Dancing Aztecs (26 page)

“I'll be there in two hours,” Bobbi said.

IN THE EXECUTIVE SUITE …

August Corella and Victor Krassmeier sat moodily together in Victor Krassmeier's private office, waiting for the arrival of Bud Beemiss. Corella hadn't liked coming back to Vic this way, and he
certainly
hadn't liked calling in Bud Beemiss, but what choice did he have?

The truth is, August Corella was not a member of the Mafia. He had a few nice hustles going, that's all, principally a sweetheart union in the bakery business, and it helped most of the time to give the impression he was a card-carrying mobster, but in fact he was not now nor had he ever been a member of the mob. Any mob.

And because of that, because he was not a bona fide mobster, there'd been nothing he could do about it when both Earl and Ralph refused to come to work today. Ralph claimed he had the flu this morning, and coughed a few times unconvincingly into the telephone. Earl, more straightforward, said he had two black eyes and a very prominent cut on the tip of his nose and he was not, repeat
not
, leaving his apartment until everything, repeat
everything
, had healed up. And maybe not then.

A mafioso, of course, wouldn't put up with such shit. A mafioso would smile and say, “Nobody quits, Earl.
You
know that.” But if Corella tried such a threat, Earl would hang up and go to work for some other union thug.

So Corella, alone, had driven his Cadillac across the river this morning, and he had called Vic, and he had called Bud Beemiss, the PR man whose house in Connecticut had been the scene of last night's foolishness, and he had set up this appointment because what August Corella needed now was a new gang and a new plan.

And to keep that goddam statue out of the hands of those goddam Inter-Air Forwarding punks.

Vic Krassmeier broke the brooding silence at last, saying, “Whatever happened to the fellow who caused all this trouble? The one who didn't know the alphabet.”

“Oh. He's out of it. Earl punished him a little and put him on a plane home to Ecuador.”

“May it have crashed,” Krassmeier said devoutly, and his intercom buzzed. “Yes?”

“Mr. Beemiss is here,” said the metallic female voice.

“Send him in.”

When Beemiss came in a minute later, bouncing and smiling in his suede jacket, be looked like a man who was pretty damn pleased with himself. If only it were possible to have Earl punish this one and put him on a plane somewhere. Antarctica maybe.

“Ah, good morning,” Beemiss said, approaching Corella, a mocking smile on his lips. “Mister Kane, isn't it?”

“Corella.”

“Corella? Much more realistic.” And Beemiss insisted on shaking hands.

Corella introduced him next to Krassmeier, who sat behind his desk and refused to stand, to shake hands, to smile, to speak or to do anything other than grunt. Beemiss seemed amused by that, and when he sat down he turned his amused expression back to Corella, saying, “I must admit that bit of vaudeville last night made me curious.”

It was time for the truth. Corella said, “One of the statues you people got is the original. We smuggled it in from South America.”

“Ah,” said Beemiss. “I was wondering if that might be it.”

“There was a screw-up,” Corella told him, “and you got the wrong box. Before we could straighten it out, this other bunch found out about it. That was one of them got your statue last night.”

“Which I assume was the wrong one.”

“Right.”

“I also assume you have a buyer for the right one.”

“Sure,” said Corella.

Beemiss waited, amiably curious, and then said, “Who?”

Corella looked over at Krassmeier, who brooded briefly and then shrugged. Apparently, he believed all hope was lost, anyway. So Corella told Beemiss, “The Museum of the Arts of the Americas.”

“Ah.” Beemiss turned his smile on Krassmeier. “You're a trustee there, aren't you?”

Grumbling, Krassmeier said, “Yes.”

“You negotiated for the museum?”

“Yes.”

“And how high did you permit yourself to be pushed?”

Once again Krassmeier and Corella exchanged glances, and this time it was Corella who shrugged. Krassmeier said, “Slightly more than a million.”

“Slightly? Is there a number figure for that slightly?”

“Two hundred forty thousand.”

“That's some slightly,” Beemiss said.

Corella said, “There've been a lot of expenses. At the South American end, for instance.”

Beemiss chuckled. “Yes, I can imagine the South American end could be terribly expensive.”

Krassmeier, leaning forward over his desk, said, “The point is, we'd like you to assist us.”

“Yes, I see you would,” Beemiss said. “If these other people don't already have the statue.”

“We can only hope they don't.”

“I'll do that,” Beemiss assured him. “And if they don't have it, you want me to get it and sell it to you.”

“
Sell
it to us?” Krassmeier sounded truly shocked.

Bemiss did his annoying chuckle again. “You aren't asking me to
give
it away.”

“We'll share in the profits,” Krassmeier said.

“I'm always happier with a dollar figure,” Bemiss told him. “I tell you what, I'll take that slightly.”

“You'll do what?”

“I'll take the two hundred forty thousand.”

“Two hundred forty thousand
dollars?”

“Leaving you a million between you,” Beemiss pointed out.

“There isn't that much left,” Krassmeier protested.

Beemiss shrugged, smiled, and said nothing.

Krassmeier said, “You may have the best access to the statue, but
we
are the only access to a market.”

“I don't necessarily have to play at all,” Beemiss said.

Corella had been watching in silence, but he could see now that Krassmeier wasn't going to get anywhere. Some negotiator. Quietly, Corella said, “All right.”

Beemiss nodded. “Thank you.”

Krassmeier stared at Corella. “All right? But you know yourself there isn't mat much left. The expenses—”

Corella gave Krassmeier his blandest look. “We can make adjustments, Vic,” he said.

It was fascinating to watch the expressions move across Krassmeier's face, as he gradually realized how totally Corella had been making a fool of him. Heavy expenses, Krassmeier's share constantly shrinking— It was a pity to have to discard that whole con, but Corella was a realist and the time had come to slice the pie a different way.

Krassmeier's face was moving toward purple, and he might actually have started yelling accusations even with Bud Beemiss in the room, but Beemiss himself broke the spell, saying, “That's fine, then. We'll want to put something on paper right now, vague about the job to be done but specific about the emolument. Then I'll start phoning my fellow committeemen, rounding up the statues. May I use a phone here?”

Krassmeier wasn't yet capable of ordinary speech, so Corella answered for him: “Sure,” he said. “Vic won't mind.”

Krassmeier growled.

WAY DOWN SOUTH …

Since the nation of Descalzo is draped like a saddle over the spine of the Andes, it is generally very difficult to travel between Quetchyl, near the eastern border of the nation, and Santa Rosita Rosaria (commonly known as Rosie), far in the west. To facilitate this trip for government functionaries and the better class of businessman, an ancient DC-3 travels regularly from Quetchyl to Rosie on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and from Rosie to Quetchyl on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays. (On Sundays, while the pilot offers
very
sincere prayers at Mass, the two mechanics work feverishly from dawn to dusk to make the plane at least possible for one more week.)

Today, a Wednesday, the plane is to leave Quetchyl for Rosie at ten
A.M.
, and among its passengers are Pedro Ninni, José Caracha, and Edwardo Brazzo, the tickets having been bought by Brazzo with most of his savings. Pedro, like the others, is in civilian clothing today, but his official museum guard pistol is concealed in the depths of the brown paper bag containing his goat-thigh sandwich and his bottle of gluppe. (This is one adventure, regardless of what José and Edwardo think, that Pedro will
not
go through sober.)

Pedro had known from the beginning, of course, that he would be the one to draw the short straw. The short end of the stick was his by right, by birth and by fate. What he didn't know for sure was whether or not he would actually go ahead and hijack this airplane. A great big airplane full of people; it didn't even
sound
right. Maybe he'd just take the ride to Rosie and then kill himself. Or, permit Edwardo and José to kill him. Or, perhaps he would flee the country on foot, although Peru and Bolivia both had an inclination to return Descalzan nationals wanted by the authorities back home. (Governments prefer to stay on good relations with neighboring governments.)

Could a man
walk
to New York? It sounded no more difficult than stealing a plane to New York.

How many armed guards there are at Quetchyl International Airport! Brown-uniformed men with automatic machine pistols, blue-uniformed men with rifles, gray-uniformed men with bolstered revolvers. And every last one of them gives Pedro a suspicious glare.

Edward and José are sticking very close to Pedro, giving him no opportunity either to run away or to gulp down a lot of gluppe. While waiting for the announcement to board their plane, the three of them sit close together in the muggy airless waiting room along with the other eleven passengers for this flight, who are five government officials, two priests, an American doctor on a malnutrition survey for the United Nations, his Canadian assistant-mistress, a lima bean merchant, and a French journalist looking for examples of undemocratic behavior. These fourteen people sit crammed together in the small room surrounded by armed guards, and when ten o'clock becomes ten-thirty, becomes ten forty-five, Pedro begins tentatively to allow himself hope. Perhaps the flight won't take off. Perhaps the plane has died. Perhaps someone hijacked it yesterday, on its way here from Rosie. Perhaps the pilot has come to his senses. Perhaps—

“All aboard for Descalzo International World Airways Flight six-seventeen, Quetchyl to Santa Rosita Rosaria, boarding at gate twenty-seven. All aboard, please. Final call.”

Final call? It's the
first
call. But that isn't the point; the point is that the blessed airplane apparently is going to take off after all. Cursing his fate and clutching his paper bag full of gun, goat, and gluppe, Pedro reluctantly passes with the others through the airport's only gate and crosses the tarmac to the plane, which sags in the hot humid sunlight like a molting member of an endangered species. Painted in the national colors of crimson and orange, but in a random pattern similar to World War II camouflage stripes, the plane looks as though it is suffering from a rare but horrible dermatological disease.

Pedro stumbles on the steps. As he is suddenly realizing, not only is this the first time he has ever hijacked a plane, it is also the first time he has ever
flown
in a plane. Is this monstrosity actually going to leave the ground? “Santa Maria,” whispers Pedro. “Santa Teresa, Santa Clara—”

“No, señor,” says the stewardess. “Santa Rosita Rosaria.” A yamfed Descalzan beauty, well over four feet tall and with her ample form squeezed into a mini-skirted uniform of orange with crimson polka dots, this stewardess is named Lupe Naz and she is a four-year veteran of these flights. One look tells her that Pedro is going to be one of those problem passengers. He'll be terrified on takeoff, he'll probably throw up, and there's undoubtedly something alcoholic in that disgusting paper bag. Giving him a professionally sympathetic smile, she adds, “Enjoy your flight, señor.”

Pedro groans, and boards the plane.

Since this plane doesn't make international flights, it need not conform to any rules or laws other than those of the Descalzan government that owns it. It is, therefore, the only DC-3 in the world with seats five across. Edging sideways along the aisle after José and with Edwardo herding him from the back, Pedro despairingly permits himself to be placed in a middle seat on the three-seat side, with José by the window to his right and Edwardo by the aisle to his left.

An engine starts! “Ai!” cries Pedro, and stares out the mingy little window as the filthy machine out there pops and whines and roars and chokes and smokes and whizzes and rattles and finally settles down to a sound midway between a tractor and an avalanche.

And the
other
one starts up! Pedro stares in horror past Edwardo's grim visage, and sees the wing on the far side of the plane shaking like a palm frond. “The plane is dying,” Pedro mumbles to himself, and then louder, “The plane is dying!” And then, yet louder,
“The plane is blowing up!”

Since the passengers are well scattered amid all the narrow empty seats, only a few of them hear Pedro's cry above the tubercular spasms of the engines, and of these few the priests merely cross themselves and the French journalist merely smiles patronizingly, while one of the five government officials, the Assistant Deputy to the Associate Director of the Ministry of Involuntary Farm Labor, leaps to his feet in panic and runs off the airplane and straight home, an act he will regret bitterly later on, when he learns what a treat he has missed.

One other pair of ears has also picked up Pedro's squeal; those of stewardess Lupe Naz, who has been dawdling in Pedro's general neighborhood in full expectation that he would be causing trouble soon. She rushes forward, her orange-with-crimson-polka-dot mini-skirt riding high over her generous buttocks encased in purple panty-hose, and speaking
very
firmly, she says, “You will sit down at once! This airplane is not going to blow up. This airplane has
never
blown up!”