The Homeless Millionaire

"I got to the bar a little early," Roch said, "But Michel was already there. He was sitting at a table not far from the entrance and saw me come in, but looked right through me, as if I wasn't there. The deal we'd made was that I'd be at the end of the bar and he'd pass by me on his way to the can and pretend to notice me, surprise surprise, hey, what are you doing here, how are you, what a coincidence, all that bullshit. So I wasn't bothered when he pretended not to see me. I sat down at the very end of the bar and ordered a beer. They have this big mirror behind the shelf with the bottles and I was able to sneak a look at him without turning round. So after a while I notice something's odd. When he smokes he always holds the cigarette in his hand all the time, and now he's putting it in the ashtray after each hit and leaving it there. Finally he gets up and starts coming my way and when he's close I turn on the bar stool and glance his way. That's when the big meeting scene was to take place. But he's looking the other way, doesn't even glance at me, passes right by me without a word. I knew for sure something was wrong then so I didn't turn to look after him, I'm still looking towards the entrance as if I was expecting someone, and what do I see: this guy gets up from a table not far from Michel's, regular guy, jeans and leather jacket, longish hair, but his face says he's there on business. He walks past me and after a while I glance the other way and he's standing in front of the cigarette machine near the men's toilet, pretending to count his change to buy a pack. That's when I started to feel scared, Mike. I'm sitting there and I don't know what to do: go to the can and try to talk to Michel in there? Go home? Stay put? I had no f.u.c.k.i.n.g idea what to do. So I order another beer and stay at the bar and watch the guy at the cigarette machine out of the corner of my eye.

"He's getting fidgety and finally gives up pretending he wants to buy smokes, and goes into the can. Almost immediately, Michel comes out and stops right next to me and calls the barman and tells him he wants a shot of rye. He puts his hand on the counter and when he picks up his shot he leaves a small folded piece of paper. So I put my hand over it while he goes back to his table, and glance the other way and see the leather jacket exit the can in a hurry. He sat down at his table, behind Michel. So I finished my beer, ordered another, left it on the counter and went to the can. Once I'd locked myself in the cabin I read the note and it says, I got a tail, La Cage at ten, same procedure. I was instantly shitting bricks, had to smoke a cigarette before leaving the can. By then Michel was gone, and so was the leather jacket.

"I had an hour to kill, so I drank two more beers and a couple of shots and smoked all my cigarettes, had to get a fresh pack. I got to La Cage a few minutes past ten, and Michel wasn't there. I got a beer and kind of looked around, the place was getting really busy, so I moved around a little making sure to check out all the spots hidden from view. Before long it's nearing eleven and he's still not there and I'm starting to think the cops have taken him in. I had a couple of shots, I really needed them by that time. At eleven he still hadn't shown up so I decided to go home. Just as I'm approaching the door Michel comes in, gives me a grin and says hey, how is it going, so I tell him I was just about to leave and he says, don't you need a to take a leak first, it's a long walk to where you live.

"There was a lineup to the toilets and we ended up going out of the delivery entrance at the back, hid behind a parked van and had a quick talk. Michel said the cops were keeping an eye on several guys from the Ecole, himself included, it was actually another guy that caught wind of what was going on and told him about it a day earlier, and then Michel noticed he's got a plainclothes cop following him when he was walking to meet me at the bar. He didn't try to shake him because he was scared it would confirm he's guilty of something. Once he'd passed me the note he went home, put the light on in his room, then went out to the backyard and into the back alley and walked a couple of blocks checking for tails before going to La Cage."

I rubbed my face for a while in a futile attempt to make my brain work. It refused to cooperate. Eventually I said:

"So what do we do now?"

Roch shrugged.

"Finish this bottle and go to bed," he said.

"You sure no one has been following you?"

"Yeah. They're just interested in students from the Ecole. You know why?"

"How the f.u.c.k would I know why?"

"Okay, okay, relax. You remember that rope? The rope we used? Michel supplied it. He swiped it from the handymen's storeroom at the Ecole. The cheap bastard thought that would be a better idea than buying it, because the cops would be sure to check out the hardware stores, asking about any customers buying fifty yards of rope. That's a lot of rope, you don't get purchases like that every day. So that made the cops focus on the students."

"I'm a student too."

"You haven't started yet, you don't have any summer assignments to complete, and you don't hang around there."

"Phew."

"You can say that again."

"You said you have good news as well. You said that the museum is willing to negotiate."

"Yeah, that part went well. Denis called the director from a hospital payphone when he went in for his checkup and told him where he'd find a pendant that was stolen. And Michel took Polaroids of the stuff at his place and mailed them to the museum. He's talked to them a couple of times already, they're willing to pay but not as much as he asked."

"How much did he ask for?"

"Half a million."

"Half a million for all that stuff? That's crazy."

"They've rejected that. They're offering a quarter million tops."

"But that's peanuts! What is it, ten per cent of the value?"

Roch shrugged and said:

"We're not giving them everything back. You're keeping the Rembrandt, right? And Michel is going to keep a couple of pieces, too."

"It's still peanuts."

"A quarter of a million is peanuts? Don't be greedy, Mike."

"That stuff we took is worth a couple of millions, at the very least."

"What can I say. It's a buyer's market."

"How soon -"

"Not soon. The museum wants iron-clad proof we've got their stuff. Photos aren't good enough. And Michel said he won't contact them again while cops are following him around. He's staying away from Denis, too. But they agreed earlier that Denis will give the museum another call this week - by the way, we need to cut him in. He won't get as much as you or me but he definitely deserves a cut."

"I'm fine with that. He won't squeal?"

"No way."

"So we wait?"

"Yeah, we go on as if nothing's happened."

We went to bed after that; there was nothing more left to say, and it was nearing three in the morning. We got together for breakfast around noon. It was a sad, silent meal and we ended it with a bottle of Beaujolais to improve the mood.

It was Saturday, but neither of us felt like partying. I reminded Roch that I would be starting work at the Montrose Hotel on Monday, and thus wouldn't be able to help much with work on the house. So we went there in the afternoon, taking a couple of bottles of wine with us. We spent a few hours prepping the kitchen downstairs for painting; there was a lot of cleaning to be done. We got mildly drunk doing that and went home and got more drunk without talking much, and went to bed.

Roch left early the next day to do his Sunday family thing, and I spent the entire day at home without going out. I kept thinking about the whole situation and wondering how it would work out and to be honest, I couldn't imagine a happy ending. I couldn't imagine a bad ending either, most likely because I was scared to do so.

I didn't want to drink booze for the third day in a row, and I felt like shit. I spent most of the afternoon lying on my bed and staring at the ceiling and seeing nothing. I was starting work the next day and my studies in a couple of weeks, but my entire future seemed to be one big question mark: after all, I could have cops banging on the door at any moment. But I wasn't afraid or tense: I felt resigned. Whatever would happen would happen, and I'd just go along with that.

I forced myself to fry a couple of eggs and heat a can of beans for dinner and then forced myself to eat what I'd prepared. Doing anything took an enormous effort; I was so exhausted by the time I washed up after that desolate dinner that I went upstairs and lay down again and stared some more at the ceiling, smoking a cigarette from time to time.

Roch returned quite late, after half past nine. He'd had a few drinks with his old man after dinner and was flying high; when he looked in on me and we tried to talk, it quickly became obvious we were inhabiting different worlds. He went to his room and I did some more staring and smoking and thought that this was probably the first time in my life that I was really looking forward to a Monday.

Yeah, I just couldn't wait for Monday to start.