if the need arose."
"Thanks for your confidence," I said. "I'd much rather have better intelligence on what I might be facing out there."
"Whatever we find out, we'll pass along to you. You can reach me right through the hotel's switchboard, or through the number on my business card. Either way, I'm eager to find out what you've learned."
I sensed I was being dismissed, so I got up. "Oh," she said.
"Three more things." She slid across a sheet of paper and tossed a pen after it. "Another non-disclosure form. I'm sure you'll understand."
"Oh, more than you'll know," I said, not even bothering to read the damn thing, just scrawling my signature on the bottom.
She reached over into her shoulder bag, pulled out something small and black and tossed it to me. I caught it with one hand. A pager.
"Just so that we can contact you when we need you."
I nodded, putted the pager in my coat pocket. Then an envelope came sliding over, bumping into the form I had just signed. 1 picked it up, peeked inside. Reeves said, "Like I promised A thousand dollars a day. There's your first check."
“Thanks," I said.
Making sure she was looking at me, I held the envelope in both hands, tore it in half, and then quarters, and I would have gone further except the scraps of paper were too thick. I let it all fall to the table, but a couple of torn pieces fluttered to the carpeted floor.
"Fair or foul," I said, "you've got me. Don't insult me by trying to make it better with something like this."
And when I walked out toward the door, I was sure that Doug, the burly man reading the Wall Street Journal, gave me a quick smile.
On the short walk back home, I stopped at the slight rise that marked the beginning of my driveway, and looked around. Behind me was the well-lit splendor of the Lafayette House, and I played a game for a few moments, trying to determine which lit window marked the suite of Laura Reeves and her merry band of pirates. I was pretty sure I had the right window fixed in my mind, and I spent another few moments thinking fun thoughts of what those burly young men back there would think if I came back to this place with my FN 8-mm rifle and started pumping rounds into those chosen windows.
A pleasant thought, though not very productive. I turned again and looked out to the dusk of the ocean swells. As the light faded, the ocean's color seemed to broaden and deepen. I shivered for a moment, then looked down to my house. There were lights on there as well. Reeves's word was at least good in this little respect.
I put my hands in my coat pocket, felt the foreign presence of the pager, and started trudging down the dirt driveway to the faint light from my home. On any other night, this picture would cheer me up and lighten my step, but not tonight. Not after I had been brutally shown how simple it would be to take everything away from me. I headed home, head down, just putting one step in front of another.
A couple of hours later I was sitting on my couch sipping a glass of red wine, looking into the dancing flames within my fireplace. Earlier I had eaten --- a ham-and-Comte-cheese omelet, nothing too fancy --- and for dessert I had cleaned and loaded my 9-mm Beretta. I thought about the dead man in the parking lot and Whizzer and Reeves and her crew, back there in the Lafayette House. Eating and cleaning up and working on my weapon had made my sour mood subside a bit, and the fact the power was on and there was a pile of cash in an envelope on my kitchen table --- exactly in the amount of $15,1l3.12 --- had helped as well. Plus, though I wouldn't admit it to Reeves or anyone else, a part of me that had enjoyed working in the shadows liked the sensation of being back on the job.
I took another sip of wine, leaned forward and tossed a dry piece of split maple onto the flames. The fire faded out for just a moment and then the flames roared up, fed by the new fuel. Still, something was bothering me. Something about the whole setup.
"Thanks for your confidence," I said. "I'd much rather have better intelligence on what I might be facing out there."
"Whatever we find out, we'll pass along to you. You can reach me right through the hotel's switchboard, or through the number on my business card. Either way, I'm eager to find out what you've learned."
I sensed I was being dismissed, so I got up. "Oh," she said.
"Three more things." She slid across a sheet of paper and tossed a pen after it. "Another non-disclosure form. I'm sure you'll understand."
"Oh, more than you'll know," I said, not even bothering to read the damn thing, just scrawling my signature on the bottom.
She reached over into her shoulder bag, pulled out something small and black and tossed it to me. I caught it with one hand. A pager.
"Just so that we can contact you when we need you."
I nodded, putted the pager in my coat pocket. Then an envelope came sliding over, bumping into the form I had just signed. 1 picked it up, peeked inside. Reeves said, "Like I promised A thousand dollars a day. There's your first check."
“Thanks," I said.
Making sure she was looking at me, I held the envelope in both hands, tore it in half, and then quarters, and I would have gone further except the scraps of paper were too thick. I let it all fall to the table, but a couple of torn pieces fluttered to the carpeted floor.
"Fair or foul," I said, "you've got me. Don't insult me by trying to make it better with something like this."
And when I walked out toward the door, I was sure that Doug, the burly man reading the Wall Street Journal, gave me a quick smile.
On the short walk back home, I stopped at the slight rise that marked the beginning of my driveway, and looked around. Behind me was the well-lit splendor of the Lafayette House, and I played a game for a few moments, trying to determine which lit window marked the suite of Laura Reeves and her merry band of pirates. I was pretty sure I had the right window fixed in my mind, and I spent another few moments thinking fun thoughts of what those burly young men back there would think if I came back to this place with my FN 8-mm rifle and started pumping rounds into those chosen windows.
A pleasant thought, though not very productive. I turned again and looked out to the dusk of the ocean swells. As the light faded, the ocean's color seemed to broaden and deepen. I shivered for a moment, then looked down to my house. There were lights on there as well. Reeves's word was at least good in this little respect.
I put my hands in my coat pocket, felt the foreign presence of the pager, and started trudging down the dirt driveway to the faint light from my home. On any other night, this picture would cheer me up and lighten my step, but not tonight. Not after I had been brutally shown how simple it would be to take everything away from me. I headed home, head down, just putting one step in front of another.
A couple of hours later I was sitting on my couch sipping a glass of red wine, looking into the dancing flames within my fireplace. Earlier I had eaten --- a ham-and-Comte-cheese omelet, nothing too fancy --- and for dessert I had cleaned and loaded my 9-mm Beretta. I thought about the dead man in the parking lot and Whizzer and Reeves and her crew, back there in the Lafayette House. Eating and cleaning up and working on my weapon had made my sour mood subside a bit, and the fact the power was on and there was a pile of cash in an envelope on my kitchen table --- exactly in the amount of $15,1l3.12 --- had helped as well. Plus, though I wouldn't admit it to Reeves or anyone else, a part of me that had enjoyed working in the shadows liked the sensation of being back on the job.
I took another sip of wine, leaned forward and tossed a dry piece of split maple onto the flames. The fire faded out for just a moment and then the flames roared up, fed by the new fuel. Still, something was bothering me. Something about the whole setup.
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