Encounters Page 16

  Just then Rupert appeared at the head of the stairs, having counted out and pocketed his share of the previous day's income, and suddenly I saw a way out of my predicament.

  “I'm sorry, gentlemen,” said Rupert, climbing down to the main floor, “but we don't allow firearms in here.”

  “Who's he?” asked the little guy.

  “Gents,” I said, “this is Mr. Rupert Cornwall, formerly of Australia, Hong Kong, and India. Brother Rupert, these here fellers are associated with the local court system, and are looking into the ownership of the Tabernacle of Saint Luke.”

  “Oh?” he said, with a kind of greedy smile on his face.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Just tell ’em I bought it fair and square and you can be on your way.”

  “I hate to correct you, Doctor Jones,” said Rupert, “but I am, and always have been, the owner of this building.”

  “You don't have to pretend for my sake, Brother Rupert,” I said. “Just tell ’em the truth.”

  “The truth is that you are a mountebank who has no legal claim to these premises,” said Rupert.

  I turned to the little guy. “Well, I done my best,” I said.

  “You are free to leave,” he said, and then turned to Rupert. “Mr. Cornwall, I wonder if my associates and I might have a word in private with you. We have a business proposition to make.”

  “Oh?” said Rupert.

  “Well, two propositions, actually,” he said with a smile.

  Rupert led ’em into the next room, and I figured that whichever proposition he took, my stake in the Tabernacle of Saint Luke was up in flames, so I went up to my room, collected my money, kissed Helga and the other handmaidens good-bye, and headed off for fresh territory, confident that having got my feet wet in the Tabernacle business, so to speak, I'd do even better with the next one.

  11. Death in the Afternoon

  There are a lot of ways to see Spain. In my expert opinion, the very worst of them is to be standing in the middle of the arena at the Plaza de Toros while a bull named El Diablo is pawing the dirt about twenty feet away and planning to use you for target practice.

  But I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself.

  If you ever go to Madrid, you're going to make two discoveries right quick: all the women wear black, and all the men think they're bullfighters. Beyond that it's pretty much like any other city, except that the people there don't speak much American, and they all go crazy for this kind of Spanish tap dance which is always being done by guys in tight pants called Juan or Jose or Diego.

  I'd left Berlin with a healthy supply of money in my wallet, so I decided to check in at the finest hotel in town, which back in them days was the Palace. There were posters all over the lobby about something called the Fiesta de Toros, which as near as I could translate meant that the restaurant had bought too much steak and was trying to find ways to get rid of it, but I wasn't hungry anyway, so instead I moseyed out onto the street and wandered around until sunset, and then, because wandering can be pretty thirsty work, I stopped by a little tavern about a mile from the hotel.

  The place was just about empty, except for this tall, athletic-looking feller with slicked-down hair and a big black mustache who was sitting at the bar, and when he saw me he sort of waved me over to join him.

  “May I buy you a drink?” he asked.

  “Why, that's right neighborly of you, Brother,” I said, sitting down next to him.

  “You are English?” he asked.

  “American,” I said. “The Right Reverend Honorable Doctor Lucifer Jones, at your service.”

  “You have come a day too soon,” he said morosely. “The service will be held tomorrow night.”

  “Yeah?” I said, wondering what service he was talking about.

  He nodded. “The women will be wailing in the streets, and they will throw themselves upon the coffin. Ten thousand candles will be lit at the cathedral, strong men will weep, and little children will lose their faith in God. The line to the cemetery will be two miles long, and the Cardinal himself will speak at the graveside.”

  “Sounds impressive,” I allowed.

  “It will be a funeral they will talk about for years,” he agreed.

  “Uh ... pardon my ignorance, but I'm a stranger in town,” I said. “Who's about to die—some president or general or such?”

  “Me,” he said glumly.

  “You?”

  “I am Pablo Francisco de Varga,” he said. “Perhaps you have heard of me?”

  “Didn't you used to play third base for the Brooklyn Dodgers?” I said.

  “I am the greatest bullfighter of all time,” he said.

  “Excuse a personal question, Brother Pablo,” I said, “but why are you figuring on dying tomorrow?”

  “El Diablo,” he said.

  “What is that—some kind of disease?” I asked, backing away a bit just in case it was catching.

  “El Diablo is the bull I must face tomorrow in the Fiesta de Toros,” he said. “He has already killed three matadors.”

  “Well, I'm right sorry to hear that,” I said. “But if you're the greatest bullfighter around, what makes you think you're gonna lose?”

  “I have broken a bone in my foot,” he said. “I am completely unable to move to the side. El Diablo will kill me on my very first veronica.”

  “Why don't you call it off, then?” I said.

  “Tens of thousands of people have come to see Varga face El Diablo in the arena,” he said with dignity. “I will not disappoint them.”

  “Seems to me you're just about guaranteed to disappoint them what ain't rooting for the bull,” I said. “If I was you, I'd get a doctor's excuse or whatever it takes to postpone this thing.”

  “That is because you are not a Spaniard,” said Varga. “You do not understand the concept of honor. This is a matter between El Diablo and myself. I will not be the first to back down.”

  Well, we got to talking and drinking, and he kept explaining the Spanish concept of honor, which seemed an awful lot like the American concept of stupidity, but after a couple of hours I gave up trying to talk him out of it, and after he'd finished a whole bottle of whiskey and paid for mine as well, I figured the least I could do to thank him was help him hobble back to his hotel. He was right insistent that no one see him limping, so we snuck around to the back door and went in through the kitchen and found a freight elevator, and a few minutes later I left him and returned to the Palace.

  It seemed to me that as long as I couldn't talk him out of canceling the fight, there wasn't no reason why I shouldn't make a little profit out of it, since me and God still planned to build our tabernacle and I didn't know what construction costs were like in Madrid, so I walked up to the desk clerk and asked him where the local bookmaker had set up shop. He must have misunderstood, because what he sent me to was a publishing company, but as I was walking back to the hotel I passed by a casino, and I figured if anyone knew where I could lay some bets on the bullfight, this was the place.

  I walked in, and sure enough, along with poker and craps and roulette tables, they had a guy in the corner taking bets on the big bullfight, but the only odds he was giving was on whether Varga would be awarded one ear, both ears, or both ears and the tail.

  “Good evening,” I said, walking up to him.

  "Buenos noches," he replied.

  “Well, that's right kind of you, but I've already et,” I said. “I'm just here to make a sporting wager on the big bullfight tomorrow.”

  “Yes, senor?” he said. “And what do you choose?”

  “I don't see no odds on El Diablo winning,” I said.

  He laughed so hard I thought he was gonna fall right off his chair, and when he finally got ahold of himself, he wiped the tears from his face and smiled at me.

  “You have a wonderful sense of humor, senor,” he said.

  “Yeah, I been told that many a time,” I said modestly. “But I still want to lay a bet on El Diablo.”

  “Do
you know that El Diablo is facing the great Pablo Francisco de Varga?”

  “Who's he?” I said.

  Suddenly he got a greedy gleam in his eye. “All right, senor,” he said. “I will give you odds of ten to one.”

  I pulled out my wad and counted out all but about two hundred dollars of it.

  “Okay,” I said. “I'll put twelve thousand on El Diablo to win.”

  Suddenly there was a hushed silence in the room. The guy I'd been talking to looked at me like I was crazy, but finally he shrugged, took my money, and wrote me out a receipt.

  “You are a fool,” he said. “Varga is the greatest matador of all time, greater even that Juan Belmonte.”

  “Well, for all you know, El Diablo is greater than Babe the Blue Ox,” I said.

  “Than who?”

  Well, I could tell I was talking to a cultural illiterate, so I just bade him good-bye and went back to the Palace, where I had a couple of drinks to wash down the whiskey I'd had with Varga, and then went up to my room and took a shower. I had just climbed out of the tub and dried off when I heard the door open, so I looked out from the bathroom and found three well-dressed Spaniards sitting around the room, one of ’em normal-sized and two of ’em looking like gorillas with suits on.

  “Howdy, Brothers,” I said. “What can I do for you?”

  “You are the Reverend Lucifer Jones?” asked the normal one.

  “The Right Reverend Doctor Lucifer Jones,” I corrected him.

  “Then we have come to the right place,” he said. “We have some business to discuss.”

  “Well, given the time of day, I'm afraid I'm gonna have to charge you time-and-a-half for salvation,” I said. “Though if any of you are lately bereaved, I got a group rate for funerals.”

  “Allow me to introduce myself,” he said. “I am Manuel Garcia, and these are my two associates. You may call them Mr. Crush and Mr. Smash.” Mr. Crush smiled at me, and from where I sat it looked like he had steel teeth; Mr. Smash just glared sullenly. “Did you just bet twelve thousand dollars that Pablo Francisco de Varga would be killed in the arena tomorrow?” continued Garcia.

  “You make it sound kind of morbid,” I said. “I didn't so much bet against him as I bet for El Diablo.”

  “My colleagues and I would like to know why you bet against the great Varga.”

  “Because I think the bull will win,” I said.

  “Do not play games with us, Reverend Jones,” said Garcia. “We represent some of the most powerful men in Madrid.”

  “You're the lawyers for a bunch of weightlifters?” I asked.

  “Enough of this foolishness!” snapped Garcia. “You have bet a substantial sum on El Diablo. We, too, are gamblers, and we want to know if you are privy to some inside information that would lead you to make a wager that, on the face of it, seems laughably foolish.”

  “Well, I don't see no point in lying to you,” I said. “But to be totally honest and even-handed about it, I don't see no point in confiding to you, neither. I mean, it ain't as if you was regular parishioners who had promised to donate, say, five thousand dollars apiece to the Tabernacle of Saint Luke once this here contest betwixt man and beast reaches its possibly tragic conclusion.”

  “All right, Reverend Jones,” said Garcia. “We agree to your terms. Give us your information, and if we elect to make our wagers based upon it and Varga should lose, we will deliver fifteen thousand dollars to you at the conclusion of the event.”

  “Well, that's mighty agreeable of you,” I said, “but how do I know I can trust you to keep your word?”

  The three of ’em looked like I'd just stabbed their mothers.

  “We are Spaniards,” said Garcia. “We live and die by our code of honor.”

  “All right,” I said. “But I want to sit with you guys at the bullfight, just so it don't slip your minds.”

  “Men have died for lesser insults, Reverend Jones,” growled Mr. Crush in broken English.

  “Painfully,” added Mr. Smash.

  “And men have gone hungry for lesser precautions,” I said. “Have we got a deal?”

  They whispered amongst themselves in Spanish, and finally all three looked at me and nodded.

  “Okay,” I said. “I happened to run into Pablo Francisco de Varga in a bar earlier tonight, and he's already making plans for his funeral.”

  “But why?” demanded Garcia. “Surely the great Varga has not lost his courage!”

  “Unthinkable!” added the other two.

  “What he's done is gone and busted a bone in his foot, and for some crazy reason he don't want to tell no one or call the match off,” I said.

  “Well, of course not,” agreed Garcia. “He has lived by the code; he will die by it.”

  “You don't find that a mite peculiar?” I asked.

  “Absolutely not. We shall pass along your information to our principals, and I'm sure they will act accordingly.” He stood up. “Thank you for your time, Reverend Jones.”

  “Where will I meet you guys tomorrow?” I said.

  “We will be waiting outside the box office at the Plaza de Toros,” said Garcia, and then the three of ’em walked out, and I finished drying myself off and spent a little time figuring out just how much money I'd be worth after poor Varga went off to the great bullfight plaza in the sky, and finally I climbed under the covers and went to sleep and dreamed about building my tabernacle right next to Varga's grave as a way of thanking him for putting me onto this opportunity.

  I woke up bright and early at about noontime, got dressed, and caught a cab out to the Plaza de Toros, where true to his word, Manuel Garcia was waiting for me with Mr. Crush and Mr. Smash. The four of us went to his private box, where we had a few beers and watched a couple of warm-up fights, and by the time the Big Event rolled around the score was Matadors 2, Bulls 0.

  We sat there and chatted about this and that, and after awhile we became aware of a kind of uneasy murmuring in the crowd, and when half an hour had passed Garcia said something to Mr. Crush, who left the box and returned about five minutes later to whisper something in Garcia's ear.

  “Come with me,” said Garcia, getting to his feet.

  “I think I'd rather stay here, sipping my beer and getting a little sun,” I said.

  “Come with me!” he repeated, and suddenly Mr. Crush grabbed me by one arm and Mr. Smash grabbed me by the other, and I didn't have no choice but to accompany them, since they were holding me a few inches off the ground and rushing to keep up with Garcia.

  We came to a door beneath the grandstand, and Garcia nodded to the guard, who let the four of us in. Then we went down a long corridor past a number of dressing rooms, and stopped at one with Varga's name on the door. Garcia pushed it open, and there on the floor lay Pablo Francisco de Varga, still in his street clothes.

  “Is he dead?” I asked.

  “Drunk,” said Mr. Crush.

  Garcia knelt down next to him and slapped his face a few times. He didn't move a muscle.

  “We have a serious problem,” said Garcia, standing up and facing me.

  “Seems to me that Varga's the one with the problem,” I said.

  “We have bet more than half a million dollars on El Diablo,” he said. “If Varga does not appear in the arena, they will cancel the fight.”

  “Well, it ain't a consummation devoutly to be wished,” I allowed. “But on the other hand, it beats losing our money.”

  “You do not understand,” said Garcia. “I have promised some very powerful men that they would increase their money tenfold by wagering on El Diablo. These are not men who like to be disappointed.”

  “Well, El Diablo is gonna win by a forfeit,” I said.

  “The bookmakers do not pay off on forfeits,” answered Garcia. “No, someone must go into the ring and lose to El Diablo. The question is: who?”

  Suddenly I became aware of the fact that he and Mr. Crush and Mr. Smash were all staring intently at me.

  “Oh, no,” I said
. “You ain't gonna get me in a ring with El Diablo! I ain't never fought a bull before!”

  “Then you are precisely the person we need,” said Garcia. “I have guaranteed my principals that El Diablo cannot lose.”

  “Then you tell your principals that they're gonna have to learn to live with disappointment,” I said. “Nothing's gonna get me to step into that ring!”

  “My dear Reverend Jones,” he said, and suddenly Mr. Crush and Mr. Smash were pointing their revolvers right betwixt my eyeballs, “you have two admittedly unhappy choices: you can die in the arena amid the cheers of thousands, or you can die in the next ten seconds, alone and unmourned. I am afraid that there is simply no third alternative.”

  Which is how I came to be standing in the middle of the Plaza de Toros in Madrid in a fancy bullfighting outfit while El Diablo stared at me through his beady little eyes and pawed the dirt.

  Since I was supposed to lose, Garcia hadn't seen fit to give me a sword, so all I had with me was a red cape called a muleta. I was more than a little bit nervous at the prospect of hobnobbing with the Lord in person in the next few minutes, and my hands were shaking, and this made the muleta shake, and for some reason this annoyed the bejabbers out of El Diablo, who snorted and drooled a bit and then let out a bellow and ran straight toward me.

  Well, I figured if he wanted the muleta all that badly, I sure wasn't going to argue none about it, so I just dropped it on the ground and ran to the far side of the arena while he shredded the thing with his horns and everyone started whistling, though truth to tell I couldn't spot no melody.

  After he'd worked off a little excess energy on the muleta, El Diablo lifted his head and looked around, and when his eyes fell on me he pawed the dirt a couple of more times and then lowered his head and charged, and I made a dash for the grandstand and reached it about two steps ahead of him and flung myself into the first row while El Diablo plowed into the concrete wall that protected the customers and busted off one of his horns.

  He looked a little bleary-eyed as he backed off, and I figured I might as well stay where I was for the rest of the afternoon, but then Mr. Crush and Mr. Smash made their way through the crowd and reached my side and tossed me back into the ring, and El Diablo shot them an appreciative look and started sizing me up again.