“The Game in Manhattan is finished, Lovejoy.” Nicko looked at Jennie, got an imperceptible assent. “On the Gina. Remember?”
“I was behind the bar, Nicko.”
“He’s stupid,” Commissioner J.J. Kilmer barked.
Nicko nearly smiled, leant forward. “Let’s hope you’re not this stupid about old furniture, Lovejoy. The Game. We’re the players, Lovejoy. At first, we play against each other here in Manhattan. The stakes are based on personal… wealth.” Now he did smile. I wished he hadn’t. “It’s up to each player to raise his or her stake. Nobody is allowed to default. The stakes can come from anywhere.”
“Tell him,” Jennie put in. It sounded a question but wasn’t.
“If a player were to bring personal cash, Lovejoy, we’d be limited to however much he or she could withdraw from a bank account, right? So we accept promissory notes. Then the sum waged can be relatively huge.”
Jennie took over. “Very damaging, Lovejoy, in a city where any major withdrawal is noticed by Manhattan’s wallet watchers.” She held the pause, waited for my nod.
“And you can bet next year’s takings?”
Jennie smiled. “You got it, Lovejoy. If the bet’s mega dollar, and based on certain illegal practices —”
“Not that word, please,” from Berto Gordino in anguish. “From selected activities, Lovejoy.”
Once a lawyer, I thought.
“— Why, it’s easy to handle. Suppose a Police Commissioner were to bet fifty per cent of the police hack and lost, okay? He’d simply raise his hack. That’s the stake.”
I looked round the table. Bullion prices would be lifted fractionally to provide the losing margin if Melodie lost. Hadn’t she said something about Monsignor O’Cody fiddling the diocesan funds? Politics was Denzie Brandau’s wager—presumably he peddled influence in the time-honoured way, for a price. Charlie Sarpi was a drugs man, Kelly Palumba the real-estate queen, Epsilon the showbiz hacker…
“If the game’s over, what’re we all here for?”
“Because you lost, Lovejoy.”
“I what?”
Nicko smiled. His eyes were miles off now, thank God. “Everybody here pays their losses into the kitty. That kitty’s the stake when we get to LA. For the California Game.”
“Thus getting a share in the New York wager.” Jennie was dying to spiel out a load of figures. I could tell.
“Which I shall bet for us all in —”
“— In the California Game,” I said. “All New York? One bet?”
“He makes it sound unfair,” J.J. said, inventing the wheel with his first-ever try at irony. People chuckled.
Melodie intervened, dear thing. “You see, Lovejoy, we gamble to see who wins here. In New York, see? In Florida, why, they’re doing the same thing. Then there’s four bets come from the Mid-West, six from California, one from Washington…”
“The Game itself’s held yearly, Lovejoy. Each bet’s the product of sectored interests.” Nicko shrugged. “It’s up to each to get the best possible finance behind them. The bigger the stake, the bigger the win.
“What’s the Game? Cards? Roulette?”
Nicko chuckled, hailstones on tin. “The entire loot of the nation, Lovejoy.”
“For twelve months,” Jennie amended. “Shared among us, in proportion as stated. The Game on the Gina was to decide who plays in LA and the total stake.”
I drew breath to ask my one remaining question, but Orly was already sniggering. “Except you, Lovejoy,” he said. “You’re the one here with no share. Yet.”
“Methods, Lovejoy?” Nicko could afford to look all cool. He’d won megamillions. Except now he had to gamble it for higher stakes still.
“I said double Bethune’s stake,” I reminded him calmly. “I meant quadruple.”
He tilted his head Jennie’s way as if interrogatingly. “It’s in ten days, Lovejoy. Nobody could possibly hack so many millions from antiques in so few days.”
“Anybody lend me an aeroplane, please?” I asked, rising. “And I’ll need a bank account — paying-in purposes only.”
“A moment, Lovejoy,” Gina said, but I twisted my hand free.
“I can hear them clearing away the grub out there. I’m starving.” I gave a bright smile down the lines of faces. “Can I get anybody anything… ?”
I just caught Blanche and Chanel wheeling the last trayfuls out, thoughtless cows. They only laughed when I ballocked them about it. You’d think women’d learn, wouldn’t you? It’s a wonder that I’m so patient. I warned them that one day I’d lose my temper altogether, but they only laughed all the more. It’s no good trying to tell women off. They’re like infants, only laugh and think you’re daft.
Somebody inside had come to a decision by the time I returned with my tray. Nicko promised a private jet, two goons, a secretary, and licence to travel.
Nobody mentioned chains, but they’d be there, they’d be there.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
« ^ »
JENNIE was efficiency itself, I’ll give her that.
Thirty lasses came, mostly skilled, beautiful, drivingly ambitious. I picked a small timid bird called Prunella, in specs, clumsy, dressed plain. No wonder the US excels. I didn’t know a hundred words per minute was humanly possible. They all knew computers and could start instantly. I was worn out, told Prunella to start in twenty
“You’ll never regret this, Lovejoy,” she told me with solemnity. “This is my greatest opportunity, travelling secretary. I’ve always been a halfway girl, y’know? Sort of nearly getting there —”
“Prunella,” I said. “Rule one: not much talk.”
“You got it, Lovejoy.”
We were alone in the foyer of the Pennsylvania. “There’s another thing, Prunella. I’ll need certain, er, commercial tasks done in great secrecy. They’ll fall to you.”
She was over the moon. “Economic espionage!” she whispered. “Lovejoy, rely on Prunella!”
I was to remember that, later.
MY team assembled at Pennsylvania Station. Tye was along, of course, monolithically, saying nothing. I’d told him not to come armed, and he’d agreed. I didn’t believe him. He needed a secret howitzer. I had a first real look at Prunella in action: today with obvious contact lenses a foot deep and extraordinary flying elbows, as if protecting her files. I’d slimmed my team down to just us, was now having misgivings about my wisdom.
“Prunella,” I said wearily as she scattered her files all over the coffee shop for the umpteenth time.
“Sorry, Lovejoy.” She retrieved them.
Jim Bethune arrived, gave Tye the bent eye.
“I don’t believe this,” he said. “Us? Up the stake in the ’ckin Game?”
Travellers were pouring past. Touts were touting. We were scrunged up at a small table, at least those of us not dropping folders. The coffee was dire, first bad quaff in this wonderful land.
“Which museum are you milking, Jim?” If he had any thoughts of undermining my position, now was the time to disillusion him.
“Lovejoy,” he said, confidence swelling, “this is between you and me, right? I don’t discuss business in shitholes.”
“Tye,” I said evenly, “get rid of him.”
Tye rose, hauled him upright.
“Wait a minute, Lovejoy. I don’t mean —”
I gave him my saddest. “Jim. You’ve blown your one chance. Goodbye, and good luck.”
He clawed desperately to stay by the table as Tye started leaning towards the exit. A boy with a white forage cap by the popcorn stand edged nervously into the walkway.
“You can’t do this, Lovejoy! Metropolitan Gallery of Arts. Bickmore’s the boss…”