The Ape's Wife and Other Stories Read Online Free PDF Page B

it?”
    “Wouldn’t have been necessary if you’d have just answered the damn phone in the first place.”
     “You already know Fong’s dead, don’t you?” And, I swear to fuck, nothing makes me feel like more of a jackass than asking questions I know the answers to.
    “Don’t you worry about Fong. I’m sure he had all his ducks in a row and was right as rain with Buddha. I need you to pay attention – ”
    “Harpootlian had him killed, didn’t she? And you knew he’d be dead when I showed up.” She didn’t reply straight away, and I thought I could hear a radio playing in the background. “You knew,” I said again, only this time it wasn’t a query.
    “Listen,” she said. “You’re a courier. I was told you’re a courier we can trust, elsewise I never would have handed you this job.”
    “You didn’t hand me the job. Your boss did.”
    “You’re splitting hairs, Miss Beaumont.”
    “Yeah, well, there’s a fucking dead celestial in the room with me. It’s giving me the fidgets.”
    “So, how about you shut up and listen, and I’ll have you out of there in a jiffy.” And that’s what I did, I shut up, either because I knew it was the path of least resistance, or because whatever spell she’d used to persuade me to answer the phone was still working.
    “On Fong’s desk, there’s a funny little porcelain statue of a cat.”
    “You mean the Maneki Neko?”
    “If that’s what it’s called, that’s what I mean. Now, break it open. There’s a key inside.”
    I tried not to, just to see if I was being played as badly as I suspected I was being played. I gritted my teeth, dug in my heels, and tried hard not to break that damned cat.
    “You’re wasting time. Auntie H didn’t mention you were such a crybaby.”
    “Auntie H and I have an agreement when it comes to freewill. To my freewill.”
    “Break the goddamn cat,” Ellen Andrews growled, and that’s exactly what I did. In fact, I slammed it down directly on top of Fong’s head. Bits of brightly painted porcelain flew everywhere, and a rusty barrel key tumbled out and landed at my feet. “Now pick it up,” she said. “The key fits the bottom left-hand drawer of Fong’s desk. Open it.”
    This time, I didn’t even try to resist her. I was getting a headache from the last futile attempt. I unlocked the drawer and pulled it open. Inside, there was nothing but the yellowed sheet of newspaper lining the drawer, three golf balls, a couple of old racing forms, and a finely carved wooden box lacquered almost the same shade of red as Jimmy Fong’s blood. I didn’t need to be told I’d been sent to retrieve the box – or, more specifically, whatever was inside the box.
    “Yeah, I got it,” I told Ellen Andrews.
    “Good girl. Now, you have maybe twelve minutes before the cops show. Go out the same way you came in.” Then she gave me a Riverside Drive address, and said there’d be a car waiting for me at the corner of Canal and Mulberry, a green Chevrolet coupe. “Just give the driver that address. He’ll see you get where you’re going.”
    “Yeah,” I said, sliding the desk drawer shut again and locking it. I pocketed the key. “But sister, you and me are gonna have a talk.”
    “Wouldn’t miss it for the world, Nat,” she said and hung up. I shut my eyes, wondering if I really had twelve minutes before the bulls arrived, and if they were even on their way, wondering what would happen if I endeavored not to make the rendezvous with the green coupe. I stood there, trying to decide whether Harpootlian would have gone back on her word and given this bitch permission to turn her hoodoo tricks on me, and if aspirin would do anything at all for the dull throb behind my eyes. Then I looked at Fong one last time, at the knife jutting out of his back, his thin grey hair powdered with porcelain dust from the shattered “Lucky Cat.” And then I stopped asking questions and did as I’d been told.
     

     
    The car was there,