“Chinese boy, you are disappointing me,” Nikki said. She looked over at Wu and made a face. “What kind of party boys are you guys, anyway? C’mon, girls, let’s dance by ourselves.”
On the dance floor, Nikki shouted to Yoko so she could be heard over the music. “Go over to the sisters and ask them what’s wrong with the boys. Sound disgusted. Play it up, Yoko. Shit, they’re asleep. Keep dancing, Alexis, pretend you don’t notice. Keep dancing. Five bucks says both of them will slide off those chairs within three minutes.”
“That’s a sucker bet,” Alexis said as she twirled and whirled. “I’m too old for this, I’m getting tired.”
“Tell me about it. My heart feels like it’s going to jump right out of my chest. Oops, there goes Wu Wing!”
“Wing Wu.”
“Whatever. There goes Johnny. Oh, God, my hips and thighs are never going to be the same again.”
Heaving and gasping, Alexis and Nikki made their way over to the La Ling sisters and Yoko. They bowed slightly to the sisters. “Yoko, ask the girls if we can get them some food. Tell them how disappointed we are in their friends. Do they speak any English?”
“They say no English. I am not so sure. They are not hungry but thank you for the offer. They wish me to tell you they adore your outfits and want to know where you got them. They want to know where you learned to dance like that.”
“JC Penney for the clothes, Arthur Murray for the dancing.” Alexis smiled. “What’s with the guys?”
Yoko shrugged. “They say they are not so nice. They think it’s funny that they fell asleep with three beautiful women like us wanting to dance with them. They have scurrilous reputations,” Yoko translated.
The servant was back to escort the La Ling sisters to their quarters. “You come now. Father says now!” the servant said. Yoko translated again for the girls.
“OK, guess the party’s over. We might as well go to bed, too,” Yoko said in Chinese for the servant’s benefit. She pointed to the three men and shrugged. The servant said something that sounded ugly.
“She said they should die in their sleep,” Yoko said.
“Uh-huh,” was all Alexis could say as she followed the sisters and the servant down the hall.
When they arrived at the atrium, the servant turned right to the east wing and the girls turned left to the west wing. Everyone bowed and waved goodbye.
Inside their room the women peeled off their clothes and donned jeans and sneakers. Their gear was packed within minutes. Alexis threw her red bag of tricks over her shoulder, opened the door, and looked both ways before she ran down the hall. Nikki and Yoko followed right behind her.
Back in the entertainment room they ran over to John Chai and propped him up on the chair. “God, this guy is so greasy I’m going to have to swab him down with alcohol. Keep your eyes on the other two. Charles said we have —” she looked at her watch — “exactly twenty-five minutes to transform this dude into an old man. Let’s strip him down so we can get this kimono on him. Where the hell is the wheelchair?”
“It’s under the buffet table,” Yoko said. “I saw it when I was doctoring the beer. How long will they be asleep?”
“Three hours, maybe a little less. Just enough time to get out of here and on to the plane. Charles has John’s documents. We got damn lucky with those sisters. Who would dispute anything they said? Hey, we left them here and went to bed. Perfect! Just perfect. Damn, Yoko, your aunts were right, this guy does have…”
“Keep your mind on your work. Who cares what size he is?” Nikki said, her voice so jittery that Alexis’s eyebrows shot upward.
Yoko and Nikki watched as Alexis swiftly changed John Chai into a frail old Chinese man with straggly white hair and a long white mustache that looked like a dog’s whiskers.
Charles and Li entered the room silently. They, too, stared in awe at Chai’s altered appearance. “All we have to do is get him into the wheelchair and we’re out of here,” Nikki said. “What if some of the guests see us?”
“That’s unlikely. Their tea was extra strong this evening. Gather up those empty beer bottles to bring with us. Empty out six more and set them on the table. We don’t want anyone knowing you three were drinking apple juice, and there might be residue inside the men’s bottles.” Yoko hastened to follow Charles’s orders.
“Is Mr. Li going with us, Charles?”
“Unfortunately, no. He said he wants to wake up in his own bed to greet his guests in the morning. He will, however, drive us to the airstrip. No more talk, it’s time to leave. Time is of the essence. The Federal Aviation Administration granted me a small window of time. We have to be out of here on schedule. Li has arranged things to go smoothly. There will be no routines to follow, no stops for customs in this country. Hustle, girls.”
Forty minutes later, everyone was aboard the Gulfstream. Chai was carried on board by Charles and Li. The two pilots looked the other way and chatted about the rainy weather. The two old friends shook hands. “If I —”
“Go, Sir Charles. I was glad to help.”
Charles nodded and ran up the steps. A minute later, the aircraft door closed. By the time Charles buckled his seatbelt the Gulfstream was taxiing down the runway. Outside, only pinpoints of red light could be seen in the distance. Li was already on his way home.
“Good luck, old friend,” Charles whispered.
And then they were airborne. Their destination: the good old US of A. The women clapped their hands.
“My God! We did it! We really did it!” Nikki said.
“Myra is going to be so happy. Have you called her, Charles?”
“I’ve tried but I’ve been unsuccessful.”
“I wonder where she is,” Yoko mused.
“That’s what I would like to know,” Charles said.
Nikki looked at Charles. She didn’t know if he was angry or worried. Probably both, she decided.
Nine
The frost on the ground crunched underneath the trio’s feet as they made their way through the fragrant pine forest. The pungent scent was thick and heady. Jack could feel his sinuses starting to clog up. He looked down at his watch and then at Mark and Cyrus Conway. Both were giving him the evil eye. Right now both men hated him and he knew it.
Mark stomped his feet and rubbed his hands together. “This sucks, Jack! The last time I was out this early in a forest I was ten years old and in the Boy Scouts. How long is this going to take?”
“I think it’s going to snow. It looks like snow. It even feels like snow,” Conway said.
“Shut up, Cyrus. We’re paying you double time to be here. Commune with nature. Be happy. Think about what you’re going to do with all that overtime money. It’s going to take as long as it takes.” Jack lowered the high-powered binoculars. “The trainer is loading the dogs in the van. As soon as I vault the fence, I’ll race over to the house, turn off the gates and you guys just hop over. Remember, time is crucial here. That guy is going to be sitting down at the end of the road waiting to see if anything happens. Don’t even ask how I know this; I just do. Besides, it’s what I would do if I was in his place. Where’s the damn pole?”
Mark handed over a long bamboo pole and Jack vaulted the chain-link fence with ease.
“Show off,” Mark mumbled as he tossed Jack’s knapsack over the fence. Jack picked it up and sprinted toward the farmhouse. Within seconds the fence fizzled into safety mode. Within minutes, Mark and Cyrus were standing next to him just as he deactivated the alarm system in the house.
“Let�
�s not waste any time. Come on, I want to show you where I saw that button. It’s right there, on the fireplace. You know what else, I forgot to check the messages on the answering machine. Cyrus, you check the messages, but don’t erase any of them. The machine is in the library. C’mon, Mark, you need to see this.”
Both men were on their knees looking at a small brass button imbedded in the carved rosette on the fireplace molding. Mark snapped the Polaroid and a blank picture shot out of the camera just as Conway burst through the door.
“That guy with the dogs is back and there’s a limousine coming up the driveway. I could see from the window. I thought you said he was going to sit at the end of the driveway. He ain’t sitting, Jack. He’s here and he’s got those damn dogs with him. C’mon, we have to get out of here!”
“Oh, shit!” Mark said as he raced to the kitchen. “We can’t go out this way, they’ll see us. You got a minute, maybe two before they figure out something’s wrong with the gates. Say something, Jack, or I’m going to kill you right now!”
Jack ran to the laundry room and fished out some pantyhose that he’d seen lying around when he was disarming the alarm system. “I can’t believe how clever I am sometimes!” He took out his pocket knife and cut the pantyhose into pieces. “Put these on your head and run like hell! We have a few minutes. C’mon, c’mon, you waiting for a bus or what? Do as I told you. OK, now run like those dogs have you in their sights, which they do. Jesus, will you listen to them! Go! Go! Go!” Jack bellowed.
The trio raced across the yard, down to the old barn and over the chain-link fence. They toppled over one another and then were up and running again. They could hear the dogs’ shrill barks and howls coming from the house.
They sprinted to their cars and pulled out on to the road just as a string of patrol cars, sirens wailing, roared down the highway.
Mark wiped sweat from his forehead. “Tell me again what we accomplished, Jack. Because they are going to be the last words you ever utter. I’m killing you as soon as we get home.”
Jack ignored him. “Where’s Conway?”
“Two cars ahead of us. Can’t you go any faster, Jack? The cops passed us; let ’er rip. I feel like a sitting duck.”
“They didn’t see us, Mark. Shit, we were so close. Ten more minutes, that’s all it would have taken!”
“Think about this, you asshole. Let’s just say that button did open on to a mysterious…what, Jack? A secret room? Stairs that lead to a secret tunnel? Then what? Just supposing you were right and we entered whatever is behind the fireplace and the limo and the dogs arrived. What the hell would we have done? Picture this: the three of us carted off to jail. No money for bail. Our pictures on the front page. Are you listening to me, Jack?”
Jack shrugged. “Do you know if Conway took the tape from the answering machine? Take a look at the picture you snapped. Is the button visible?”
Mark looked down at the picture he was holding. “Yeah, you can see a button. For all the good it’s going to do us. Where the hell are you going? This isn’t the way to our apartment, and I have no idea if Conway took the tape or not. For all our sakes, I hope not.”
“We’re going to Georgetown to Nikki’s town house. Then we’re going to have breakfast, or I can make us breakfast at her house. I know where everything is.”
“You’re insane! Do you have a secret death wish?” Mark snarled.
“I’m not insane. I’m right. I knew — know — those women are out there breaking the law. I just proved it to you. Sometimes I am so smart I can’t stand myself. And, no, I do not have a death wish. I also know we just blew our one and only opportunity to get inside that house. From here on in, good old Myra will probably hire a SWAT team to guard the place. More proof that something unlawful is going on. Bet you ten bucks that was the architect in the limo. Damn, why weren’t we smart enough to put a bug in the phone?”
Mark clamped his lips shut. There was no sense wasting his breath talking to Jack. Jack had tunnel vision and a one-track mind when it came to the women of Pinewood.
They rode in silence until Jack finally said, “It’s snowing! What are we doing for Thanksgiving, Mark?”
Mark gritted his teeth. It was indeed snowing. “What would you like to do for Thanksgiving, Jack?” he asked, but Jack didn’t pick up on the heavy sarcasm. He was always amazed at how Jack could turn “it” off and go in another direction and then turn “it” back on and never miss a beat.
“Well, I don’t think either one of us can cook up a full-scale dinner, so let’s order from one of those places that do the whole thing. All you have to do is unwrap everything and set the table. We have to get some flowers for the table and some candles that smell. You’re supposed to use a tablecloth on holidays with real napkins, not paper ones. Do you have a tablecloth and napkins, Mark?”
“Shut the hell up, Jack. Flowers, candles, tablecloths, what difference does it make, for God’s sake?”
“The difference it makes is that it means we — me in particular — are not consumed by what’s going on in our professional life. It means we can keep our private life separate, for example, on Thanksgiving, our private life, is separate from the women of Pinewood, our professional life. Call Conway again and give him Nik’s address. Tell him to park wherever he can find a space. We’re going to need that gizmo to disarm her security system.”
“Do you know anything about Georgetown cops, Jack? They’re mean as snakes.”
“Kind of like you fibbies, huh?”
“Ex-fibbie, Jack. Yeah, like us. They kick ass first and take names later.”
“Mark, Mark, Mark, first they have to find our asses before they can kick them. Nik is always someplace. That means we have a clear shot at her town house. No one is going to call and complain. You need to relax or you’re going to get high blood pressure.”
Mark clamped his lips shut, his eyes straight ahead. He marveled at Jack’s good fortune in finding a parking spot on the crowded street. He watched as Conway parked three spaces down. If he was doing the driving, with his usual luck, he’d have had to park a mile away. Jack was right about the blood pressure, too. He really did need to relax more.
Jack picked the lock on Nikki’s door within seconds and had the alarm deactivated in no time. “Come on in, boys, and I’ll whip us up some breakfast, but first I want to check out a few things. Nik keeps a little office upstairs. I want to go through her things. Mark, see if you can lift anything of importance off her computer. Conway, set the table and get the stuff ready. Scrambled eggs, bacon, whatever you can find. Use her best dishes. This is a party.”
“I am personally going to sign your commitment papers when they cart you off,” Mark said.
Jack laughed all the way up the stairs. He had a bad moment when he saw Nikki’s neat, tidy bedroom. It smelled so much like her that his eyes started to water. He was stunned to see a picture of the two of them on her dresser. Suddenly he wanted to cry the way he’d cried when he was a little kid. He tried to shake off the feeling but his eyes stayed moist. He knew Mark was pretending not to see what he was going through.
“OK, let’s get with it.”
One of the police officers led Isabelle to the side. “Tell me one more time exactly what you saw and the time you saw it.”
Isabelle kneaded her hands. “I came out here in a limousine. You already spoke to the driver. We were right behind the man from the kennel. I got out of the limo when the trainer got out. The gate was dead, the power off. When I left here a few days ago, the power was on and the alarm was on in the house. The trainer said it was on when he left a little while ago. I’ve been…been house-sitting. I wasn’t able to get out here yesterday because I had car trouble. Mrs. Rutledge called the limousine company and had them pick me up. When the trainer finally managed to pry open the gates enough so we could slip through, I saw that the lock on the kitchen door had been picked. I’m assuming it was picked, because I locked it when I left. I set the alarm, too.”
&nb
sp; “When did you see the three figures running away?”
“When the trainer was trying to pry open the gates. The dogs were going crazy and it had just started to snow. All I know is there were three of them. They had something over their heads. I don’t know this for sure, but it looked like…like pantyhose or something sheer like that. Whatever it was, it was flesh-colored. Like I said, it was snowing, the flakes were kind of swirling around making it hard to see. I wasn’t wearing my glasses. I need them for distance but since I wasn’t driving, I didn’t have them on. Maybe the trainer could see better than me.”
“Was anything taken from the house?”
“I don’t know. I don’t live here. It doesn’t look like it to me but I can’t be sure. I told you, I’m just house-sitting till Mrs. Rutledge gets back.”
The officer narrowed his eyes slightly. “Where exactly is Mrs. Rutledge? When will she be back? Do you have a way to get in touch with her?”
Isabelle pretended to sigh mightily. “Mrs. Rutledge doesn’t share her personal comings and goings with me. I’m a paid employee. I’m not sure, but I think she’s due back late tonight or tomorrow. No, I do not have a number where she can be reached. It’s not like there are small children here or pets where something could go awry. I told you, I’m just watching the house.”
“Those dogs out there…what’s that all about?”
“Officer, I simply don’t know. I guess Mrs. Rutledge values her privacy. They’re usually just here at night. You’ll have to talk to the trainer if you want to know more about those dogs. Personally, they scare the crap out of me. Is there anything else, Officer? Excuse me, the phone is ringing.”
Isabelle grappled with the wall phone as an arctic blast of air swirled into the kitchen. She didn’t offer a greeting until the door closed behind the officer. Her “hello” was cautious, even breathless. “Charles, thank God! It’s Isabelle.” She quickly related the past events. “You sound so far away. What a silly thing to say. Of course you’re far away. Exactly where are you, Charles?”
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