“A brawler,” Hush said. “Made his way in by getting into fights. I never took him for a pro.”
“How do you know him?”
“He was a bodyguard for a guy I had paper on once. Later on we met when I was introduced to his boss’s boss’s boss. He was standing at the outside gate upstate somewhere.” Hush said. “While you were coming down I called a guy I know and he told me where you can find LouBob most nights.”
“They were going to kill me,” I said.
“Yeah. Sure were.”
The check came and I paid.
FROM THE RESTAURANT we went to a place called Little Ron’s Piano Bar on the ground floor of an apartment building looking out on Central Park West. Hush got us seats in a corner against the wall where we had a good look at the bar.
The piano man was practicing his Fats Waller so I was happy with my scotch.
Hush then engaged me in unexpected small talk. He knew I liked boxing and so asked me what odds I gave the light heavyweight Antonio Tarver against the man who currently held the title, Chad Dawson.
“Tarver’s almost forty,” I said, “past his prime. Dawson is younger and fast, but he’s also a natural middleweight. It’s a toss-up.”
Hush and I had to maintain a conversation so as not to look suspicious. I kept it up but it felt spurious, like trying to concentrate on a leopard’s spots when he’s leering down at you from an overhead branch.
Relief from this torture came when LouBob Georgias walked in at a little after eleven. He was wearing a green suit and a black hat with a yellow feather in it. He was very big, as broad and as tall as Willie Sanderson. He had a friendly face and smile. He joked with the bartender and the waitress who had served us.
“Want to brace him outside?” I asked.
“Just wait,” Hush said.
Maybe a quarter of an hour later a voluptuous brunette came through the front door. In her late twenties, she had a figure that certain men and most twelve-year-old boys dream of. Her dress, what there was of it, seemed to be made from multicolored confetti, and her tanned skin glowed like rose gold.
LouBob put his hand at the small of her back and lifted her off the ground to give her a sloppy kiss. Every eye in the bar was on them. Even the piano man missed a note or two.
Our conversation had ended with the o€nded witentrance of the woman. Hush was watching them like a cat. I sat back and studied my friend, hoping to learn something beyond my ken.
LouBob and the woman settled at the bar and ordered drinks.
They were on their third round when Hush said, “Come up on the other side of him after the girl leaves.”
He got to his feet and walked toward the bar.
Once again I had the picture with no sound. Hush walked up behind LouBob. For a moment I was afraid that he was going to come out with his pistol and shoot the guy behind the ear. It was an irrational panic that subsided after he tapped the big man’s shoulder.
The fright moved from me to LouBob when he saw Hush standing there in his medium-black suit and thin green tie. My would-be killer’s spine seemed to freeze, and the brunette became curious.
LouBob said something to the woman and she reacted angrily. Hush didn’t seem to notice and LouBob turned away. A moment later the woman stormed out of the bar. Hush gave her the briefest glance as she left. It struck me that the ex-assassin got some sort of sadistic pleasure out of humiliating the big man in front of his woman. I filed that little bit of information away and then went over to flank LouBob Georgias.
“Hey, Hush, LouBob,” I said when I rolled up on the other side of my would-be killer.
Georgias gawped at me openmouthed but didn’t say anything.
“This is my friend Leonid McGill,” Hush said and the fear in LouBob’s eyes deepened.
The big man was still looking at me while he addressed Hush. “I didn’t know he was your friend, man.”
“Sit down,” Hush said and we all three perched on gilt-and-red-vinyl barstools.
“Can I get you guys something?” the bartender asked from somewhere off to my right. He’d come up from the other end of the bar when he noticed our approach.
“Three black Russians,” Hush told him. I think he meant that as some kind of joke about my name.
The bartender, a white man who was maybe sixty and had spent some time in the sun earlier in life, moved back a bit when he observed the deadness in Hush’s eyes.
“You got it,” he said.
“What’s Timothy Moore’s real name?” I asked LouBob.
“Far as I know that is his real name.”
“Tell us about him,” Hush said.
“He, he did a nickel in Attica for bein’ stupio€or bein’d, and since then he’s worked for this rich guy now and then, doin’ odd jobs. He’s got a straight job somewhere too, in an office, I think.”
“What’s the rich guy’s name?” I asked.
“I dunno. He never said. We met over this union beef his boss had. It was a strike gonna come down with the hotels before a big convention. We was supposed to talk this guy into puttin’ it off. I never knew who hired him. He just said he did work for a rich guy. A rich guy. I don’t know his name.”
LouBob was sweating but I didn’t feel any contempt for him—Hush’s stare would open the pores of anyone who
