Hit List

by Lawrence Block

“But you didn’t want to. Tell me more about this feeling, Keller.”

  “It was just a feeling,” he said. He wasn’t ready to tell her about his horoscope. He could imagine how she’d react, and he didn’t want to hear it.

  “You had a feeling another time,” she said. “In Louisville.”

  “That was a little different.”

  “And both times the jobs went fine.”

  “That’s true.”

  “So where do you suppose these feelings are coming from? Any idea?”

  “Not really. It wasn’t that strong a feeling this time, anyway. And I took the job, and I did it.”

  “And it went smooth as silk.”

  “More or less,” he said.

  “More or less?”

  “I used a letter opener.”

  “What for? Sorry, dumb question. What did you do, pick it up off his desk?”

  “Bought it on the way there.”

  “In Boston?”

  “Well, I didn’t want to take it through the metals detector. I bought it in Boston, and I took it with me when I left.”

  “Naturally. And chucked it in a Dumpster or down a sewer. Except you didn’t or you wouldn’t have brought up the subject. Oh, for Christ’s sake, Keller. The coat pocket?”

  “Along with the keys.”

  “What keys? Oh, hell, the keys to the apartment. A set of keys and a murder weapon and you’re carrying them around in your coat pocket.”

  “They were going down a storm drain before I went to the airport,” he said, “but first I wanted to get something to eat, and the next thing I knew my coat was gone.”

  “And the thief got more than just a coat.”

  “And an umbrella.”

  “Forget the umbrella, will you? Besides the coat he got keys and a letter opener. There’s no little tag on the keys, tells the address, or is there?”

  “Just two keys on a plain wire ring.”

  “And I hope you didn’t let them engrave your initials on the letter opener.”

  “No, and I wiped it clean,” he said. “But still.”

  “Nothing to lead to you.”

  “No.”

  “But still,” she said.

  “That’s what I said. ‘But still.’ “

  Back in the city, Keller picked up the Boston papers. Both covered the murder in detail. Alvin Thurnauer, it turned out, was a prominent local businessman with connections to local political interests and, the papers hinted, to less savory elements as well. That he’d died violently in a Back Bay love nest, along with a blonde to whom he was not married, did nothing to diminish the news value of his death.

  Both papers assured him that the police were pursuing various leads. Keller, reading between the lines, concluded that they didn’t have a clue. They might guess that someone had contracted to have Thurnauer hit, and they might be able to guess who that someone was, but they wouldn’t be able to go anywhere with it. There were no witnesses, no useful physical evidence.

  He almost missed the second murder.

  The Globe didn’t have it. But there it was in the Herald, a small story on a back page, a man found dead on Boston Common, shot twice in the head with a small-calibre weapon.

  Keller could picture the poor bastard, lying facedown on the grass, the rain washing relentlessly down on him. He could picture the dead man’s coat, too. The Herald didn’t say anything about a coat, but that didn’t matter. Keller could picture it all the same.

  He went home and made some phone calls. The next morning he went out first thing and bought the Globe and the Herald and read them both over breakfast. Then he made one more phone call and caught a train.

  Thirteen

  * * *

  “His name was Louis ‘Why Not?’ Minot,” he told Dot. “No ID on the body, but his prints were on file. He had a dozen arrests on charges ranging from petty theft to bad checks.”

  “Well, you wondered what kind of man would steal another man’s raincoat. A small-time crook, that’s what kind.”

  “Somebody gave him two in the head with a twenty-two.”

  “Mathematically, that’s the same as one with a forty-four.”

  “It was enough. Gun was silenced, would be my guess, but there’s no way to tell. Minot was walking on the Common, someone waited until there was nobody nearby, not hard to manage with the weather as bad as it was. Went up to him, popped him, and walked away.”

  “Must have been a vigilante,” Dot said. “Whenever he sees someone steal a coat, he wreaks vengeance. Charles Bronson can play him in the movie.”

  “What do you know about our client, Dot?”

  “I can’t believe this came from him. I just can’t.”

  “What must have happened,” he said, “is someone was watching the house on Exeter Street. As a matter of fact . . .”

  “What?”

  “There was a cab came along, dropped a guy in front of the place. I thought it was him, what’s his name, Thurnauer. Not that there was a resemblance, but I was seeing him from the back, watching him take a long look at the house across the street. But he walked away. Except maybe he just walked a little ways off and waited.”

  “And saw you go in and come out.”

  “In my pretty green coat. Then he tagged me to the place where I had lunch, and then he picked me up when I left, except this time it wasn’t me.”

  “It was Louis Minot.”

  “Wearing my coat. A day like that, rain coming down hard, he wouldn’t get too good a look at my face. The coat would do it. He stayed with the coat. Minot walked over to the Common, the shooter followed him, picked his moment . . .”

  “Bang bang.”

  “Or pop pop, if he used a suppressor.”

  “Who knew you were going to Exeter Street? Answer: the client. But I still can’t believe it.”

  “The cops believe it.”

  “How’s that?”

  “We already know what color Minot’s coat was. Do you want to guess what he had in the pockets?”

  “The keys and the knife.”

  “Letter opener.”

  “Whatever. I forgot about them, Keller. The cops made the connection?”

  “Well, how could they miss it? One guy’s stabbed to death and another guy turns up dead less than a mile away with a letter opener in his pocket? They found blood traces on it, too.”

  “I thought you wiped it.”

  “I wiped it, I didn’t run it through a car wash. They found traces. Probably not enough for a DNA match, but they can type it, and it’ll be the same type as Thurnauer’s.”

  “And the letter opener fits the wound.”

  “Right. And the keys fit the locks.”

  She nodded slowly. “Not hard to reconstruct. Minot moved up in class and took a contract, iced Thurnauer on Exeter Street and kept a date on Boston Common to get paid off. And got shot instead, bang bang or pop pop, because dead men tell no tales.”

  “That’s how they figure it.”

  “But we know better, don’t we, Keller? Minot said ‘Why not?’ to the wrong coat, and got himself killed by mistake. By somebody working for our client.”

  “You just got finished saying you couldn’t believe it.”

  “Well, what choice have I got, Keller? I have to believe it, whether I want to or not.”

  “Not necessarily.”

  “Oh?”

  “I was up most of the night,” he said. “Thinking about things. Do you remember Louisville?”

  “Do I remember Louisville? As if I could forget. The smell of bluegrass, the taste of a tall mint julep in a frosty glass. The packed stands at Churchill Downs, the horses thundering down the stretch. Keller, I’ve never been to Louisville, so what’s to remember?”

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Your trip there, the other time you had a bad feeling. And a husband tracked his cheating wife to your motel and killed her and her boyfriend in your old room.”

  “Capped them with two in the head fr
om a twenty-two.”

  “Jesus Christ. But they got the husband for it, remember?”

  “He didn’t do it.”

  “You sure?”

  “The cops are,” he told her. “His alibi held up.”

  “Do they have anybody else they like for it?”

  “I don’t think they’re looking too hard,” he said, “because they still like the husband. They think he arranged it, although he doesn’t seem like the kind of a guy who could arrange a three-car funeral. But they think he hired someone else to follow the wife and kill her in the act. Because it sure looked like a pro hit.”

  “Two in the head, di dah di dah di dah.”

  “Rings a bell, doesn’t it?”

  “Ding fucking dong. A whole carillon. Give me a minute, will you? And turn that damn thing off, I can’t hear myself think.”

  The TV had the sound off, the way she generally had it, but he knew what she meant. He hit the Power button and the screen went dark.

  After a long moment she said, “It wasn’t the client in Louisville and it’s not the client in Boston. It was somebody else who was after you personally.”

  “Only way it adds up.”

  “Only way I can see, Keller. It can’t be some avenging angel, has to even the score for Thurnauer or the guy in Louisville—“

  “Hirschhorn.”

  “Whatever. In Boston he staked the place out, waited for you to do it, then made his move. He didn’t care if Thurnauer got killed, just so he got his shot at you.”

  “And in Louisville . . .”

  “In Louisville he must have been watching Hirschhorn’s house. After you gassed the guy in his garage, he followed you back to the motel and—“

  “And?”

  “Doesn’t work, does it? He couldn’t have followed you back to the room you already checked out of twelve hours ago.”

  “Keep going, Dot.”

  “I’ll tell you, it’d be easier if I had a map and a flashlight. I’m in the dark here. If he went to the wrong room, the old room, it’s because he already knew where you were staying. He knew about the room before you did Hirschhorn.”

  “Bingo.”

  “Definitely not the client,” she said, “because how would he know where you were staying? He didn’t even know who you were. Keller, I’m bumping into the furniture here. Help me out, will you?”

  “Remember the drunk?”

  “Looking for his friend, wasn’t he? What was the friend’s name?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “None. Forget it.”

  “The name was Ralph, if it matters, but—“

  “How could it matter? He didn’t exist, did he? Ralph, I mean. Obviously the drunk existed, except I don’t suppose he was really drunk.”

  “Probably not.”

  “He knew where you were staying. How did he know? You didn’t make any calls from your room, did you?”

  “I don’t think so. If I used the room phone at all, it was well after he came knocking on my door.”

  “And you didn’t use your own name at the motel?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Must have tagged you from the airport, then. Or he put a homing device on your car, but the client gave you the car, and we already established that the client didn’t do this. Somebody else knew you were coming, or else, Jesus, followed you out from New York—is that possible?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Sure enough. Look, I think I know who it was.”

  “Who, for God’s sake?”

  “Go back to Louisville for a minute. I get off the plane and there’s a guy there to meet me.”

  “As arranged.”

  “As arranged, and there’s another guy, has a sign I can’t make out. I walk up to him until I’m almost in his face, trying to read what’s on his sign.”

  “That’s the guy?”

  “I think so.”

  “Because he can’t spell?”

  “Because he wasn’t waiting for anybody, unless you count me. Look, Dot, it has to be somebody who doesn’t know who I am.”

  “What does he do, just kill people at random?”

  “He knows what I do,” he said, “but not who I am. If he knew my name and address he wouldn’t have to chase all over the country after me. Why go after me when I’m working and on guard? Between jobs, what do I do? Watch a movie, take a walk, go out for a meal.”

  “Maybe he wants a challenge.”

  “No,” he said, “I don’t think so. I think he knew the guy who was meeting me, knew him by sight, and knew he was going to the airport to pick up the out-of-town shooter. So he made a sign of his own, one that wouldn’t match anybody coming off a plane, and he stood around and waited. And then I showed up and made sure he got a good close look at me.”

  “And then you went to the right guy, and that confirmed the ID.”

  “Who followed us to the car they had for me in long-term parking. And when I drove off in it he got on my tail.”

  “Straight to the motel.”

  “I stopped for a bite on the way, and looked at a map, but then I went and found a motel, and I wouldn’t have been hard to tail. I wasn’t looking out for it. I didn’t have any reason to.”

  “And he came and knocked on your door. Suppose you open up. Then what? Bang bang?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why not? Be easy, wouldn’t it?”

  “It would have been easy any time during the next couple of days. But he waited until I did Hirschhorn. And in Boston he waited until I got Thurnauer.”

  “What is he, polite? He lets the other person go first?”

  “Evidently.”

  “A real gentleman,” she said. “I’m trying to sort this out, Keller. He came looking for Ralph to make sure he was right about what room you were in. Then, once he knew for sure, he sat tight.”

  “He probably followed me around some.”

  “While you bought stamps and drove over the bridge to Indiana. Is that what’s on the other side of the river? Indiana?”

  “That’s right.”

  “And then you finally made your move on Hirschhorn, and he was close enough to know about it, and then what? He followed you back to the motel?”

  “He wouldn’t have had to follow too close. He knew where I was going.”

  “So you both drove there, and you went to your new room and he went to the old one.”

  “I parked in back, near the old room,” he remembered. “Out of habit, I guess. He’d have seen the car and known I was home for the night. Then he gave me a little time to unwind and go to bed, and then he came calling.”

  “Had a key?”

  “Or had enough tradecraft to get through a motel room lock without one. Which isn’t the hardest thing in the world.”

  “He goes in and there’s two heads on the pillow. He must figure you got lucky.”

  “I guess.”

  “It’s dark, so he doesn’t notice that neither head is yours. Doesn’t he turn on the light afterward? You’d think he’d want the chance to admire his work.”

  “He might.”

  “But not necessarily?”

  “Why bother, if he knows he nailed both parties? But if he does put the light on, then what?”

  “He’s been following you around all this time, Keller, he must know what you look like.”

  “The man he shot might look enough like me to pass,” he said, “especially with his face in a pillow and two bullets in his head. But say he realizes his mistake. What’s he going to do? Go door-to-door looking for me?”

  “He can’t do that.”

  “Odds are he figures I dumped the car, checked out, somebody drove me to the airport and I’m gone. One way or another he missed me. But my guess is he never turned on the light and never knew he screwed up until he read about it the next day in the paper.”

  “I’m trying to sort this out,” she said, “and it’s not easy.
You want some iced tea?”

  “Sure, but don’t get up. I’ll get it.”

  “No, it helps me think if I move around a little. What did you do after Louisville?”

  “Came home and lived my life.”

  “In terms of work, I mean. There was the job in New York, which was the one I had the bad feeling about, because I should have turned it down. Where was our friend while you were busy with that one?”

  “No idea.”

  “If he got on you here in the city, even if he missed you he’d wind up knowing your name and address. But nothing like that happened. Keller, what do you figure gets him off and running? What’s his wake-up call?”

  “It has to be he learns a contract’s been put out and a hit’s going down.”

  “So he starts off knowing who the subject is, but not the shooter.”

  “Has to be.”

  “And he stakes out the subject, or he picks up the shooter coming in, like he did with you in Louisville. New York, that artist, maybe he didn’t get wind of the contract in the first place.”

  “Maybe not.”

  “Or he did, but he couldn’t pick you up on the way in. Nobody met you, nobody fingered the artist. What was his name?”

  “Niswander.”

  “You showed up at the opening.”

  “Along with half the freeloaders in Lower Manhattan,” he said.

  “If he staked out Niswander, waiting for somebody to hit him, well, he’s still waiting, because you went and knocked off the client instead. What came after that?”

  “Tampa.”

  “Tampa. Something something beach.”

  “Indian Rocks Beach.”

  “You were down and back the same day. Even if he was ready to play, it was over and done with before he could have drawn a bead on you. And then comes Boston, and that brings us up-to-date, unless I’m forgetting something.”

  “I think that covers it.”

  “You saw him in Boston, isn’t that what you said? Getting out of a cab and looking at Thurnauer’s house?”

  “It wasn’t Thurnauer’s place. I think it was the girl’s.”

  “I’m glad you cleared that up. Point is you saw him, didn’t you?”

  “I saw somebody. Maybe it was him and maybe not.”

  “Here’s the real question. Was it somebody you saw before?”