Sand Dollars by Charles Knief

let’s do this Friday.”
    â€œAnd you got the money?”
    â€œI have it,” I said.
    â€œWhere you can get to it fast?”
    I nodded.
    â€œI’ll make sure that survey happens. Call me when you get back on Thursday, or on Friday morning. We’ll wrap it up then.”
    â€œAnd your commission?”
    â€œComes out of his cut,” said Kinsman, adding more wrinkles to his permanently furrowed brow. “Which will go down if he lowers the official price.”
    â€œI’ll make up the balance to you. In cash.”
    â€œJust what I wanted to hear. It’s nice doing business with a gentleman. Don’t see many of them these days.”
    â€œWe’re a dying breed,” I said.
    â€œJust don’t become extinct before Friday.”

10
    I skipped running the Embarcadero and spent slave time in the hotel gym instead, content to stay inside. The promise of rain had been fulfilled with a vengeance. Heavy showers pounded the streets and buildings, washing the beggars away to wherever they went when they weren’t pressing tourists for coin.
    I ate dinner in one of the hotel dining rooms facing the harbor. There was no sunset, just a gradual fading of the day until only the powerful quay lights of North Island pierced the black.
    My mood was as dark as the sky. I should have felt celebratory. I’d found Duchess’s replacement. Olympia would be a comfortable home. While I was working out in the gym, Jack Kinsman had left a message that the owner had accepted my offer, contingent upon the survey. That was no surprise. I’d never known a banker who didn’t know what to do with cash.
    A couple in the booth across from me caught my eye. They weren’t young, but they were obviously in the throes of that first, startling gasp of a new relationship. They were too sophisticated to paw each other in public, but in their own way they let it show. I envied them.
    The sound of the rain against the windows ebbed for a moment, then renewed its energy, lashing the building and rattling the glazing. People looked up from their conversations, glancing at the wall of glass and then at each other, and smiled reassurance before returning to their tasks.
    Everybody had somebody except me.
    I killed the glass of merlot, my only one for the evening. I didn’t feel like drinking, didn’t appreciate good food or good wine; I found that all tastes were reduced to that of ash. I dropped some bills on the table and went up to my room.

    The light on the phone was blinking. Claire Peters had left a voice-mail message that she was scared, that someone was lurking around the house and she felt she needed protection. I flashed for an outside line and called her.
    â€œPeters residence. Juanita speakeeeng.”
    â€œThis is John Caine—”
    â€œOh, jess, Meester Caine. Please hold for the lady.” There was a murmur, as if a hand had gone over the mouthpiece, then Claire’s voice.
    â€œJohn. Are you at the hotel?”
    â€œI got your message,” I said. “What happened?”
    â€œWe’ve had a prowler. Someone came into the backyard.”
    â€œAre you all right?”
    â€œThey’re gone, I think. But we would both feel better if you would come over.”
    â€œOf course. Fifteen minutes.”
    â€œFaster, if you can.”
    I hung up and retrieved my briefcase from under the bed, worked the combination lock and opened it. Nestled between banded stacks of hundred-dollar bills, secure in its holster, lay my Colt .45 Gold Cup and five eight-shot magazines loaded with Black Talon hollow-points. The lady said she was frightened. A prowler, she said. Someone lurking outside.
    I thought about it for a full ten count, then closed and relocked the briefcase and shoved it back under the bed. She already had an arsenal over there. If firearms were necessary, and I had no reason to believe they were, there was enough firepower at the house to