Spare Change

by Robert B. Parker

  Julie blotted her nose carefully, with a paper napkin.

  “I must look awful,” she said.

  “Nothing you can’t fix,” I said.

  She nodded. We were quiet. It was quite late by now. No ships cruised past the big window, and the city lights across the harbor were more scattered. Julie was nursing a glass of wine. I poured myself a little. Mediocre is better than none. I felt a kind of post-adrenaline languor. I knew what it was. I’d felt it before.

  “Men are lucky,” Julie said.

  “You think?”

  “They don’t always have to go around being afraid of getting raped or molested or whatever,” she said.

  “Because they are generally bigger and stronger than women?” I said.

  “Yes. Unless we have a gun like you did, we have to do what they say.”

  “Men are afraid of each other,” I said.

  Julie shrugged.

  “Most men are stronger than we are, but most men are weaker than other men,” I said. “At best they have fewer people to fear, physically, than women, but there are still plenty.”

  “How do you know?” Julie said.

  “I know men for whom strength and toughness and winning and losing is a daily issue,” I said. “I work in their world, perhaps more than you do.”

  “It’s your world, too,” Julie said, “isn’t it.”

  “I guess so.”

  “But you’re so…female. There’s nothing mannish about you.”

  I nodded.

  “When I first thought about becoming a cop,” I said, “my father told me that anyone can win a fight with anyone. In most cases it’s only a matter of how far you’re willing to go to win.”

  “You have a gun,” Julie said. “I suppose that makes a difference.”

  “It’s supposed to,” I said. “But anyone can carry a weapon. The trick is will you use it. I will.”

  Julie smiled faintly.

  “You did,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m not sure I could,” Julie said.

  “Most people don’t know,” I said. “And most people will never have to decide.”

  “You had to tonight, because of me,” Julie said.

  I smiled.

  “I decided long before tonight,” I said.

  “It’s why you do what you do,” Julie said.

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “Because you can,” Julie said.

  This was a pretty good version of Julie. The one that kept me with her. Usually it was wrapped in the glib, overconfident, sexually aggressive, flamboyant Julie. The evening had undressed her, and what I liked to think of as the authentic Julie was visible.

  “I’m such a goddamned stupid fool,” Julie said.

  “You’re capable,” I said, “of occasional misjudgments, I guess.”

  “It’s more than misjudgment,” Julie said. “I…I have no center.”

  I sipped my wine and didn’t say anything.

  “I mean, look at you. You know what you can do and can’t do, and what you should do and shouldn’t do. And you do it. And here I am thinking I’m in love with some goddamned pervert who’s married to a client, and God knows what would have happened if you hadn’t been here.”

  I thought about me, and Richie, and Jesse Stone.

  “I’m not so sure how centered I am,” I said.

  “Well. What would have happened if you hadn’t been here?”

  I shrugged.

  “Ménage à trois?” I said.

  “Probably,” Julie said. “And I would probably have let it happen, because I didn’t know what else to do…. Are you actually going to see him tomorrow?”

  “George? Yes.”

  “By yourself?”

  “Actually,” I said, “I think I’ll bring Spike with me.”

  “You need a man?” Julie said. “What about all that I-am-woman-hear-me-roar stuff?”

  “I’m not a feminist, Jule. If I’m anything, I suppose, I’m a pragmatist. I’m not trying to prove anything. I like things that work. Despite last night, I won’t terrify George. Spike will.”

  “And you’ll warn him not to see me again?”

  “Yes.”

  “Or Spike will beat him up?”

  “The threat may be implied more than stated,” I said. “I’ll play it by ear.”

  “And you think it will work?”

  “You know Spike,” I said.

  Julie nodded.

  “It’ll work,” I said.

  I looked at my watch. It was twenty to one.

  “Do you have to go?” Julie said.

  Her voice was frightened.

  “No,” I said. “I’m going to stay the night.”

  “Here?”

  “If you’ll have me.”

  “What about Rosie?”

  “Spike is with her,” I said.

  Julie nodded. She started to speak and couldn’t seem to. Then she stood suddenly and put her arms around me and started to cry again.

  “Thank you,” she said. Her voice was hoarse. “Thank you.”

  I patted her back.

  “You’re welcome,” I said.

  39

  Spike and I walked in to the Wellesley branch of Bay Colony Bank a little after ten a.m. The tellers were behind the long counter on the left wall. The suits of both genders were behind a railing on the right wall, sitting at big, dark wooden desks that radiated stability and trust. At the far end of the desk space was a conference room. It was empty. George sat at the desk three down from the conference room, talking on the phone.

  “What’s your job here?” I said to Spike.

  “Look scary, say nothing.”

  “Correct,” I said.

  We went behind the railing and walked down to George’s desk. Spike was wearing a black do-rag, a black tank top, and little wire-framed oval-shaped sunglasses. He looked like a deranged biker. George hung up the phone as we approached and smiled at us professionally. Then it registered who I was and the smile went away. I pointed at him and then at the conference room and walked toward it. He looked uncertainly at Spike, then followed me to the conference room. Spike came behind him and closed the conference-room door. None of us sat. George stood on the other side of the conference table.

  “What do you want?” he said.

  I could see his eyes shifting regularly to Spike, who loomed in front of the door.

  “The large gentleman behind me is Spike,” I said. “If you go near Julie again, Spike will come and get you and beat you nearly to death.”

  Spike looked at George steadily.

  “You…you can’t…” George said.

  “Can’t what?” I said.

  “You can’t just come in here and threaten me,” he said.

  “Actually, we can,” I said. “We’re doing it now. We’re in here threatening you.”

  “This is a bank,” George said. “I can have the police here in like two minutes.”

  “Sure,” I said.

  I folded my arms and rested my butt against the conference table.

  “What are you doing?” George said.

  “Waiting for the cops.”

  “You think I won’t call them?”

  “I don’t care if you do or don’t,” I said. “If you do, I wish to be here when they come.”

  George didn’t say anything. His eyes kept shifting to Spike.

  “You’re both just going to stand here?” George said.

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “I won’t call the police,” he said.

  “And you won’t bother Julie again,” I said.

  “I…look…I’m s
orry about that. We were all a little drunk, I guess.”

  “I wasn’t drunk,” I said.

  “Well, Jimmy and I, I guess, we had a couple too many.”

  “Where is Jimmy?” I said.

  “He went home.”

  “Milwaukee,” I said.

  “Yes.”

  “You feel like going to Milwaukee, Spike?”

  Spike shook his head no.

  “Okay, then if Jimmy ever bothers Julie again, Spike will come and beat you up.”

  I could see the last breath of self-importance seep out of him.

  “I won’t bother her,” George said. “Neither will Jimmy.”

  “And if either of you do…” I half turned. “Spike, will you hurt George if either of them bothers Julie?”

  Spike nodded slowly, his gaze never moving from George’s face.

  “Badly?” I said.

  Spike kept nodding.

  “Honest to God,” George said. “Nobody will go near her.”

  “Does your wife know about Julie?” I said.

  “No.”

  “Keep it that way,” I said, and walked toward the door.

  Spike opened the door for me courteously and I preceded him out. Spike didn’t come right behind me. I turned. He was standing in the doorway staring at George, as if he were memorizing every detail. Then he turned, and we left the bank.

  In the car, I said to Spike, “What do you think?”

  “He’s kind of cute,” Spike said. “What did Jimmy look like?”

  “About as cute,” I said.

  “And they’re not dating Julie anymore….”

  Spike grinned at me and moved his eyebrows up and down a couple of times.

  “You and two straight perverts?” I said.

  “They might want to change their luck,” Spike said.

  “Oh, ick!” I said.

  “Hey,” Spike said, “love is where you find it.”

  40

  How often did Spare Change used to write you?” I said.

  “The first time around?”

  “At least one a week,” my father said.

  We were in the government center in the FBI offices, talking with Nathan Epstein.

  “He’s written me just once,” I said.

  Epstein nodded.

  He was a thin man with not much hair. He wore round, dark-rimmed glasses, and he looked as if he rarely went outdoors.

  “Maybe something else is giving him a charge,” Epstein said.

  “I think it’s because we talk.”

  “You and him,” Epstein said.

  “Yes.”

  “Which would be Bob Johnson,” Epstein said, “the guy you’ve been playing.”

  “Yes,” I said.

  Epstein looked at my father.

  “Phil?”

  “I think she’s right,” my father said.

  “She probably is,” Epstein said. “Say a little more about why he’s not writing you.”

  “We meet for a drink,” I said.

  “In a safe place,” my father said.

  “In a safe place,” I said. “We talk. He’s flirted with me about the Spare Change Killer every time. Last time we talked, he did everything but tell me he did it. He doesn’t need to write letters.”

  “Flirted?” Epstein said.

  “I don’t know a better word,” I said. “It’s like he’s coming on to me, except it’s about the murders…. No, that’s wrong. It’s not about the murders. He comes on to me about the killer.”

  “Which, in your script, is him,” Epstein said.

  “Yes.”

  “Okay,” Epstein said, “so he likes to talk to you about himself.”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m told that a lot of men do that with women,” Epstein said.

  “They do,” I said. “But they are usually not serial killers.”

  “Agreed,” Epstein said. “But in your experience, when men talk about themselves, what are they doing?”

  “Trying to impress me.”

  “You think that’s what’s going on?”

  “Yes,” I said. “In part. But it is also talking dirty, as if a man were going on about his sex life, excited to be talking about it in front of me.”

  “Sunny,” my father said, “we may have to talk about your social life.”

  I smiled at him.

  “The hell we will, Daddy.”

  He smiled back.

  “Okay,” Epstein said. “He’s bragging about it and he’s getting his rocks off talking about it.”

  “Like guys who expose themselves,” my father said.

  I turned in my chair toward my father.

  “Yes,” I said. “Yes. That’s what he’s doing. He’s exposing himself to me.”

  “Most flashers don’t want more,” Epstein said. “Which may be good news.”

  “Or it may be that he goes too far and fully exposes himself,” my father said.

  “By actually confessing,” I said.

  “In which case he’d have to kill you to save himself,” my father said.

  “His letters to you, Phil, were, essentially, taunting,” Epstein said.

  My father nodded.

  “His interaction with Sunny is, if I understand you right, Sunny, flirtatious.”

  “If you define it loosely,” I said. “He seems to be trying to get us to agree on how special the Spare Change Killer is.”

  “So there’s a see me in both approaches,” Epstein said. “But with you there’s the, shall we call it sexual, overtone?”

  “Definitely sexual,” I said.

  “Do you think he wants to have actual sexual congress with you?” Epstein said.

  “Sexual congress?” I said. “I didn’t know FBI agents talked like that.”

  “Only if he’s a Special Agent in Charge, and of Jewish heritage,” Epstein said. “And in deference to your father.”

  “How many Jewish SACs are there, Nathan?” my father asked.

  “One,” Epstein said. “I think. Would you say that Bob Johnson’s goal is to have sexual intercourse with you?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “At about the point when his sexual excitement becomes palpable, he ends the evening.”

  “Has he ever invited you home?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve declined.”

  “Nicely,” I said.

  “Has he ever asked to come to your home?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you declined.”

  I smiled.

  “Nicely,” I said.

  “But he knows where it is,” Epstein said.

  “He sent me a letter,” I said.

  “You in the phone book?”

  “Yes.”

  Epstein seemed to turn this around in his head for a time. Then he started again.

  “When you talk about palpable excitement,” Epstein said, “what do you mean?”

  I looked at my father.

  “Palpable to me,” I said. “His lips seem wet. His eyes seem to get bigger. His face seems to flush.”

  “Nothing as palpable as an erection,” Epstein said.

  My father groaned.

  “None that I’ve observed,” I said.

  Epstein sat with his elbows on the arms of his swivel chair, the knuckles of his left hand pressed against his mouth. My father and I sat quietly.

  “You got any thoughts, Phil?” Epstein said around his knuckles.

  “The sex stuff, if Sunny’s right, may be new. Maybe this is the first time he’s had a woman he could flirt with like this.”

  “A
n attractive female investigator,” Epstein said.

  “Yes,” my father said.

  “Sunny?” Epstein said.

  “Daddy may be right,” I said. “But we’re all guessing. Except about the attractive part.”

  Epstein nodded, still with his fist to his mouth.

  “Guessing is all we know how to do, at this point,” Epstein said. “I’ll talk to the shrinks, see if they have anything to say.”

  “Quirk’s got a couple on call, too,” my father said. “Sunny will talk with them.”

  “Okay,” Epstein said. “In the meanwhile, I would urge you to be very cautious with this man. We don’t have a lot of history on this kind of perp. I don’t think we know what he might do.”

  “I’ll be careful,” I said.

  “I don’t want him to kill you,” Epstein said.

  “Me either,” my father said.

  “Good,” I said. “We’re all on the same page.”

  41

  My father called to tell me that Victoria Russo lived in Cranston, Rhode Island, with her husband, whose name was Leonard Mason.

  “I’ll go see her this week,” I said.

  “You could do it on the phone,” my father said.

  “No,” I said. “I need to be with her.”

  “At least make an appointment,” he said.

  “I will,” I said.

  “Might be wise to keep the purpose kind of vague,” my father said.

  “I agree.”

  “Want to touch base with the Cranston cops?” my father said.

  “No. I want to keep it informal,” I said. “Do we have travel budget.”

  “To Cranston?” my father said.

  “I might have to stay overnight.”

  “I have budget for that,” my father said. “You can even buy a sandwich.”

  “Good,” I said. “I’m not doing this for love, you know.”

  “Funny,” my father said. “I thought you were.”

  “Do you have any more on Johnson’s father?” I said.

  “Bob Senior? I was over there reasoning with the alumni office. When I had persuaded them to cooperate, I went over to the Business Administration department. Not many people there anymore were there when Bob Senior was there. But the department secretary’s been there since they named the university, and she remembered him. Secretary’s name is Regina Hanley. Regina says that they got a call one morning from Mrs. Johnson Senior, says her husband never came home last night and she’s beginning to worry. She says she calls but there’s no one answering the phone. And she wonders if Regina could check his office. So Regina goes down to his office and it’s locked. She knocks, and nothing, so she gets her passkey and goes in and there’s Senior on the floor behind his desk, and she can tell he’s dead. She says he just looked dead, and even if he wasn’t, he’s clearly not moving, and she doesn’t want to deal with whatever was going on. So she closes the door and calls the university cops, and they come over with a paramedic unit, and take him down to the university health service, and the doctor there pronounces him dead and that’s that.”