Fatboy Read online

  And the clincher, of course, was that she’d have a focus, a companion, something to take her mind off the bad people hitting on her for money.

  “I was definitely serious. Please remind me of your name?”

  “Dolly Rawlings.”

  “Dolly. Excellent. Call me Sara, by the way. Why don’t you come around here and sit down and we’ll go through some details.”

  “Oh sure.”

  Sara brought her spare chair over to the counter. “Where do you live?” she said, waving Dolly towards the other chair. She thought a shadow of fear or doubt crossed Dolly’s face.

  “Geraldtown.” She waved vaguely to the north. “It’s not too bad. I can get here by microbus. Plus I walk a lot.”

  Sara glanced down at her boots as Dolly sat down and crossed her legs; stylish, but with sensible heels.

  “Is that okay?” Dolly said, the doubt sharpening. “Would I need a car?”

  “Oh no,” Sara said, sitting beside her. “If you need to run errands, you can use my car.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure.”

  “It’s not that I don’t have a car, when I need one, but... sometimes...”

  “It’s no problem. What I do have to make clear, though, is that I’m not running a big business here. You can see what it is, lots of love, but low turnover, so what I could offer you would be low wage, and maybe only half-time. Is that okay?”

  “Oh sure. Absolutely.” Dolly was nodding her head in enthusiastic agreement.

  “Great. Then let’s get the basic data exchanged.” She opened her screen and then looked up. “You don’t sew, by any chance?”

  “Not much, but I’m sure I could learn more.”

  “Robots can do everything, in the technical sense,” she explained, “but with really valuable dresses you have to take it stitch by stitch, make judgment calls, replicate the old methods, and I haven’t yet found a robot, in my price range anyway, that gets that right.”

  Dolly was nodding again. “I’d be happy to try and learn all that.”

  Sara came close to laughing out loud. “Dolly, I think you and I will get along. Now let’s sign you on.”

  Another shadow crossed Dolly’s face. “Would you mind... because of the government program I’m on... if we didn’t make it official for a few weeks? I really don’t mind... you know... working for a real low wage... while we see...”

  Sara thought for a second and then nodded. There were advantages to that on both sides. “Yeah, that’s okay, Dolly. I can fund you out of petty cash for a few weeks. Remind me if I forget to pay you, okay?”

  Frank the locksmith called in the afternoon.

  “This is an anonymous call from a friend.”

  “What are you talking about, Frank? Your name’s right here on my phone.”

  “Oh yeah. I keep forgetting about that. Listen, I mended some locks for a guy who had a break-in like yours.”

  “Oh yeah? Do I know him?”

  “I don’t know that, Sara, but I can give you his name.”

  “That would help.”

  “Mattie Goldberg. He has what amounts to a garage over on twenty-first.”

  “The guy who makes and repairs jewelry?”

  “I’m told he also mixes a pretty nice vodka martini.”

  “What? Oh never mind. You figure the break-in was like mine, and... what’s the outcome? How’s he taken it?”

  “Hard to say. He’s a crotchety old guy, lives on his own, in a nice one-story over on Westport. He mumbled about young folks being out of control, but he didn’t seem badly shaken up. Anyway, I mentioned you’d had a similar thing, without giving your name, and he said he’d talk to you if you wanted to call round.”

  “That’s kind of you, Frank.”

  “Frank? Frank? Who’s Frank?”

  She closed up early and stopped by Mattie’s little outlet on her way home. As Frank had said, it was basically a garage with a shop front in place of a garage door, and signage from another century. The door into the shop was wood with glass panes and a handle, but there was a metal shutter which rolled down in front of it for security. She went into the shop and closed the door behind her, glad of the warmth. The interior was a well-lit workshop, with a small counter to one side, and a single display case housing a range of original pieces, some in precious metals, some in fired enamel. She had been here at least once before. She remembered Mattie showing her some of the tools he used: yes, they were clever, and made some jobs easy; but each of his pieces was executed to his own design.

  Mattie was working. He put down his hand tool and crossed towards her with careful steps. He was a short, thickset man, with a gaunt face and tragic, probing eyes. She recalled rumors about an estranged wife and daughter. He didn’t smile, but gave a little nod as though to acknowledge her presence.

  “Hi.” She put out her hand. “I’m Sara Barnardi, from the dress shop. Do you remember me?”

  “No.” He turned away and went slowly to the counter and picked up a tissue and wiped his hands. He came back and offered his hand as though it was still an item without much interest. She shook it briefly. “But I know who you are,” he added.

  “Mattie...” She paused. Was Frank serious about not using his name? “Mattie, I’m told you had a break-in recently. Nothing taken, but a message demanding money...”

  “They won’t get anything out of me,” he said, his face hard.

  “Right,” she said with a sympathetic nod. “Nor me, I hope... but this message... Was it a little speaking toy?” She held up thumb and forefinger about three inches apart.

  He peered at her for a second. “Something like that. I wasn’t seeing too good. Told me to send seven hundred dollars to some damn charity somewhere. I told it right then I wasn’t sending money anywhere, no matter what they tried to do to me. Might as well give it straight to those scum over in Woodside.”

  Like her, Mattie had identified the ghetto as the likely source of the threat; but he’d apparently responded more vigorously.

  “Have you heard of anyone else being threatened?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t get out much.” His gaze slid away, back towards his workshop.

  “Mattie, if you want to stay in touch... coordinate policy... maybe take our story to the cops...”

  “The cops won’t do anything,” he said, frowning into space. “They’re a part of the problem.” He hesitated, gave her a brief glance. “But if you want to drop by... whenever... that’s okay.”

  She woke up in the night remembering how it had all begun: the ping from her hand screen telling her that her surveillance system was down. She eased herself up in the bed and checked the screen, but everything showed normal. Just a worried memory, a dream. Foster was asleep beside her, his breathing steady. The bedroom was lit by a faint glow, the ambient level they preferred when inactive or asleep.

  She watched him for a moment. He’d taken the news of the break-in okay, accepting her suggestion that it was an inept burglary. It might have been nice, maybe, if he had been just a little worried on her behalf, but she knew that was partly her fault: she built up her efficient, capable, image because she didn’t want her business to be seen as a liability. Foster wasn’t interested in dresses, nor was he interested in making money. His mind was focused on the philosophy of science and academic politics. So she made sure she always sounded in control, and didn’t work late.

  But maybe, she thought with a sigh, she had let the efficient and capable thing become so habitual that she forgot to be sexy and feminine. Not that Foster made her feel sexy and feminine very often these days. It was a two way street, surely. She didn’t demand nights of passion, but a bit of a cuddle now and then would be nice.

  She turned her head to the right, towards the window, her attention caught by something. A faint scratching noise? They were eight floors up, and the window was triple-paned glass in a fixed frame, hidden now behind heavy drapes. Birds occasionally flew into it in daylight, but at night
the only sound was the occasional rumble of thunder, or the whine of a passing aircraft.

  She was startled when a light source appeared behind the drapes, like a beam of intense moonlight, moving and shifting through the spectrum towards yellow. She instinctively put out a hand towards Foster, thinking of a fireball, an explosion in the city. A second later there was a splintering crack, and the drapes shook. She froze in horror, waiting for the building to collapse, for the follow-on bomb blast, an incinerating wave of heat.

  Foster woke up with a gargling cry that sounded like a death rattle. She held on to him, her eyes still on the window drapes, believing they were about to die. But the blast-wave didn’t come. She was half-blinded, half-deafened, but alive. She was aware of the frantic pumping of her heart. Please carry on and happen, she thought, whatever it is that is going to happen.

  “What the hell was that?” Foster said, his voice low, as though he was afraid to break the silence that now enveloped them. She could feel the rigid muscles in his arm. The room lighting had responded to the noise by coming full on, and for a moment their bedroom seemed bright and normal, except for cold air reaching across to them from the window, stirring the drapes.

  Sara remained motionless, not answering him, her eyes on the window. She sensed there was more to come, and that whatever it was would somehow connect with the incursion at her warehouse. She seemed to wait a long time, breathing suspended, life on hold.

  She cried out in shock when the top of one of the drapes moved back by a foot. She wanted to roll over Foster and run, save herself, hunt for a weapon. But they didn’t have a weapon. Foster didn’t believe in guns. And in any case she was paralyzed, held on a rack of muscular tension, unable to do anything but watch.

  She hallucinated eyes, pinprick lights, claws, pulsating surfaces, in the square foot of black behind the drawn edge of the drape. In retrospect, she wasn’t sure she had seen anything. Foster said there had been nothing to see. But at the time she saw the hint of something monstrous. Then the drape moved back into place and everything relapsed into eerie quiet.

  But something was swinging gently back and forth in the cold air, a little red and black toy, suspended from the ceiling by a thread.

  She knew, well before that, that her deception had unraveled and that she was going to have to tell Foster everything. Nevertheless she felt blindsided and betrayed by this ridiculous messenger of ill will, and she struggled for a moment to get free of her bed clothes, intending to pluck it out of the air and crush it.

  It spoke without waiting for a cue: “Make the payment, or it gets worse!”

  It flared white and disappeared.

  Foster made a noise in his throat. He tried again. “Sara? Was that...”

  She slumped down and put a hand to her head. “Honey, I’m so sorry. I know what this is about. I never dreamed...”

  He stared at her for a moment, but didn’t seem to take in what she had said. At last he eased himself out of bed and went across to the drapes and looked out. Sara couldn’t understand this reckless outburst of courage. Foster was the cautious one. Foster was the one who planned everything so as to minimize risk.

  He came back and sat down on the bed and took her hand. “The glass is gone,” he said, his voice astonished and unsteady. “Just completely... gone...” Now at last he looked helpless.

  She roused herself and got up and found a robe. “I’m going to make us a hot drink with a good shot of whisky in it. Also we should move into the spare room, because this place is going to be cold. After that... when you’re ready...” She gave him a guilty look. “...I’ll tell you the whole story.”

  Chapter Six

  “Hee-ha, whoop-de-doo, what’d I tell you? Now we’re rolling. Now these fuckers are paying attention.”

  Sol was grinning and gesticulating with excitement. KR gave a small grin of his own and punched Sol lightly on the shoulder. They were looking at a screen showing payments to the Nigerian charity. Five of these were now listed, including Dolly’s friend the Barnardi woman, all for the full $700.

  Sol jumped up and scuttled around the boxes and equipment trolleys to where Fatboy crouched in dormant slumber. He reached out and slapped the purple midsection. “This fucker can do anything, man, anything at all. Run up walls, chase vehicles, melt glass, blow that Popeye crap sky high. Woo ha, we is going to win.” He bared his teeth and pumped his fist.

  The other gang-members in the basement raised their fists and laughed.

  “You know what?” KR said. “I’m starting to wonder about the basic way we’re doing this thing. Maybe we shouldn’t be bothering with the business address. Maybe we should go straight for the domestic neighborhoods. Shake ‘em up right at the get-go. Frighten them at home. Quicker results and a lot more possible patsies.”

  “Man, you is one bad bad nigger. I’ll go scout the data.”

  “No families. Couples or singles, preferably in detached homes.”

  “Fatboy will love it.”

  KR went across to the big old safe dug in to the wall and spun the combination. There wasn’t much money inside, but at least he could take what he needed in the hope of more coming in. Fatboy could chase up some more laggards tonight or tomorrow night, and they could easily double the $3500 they’d made so far. By extending their reach a little bit and breaking in some new clients they could double that again.

  He made up a bag of silver and put it in the pocket of his leather coat. Back on the street he walked a few blocks on icy pavements and sat on the stoop of a shack owned by one of his girlfriends. She brought him a cup of coffee and he held it in gloved hands and sipped at it. If they really kept this thing going, they had maybe fifteen thousand coming in every month, maybe every couple of months, well, it wasn’t much, but it would make a difference. They’d pay off Fatboy in a year. Keep the Popeyes in their place. Square these fucking cops, who always liked to keep him waiting for an hour or more.

  He put the mug down on the porch and stood up and began walking to keep warm. The cop car came by close to the curb, spraying him with slush, and pulled to a halt. He walked slowly over. Brolin was grinning at him from the driver’s side. The cop on the nearside got out. KR leaned over and put his gloved hands on the edge of the roof. The cop frisked him with lazy indifference, waved at the car, and pulled out his cigarettes.

  KR climbed into the front seat and sat with his hands tucked into his pockets, staring straight ahead.

  Brolin was still grinning. “Got yourself a little messed up there, KR. Nice pants, too. Real shame.”

  “Fuck you, my friend,” KR said, giving him a sideways glance. Brolin was mid-fifties, well-padded with fat. His voice was high-pitched, like a malfunctioning robot toy. KR disliked him about as much as the others. Or maybe a little more.

  “Your mom teach you these good manners, KR?”

  “My mom taught me, always show respect for other people.”

  “My view exactly. So hand it over, motherfucker, and don’t pretend you’ve got better things to do with your time.”

  KR pulled the bag out of his pocket and reached out and dropped it in Brolin’s waiting palm. Brolin emptied the bag into his lap and began counting.

  KR stared straight ahead up the desolate street. Would the time ever come, he wondered, when he’d rise above this crap, get started in a proper business? Would he live to see the likes of Brolin get what they deserved?

  “You’re short, KR.”

  KR looked at him. It was a bleated complaint from an overblown nothing who got off on wearing the uniform: but power was power. He had a fleeting image of Fatboy throwing the guy into the canal. He sighed, looked away. “Times are tough. Why don’t you do your job and round up some Popeyes? They’re trying to cut into our business.”

  “See, we in law enforcement can’t afford to take sides, KR. Who got the money gets the deals.”

  “What does that mean?”

  Brolin was putting the silver back in the bag. “It means you should wonder wh
at it’s like with a C-spy on your back the whole fucking time.”

  KR felt his jaw tightening in anger. “Back off, Brolin. I’ll get you the money. And if you fuck me around, you sure as hell won’t get it from any place else.”

  Brolin put the bag of silver under the seat. “Of course we could look for value somewhere else. You’re a couple of hundred bucks short, so what have you got that’s worth that much?”

  “You talking drugs? Your guys are already ripping me off whenever they feel like it.”

  “Forget about drugs. Drugs are getting cheap. What about girls? You grooming anything young and pretty?”

  “I don’t deal in girls.”

  “Sure you do. All you guys deal in girls. Even if only to provide protection. Don’t you try and kid me, KR. I know the score. It’s part of the life.”

  KR stared out through the windscreen, his jaw set. Don’t listen to this guy.

  “Let’s take your sister, for example,” Brolin went on. “The pretty one, not the ugly one. She might help you square the account.”

  KR felt his heart rate climbing. Easy, easy, he told himself: he’s just trying to wind you up. “You’re getting into a bad place with this, Brolin. Drop it.”

  “Come on, KR. You’re not trying to tell me she doesn’t turn a few tricks now and then? A pretty girl like that?”

  KR turned towards him. “As a matter of fact, she’s working. Got a proper job. So drop it. Drop the whole thing. I’m not organizing girls for you greasy pimps.”

  Brolin pretended to grin at him, but KR saw a spark of anger in his eyes. Brolin said in his high, bleating voice, “Well we’ll just see about that. Mister fucking ghetto big shot. Maybe I’ll have a word with Dolly myself.”

  KR lost it: maybe because he’d been flirting with the power of Fatboy; maybe just because it was going to happen and now was the time. He reached out and grabbed Brolin by his uniform collar and pulled him close. “You do that, Patrolman Brolin, and I’ll beat the shit out of you so fucking bad you never piss in comfort again.”