I Come as a Theif (9 page)

"What's there for you to bear?" George spoke in sudden petulance, as if no blood relationship now existed between them. "You're perfectly self-sufficient. You steal when you want, lie when you want, take everything out of life you want. You're a Daly through and through, despite your grandfather's ranting. He's secretly delighted, of course. Not because you're a thief, but because I always rated you above the Dalys. Oh, I never said it. I didn't have to. He knew I thought it, the old devil. He knew from the beginning. And he hates me for it. It's not enough that he and your mother have sucked the blood out of me. They had to take my children, too. Make them pure Daly, so I didn't even have stud value. Well, I never had much hope for Susan or Philip, but I had some for you. And now that's gone."

Tony's eyes, too, were filled with tears. The world in his mind stretched out to an infinite plane of scorched grass. There seemed no end to desolation. "Why didn't you tell me, Dad?"

George seemed surprised at the agony in his tone. "Tell you what?"

"Tell me you believed in me. Tell me what was at stake."

"Oh, Tony, when did any of you ever listen to me?"

"I did. I wanted to, anyway."

George's surprise turned to distrust. He was retentive of grievances. "Well, even if you would have, it's too late now. What's done is done."

"But I don't have to stay a thief."

"Would you swear to stop?" George looked at him doubtfully. "On your word of honor? If you have one?"

"Of course, I will."

George shook his head. "Your grandfather will never believe it. He'll always suspect you."

"Well, who cares about Grandpa? You and I will believe it. Oh, Dad, you'll see. I'll be all the things you want."

The blankness on George Lowder's face might have been something like shame, as if he had conceived a sudden suspicion of what had been sacrificed in his private war with Patrick Daly. But if he had built his life on hate, could it be suddenly switched to love? "Please, Dad," Tony cried in a sudden passion of sincerity. "Please."

"Then tell me. Have you stolen any other things?"

"No."

"This was your first time?"

"My very first."

"Then maybe it's not too late."

Tony hugged his father, and when the latter had left, he immediately sat down to draw up a list of the stolen objects that had now to be returned. For it was at once perfectly clear to him that thus and only thus could he even hope to convert his egregious lie into a necessary truth.

The weeks that followed the Lowders' return to the city were full ones for Tony. Each stolen chattel had to be the subject of a separate campaign. Some of the campaigns were simple enough. The toys that had been taken from the homes of friends could be easily and secretly restored. But the ornaments and bric-a-brac taken from the homes of grown-ups proved much harder. He had to wait until his mother proposed a visit to the owner and then persuade her to take him along. In one case he had to pretend an interest in a thirteen-year-old daughter of the house that he was far from feeling, which resulted in more sticky kisses in the library while their mothers gossiped in the parlor. Yet there was ecstasy in the moment when he dropped a silver ashtray, shaped like a heart, on the table from which it had been ravished, just as his precocious little hostess slid her impertinent and unwelcome tongue between his lips.

His mother had quarreled with a Daly aunt who had been particularly nasty about the episode of Grandpa's scissors-knife, and Tony was beginning to despair about ever being able to return the ivory seal that belonged with the hunting eskimo on her mantelpiece. His despair was real, for he had got it firmly into his head that a single failure would be enough to invalidate his redemption and to leave him enmeshed forever in the dirty net of his lie. One Sunday morning, however, after a night when he had prayed very hard to a deity whom he was beginning to conceive of as an entity distinct from Grandpa Daly, an entity no longer necessarily disassociated from sympathy, the Daly aunt, Genevieve, called at the apartment after church to make up with her sister. In the flush of their reconciliation Dorothy gave her an azalea plant and Tony, leaping to his feet as he recognized the miracle, cried out to Aunt Genevieve that he would carry it home for her. When he got to her apartment she could not fail to offer him a glass of orangeade, and while she was in her pantry, he restored the little seal to its still empty place. As he did so he saw his glittering eyes in the mirror over the mantel and made the sign of the cross on his chest.

Finally there was only a single trinket left to restore: a tiny doll's flower vase, with yellow and purple latitudinal lines. He had filched it from a notions store while the proprietor and his mother had been discussing the deterioration of the neighborhood, and he had left it to the last because he had thought it would be the easiest to put back. But when he went to the store, he stared in dismay at a show window filled with shiny plumbing fixtures. The notions shop had gone out of business, and inquiry within revealed that the proprietor was dead.

Tony turned back toward home in dazed, solid misery and walked several blocks before he realized that the funny little throb that seemed to be accelerating in his chest was anger. Somebody was making fun of him, somebody even meaner than Grandpa Daly! And taking the little vase out of his pocket, he hurled it on the pavement and ground it under his heel, turning around and around until, looking down, he could distinguish none of the particles. If God would not free him, he would free himself!

But as he resumed his walk, he was conscious of a curious feeling of emptiness. He felt very light, as if with each step he might rise several feet in the air, so that his shoes and clothes acted as weights to keep him down. And then, suddenly, he realized that his anger was quite gone. He stopped again, as if waiting for nature to fill the vacuum, and, surely enough, something seemed to be being pumped into him. His body and mind, his very soul, appeared to be taking the joint shape of a tank, of some kind of receptacle anyway, into which a soft, warm foaming liquid was rapidly flowing. He stood very still in fear of losing the illusion which grew more and more agreeable as his realization of it intensified. Now he was almost flooded to the brim with a sense of unutterable ecstasy, yet the fuller he was, the lighter he became. He might have been a balloon that would float straight up to heaven! He cried aloud in his joy. What could it be but the promised redemption? What could he do but run home, as fast as he could, and fall on his knees to thank God?

Tony had rather taken it for granted that payment by the underworld would be quick and efficient. He had vaguely pictured Max, on a park bench at lunch hour, being joined by a man in dark glasses. No greeting would pass between them, but when the man rose, an envelope with crisp new bills in the exact amount would be left at Max's side. He had to be indoctrinated into the elaborate and clumsy ritual of crime.

"Have our margin gaps been covered?" he asked confidently, when he and Max next met for lunch.

"They've been covered to the extent of eight thousand bucks."

"
Eight
thousand! What happened to the other thirty-two?"

Max glanced evasively about at the neighboring tables. "The first payment was only to be for fifteen."

"Then where's the other seven?"

"Look, Tony, can't you leave that to me? These guys are tricky to deal with."

"So I'm beginning to see."

"All I ask is that you take care of your side. That should be simple enough."

"Not as simple as you so lightly assume. The Regional Director has already asked me what I'm doing in the
Menzies
case."

"No kidding?"

"None whatsoever, I assure you. In his own very special brand of bureaucratise he managed to convey the distinct suggestion that I get off my ass."

"Jesus."

"Precisely. Jesus. I have plenty of little tricks up my sleeve as to how I can stall him, but in the meantime I expect to be compensated. And compensated according to the precise terms of our agreement. So I repeat: where is the other seven?"

"I don't know."

"Come, Max."

Max looked at him now with a desperate, sullen defiance. "Lassatta says he has to pay someone called Rubin. He says it was understood from the start that Rubin's share was to come out of ours."

"And who the hell is Rubin?"

"I don't know exactly. Somebody in Lassatta's union who originally brought him to Menzies."

"But why does he get paid out of
our
share? And for doing what?"

"I guess because he always does."

"Always does what?"

"Always gets a percentage of every Menzies deal."

"Max, you're making no sense. Why should we risk our necks for forty grand and then have it chiseled down by some guy you've never even heard of? Tell Lassatta a deal's a deal. If we don't get every penny of that money, I'm not going to play ball. Menzies, Lippard and Co. can close shop."

"You'd better go easy with that kind of talk. You're playing in a different league now."

Tony stared at his friend with an exasperation that turned to astonishment. For Max's cheeks were as yellow as the table cover. And why, Tony wondered, should fear, simple animal fear, instantly raise such quivering contempt in himself? "Maybe this is what they mean by crime not paying," he observed sarcastically. "And I thought we had figured this out with such masterly precision! The price, you will recall, was the bare minimum that would justify the risk. Even a couple of thousand less, and we would have stayed honest. And now you're talking about cutting it in half."

"I still don't see what else we could have done."

"
Could
have done? You mean you plan to take this lying down?"

"What can I do, Tony?"

"Tell Lassatta what I said. Is it a deal or no deal?"

"You'd better see him yourself."

"I guess I'll have to."

It was finally arranged that Tony and Max and Lassatta should meet in the back of a parked Buick sedan at Broadway and 110th Street on a Saturday afternoon at two. Tony took an immediate dislike to Lassatta, in whose fixed, stale little smile he read the desire to humiliate and bring down to his own level the political candidate.

"Look, Lassatta," he said after some minutes of pointless discussion. "I'm not pretending to be any bigger or any grander than you or any of your crowd. As far as I'm concerned, we're all crooks together. But if I'm not going to get what I was promised, you're not either. Is that clear? If I get a penny less than forty grand the
Menzies
case goes straight to the Regional Director."

Lassatta's smile became the least bit staler, but his voice was soft. "What about Max's back interest due? Aren't I to take that out?"

"What does that come to?"

"Twelve g's."

Tony turned indignantly to Max. "Is that right?"

"Yeah, that's right." Max was almost inaudible.

Tony brooded for a minute. He knew that Max was too scared to deny it. On the other hand, with so broken an ally, he might do well to settle. "If I concede the interest, Lassatta, will the balance be paid in full? Twenty-eight to the penny? I'm damned if I'll pay this guy Rubin a cent."

"It's the custom, Lowder."

"I don't know anything about customs. I only know the deal I made."

"Take it easy, fella."

"I'll take it as I find it."

"You could make a mistake, you know."

"Two could."

There was a pause, and Lassatta finally shrugged.

"Let me talk to Rubin. I'll see what can be done."

"You tell Rubin—and anyone else you want—that the case goes to the Regional Director the first thing Wednesday morning if the whole twenty-eight thousand isn't paid up by midnight Tuesday."

"Say, wait a second,
wait
a second," Lassatta protested, with a note of actual grievance in his tone. "You were to give us two full weeks."

"They expire on Wednesday. And Max and I so far have received a stinking eight thousand bucks. And the Regional Director's on my tail."

Lassatta's eyes drooped. "I told you. I'll see what can be done."

"And I'm telling you I don't care what can be done. If the twenty thousand still due isn't paid up by Tuesday night, I'm through with the
Menzies
case. I don't want to see you again. I don't want to talk about it." He turned to wink at Max with a sudden exhilaration and chuckled at the latter's ashy countenance. "You can call out your gorillas and toss us both in the East River. I couldn't care less. But I promise you, Lassatta, on my sacred word of honor as a neophyte crook, no matter what
you
do, I'll do what I say."

Lassatta looked pained. "It isn't necessary to use that kind of language, Lowder. You're new at this game, and you ought to be willing to learn the rules from those that know."

"I am. But you have to learn mine. What kind of a businessman are you, anyway? Do you think I'd ever do another deal with you, after the way you've treated me in this one?"

Lassatta merely grunted at this, and Tony nudged Max to indicate that the interview was over. He was fairly sure at least of the compromised sum.

At his office, however, on Monday morning, another complication developed. Tod Jennings, the Regional Director, came in to see him. He was one of those very dry, very faithful, very practical public servants, a bit gray, a bit bent, a bit dull, but with unexpectedly sympathetic eyes.

"I thought I'd better check up on the
Menzies
case," he said, almost apologetically. "I've had two more calls about it. There seems to be an impression that they may be in a real jam."

"Is that so?" Tony asked. He puffed at his pipe quietly for a moment as he contemplated his boss. Then he directed his attention to the files heaped up on the right side of his desk. "It must be here somewhere. Let's see. Ah, yes, Menzies, Lippard." He pulled out the file with a little nod of recognition and studied a memorandum clipped to the first page. "There seems to be a question about Lippard's special partnership. It looks a bit complicated. I have a note here to call a Mr. Oxenstern on Wednesday of this week."