“Give you a National Newspaper Award then.”
Griffin’s mouth puckered when he tasted his Bloody Caesar. I’d gone heavy on the Tabasco.
“Who do I phone?” he asked.
“Your old sparring partner Charles Grimaldi.”
“So,” Griffin said, “the story I get at the end is what’s going on at Ace Disposal?”
“Terrific guess, Ray,” I said. “But after the phone call, you hold your horses on the article until I say go. No speculation on your own, no digging around at Ace, no requests for interviews.”
“And you’ll give me the whole picture?”
“Exclusive.”
“What do I say to Grimaldi?” Griffin asked.
I slid a piece of paper across the kitchen table. It had three names written on it in my own round hand. Laidlaw Construction. Stibbards Wire. Soward Brothers Concrete. I’d culled the names from one of Harry Hein’s computer printouts. Beside the names was the magic number. 837.
“When you get Grimaldi on the line,” I said to Griffin, “tell him you’re following up on your garbage series from last year. Say you’ve got fresh leads and want to check out your facts with him. Read off these names on the paper and ask if it isn’t odd the three companies were charged an identical amount for a day in the third week in June. That’s the 837. Quote him the figure.”
Griffin listened, his mouth hanging a shade open.
“Let Grimaldi talk,” I said. “He’ll have some kind of explanation.”
“A glib guy, all right,” Griffin said.
“Wait till he’s winding down,” I said. “Then say, well, you think you might have access to invoices that’ll make things clearer.”
“After that, what?”
“Nothing,” I said. “Grimaldi’ll have heard his fill.”
“You’re not going to let me in on what these names mean?” Griffin said. “And the significance of the 837?”
“Just dollars.”
Griffin studied the sheet of paper for clues.
“I could follow this up myself,” he said. “The companies are customers of Ace’s, that’s easy, and something’s wrong with them getting billed 837 dollars.”
“It’d take you weeks to get past what I’ve put in front of you,” I said. “My way, you get the complete bundle in a couple of days.”
I was exaggerating. Maybe lying. I couldn’t tell what Grimaldi’s reaction would be. He might bluff it out. He might catch a plane for Brazil. He might send Sol Nash around for another visit. Do it to me professional this time.
“Where’s the phone?” Ray Griffin said.
Grimaldi was at home, and after Griffin exchanged happy memories of past interviews with him, he popped the questions.
“Uh, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said, “I’ve got some names here I’d like to try out on you for background on the story I’m researching. Laid-law Construction’s one. Stibbards Wire. That’s with two ‘b’s in the middle. And the last is Soward. S-o-w-a-r-d. A concrete company.”
As he talked, Griffin kept the receiver cradled between his left shoulder and his ear. He wrote in the notebook with his right hand and held the notebook in place with his left. I sat across the table with the soggy vodka and ice I’d been nursing along most of the evening.
“All customers of yours?” Griffin said into the phone. “That’s what I understood. Well, the thing is, Mr. Grimaldi, it’s come to my attention, these three, kind of a coincidence here, they were all charged 837 dollars by your company for work done on the same day in June. Wonder if you could explain that for the story.”
Grimaldi talked for five minutes without allowing space for Griffin to butt in. Griffin kept himself busy writing in his notebook. The writing covered six pages before Grimaldi took a break.
“Sure, it makes sense, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said. “Good business practice, yeah, like you say.”
Griffin and Grimaldi alternated talking in spurts. I listened to Griffin’s end. I could imagine Grimaldi’s end.
“Well, anyway,” Griffin said when he had a space, “I believe I have a backup on this. Nothing definite, but a source of mine might make available the relevant invoices, the ones for the three companies I mentioned a minute ago.”
Grimaldi took a turn. He raised his voice loud enough for me to make out two of his words.
“Fucking nerve,” Grimaldi said. He repeated it a couple of times.
“Just running down my leads, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said. He was good on the phone, guileless, and a dangerous hint of information held in reserve. “If I get the invoices, you know, it’ll be a matter of nailing down the answers. Confirm what you’ve explained.”
Griffin let the phone fall from his ear. Grimaldi had geared up to a shout.
“That’s getting serious, Mr. Grimaldi,” Griffin said when it came back to talking time for him. “Nobody’s threatening your company. Any event, I can’t reveal my contact. He hasn’t said he’ll definitely come through with the invoices. It’s up in the air right now.”
Griffin got off the phone and flipped his notebook shut.
I said, “You care for another Bloody, Ray?”
Griffin shook his head.
“The reason the figure is the same for the three companies,” he said, “is a system they got at Ace that’s a variation on equal billing. Kind of thing Consumers’ Gas does with your monthly bill.”
“That’s what Grimaldi said?”
“Makes crazy sense when he’s explaining it, but I don’t swallow it,” Griffin said. “He asked me out to the office for a look at his accounting system. He said it’s state of the art.”
“He didn’t lie.”
“He got abusive when I brought up the invoices,” Griffin said. “Wanted to know who the guy was, my source. Made some noise about taking steps. That was his phrase. He said the person with the invoices would end up with his ass in a sling.”
“Another one of his phrases?”
“It’s you he’s talking about, correct?” Griffin said. “Whatever these invoices amount to, you’ve got them.”
I told Griffin he’d get the story complete to every detail as soon as the rest of the pieces had fallen into place. Griffin tried a few questions. I talked around them. He thrust. I parried. And after a while, Griffin said he had to leave for another appointment. I asked if it was with his clothes consultant.
“Sometimes I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about, Crang,” Griffin said.
He left and I put a Lester Young album on the stereo in the living room. It was from the 1950s when his sound had grown thicker and more sombre. I sat in the dark and looked out the window at the park across the street for a long time. Charles Grimaldi would know it was me who’d tipped off Ray Griffin. That was the point. I wanted Grimaldi to know. But he’d also recognize I’d given Griffin only a taste of what I had. Three names and a figure in dollars wasn’t the basis for a solid investigation even by a persevering chap like Griffin. But the invoices, if Griffin got his hands on them and took note that the invoice numbers were the same on each of the three, would launch him in directions calculated to make Grimaldi nervous. Had I developed a scenario that might persuade Grimaldi to deal with me on Matthew Wansborough’s three hundred thousand? It struck me as a good bet. Scenario? As words go, it was as moronic as interface