Queen of Spades Read online

  The individual carrels were full in that midday hour, so Chan set his books down at a table with only one other user, a young man in his teens, pale faced, with dark liner around the eyes and spiky rigid hair dyed a jet black. A gold ring dangled from a pair of flared nostrils, and he glared at Chan, then moved his body so as to shield whatever he was reading. The boy’s black leather jacket reeked of cigarettes and mildew, and as Chan looked him over, he surmised that each and any of these aforementioned qualities could have contributed to the fact that no one else sat at their table, despite the others being three- and four-full.

  Chan, however, was used to dealing with (and to) undesirables, and he paid little heed to his neighbor’s paranoia. Instead, he opened on the table before him the first volume of archives and began to scan it page by page for some mention of the Countess’s big night. It was a slow, arduous task. As Chan looked over each news story—about the school board, the city planning commission meetings, a rise in petty crime—the sparse, bare picture he’d held in his mind about Snoqualmie, the town in which he now lived, slowly grew inflected with texture, more colorful impressions. The mayor was some sort of crackpot, apparently, having designated a particular day of the month when all municipal workers could bring their cats to work. Another story described a high school charity fundraiser gone awry—in the midst of performing a difficult dance move, a troupe of students had fallen from the stage and injured themselves, one critically. Later on, the injured student, now in a wheelchair, had made a triumphant return to the high school gym at the halftime of an important district basketball game and received a standing ovation. At the close of the volume, Chan read in its entirety a story about a group of scientists who were claiming that the age of the tallest evergreens in Snoqualmie had been previously misjudged, and that they were actually much older, by tens of thousands of years. But his ledger remained empty—there was still no mention of the Royal Casino, nor the Countess.

  As he set aside the first volume and replaced it with the second, Chan looked up and saw that the young man at his table was casting furtive glances while scribbling something down on a sheet of paper. Their eyes met for a brief moment, and Chan, caught in the act of staring, managed a feeble greeting: “Hello there.” The young man snorted, slammed shut the book in front of him—a medieval history book, it appeared from the cover. Chan watched as his neighbor rose from the table, carrying off with him the book and the notes he’d been taking. At a wastebasket next to the stairs, the young man stopped, tore off the top sheet from his notes, crumpled it, and fired it into the bin with theatrical force. He then disappeared down the stairs, the sound of his heavy boots receding until it was quiet once more.

  Amused, Chan returned to the volume in front of him. As before, he skimmed each page, bypassing an entire series of investigative reports on zoning decisions that had aroused the ire of the citizenry. Instead, he read about a retired local man who won a statewide lottery and remodeled the basement of his home to resemble a 1950s diner; a few pages further, a pair of newlyweds had vanished on their honeymoon near Snoqualmie Falls—several days later, their ransacked backpacks and a dismembered foot with a hiking boot still on it was discovered. Forensic experts attributed the unfortunate couple’s demise to one or more grizzlies, and the Intelligencer ran a weekend edition that contained a pullout with numbered instructions on how to behave when confronted with the wild animals in the region. (You were never supposed to run, Chan learned—either fight back or play dead.) Chan was about to close the second volume when a small Local News item near the end, on December 24, caught his eye:

  DISTRICT RECEIVES

  ANONYMOUS GIFT

  Confirming previous reports, Public School Superintendent Cassandra Giles officially announced on Tuesday that the Snoqualmie Valley School District was recently the recipient of what she described as an “extraordinarily generous” donation from a private party. The amount remains undisclosed, as does the identity of the benefactor. “It was a condition of the gift,” Giles said, “that the donating party remain anonymous.”

  Giles further stated that it was the wish of the benefactor that the funds be spent on the district’s math programs as a way to commemorate Winter Solstice. “We need new textbooks, a computer, everything,” Giles said. “This gift will allow us to do that.” She also announced that one third of the funds would be set aside to award scholarships to three local students, aged seventeen and below, who could prove Fermat’s Last Theorem in the least number of lines.

  Chan thought the Countess could be capable of such an award—so precise yet lavish was the prize. One third of how much? he wondered. On his ledger, he wrote down the name of the Intelligencer reporter, Murry Handoko. Then he moved on to the third and last volume.

  By its end, an hour later, the name of the reporter was still the only mark Chan had made in the ledger. The bright afternoon had turned into chilly dusk, and he hardly had a lead. Chan stood and collected his belongings, replaced the three volumes on the shelf, and then approached the stairs. At their head, he paused at the wastebasket and, after glancing around, he reached into the bin and extracted the crumpled sheet lying on top. Flattening it on the cover of his ledger, Chan was surprised to see that instead of inscribing notes as he’d thought, the young spiky-haired man had been drawing: in a delicate hand, finely shaded in pencil, was a portrait of a grotesque face in an ancient, regal collar—it was a royal portrait, there could be no doubt about that, for underneath, the boy had written in a jagged block script: Charles II of Spain—Cursed.

  The next morning, after another fitful night, Chan phoned the Intelligencer. “I’d like to speak with a reporter named Murry Handoko,” he said to the switchboard operator.

  “The only Handoko here works in Archives,” he was told. “Please hold.” Chan was transferred and after several moments, a female voice answered. “Archives. Can I help you?”

  “I’m trying to reach Mr. Murry Handoko.”

  “Who is this?”

  “My name is Arturo Chan. I have a question regarding a story he wrote about four years ago.”

  “Mr. Chan,” the voice said, hesitating. “I regret I must disappoint you, but the person you are trying to reach is dead. He passed away last March. I’m his daughter, Faye.”

  “Oh! I’m sorry—”

  “It took us all by surprise. Is there anything I can help you with?”

  “I apologize for asking. But is it possible he left behind a notebook? The story ran on December 24, 1980. I wonder if there’s more information than was published.”

  “Why do you ask? Is this a personal matter?”

  “Not for your father, Ms. Handoko—but for me.”

  The voice paused. “What is this about?”

  “It concerns someone extraordinary,” Chan said, speaking slowly. “Your father may have crossed paths with her that day.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know much about her. She’s difficult to explain—over the phone.”

  “This isn’t some sort of joke, is it?”

  “No, Ms. Handoko—I assure you it’s not.”

  After a moment of silence, the voice finally informed him of a cafe called Scribes, located in Old Snoqualmie, only a mile from Chan’s apartment. A reporter’s hangout. “I’ll be there, Mr. Chan,” the voice said, “during happy hour, at half past five today. Don’t look for me. I’ll come find you.” Chan wrote the information on the ledger.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  That afternoon was the first rainfall Chan had experienced in the Pacific Northwest—a persistent warm drizzle. Out on the streets of Old Snoqualmie, he saw he was the only one with an umbrella—everyone seemed perfectly comfortable walking in the rain, even stopping to hold conversations on the sidewalk as they got wet. The umbrella marked him, and Chan was thankful when he reached the awning of Scribes and was able to place it inside the door under a coat rack.

  The cafe was crowded and loud at that hour, and Chan caught snatches of r
eporter jargon he didn’t understand. He ordered a glass of hot water, which drew dubious looks from everyone within earshot—the clerk returned with a cup on a saucer and said there was no charge. Chan left two dollars on the counter and inched his way through the crowd to a high-top table in the corner, where he settled down to await Handoko’s daughter.

  Presently, a small, dapper woman broke off from the line at the counter and approached him, carrying a drink. “Mr. Chan, I presume?” She held out her left hand. “I’m Faye Handoko. Let me guess—you’re a dealer.”

  “Yes,” Chan said, smiling, as they shook hands. “How did you know?”

  “The way you’re dressed.” Faye settled onto the stool opposite his. She eyed him carefully. “Where do you work? I don’t believe you told me.”

  “The Royal,” Chan said. “It’s just off the highway.”

  “I know the place. Nice spot. How long have you been there?”

  “Less than a month. I’m new in town.”

  “Welcome to Snoqualmie.” Faye raised her glass and drank something dark out of it. Chan sipped his water. “So,” she said after a moment, “I pulled my dad’s story from the day you mentioned. It piqued my curiosity. What do you want to know about it?”

  “I’d like to learn more about the mysterious benefactor,” Chan said. “I believe she may gamble where I work.”

  Faye’s eyes narrowed. “Mr. Chan, please don’t tell me you’re stalking one of your customers.”

  “No,” Chan said. “It’s not that. I’m interested in learning the way she gambles. I’ve never seen or heard of anyone who plays the way she does.” Chan paused. “Do you gamble, Ms. Handoko?”

  “Yes,” Faye said. “Of course. But I usually play in Auburn—I know too many people around here.” She lowered her voice. “When I gamble, I don’t want any distractions.”

  Chan smiled. “Then you’ll understand how unusual her play is: She either places no bets or one bet over the course of a whole evening. I was told by another dealer that one night three years ago, she placed two consecutive bets and won over a hundred grand. That was the story I was looking for at the library, when I came across your father’s.”

  “And why do you think they’re connected?” Faye said.

  “The donation feels like hers. The parameters of the award especially. The way she plays is highly mathematical—a system.”

  “Does she win?”

  “She must. Over the long term,” Chan said. “Otherwise, why not play more hands?”

  “Maybe she’s cheap.”

  “She hands out at least a thousand in tips every night she comes. There’s always eight or nine valets falling over themselves to escort her around the casino.”

  Faye laughed. “Okay. So you need to know more about her system, but first you need to know more about her.”

  “Do you think I’m misguided?”

  Faye inspected his face closely. “No,” she said, “you seem all right. You’ve done your homework, at least.” She removed a small, black, leather-bound notebook from her satchel and placed it on the table next to her glass. “This is my father’s notebook from 1980,” she said. “Before we open it, you must tell me what you plan to do if you learn this system.”

  “I’ll play it,” Chan said after a moment. “If I can. Wouldn’t you?”

  “Yes. If you found out and told me.”

  Chan said he understood. “Thanks again for doing this,” he said.

  Faye flipped through the book to the month of December and showed Chan her father’s shorthand, a jagged, near illegible script. “December 23, 1980,” she said. “Cassandra Giles—that’s the name of the superintendent. He spoke with her that day. There was a private donation—anonymous—you already know that. Amount undisclosed, but was told off the record it exceeded a hundred thousand dollars.”

  “Interesting,” Chan said. “That’s the right number.”

  “Here’s something else,” Faye said. She pointed to two numbers circled underneath the notes: a three and a seven. “My dad believed in seven basic rules of investigative reporting,” she explained. “These must be rules that directly pertain to this story.”

  She flipped back to the front of the book. Chan watched her scan the pages, quickly and without fuss. “Here they are.” She turned the notebook so Chan could see.

  1. Avoid political affiliation.

  2. Be equally aggressive with friend and foe.

  3. Know your subject (do your homework!).

  4. Do not use tricks or pretense unless absolutely necessary.

  5. Do not exaggerate or distort the facts unless absolutely necessary.

  6. Do not violate the law unless you are willing to suffer the consequences.

  7. Never take someone’s word for their identity.

  Chan read rules three and seven again. Finally, he said, “I understand rule three—but what about seven?”

  “This woman you’re interested in,” Faye said. “There must be information connecting her somewhere. Does she have a home? A car?”

  “No one knows where she lives—I’ve asked around. But her car is unique: it’s a silver Rolls Royce Phantom limousine, 1960s era. There can’t be many of those on the road.”

  Faye nodded. “Not around here. But if it’s registered, it can be traced.” She recorded the information in the margin of the notebook, then closed it and returned it to her satchel. She looked at Chan. “If I have time, I’ll look into it.”

  “I really appreciate your help, Ms. Handoko.”

  “Perhaps I’ll see you at the Royal sometime.” She slid her business card across the table—Faye Handoko, Archivist. “Good luck, Mr. Chan,” she said, rising from her seat. “Remember to call me when you discover the secret to gambling.”

  “I promise,” said Chan. They shook hands again, longer this time, and Chan wondered whether he shouldn’t say more.

  After Faye rejoined the crowd around the counter, Chan left Scribes and walked home to his apartment, his mind swimming with the image of the Countess’s limousine. He imagined the long, silver car parked in its spot near the valet stand at the Royal—it would be there that night. Her car was the key—that’s what Handoko had been reminding himself, and whoever happened to decipher his cryptic notes. In this excitable frame of mind, it wasn’t until several hours later, when Chan was preparing to leave for the Royal in a downpour, that the thought finally struck him that in leaving Scribes, he’d completely forgotten his umbrella beside the door.

  The Oblong Box

  During Mannheim’s first session with Dr. Eccleston, she had brought out a small, gray tin-metal box with two dials on its face. She called the machine her “intaker,” and before any further word was exchanged, she carefully connected a series of five diodes to Mannheim’s temples, wrists, and chest. When this was done, he was made to lie back on a generously upholstered armchair, his feet on an ottoman and the back of his neck coming to rest against the pillow.

  Dr. Eccleston sat next to him, beside an impressive desk that appeared to have been carved from a single tree. When she spoke, her pencil poised over clipboard, her voice was prim and measured.

  “Please state your full name.”

  “Stephen Mannheim.”

  “Age?”

  “Sixty-two.”

  “Occupation?”

  “I’m a pit boss at the Royal Casino.” Mannheim watched as Dr. Eccleston noted this on her clipboard. “I run the graveyard shift.”

  “So what brings you here today, Mr. Mannheim?”

  “I was—ah, referred by Dr. Sarmiento.”

  Dr. Eccleston nodded. “And why did she refer you?”

  Mannheim cleared his throat. “During our last visit, she informed me that I was dying. Not tomorrow, but soon.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” Dr. Eccleston said. “She often asks me to consult in these kinds of terminal cases. What is your prognosis, if I may ask?”

  “Six months—or less.” Your protégé knew this already, he
felt the urge to add, but resisted.

  “Good,” said Dr. Eccleston. “There’s time.”

  Mannheim chuckled nervously. “To be honest, I’m not sure. The symptoms Dr. Sarmiento describes are highly distressing—amnesia, blackouts, hallucinations of all kinds. Suicidal thoughts.” Unbidden, the noose returned to his mind, and Mannheim shoved it down. “I don’t—can’t—face this alone, at least not right now. I want to become all right with it—everyone dies, you know?” Again he laughed mirthlessly. “But I guess I’m not okay at this moment.”

  “Is there anyone else who knows?”

  “No. There’s not really anybody I can tell. Just my dealers, and I don’t want them knowing. I don’t think I could stand that. You see,” he said with sudden emotion, “I am a quiet, unobtrusive man. I don’t want to be made a spectacle of.”

  “I understand, Mr. Mannheim.” She seemed to write for a long time. In the intervening silence, the machine emitted a low, steady hum. Then she said, “These symptoms you’re speaking of—have you experienced any of them yet?”

  “Yes,” said Mannheim. “One morning, before I knew I was sick—it was why I went to see Dr. Sarmiento in the first place—I woke up in bed still dressed in my clothes from the night before, and in my pockets were receipts for random things, drinks, food that I don’t remember ordering or eating.” Mannheim’s fingers trembled at the recollection. “Have you heard of such a thing?”