The Music of Chance by Paul Auster

You’ll be so impressed, your mouth will drop open. I guarantee it. I’ll make the eyes fall out of your fucking head.”

3

    N ashe understood that he was no longer behaving like himself. He could hear the words coming out of his mouth, but even as he spoke them, he felt they were expressing someone else’s thoughts, as if he were no more than an actor performing on the stage of some imaginary theater, repeating lines that had been written for him in advance. He had never felt this way before, and the wonder of it was how little it disturbed him, how easily he slipped into playing his part. The money was the only thing that mattered, and if this foul-mouthed kid could get it for him, then Nashe was willing to risk everything to see that it happened. It was a crazy scheme, perhaps, but the risk was a motivation in itself, a leap of blind faith that would prove he was finally ready for anything that might happen to him.
    At that point, Pozzi was simply a means to an end, the hole in the wall that would get him from one side to the other. He was an opportunity in the shape of a human being, a card-playing specterwhose one purpose in the world was to help Nashe win back his freedom. Once that job was finished, they would go their separate ways. Nashe was going to use him, but that did not mean he found Pozzi entirely objectionable. In spite of his wise-ass posturing, there was something fascinating about this kid, and it was hard not to grant him a sort of grudging respect. At least he had the courage of his convictions, and that was more than could be said of most people. Pozzi had taken the plunge into himself; he was improvising his life as he went along, trusting in pure wit to keep his head above water, and even after the thrashing he had just been given, he did not seem demoralized or defeated. The kid was rough around the edges, at times even obnoxious, but he exuded a confidence that Nashe found reassuring. It was still too early to know if Pozzi could be believed, of course, but considering how little time there had been for him to invent a story, considering the farfetched plausibility of the whole situation, it seemed doubtful that he was anything other than what he claimed to be. Or so Nashe assumed. One way or the other, it wouldn’t take long for him to find out.
    The important thing was to appear calm, to rein in his excitement and convince Pozzi that he knew what he was doing. It wasn’t exactly that he wanted to impress him, but he instinctively felt that he had to keep the upper hand, to match the kid’s bravura with a quiet, unflinching confidence of his own. He would play the old man to Pozzi’s upstart, using the advantage he had in size and age to give off an aura of hard-earned wisdom, a steadiness that would counterbalance the kid’s nervous, impulsive manner. By the time they came to the northern reaches of the Bronx, Nashe had already settled on a plan of action. It would mean paying out a little more than he would have liked, perhaps, but in the long run he figured it would be money well spent.
    The trick was not to say anything until Pozzi started asking questions, and then, when he did ask them, to be ready with goodanswers. That was the surest way to control the situation: to keep the kid slightly off balance, to create the illusion that he was always one step ahead of him. Without saying a word, Nashe steered the car onto the Henry Hudson Parkway, and when Pozzi finally asked him where they were going (as they drove past Ninety-sixth Street), Nashe said: “You’re all worn out, Jack. You need some food and sleep, and I could go for a little lunch myself. We’ll check into the Plaza and take it from there.”
    “You mean the Plaza Hotel?” Pozzi said.
    “That’s right, the Plaza Hotel. I always stay there when I’m in New York. Any objections?”
    “No objections. I was just wondering, that’s all. Sounds like a good idea to me.”
    “I thought you’d like it.”
    “Yeah, I like