Glen Cook - A matter of time

By the time the ARVN battalion arrived and the body counting began, Michael Cash was three miles into an odyssey that would pause only briefly in a grim little camp in North Vietnam.

From one point of view, he could be considered lucky.

He was still alive.

XI. On the Y Axis;

It was almost quitting time when Cash reached the station, returning from Miss Groloch's. He was near distraction with the case.

It had taken Harald as long to dispose of Annie and Sister Mary Joseph. They arrived at the same time. Cash told him about the Egan lead.

"Egan's Rats? Don't think I ever heard of them."

"Predecessors of the Syrian Gang, more or less. Goes way back. Bootleggers, train robbers, like that. Some supposedly were the trigger men in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre. I was thinking. I know a couple of the old Syrians. They go back far enough. Tommy O'Lochlain in particular might remember O'Brien."

The Syrian Gang, with most of its members in their dottage, was probably the last of the Irish outfits. Cash had never learned the reason for their name. Perhaps because there were a number of Lebanese connected.

They moved into the office. From behind his desk Cash asked, "How'd you do with the sister?"

"She went completely drifty. Kept babbling about witchcraft and Satan was going to get her. She's scared to death of that old lady. It's weird."

"What about this morning?"

"Oh." He took out his notebook. "Didn't get much that's solid. She ought to launder money for CREEP."

"She's got a lot of stock. Old stuff, in rails and arms, A, T and T, companies that have been around as long as she has. She's also got a growth portfolio that she's done good with.

Like Xerox. Her income, about fifty thousand, is all from dividends. She puts most of it back in. Her brokers have a power of attorney. They pay her living money into an account managed by an accounting company. Those guys take care of her bills, taxes, and things. I couldn't find out if she has a savings or checking account anywhere. Depending on what she's buying, she pays cash at her door or has the accountants send a money order. Twice a month they send a messenger with cash and any paperwork that needs signing. She sends back written instructions for the accountants and brokers.

"The brokers are a little scared of her. They've had her since the thirties. She never loses money. She doesn't move often, but when she does she's always right. When she shakes something out of her portfolio, they pass the word to their other clients. But she's no Getty. I think because she's careful. Doesn't want to attract too much attention."

"Maybe Annie and the sister are right. Maybe she is a witch. What about everyday things? Maintenance on the house, appliances, like that?"

"Per the letters of instruction. The accountants let me look at their records after I started to make a scene. They wouldn't let me see the letters without a warrant, though. Anyway, she's had them on retainer since forty-seven, when they took over from another outfit. Since then, nobody's done any work inside. But she's had wallpaper, paint, and stuff like that delivered several times. Outside work, even gardening, she contracts. Lawn mowing and stuff is probably done by neighborhood kids. The furnance was converted to oil in fifty-four. The washer and dryer came in sixty-three. On a trade-in. Probably some real antiques. And a TV just the other day."

"You said nobody got inside."

"Not to paint or anything. But the gas company did the furnace conversion. The appliance dealer did the delivery and installation on the washer, dryer, and TV. You think we could find any of those guys now? She might be Hitler in drag, but there's no way to pin her down. She's stayed so insulated that it's unreal."

"On purpose?"

"Hell, why else?"

"So why's she hiding? From whom? Goddamn, John, if she's really the same Fiala Groloch who came here a hundred years ago, she's already outlived anybody who could've been after her in the old days. Unless they're some of those two-hundred-year-old Russians."

"Or the Secret Masters?"

"What?"

"Just joking. Haven't you ever heard about the secret society that runs the world? Sometimes they're supposed to be immortals."

"Yeah. And sometimes they're Communists, Tibetan monks, Rothschilds and Rockefellers, Jews, Masons, Rosecrucians, combinations thereof, or the gang in this Illuminati book Smith was on about the other day. I don't believe in vast secret conspiracies, John. Not even real ones if I can help it. Wouldn't it be nice if Patty Hearst and the SLA, or the Manson family, were just some cheap writer's gimmick? I'll stick with the time machines, and thank you."

"Whatever you want, Norm. But you got to admit that her being a spry hundred-and-thirty-plus takes some explaining."

Everything about Fiala Groloch took some explaining, Cash reflected. He was beginning to wish that he had let Railsback bury the whole thing. "You find anything about a demolition contract?"

"A who?"

Cash explained about the carriage house and pear tree.

"No. But that's something we should be able to trace at City Hall. I was going down tomorrow to check out the house anyway." He put the notebook away, rose. "But right now I'm getting the hell out of here. Don't want to think about this anymore for a while. Maybe I'll take Carrie to see Jaws. They say that'll blow anything out of your head."

"Yeah, me too. I keep finding myself wishing these were the old days and we could just drag her down into the dungeon and get the answers with the whips and chains. The good old Iron Maiden…"

Just then he spied Railsback backing from his office while arguing vehemently with someone inside. Beth made violent signals indicating they should use the door. "Time to make a break, old buddy. Hank's going to have somebody's ass on toast in a minute."

Harald made it, but by the time Cash had gone down to his personal automobile, discovered he had left his keys in his desk, and had returned for them, Railsback was a thunder-head on a course to intercept him at the door.

"What the hell kind of clown's festival did you and the kid put on today?" he thundered, startling every eye into looking their way. "I thought I told you to keep it quiet."

Cash put on his puzzled-but-curious face and asked, "What's the matter?"

"I got some bozo from the Argus, of all goddamned things, in there bugging me for an old-fashioned scoop, and I don't even know what the hell he's talking about. He's got more imagination than you and the kid combined."

The Argus was a small but highly respected newspaper, the oldest black business in the city. The source of the leak was obvious. The morgue attendant. Equally obvious was the fact that the major dailies and electronic media would be on it by tomorrow.

Cash shrugged. "We just took the old lady in for a look at the stiff. She claimed we were working a frame. Where's the hassle?"

"There was this attendant, see? And he listened to everything, see? Maybe he didn't hear so good, but there was this spooky old lady, this hysterical nun, and these two weird cops claiming the stiff was a guy that got croaked fifty years ago… I got to say more? Can you see it when it hits the Post? They'll go the 'Cops roust little old granny lady over science-fiction theory' route. And that bleeding heart jackoff McCauley could turn it into the biggest show around here since the World's Fair."

Over the past ten years, the Post's editorial stance had become ever more left-radical, and Railsback's opinion of it had declined proportionally. There were times when he mumbled about driving a stake through the heart of Jason McCauley, especially when that worthy did one of his columns bemoaning the plight of some prisoner it had taken city and state years to put inside. Cash suspected that his superior lived in terror of being discovered by the newspaper. It had ruined careers before. Cash had his own differences with the Post, but remained amused by Railsback's pointed fingers and endless cries of "Anti-Christ!"