Falls The Shadow

32

In Philadelphia, if you want to start a restaurant, first you buy a bank. Then you fire the tellers, tart up the place to fit your theme, hire a famous chef, stick the valet parkers out front, charge thirty-six bucks for a piece of fish, and away you go. That’s the way it worked for the Striped Bass, for Circe and the Ritz-Carlton, and that’s the way it worked for Geoffrey Sunshine, when he bought the First Philadelphia Bank building, with its soaring marble pillars and golden ceiling inlays. His supper club, Marrakech, was an exotic Moroccan fantasy for the discriminating diner, offering Mediterranean cuisine in an atmosphere of fluid lights and shimmering fabrics. The ceiling was blue, the upholstery golden, the tagines aromatic. Tables at Marrakech were booked months in advance, and still they made you wait when you arrived, just because they could. But the real action in the joint was not in the restaurant, it was upstairs, in the splendiferous El Bahia Club.

“She has a dinner appointment,” I said to Beth as we stood together at the El Bahia bar, trying to grab the attention of one of the too-cool-to-care bartenders. “She’s in public relations. But she said she’d join us here for a before-dinner jolt.”

“So where did you meet her?”

“My dentist introduced us.”

“Your dentist? I thought you hated the lot of them.”

“I do. Savage little bastards.”

“It’s that tiny chuckle they give when they hit a nerve and you gasp in pain,” she said, nodding. “It’s the way they say, as if to a defiant child, ‘Loosen your lower lip, you’re fighting me,’ and all I want to say is, ‘Of course I’m fighting you, you sadist, you’re scraping the flesh off my gums.’ ”

“Yeah, Dr. Bob does all of that.”

“But still you trusted him enough to set you up?”

“Well, he’s an interesting guy.”

The bar of the El Bahia was jammed with quite the sharp-suited crowd. The place was decorated like a sultan’s palace, inlays and mosaics, curtains and rugs and golden statues of naked women. Around the rollicking dance floor, heavy chairs and couches sat in intimate groupings on raised tiers. Tables filled with patrons surrounded the circular bar, there was a separate room in the back for the cigar smokers, the bartenders were crazy busy and they enjoyed ignoring your calls for drinks. And this was only a Wednesday. Saturday night the line to get in snaked well down the street.

Finally I caught the attention of a beefy guy behind the bar. He had a flattop and an earring and he wiped his hands on a rag as he came over.

“A Sea Breeze for me,” I said. I looked at Beth.

“Beer,” she said, “in a bottle.”

“What kind?” said the barkeep.

“Brown,” said Beth. The bartender looked at her for a moment, uncomprehending, before he shrugged and left to gather our order.

“You said your dentist was an interesting guy,” said Beth. “How so?”

“He says he likes to help. I think it means he tries to meddle in people’s lives in hopes of making the world a better and more peaceful place.”

“And I suppose, as a dentist, he does it wearing rubber gloves and a mask, like Batman.”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way, but you’re absolutely right. The Justice League of Professionals. Accountantman. Actuarial Woman. The Green Litigator. Gad.”

“Who would your dentist be?”

“The Steel Pick, I suppose, scourge of plaque the world over, scaling great heights in the never-ending battle against tooth decay.”

“With his archnemesis, the femme fatale Ginger Vitus.”

“Ooh, I like that, sweet Ginger with her coffee-colored cat suit and faint aroma of decay.”

“How’d you find him?”

“Whitney Robinson recommended him,” I said. “And then I found out he was also treating Seamus Dent.”

It was cute the way Beth’s eyes bugged out at that one. “Does your dentist know anything about François?”

“I haven’t asked him yet.”

“Victor. Why not?”

“Because you don’t go right at Dr. Bob. He’s the kind of guy you have to come at obliquely. He’s letting me know what he wants me to know in his own sweet way. Ah, our drinks.”

The bartender slopped my Sea Breeze onto the bar, banged a Dos Equis in front of Beth, named his exorbitant price as if ransoming my firstborn. I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out one of the photographs of Velma Takahashi that my secretary had snapped in my office.

“You see her around, ever?” I said.

“Nice,” said the bartender. “What, is she missing?”

“Only her cellulite. You recognize her?”

He scratched his chin. “I can’t be sure.”

“You’re a sweetheart, aren’t you? What’s your name, sweetheart?”

“Antoine.”

“All right, Antoine. I’m running a tab for the drinks, but this” – I took a twenty out of my wallet, raised an eyebrow – “might be for you.”

“You sure you can afford all that?”

“Screw it, then,” I said, “I’ll give it to a busboy.” But before I could stuff the bill into my pocket, he snatched it out of my fist.

“Never saw her,” he said. “And someone that well put together, I’d remember.”

“Oh, I bet you would.” I put the photo back in my jacket. “How long you been working here, Antoine?”

“A year and a couple of months,” he said.

“Of all of the staff, who’s been working up here the longest?”

“Celia started after me. Pinar’s been here about two years, but he’s about to go. No one stays too long because of the boss.”

“You’re talking about Mr. Sunshine?”

“That’s right.”

“Is he a tough act to get along with?”

“He’s your best friend for a month or two, slapping your back, partying with you, giving you the best shifts, and then he becomes a sharp pain in your ass. It’s a pattern of his. He says turnover keeps the atmosphere fresh.”

“That and a little Air Wick.”

“Plus there’s his spy gadgets, hidden cameras and the like, all so he’s sure we’re not stealing him blind.”

“Are you?”

“If we are, we’re clever enough not to get caught by him. But the whole James Bond over-your-shoulder act gets old fast. And then there’s the bounced checks.”

“Really?”

“He said it was a mistake, and they’ve been good for a few months now, but the résumés are out, you know what I mean?”

“So the only staff person who would have been here continuously for the last five or so years is the boss.”

“You got it.”

“He in tonight?”

“Not yet, but he will be. Eventually.”

“Let me know when you see him.”

“Sure.”

I turned away to think on what Antoine had said when I saw her gliding toward me. Carol Kingsly. I wasn’t yet sure how much I liked her, actually, but damn, she was good-looking. She was in work clothes, a gray suit, gray pumps, a silk blouse open at the collar, and a strand of pearls across her pretty neck. Accompanying her was a gelhead, one of those grossly handsome men with gleaming teeth and hair slimed back with massive quantities of some petroleum product. He was wearing a brown suit and a loud striped tie.

“Hey, you,” said Carol, taking proprietary hold of my arm as if we had been an item for years instead of days. With her free hand, she smoothed down my tie. “You look great.”

“It’s my new fashion consultant. She’s all the rage. You thirsty?”

“Parched.”

After I ordered a round, we made the introductions and had one of those spineless conversations that awkward groups have at crowded bars where the music has grown a little too loud. The weather, the Phillies, the food downstairs, snide remarks about the latest celebrity scandal. Carol kept hold of my arm and was overly effusive toward Beth. Gelhead’s name was Nick, and he seemed to have a thing for Carol. Beth, who usually had a thing for gelheads, didn’t seem at all interested in Nick, but she couldn’t stop staring at the way Carol flirted and clutched at me. All enough to give me a headache. I called Antoine over and ordered another round for the four of us.

Twenty minutes in, Nick glanced at his watch. “It’s time,” he said.

“Duty calls,” said Carol. “Sorry to run out like this and leave you stranded.”

“We’ll manage,” I said.

“The man we’re meeting is very big in real estate,” she said, her eyes widening at the word big. “It’s all hush-hush, but this could be the break of our careers. One of his lieutenants is a patient of Dr. Pfeffer’s. That’s how he got my name. He told the doctor he was looking for a new public-relations firm.”

“Convenient.”

“He also told him they’re looking for a new lawyer to handle some problem they are having. Should I give them your name?”

“We don’t do real estate,” said Beth.

“But we can learn,” I said, handing Carol one of my cards.

She looked at it. “Derringer and Carl. It has a ring, doesn’t it? Do you know anything about real estate?”

“Location, location, location,” I said.

“That should be enough.”

She yanked at the arm she had been holding, pulled me close, and as Nick looked balefully on, kissed me wetly on the lips. Our first kiss, but it was performed by Carol so matter-of-factly it was as if we had been intimate for months.

“It was so nice to meet you, Beth,” said Carol.

“Likewise, I’m sure,” said Beth.

“Bye, Victor. Be good. I’ll call you when I get home, tell you what they said.”

“So that’s Carol,” said Beth as we watched the two of them elbow their way away from the bar.

“That’s Carol.”

“Carol, Carol, Carol.”

“She does yoga.”

“I wouldn’t put it past her,” said Beth. “It seemed like you guys were pretty hot and heavy.”

“So it did,” I said.

“Are you?”

“I didn’t think so, but I’ve never known what the hell is going on in any of my relationships. Why should this one be any different? I suppose by the time I get up to speed, she’ll dump me.”

“I don’t think Slick Nick would mind that at all,” said Beth.

“No, he seemed a bit smitten, didn’t he?”

“You’re not worried, your new girlfriend spending the night alongside handsome Mr. Nick?”

“With that tie? Please.”

Just then Antoine stepped up and reached over the bar to tap me on my shoulder.

“There he is,” he said, indicating a short, hunched man with wavy black hair and a pointed face. He looked like an overdressed ferret with bad posture as he made his way, meeting and greeting, across the club. A walking T-bone in a black turtleneck moved in front of him, wedging the crowd open as if for Caesar. “He generally holds court in the cigar lounge,” said Antoine. “And he likes his privacy.”

“Thanks for the warning,” I said.

We stayed at the bar for a few moments longer, finished our drinks, paid our bill, watched as Geoffrey Sunshine entered the glass-walled, smoke-filled room. Geoffrey Sunshine, the restaurant mogul who had brought François Dubé, Leesa Cullen, and Velma Takahashi together, a combustible combination that ended in murder. I had a few questions for Mr. Sunshine.

“You ever smoke a cigar, Beth?”

“Not in this life.”

“Time to start,” I said as we fought our way to the cigar lounge and to Geoffrey Sunshine. “Off we go, into the miasma.”