Wild Cards VIII: One-Eyed Jacks Page 9

  Sitting beside Beth, on the opposite side from Kenneth Strauss, who was chatting with some young woman in a purple dress, was Jasper von der Stadt, and beside him was Jessica. Her cricket cage was on the table in front of her, though she was still guiltily eyeing the pirate ship down the table. It sat in the center between Beth and Kenneth and David and Diane. The mermaid pointed to David, who was drinking more champagne he did not need. “It’s okay, Jessica,” her father told her. “I’m not mad. See? Someone was willing to sit there.”

  “Why do you think they call it a poop deck?” Trudy told Jessica, causing her to giggle and Jasper to give Trudy a look of extreme gratitude.

  The seat opposite Jessica was still empty, though the one beside her, at the foot of the table, was occupied by Cyclone, who told her, “My daughter’s an ace, too.”

  “Really?” asked Jessica, her blue eyes going wide.

  He nodded. “Her name’s Mistral.”

  “What’s her power?”

  “Same as mine,” Cyclone told her.

  Jessica rolled her eyes as if she did not believe him, even though Trudy knew it was the truth, unlikely as it sounded. But then a man walked up to the last empty chair. “Looks like this is the wild-card corner. Mind if I join you?”

  He looked to be in his twenties, tall and thin, with dark hair and glowing eyes. Reality rippled around him, like a heat shimmer in the desert, making him hard to look at. He glanced to her, then blinked. “Hey, Trudy. Been a few years.”

  She looked back. She’d never seen him before in her life, and with a weird joker effect like that, he wasn’t someone she’d forget. Then she put two and two together. “Croyd?”

  He grinned. “In the flesh.” He sat down heavily and yawned. “Sorry. Been up a while, but I wanted to make this party.”

  Trudy signaled the waiter. “A coffee for my friend here. Espresso shots, too.”

  The waiter nodded while Croyd was yawning. He gave her a quick hug, then whispered in her ear, “Got anything stronger? Couldn’t find my regular dealer.”

  “Give me a few minutes,” Trudy whispered back.

  Croyd was the Sleeper, and he’d been around since the first Wild Card Day. He was a damn good thief when he could keep it together, but getting him at the end of his cycle was a recipe for trouble. Who for depended on whether you were working with him or against him. But judging by Fantasy’s goodie bag in the past, uppers and downers were practically guaranteed.

  “Thanks, Trudy. You’re a pal.” He hugged her again. “Do me another solid? Grab an extra something for me?”

  “What do you need?”

  “Anything,” Croyd whispered fiercely. “I cut a deal with the West Germans for diplomatic immunity for whatever I brought them and they think I’m this awesome ace, but my power is crap this time. I thought I’d be able to control it better if I practiced, but no dice.”

  “I’ll try, but you’ll owe me one. And fifty-fifty.”

  “Deal.”

  Trudy glanced to the other tables’ centerpieces. The toad and the tortoise were the best bets, basically big amber paperweights with a nice compact shape, and the grapes were put together with gold wire so could probably be smushed. Maybe the music box if she stuffed Fantasy’s evening bag into it. It would be tricky, but then again, so was she.

  Trudy listened in on the conversations at the table. The young woman in purple was the daughter of the congressman Latham had been talking to earlier. He sat at the far end of the table, flanked by his wife, Mrs. Congressman, and their son, Gyro. Or Gary, as they kept calling him as he kept staring up at Fantasy with adolescent lust.

  The waiter brought Croyd’s coffee and the menus. The choices for dinner were themed for the progress of the Amber Room: Prussian Jägerschnitzel mit Pfifferlingen (veal cutlet with chanterelles) and spätzle with Königsberg flamed marzipan for dessert, Russian sturgeon coulibiac with Tula gingerbread, and American aged porterhouse with cognac-cherry demiglace reduction followed by the Golden Tower’s signature towering chocolate cake, dusted with edible gold. Naturally. You were allowed to mix and match, but for $10,000, she hoped so.

  Trudy opted for the coulibiac and the marzipan. It had been a while since she’d had, either. She handed the waiter her menu, then watched as the sugar bowl wandered by in front of her on its little legs. She nudged Croyd, asking softly, “That you?”

  “Yeah,” he whispered back. “Can bring things to life. But it’s a pretty punk power. Thought I’d be able to control them, get them to sit, stay, follow me home, if you get my drift. But the things just do whatever they want. Fun to watch, though.”

  Trudy watched the sugar bowl continue to amble down the table, past where David was finishing yet another glass of champagne, still looking over his shoulder to lust after Fantasy. Trudy started to have a wonderful idea. A horrible idea. A wonderfully horrible and horribly wonderful idea.

  But before it could fully gel, David passed out and slumped over against her. Trudy shoved him off of her, into Diane, who was a bit more sympathetic, or at least was being paid to act like it. She smoothed his hair and make soothing noises. Then she noticed Jasper von der Stadt staring past her, his mouth hanging open, his face wearing the same expression of lust as Gyro. Kenneth Strauss had the same look, too, while his wife Beth simply looked dumbfounded. Little Jessica, watching wide-eyed, started to giggle.

  Trudy turned around. Fantasy had stood up and was twirling her goodie bag by its strap like a pimp twirling a watch chain, wiggling her hips just enough to count as a dance and fascinating every man in the room and a bunch of the women, too. She whipped the evening bag a couple extra times, then slung it hard, sending it flying to the end of the front row to smack Cyclone in the face.

  Fantasy got up on her throne, turning around to shake her ass at the audience, then climbed onto the table, took a step down to kick aside the pieces on the amber chessboard, destroying whatever sad excuse for a chess match was in progress, then proceeded to dance right there between Duncan Towers and Dan Quayle. Marilyn Quayle looked around the room, as if hoping security would do something, only to note what Trudy had already noted earlier: Duncan Towers had not hired a single woman for the evening barring some cocktail waitresses.

  All of the men were staring at her, transfixed. All of the women were staring as well … Trudy with incredulity. She’d seen Fantasy dance before, many times, even when a little or a lot under the influence, but whatever drugs she’d gotten this time were really bad. Asta Lenser wasn’t even phoning it in. Her “dance,” if it could be called such, looked more like a teenage boy impersonating a hooker performing a striptease.

  Fantasy’s gown fell to the table with all the grace of a pair of boxer shorts hitting the floor. Her panties followed. She kicked them up, twirled them briefly, then slung them at Gyro, landing them on his head. She flashed one tit, then the other, struggling with her bra like she’d never worn one before before putting it on Duncan Towers’s head like a ritual headdress for a fraternity initiation. Next she pulled off her blond wig, revealing her wig cap, and twirled the wig around by its braids before depositing it on Dan Quayle’s blond head. When she turned back to Towers, she mooned the audience and began the least erotic version of the bump and grind ever performed.

  Trudy appraised the room. Despite the lack of terpsichorean merit, everyone was still staring. Croyd, Cyclone, and Jasper von der Stadt were all still watching openmouthed with lust. Jessica was giggling as she watched the drunk lady dance naked on a table. Badly. None of them were paying any attention to the elephant, Timothy.

  Timothy the elephant disappeared and reappeared in Trudy’s hand.

  She pretended she’d dropped her napkin, then reached down and placed him inside her purse. While she was at it, she glanced down under the table, spying the edge of Fantasy’s evening bag where it had landed. It disappeared and reappeared inside her purse as well.

  Fantasy was always great for a distraction, but she’d never been this good.

 
The naked ace raised her hands up high in the air, shaking her tits at the bank of security cameras, then reached down to grab Duncan Towers’s hands as she arched over backward, still holding on to him as she grabbed her crotch and looked back at the audience, briefly making eye contact with Trudy. With one final twist of her head, she fell onto the table in a dead faint, her ass on the chessboard, her head and arms dangling backward over the edge, her legs to each side of Duncan Towers.

  “Huh, what?” slurred David, coming awake.

  There was some justice in the universe. The rude boy had completely missed it.

  “What the hell?!” roared Duncan Towers, his bronzer smeared, his hair-sprayed helmet of blond hair now sticking straight up in the air like Struwwelpeter. He pulled out his hands and Fantasy slid off the table, falling in a heap.

  Dan Quayle sat there, looking even more idiotic under the German braided wig sitting slightly askew. “Someone must have given her drugs.…”

  “‘Someone’ meaning herself,” Marilyn Quayle told her husband.

  “Bad drugs…” Trudy added softly, turning around for some sense of decorum.

  Diane said, “Maybe that new one, rapture. I’ve heard it’s nasty.”

  David giggled drunkenly and Gyro even more, gleefully clutching Fantasy’s panties until his mother exclaimed, “Gary, give those back! That poor woman!”

  Ramshead collected Fantasy’s panties and Fantasy as well, Towers roaring, “Get her out of here! Get her sobered up! And tell those assholes in the security room to scrub the footage now, because if one single frame leaks to the press, it’s all their asses getting fired and sued!”

  Ramshead nodded, and two security men spirited Fantasy away as Towers ranted further, “And you, the jackal from the Gray Lady I let in!” He pointed one small wet finger at the New York Times photographer in the back. “Bet you were too busy drooling to snap any pics, but breathe so much a word about this beyond ‘an unscheduled dance recital’ and I’ll see you never set foot in any of my events again! And don’t you dare give me any shit about the public’s ‘need to know.’ All the public needs to know is that you’re all a bunch of liars!” He then glanced over to the table with the amber bull as centerpiece which looked to hold the cream of Wall Street, including editors from the Journal. “We good, gentlemen?”

  The journalists nodded as Marilyn Quayle snatched the blond braided wig off of Dan and flung it at one of the security agents who was scrabbling for the fallen chess pieces. Nervous chatter started up, men apologizing to their wives, wives accepting or demanding more, while Trudy counted on her fingers silently and waited for it. On the count of seven, Jessica von der Stadt screamed, her high-pitched little girl’s scream silencing the room again as she cried “Timothy! My elephant! Daddy, my elephant’s missing!”

  “Didn’t you latch the cage properly, pumpkin?” Jasper von der Stadt asked in concern.

  “I did, Daddy! I did!” Jessica opened the cage to show him, in the process destroying the evidence of the latched cricket cage mystery. “See?”

  “What the hell is it now?!” Towers roared.

  “My elephant, Mr. Towers!” Jessica explained. “My elephant is missing! Help me find him! Please!”

  Towers waved. “I’m sure your daddy can buy you a new one.”

  “No.” Jessica popped to her feet, her face turning red. “There’ll never be another elephant like Timothy!”

  “There are plenty of elephants,” Towers snapped.

  “No,” stated Jessica, “and I said please.”

  “Now Jessica, don’t get angry,” her father pleaded, “and Mr. Towers, please don’t upset my daughter. You don’t want her upset.”

  “I said please, Daddy.…”

  “Jessica is right.” Trudy rose with grandmotherly calm. “She did say ‘please.’ We’re the party of traditional values, are we not? The Grand Old Party? I think our servers can keep the food warm while we take a few minutes to help her.” She picked up her water glass and rang it with her teaspoon for attention. “Everyone, your attention, please! A little girl has lost her elephant! He’s about the size of a mouse and answers to ‘Timothy.’ Get up carefully so you don’t step on him! Remember, he’s our party mascot! We don’t want the press getting wind of that, do we? Help Jessica find her elephant! For Bush and Victory!”

  “For Bush and Victory!!!” they responded.

  Trudy set down her water glass and teaspoon, then picked up her purse, containing the “missing” elephant and Fantasy’s evening bag. She opened that and rifled through it, finding the zippered compartment with the drugs. A badly stoppered vial of white powder spilled out, losing half its contents, but she replaced that and sorted through pillboxes until she found one with some black beauties.

  “Here.” She handed half to Croyd along with his water glass as he sat in his chair, still yawning, reality shimmering around him while his butter knife squirmed across the table like an inchworm. “Ration yourself.”

  Croyd being Croyd of course popped two immediately.

  Trudy whispered in his ear, “Now follow my lead and we’ll pull the heist of the century.”

  Croyd looked askance, so Trudy whispered her mad plan. It probably helped that he was on drugs, but Croyd was generally up for anything.

  She took her purse and started hunting around the room methodically, looking for the “lost” elephant. While she was doing so she popped out the lenses of the security cameras in a staggered pattern so the men at the security desk couldn’t just review the tapes and narrow the list of suspects.

  It took quite a few minutes, and by the time Trudy was done, Jessica was well and truly distraught, sitting in her chair crying, her father alternately comforting her and begging her not to do anything rash. A few people still milled around the room looking for her elephant, but most just ignored her plight and blathered on about politics.

  “Look what I found,” Trudy said, presenting Jessica with her clasped hands and then teleporting Timothy to the hollow between them. She opened them. “Your party mascot.”

  Jessica squealed with delight. “Thank you!” She took Timothy in her hands, then put him in his cricket cage, latching it securely. She wiped her tears with her father’s pocket square. “Where did you find him? We looked everywhere!”

  “So did I,” said Trudy. “Then I thought I’d look in the last place I always think to look—my purse. The poor thing must have run off the edge of the table and fallen in!”

  Jessica laughed. “Oh, look at him! He’s so happy he’s dancing!” The elephant was indeed swaying from side to side inside his cage, waving his trunk and flapping his ears. “What’s that white stuff on his nose?”

  “Powdered sugar,” Trudy lied. “I had a jelly donut this morning.”

  “Thank you,” said Jasper von der Stadt. “Thank you so much.” He smiled nervously. “We should probably go. We’ve caused enough trouble.”

  “Oh, nonsense,” Trudy said firmly. “The Republicans are big boys and girls and you paid the same as everyone. Just go make nice with Towers and I’ll stay here with Jessica.” She turned to Jessica. “You want dinner, don’t you, honey?”

  “Yes,” said Jessica. “I like schnitzel. Grandma makes it.”

  “See?” said Trudy. “It’s settled.”

  Jasper nodded and went off to see Towers while Trudy remained with Jessica, sitting in Cyclone’s seat while he floated up near the clouds at the top of the vault between Mary Magdalene and the mooning cherub. “You okay, honey?” Trudy asked. She felt slightly bad to have put a child through that, but only slightly. And the elephant was no worse for the wear; in fact, it was happier than it had been earlier.

  “Yes, but…” Jessica paused, looking up at the dais where her father was apologizing to Towers while the mogul glared back, his hair fixed but his mouth pursed like he’d just eaten a rotten prune. Jessica confessed, “I want to squinch Mr. Towers, but Daddy says I shouldn’t. Not ever. But he’s such a big bully.…”

&nbs
p; “Well, you probably shouldn’t, if Daddy says not to.” Trudy gestured to the amber-paneled walls around them. “Wouldn’t this room make the world’s most wonderful dollhouse?”

  “Yes,” said Jessica, “but I can only squinch living things.”

  “Can you keep a secret?” Trudy asked softly. “Especially if it’s one that would make Mr. Towers very unhappy?”

  Jessica nodded enthusiastically, so Trudy beckoned Croyd to return to his seat. “This is my old friend, Mr. Croyd. He’s got a little ace himself. And I’ve got a secret ace of my own, one I’ve had a very long time. And three aces almost always wins.…”

  Dinner was nice enough for banquet food, but for the price, it ought to be, and Trudy was glad she’d ordered the coulibiac. She watched Duncan Towers up on the dais pouring ketchup on his steak. Cyclone had taken Fantasy’s seat beside him, for security purposes, chatting with him and the Quayles as he ate his own steak.

  Once they’d all eaten enough, Trudy set her napkin on the table, then glanced to Croyd and Jessica, and they all looked up at Duncan Towers and Dan Quayle. “We’re going to make this country great again!” exclaimed Towers … and as he said the word great the painting above him, the one with the cherubs trying to figure out what to do with the tower shield as well as the buxom nymph–topped mirror on the pillar between the windows, quivered like they were made out of gelatin as they came loose from the wall, shrank to the size of a bookmark fluttering through the air, and disappeared.

  Trudy felt them wriggling in her purse. She didn’t know what effect cocaine would have on a miniaturized living armorial painting and a nymph-topped mirror, but she hoped it wasn’t going to be a problem. Usually one put cocaine on mirrors.

  Everyone inside the Amber Room noticed except the four on the dais. But Towers noticed his audience was neither looking at him nor listening to what he said, so he turned and looked, as did the other three. No one said anything until Dan Quayle decided to fill up the emptiness in the air by stating the obvious. “It disappeared!”