The Queen and I Read online

  Jeffrey David Rothstein had insulted the man, had insulted his idea, and even worse, insulted his cat. It was not something that Heinrich was used to experiencing, and it was certainly not a feeling that he enjoyed.

  As he watched the traffic moving along quietly below him, he suddenly thought that defeating Jeffrey at his own game was not going to be enough. It was one thing to see to it that Jacob Stone stole an unfinished manuscript and then rewrote it into the dream that was Kristallnacht and Noel; he would have to go beyond ruining the man’s future prospects and destroy his reputation among the Broadway elite, and he would have to crush what was left of his life. There was no going halfway on this; it was all or nothing at all.

  Once he had successfully seen his vision brought to life in an award-winning play, he would focus his attention on Jeffrey and see to it that he became the first celebrity contestant in his great hunt on the island. That should fetch even more than the usual ten thousand a night. For the thrill of killing a man who was at the top of his field, he could quadruple the fee.

  Jeffrey had no idea what was in store for him. His arrogance would be his downfall, and there was no getting around it. All he had to do was see to it that Stone was the man for the job and up to the task for which he had been hired, but there always needed to be a backup plan, and Heinrich had just the man in mind. He had not worked with him in years, not since boarding school, but he was certain he would bring that little extra something that perhaps Jacob would need if he became stuck while rewriting the manuscript and required some creative motivation.

  He bent down and lifted Herman into his arms and nuzzled him gently with his nose and walked back over to his desk. He pushed the intercom button that rested quietly there and told his secretary to get him Mendel Fujikawa.

  Chapter Four: To Catch a Hit

  Jeffrey and Rachel were safely away in the Caribbean, and Jacob was left to do what he had always done for as long as he had worked for Jeffrey; he answered the phone, returned e-mails, and saw to it that the national and local trade magazines received the obligatory responses to their questions about what inspired the writing genius to come up with such diverse characters and storylines.

  With the apartment to himself and all of the work caught up, Jacob had plenty of time to go through his employer’s prized collection of spiral notebooks that contained copies, original transcripts, and working ideas for plays that his boss had been working on. It was a veritable treasure trove of genius at work. Some of these writings had been only known about to Jeffrey, not even Rachel knew about them, and here was Jacob, thumbing through all of them and searching for the one that could best be rewritten into the dream script for Heinrich Schultz.

  Finding a completed work was not the problem, most of what was contained inside of these volumes was completed work, the only problem was that Jacob had never written an entire manuscript before, so he needed to find something that was finished and only needed some tweaking in order to become Kristallnacht and Noel.

  Going through the library of Jeffrey David Rothstein was a humbling experience, and Jacob could not believe just how proficient his employer and friend had been without him even knowing about it; he must have done most of his writing when there wasn’t anyone around. This was the work of a man who did not sleep much, and Jacob thought that this explained some of his boss’s idiosyncrasies.

  What he was most impressed about was the collective works that were not even published, these masterpieces of creative ingenuity and imagination. He had never been so impressed in his life.

  He came across The Rabbi Rings Twice, a tale of a female reformed rabbinical student who falls in love with her rabbi. While reading further, he thumbed through One Shiksa Summer, about a magical summer in 1950s New York’s Catskills for a group of teenage boys who each share romantic affairs with the new yoga instructor at the resort where they are vacationing. And of course, there was Ghetto Mishegas.

  This soon-to-be masterpiece that was never even whispered to Jacob was about a Jewish shop owner in the Warsaw Ghetto who survived the Nazi occupation by creating and selling Jewish piñatas to sell to the Nazi officers for their children. This was the one that Jacob was going to steal and rewrite into Heinrich’s dream play. The hard part had been done, the script was written; the only things that needed doing now were character changes and some basic storyline alterations. Jacob was supremely confident that he could pull this off.

  He was about to call Heinrich when the front doorbell rang, and Jacob’s heart skipped a beat.

  Wearing a rain-slicked, black trench coat and a wide-brimmed fedora with a pink feather tucked in the side, he stood at a mere five and a half feet tall, but walked with the air of a man twice his height. He was obviously of Asian descent, but there was something else in his face that Jacob could not yet determine. Who this man was or what he was doing there were both questions Jacob needed answers to, and to the best of his recollection, he had never seen or heard any mention of him during all of those long hours of working with Jeffrey.

  The little man barged in past Jacob without even being invited and quickly removed his coat, folding it neatly, and placing it on a chair next to a confused Jacob. He was wearing bright canary-yellow pants with a pink silk shirt and a floral-patterned Kashmir jacket with a canary-yellow handkerchief tucked into the pocket.

  “Can I help?”

  “Silence!” the mysterious man interrupted Jacob. He turned and slowly walked around Jeffrey’s apartment, rubbing his finger across the table to check for dust and examining pictures hanging on the walls. He stopped in front of the library and the collection of manuscripts and without turning asked, in an accent that could best be described as Yiddish with a hint of Japanese and a little nasally, “So, you found the one?”

  Jacob looked back at him with a puzzled expression and asked, “Who are …”

  “Silence!” the little man yelled again. “Only I ask the questions.”

  He walked to the kitchen and examined the wine cooler for something suitable to his palate and settled on a Chardonnay. He opened the bottle, poured himself a glass, and admired the color in the light of the kitchen before taking a sip and saying in that accent, “I like them woody.”

  He walked back into the living area and sat down on the sofa, put his feet up on the coffee table, and removed a pair of ivory-rimmed glasses from his pocket. He gave Jacob an admiring once over and looked as if he was going to ask him to turn around and show him what he looked like from behind, but only said, “I am a friend of Henry. We were schoolboys together, he he.” He winked and chuckled like an adolescent girl. “Is that the play?” He pointed to the notebook in Jacob’s hand. He had not even realized that he was still carrying it. “Let me see.” The stranger ordered seductively.

  Jacob gripped the volume tighter than he had been and angrily shot back, “Absolutely not until you tell me who you are, you crazy bastard.”

  The little man smiled and said, “I am a friend of Henry’s …”

  “I don’t want to hear that bullshit answer again. I swear to God that I’m going to call Henry, and then I’m going to throw you out the window!”

  A wicked smile crossed the face of the stranger, and he calmly said, “My name is Mendel Fujikawa.”

  Jacob almost dropped the manuscript. The man sitting in front of him could not possibly be Mendel Fujikawa. Jacob had heard of him, everyone in the industry had heard of him. He was the most feared and dreaded drama critic of all time; he was the man who performed more burials than Arlington National Cemetery, and just for fun, he was a coldblooded killer who was said to stalk sports bars looking for testosterone-driven, homophobic men whom he could seduce with his masculine wiles and lure to his lair where he disposed of them.

  These were all rumors, of course, since the man had never been tried, convicted, or even charged with anyone’s death. But this could not possibly be him, he was too short. The Mendel Fujikawa who Jacob had heard about was easily over six feet tall, weighed over
three hundred pounds, and was black. This had to be some kind of mistake or a joke.

  Mendel stood and walked lightly over to Jacob and gently took the manuscript from his hand. He smiled wryly, and for the first time, Jacob noticed that he was wearing pink lipstick and a touch of glitter on his cheeks. He licked his thumb dramatically and began going through the pages, reading quickly, laughing at some parts, and shaking his head at others.

  He handed it back to Jacob and said, “We have some cleaning to do before we leave, and then it’s time to get to work. You picked our play.”

  Chapter Five: If This House Is Rocking …

  He had bought this house as part of a greater dream, a dream to become a world famous author who mesmerized the world with his stories of love and betrayal, hope and loss, and the never-ending promise that comes from God.

  Inspirational words had moved him, and it was his gift that he wished to share with the entire world. Richard Kearney had always known that he was meant for great things, and his love of God was his medium in which to spread that gift.

  His plan was quite simple, like Jesus Christ before him, he would shun all worldly possessions other than what he needed to survive and sustain him. He would seek the salt of the earth to surround himself with and become one with his neighbors and the surrounding country that he ensconced his life in.

  It was as if everything was written out for him in a larger, greater plan that he need only follow and not fight in any way. Even when he bought the house, it was at such a below market price that it could only mean that divine intervention had played a large part in his coming into possession of it. And the house was perfect in every way that an aspiring writer could possibly want if he needed to get away from it all and have nothing but peace and quiet so that he or she could concentrate on their epic work.

  The community was charming, if not a little eccentric, and everyone seemed to know everyone. He felt welcomed as soon as he arrived. It was as if they were going out of their way to make him feel at home, and they succeeded at every turn.

  The house itself was nestled in a stand of fir trees and pines, and there were no distractions other than the morning sounds of scampering chipmunks and rabbits, the clicking sounds of woodpeckers, and the charming song of the male cardinal trying to impress his potential mate. It looked over a glass-calm lake that stretched over two miles wide and five miles long. The lake was said to be over seven hundred feet deep at its greatest depth, and it was spectacular to look at in the morning when the fog rested on its shores until it succumbed to the sun by midday. It really was a perfect house.

  There was just one little problem—the singing.

  At first, Richard had thought that perhaps a neighbor up the road had been throwing a late-night party and had brought the speakers outside, but the choice of music made no sense at all. Why would anyone be throwing a party that played ballads from Broadway shows like Fiddler on the Roof and The King and I? It was only when the music seemed to be playing inside the house itself, when he tried sleeping at night, and only continued to get louder the more he searched for the source of the mysterious music that he became mildly concerned.

  Finding nothing odd, he actually started to pass it off as nothing more than a little case of cabin fever due to self-imposed isolation, so he made a concerted effort to get out more and mingle with his new community. It seemed to work for a time. The singing stopped, and there were no longer any late-night solos to disturb his sleep.

  When he noticed that his shower was running all night, he became only slightly more concerned, but chucked that up to his working very odd hours and being just a bit forgetful. What was wrong with leaving the shower running at night, other than having a larger water bill at the end of the month?

  It was when he discovered the notes on his manuscript when he seriously became disturbed and convinced that he was either the butt of a cruel practical joke or something far more menacing.

  He tried everything in order to find the source of these clandestine notes by staying up all night in the cover of the kitchen alcove that looked out into the living area where he wrote. For two weeks, he stayed up and saw no one, yet he still found notes written on his work, and the critic was not kind about what he was doing.

  Richard finally called in the local sheriff, who kindly dismissed the problem as being nothing more than his imagination getting the better of him and suggested that he go and see a doctor since he was probably walking in his sleep.

  The doctors discovered nothing wrong with Richard or any evidence that he was having problems sleeping. Meanwhile, the sightings of odd and disturbing events only continued, and the singing had now moved from the basic choruses of Broadway hits to that of 1920s ragtime music and Jewish folk songs.

  He wasn’t sure what had happened to his peaceful utopia that he had created in this little corner of the world, but as the new song that he had learned in the middle of the night suggested, Those were the days, my friend.

  Richard was running out of ways to calm his thoughts and actions. He was becoming increasingly paranoid and even joined a local gym so that he could use their shower, convinced that he was being watched, even ogled, and that made him too uncomfortable to enjoy bathing in his own home anymore.

  He tried to reach out to his neighbors, but they, like most of the town, now looked at him only as the strange city boy who was hearing bumps in the night and was probably only looking to exploit their town for his own personal gain. He was without friends and confidants. Even his relationships in New York no longer wanted anything to do with him since he had burnt many bridges en route to his new lifestyle.

  Richard went to the local priest who suggested that he give himself to God and that he throw his burdens on his Lord and Savior by approaching him in prayer. This actually seemed to work for a very brief time, since Richard spent a large amount of his time at home praying to the Lord to help him through this trial in his life and the singing, notes, and finding the shower running had stopped. He was convinced that whatever demon had been haunting his existence had left him alone for good, until one night when he prayed before eating, when he finished his prayer, he heard a very low and scratchy voice say, “Amen.”

  After that, Richard spent the next month living in the local motel, but was forced to leave when the phone kept ringing at all hours of the evening and morning in his room and at the front desk until the motel proprietor asked that he check out immediately and never come back. So, Richard returned to his cabin and did nothing else but drink coffee, smoke more cigarettes than he ever had in his life, and even turned to alcohol to soothe his nerves to the point where he would just pass out. It was better than no sleep at all.

  He was a man alone in his little corner of the world; even the animals and birds who visited every morning and afternoon seemed to be avoiding Richard and his home as some kind of dark and terrible place that nothing could possibly survive of this world. He felt his life slowly slipping away, and he had no way to fight what was happening to him.

  All of the torment paled in comparison to what eventually happened that caused him to lose what was left of his will to stay in the house and pursue his dream of one day becoming an author.

  He was alone in the cabin, after just finishing his dinner and cleaning the dishes, when he poured himself a drink and went to the porch that looked out over the lake. His hopes were that the soothing effects of the sunset on his soul would somehow magically help him to cleanse whatever evil had been tormenting him for these past months, and maybe, just maybe, he could have a calm and peaceful evening.

  His hopes of peace and quiet quickly vanished when he walked to one of the chaise chairs on his porch. When he sat down, he distinctly heard that same deep, scratchy voice say, “Oy, try a salad!”

  That was the proverbial straw for Richard, and he wasted no time at all gathering his things and moving back to the city. He contacted the real estate agent who sold him the house and demanded that she put it back on the market. He car
ed nothing as to whether or not he made any money back on his investment, he just wanted to be done with the entire enterprise and return to his former life.

  His dream of becoming a motivational author who used the teachings of God to inspire others was gone, his clean lifestyle was replaced by that of heavy drinking and personal debauchery, and he swore that he would never return to upstate New York again.

  The house quickly became the stuff of local legend. Some of the town’s residents even started looking into the prospects of selling t-shirts and maybe even buying the first certified haunted house in the area, hoping to attract tourists.

  They were too late. Two days before the town council passed a resolution to purchase the property, another New York author purchased the house for far below market value and had already had his personal effects delivered.

  The town welcomed him as they did everyone else, but secretly they were taking bets on how long this one would last.

  Chapter Six: Betrayal

  The time away was exactly what Jeffrey needed. It had been years since he had gotten away from the city, and he and Rachel had never been on a vacation together in the five years that they had been a couple; one of the problems of two workaholics seeing each other.

  They could have gone anywhere they wished, but decided on a place where he would not likely be recognized and somewhere where Rachel’s beauty would not draw too much attention, so they decided on the tiny island of Curaçao.

  It was ideal due to the fact that it was not as popular a destination as its sister island, Aruba, and also because it was a Dutch colony, so it was not likely that the cold disposition of the Dutch citizens on vacation would bother anyone other than the servants, whom they treated much in the same way that the apartheid government had operated in South Africa, and with all of the topless sunbathers, Rachel could go unnoticed.