Trash - Andy Mulligan [63]
He was right about the key, of course, but – once again – he did not think his houseboy would draw it and take the drawing to a locksmith on the other side of the city. He did not think the houseboy would return, and try the copy the next time he got a chance, and note how it failed to match, drawing revisions carefully and crumpling the paper to look like trash, to smuggle it out again. He never thought that, just like my god father in jail, with years to think and plan – I, José Angelico, thought in years rather than days or hours. Sixteen times I tried the key-copies before we got it right. Then it was a question of waiting for the right combination of circumstances. When Senator Zapanta announced a three-month trip to Europe, it seemed the time. The house staff was scaled down. Repairs and re-decoration of several rooms was announced – this would mean so many visitors. I started to worry about the fridge in the servants’ kitchen, and I broke the thermostat twice, and mended it again. When someone suggested we call in the repair man, I told my friends that I’d run out of patience and would buy a new one myself, out of my own wages. The housekeeper promised she would try to make it a house purchase, but I told her that in this hot country we needed a reliable fridge, and I would not wait.
The housekeeper trusted me. The guards trusted me. The thing I worried about most was that once I’d filled the fridge with money, we’d be stopped at the gate and searched – we are routinely searched, of course. But I was José Angelico, with the right papers, and there were delivery vehicles going in and out all morning, and I’d wrapped the thing in plastic and roped it ready for loading. We sailed through.
Getting the money from the vault to the fridge? It took two trips. I chose a Thursday, which is when I pull all the household trash together for the dump truck. Nobody is surprised to see the houseboy dragging two, three or four awkward bags of trash around – especially when the builders are at work, making so much mess. When Senator Zapanta discovers the simplicity with which six million dollars disappears, I hope that he will fall to his knees and howl. Remember, Pia – and remember, Senator – whatever is said about me, I was no thief. I simply took back the money that was ours, and now I am about to put it in this coffin.
I have, of course, created the alternative route: if you have travelled this route, it is only with the help of Mr Olondriz – so I hope you are a friend. My final letter to him will lie in box 101, for 101 is the thing you cannot resist. With it lie instructions that only he will understand. The key to the box will stay safe with me.
Now I am so tired.
I am about to place the coffin in a grave that will be marked with your name, my child. I mean to find a way of returning it to the people from whom it was stolen. But if someone is reading this, it means I am almost certainly dead and the money is in their hands, and I can only say, ‘Beware, because this money belongs to the poor. That is what you cannot resist.’
It seems fitting that the Day of the Dead is approaching. We will meet again, Pia Dante, but in the brightest light.
It is accomplished.
A Note from the Author: What is a book-code?
I first came across the device in a novel by John le Carré. It was explained as a very simple code that relied on two or more people having exactly the same copy of a book. For example, if I know that you have the Penguin 1975 edition of Under the Volcano, I can get my own copy out and communicate thus:
234•15•1•3•3•7•4•16 •4/8• 2•6 •15•5•3•16 • 2•3•4•19•16•
The most important number is the first: it identifies the page. Now you’re at that page, you count fifteen lines down. At line fifteen, you go just one letter in, which gives you a capital ‘B’. Now go to line three, character three. It gives you an ‘e’. On you plod and you end up with Best. You now hit