Genuine Gold

by Ann Aptaker

  The flame blurs as I walk between the shelves, turning the lighter left and right, looking for my jackpot bundle. The path’s treacherous with loose pebbles, and I trip more than once, banging against the shelves, rattling the ghostly dishware.

  My lighter’s getting hot, the chrome-plated steel burning my fingers. I snap it shut, let it cool. I’m in the dark.

  The mind does funny things in the dark. Since it can’t look out, it looks in, rummages around in memories, finding ones that fit with whatever sensations seep in from the air. The gritty sand, the stinging smell of saltwater, coax from the darkness fragments of carny music and shuffled images in swirling colors. I’m inside those colors, feeling the windy thrill of wild rides, seeing the wide grins of wild people who taught me how to beat the world at its own game. I see myself move through the slatted shadows under the boardwalk, where I’d bury the loot I stole from the beach, and bury, too, my hurt feelings when a pretty girl would shrink from my longings. I’m on the Thunderbolt coaster, screaming with giddy fear. I see myself hanging around Mona’s fortune-telling booth near the Wonder Wheel, watch Mona dig deep into the marks’ minds and pockets with just a word, a hint that their future hangs in the balance. I’m at a shooting gallery where I was better than any ten-year-old should be in shooting a moving line of painted tin ducks. I’m in my gaudy once-upon-a-time days and neon nights tangy with salt air and my shoes full of sand.

  My soul’s never gotten rid of any of it.

  I force myself out of the reverie. My lighter’s cooled down enough for me to snap a new flame. The flickering light replaces the memories and visions. I’m back in my now, back in my need to find my stolen treasure and pick up my life in the bright lights and dark alleys of Manhattan, back to making peace with Rosie, and pressing Sig to make good on his promise to find Sophie. I need all that but can’t get it back until I find what Mickey Schwartz Day stole from me, a treasure older than any of my memories.

  So I start moving through the tunnel again, past the white glimmer of dishware.

  My lighter picks out a dark, slouching shape next to a stack of dishes. Reaching for it, I feel a leather strap and a damp, bulging stretch of canvas. I bring the lighter close: it’s my satchel.

  If my heart beat any harder it would crack my bones. My palms are suddenly sweaty despite the tunnel’s salty chill, because finding the satchel won’t matter a whit if the pyxis isn’t in it or if it’s broken. I can’t count on Mickey’s thugs, or Mickey himself, for taking good care of my stolen loot.

  Putting the lighter on the shelf, I take hold of the satchel, reach inside, feel the bulky padding I’d wrapped around the pyxis. The shape under it feels intact, as if Mickey never bothered to unwrap it for a look, but I won’t know what’s what until I examine it for damage. Miranda van Zell expects me to deliver a perfect specimen, and she’d probably keep her money in her handbag if there’s so much as a scratch. Slowly, carefully, I unwrap the bundle, then bring the lighter close to examine the surface.

  In the flickering light, I’m again thrown back in time, but now it’s far, far back to the ancient moment when the dancing ladies on the surface of the pot were first seen by torchlight, their lifted legs and swirling chitons of red-ochre against a black background, their heads thrown back in pagan ecstasy. I’m pretty sure I would’ve enjoyed attending their feasts.

  I don’t see any cracks in the surface, at least not in the meager light of the flame. Even the lid, with its sunburst pattern bordered by the traditional meandering Greek key and surmounted by a small ringlike handle, seems to be intact. I can’t be sure, though, until I get it out of Coney Island and under good light.

  But I found my Dancing Goddesses. I can get out from under the secret, watchful eyes of Sig’s local henchmen, out from the cops nosing around in my business, out from the mess of Mickey’s murder, out from Coney Island’s sweet grip.

  Chapter Twelve

  I didn’t say good-bye to Lilah, didn’t bother with any toodle-oo to Eddie, or check in with Esposito and Pike to let them know I’ll be out of their hair, their precinct, and their gun sights. I drove right back to the city. As I walk through the back alleys from Louie’s garage to my office, the noise of my dockside neighborhood gathers around me like a comforting shawl, helps shake off Coney Island’s fevered dreams.

  Judson’s hanging up the phone when I walk in. “That was Mrs. van Zell. She wants to know—” He sees the satchel. “You found it?”

  “Yeah. But I need to check its condition before I deliver it to Miranda. It’s had a rough ride since I brought it ashore. C’mon, let’s look this baby over.”

  Inside my private office, I take two magnifying glasses from my desk, give one magnifier and the lid of the pyxis to Judson, keep the body of the pot and the other magnifier for myself, and turn my desk lamp on. I’ve done this dance with Judson before, each of us checking the condition of an artwork or artifact, then confirming what the other found, or didn’t.

  “Wow,” Judson says when we’re done. “It’s a beauty, and not a scratch on her.”

  “She’s a beauty, all right. Twenty thousand dollars worth of beautiful.” I wrap it back up, put it in the satchel.

  Judson says, “So where’d the guy stash twenty grand of gorgeous?”

  “In a booze tunnel in a bathhouse kitchen.”

  “Huh. Not bad. Pretty smart.”

  “The choice of spot was smart,” I say. “The guy wasn’t. Okay, let’s get Miranda back on the phone.”

  Judson dials the phone on my desk, says to Miranda’s butler Charles, “Cantor Gold for Mrs. van Zell,” hands me the receiver, then goes back to the outer office.

  I hear Miranda’s throaty hello.

  “It’s Cantor,” I say. “I have your little piece of ancient Greece.”

  I hear her quick, sharp intake of breath, then, “Intact?”

  “Intact.”

  Her breath flows out again, slowly. “Well done, Cantor. Very well done, indeed. How soon can you be here?”

  “How soon can you have twenty grand?”

  “As soon as I open the safe.”

  “I’ll be right over.”

  *

  It’s nearly three in the afternoon when I arrive at the van Zell penthouse, and Charles escorts me to the same study where I delivered the bad news about the pyxis last night.

  Miranda, dressed in a pencil-thin gray skirt and a severely cut, severely expensive belted black jacket, is enjoying a drink at her desk when I walk in. “Join me?” she says.

  “Chivas, neat.”

  The way she gets up from the desk and walks to the bar cart, serene as a smooth lake, you’d never know she’s about to receive a fabulous treasure. But that’s one of the differences between people whose money is old as quill pens and people whose cash is newer than yesterday’s gossip columns. The old-money crowd doesn’t grab for things. They’re accustomed to things coming to them.

  Miranda hands me the scotch, and with a wave of her hand invites me to join her on the couch. After allowing me the courtesy of enjoying a deep swallow of my drink, she nods discreetly toward the satchel. “So, is it as beautiful as I imagined?”

  “You tell me.” I remove the bundle from the satchel, unwrap it, and give the pyxis to Miranda, whose green eyes suddenly shine. Not with grasping greed, but with a kind of scholarly lust. She has a collector’s appreciation for beauty: finely sophisticated, and utterly primal.

  “This is it,” she says. “This is the treasure that will finally convince the museum to name their ancient art galleries the van Zell wing.”

  So much for the pure love of beauty.

  “Thank you, Cantor,” she says. “You’ve succeeded admirably.”

  “I’ve earned my money,” I say. The hint’s not especially subtle, and not meant to be.

  “Ah yes, your twenty thousand. Just a moment.” She says it with the easy confidence of someone for whom twenty grand is just pin money as she gets up from the couch. Putting the pyxis on the desk, sh
e walks around to the landscape painting on the wall and pushes a button camouflaged by the blue silk wallpaper. The painting slides up, revealing a wall safe. With a glance back over her shoulder, no doubt making sure I’m too far away to see—and memorize—the combination to the safe, Miranda twirls the dial. I just smile back at her. My smile hides my annoyance at being distrusted.

  My annoyance melts when Miranda hands me two tight stacks of cash.

  Twenty thousand dollars in hundred dollar bills makes a bulge in my inside jacket pocket, but my black overcoat hides it. “Thanks,” I say, taking my satchel and starting to leave, “until next time.”

  “Yes, until next time.”

  I’m just about at the study door when another bit of business turns me back. “By the way, have the police been around again about the dead doorman? What was his name? Frank?”

  “Oh, that,” she says, as if I’ve brought up a minor irritation and not a man’s murder, a murder I was privy to. “The police won’t be around anymore, Cantor. That matter’s been taken care of.”

  “They’ve arrested someone?” That could jam me up, since the thug who killed the doorman was one of the thugs who grabbed the pyxis from me. The guy was one of Mickey’s boys, and if the two murders, Frank’s and Mickey’s, get roped together, I could find myself tangled in so many police knots I’ll be picking threads of rope outta my skin for years. “What do you mean, taken care of?”

  “Just that,” she says as she sits down at her desk with the nonchalance of someone who has nothing much of importance to do, except maybe write a cocktail party guest list. “There won’t be any further inquiries in the matter. When I spoke to the police commissioner this morning, we agreed the guilty party must be a common thief who tried to rob poor Frank and wound up killing him when Frank resisted. And you know, anonymous muggers are rarely, if ever, caught. Don’t you agree, Cantor?”

  I don’t know if I’ve ever been reminded so diplomatically that I owe someone—in this case, the well-connected Miranda van Zell—a favor. “Yeah, that sounds about right,” I say.

  “Good-bye, Cantor. Until next time.”

  “Until next time, Miranda.”

  *

  Back out on the street on this beautiful day, I take my time walking along Fifth Avenue to my car. The sun is shining, the air is winter crisp, and my recent troubles are done with. I’m even tempted to cross the street and stroll in Central Park. But walking around New York with twenty grand in my suit pocket is not the best idea, so I figure I ought to get back to my office and my own wall safe behind my own desk.

  In my good mood, I’m not particularly uneasy about Miranda’s cozy relationship with the police commissioner, or her power to cover up a crime, but I feel a little guilty about Frank being cast aside as just another poor shlub too unimportant to get justice. Still, that’s the way of the world. If it wasn’t for the money I make so I can afford one of the best lawyers in town, and having fixers like Miranda van Zell and Sig Loreale on my dance card, the Law would treat me as less than human, too. It already tries. And not because I steal things.

  Meantime, though, I’m free as a bird. I’ve got money in my pocket, and time on my hands to spend it. I wouldn’t mind spending the time, and a chunk of the cash, with a beautiful woman on my arm. I wouldn’t mind spending it with Rosie.

  *

  I’m not in my office five minutes, giving Judson his three grand cut of the twenty Gs and then putting the rest in the safe—where I glance, as always, at the photo of Sophie and me—before Judson comes into my private office, his face pale and pasty as wet bread.

  “Loreale’s on the phone for you. How come he’s calling here? He never calls here.”

  Sig’s a man of habits, and when he breaks a habit, the world gets nervous. I get nervous. But I also get curious. “Close the door on your way out, Judson.”

  When Judson’s gone, and I’m alone, I pour myself a scotch, sit down at my desk, take a long pull of the whiskey, and wonder if this could be it, if this could be the phone call when Sig tells me he’s found Sophie.

  I’ve got a belly full of butterflies when I pick up the phone, say, “Hello, Sig,” and hear the click of Judson ringing off.

  “Good afternoon, Cantor. I assume that click is your boy hanging up?” His slow way of speaking makes everything he says, even a casual question, sound like a death knell.

  “You assume right. What’s on your mind?”

  “I heard you left Coney Island without even saying good-bye.”

  I don’t waste my breath asking who told him.

  “That was wise, Cantor,” he says. “Leaving was wise, and the way you left was wise, too. No fuss, no messy ends regarding the death of Mr. Day.”

  “I found what I was looking for, so his death no longer concerns me.”

  “Yes, that is wise, too. That matter will all be taken care of.” There it is again, the second time today I’ve heard the language of the privileged or the powerful, the language of matters taken care of. If the average Joe and Jane ever found out just how many people were pulling life’s strings, they’d break down and cry over the lie that’s the American Dream. Or maybe they’d just keep barbecuing in their new backyards, numbed by a juicy steak.

  “So why are you calling, Sig?” The heart-pounding hope I started this conversation with is fading, but not gone. No, not entirely gone. “Do you have something to tell me?”

  “No, I have something to ask you.”

  My last bit of hope just crumbled. “Sure. Go ahead.”

  “In the aftermath of Mr. Day’s death, I assume you had dealings with his sister.”

  “I wouldn’t say dealings. Just a chat. What you might call a condolence chat.”

  “I see. All right, during your condolence chat, did she say what her plans were for Mr. Day’s property and any of his businesses? Not that he had much.”

  “No.” I almost gag on the word, remembering that the only thing Lilah was concerned about was servicing her next john.

  “Of course, you will keep me informed should you hear of her—”

  “Look, Sig, I don’t expect to hear from Miss Day, and I have no plans to be in touch with her. My business in Coney Island is finished. But my business with you isn’t.”

  “I wasn’t aware we had any current business, Cantor.” He couldn’t sound any colder if he spoke through a mouthful of ice.

  “Sophie.” I say. “The business about Sophie. About who took her and where. Look, I’ve paid for big ears all over the place, listening for any whisper of information. But my contacts, extensive as they are, are nothing compared to yours, and we made a deal to use your contacts to help find her. For a man who thumps his chest about keeping his promises, you sure aren’t living up to your billing.”

  The silence on the other end of the phone is as thick and heavy as the air before a dangerous storm. “When I have something to tell you,” he says, every slow word like the deep rumble of thunder, “I will tell you. Good-bye, Cantor.”

  *

  Doris is pouring a mug of coffee for a guy down the line when I take a seat at the counter of Pete’s luncheonette. Finishing up with the guy, Doris brings me a mug and the coffeepot, and pours me coffee. “Late lunch?” she says. “Or early dinner? Or maybe just a piece of pie?” The friendly warmth of her cigarette voice is a welcome change after Loreale’s cold rumbling. “We got a nice apple today. I could heat it up for you.”

  “Chicken on rye,” I say. “I haven’t eaten a thing since I was here this morning, and I’m hungry, so make it a double-decker.”

  “Double-decker chicken on rye. Mustard, right? Slice of tomato?”

  “You know me too well, Doris. Marry me.”

  “Not in this lifetime.” Then she adds, “But maybe the next.”

  “I’ll look for you.”

  I take off my coat and hat, hang them on the rack, then sip the good black coffee while Doris orders up my sandwich.

  The day was okay until Sig put his chill in it. I
’ll need a lot more than just hot coffee to warm it back up. My spoiled mood must be all over my face, because when Doris comes back with my chicken sandwich, she says, “So who the hell hurt you in the five minutes I was gone?”

  The only things Doris knows about Sig Loreale are the same things everybody else reads in the paper, hears on the radio, or sees on the television news: crime stories or gossip squeezed between the latest battlefield news from Korea and items about some Hollywood pinup girl’s latest playboy romance. None of them gets Loreale’s story right, anyway. But the less Doris knows about the real Sig, the better. And it’s better if she has no idea that I know Sig at all.

  So with as much cheery nonchalance as I can muster, all I say is, “Hey, life hurts sometimes, Doris.”

  “Eat your chicken sandwich. You’ll feel better. And when you feel better, you’ll be able to lie to me better.”

  “I’d never lie to the woman who brews the best damned coffee in America.”

  “Listen, smart aleck, lyin’ to me ain’t no skin off my back. I’ll pour your coffee anyway. But lyin’ to yourself, well, that’ll catch up with you and kill you. Eat you alive from the inside. So whatever’s botherin’ you, you don’t want to tell me? Fine. Maybe it’s none of my business. But do yourself a favor and own up to what hurts you. You’ll live longer.”

  *

  Home now, standing at my apartment window in my shirtsleeves, a smooth Ellington tune on the radio on low, I sip a drink in one hand, follow it with a pull on a cigarette in the other, smoke curling along the window as evening descends on the towers of the city. The lights of my Theater District neighborhood glow into life. The drink, the smoke, the music, the sweet view vanquish Doris’s finger wagging about owning up to what hurts me. Sure, the loss of Sophie hurts. But that always hurts. I’d have to be numb, or dead, to deny it.