A Brilliant Plan

Chapter 11

SATURDAY I GOT up early to burn some of the extra calories I had collected over the Thanksgiving holiday. I ran three miles in the nearby park, did some stretches to keep me elastic and ended with some fast kickboxing moves against an innocent tree.

During the final run back to my car, I made a stop at a non-descript phone booth. Using an anonymous long distance calling card that was only used once and for this call only, I made a call to Philadelphia. With three hours ahead, Yehova Feingold had just opened his shop on Philly's jewelers' row, near the old town district. His creaky old voice took the call and I said, "Hello Uncle Yehova, it is Sarah speaking."

He didn't hesitate. "Sarah, my good child, how are you? Happy Thanksgiving."

After a few non-relevant pleasantries, I said, "By the way, Uncle Yehova, I came across some silver chandeliers with engravings. Would you be interested?" Anything to do with light was our code name for diamonds and any latter modification like 'engraved' meant 'cut.'

I immediately knew that something was wrong because he didn't ask me how many chandeliers I had to offer. Instead, there was a second of silence.

"Yehova?"

"Dear child, dear Sarah." Yehova was stalling, trying to find a way to say 'no.' A complete novelty. "Are they a recent acquisition of yours?"

"I got them a few days ago and I immediately thought of you."

"My child, I am afraid I have no use for them at the moment."

"Uncle, what is the matter? Is family coming over from Europe?" 'Family' was the code word for police.

Stalling, Yehova blew his nose. "You know... my mother told me not to buy any new stuff right now."

His mother, who was his mother? That code didn't exist. I decided to blow the spy talk. "Whose mother? Not yours, Uncle, you are close to 75."

"No, the mother of the, eh, East. In a literal sense."

Mother of the East? What did he mean? Who the heck? A mother was an authority figure, some kind of politician? Uh... oh... things were beginning to dawn on me. I dropped the handset of the phone, did a few steps back and began to kick a nearby trashcan with all my might. It fell over and spilled paper, trash and a fat rat that took off toward the next rain gutter. I picked up the phone again.

"Nothing you could do? Make an exception for a little girl?"

There was another silence, and then he hung up, kind of an apologetic gesture.

Shit. I kicked the trashcan again. Hurt my big toe. Did a little scream and dance. Everything coming down on me. Continued to jog back home.

Yehova Feingold was my main contact for getting rid of my stolen goods. To this point, we had always had a good and fine working relationship, never a hitch. I specialized in uncut stones or bigger cut stones and he would cut, divide or modify the stones and, to say it in banking terms, laundered the jewels.

But Thomas 'The Fence' Cornelius III had somehow pulled the stops. Mother of the East. That meant that I couldn't try any of my other Eastern contacts besides Yehova. To prove the point, I made another stop at a pay phone and called another number, this time in Miami. This time a nice Spanish-speaking lady told me in a haughty voice that all transactions were currently suspended, call back another time.

Another call to Boston gave me a similar response.

I was stuck. I was stuck with 200K worth of stones that were hotter than hell.