Numbers Don't Lie Read Online Free Page B

asked.
    â€œI never took drawing,” Vinnie said, “so listen up close.”
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    Vinnie’s instructions had to do with an abandoned railroad track, a wrong-way turn onto a one-way street, a dog-leg that cut across a health club parking lot, and several other ins and outs. While I was negotiating all this, Wu was scrawling the back of a car-wash flyer he had taken from Vinnie’s counter.
    â€œThe tide,” he muttered. “I should have known!”
    I didn’t ask him what he meant; I figured (I knew!) he would tell me. But before he had a chance, we were bouncing down a dirt track through some scruffy trees, and onto the now-familiar dirt streets of the Hole. “Want some more moon rocks?” I asked when we passed the kids and their stand.
    â€œI’ll pick up my own today, Irv!”
    I pulled up by the gate and we let ourselves in. Wu carried the shopping bag; he gave me the toolbox.
    The old man was working on an ancient 122, the Volvo that looks like a ’48 Ford from the back. (It was always one of my favorites.) “It’s electric,” he said when Wu and I walked up.
    â€œThe 122?” I asked.
    â€œThe dune buggy,” the old man said. “Electric is the big thing now. All the cars in California are going to be electric next year. It’s the law.”
    â€œNo, it’s not,” I said. “So what, anyway?”
    â€œThat makes that dune buggy worth a lot of money.”
    â€œNo, it doesn’t. Besides, you already agreed on a price.”
    â€œThat’s right. Five hundred,” Wu said. He pulled five bills from his pocket and unfolded them.
    â€œI said I couldn’t take less than five hundred,” the old man said. “I never said I couldn’t take more.”
    Before Wu could answer, I pulled him behind the 122. “Remember the second thing we learned in law school!” I said. “When to walk away. We can come back next week—if you still want that thing.”
    Wu shook his head. “It won’t be here next week. I realized something when Vinnie told us that the Hole was getting hard to find. The adjacency is warping the neighborhood as well as the cislunar space-time continuum. And since it’s lunar, it has a monthly cycle. Look at this.”
    He handed me the car wash flyer, on the back of which was scrawled:
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    â€œSee?” said Wu. “We’re not just dealing with an incongruent neotopological metaeuclidean adjacency. We’re dealing with a periodic incongruent neotopological metaeuclidean adjacency.”
    â€œWhich means . . .”
    â€œThe adjacency comes and goes. With the Moon.”
    â€œSort of like PMS.”
    â€œExactly. I haven’t got the figures adjusted for daylight savings time yet, but the Moon is on the wane, and I’m pretty sure that after today, Frankie will be out of the illegal dumping business for a month, at least.”
    â€œPerfect. So we come back next month.”
    â€œIrv, I don’t want to take the chance. Not with a million dollars at stake.”
    â€œNot with a what?” He had my attention.
    â€œThat LRV cost two million new, and only three of them were made. Once we get it out, all we have to do is contact NASA. Or Boeing. Or the Air & Space Museum at the Smithsonian. But we’ve got to strike while the iron is hot. Give me a couple of hundred bucks and I’ll give you a fourth interest.”
    â€œA half.”
    â€œA third. Plus the P1800.”
    â€œYou already gave me the P1800.”
    â€œYeah, but I was only kidding. Now I’m serious.”
    â€œDeal,” I said. But instead of giving Wu two hundred, I plucked the five hundred-dollar bills out of his hand. “But you stick to the numbers. I do all the talking.”
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    We got it for six hundred. Non-refundable. “What does that mean?” Wu asked.
    â€œIt means you