Jokers Wild Page 0,9

suspicious of any helpful stranger wearing a purple pinstripe suit, slouch hat, and a fur-trimmed coat. It looked like baby harpseal pelts.

"Hey!" Jack shouted. "Cordelia! Over here! It's meJack!"

She obviously didn't hear him. For Jack, it was like watching television, or perhaps the view seen through the wrong end of a telescope. He couldn't attract Cordelia's attention. With the noise of the terminal, the buses revving their engines, the massed roar of the crowd, his words wouldn't cross the intervening distance.

The man took her suitcase. Jack yelled helplessly. Cordelia smiled. Then the man took her elbow and steered her toward a near-side exit.

"No!" It was loud enough that even Cordelia turned her head. Then she looked puzzled briefly, before continuing toward the exit at the behest of her guide.

Jack uttered a curse and started to pull and shove people out of his way as he tried to cross the waiting area. Nuns, jokers, punkers, street bums, it didn't matter. At least not until he fetched up against the bulk of a joker who looked to have the general shape and about half the mass of a Volkswagen Beetle.

"Goin' somewhere?" said the joker. "Yes," said Jack, trying to move past.

"I come all the way from Santa Fe for this. I always heard you people here was rude."

A fist the size of a two-slice toaster grabbed Jack's shirt lapels. Fetid breath made him think of a public restroom after rush hour.

"Sorry," said Jack. "Look, I've got to get my niece before a son-of-a-bitching pimp steals her out of here."

The joker looked down at him for a long moment. " I can dig it," he said. "Just like on TV, huh?" He let loose of Jack, and the latter scooted around him like rounding the flank of a mountain.

Cordelia was gone. The nattily attired man guiding her was gone. Jack got to the exit where the two had presumably left. He could see hundreds of people, mainly the backs of their heads, but no one who looked like his niece.

He hesitated only a second. There were eight million people in this city. He had no idea how many tourists and jokers from all parts of the world had flooded into Manhattan for Wild Card Day. More millions, probably. All he had to find was one sixteen-year-old from rural Louisiana.

It was all instinct for the moment. Without thinking further, Jack headed for the escalators. Maybe he'd catch up with them before the man and Cordelia got outside. But if not, then he'd just find Cordelia on the street.

He didn't want to think about what he'd tell his sister.

Spector hadn't slept. He picked up the amber bottle of pills on the bedside table and dropped them into the trash. He'd have to find something stronger.

The pain was always there, like the smell of stale smoke in a seedy bar. Spector sat up and breathed slowly. The early morning light made his apartment look even grayer than usual.

He'd furnished the efficiency with cheap beat-up junk from pawnshops and secondhand stores.

The phone rang. "Hello."

"Mr. Spector?" The voice had the refined edge of a Bostonian. Spector didn't recognize it.

"Yeah. Who are you?"

"My name is unimportant, at least for now."

"Right." They were going to play cagey with him, but most people did. "So why are you calling me? What do you want?"

"A mutual acquaintance named Gruber indicated that you have certain unique abilities. A client of mine might wish to employ you, initially on a freelance basis."

Spector scratched his neck. "I think I see what you're getting at here. If this is some kind of a setup, you're a dead man. If you're legit, its going to cost you."

"Naturally. Perhaps you've heard of the Shadow Fist Society? It could be very profitable for you to work within that organization. However, they are cautious and would require a demonstration first. Would this morning be too soon?"

Word had it that the Shadow Fist Society was run by the city's anonymous new crime lord. They were leaning hard on the older gang bosses. Spector would feel right at home in the upcoming bloodbath. "I got nothing else to do. Who do you have in mind?"

"That's really of no importance to us." He paused. "Mr. Gruber seems to know quite a bit about you, and he's far from discreet."

"Fine by me."

"Be at Times Square at eleven-thirty this morning. If we're satisfied that you meet our needs you'll be contacted there."

"What about money?" Spector heard a buzz at the other end.

"That will be negotiated