Taming A Sea-Horse Part 17

"Well, not right away," I said. "Probably have to rest up a little first."

"Good thought," Susan said. "Perhaps you'd care to lie down on a comfortable psychologist?"

"Are you sure it will be restful?" I said.

"I hope not," she said.

"Need to figure out who Warren is," I said, I had slid down on the bed beside her. I put my free arm around her. "I don't know if Warren fits, but he's a loose piece and I can't ignore him."

"Maybe you could ignore him for just a little while," Susan said.

"How little?" I said.

"It's up to you, big fella," Susan murmured.

"Then we'll ignore him for a large while," l said.

And we did.

26.

We got back from St. Thomas on a Monday. Susan had patients on Tuesday, so I went to New York without her. Someone told me that the Parker Meridien had a health club, so this time I stayed there. Besides, it was but a few strides from the Russian Tea Room. It was my intention to keep going to the Russian Tea Room for lunch until someone recognized me. Or mistook me for someone. Or gave me a table downstairs.

To recover from the shuttle ride down, I went immediately to the health club in the hotel and did three sets of everything on the Nautilus machines. Then I rode one of the Exercycles for a half hour at a ten setting and limped back up to my room and took a shower. I bet I could bench press more than the maitre d' at the Russian Tea Room. If he came to the health club, I wouldn't seat him either.

I went down into the high flossy lobby and had two bottles of Heineken beer in the lobby bar and felt sufficiently reinvigorated to try a walk uptown.

It was about four in the afternoon when I turned down 77th Street from Fifth Avenue and about ten past four when I arrived in front of Robert Rambeaux's apartment. He didn't answer the bell. I rang some other bells but no one buzzed me in. I leaned against one wall of the entry and waited. At about fourforty a tall young man wearing a T-shirt that said JACOB's PILLOW on it came out and I went in before the door closed behind him. He glanced at me as I went in and then moved on. The slow narrow elevator took me to Rambeaux's floor. I knocked on his door with no result. I wished I could open a door with a credit card like they did on TV, but all I ever did was screw up the card. I could kick it down.

I pressed my ear against the door to hear what was in there. If Robert was still scared and in there with a gun, kicking the door down would get me a faceful of .32 ammunition.

I didn't hear anything. But I smelled something. I knew what it was and I knew it had been a while if I smelled it through a closed door. I went back down in the elevator and out onto the street and found a pay phone. I dialed 911.

"I'd like to report a dead body," I said, "at 330 East 77th Street."

I met the patrol officers at the apartment and we went up with the super. I let them go in first. Old corpses aren't fun. The stench was strong when the super opened the door, and there was a buzz of flies.

The super left the key in the door and turned and went as fast as he could without running back down the stairs.

"Jesus Christ," one of the cops said, and pulled out a handkerchief and covered his mouth and nose and went in. His partner did the same and followed him in. I didn't.

An hour and a half later I was leaning on the front right fender of a patrol car, talking with Detective Second Grade Corsetti.

"No way to tell if it's Rambeaux," Corsetti was saying. "Have to wait for the ME to tell us."

"You didn't examine him closely?"

Corsetti wrinkled his nose. "Time I got here they'd hauled him off, I'm just telling you what the bodybaggers told me. You were, you get a close look?"

"I didn't want to be in the way," I said.

Corsetti nodded. "I know," he said. "I seen maybe eight, ten stiffs been dead like that, still can't stand it. Makes me sick every time."

"We fat all things to fat ourselves," I said.

"Your worm is your emperor of diet," Corsetti said.

I looked at him. He grinned. "Shakespeare's a hobby," he said. "Lotta oddb.a.l.l.s on the New York cops."

I nodded. "a.s.sume it was Rambeaux," I said. "It's nearly a week since I talked with Perry Lehman at the Crown Prince Club. How long you figure Rambeaux's been dead?"

"'Bout a week," Corsetti said. "Depends on how warm it was in there, but it's been a while."

"And it's sort of a coincidence that a hooker gets killed and then her pimp gets killed."

"And both of them have talked with a private cop from Boston first," Corsetti said.

"Be logical to have him as a suspect," I said.

"Would in fact," Corsetti said.

"All I'm trying to do is find a kid named April Kyle," I said.

"So you keep telling me," Corsetti said. "Now I've got two stiffs and no suspect except you."

"You don't think I did it," I said.

Corsetti shook his head. "No," he said. "Boston says you're clean, though annoying. I believe it. You got no reason to ace Rambeaux and then come back a week later and discover the body and call 911." A young woman in a ponytail wearing white shorts and blue running shoes went by. Corsetti looked after her. Her shorts were so high that the cheeks of her b.u.t.tocks showed. Corsetti shook his head.

"So where are we?" he said.

"I don't know," I said. "Perry Lehman's got to be in this thing, and he's got mob connections in Boston. And he or they or somebody is killing people I talk to about April."

"Maybe," Corsetti said, "or maybe there's a whole other thing going on that you got nothing to do with."

"a.s.suming that doesn't leave me anything to do," I said.

"Readiness is all," Corsetti said.

"Not enough," I said.

"Might have to be," Corsetti said.

"No," I said. "Doesn't help me find April Kyle."

"For crissake," Corsetti said. "You were a cop. Hookers get clipped. So do pimps. Most of the time you don't know why and most people don't care why. How much time you think the city of New York wants me to spend on this thing?"

"Less than this," I said.

"That's right."

"But I work for a client who does want me to spend time," I said. "It's the luxury of the private sector."

"Most of the private sector is doing divorce tails and store security," Corsetti said.

I shrugged.

"You come across anything that might be useful to me, give me a call," Corsetti said. He handed me a card.

"You going to spend more time on this thing?" I said.

"You're going to spend time on it," Corsetti said, "I'm going to be ready."

"Okay," I said.

27.

I had followed the string as far back as I could and it stopped dead at Perry Lehman. It didn't mean Lehman had done anything I cared about. It didn't mean that he could help me find April Kyle. It just meant that I didn't have anywhere else to look. So I decided to look at him some more.

It was full summer in Boston and the heat sat on the city like a possessive parent. I parked half up on the sidewalk near the corner of the alley that led to the Crown Prince Club, and got out and leaned on the fender with my arms folded. I had on a summer silk tweed jacket and a black polo shirt and jeans and running shoes. The jacket was to cover my gun. Summer weight or no, it was too hot for comfort; one of the drawbacks to being armed and dangerous in summer. I thought about getting back in the car and using the AC. But I wanted to be conspicuous. Sitting in the car would make me less so.

Nothing happened. After a half hour I took off my jacket. The gun made me even more conspicuous. But I had a permit and if it bothered people that wasn't my problem. It was nine-thirty in the morning.

Two guys looking a little blurry came out of the club and walked up the alley past me. One of them saw me and the gun and looked quickly away. He murmured something to his friend. They moved away up the alley toward Boylston Street and I caught one of them glancing back as he rounded the corner. At ten-fifteen a guy in a seersucker suit and a straw hat with a colorful band came down the alley and looked at me, and stopped and looked at his watch and looked at me covertly while he was looking at his watch and hesitated and then rang the bell at the Crown Prince Club and went in. At ten-forty another guy came down the alley and saw me and stopped and started forward and stopped and turned on his heel and went back up the alley. The lunch crowd began drifting down the alley at eleven-thirty, all men, rep ties and pin collars and briefcases and Bally shoes and suits from Louis. Many of the lunchers paid me no mind. But some did, and I made them uneasy.

My shirt was soaked through in back by twelve-fifteen when the big doorman in his Rudolf Friml uniform came out of the club and walked across the street. He was studiously uninterested in my gun.

"Miss Coolidge has asked me to see what it is you might want," the doorman said.

"I don't want anything," I said. "But thank Miss Coolidge anyway."

"Miss Coolidge doesn't like you standing out here wearing a gun looking at the members. Members don't like it much neither."

"I don't blame them," I said. "How'd you like to be caught walking into this place for lunch."

"Miss Coolidge asked me to ask you to move along."

"No," I said.

The doorman looked at me for a full thirty seconds.

"Gun buys you a little something," he said. "But don't count too heavy on it."

"You don't think Miss Coolidge will be satisfied with my response?"

"Don't seem likely," he said, and turned and walked back into the club.

It was quiet again, except for the sound of the sweat soaking into my shirt. People came and went from the Crown Prince Club. I thought about lunch. Maybe a lobster roll, and a draft beer. Two drafts, the moisture condensing on the side of the cold gla.s.s. And maybe a second lobster roll, but then I wouldn't come out even, so I'd have to have at least one more beer. By two o'clock the lunch traffic had dwindled to a precious few. I was thinking about the different ways beer could be chilled, and which way was most effective, when a maroon Oldsmobile sedan pulled down the alley past me and pulled to the side. Two guys got out and walked toward me. They were both dark-haired and wore thick mustaches. They might have been brothers. The one that got out the driver's side had a sunburned face and his nose was peeling. He had on a madras plaid sport coat with green predominant and a yellow V-neck T-shirt. His hair was combed smoothly back from his forehead and he had on thick-rimmed RayBan sungla.s.ses. His partner was maybe half an inch taller, his hair curled, wearing a Hawaiian shirt hanging out over his belt. Around his neck was a thick gold chain with an Italian pepper hanging from it. I could see by the way the shirt hung that he was wearing a gun under it.

The guy with the sunburned nose said, "What's happening, chico?"

I said, "Are you guys brothers?"

"Yeah, why?"

"I just wondered," I said. "Did you get your hair straightened or did he get a perm?"

"Funny," the guy with the sunburn said.

Curly said, "Don't f.u.c.k around with him, Paulie. It's hot, let's get him the f.u.c.k out of here and get back in the car."

Sunburn nodded. "He's right, chico. Let's hear it, what are you doing standing out here looking at the club?"

"You guys work for the club?" I said.

"We're asking the questions, chico, and we're getting tired of it. What are you doing here?"

"I'm staying in the sun," I said, "trying to get my nose to peel like yours. It's cute as a b.u.t.ton."

"Okay, pal," Curly said, "enough. You either haul your a.s.s out of here now, or we drop you right here on the street."

"Eek," I said.

"You don't think we'll do it?"

"I'm not sure you can," I said. "There's only two of you."

"Listen, stupid," the guy with the sunburn said, "you don't know who you're dealing with. You are getting yourself in really bad trouble."

"Who am I dealing with?" I said.

"You'll find out-if you don't smarten up."

"Listen," I said. "This is getting boring. You guys are stuck. They sent you over here to run me off but they told you not to make any trouble. So you can threaten me, but you can't back it up, because you were told not to."

"You think so, huh?"