Full House

by David Housewright

  A Turn of the Card

  Probably all of his employees thought he was having an affair, that he had a mistress stashed on the top floor of the apartment complex in downtown Minneapolis overlooking the Mississippi River. Maybe his wife did, too. She had been awfully quarrelsome, lately. He wasn’t happy about it. Yet it was better that they believed a lie than knew the truth.

  He parked his car at a meter on Washington Avenue and walked to the entrance. The security guards knew him. After all, he had been visiting unit 427 at least once a week for the past two years. Yet they made him sign in, anyway, and called ahead before they granted him access to the elevators. He didn’t mind. There were cameras in the elevators, outside the elevators and overlooking all the corridors that led to the lofts. There were even panic buttons spaced out along the corridors. He didn’t mind those, either.

  He knocked softly when he reached 427. The door was pulled open and a young man stepped back to let him pass.

  “Good morning, Mr. G,” he said.

  “Morning, Joe.” Mr. G waited while Joe closed the door before he said, “How is she today?”

  “Just great, Mr. G.”

  “Don’t give me that, Joe. I asked you a question.”

  The young man took a deep breath and answered with the exhale. “She’s unhappy, Mr. G. She wants out of here. She wants—well, you know.”

  Mr. G patted Joe’s shoulder.

  “I know,” he said.

  “Want me to take off for a while as usual?”

  “Be back in an hour.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Joe slipped on his sports jacket, making sure it covered the Beretta he had holstered behind his right hip before he left the apartment. Mr. G slapped the extra dead bolts into place as soon as Joe left and moved deeper into the apartment. His hand brushed the top of a stuffed chair as he crossed the living room. It was an expensive chair. Hell, everything in the loft was expensive. It had cost him $67,842 to furnish it.

  “Good morning, Jill,” he called. When there was no answer as he moved into the dining room. “Jillian?”

  She stepped through the doorway leading to the kitchen carrying a silver serving tray loaded with cups, saucers, spoons, cream, sugar and ornate coffee pot; moving cautiously as if she were threatened by life’s sharp edges. Jillian was young, no more than twenty-two he knew, with golden hair that bounced against her shoulders, a fetching figure and smooth, milky-fresh skin colored with the tint of roses, skin he had seen only in northern girls. Yet it was her eyes that he found most remarkable. They were warm and wide open and so honest that meeting them made a man regret his many sins. And something else: she was the kindest person he had ever met, the epitome of Minnesota Nice.

  “We have a French vanilla blend today,” she said. “Hope you like it.”

  “You know I always love your coffee.”

  She set down the tray and immediately prepared a cup for Mr. G, hesitating before she dumped the second spoonful of sugar into the bowl and giving it a stir.

  “You should have less sugar in your diet but I’m tired of arguing about it,” Jillian said.

  Mr. G smiled as he took the cup and saucer from her outstretched hand. Always thinking of someone else, he thought. He waited while Jillian made her own coffee and then they sat together in the living room. There was some small talk. It bothered Jillian that Mr. G looked so tired these days. He waved her concerns away as he always did.

  “How is Joe working out?” he asked.

  “I hate him.”

  “Has he been out of line?”

  “No, no. He’s—I don’t hate him. Joe’s been great. Better than the last guy for sure. I just—I hate this. Living like this.”

  “I’m sorry, Jill. It won’t be for much longer.”

  “That’s what you said six months ago. And six months before that. Gene, I feel like a prisoner here, I don’t care how much money you’re paying me. I want to walk down the street without a bodyguard following me. I want to travel without asking your permission. I want to go back to school. I want to meet men and go out on dates.”

  “I guess I can’t blame you for that, but it’s for your own safety. If my competitors knew what you do for me…”

  “I know, I know.”

  “Joe’s a good-looking boy.”

  “C’mon Gene. Joe is terrified of even touching me for fear you’d have him rubbed out. Do gangsters still say that—rubbed out?”

  No, they didn’t, Mr. G explained, although he was pleased to learn that Joe was keeping his hands to himself. Joe was one of his most trusted employees. ’Course, so was Scott and he lasted all of six days before he started hitting on Jill. Now his job was driving Mr. G’s wife. Still, Joe was a young man and Jillian was a young woman and they spent a lot of time together in private—maybe, Mr. G decided, he should remind Joe of his responsibilities before he left.

  Jillian set her cup and saucer on the coffee table and stood.

  “Should we get to it?” she asked.

  Mr. G followed her back into the dining room and sat at the head of the table. Jillian swept the serving tray back into the kitchen. She returned with a glass bowl filled with oil with a small candle floating on top that she set on the buffet and lit with a match. Almost immediately the room was filled with the scent of jasmine. She used the dimmer switch to lower the lights to three-quarters power—setting the mood, she called it. Afterward, she opened a drawer in the buffet and pulled out a deck of Tarot cards wrapped carefully in a red silk scarf. She unwrapped the cards and pulled off the top twenty-two, setting the remaining fifty-six cards near her elbow.

  “I think we’ll work with the Major Arcana, today,” Jillian said as she passed the cards to Mr. G.

  The seventy-eight cards in a Tarot deck are divided into two packs: the Major Arcana and the Minor Arcana, the word “arcana” meaning “secret” in Latin. Major Arcana is the trump cards. Each has a title and is numbered in Roman numerals I to XXI with one unnumbered card, The Fool. The Minor cards consist of four suits of thirteen cards each and except for the addition of “knights,” most closely resemble everyday playing cards. Mr. G knew this, along with the Egyptian, Greek, Indian and Chinese origins of Tarot cards, because Jillian had carefully explained it all to him—on more than one occasion. Still, he understood none of it, including why she insisted in calling him “the querent,” a phrase he disliked immensely. He only knew that it worked.

  Jillian had an uncanny ability to predict significant events in his future, often helping him decide between two alternatives. He had not made an important move without secretly consulting her since he found her dressed like a gypsy and working in a tiny booth at the Stone Arch Bridge Art Festival—emphasis on secretly. Mr. G had become the most influential organized crime figure between Chicago and the West Coast and he was within an eyelash of restoring the criminal underworld that had flourished in Minneapolis until Isadore “Kid Cann” Blumenfeld was finally convicted of a felony—after twenty-five tries—in 1961. All he needed was a little more time to solidify his alliance with the Outfit. Yet he knew if his competitors and other business associates discovered how thoroughly dependent he was on this young Tarot card reader, he wouldn’t last a week.

  Mr. G shuffled the cards—the only time anyone but Jillian was allowed to touch them.

  “Start with a general question,” Jillian advised.

  “Will my present business endeavors continue to be successful?”

  Mr. G passed the cards back to Jillian. She dealt the top three cards face down in a row in front of her. He understood after so many readings that they represented his past, present and future. Jillian turned over the first card. It was labeled The World and it was reversed. Upside down cards were usually not desirable, Mr. G knew.

  “At its very best, the appearance of The World card signals the arrival of your heart’s desire,” Jillian said. “So even when it’s upside down like this, its reversed interpretation cannot be too negative. It usually means th
at you have chosen wisely in the past, but you still have a way to go before the promised rewards will be delivered.”

  She turned over the second card to reveal The Chariot.

  “Ahh,” Jillian said. “The Chariot signals that there are battles to be fought and considerable odds to overcome and that resilience of character will be needed if you are to achieve a victorious conclusion. But, when preceded by The World, The Chariot indicates that the rewards you’ll receive will be considerable, although you will take on some very taxing duties in the near future.”

  The third card—indicating the future—caused Jillian to frown. It was The Wheel of Fortune and it was upside down.

  “The Wheel of Fortune reversed like this means there are unpleasant surprises in store for you,” she said. “But Gene, you need to know that it’s the nature of the wheel to turn and you will find that eventually things will change for the better. However, when the Wheel of Fortune is paired with the Chariot, urgent decisions will be needed to make your luck certain.”

  “What urgent decisions?” Mr. G asked.

  Jillian grinned at him. He had seen the grin before and knew what it meant—“After all these years you still don’t get how this works?”

  “All right, all right,” Mr. G said. “Deal ’em again. This time use the Minor cards, too.”

  Jillian joined the two decks together and passed them to Mr. G. He reshuffled them and passed them back.

  “What will cause these unpleasant surprises?” he asked.

  Jillian dealt the Temperance and Death cards, both reversed, and the ten of Swords. Mr. G knew that the Death card wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, although the first time Jillian had dealt it, it scared the hell out of him

  “Temperance indicates that you have a rival who competes with you on an emotional and business level; quarrels and strife are likely,” Jillian said. “The Death card reversed tells us that drastic changes must be made and when paired with the ten of Swords - Gene, violence comes.”

  Mr. G stared at the cards for a long time. He was not concerned that there was a rival—“Like that’s new,” he muttered—or the violence. What concerned him was that the rival was competing with him on an “emotional level.” What the hell did that mean, he wondered.

  “Another spread?” he asked.

  “Of course.”

  Mr. G reshuffled the cards and passed them over.

  “This time be more precise,” Jillian said.

  “What will be the outcome of the decisions I make?”

  Jillian dealt an Ellipse Spread, designed to answer specific questions. The spread was shaped like an arrowhead, with the first and seventh cards at the apexes and the fourth at the point. It expanded the reading, touching on the past, present, future, steps to take, external influence, hopes and fears and final outcome of the situation. The Fool, three of Pentacles, The Moon, seven of Pentacles, King of Pentacles, seven of Swords and five of Swords—Jillian took a deep breath at the sight of the cards and let it out slowly.

  “When I first started doing this, I promised myself if I didn’t have anything nice to say to the querent, I wouldn’t say anything at all,” she said.

  “I’m not paying you to be coy with me, Jill.”

  Jillian dealt three more cards—The Lovers reversed, Ace of Pentacles and five of Pentacles—and took another deep breath.

  “Okay,” she said. “Now that I have these last three cards, I can tell you I was really concerned, Gene. There is a very strong warning in the original reading that somebody is perpetrating some kind of deceit around you which is potentially quite bad for yourself and your wife. However, the last three cards indicate that you are able to take steps to protect yourself, which is great news.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “In the recent past, you took some calculated risks to improve your position on the material front. On the face, things look very successful. At the moment, you seem to be tying up the last few details connected with it. But it looks to me as though you have not been given all the facts you need to make a good decision. I think you and your wife have been deliberately misled. The man represented as the King of Pentacles appears on the surface to be an honest and helpful associate. However, I am not convinced that he is as straight-forward as he appears. He is definitely a person with his own agenda. These two sevens, they’re a little disconcerting, too. The seven of Pentacles tells you that no matter how events may appear, danger lurks and it is important that you be ready to challenge these events through any channel available to you. These last three cards make it clear that as long as you and your wife remain true to each other, you will find the strength to sort things out, although…”

  “Although, what?”

  “I am concerned by the reversed Lovers. I have no cards here to substantiate what I’m about to say, but the reversed Lovers—Gene, I get the impression that your wife will be more of a hindrance than a help.”

  Mr. G thought about it for a moment. A hindrance? It was true that they had not been getting along as well lately as they could have, but—he gathered up the cards, reshuffled them, slid the deck in front of Jillian and said, “How will my wife be a hindrance to me?”

  Jillian dealt The Moon, Queen of Cups reversed, The Fool, seven of Wands, seven of Cups, nine of Pentacles and The Empress.

  “Well?” Mr. G said.

  Jillian knew better than to lie to him.

  “You have recently discovered some deceit taking place around you,” she said. “This appears to be connected to the woman indicated by the Queen of Cups. She’s reversed, which indicates—Gene, it indicates a woman who can be immoral and vain, deceitful and perverse, a faithless lover who forces others to indulge her idle whims. However, the Moon can indicate all kinds of deception, including the sort that means things aren’t what they seem. Very soon you will be asked to take a risk. This will be quite demanding and you might be tempted to shy away from it. Please don’t. Somewhere very close to you is a person who calls himself a friend, but who is running a personal agenda that will do you no good at all. This betrayal will become apparent in the immediate future. And you will be able to pinpoint the individual accurately. Don’t be afraid to act. What goes around comes around. Be ready to receive good fortune and happiness. With the Empress in the final position, you’ll find love in the air very soon. Just be ready to take the risk when it comes your way.”

  Mr. G stared at the young woman. God, she was beautiful, he thought. Was she the Empress? No, no, stop it. What are you thinking? This is crazy. These cards are wrong.

  “Jill, you’re telling me that my wife and one of my people are conspiring against me.”

  “I’m not telling you anything. The cards…”

  “The cards? You’re expecting me to believe the cards?”

  “You always have.”

  “I want a second reading. Second reading.”

  Mr. G gathered the cards, shuffled them, gave the deck to Jillian and asked, “How will my wife be a hindrance to me?”

  Jillian dealt an Ace of Disks, The Fool, Lust, The Tower, Justice, The Sun and The Lovers.

  “Again we see uncertainty about something you have recently discovered, with the Tower indicating shock and sudden violence. There is a mention of great and irreversible change, but the same indications that events will very soon re-shape themselves and allow you a more happy and positive period.”

  “I don’t believe it,” Mr. G said. “I don’t believe any of it.”

  Jillian shrugged as she gathered up her Tarot cards and re-wrapped them in the red silk scarf.

  “The cards say that all will be revealed to you in the immediate future,” she said.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  There was a soft rapping on the door. Joe had returned as instructed—he had a key, yet never let himself into the loft while Mr. G was in residence. Mr. G rose from his chair and began his departure. Jillian called to him.

  “Gene?”

  “What?”


  “Please be careful.”

  He nodded at her and yanked the door open, startling Joe and causing him to take a step backward. Mr. G set a hand on the young man’s shoulder. There was nothing affectionate about the gesture.

  “Listen to me,” he said. “Are you listening?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Anything happens to that girl in there better happen to you, first. Understand?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Mr. G retreated from the building, pausing only to sign himself out at the security desk. All the while he considered what the Tarot cards had told him. His wife cheating on him? Sure, they seemed to be going through a rough patch, but that happens to every marriage from time to time, right? And yeah, lately she had been spending a lot of time with her friends. Still, conspiring to betray him with someone in his organization? The cards had always been true in the past but—no, no, no. Not this time. Jillian had screwed up. Or maybe she was just pissed off because he kept her a virtual prisoner in her ivory tower. She had told him once that a true and accurate reading required a calm system and a clear mind. You need to be relaxed. Did Jillian look relaxed to you? Well, yeah, he decided, she did. Yet the cards were wrong. They had to be. After all, who could his wife be involved with? Her driver Scott? Granted, he was unable keep his hands off Jillian…

  Mr. G stopped on the sidewalk several yards short of his car. “I don’t believe it,” he shouted even as he pointed his remote control at the vehicle and pressed the button that opened his locks.

  The car exploded.

  The force of the blast threw him up against the building.

  This betrayal will become apparent in the immediate future, Jillian had said. It was the only thought he held for several moments.

  One security guard had hurried to the site of the explosion. The rest had remained at their posts on high alert. They were good boys, Mr. G decided; the kind of boys he wanted in his organization. He returned to 427 without bothering to wait for the police and pounded on the door. It was cautiously opened by Joe who said “Hey, Mr. G. Did you forget something?” Mr. G ignored him, pushing deep into the loft.