Mickey Spillane - Kiss Her Goodbye

What was the use of being a private cop if you had to go public with everything? Anyway, Captain Chambers had all sorts of murders on his desk to attend to. I had two. " Balls!" cried the queen.

Off Sixth Avenue on Forty-seventh Street is a curbside exchange in the most literal sense, where fortunes in diamonds and cash are traded daily, carried in the pockets of worn coats, wrapped in tissue-paper coverings, and displayed openly to proper customers ... and the only security is that custom, and the New York police.

It's one of the damndest things you've ever seen, if you are lucky enough to see it at all. A million might change hands when all you thought you saw was two humble Jewish merchants passing the time. It's an ethnic area where all the divisions of the international jewelry trade are busy at it, extending into the buildings on either side. Despite the wealth concentrated in that one block, it is as unpretentious today as it was fifty years ago.

David Gross was an old friend. In 1954 he had retired and left his thriving business to his son. But retirement almost killed him, so he started another business; and in 1965 he retired again and left this one to his grandson. Still he couldn't take retirement, so he went back out on the street, where he had started as a young man, hassling with the diamond traders.

Even among the common black rabbinical garb and the long gray beards, David was easy to spot. His beard had an uncommonly pure black streak on the right side that somehow marked him as the presiding patriarch in the business.

"Well, David Gross," I said. "You never change."

His head craned out and he peered at me through his thick, slightly magnifying glasses. It was hard to make out his smile through the nest of beard. "We have both changed, my friend, Michael. But we will pretend otherwise. How nice to see you again! And alive. "

We shook hands warmly. "Good to see you too, Mr. Gross. Not bad being alive either."

"Since when to you am I mister? "

"David, I'm just a goyim trying to be respectful."

"No—a mensch." He shook his head and the smile became manifest, beard or not. "You have been gone a long time, Michael. Sometimes I would think about you and worry. I remember well what happened in that trouble you had." He paused, the smile gone, looking around uncertainly as if a sniper might be lurking, and said, "This is not an accidental meeting, is it?"

"Not really."

"Nor a social call."

"There's an element of that, but—"

"But there is something we have to talk about?"

"Yes. You got a roof we can sit under, David?"

The old man nodded, his eyes flicking to a building across the street. "My grandson, his office is there. Not that he is. Too much money for that boy, it overwhelms him. Oh, he worked for it, but now he wants to spend it all. Always vacations. He's getting fat. That tan—don't tell me you've been on vacation? You're not fat."

"No. I've been sick."

"You look good to me. The city, it's good for you. Follow me."

"Sure. Do I have to keep my hat on in there?"

He let out a guttural snort. "That thing you wear with that awful name—what is it?"

"A porkpie. But I'm not asking you to eat a slice, David."

"Better you should eat it than wear it."

"Hey, it's brand-new."

"Then at least do an old friend the courtesy of changing its name."

I laughed. "Okay. Stetson makes it. We'll call it a Stetson."

"Perfect. Michael Hammer, western gunslinger."

"Eastern," I corrected.

Ordinarily, the old man would have wanted to spend an hour over such kidding pleasantries, but his curiosity got the better of him—me coming to him on a business matter was a rarity. So as soon as we had sat down in wooden chairs on either side of a scarred old table, he poured us each a paper cup of wine.

"Now, Michael, what is it you wish to see me about? A lawyer I'm not. Neither am I a ladies' man. Diamonds I know, but what would you..." He paused, looked at my face, and his expression grew curious. "Are you buying for that beautiful secretary of yours? You are finally coming to your senses?"

I shook my head. "We split up while I was away."

"A shame. Is there no hope?"

"I don't believe so. Anyway, David, I'm not here buying."

"Selling?" This time his tone was wary.

"Not exactly."

"So there's a third alternative?"

I held out my hand and let him see the marble-size stone in my palm. He didn't reach for it, just looked at it, then I let it roll over so he could see the ground-in little window into its gleaming soul.

This time he did reach for it, felt it, rolled it around in his fingers, then finally brought out a worn loupe, took off his glasses, twisted it into his eye, and examined the pebble carefully. Twice he changed the intensity of the light to be sure of his appraisal.

I let him take his time, not even watching him. Several times his eyes left the stone to peer at me, a strangeness in the silent expression.

I said nothing and waited until he was through. "It's for real?"

"Oh, yes, Michael. It is very much 'for real.'" He paused, then handed the stone back to me. "Do you know how much that is worth?"

I grinned at him. "That's what I'm here to find out."

"Something is funny?"

"How much the stone is worth is not the question you wanted to ask me, David."

"Now you are a mind reader?"

"Sure. When a guy like you has no expression just when he's gone into slow motion? Sure."

"So what is it I am supposed to ask?"

I grinned again and waited.

He squirmed because I wasn't playing his game. "Okay, Michael, I will ask— where did you get it? "

"I found it, which is the truth, but that's not what you want to know, is it? There's another overriding question, right?"

"How can you do this to me?"

"That's not the question."

And then he put me right where I wanted to be in this ball game.

" Where are the rest of them? "

I raised a hand in a gentle "stop" gesture. "Right now, David, I really don't know. But what you have in your head is what I have to know."

The excitement in his voice was the gentlest quiver that few would pick up on; he was under control again—almost. "Michael, do you think you can find them?"

I shrugged. "Maybe. I'm guessing this little gem has a history."

"It ... may have."

"David, don't hedge with me. We're not bargaining yet."

He shrugged. "With one stone, how can I be sure?"

My eyes narrowed and, through a slit of a smile, I asked, "How did you know there were more?"

He took a deep breath and sighed loudly. "I am too old to be doing this. Such excitement I do not need."

"Bullshit. You thrive on excitement."

"But I could be wrong."

"Come on, David. I'm here because I trust your opinion as much as I trust you."

He rubbed his eyes, then leaned forward, propping his chin on his fist. He tapped on the tabletop. "Put the stone there."

I set it in front of him.

"It looks like an ordinary pebble, yes?"

"Sort of."

"Do you notice on the surface anything peculiar?"

"No. I'm not a jeweler."

"It is like an erosion," he said. "But ... what has such hardness as to wear down a diamond?"

"Another diamond."

"Very good." He rolled the stone over gently. "Such an erosion as this ... no scratches, no chipping ... what does it tell you?" He watched me carefully again.

But when I could only shrug, he said, "I could say it is likely that this precious pebble was carried in a pouch with many other stones for a very long time. Continuous rubbing together, over a period of years, would make the surface like so. They are not like that when they come from the earth."