The girl nods. ‘You mean the old man’s message? Do you think AD heard it? Or …’
He shrugs, not willing to say more.
‘Fat Peter’s death isn’t your fault,’ she says, her voice soft. ‘Everybody knew Fat Peter was no thief. If he were involved with that necklace, it was as a fence – a resale man. Everyone knew he could move stuff. But, maybe, if he paid someone, gave out credit …’ She nods, the possibilities becoming clear. ‘That might explain a ticket not entered in the book, a marker for those emeralds, especially if he expected Diamond Jim to send someone looking. Someone tougher than the old man.’
She thinks on that for a while. ‘The old man wouldn’t have taken the job if he thought he was setting up an execution. Diamond Jim must have kept that from him, and that’s pretty hard to do. So maybe Fat Peter knew something else, something about who commissioned the job or why they hit Diamond Jim. But if so, why …’
Another pause and then she turns, slowly, to appraise the boy.
‘Unless the jewels came to him first, before he found out where they were from. Fat Peter never could resist a bargain, and if a thief brought him something nice, he’d be hard-pressed to turn it down. Especially if he could get it cheap – if he could bully the seller down to a rock bottom price.’ Her voice fades as she sorts it out. ‘And then, if he found out; if he wanted to return them … Tick?’ An edge has crept into her voice. She tries to hide it, softening her questions with a singsong quality. ‘Did you steal from Diamond Jim? Did you maybe do a smash-and-grab, a quick pocket and hare, perhaps? Please, tell me.’
‘No.’ He’s shaking his head so hard, his overlong hair swings back and forth. ‘No, I don’t do that anymore, Care. You told me what could happen and I don’t want to go back. No way. Not even if I’m hungry. I don’t steal.’
Her voice grows softer and my fur begins to prickle. ‘What about that little weight you gave me, Tick? The brass thing? Didn’t you pick that up, maybe, at Fat Peter’s?’
‘I didn’t.’ His lower lip sticks out and I fear tears. ‘He gave that to me. Honest.’
The girl bites back the obvious response. ‘Maybe there’s a silver lining,’ she says instead. ‘I never did like you hanging out there with everything that went on in that shop of his. And it was probably one of those flash boys who brought the wares to Fat Peter. Nobody will cry when one of that crew washes up on the riverbank. I wonder who the old man was looking at? Was there some big money on the other end of the transaction? Diamond Jim’s wares are major league and that necklace sounded grand. Even once he broke it up, Fat Peter must have had somebody in mind for the stones.
‘Unless …’ She reaches for the ledger again. ‘Unless they were on consignment.’
‘What do you mean?’ The boy sits up as she starts to leaf through the pages. The sun has moved, and so I join them. The basement is damp after the recent rains, and the shared warmth is welcome. ‘Like on order?’
‘Exactly.’ She runs her finger down a page. The light has grown dim and she must lean forward to make it out. After a moment, she pauses to dig into her pocket. The rumpled ticket is the worse for wear, and she holds it flat, squinting at its surface. I cannot resist a look myself, but as I jump up on the windowsill, the better to view the tiny scrap, my shadow falls upon it.
‘Hang on,’ she says, standing. Reaching up to the open well, she leans on the sill beside me. The markings are clear to me, although she struggles to make them out. Would that we could combine my eyesight and her comprehension. ‘Eight one three,’ she says. ‘And no name on the line.’
Back to the page then, and she nods with something like satisfaction. ‘The missing entry – the one Fat Peter skipped – it’s got to be tied in with the stolen necklace. The old man always told me: “Never trust a coincidence.”’
She sinks back to the floor, the ticket in her hand. ‘So maybe Diamond Jim hasn’t gotten the emeralds back yet. And maybe this is what those creeps were looking for.’
‘Wouldn’t Fat Peter have given that up?’ Tick isn’t looking at the ledger. He reads Care instead. ‘I mean, if Brian or Randy showed up to hurt him?’
‘You’d think.’ Care goes back to the ledger. ‘Maybe things got out of hand. Maybe he died before they could get the info. That could be why they still want the ledger.’
She sits there quiet, deep in thought, the boy by her side. This is their circle, the rules they know. But something is eating at the boy, something besides hunger and his own filth. He’s fidgeting again, and while she reads I examine his face – the way he chews his lip. I mutter softly, a murmuring rumble to break her reverie, but it’s the boy – agitated, alert – who looks up.