Transgressions

by Ed McBain

  “Sure. How was your day?”

  “I did great,” Echo said, still finding small ways to fuss over him: brushing his hair back from his forehead with the heel of one hand, dabbing at a drip of sauce on his chin with a napkin. “I deserve a raise.”

  “About time. How’s your mom?”

  “Didn’t have a real good day, Julia said. Want another beer?”

  “Makes you think I had one already?”

  “Ha-ha,” Echo said; she went out to the porch to fish the beer from the depths of the cooler. Peter’s sister Siobhan, the bride-to-be, followed her unsteadily inside, back on her heels from an imaginary gale in her face. Her eyes not tracking well. She embraced Peter with a goofy smile.

  “I’m so happy!”

  “We’re happy for you, Siobhan.” At thirty-five she was the oldest of the seven O’Neill children, and the least well favored. Putting it mildly.

  Her fiancé appeared in the doorway behind Siobhan. He was a head shorter, gap-toothed, had a bad haircut. A software salesman. Doing very well. He drove a Cadillac, had put a down payment on a condo in Vally Stream and was planning an expensive honeymoon cruise. The diamond on Siobhan’s finger was a big one.

  Peter saluted the fiancé with his can of beer. Siobhan straightened unsteadily and embraced Echo too, belching loudly.

  “Oops. Get any on ya?”

  “No, sweetie,” Echo said, and passed her on to the fiancé, who chuckled and guided her through the kitchen to a bathroom. Peter shook his head.

  “What they say about opposites.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Siobhan has a lot to learn. She still thinks ‘fellatio’ is an Italian opera.”

  “You mean it’s not?” Echo said, wide-eyed. Then she patted his cheek. “Lay off. I love Siobhan. I love all your family.”

  Peter put the arm on his fourteen-year-old brother Casey as he came inside from the porch, and crushed him affectionately.

  “Even the retards?”

  “Get outta here,” Casey said, fighting him off.

  “Casey’s no retard, he’s a lover,” Echo said. “Gimme kiss, Case.”

  “No way!” But Echo had him grinning.

  “Don’t waste those on that little fart,” Pete said.

  Casey looked him over. “Man, you’re gonna have a shiner.”

  “I know.” Pete looked casually at Echo and put his sandwich down. “It’s a sweatbox in here. Why don’t we go upstairs a little while?”

  Casey smiled wisely at them. “Uh-uh. Aunt Pegeen put the twins to sleep on your bed.” He waited for the look of frustration in Peter’s eyes before he said, “But I could let you use my room if you guys want to make out. Twenty bucks for an hour sound okay?”

  “Sounds like you think I’m a hooker,” Echo said to Casey. Staring him down. Casey’s shoulders dropped; he looked away uneasily.

  “I didn’t mean—”

  “Now you got a good reason not to skip confession again this week,” Peter said. Glancing at Echo, and noticing how tired she looked, having lost her grip on her upbeat mood.

  Driving Echo back to the city, Pete said, “I just keep goin’ round and round with the numbers, like a dog chasin’ its tail. You know?”

  “Same here.”

  “Jesus, I’m twenty-six, ought to have my own place already instead of living home.”

  “Our own place. Trying to save anything these days. The taxes. Both of us still paying off college loans. Forty thousand each. My mom sick. Your mom was sick—”

  “We both got good jobs. The money’ll come together. But we’ll need another year.”

  Peter exited from the Queensboro Bridge and took First uptown. They were nearing 78th when Echo said, “A year. How bad can that be?” Her tone of voice said, miserable.

  They waited on the light at 78th, looking at each other as if they were about to be cast into separate dungeons.

  “Gotta tell you, Echo. I’m just goin’ nuts. You know.”

  “I know.”

  “It hasn’t been easy for you either. Couple close calls, huh?” He smiled ruefully.

  She crossed her arms as if he’d issued a warning. “Yeah.”

  “You know what I’m sayin”. We are gonna be married. No doubt about that. Is there?”

  “No.”

  “So—how big a deal is it, really? An act of contrition—”

  “Pete, I’m not happy being probably the only twenty-two-year-old virgin on the face of the earth. But confession’s not the same as getting a ticket fixed. You know how I was brought up. It’s God’s law. That has to mean something, or none of it does.”

  The light changed. Peter drove two blocks and parked by a fire hydrant a few doors down from Echo’s brownstone.

  “Both your parents were of the cloth,” he said. “They renounced their vows and they made you. Made you for me. I can’t believe God thought that was a sin.”

  Blue and unhappy, Echo sank lower in her seat, arms still crossed, over her breasts and her crucifix.

  “I love you so much. And I swear to Him, I’ll always take care of you.”

  After a long silence Echo said, “I know. What do you want me to do, Pete?”

  “Has to be your call.”

  She sighed. “No motels. I feel cheap that way, I can’t help myself. Just know it wouldn’t work.”

  “There’s this buddy of mine at the squad, he was in my year at the Academy, Frank Ringer. Like maybe you met him at the K of C picnic in July?”

  “Oh. Yeah. Got a twitch in one eye? Really ripped, though.”

  “Right. Frank Ringer. Well, his uncle’s got a place out on the Island. Way out, past Riverhead on Peconic Bay I think.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Frank’s uncle travels a lot. Frank says he could make arrangements for us to go out there, maybe this weekend—”

  “So you and Frank been having these discussions about our sex life?”

  “Nothing like that. I just mentioned we’d both like to get off somewhere for some R and R, that’s all.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So in exchange for the favor I’d cover Frank’s security job for him sometime. Echo?”

  “Guess I’d better be getting on up, see how mom is. Might be a long night; you know, I read to her when she can’t—”

  “So what do I tell Frank?”

  Echo hesitated after she opened the door.

  “This weekend sounds okay,” she said. “Does his uncle have a boat?”

  Three A.M. and John Leland Ransome, the painter, was up and prowling barefoot around his apartment at the Pierre Hotel on Fifth Avenue. The doors to his terrace were open; the sounds of the city’s streets had dwindled to the occasional swish of cabs or a bus seven stories below. There was lightning in the west, a plume of yellow-tinged dark clouds over New Jersey or the Hudson. Some rain moving into Manhattan, stirring the air ahead of it. A light wind that felt good on his face.

  Ransome had a woman on his mind. Not unusual; his life and career were dedicated to capturing the essence of a very few uniquely stunning creatures. But this was someone he’d never seen or heard of until approximately eight o’clock of the night before. And the few photos he’d seen, taken with a phonecam, hadn’t revealed nearly enough of Echo Halloran to register her so strongly on his imagination.

  Anyway, it was too soon, he told himself. Better just to forget this one, the potential he’d glimpsed. His new show, the first in four years, was being mounted at his gallery. Five paintings only, his usual output after as much as eighteen painful months of work. He wouldn’t be ready to pick up a brush for at least that length of time. If ever again.

  And half the world’s population was women. More or less. A small but dependable percentage of them physically ravishing.

  But this one was a painter herself, which intrigued him more than the one good shot of her he’d seen, taken on the train, Echo sitting back in her seat with her eyes closed, unaware that she was being photographed.

 
Ransome wondered if she had promise as a painter. But he could easily find out.

  He lingered on the terrace until the first big drops of rain fell. He went inside, closing the doors, walked down a marble hall to the room in which Taja, wearing black silk lounging pajamas, was watching Singin’ in the Rain on DVD. Another insomniac. She saw his reflection on the plasma screen and looked around. There was a hint of a contrite wince in his smile.

  “I’ll want more photos,” he said. “Complete background check, of course. And order a car for tomorrow. I’d like to observe her myself.”

  Taja nodded, drew on a cigarette and returned her attention to the movie. Donald O’Connor falling over a sofa. She didn’t smile. Taja never smiled at anything.

  THREE

  It rained all day Thursday; by six-thirty the clouds over Manhattan were parting for last glimpses of washed-out blue; canyon walls of geometric glass gave back the brassy sunset. Echo was able to walk the four blocks from her Life Studies class to the 14th Street IRT station without an umbrella. She was carrying her portfolio in addition to a shoulder tote and computer, having gone directly from her office at Gilbard’s to class.

  The uptown express platform was jammed, the atmosphere underground thick and fetid. Obviously there hadn’t been a train for a while. There were unintelligible explanations or announcements on the P.A. Someone played a violin with heroic zeal. Echo edged her way up the platform to find breathing room where the first car would stop when the train got there.

  Half a dozen Hispanic boys were scuffling, cutting up; a couple of the older ones gave her the eye. One of them, whom she took in at a glance, looked like trouble. Tats and piercings. Full of himself.

  A child of the urban jungle, Echo was skilled at minding her own business, building walls around herself when she was forced to linger in potentially bad company.

  She pinned her bulky portfolio between her knees while she retrieved a half-full bottle of water from her tote. She was jostled from behind by a fat woman laden with shopping bags and almost lost her balance. The zipper on her portfolio had been broken for a while. A few drawings spilled out. Echo grimaced, nodded at the woman’s brusque apology and tried to gather up her life studies before someone else stepped on them.

  One of the younger Hispanic kids, wearing a do-rag and a Knicks jersey, came over to give her a hand. He picked up a charcoal sketch half-soaked in a puddle of water. Echo’s problem had attracted the attention of all the boys.

  The one she’d had misgivings about snatched the drawing from the hand of the Knicks fan and looked it over. A male nude. He showed it around, grinning. Then backed off when Echo held out a hand, silently asking for the return of her drawing. She heard the uptown express coming.

  The boy looked at her. He wore his Cholo shirt unbuttoned to his navel.

  “Who’s this guy? Your boyfriend?”

  “Give me a break, will you? I’ve had a long day, I’m tired, and I don’t want to miss my train.”

  The boy pointed to the drawing and said, “Man, I seen a bigger tool on a gerbil.”

  They all laughed as they gathered around, reinforcing him.

  “No,” Echo said. “My boyfriend is on the cops, and I can arrange for you to meet him.”

  That provoked whistles, snorts, and jeers. Echo looked around at the slowing express train, and back at the boy who was hanging onto her drawing. Pretending to be an art critic.

  “Hey, you’re good, you know that?”

  “Yes, I know.”

  “You want to do me, I can arrange the time.” He grinned around at his buddies, one of whom said, “Draw you.”

  “Yeah, man. That’s what I said.” He feigned confusion. “That ain’t what I said?” He looked at Echo and shrugged magnanimously. “So first you draw me, then you can do me.”

  Echo said, “Listen, you fucking little idiot, I want my drawing now, or you’ll be in shit up to your bull ring.”

  The express screeched to a stop behind her. A local was also approaching on the inside track. The boy made a show of being astonished by her threat. As if he were trembling in fright, his hands jerked and the drawing tore nearly in half.

  “Oh, sorry, man. Now I guess you need to get yourself another naked guy.” He finished ripping her drawing.

  Echo, losing it, dropped her computer case and hooked a left at his jaw. She was quick on her feet; it just missed. The cholo danced away with the halves of the drawing in each hand, and bumped into a woman walking the yellow platform line of the local track as if she were a ballet dancer. The headlight of the train behind her winked on the slim blade of a knife in her right hand.

  With her left hand she took hold of the boy by his bunchy testicles and lifted him up on his toes until they were at eye level.

  The Woman in Black stared at him, and the point of the knife was between two of his exposed ribs. Echo’s throat dried up. She had no doubt the woman would cut him if he didn’t behave. The boy’s mouth was open, but he could have screamed without being heard as the train thundered in a couple of feet away from them.

  The woman cast a long look at Echo, then nodded curtly toward the express.

  The kid in the Knicks jersey picked up Echo’s computer and shoved it at her as if he suspected that she too might have a blade. The doors of the local opened and there was a surge of humanity across the platform to the parked express. Echo let herself be carried along with it, looking back once as she boarded. Another glimpse of the Woman in Black, still holding the cholo helpless, getting a few looks but no interference. Echo’s pulses throbbed. The woman was like a walking superstition, with a temperament as dark and lurking as paranoia.

  Who was she? And why, Echo wondered as the doors closed, does she keep showing up in my life?

  She rode standing up to 86th in the jam of commuters, her face expressionless, presenting a calm front but inside just a blur, like a traumatized bird trying to escape through a sealed window.

  ______

  Echo didn’t say anything to Peter about the Woman in Black until Friday evening, when they were slogging along in oppressive traffic on the 495 eastbound, on their way to Mattituck and the cozy weekend they’d planned at the summer house of Frank Ringer’s uncle.

  “No idea who she is?” Peter said. “You’re sure you don’t know her from somewhere?”

  “Listen, she’s the kind, see her once, you never forget her. I’m talking spooky.”

  “She pulled a knife in the subway? Switchblade?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know much about knives. It was the look in her eyes, man. That cholo must’ve went in his pants.” Echo smiled slightly, then her expression turned glum. “So, the first couple times, okay. Coincidence. A third time in the same week, uh-uh, I don’t buy it. She must’ve been following me around.” Echo shrugged again, and her shoulders stayed tight. “I didn’t sleep so good last night, Pete.”

  “You ever see her again, make it your business to call me right away.”

  “I wonder if maybe I should—”

  “No. Stay away from her. Don’t try to talk to her.”

  “You’re thinking she could be some sort of psycho?”

  “That’s New York. Ten people go by in the street, one or two out of the ten, something’s gonna be seriously wrong with them mentally.”

  “Great. Now I’m scared.”

  Peter put an arm around her.

  “You just let me handle this. Whatever it is.”

  “Engine’s overheating.” Echo observed.

  “Yeah. Fucking traffic. Weekend, it’ll be like this until ten o’clock. Might as well get off, get something to eat.”

  The cottage that had been lent to them for the weekend wasn’t impressive in the headlights of Peter’s car; it looked as if Frank Ringer’s uncle had built it on weekends using materials taken from various construction or demolition sites. Mismatched windows, missing clapboards, a stone chimney on one side that obviously was out of plumb; the place had all the eye appeal of a bad scab.

/>   “Probably charming inside,” Echo said, determined to be upbeat about a slow start to their intimate weekend.

  Inside the small rooms smelled of mildew from a leaky roof. There were curbsides in Manhattan that were better furnished on trash pickup days.

  “Guess it’s kind of like men only out here,” Pete said, not concealing his disbelief. “I’ll open a couple of windows.”

  “Do you think we could clean it up some?” Echo said.

  Peter took another look around.

  “More like burn it down and start over.”

  “It’s such a beautiful little cove.”

  There was so much dismay in her face it started him laughing. He put an arm around her, guided her outside, and locked the door behind them.

  “Live and learn,” he said.

  “Your house or mine?” Echo said.

  “Bayside’s closest.”

  The O’Neill house in Bayside didn’t work out, either; overrun with relatives. At a few minutes past ten Echo unlocked the door of the Yorktown apartment where she lived with her mother and Aunt Julia, from her late father’s side of the family. She looked at Peter, sighed, kissed him.

  Rosemay and Julia were playing Scrabble at the dining room table when Echo walked in with Peter. She had left her weekend luggage in the hall by her bedroom door.

  “This is a grand surprise,” Rosemay said. “Echo, I thought you were stayin’ over in Queens.”

  Echo cleared her throat and shrugged, letting Peter handle this one.

  Peter said, “My uncle Dennis, from Philly? Blew into town with his six kids. Our house looks like a day camp. They been redoin’ the walls with grape jelly.” He bent over Rosemay, putting his arms around her. “How’re you, Rosemay?”

  Rosemay was wearing lounging pajamas and a green eyeshade. There were three support pillows in the chair she occupied, and one under her slippered feet.

  “A little fatigued, I must say.”

  Julia was a roly-poly woman who wore thick eyeglasses. “Spent most of the day writing,” she said of Rosemay. “Talk to your ma about eating, Echo.”

  “Eat, mom. You promised.”