“Un huh.”
We sat. The wind shifted. The Styrofoam cup skittered slowly back across the blacktop.
“You got any thought on what developments we might be awaiting?” I said.
“No.”
A rat appeared around the corner of one of the buildings and went swiftly to an overturned trash barrel. It plunged its upper body into the litter. Only its tail showed. The tail moved a little, back and forth, slowly. Then the rat backed out of the trash barrel and went away.
“Maybe we can keep the peace by sitting here in the middle of the project. And maybe we can find out who killed the two kids, mother and daughter,” I said. “I doubt it, but maybe we can. Then what? We can’t sit here twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, until the social order changes. No matter how much fun we’re having.”
Hawk nodded. He was slouched in the driver’s seat, his eyes half shut, at rest. He was perfectly capable of staying still for hours, and feeling rested, and missing nothing.
“Something will develop,” Hawk said.
“Because we’re here,” I said.
“Un huh.”
“They won’t be able to tolerate us sitting here,” I said.
Hawk grinned.
“We an affront to their dignity,” he said.
“So they’ll finally have to do something.”
“Un huh.”
“Which is what we’re sitting here waiting for,” I said.
“Un huh.”
“Sort of like bait,” I said.
“Exactly,” Hawk said.
“What a dandy plan!”
“You got a better idea?” Hawk said.
“No.”
“Me either.”
CHAPTER 9
When I got home Susan was in bed eating her supper and watching a movie on cable. Pearl was in bed with her watching closely. Susan was wearing one of my white shirts for a nightdress and her black hair had the sort of loose look it had when it had just been washed. I kissed her.
“And the baby,” Susan said. I kissed Pearl.
“There’s some supper waiting for you in the refrigerator,” she said.
“Good,” I said.
“Why don’t you get it and bring it up and we’ll eat together and you can tell me about your day.”
“I can tell you about my day now. Hawk and I sat for thirteen hours in the middle of Twenty-two Hobart Street.”
“And?”
“And nothing. We just sat there.”
“How boring,” Susan said. “Well, get your supper and we can talk.”
I took my gun off my belt and put it on the night-table next to my side of the bed. I took a shower. Then I went downstairs to the kitchen and found supper, a large bowl of cold pasta and chicken. I tasted it. There was raw broccoli in it, and raw carrots, and some sort of fat-free salad dressing that tasted like an analgesic balm. Susan admitted it tasted like an analgesic balm, but she said that with a little fat-free yogurt and some lemon juice and a dash of celery seed mixed in, it was good. I had never agreed with this. I put it back in the refrigerator. When I’d moved in I had brought with me a six-pack of Catamount Beer. I opened one.
In Susan’s refrigerator was a half-used cellophane bag of shredded cabbage, some carrots, some broccoli, half a red pepper, half a yellow pepper, and half a green pepper, some skimmed milk, most of a loaf of seven-grain bread, and a package containing two boneless skinless chicken breasts. I sliced up both the chicken breasts on an angle, cut up the peppers, sprinkled everything with some fines herbes that I found in the back of Susan’s cupboard, and put it in a fry pan on high. It was a pretty fry pan, a mauve color with a design on it, that went perfectly with the pillows on the love seat in the kitchen. As an instrument for sauteeing it was nearly useless. I splashed a little beer in with the chicken and peppers and when it cooked away, I took the pan off the stove and made up a couple of sandwiches on the sevengrain bread. I put the sandwiches on a plate, got another beer, and took my supper upstairs.
“Oh, I left some pasta salad for you,” Susan said.
“I sort of felt like a sandwich,” I said.
Susan smiled and nodded. I sat on the edge of the bed and balanced the plate on the edge of the night-table.
