Last Call (Last Call 1)

A skinny man trying to get out.

He knew all about the skinny man. He had seen him many times in Korea, the skeleton in the ditch, all the juices leaked or evaporated away, with only the flimsiest leathery remnant of skin to cover the intolerable bones—all the substance lost, gone to nourish other life: bugs and plants and birds and dogs.

Emptied.

In Korea he had formed the resolution to fill himself, to contain as much of all that other organic life as possible, to bury the skeleton as far below the surface of his skin as he could. And Betsy had sworn that when he eventually died, she would make sure that he was sunk in a block of cement before burial, so that nothing should be lost, ever.

Reculver stood up now and walked to the bookcase and back. "Whew. I hope he doesn't choke of asthma before he can get to his fresh inhaler," she said irritably. "I didn't let him take one break since that call at seven."

"Any signs?"

"I had Beany in the Seven-Stud game the whole time, so as to see more cards. The goddamn Queen of Hearts kept showing up, so I think this Diana person is in town somehow. There'll be other women around, wanting Isis's crown, but she's the one with the advantage of actually being a physical child of the old Queen, that Issit woman you folded in '60. I wish to hell you'd got the baby, too, then."

There was nothing in that for Trumbill, so he just kept looking at her stolidly.

"And the Jack of Hearts showed up way too often, generally with the Four of Hearts."

"What's the Four?"

"It's—sort of an old-bachelor figure. I don't see it as a threat to me, but I wonder who the hell it is."

"Who's this jack, is the question." Trumbill shifted in the chair and wished he had brought another one of his tropical fish out with him. A cichlid would go down well right now. He hated bringing up awkward topics with Betsy lately; he wished she'd wear the Richard body more often, or even haul the Art Hanari one out of mothballs. "It's got to be the jack you sensed last night, doesn't it? That seemed like the big one, the one to worry about."

"It's a jack," she said shortly. "I can handle jacks. I'm the King."

"But—" Oh, Jesus, Trumbill thought, here I go. "But it sounds like it's as—as far outranking the other jacks as this Diana woman is outranking the other wanna-be Queens. Now, Diana has that advantage because she is the actual kid of Issit." Unobtrusively he took a deep breath. "Way back when you were in the Georges Leon body—didn't you have a second kid, besides Richard? A second biological son?"

Her lower lip was pouched out, and there were tears in her eyes when she looked at him. "No. Who told you that?"

"You did, Betsy, one time in the sixties when you were in Richard, Ricky Leroy. Remember? I don't mean to … hurt your feelings, but if this jack may be that kid, isn't it something you've got to think about?"

"I can't think. I've got to do everything by myself. I—"

Trumbill flexed his massive arms and legs and got out of the chair. "Time," he said when she looked at him in alarm. "Got to get the tape going."

"Time? Oh, that call. Sure, go ahead."

Trumbill had just got the tape recorder going when the phone rang. He picked it up before the answering machine could cut in.

"Yes?" He turned on the speakerphone so that Betsy could hear.

"This is the guy that called before, about Scott Crane, Ozzie, and Diana. I know where they are, I can get to them for you. Are you interested?"

"Yes," said Trumbill. "We'll pay you twenty thousand dollars, half when you tell us and half after we've determined that your information is valid."

"Uh … okay. That'll do. Where do you want to meet?"

Trumbill looked over at Betsy. "The Flamingo," she mouthed.

"The Flamingo," said Trumbill. "Two o'clock this afternoon. In the coffee shop, Lindy's Deli. I'll be at the Trumbill table."

He spelled the name and then hung up.

"I'm going with you," Betsy said.

"I don't think—"

"You don't want me to, is that it? Who is this guy you're meeting, anyway?"

"You know as much about it all as I do, Betsy." He thought about asking her to step into the Art Hanari body and give him a call, but he suspected that she was too agitated right now to agree to it. "Betsy, I don't mean to upset you, but it might help me to help you if I knew the name of the boy, your son who got away in '48."

"I don't remember," she said, and then she stuck her tongue out at him.

Funo arrived early, and walked around the hotel for a while. He picked up a pamphlet and read it on one of the couches by the registration desk and learned that the hotel had been founded by a gangster named Bugsy Siegel.

Ordinarily that would have fascinated him, and he might have made a mental note to read up on this Siegel character, but right now his nerves were too jangled. He shook another couple of Tic Tac mints out into his palm and popped them into his mouth, wishing he could get rid of the taste of vomit.