“Run it,” the head FBI man said. They all talked in clipped little sentences like that; Harrington felt himself getting a headache.
From the machine, a voice said, “Hello?” and another voice said, “Is that Herbert Har—”
Talking over the second voice, Harrington said, “Is that me? It doesn’t sound like me.”
“Hold it,” the head FBI man said, and the technician stopped the tape and ran it backward again. To Harrington the head FBI man said, “Let’s just listen.”
“Oh, of course,” Harrington said. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt, I was merely startled.”
“Run it,” the head FBI man said, and the tape started forward again.
“Hello?” His own voice sounded lighter to him than he would have guessed; not so manly. He didn’t much like it.
“Is that Herbert Harrington?” It was a female voice, middle-aged, New York City accent, rather truculent. An irascible-sounding woman, like one of your lady cabdrivers.
“Yes, it is. Who’s calling, please?”
“We have your boy.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I said, ‘We have your boy.’ It means we kidnapped him, we’re the kidnappers. I’m one of the kidnappers, this is the phone call.”
“Oh, yes! Of course, I’m sorry. Maurice phoned me when he got home.”
“What?”
“My chauffeur. He was very upset, he said it was extremely difficult to drive while chained to the steering wheel.”
Small pause. Then, the woman’s voice again: “Look, let’s start all over. We have your boy.”
“Yes, you said that. And this is the phone call.”
“Right. All right. Your Bobby’s fine. And he’ll—”
“What say?”
“I said, ‘Your Bobby’s fine. And he’ll stay—”
“Are you sure you have the right number?”
“Jimmy! I didn’t mean—I meant Jimmy. Your Jimmy’s fine. And he’ll stay fine just as long as you cooperate.”
Silence. Far in the background one of those telephone company noises took place: boop-boop-boop-boop-boopboop-beep-boop-boop-boop.
The woman’s voice: “Did you hear me?”
“Yes, of course.”
“Well? You gonna cooperate or aren’t you gonna cooperate?”
“Of course I’ll cooperate.”
“At last. Okay. That’s good. And the first thing is, you don’t call the police.”
“Oh, dear.”
“What?”
“I do wish you’d told me before. Or told Maurice, that would have been best.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Well, the fact is, I’ve already called them. In fact, they’re here right now.” (That had been the moment when the head FBI man had started waving his arms back and forth in a negative manner; Harrington remembered now his decision at that point not to mention to the woman that the call was being recorded. But weren’t there court decisions to the effect that people had to be informed if their calls were being recorded?)
“You already called them.”
“Well, it did seem the thing to do. Maurice said you people carried guns and seemed extremely menacing.”
“All right, all right. We’ll forget that part. The point is, you want your kid back, right?”
Slight hesitation. “Well, of course.” (Listening to the tape now, Harrington could see where that hesitation might very easily be misconstrued. But he hadn’t been thinking it over, or anything like that, it was merely that the question had been raised so suddenly it had startled him. Naturally he wanted Jimmy back, he was a fine lad, an excellent boy. There were times when Harrington wished he’d named this son Herbert, rather than having thrown the name away on his first son by his first marriage; the actual Herbert, now a twenty-eight-year-old hippie on a commune in Chad, had little to recommend him. In fact, nothing. In fact, it was good sound business sense on the kidnappers’ part to steal Jimmy rather than Herbert Jr., since Harrington doubted very much he would pay one hundred fifty thousand dollars for the return of that clod.)
“All right. You want him back. But it will cost you.”
“Yes, I’d rather thought it would. You people speak of that as the ransom, don’t you?”
“What? Yeah, right, the ransom. That’s what this call’s all about.”
“I thought as much.”
“Yeah. Okay, here it is. Tomorrow, you get a hundred—” Clatter, clatter. “Damn it!”
“Beg pardon?”
“Hold on, I lost my—” Rattling sounds. “Just a minute, it’s—” More rattling sounds. “Okay, here we go. Tomorrow, you get a hundred fifty thousand dollars in cash. In old—”
“I doubt I could go that high.”
“—bills. You— What?”
“You say tomorrow. I take it time is of the essence here, and I’m not sure I could gather a hundred fifty thousand in cash in one day. I might be able to do eighty-five.”
“Wait a minute, you’re going ahead of me.”
“I’m what?”
“Here it is. That’s up to you. The longer it takes, the longer it’ll be before you see your Buh—Jimmy again.”
“Oh, I see, it isn’t necessarily tomorrow.”
“It’s whenever you want him back, Buster.” She was sounding really very irascible by this point.
“I was just thinking, if you wanted to complete this operation tomorrow, you might settle for eighty-five thousand.”
“I said a hundred fifty thousand, and I meant a hundred fifty thousand. You think we’re gonna haggle?”
“Certainly not. I’m not dickering over the well-being of my child, it’s merely that I thought, within the time frame you appeared to be contem—”
“All right, all right, let it go. It’s a hundred fifty thousand. no matter what.”
“Very well.” He sounded a bit chilly himself by this time, and listening to the recording now he could only applaud his decision then to let the woman see a bit of his irritation.
“Okay. We’ll go over it again. Tomorrow you get— Well. As soon as you can, okay? As soon as you can, you get a hundred fifty thousand dollars in cash. In old bills. You pack it in a suitcase, and stay by your phone. I’ll call again to give you the next instructions.”
(It was during that statement of the woman’s that the head FBI man had extended toward Harrington a slip of paper containing the penciled words, “Tell her to prove it.”)
“Urn. Prove it.”
“What?”
“I said, prove it.”
“Prove what? That I’m gonna call you again?”
(During which, the head FBI man had been with great exaggeration mouthing the sentence, “That they have the kid!”)
“No, urn— Oh! That you have the kid. My son. Jimmy.”