“We have a calling system. Each person has two people to call.”
“Who were you supposed to call?”
“Milo and Antone.”
“Balls.”
“I cannot help you.”
“Maybe you can’t,” I said. Maybe I’d used her up. And maybe she couldn’t.
20
Hawk was back in less than an hour. When he came in he shook his head. “Gone?” I said. “
Uh huh.“
“Clues?” Hawk said, “Clues?”
“You know,” I said, “like an airplane schedule with a flight to Beirut underlined. A hotel confirmation slip from the Paris Hilton. Some tourist brochures from Orange County, California. A tinkling piano in the next apartment. Clues.”
“No clues, man.”
“Anyone see them leave?”
“Nope.”
“So the only thing we know for sure is he isn’t in his place on Prinsengracht, and he isn’t here in this room.”
“He wasn’t when I looked. She tell you anything?”
“Everything she knows.”
“Maybe you believe that, babe. I don’t.”
“We’ve been trying. You want some more wine? I ordered some while you were gone.”
“Yeah. Yeah.” I poured some for Hawk and some for Kathie. “Okay, kid,” I said to Kathie. “He’s gone and all we’ve got is you. Where might he be?”
“He could be anywhere,” she said. Her face was a little flushed. She’d had a lot of wine. “He can go anywhere in the world.”
“Phony passport?”
“Yes. I don’t know how many. Many.” Hawk had taken off his coat and hung the shotgun rig from the corner of a chair. He was leaning far back with his Frye boots crossed on the bureau and the glass of red wine balanced on his chest. His eyes almost closed. “Where would the places be that he wouldn’t go?”
“I don’t understand.”
“I going too fast for you, sugar? Watch my lips close. Where would he not go?” Kathie drank some wine. She looked at Hawk the way sparrows are supposed to look at tree snakes. It was a look of fearful fascination. “I don’t know.”
“She don’t know,” Hawk said to me. “You do take up with some winners, babe.”
“What the hell are you going to do, Hawk, keep eliminating the places he wouldn’t go until there’s only one left?”
“You got a better idea, babe?”
“No. Where would he be least likely to go, Kathie?”
“I cannot say.”
“Think a little. Would he go to Russia?”
“Oh no.”
“Red China?”
“No, no. No Communist country.” Hawk made a gesture of triumph with his open palms turned up. “See, babe, eliminate half the world just like that.
“Swell,” I said. “This sounds like an old Abbott and Costello routine.”
Hawk said, “You know a better game?”
Kathie said, “Have they had the Olympics yet?” Hawk and I looked at her. “The Olympic games?”
“Yes.”
“They’re on now.”
“Last year he sent away for tickets to the Olympic games. Where are they being held?”
Hawk and I said, “In Montreal,” at the same time.
Kathie drank some wine and made a small giggle and said, “Well, that’s probably where he went, then.”
I said, “Why in hell didn’t you tell us?”
