Jane 8086 Part Three

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  "That man is cheating, Remi. Why is he doing that?" asked Jane. She was referring to the shell game that they'd stopped to watch. It was standard street fare run by the local hoodlums. A shill had made an easy twenty while the crowd gathered and they'd just taken down their first mark. A young man operated three cups on top of a box. All you had to do was choose the cup that the pea was under after a quick shuffle. What the mark didn't know was that there was never a pea under any cup when the shuffle was done...the operator always managed to palm it by sleight of hand.

  "Shush!" Remi said, pulling Jane to the side, "if you call them cheaters, we're likely to get knifed over it!"

  Jane gave Remi a startled, wide-eyed look before shaking her head. "This is unacceptable. You're in danger, Remi. We can't have people like this living so close to our home. I will expose him. These honest people are unaware of his deception."

  "No, Jane! We can't do that, we're going to get in to trouble," Remi whispered as he spotted the vicious thugs amongst the crowd. They were waiting for the first sign of customer dissatisfaction. Jane paid him no heed and walked back to the gathering just as the mark had lost his second round.

  "Come on!" the young man exclaimed, having just lost another twenty on an empty cup.

  Jane deftly reached in to the operators sleeve and pulled out the pea. She turned to the crowd and held it up triumphantly for everyone to see. Shocked and discordant looks mixed with dropped jaws all round. Jane flashed the crowd a huge smile to compensate for their jarred expressions. She looked as though she'd won first place in a race and was holding her medal up for everyone to admire. "This man is deceiving you, good people of earth!" she proclaimed before turning to the operator, "You are therefore, NOT a nice man." She said the word 'not' as though it were the harshest judgment in the world. "You've one chance for salvation, man who hides the pea!" announced Jane, "give this man back what you stole and leave this area immediately or I shall have no choice but to alert the relevant authorities."

  "Who the hell do you think you are, lady?" the operator asked with an irritated look on his face.

  "My name is Jane," she said with a half smile, "and it is not a pleasure to have met you."

  Suddenly Remi was at her side, gently tugging at her arm, "Jane, we have to go now."

  "No, Remi," Jane insisted, "the pea man is wrong. I have read about justice in this world and—"

  "Buddy, I think you better take your girlfriend and hit the bricks before someone gets hurt," said the operator, brandishing a menacing stare.

  "The blonde chick is right!" yelled the mark, "I want my money back!"

  "Yeah! I want my twenty back too!" shouted another voice in the crowd.

  "Me too!" came another voice.

  "Get em!" someone screamed...and then there was chaos as the crowd rushed the operator. Remi didn't wait to find out if the well-placed thugs around the scene would be able to help their leader escape the massacre. He grabbed Jane and pulled her in to a nearby bodega just as the fight reached its peak.

  "Please don't do that again!" Remi pleaded.

  "We're here to help, Remi. The pea hiding man will receive the justice that he deserves through the authorities or the will of the people. We have righted a wrong. Ooh...what are these?" Jane asked, suddenly distracted by the man at the counter who was about to use a coin on scratcher lottery tickets.

  "They're to win money," said Remi, "the owner puts down nine scratchers, you pick three and then scratch off the silver to win. Three of any shape means that you've won."

  "This one, this one and this one," Jane said, pointing to three tickets with her slender, well manicured index finger.

  "Okay, gorgeous. Lord knows every time I pick 'em myself I never win."

  "Let's go," said Remi as he pulled Jane along, "the fight's moved down the street." They were through the door and halfway down the block when the rotund patron from the bodega shouted from far behind them, "hey, gorgeous! All three were winners! I made two thousand bucks!" Jane smiled back and mimicked the man's wave while Remi quickly hailed a cab.

  "We've got to go somewhere a little quieter before you end up on the six 'o clock news!" He pushed Jane into the cab and climbed in after her. "11th and Gardenia, please," said Remi.