Tony leaned sideways to get a better look inside. The living room, of which he could see only a small part, was shadowy and still. The drapes were shut, and there were no lights burning.
Tony shouted, 'Police!'
His voice echoed under the balcony roof.
A bird chirruped in an olive tree.
'Come out with your hands raised, Bobby!'
On the street, a car horn sounded.
In another apartment a phone rang, muffled but audible.
'Bobby!' Frank shouted. 'You hear what he said? We're the police. It's all over now. So just come out of there. Come on! Right now!'
Down in the courtyard, the whirlpool bathers had grown very quiet.
Tony had the crazy notion that he could hear people in a dozen apartments as they crept stealthily to their windows.
Frank raised his voice even further: 'We don't want to hurt you, Bobby!'
'Listen to him!' Tony shouted into the apartment. 'Don't force us to hurt you. Come on out peacefully.'
Bobby didn't respond.
'If he was in there,' Frank said, 'he'd at least tell us to go fuck ourselves.'
'So what now?' Tony asked.
'I guess we go in.'
'Jesus, I hate shit like this. Maybe we should call a backup team.'
'He's probably not armed,' Frank said.
'You're kidding.'
'He doesn't have any prior arrests for carrying a gun. Except when he's after a woman, he's a sniveling little creep.'
'He's a killer.'
'Women. He's only dangerous to women.'
Tony shouted again: 'Bobby, this is your last chance! Now, dammit, come out of there nice and slow!'
Silence.
Tony's heart was hammering furiously.
'Okay,' Frank said. 'Let's get this over with.'
'If memory serves me right, you went in first the last time we had to do something like this.'
'Yeah. The Wilkie-Pomeroy case.'
'Then I guess it's my turn,' Tony said.
'I know you've been looking forward to this.'
'Oh, yes.'
'With all your heart.'
'Which is now in my throat.'
'Go get him, tiger.'
'Cover me.'
'The foyer's too narrow for me to give you good cover. I won't be able to see past you once you go in.'
'I'll stay as low as possible,' Tony said.
'Make like a duck. I'll try to look over you.'
'Just do the best you can.'
Tony's stomach was cramping up on him. He took a couple of deep breaths and tried to calm down. That trick had no effect other than to make his heart pound harder and faster than it had been doing. At last, he crouched and launched himself through the open door, the revolver held out in front of him. He scuttled across the slippery tile floor of the foyer and stopped at the brink of the living room, searching the shadows for movement, expecting to take a bullet right between the eyes.
The living room was dimly illuminated by thin strips of sunlight that found their way around the edges of the heavy drapes. As far as Tony could tell, all of the lumpy shapes were couches and chairs and tables. The place appeared to be full of big, expensive, and utterly tasteless Americanized Mediterranean furniture. A narrow shaft of sunlight fell across a red velvet sofa that had a large and thoroughly grotesque wrought-iron fleur-de-lis bolted to its imitation oak side.
'Bobby?'
No response.
