On the Other Hand, Death

"Crowded enough. If they drop off the Greco guy, twenty men will be on top of them in nothing flat. If they just snatch the ransom and take off, there'll be unmarked radio cars doing relays a block behind them till they get where they're going. Just to be on the safe side, we've got a homing transmitter sewn into the bottom of the money case. When they get to where they've got Greco, we'll move in fast. They'll never know what hit 'em."
"Sounds close to being foolproof. It'd better be. Here's the rest of the cash."
I tugged Trefusis's envelope out of my back pocket and shoved it toward Bowman. He grinned.
I drove over to Central and went into a Grandma's Pie Shop. Grandma wasn't there that night, but the cashier, a comely grandson whom I'd seen around, directed me to a pay phone. I dialed the apartment.
"Hello?" His voice was scratchy, distant.
"It's me. I love you."
"Don't be manipulative. I'm in no mood for it. This will be a non-personal conversation. I obtained the information you requested regarding William Wilson."
"I apologize. Really. It'll rarely happen again. Hardly ever. Not often at all."
"Do you want this information or don't you?"
"Once every three months, about. That'd be it. And only in other cities. Never in Albany or any contiguous municipality. Doesn't that sound reasonable? Short of storing my nuts in a jar of vinegar, which you would keep locked in your desk drawer, that's the best I can do. I think you'll have to agree that it's fair, given certain chemical imbalances in my frontal lobe. So. Are we friends again? Lovers, at least?"
Cutesy sniveling got me nowhere. He didn't even pause. "Here is what I have learned. Are you listening?"
"Sure. Yeah. I'm listening."
"I talked to Gary Moyes out at the Drexon Company. The word is, Bill Wilson runs the plant baseball pool. Except there's some scam going on and nobody ever seems to collect any winnings. They're all 'reinvested' in the following week's pool—which is not the way the players understood the pool would operate. There's a lot of grumbling, and Wilson's time may be running out.
"Moyes guesses that as soon as one of the more impatient employees comes up a winner, Wilson will either have to pay everybody off or suffer dire consequences. If he's getting rich in a small way, it looks as if he'll need every dime of it for a new set of teeth and maybe a neck brace. Wilson definitely is in bad trouble, or soon will be."
"Nnn. Yeah. That explains Wilson's bragging to his wife about soon making her a rich woman, I guess. But it also looks as if he's in need of even more cash and must be fairly desperate to come up with it. This might lead Wilson to behave irrationally, criminally. Unless he's got all the pool money stashed somewhere, which he might. He doesn't appear to be spending it on anything or anybody at home. Can you check his bank records and the plant credit union?"
"On a Saturday night? Neither of us has those kinds of contacts."
"Yeah. Crap. It looks as if we're back to square one with Wilson. Not that I'm all that much interested in him anymore. Maybe Bowman will come up with something on him. His guys are checking too."
"I have now fulfilled my obligation to you. Goodbye."
"Hey wait. I want to talk to you! We've really got to sort things out. You know and I know that we've got too much going for us to let—"
"I just want to say one last thing to you, Don. Listen to this. Listen carefully. I was thumbing through your Proust a while ago and came upon a line that jumped right out at me. It seemed so apt, so perfect. It was Swann talking to Odette, but it could as easily have been me to you. He says to her, Swann says, 'You are a formless water that will trickle down any slope that offers itself.' How about that? 'A formless water that will trickle down any slope that offers itself"
He waited.
I said, "Yeah. How about that? Quite a phrasemaker, Proust. The man was a genius, no doubt about it."
"He summed you up in fourteen words. Goodbye."
"Actually, it's probably less harsh in the original French, and— Hello? Timmy? Hello?"
With a phone company click he was gone.
"A formless water." I'd done it.
I ate a slice of pie, got change for a dollar from grandson, went back and piled some dimes by the phone. I dialed the apartment. No answer. I dialed my service. No messages.
Later. For sure.
Back in my booth I went over the Trefusis-Greco-McWhirter-Deem-Wilson-Fisher situation in my mind yet again. I had my coffee cup refilled twice. My head buzzed with heat, fatigue, and caffeine, and I swiped at flies that weren't there. One dropped into my coffee cup.
I couldn't figure any of it out. I still was nagged by the idea that I had not picked up on something crucial, but I didn't know what. I had been preoccupied, and that had been my fault, mostly.
I remembered my meeting with Lyle Barner. I got out my address book, went back to the phone, and made a credit card call to San Francisco. It was nine-thirty-five in Albany, three hours earlier in California. He'd probably be home.
"Yyyyeh-lo."
"Hi, Buel. Don Strachey. You sound chipper enough."
"Don, you old faggot pissant! Son of a bee! You in town, I hope?"
"Albany. Grandma's Pie Shop on Central. We shared a Bavarian cream here once."
"Ah, so we did. And if my rapidly deteriorating memory serves me, the pie that night was the least of it."
"If Grandma had known."
"Well, shithouse mouse! If this doesn't beat all! An old trick calls me up from three thousand miles away six years later, when last Tuesday's passes me on the street today and looks right through me. Son of a bee."
"You sound as if you're in good shape, Buel. Still out there organizing the masses for the socialist judgment day?"
"Oh, yeah. In a manner of speaking, I am. To tell you the truth, Don, I am now actually gainfully employed. Can you believe that? I work at an S and L."
"You into that too? When I knew you, your sexual tastes were more or less conventional."
"That's a savings and loan. Hercules S and L. It's all gay. No more rude tellers and huffy loan officers for the brothers and sisters. It's a new day, Don. I love it. And we're growing like crazy. B of A's gonna have to either come out of the closet or move to Kansas."
"B of A, what's that? Belle of Amherst? Basket of apples? What?"
"Bank of America. Owns half the city, and the suburbs all the way to Denver. But not for long. Hercules is flexing its mighty muscle."
"I can't wait to see your logo."
"So, how you doing back there in Depressoville? How's Timmy?"
"Oh, Timmy's fine, fine. The reason I called was I know a gay cop here who needs to make a move. Is San Francisco still recruiting among the brethren?"
"In a small, halfhearted way, yes. You want a name? I'll get you one if you want to hang on."
I said I did. He came back on the line a minute later with a name and phone number. I wrote them down.
"Thanks, Buel. This might help. As you can guess, the
revolution has not yet reached the Albany Police Department. Speaking of which, one of your city's most notorious troublemakers is with us in Albany this weekend. Do you know Fenton McWhirter?"
"Oh, sure. Everybody knows Fenton. We worked together on the first Harvey Milk campaign. Fenton rubs a lot of people the wrong way, but I always thought he was okay. There's nobody more dedicated to the movement, that's for sure. And, I suppose, nobody more ruthless. Fenton can be counted on to make some noise at least, one way or another."