Chocolate Chocolate Moons (29 page)

“Why should I trust you?” Scheherazade screams. “I’ll do my own evaluation.”
Click!

The next day, dressed as sheep in wolves’ clothing, 507 and 509 break into Drew’s apartment and take the Giacometti. They’re angry because Scheherazade just hired one more knight to her thousand, making a thousand and one, a tiebreaker in a winner-take-all vote about joining the Knights of Columbus or the Knights of Vasco de Gama. They leave a card: “507 and 509 Locksmiths: Fixed Locks Broken. Same-Day Service.”

Drew calls Roger Orbit.

“Great timing,” Roger says. “We’re having a memorial event honoring Rocket. I’ll sit you with the Big Bang Patrons.”

“No thanks, Roger. I’m just calling to tell you that the Giacomettis were fakes. Other artworks could be too.”

“I hope they all are.”

“Why? I would have thought you would be upset. Far Horizons needs the money.”

“Well, I just learned from our generous new donor that there is a brisk market for copies and an even greater market for copies of copies. Anyone can get numbered signed limited editions because it’s so easy to get them extended. With unlimited editions no one ever knows how many there are. Adds to their mystery, ergo their value. Unlimited Editions stock is soaring.”

“And who may I ask is this new generous donor who has given you this information?”

“Scheherazade. She’s going to be our speaker at our next fundraiser. Sorry you’ll miss her keynote address: ‘How to Fool All the People All the Time.’”

38

T
HE NEXT MORNING
, a call from Sandy’s secretary wakes Drew. “He wants to see you immediately. Be prepared. He’s having a tantrum that looks like a prelude to a tornado.”

Sandy sits at his desk with micro phones on each finger, talking to ten people at the same time. It looks like he’s practicing some new kind of musical instrument except that his voice sounds like scratched glass on gravel. As soon as one of his secretaries lets Drew in, Sandy shakes his fingers disconnecting the phones and charges toward him. He motions for him to sit. Drew sits. Sandy peers at him like a scientist examining a deadly virus.

“The police have been all over me, Drew. They thought I had something to do with the death of that crook Rocket Packarod because we were on the same transport and I walked near his cabin. I didn’t even know he was on the ship. And now Lamont Blackberry wants
you
to stop by Mars Yard! Any idea what that’s about?”

Drew shrugs. Sandy gives him his most intimidating stare. Drew looks concerned but says nothing, enraging Sandy more.

That afternoon Drew stands in the Mars Yard waiting room under a blinking light that maximizes nervousness. It was designed by a group whose level of nervousness was consistently off the charts: mothers waiting to hear if their child got into an exclusive nursery school. Drew blinks and reads a sign that says “Take a number.”

“Do I have to take number? I’m the only one here,” he says putting his hands in his pockets and tucking his neck into his collar.

“Yes, you do,” the policeman on duty says.

Drew pulls off a number. “How come it says ‘Number Two’? No one else is here.”

“No one likes to go first. Makes people feel better about being interrogated and tortured.”

“Tortured?”

“Only kidding. You have nothing to fear but fear itself.”

“Fear of fear is a lot of fear.”

Drew sits on a well-worn sofa next to a table with a bowl of fortune cookies, takes one, cracks it, and reads, “Your number is up. You will go on a long journey to a dark place for a long time.” He frowns.

“Don’t worry,” says the policeman. “They all say that or ‘Consider the lilies of the field.’” Drew crumples the fortune and throws it toward the garbage. He misses.

“Aren’t you going to pick it up? It has your biometrics all over it.”

Drew gets up and tosses it in the basket.

The policeman thrusts a clip-screen into his hand. “Fill out this form.”

Drew takes it and looks. He sees a series of inkblots and a list of multiple-choice questions. Drew reads: Is this a picture of a man killing a woman with an ax or an ax killing a woman with a man? Pick or an answer will be assigned to you.

“This is ridiculous,” Drew says. “I refuse to answer.”

“I’m noting that you have a hostile vicious attitude. Is that what you want?”

Drew sighs and picks up the stylus.

Five minutes later, the inner door opens. An android that was hauled in from
Disconnect,
a home for retired androids because the police were short staffed, pushes a walker and shuffles to the center of the room.

“Next number,” it shouts. Drew hands it the paper. “We’re sorry. This is not a valid number. Please check the number and try again.”

“How can the number two not be a valid number?” Drew asks.

The policeman looks up. “Sorry for that. Two is an even number. They sent the odd man out.” He pushes his keyboard. The android turns and makes a slow exit. Then an identical android appears.

“Next number,” it shouts in the same mechanical voice. Drew shakes his head, makes an annoyed expression and hands it the number two.

“I’ve learned not to mess with them,” the policeman says. “They have a very strong union.”

When Lamont confronts Drew about taking a substance from Congress Drugs, Drew doesn’t deny it.

“I didn’t know why Rocket wanted it nor what he would do with it. You’ve got to believe me. I swear I’m telling the truth. I’m even willing to submit to Chinese water torture, circumcision—anything to prove it.”

Lamont, pausing for maximized drama and not missing a wonderful opportunity to stick it to Drew, looks down at Drew’s trousers and lets him think that he is considering circumcision. Then Lamont raises his eyes and says, “But after the poisoning, when the market crashed, people privy to insider information were able to make money selling short. Bet you made a bundle.”

Drew’s eyes shift sideways. He says nothing.

“By the way, that substance you took from Congress Drugs and gave to Rocket was harmless.”

“Harmless? What do you mean, harmless? Didn’t people fall into comas after eating poisoned Chocolate Moons?”

“Yes, they did, but not from what you took from Congress Drugs. You must have been in such a rush that you grabbed the first white powder you saw, thinking it was the anti-flavonoid.”

“Did anyone else take the real anti-flavonoid?”

“Yes, three other people.”

“Three? You’re sure?”

“Who are they?”

“We can’t disclose the information at this time because we are still in the process of collecting evidence.”

“So why am I in trouble if I’m not the one who took the anti-flavonoid?”

“You stole a product from Congress Drugs that didn’t belong to you. Sandy Andreas wants to press charges. But if you cooperate we can reduce them.”

“Cooperate? What do you want me to do?”

“Help us catch Scheherazade and in exchange we’ll give you a sweet deal.”

“Done,” he says, wondering if he agreed too quickly.

39

C
RAIG
C
ASHEW CALLS
a meeting of Culinary Institute security guards and tells us that Sandy Andreas is expanding San Andreas Farms. For the next two weeks, Sandy needs additional personnel until a larger team is hired.

Jersey and I, anxious to get an insider’s view of the farms, volunteer to go.

When CC learns that San Andreas Farms is expanding and knowing there will be a lot of digging as part of the construction she freezes. Then she calls Sandy Andreas.

“I hear you’re developing new land. I was wondering if you would like me to do a follow-up story about San Andreas Farms.”

“News travels fast,” Sandy says. “That will be great. I’ll also give you an exclusive on our newest project, blue watermelons. I always thought that the insides of watermelons should be blue because they are made of so much water.

“Makes sense. What did you do?”

“When we tweaked the DNA of blueberries and watermelons the inside color looked like blue sky reflected in a lake.”

“Wow!” CC says. “They should make a big splash when they hit the market next month. I’ll give them a big plug.”

I get a few days off before the assignment begins. It has been a long time since I’ve had people over for dinner and it will give me an opportunity to meet Becky’s new boyfriend, a yodeler named Franklin Delano Rosenberg whom Becky calls FDR and Cortland calls a person who can’t sing.

Lois will be shopping with Flo, a much higher priority than eating, so I invite Jersey and Trenton who never decline a dinner invitation.

I wear a loose blue-and-gold-striped caftan that hides my bulges and ballet flats so I don’t wobble on heels as I serve. Since my trip to Rose’s Heaven, and asked if I was in the over-five–hundred-pounds category, I watch what I eat. The bulges are smaller as pounds come off. But no one notices, least of all Cortland, who doesn’t see my progress because he travels and is exhausted after searching for new talent for his music agency, Molawn Music. Last week he signed the Bottles, a six-pack of vocalists he found at a recycling plant.

While I’m setting the table, Lamont calls. “I called to tell you we determined the identity of the third person whose biometrics were found next to where the missing poisonous anti-flavonoids should be at the Congress Drugs lab.”

“Was it Sandy’s wife, Solaria, or her cousin Pluto?” I ask, adjusting the flowers I had put in the center of the table.

“Try again.”

“Nooooo, not Colorful Copies!”

“Yup. Her biometrics and time stamp at Congress Drugs match. Remember, after her interview with Sandy Andreas and her tour of their laboratories and San Andreas Farms, she was on Nova Scotia’s program.”

“Yes, I remember because Cortland wanted to watch Earth’s news from Quito, Ecuador, but I insisted because I wanted to see Colorful Copies. We went to college together.”

“Were you friends?”

“Definitely not!”

“So,” Lamont says backing off, “do you remember she held her arm to the camera to show off her charm bracelet? She thought she had eight charms, but when she counted, she only had seven, meaning she lost one somewhere.”

“I also remember that she mentioned talking to a fat scientist at Congress Drugs, who was most likely Decibel Point, as no other scientist is overweight. He told her that he wasn’t happy with the way Congress Drugs tested new products. But this doesn’t mean she took the anti-flavonoids to poison something. After all she is a reporter. Maybe she wanted to—”

“Reporter or not, it’s a theft. I learned that you and Jersey will be spending time at San Andreas Farms this week. Keep your eyes peeled for a clue that might pin her to the case.”

Becky’s new boyfriend is a tall, thin young man with a dark handlebar mustache. He brings me a gift from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s thrift shop on Jupiter’s moon Ganymede that says in big red letters, “Made in Ganymede, home of the solar system’s best Chinese reproductions.” It’s a windup music box with a miniature von Trapp family inside yodeling the Mars national anthem. Cortland examines it and winds it so tightly that he can’t stop it from playing. So he stashes it in the freezer, where it plays until it freezes.