Aces High Page 0,75

at one of his tusks. "You ask too many questions."

"Fair enough." She swept a hand over the jewels. "We have four here. Have there been others?"

Jube nodded. "One or two. You missed the emeralds."

"A pity. I'm fond of green. The British racing color." She sighed. "Why gems?"

"People were reluctant to take my checks," Jube told her, "and it was easier than carrying large amounts of cash."

"If there are more where these came from," Chrysalis said, "see that they stay there. Let the word get around Jokertown that the Walrus has a secret cache of precious gems, and I wouldn't give a bloody fig for your chances. You may have stirred the waters already, but we'll hope the sharks haven't noticed. Elmo told no one but me, of course, and Devil John has his own peculiar sense of honor, I think we can rely on him to keep mum. As for the garbageman and the police clerk, when I purchased their gems I bought their silence too."

"You didn't have to do that!"

"I know," she said. "The next time you want information, you know how to find the Crystal Palace. Don't you?"

"How much do you know already?" Jube asked her. "Enough to tell when you're lying," Chrysalis replied. "I know you're looking for a bowling ball, for reasons incomprehensible to man, woman, or joker. I know that Darlingfoot stole that joker corpse from the morgue, presumably for pay. It's not the sort of thing he'd do on his own. I know the body was small and furred, with legs like a grasshopper, and quite badly burned. No joker matching that description is known to any of my sources, a curious circumstance. I know that Croyd made a rather large cash deposit the day the body was stolen, and an even larger one the following day, and in between had a public confrontation with Darlingfoot. And I know that you paid Devil John handsomely to reveal whose interests he had represented in this little melodrama, and tried without success to engage his services." She leaned forward. "What I don't know is what all this means, and you know how I abhor a mystery."

"They say that every time a joker farts anywhere in Manhattan, Chrysalis holds her nose," Jube said. He looked at her intently, but the transparency of her flesh made her expression impossible to read. The skull-face behind her crystalline skin stared at him implacably from clear blue eyes. "What's your interest in this?" he asked her.

"Uncertain, until I know what 'this' is. However, you've been quite valuable to me for a long time, and I would hate to lose your services. You know I'm discreet."

"Until you're paid to be indiscreet," Jube pointed out. Chrysalis laughed, and touched the diamond. "Given your resources, silence can be more lucrative than speech."

"That's true," Jube said. He decided that he had nothing to lose. "I'm really an alien spy from a distant planet," he began.

"Jubal," Chrysalis interrupted, "you're wearing on my patience. I've never been that fond of your humor. Get to the point. What happened with Darlingfoot?"

"Not much," Jube admitted. "I knew why I wanted the body. I didn't know why anyone else would. Devil John wouldn't tell me. I think they must have the bowling ball. I tried to hire him to get it back for me, but he didn't want anything more to do with them. I think he's scared of them, whoever they are."

"I think you're right. Croyd?"

"Asleep again. Who knows what use- he'll be when he comes to? I could wait six months, and he'll wake up as a hamster."

"For a commission," Chrysalis said with cool certainty, "I can engage the services of someone who'll get you your answers."

Jube decided to be blunt, since evasion wasn't getting him anywhere. "Don't know that I'd trust anyone you'd hire." She laughed. "Dear boy, that's the smartest thing you've said in months. And you'd be right. You're too easy a mark, and some of my contacts are admittedly less than reputable. With me as intermediary, however, the equation changes. I have a certain reputation." Next to her elbow was a small silver bell. She rang it lightly. "In any case, the man who'd be best for this is an exception to the general rule. He actually has ethics."

Jube was tempted. "Who is he?"

"His name is Jay Ackroyd. Ace private investigator. In both senses of the word. Sometimes he's called Popinjay, but not to his face. Jay and I do favors for each other