Indigo Slam: An Elvis Cole Novel (20 page)

Thornton and Minelli left first. I thanked Marsha Fields, and told Jasper that I would call him as soon as I had talked with Clark and the other principals.

Jasper said, “I’ll wait here until I hear from you.”

“It might be late.”

He shrugged. “I don’t have anything else to do.”

I drove back to Studio City, and reached the safe house at six minutes before three o’clock. Joe Pike was standing beneath a pine tree on the front sidewalk. He said, “We on?”

“We’re on. They went for it, but a fed has to come along. Jasper.”

“Dak won’t like it.”

“We didn’t have a choice, and neither does he. They agreed not to investigate.”

Pike’s jaw moved imperceptibly. “But they’ll still know.”

“Yes. They’ll know. You ready to go?”

“Always.”

We went inside and explained the setup to Clark and the others. When I got to the part about Jasper coming along, Dak made a hissing sound, and both Mon and Walter Senior said, “No, no, no, no. They will know everything about us.” Like they’d rehearsed it. Walter Junior was asleep on the floor.

“Stop saying no and listen. The feds have given you guys a pass. Jasper is just going to be there to make sure we’re not scamming them. They’ve agreed not to investigate you, or interfere with Clark in any way.”

Mon said, “I can’t believe this is happening.” He was running his fingers through his hair, and fistfuls of gray hair were coming out. “We’ll be ruined.” So much for revolutionary fervor.

I said, “Look, their only interest here is Clark and Markov. If you’re worried about it, go down to the warehouse and remove anything that could connect you or your people to that location. Just leave whatever Clark will need to print the money.”

Mon was still pulling his hair, but Dak nodded. “What about the dong?”

“When the business with Markov is finished, we’ll come back with Clark and print the dong.”

Dak said, “We could all end up in jail.”

“You knew that when you conspired to break the law, but you’re safer now than you were before. Before, they might’ve gotten wind and investigated and thrown your asses in jail. Now, they’re going to look the other way and not even ask your name.”

Walter Senior said, “Can we trust these people?”

“Yes.”

Mon started to say something else, but Dak shook his head and spoke in Vietnamese. Twenty seconds later they were gone. I looked at Clark. “Can you set up to print U.S. currency?”

“Oh, sure.” Like it was nothing.

“How long will it take you to run off a million dollars?”

He frowned. “Markov said five million.”

“That’s what he wants, but it’s not what he’s going to get. All we need to do is make sure he’s busted with a million in his possession. One million is the magic number.”

Clark nodded. “Three or four days.”

“You’re printing for Charles, damnit. You have to do it faster than that.”

Clark frowned again. “Well, I don’t have the right kind of paper. I don’t have the right inks.”

“It doesn’t have to be good, Clark. All it has to be is phony and add up to a million.”

“But Markov will take one look at it and know right away that it isn’t like the money you showed him.”

“He won’t have a chance to look at it. He’ll be listening to Marsha Fields reading his rights.”

Clark thought some more, then looked at his watch. “Well, I know where we can get some paper that might be good enough. And we’ll need something to carry the money after it’s printed.”

Pike said, “How big is a million bucks?”

“About five suitcases worth. We’ll need five regular Samsonite suitcases. That should do it.” The voice of experience.

“Okay. I can get the suitcases.”

“How long, Clark?”

More thinking. “Tomorrow by noon.”

I looked at him. “You can print a million dollars by tomorrow at noon.”

He frowned. “Well, it won’t be my best work.”

I used the kitchen phone to call Dobcek at the Sheraton. “Da?”

“We can have the money for you by midafternoon tomorrow.”

“Five million dollars.”

“Sure. Five million. How about we meet at Griffith Park?”

Dobcek laughed. “Call us again when you have the money. I will tell you when and where.”

“Whatever you want.”

I hung up. “We’re on. Everything will happen tomorrow afternoon. We should leave as soon as possible.”

Clark took his vial of pills into the bathroom, but this time he brought his bag, too. The pain was getting worse. I went upstairs to the second-floor office to Teri and Winona. Winona was coloring and Teri was helping her, but she looked up when I stepped in. I said, “How’re you guys doing?”

Teri’s face was flat. “Fine.”

“We need to leave you and Winona here again. Will you be okay?”

“Of course.” Angry about being excluded. And maybe about something else.

“There’s plenty of food in the fridge, and there’s a market on the corner.” I took forty dollars from my wallet and put it on the desk. “Here’s some money.”

Teri didn’t look at the money. “How’d it go for your friend?” Lucy.

I sat on the floor beside her. Winona was drawing a picture of the troll. It looked sad. “It went okay. She got things worked out.”

“How nice for you both.” She said it so cold that we might as well have been sitting in a Subzero, but then she realized that and turned red. She adjusted her glasses and looked away. “I’m sorry. That was so bush.”

I put my arm around her and squeezed. Fifteen going on thirty, and feeling all the pain at once. “Been tough on you.”

“You like her a lot.”

“Yes, I do.”

“You’d rather be with her, right now, wouldn’t you?”

“That’s right. But my obligation is to see this through for you and your father and Charles.”

Pike rapped softly at the doorjamb. “Clark’s ready.”

Teri’s eyes were wet and she reached under the glasses to wipe them. She said, “I really like you, too.”

Winona said, “Oh, yuck.”

I smiled at Teresa Hewitt. “I like you, too. But Lucy’s my girlfriend.”

“Can I hug you, please?”

She hugged me hard, and then she said, “Please take care of my daddy. Please save my little brother.”

“That’s what this is all about, Teresa.”

I went downstairs to Clark and Joe. We decided that Clark and I would get the paper, and Pike would pick up Jasper and the suitcases. I called Reed Jasper in Marsha Fields’s office. Marsha Fields answered. “We’re on. Is Jasper there?”

She gave him the phone without a word, and he said, “We ready to rock?”

“Joe will pick you up in forty minutes.”

“I’ve got a car. Just tell me where to meet you.”

“Joe will pick you up. If you’re happier driving, follow him.”

I hung up before he could say anything else, and we went to print the money.

Clark phoned paper suppliers until he found one that had the kind of paper he wanted. “It’s a nice cotton blend, but it should look okay.” Like he was talking about sheets.

“Remember, Clark, it doesn’t have to be perfect. It doesn’t even have to be pretty good.”

“Well, you want it to look like a legitimate attempt to counterfeit money, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

He looked sulky. “Believe me, no one will confuse this stuff with Crane paper, but at least it won’t look like Monopoly money.” I guess he had an artist’s temperament about these things.

The paper supply house was in a little red-brick building on Yucca Street in Hollywood, a block north of Hollywood Boulevard. The clerk had two boxes of the paper waiting for us, each box about the size of a standard moving box. It didn’t seem like much, but the boxes were heavy. I went inside with Clark because I had to pay for the paper. On my Visa.

When we had stowed the boxes in the little bay behind my car’s seats, I said, “Doesn’t seem like very much paper.” Clark had said that the million dollars would fill five Samsonite suitcases, but this paper only filled two boxes.

“Air. Factory bundles are packed tight. When the sheets have been printed and cut and stacked, they’ll take up more room.”

“Ah.”

The drive to the warehouse in Long Beach was in the worst of the evening rush-hour crush, and took almost three hours. For most of that time, Clark seemed in a kind of peaceful half sleep. The eastern sky purpled, slowly fading to black as the sun settled on our right and, around us in the heavy traffic, people ended their day in a slow, frustrating march toward home.

We turned into the parking lot next to the warehouse just before eight that night as a huge Air Korea 747 thundered into the sky. The lot was empty except for a single white Pontiac that probably belonged to someone who worked at the adjoining building or across the street. Dak and his people were gone, but the parking lot was lit and a single light burned at the warehouse front door. “Clark.”

Clark opened his eyes.

“We’re here.”

He nodded. “We have a lot to do.”

I used Dak’s key to open the side door. They had left some of the inside lights on, but not all, and the still space of the empty building made me feel creepy and afraid. I took out the Dan Wesson, but no one was waiting behind the door or in the long hall or in the big room with the printing equipment. I hadn’t expected anyone, but I felt better with the gun all the same. Thirty-eight-caliber pacifier.

Clark turned on the banks of fluorescent lights and filled the printing room with a cold blue light. He looked over what Dak’s people had left on the tables, then powered up the litho printer and the platemaker and the Macintosh. I said, “Is there anything I can do?”

“Turn on the radio.”

I turned on the radio and tried to stay out of his way. Help at its finest.

The crates of Russian paper were gone, as were the dong plates and most of the boxes of inks. I said, “They took damn near all the ink.”

Clark didn’t bother to look. “All we need is black and green. I told Dak what to leave.” He checked something on the litho machine. “You could bring in the paper.”

I went out and got the two boxes of paper. Didn’t trip even once.

Pike and Japser arrived forty-five minutes after us, first knocking at the door, then coming through with the suitcases. A black guy with short hair was with them. Clark stopped connecting the scanner to the Macintosh when Jasper walked in. “Hello, Mr. Jasper.”

Reed Jasper smiled. “Damn, Clark, you’re a hard man to find.”

I was looking at the black guy. He was wearing a navy suit, and he was trying to see everything at once. “Who are you?”

“Claude Billings, Secret Service.” He was chewing gum.

“I thought it was just Jasper.”

Billings blew a bubble the size of a grapefruit and walked over to the litho press. “Guess they wanted the first team in the game.” Secret Service, all right. Cocky.

Jasper and Pike put down the suitcases by the long tables, then Jasper came over and shook Clark’s hand. Clark seemed embarrassed.

Jasper put his hands on his hips and looked at the lithograph press and the platemaker and the computer. “Well, I don’t blame you for being scared after what happened that night, but you should’ve stayed in the program. After that night, you would’ve been fine.”

Clark said, “I’m sorry about your friend.” Peterson.

“Yeah, well.” Jasper walked over to the big press and ran his fingers along it. Billings took off his jacket, folded it, then put it on one of the long tables. Jasper said, “I understand there’s a problem with your boy. I’m sorry about that.”

Clark stopped futzing.

“We’ll try to do a little bit better by you this time.” Jasper offered a friendly smile when he said it.

Clark turned back to the Macintosh and scanned a one-hundred-dollar bill. I watched him, and Billings came over and watched with me. Clark scanned the Franklin side, then turned the bill and scanned Independence Hall. When the images were scanned, he brought them up on the Macintosh, enlarged them, and began isolating sections of the bills. I said, “What are you doing?”

“I have to make plates, and to make the plates I need a clean image. We’re making Federal Reserve notes, and that means we need three plates. A back plate because the back of the bill is printed in a uniform green, and two front plates because the face of the bill is printed in black, but the serial numbers and Treasury seal are printed in green, so those images have to be separated.”

“Oh.”

Clark stopped what he was doing and looked at me and Billings. “Do you have to watch me?”

“Sorry.”

Billings and I went to the table. There were five people and only two chairs, so I sat cross-legged on the table. Billings took one of the chairs.

The time oozed past like cold molasses. Clark worked steadily and hard, but the rest of us could only watch. Pike went into the far corner and stood on his head. I did a little yoga and felt myself getting sleepy. Jasper paced. Billings blew bubbles. Crime fighting at its most exciting.

Jasper said, “I’m starving. Is anyone else hungry?”

Pike and Billings and I said, “Yes.”

“Saw an In-N-Out Burger on the way.”

I said, “Joe doesn’t eat meat.”

Jasper frowned, like that was the world’s biggest problem.

Clark said, “There’s a Chinese place close by.”

Billings said, “I could go for that.”

Pike and Jasper went for Chinese, got back just before ten, and we ate. Clark never stopped working, and didn’t eat. Maybe the dope killed his appetite, or maybe he was thinking about Charles.

When Clark had perfect separate images, he had the computer reverse them and build perfect photonegatives, then copied the negatives in a pattern that would let him print twenty bills at a time. One million dollars was ten thousand hundreds, but if you could print twenty bills per every sheet, that meant only five hundred sheets. Of course, you had to run each sheet through the press three times, but it still meant that the press only had to run for three or four hours. All the time was in getting ready.

When Clark had the three master negatives, he mounted them in a platemaker and burned a positive image on a thin aluminum sheet, then, one by one, washed the sheets in a chemical bath to ready the plates for the ink. It took Clark about six hours to make the plates, and it was time that passed ever more slowly, with nothing for me or Pike or Jasper or Billings to do except offer the occasional word of encouragement. The In-N-Out Burger was open twenty-four hours, and once Jasper went for drinks, and once I went, but most of our time was spent doing nothing. Clark grew pale again, and his skin seemed clammy, and twice he sat down, but neither time for very long. I said, “Clark, why don’t you take a break. Let’s get some air.”

“It won’t be very much longer.” He said it even when I didn’t ask. He said it maybe a hundred times.

Jasper would watch Clark, then walk away, then watch some more, then walk away, like he was nervous about all of this and losing his patience. Finally, he said, “It doesn’t have to be perfect, for chrissake.”

Clark stopped working and stared at him. Jasper walked away.

At ten minutes after six that morning I went out into the parking lot and breathed the cool night air and watched the first traces of pink freshen the eastern sky. Moths swarmed around the parking lot lamps, banging into the glass with a steady tap-tap-tap, and I wondered if they welcomed the dawn. At dawn, they could stop slamming their heads into the thing that forever kept them from the light. People don’t have a dawn. We just keep slamming away until it kills us.

Clark had worked steadily through the night, and I thought that his pain must be terrible, but, unlike the moths, he was doing it because he loved his son. I guess I would do it, too, and I hoped that the love helped with his pain.

When I went back inside, Clark Hewitt was still working. Billings had fallen asleep.

At eight minutes after seven that morning, Clark brought the plates to the lithograph machine, fitted the portrait plate to the printing cylinder, then filled the inkwell with black ink. He looked at me and said, “I think we’re ready.”

Jasper said, “About goddamned time.”

Pike was still in his corner. I don’t think he had moved for hours. Billings sat up, blew another bubble, then stared at Pike. I think he found Pike odd.

Clark said, “We’ll run some test sheets through, first. Just to see.”

I brought over a bundle of the paper. It made me feel useful.

Clark fitted a stack of the paper into the paper feeder, then ran through two sheets. The big machine made a whirring, snapping sound as the paper went through, and the paper went through faster than I’d expected. It came out smudged and dark. Clark said, “Sucks.”

He made some adjustments with a little screwdriver, then ran through two more sheets. These looked fine to me, but Clark frowned again. Jasper rolled his eyes. Clark made another adjustment, printed two more sheets that I thought were identical to the last two, but this time he seemed pleased. “This should do. I think we’re ready to print.”

That’s when Joe Pike said, “Listen.”

Billings said, “What?” He blew an enormous pink bubble.

Jasper said, “For chrissakes, let’s just print the money and get going.”

Pike moved to the lithograph and slapped the shut-off switch. The drum whined down and the humming stopped. Clark said, “It’s going to take a while to reheat.”

Jasper said, “What are you people talking about?”

Pike held up a finger, his head cocked to the side, and then he took out his gun. “Listen.”

There might have been the faint squeal of a door hinge, and there might’ve been the faraway thump of something hard bumping into a doorjamb or a wall. My first thought was that it was Dak and his people, coming to check on us, but it wasn’t, and I didn’t have time for another thought.

Claude Billings trotted to the door, stepped into the hall, and that’s when Alexei Dobcek shot him once through the great pink bubble and blew out the back of his head.