Footsteps of the Hawk

red cement–barge sat on the water, the name Adelaide carefully stenciled on the stern. The captain's wife, my best guess. A brown tug with all–black topsides was pushing the barge upriver, probably to one of the yards in the Bronx, pushing so slow that a passing sailboat looked turbo–charged. Another tug with the same brown–and–black paint scheme caught up and ran alongside for a few minutes, then it pulled away in a wide sweep, heading back to base.

I lit a smoke, wondering why I felt so safe out there, open and exposed, a sniper's dream. It hit me all at once. I couldn't run, but I was safe until I did something.

They were stalking each other— and I couldn't stay out of the middle. I was a blind leech in muddy swampwater, searching for a pulse. The bigger animals wouldn't chase me, couldn't catch me if they did. But if I didn't find that pulse, I could starve to death.

The cellular phone in my jacket purred, making me jump. I pulled it out, my back to the river, scanning the wide street.

'What?' I said into the mouthpiece.

'I got it!' Hauser's voice, low volume, high energy. Whatever it was, he was pumped.

'Are you— ?'

'In my office,' he said. Then the connection went dead.

No way to go back to my place, drop Pansy off. I'd been out long enough for Morales to have picked up my trail. Some other cop might have spread some cash around the streets— 'Call me when you see this car,' like that— but Morales wouldn't do that. When he was partnered with McGowan, he let the Irishman do that kind of work. Alone, he was a blackjack kind of cop, the kind you couldn't do business with. He'd pay a whore for sex, but not for information— Morales expected that on the house.

Scaring people isn't the best way if you need them working for you. It's okay when all you need is a piece of information— fear makes some people talk. But it's easy to overdose that kind of thing— easy to scare people so much that they freeze. McGowan knew the difference. Morales didn't. Or didn't care.

Morales wouldn't go on the pad, wouldn't take a bribe to look the other way. But he'd shoot you in the back and lie about it with a straight face. Morales had been out too long. He was rotten with honor, as dangerous as a nerve–gas canister in a subway car— with Morales, the best you could hope for is that the body wouldn't be yours.

I loaded Pansy into the car, headed south on West Street. I made a U–turn at Chambers, heading uptown. I cut east on Little West Twelfth, did some twists and double–backs through the Meat Market, then pulled over and waited.

Five minutes, ten minutes. Nothing. I knew Morales could track— he'd shown me that much— but I also knew he had no patience. I put the Plymouth in gear and headed back uptown.

I found a place to park on Eighth, in the mid–Twenties. I wouldn't leave Pansy in the car, not in this city. A guy I know in Brooklyn, he had a beautiful Rottweiler, kept it in his yard, behind a high wrought–iron fence. The dog would challenge anyone who walked by, but it couldn't get out. Some two–bit gangstah–dressed punk walked up and stood right by the fence. When the Rottie came over, the punk sprayed metallic paint right in the dog's eyes. The Rottie screamed, tearing at its eyes with its claws. The punk was still watching when the cops rolled up, the paint can in his hand, giggling.

The cops called the Animal Control people. They tranq'ed the Rottie, but it was too late— one eye was gone, the other burned right in its socket.

The Rottie lived, but it was blind.

The punk went to Family Court. He told the judge he was walking by the yard one night. He couldn't see the Rottie in the blackness. The dog growled, and he jumped, scared. His homeboys laughed. 'Nobody disses me like that,' he said. So he came back with the can of spray paint for payback.

The judge put him on Probation.

When he got shot in the chest a few weeks later, the cops put it down to gangbanging. At least that's what it said on the report. They never got to interview the punk— he died in the ambulance.

'No dogs allowed,' the slug at the desk said, not even bothering to take the cigarette out of his mouth.

'Where's it say that?' I asked, looking around for a sign. The only one I could see said NO SMOKING.

'Building rules,' the slug said.

'I got a pass,' I told him, leaning over the desk, a twenty–dollar bill in my hand.

The slug took the money, dropped his eyes like he was reading. I took the stairs— I didn't want anybody running into Pansy on the elevator.

Outside Hauser's office, I turned the handle to the door. It opened easily. I walked inside, Pansy slightly behind me to my left.

'What the fuck is that?' Hauser greeted me.

'She's a Neapolitan mastiff,' I told him. 'Don't worry, she's mellow.'

Hauser gave me a dubious look. I threw Pansy the hand signal— she dropped to the floor. 'Stay,' I told her. It was just to comfort Hauser— staying in one spot was one of Pansy's specialties.

I sat down across from Hauser, his desk between us. I noticed four empty white Styrofoam coffee cups— Hauser had another in his hand.

'You gonna finish that?' I asked him, tilting my chin toward about half a roll with thick butter oozing out the sides.

'You want it?' he replied.

'Yeah,' I said.

When he nodded, I reached over and took it, flipped it back over my shoulder without looking. I heard the click of teeth. 'Jesus!' Hauser said. 'She just— '

'Pansy would catch bullets, you covered them with enough butter,' I told him.

Hauser shook his head in amazement— like all real reporters, there wasn't a whole lot that didn't interest him. All the urgency he'd shown on the phone was gone— whatever he had, he was going to showcase it, slip a little bit out at a time. I didn't push him, knew there was no point.

'Loretta Barclay,' he finally said. 'That name ring a bell?'

'The woman in Scarsdale, right? The one who got killed…with the red ribbon left in— '

'Right,' Hauser said, leaning forward. 'The cops have been working on it. And it doesn't look random anymore.'

'Because…?'

'Because she didn't exactly come from money, this woman. In fact, she's got a nice little track record of her own. How does a twenty–year sentence in Indiana strike you? She did three of it, then she went over the wall. Off the grounds, actually— she just walked away. One of the guards went with her. They found him…dead. In a motel room in Youngstown, Ohio. He had enough pills in him to drop a horse. Left a suicide note too, but the cops never bought it— it was too soon after the escape. And the woman, she just vanished.'

'When was this?' I asked him.

'She was arrested in 1979, tried in 1980, sentenced the same year. She walked away in '83.'

'They been after her all that time?'

'Right. The feds too. Turns out she met the guy she married in Boston. When she was dancing in one of those topless joints.'

'That's kind of open for a woman on the run,' I said. 'How could she— '

'She had the works,' Hauser cut in. 'New face, new chest too. The cops think it had to be the same plastic surgeon. Beautiful work…no way to tell unless you had her under a magnifying glass. A lot of those strippers get implants anyway— that wouldn't make anyone suspicious. She dyed her hair, blond to brunette, let it grow real long. I saw a picture of her— a copy of the original they took when she was booked in Indiana. Believe me, her own mother wouldn't have recognized her. If it wasn't for the fingerprints, they never would have tumbled to it.'

'So they think it's somebody from her past?'

'They think it could be. They talked to the cops here, but there's really no connect to our pattern. I mean, they were all killed, all stabbed to death…but that's all.'

'So the big break, it's just that she was— '