Pit and the Pendulum. John Gregory Betancourt

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СКАЧАТЬ if you let me walk away with all this money? I’m sure others are watching on your security cameras.”

      The window slammed shut. For a moment, I wondered if I’d pissed him off. Finally, though, I heard a deadbolt slide over and the door swung out. My personal charms must have worked.

      Jersey-boy was about forty, of Mediterranean descent, and built like a brick wall. He wore his hair short and slicked back, and a thin white scar ran from his left ear to his chin. From the bulge under his suit jacket, I knew he sported a shoulder holster. I got the impression he could have torn me in half without really trying. This definitely wasn’t the sort of person I wanted to tangle with.

      “In,” he said with a jerk of his thumb.

      “Thanks.”

      I shut the briefcase and strolled into a richly decorated antechamber perhaps ten feet deep and twenty feet wide. From plush red carpet to oak paneled walls to the crystal chandelier overhead, everything felt rich and inviting. Even the paintings on the walls were tasteful country landscapes. The air had the well-scrubbed feel of industrial air conditioning.

      “Sit,” he said, indicating a low bench, its seat done in crushed red velvet the same shade as the carpet.

      I sat, briefcase beside me, cane across my knees. It hurt, but I kept my legs folded back. A small table held recent issues of Newsweek, Cosmopolitan, and Sports Illustrated. None looked like it had ever been read. I picked through them. The subscription address labels had been meticulously clipped out.

      After a couple of minutes, four people trooped through after me: two middle-aged men in tuxedos, two women in evening gowns. Jersey-boy greeted them warmly. I felt underdressed until I recalled the photos Davy had shown me. Most men in the club had been wearing suits. Gambling wasn’t necessarily a black-tie event here.

      The newcomers passed through a doorway to my left, into a short windowless hallway. Jersey-boy resumed his post by the entrance.

      Then the door on the other end of the room opened, and an older man in a gray silk suit appeared. White hair, brushed straight back, dark Mediterranean complexion, trim and wiry looking—and I knew him. Somehow, somewhere, we had met before. But where? I began to search my memories.

      He gave a slight nod to the muscle on duty.

      “Mr. Smith will see you now,” Jersey-boy told me.

      “Thanks.” I used my cane and limped toward Smith. He turned to lead the way up another red-carpeted hall.

      As I passed through the doorway, I caught a whiff of Smith’s lavender cologne. Then beefy men on either side grabbed my arms in vicelike grips. I gave a startled yelp and dropped both cane and briefcase. They half carried, half dragged me forward.

      I should have seen the trap. Davy’s money made a very tempting target.

      When I glanced back, a fourth man was picking up my briefcase and cane. He trailed us.

      The two goons brought me to a small room with a chest-high wooden table pushed up against the back wall. Handheld metal detectors and other equipment sat there. Of course—they had to check me out to make sure I wasn’t an FBI agent of some sort. I let myself relax a bit. Maybe this wouldn’t take long and we could get down to business.

      The fourth man set my cane and briefcase down next to the table, then frisked me. He removed Davy’s cell phone and my billfold, then turned to the table and selected one of the metal detectors. Switching it on with his thumb, he stepped forward and ran it over my body with practiced efficiency, starting at my head and working his way down. Each time the device beeped, one of the goons removed the offending bit of metal and tossed it onto the table: car keys, house keys, cufflinks. They even took my belt for its buckle.

      As his men worked, Smith picked up my billfold and went through it item by item. Where had I seen him before? Strangely, the fact that I couldn’t identify him bothered me more than the search. I could usually place any name or face in a few seconds.

      Several times Smith murmured, “Hmm.” Once was when he held my driver’s license—probably in reaction to my address. No one with money lived where I lived. He pulled a small notepad from his back pocket and jotted something down.

      Then the metal detector hit my legs and went wild. Everyone jumped. The goons’ grip on my arms became painful.

      “I have pins in my bones,” I gasped. “That’s why I need a cane.”

      “Kick off your shoes and drop your pants,” the man with the metal detector said in a not-to-be-argued-with voice.

      I did so. I could feel the tension go out of the room as their gazes dropped from my gray briefs to the hideously scarred, vaguely fleshy mess of my legs. I looked like something out of a freak show. Pity—oh how well I knew pity. And revulsion. I saw it now in their faces. It had taken six operations to make my lower limbs at all usable after the accident. For a while, every doctor I saw told me I’d need the right one amputated. Stubbornly, I had refused. They had also told me I’d never walk again.

      “There are,” I continued to break the sudden and uncomfortable silence, “seventeen steel pins in my right leg and eight in my left. I can point them all out, if it’s helpful.”

      “Not necessary.” The man with the metal detector ran it over my shoes. Apparently the nails were too small to register, or he had adjusted his equipment for them. Then he took my pants and searched them before giving them back.

      “He’s clean,” he told Smith.

      “Check the bag and the cane,” said Smith. He nodded to the goons, who released me. I had to lean against the wall to get my pants up. It hurt enough to make my eyes swim, but I kept my face calm and impassive.

      “Mr. Geller,” said Smith. He tossed my billfold to me. “You have a most unusual way of making an entrance.”

      “I realize that, sir.”

      “You understand, we have to be careful about who we let in.”

      “Of course.” I shuffled to the table, leaned on it heavily, and recovered my keys, cufflinks, and belt. Slowly I put everything back.

      “His cane is fine,” said the man examining it. “So is his bag. Lots of money in it.”

      “How much?” Smith asked.

      “Want me to count it, sir?”

      “Don’t bother,” I said. “It’s two hundred thousand even.”

      Smith raised his eyebrows. “That’s quite a lot to carry around. Not that I’m complaining, of course. Games always work in the house’s favor.”

      “I didn’t come to gamble,” I said. “I came to meet with the person in charge. I assume that’s you.”

      He inclined his head slightly, eyes narrowing. “Yes.”

      “So—” I smiled. Hopefully he would go for it. “How about a meeting?”

      He studied me for a moment, undoubtedly trying to figure out my angle. Apparently he didn’t find me the least bit intimidating. I just wished I could remember where we had met.

      Then, СКАЧАТЬ