by Ian Rankin
My knees and elbows were black with earth, and with my bruised face I knew anyone seeing me now would have little hesitation calling the cops. So I fairly jogged back to the VW and got in.
‘I saw them leave,’ said Bel. ‘When you didn’t come back straight away, I thought — ’
I stopped her panic with a kiss. What do you know, it worked, just as it had with Provost. In fact, she took another kiss and then another, this time with eyes closed.
I told her what I’d found out, but she couldn’t make much out of it.
‘Things seem to be getting more confused all the time.’
She had a point. It took us a while to find a road down on to Aurora, where we found ourselves part of the evening rush-hour. There was a drive-in burger bar, so we stopped there for dinner. The burgers were huge and delicious. Then Bel dropped her bombshell.
‘I want to see Sam.’
24
New York, New York. Hoffer was back in his element. He loved all of it, from Brooklyn and Queens to downtown Manhattan. He belonged here, along with all the other movers and shakers, the trick operators and cowboys and scammers. New York made sense to him, he knew its rules, knew when to play and how to play. Other cities, other countries: fuck ’em.
He stood outside the splatter gallery and felt so euphoric, he almost climbed the stairs to his office. Then he crossed to the diner and phoned his secretary instead.
‘Moira baby, I’m down here if anybody wants me.’
‘Sure. Constantine’s here.’
‘Send him down in five minutes.’
‘Okay. Did you bring me a souvenir?’
‘Hah?’
‘A souvenir,’ she persisted. ‘I wanted something royal.’ She sounded petulant.
‘Give me a break,’ Hoffer told her, putting down the phone. He didn’t recognise any of the waitresses. The one who came to his table told him it was vacation time, everyone waiting tables this week was relief.
‘And do you give relief as well, honey?’ Hoffer said, grinning. She stopped chewing her gum and gave him a look. You couldn’t have called the look ‘interested’. ‘Just coffee,’ Hoffer said, dismissing her.
He glanced at his watch. Five minutes gave him time for one quick coffee. He didn’t intend staying here, not with Constantine. That fuck always had an appetite, and never seemed to have money enough of his own with which to satisfy it.
Constantine was one of Hoffer’s three employees. He’d just come back from Boston, and Hoffer wanted the lowdown. Meantime, he drank his coffee and stared out of the window. The street was noisy with cabs and drunks and what looked like a few tourists. Someone who looked like a prospective buyer even walked into the splatter gallery. That had to be a first. Then he saw Constantine come out of the building. The guy was young, mid-20s. He was always sharply dressed. Hoffer reckoned he had a side job. He sure as hell didn’t buy all those clothes on what Hoffer paid him. Constantine was a shrewd guy, despite his years. He’d grown up on the street, or not far from it, and had a good way with words. He usually got people to talk.
Hoffer was at the diner door waiting for him. He put an arm round Constantine’s shoulder and led him away from the diner.
‘Let’s walk, get some air.’
‘I was gonna have some cheesecake,’ Constantine complained.
‘Sure, kid, later. First, tell me about Boston.’
What was there to tell? Armed with the information that the D-Man and Harrison had touched down there, all Constantine had done was find their hotel.
‘They only stayed one night,’ he told his employer. ‘Staff hardly saw them. Crashed out, I’d guess.’
Hoffer was only half-listening. Between his friend in the FBI and Robert Walkins’s contacts, he’d been able to find out a little about Don Kline. This past day or so, he’d found himself thinking more about Kline than about the D-Man. After all, the D-Man had never had the bad grace to disturb Hoffer at breakfast.
Kline was ex-NSC. Nobody seemed to know why he’d resigned; at least, nobody was telling. This niggled Hoffer, because now he couldn’t be sure who was paying Kline. Somebody had to be paying him. That trip to the UK must have cost something, plus he had men to feed. Kline was beginning to worry Hoffer more than the D-Man himself was. Maybe he was just nervous that Kline might track the D-Man down before he did. Maybe there was more to it than that ...
‘What’s that you said?’ Hoffer said suddenly.
‘The sister hotel,’ Constantine repeated. ‘That’s where they headed after Boston. They booked from their hotel.’
‘Sister hotel where?’
‘Here,’ Constantine said, opening his arms wide. ‘That’s what I’ve been telling you. Here in Manhattan.’
‘Where in Manhattan?’
‘The corner of 42nd and 7th.’
Hoffer was already waving down a cab.
The hotel was a typical tourist place, lacking style but clean enough to suffice. They’d booked in as Weston, and again they’d stayed just the one night. Hoffer handed a twenty to the desk clerk, as agreed. ‘Any idea how they spent their time?’
‘Sir,’ said the desk clerk, pocketing the money, ‘to be honest, I don’t remember them at all.’
‘You don’t, huh?’ The clerk shook his head.
‘Well, thanks for your time. Rate you charge, I’d’ve been cheaper renting a hooker.’Hoffer turned away and found himself face to face with Constantine. 'I don’t like it,’he said.
‘What?’
‘The fact that the D-Man’s been here. This is my fucking town!’ Then he stuffed his hands into his pockets and charged out of the hotel, nearly toppling two elderly tourists in his wake. Constantine followed him into the street. Hoffer turned so suddenly, the two almost collided.
‘Right,’ he said, ‘look at flights, trains, coaches, car rental, the lot. Leave nothing out. Names to check: Weston, West, and Wesley, pre-names Michael or Mark. And remember there’ll be a female companion.’ Hoffer turned away again and faced the traffic. He wasn’t seeing it.
‘What was he doing here?’ he asked. ‘What did he come here for? He must’ve had someone to see, maybe something stashed away.’
‘You don’t think he’s still here, chief?’
‘What am I, fucking Sitting Bull? Don’t ever call me “chief’, understand?’
‘Sure.’ Constantine swallowed. He’d never seen his boss like this. Come to that, he’d seldom seen his boss period. But the guy paid, always on time and always the amount owing, and you had to respect that. Money: it was practically the only thing, excepting the Giants, his mother, and the pairing of Cary Grant with Katharine Hepburn, that Constantine did respect.
‘So what’re you waiting for?’ Hoffer said. ‘A gratuity?’
Then he turned away from Constantine and walked away. Constantine watched him go. There was room in his heart for a moment’s pity. He wouldn’t like to be Leo Hoffer, not for a day, not for a hundred thousand dollars (which was what he reckoned Hoffer earned in a year). There couldn’t be many years left inside Hoffer’s oversized body, maybe ten at most. Guys his size never lasted; they were like dinosaurs that way, neither species meant to last.
Eventually, Constantine’s attention was diverted by a burger bar across the intersection. He dug into his pocket and started counting his change.
Back in his apartment that evening, Hoffer took a shower, then wished he hadn’t. His ears still hadn’t recovered from the flight, and he got some water and soap in one of them, making it worse. It was like the wax was moving in there, like it was alive, crackling. Maybe the stuff was evolving or mutating. He stuck a match in, but that hurt, so he let the wax be. Maybe it was more than wax, some infection or something. He took some painkillers and had a hit of his duty free. Then he slumped on his sofa and took a look around him.
The apartment didn’t have much to it. No personality or anything like that. It was a place to sleep, to ball sometimes, a place to cook up a meal if he could be bothered. He did
n’t have hobbies, and he wasn’t about to waste his time decorating or anything like that. He never brought friends back here, because he didn’t have any friends. There were a few guys he might go to a ball game with or play poker with, but that was always someplace else, not here. They were men he’d known on the force. Actually, these days, he hung out with more old hoods than old cops. A sign of the way his life had gone.
He couldn’t remember the last woman he’d brought back here. Why should he? They were always one-night stands, the woman was usually drunk, and so, come to that, was Hoffer. He had plenty to waste his self-pity on. He could sit here all night bawling inside like a baby. Or he could go get ripped at the bar down the street. Instead, he pulled out the file Joe Draper had given him. And he wondered again, what am I doing here when I could be in Seattle? He knew that’s where the D-Man would head, maybe not straight away, but eventually. So what was Hoffer doing hanging around New York? He reckoned he had half the answer: he wanted the D-MAN to do his thing. Because Hoffer too wanted to know who had set the D-Man up, and why. He wanted to know who else wanted the D-Man as badly as Hoffer himself did. Part of him didn’t like the competition. It was like someone was trying to steal his pet mutt.
But there was more to it than that. There was Kline. He still couldn’t see where Kline fitted in, but he knew Kline would be on the lookout for him. Since arriving back in the States, he’d been watching for tails, checking for bugs. Kline would be keeping tabs somehow. Hoffer didn’t want to look too keen. He’d hit Seattle soon, but on his own terms. And by then maybe Kline and the D-Man would be out in the open. That would be interesting. That would be very interesting.
‘Yeah,’ he said, nodding to himself. Then he got up and put his jacket back on. All of a sudden he wanted two things: a drink, and not to be alone.
‘Simple needs,’ he muttered, locking the door behind him.
25
It was time Bel had a disguise. So we dyed her hair dark and I helped her with a haircut. Her hair had been short to start with, now it made her head look like a hedgehog. Not that I told her this. She quite liked the cut, and ran her hand over her head, enjoying the feel of the bristles. She used an eyelash-brush to dye her eyebrows. Then she started playing with the make-up we’d bought in the supermarket next to the motel.
Bel trimmed my hair. She was good at it, she’d gone on a course once. My own choice of dye wasn’t so successful, and left my hair streaky. I didn’t bother with the eyebrows.
‘How do I look?’ said Bel. The truth was, she looked stunning. It was just that she didn’t look like Bel any more. Her eyes were heavily made up, black, and incredibly sexy. It was hard to look at them without looking away again quickly. She’d dusted her cheeks and applied cherry lipstick to her mouth. She’d bought some cheap jewellery, and now wore earrings and bangles and a gold chain around her throat.
‘You look different.’
‘Different is what we want.’ She pouted. ‘Now, Mikey, do I get to go to the hospital?’
‘Just don’t try an American accent, all right?’
‘You got it, Mikey.’
Actually, to my ears her accent was pretty good. Its only flaw was that it sounded like an actress doing it rather than the real thing. I guessed she’d picked it up from TV and films rather than from our travels.
She seemed confident, so I drove her downtown. Part of me was hoping she’d walk into Clancy’s room and be arrested on the spot. I didn’t think she’d tell them anything, but at least she’d be safely locked away. I considered phoning the cops from a callbox and tipping them off, only she’d know who’d done it.
So I dropped her off near the hospital steps and drove the VW around the block. There was a visitors’ car park, and since I couldn’t find a space anywhere else, I ended up there. The problem was, I couldn’t see the hospital entrance, so I got out of the van and walked about, kicking my heels like I was waiting for someone. I wasn’t alone. There were a couple of other men doing the same thing, plus a cab driver chewing gum and leaning his arm out of his cab to beat a tattoo with his fingers on the roof.
It was a warm evening, but not sticky. It had been about this time of year that I’d come here whale-watching. I’d been lucky. I’d seen several pods of Orcas. I couldn’t remember now why I’d wanted to watch whales, but I was glad I’d done it.
‘I hate hospitals.’ I turned towards the speaker. It was the cabbie. I walked over towards him. ‘I mean, I could wait inside, right? But I prefer to wait in the car. Inside, I could maybe get a coffee, but then there’d be that smell wafting up at me. You know that smell?’ He waved his hands beneath his nose. ‘That damned doctor smell, things in bottles. That sort of smell.’
‘I know what you mean.’
‘You need a cigarette?’ He offered me one, and for some reason I took it. He decided this had broken sufficient ice for him to get out of the car. Once out, he lit both our cigarettes. He had an ex-boxer’s face and a few faded blue tattoos on his arms. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt with a row of pens in the breast-pocket. ‘You ever wonder how many people are dying in there while you’re waiting outside, huh? How many are throwing their guts up or haemorrhaging? You get in a fight or what?’
I touched my face. ‘Yeah, sort of.’
‘Jesus, what did he hit you with, a tyre-iron?’
‘Actually, it was his fist.’
The cabbie whistled. ‘Big fuck, huh?’
‘Huge.’
He flexed his shoulders, wondering if he could have made a better job of my opponent.
‘Have you ever boxed?’ I asked him.
‘Yeah, I used to do some.’
‘I thought so.’
‘You?’
‘I’m a man of peace.’
‘Well, in my estimation, everyone’s a man of peace until he gets steamed up about something. I had a lot of aggression in my youth. What was I going to do, be a public nuisance or step into a ring? Step into a ring, all that aggression is licensed. It’s entertainment.’
‘You enjoyed it, huh?’
‘I didn’t much enjoy getting beat.’
I wasn’t listening any more. I was watching the entrance. A few people had just come out of the hospital and were standing on the steps. I recognised Kline first. It took me another moment to recognise Bel.
Kline was looking up and down the street. At first I thought he was looking for me, but in fact they were waiting for a car. One of his men, the passenger from the front car in Oban, spoke into a radio. Bel was staring at the ground. Kline had a hand on her arm.
‘Hey, you okay?’
The cigarette had dropped from my mouth. I turned away from the cabbie and walked quickly to the van. I went into the back, opened a cupboard, and brought out the Colt Commando. It was pre-loaded and ready for action. Then I got into the driver’s seat and started the van. The cabbie was wide-eyed as I passed him, one hand on my steering-wheel and the other gripping the gun.
Kline’s car was just arriving. They’d brought Bel down to the kerbside. I speeded up and hit the kerb, bouncing the van on to the pavement. Kline and his men looked surprised, then scared. They dived out of the way as I let rip with a few rounds. Bel didn’t need to be told what to do. She opened the passenger door and clambered in.
‘Hey, Kline!’ I roared. ‘We need to talk.’
He was crouching behind the car. ‘Fuck you!’
I fired another burst to keep them down, then reversed back on to the road, hit first gear again, and roared forward.
‘Get down!’ I yelled. I fired a burst up into the air, but they weren’t scared any more. The initial shock had worn off and they’d found their pistols. I felt rounds thumping into the side and rear of the van. But they missed the tyres. We took a hard right into another street, ran a red light and took a left. I didn’t know where the hell we were, but I knew we were out of range.
‘We don’t seem to be having much luck with our vehicles,’ I said. I was thinking: at the very leas
t now they’d know that I was seriously armed and driving a VW van. They might even have got the licence number. It was only three letters and three numbers, easily memorised. I kept checking in the rearview, but there was no sign of pursuit. I slowed down a bit until I’d got my bearings. Soon we were back on 99 and heading north.
‘Don’t you want to hear what happened?’ Bel said. She was shivering. I wound my window back up, then realised that wasn’t why she was shivering.
‘So what happened?’ I was more than angry with her, I was furious. I’d told her not to go, I’d known it was a stupid idea. Yet I hadn’t stopped her. I was furious with myself.
‘They must have been in the reception area, only I didn’t see them. I asked where I could find Sam Clancy, and the woman on the desk pointed me along a corridor. Only, halfway along they grabbed me. They had a good look at me, and then Kline told me to say something.’
‘You tried your American accent?’
‘Yes. The bastard hit me. So I started swearing at him, and all he did was smile. Then he told me he knew who I was and he asked me where you were.’
‘What did he call me?’
‘Weston.’
‘Not West?’
‘No, Weston. Or maybe West. I don’t know. Jesus, I was petrified, Michael.’
‘Did you say anything else?’
‘I told him I knew he killed my father and I was going to kill him for that.’
‘Well then, you’ve told him pretty much all he needs to know. He can’t let either of us live now.’
She bit her lip. ‘Thanks for bailing me out.’
