way.”
The front. There was a narrow bare porch. The woman knocked on the glass of the door, which probably meant the bell didn’t work.
The door opened and a pudgy kid was standing there. Or maybe not a kid. But short, and soft, and covered with baby fat. He wore a wrinkled white shirt open at the collar and bunched at the waist, and dark trousers with unmatching jacket, and black shoes, and large eyeglasses with black rims. He had thinning black hair, and a round white face, and soft hands with stubby fingers. He said, “Claire! And this must be Mr. Parker.” His voice was high- pitched and weak, making Parker think of eunuchs.
The woman—Claire—stepped into the house, saying, “Hello, Billy. His name is supposed to be Lynch.” There was a resigned quality in her voice now that hadn’t been present before, as though all her objections had long ago worn themselves out on the unlined brow of Billy.
“We’re all friends here,” Billy said, and laughed, and extended a soft hand toward Parker, saying, “I’m Billy Lebatard, this is my show. Lempke’s told me a lot about you.”
Parker stepped inside, ignored the outstretched hand, and pulled the door away from Billy’s other hand, shutting it, saying, “Did he tell you I don’t like to be framed in a lit doorway?”
Billy’s smiling face went blank, but without losing the smile, which hung on like a leftover crescent moon. He looked over at Claire, who was half-turned away from him, looking through the archway into the living room, and he said, “Claire? Did I do something wrong?”
“Probably,” she said wearily, not turning her head, and walked away into the living room.
Parker said, “Is Lempke here?”
“Well, certainly,” said Billy, suddenly happy again. “We’re all here, just waiting for you.”
“Is that right?”
“Lempke tells me you’re an idea man, an organizer. He tells me you’re just the man we need for this job.”
“Maybe. Where is he?”
“In the living room,” Billy said eagerly. “We’re all here in the living room.” He moved off, urging Parker to move with him, not quite touching Parker’s arm.
The living room was small and cramped and full of furniture. Two lamps and a ceiling light were all burning, making the room bright and garish and semi-hysterical. A shabby dining room, also brightly lit, was through an archway on the left. The ceiling was low, making the room seem even more crowded than it was.
Lempke was sitting on the overstuffed mohair sofa straight ahead, a can of beer in his hand. He looked much older than Parker remembered. A small, neat, spare man in his mid-fifties, he gave the impression of being scrubbed, like a child leaving home for the first day of school. When he smiled — as he did now, seeing Parker—he showed the smallest, neatest, whitest, falsest set of false teeth Parker had ever seen, and from the look of them Parker guessed that Lempke had been on the inside for a while since they’d last worked together. Those choppers looked like the kind of thing you might expect from a prison dentist.
Lempke got to his feet, extending his hand, saying, “Parker. Long time no see.”
“Good to see you again, Lempke,” Parker said, though it maybe wasn’t true. If Lempke was fresh out of the house his judgment might not be trustworthy. He might be too hungry for a score, might be tempted to sign on somewhere even if the setup wasn’t one hundred per cent right.
Lempke said, “I don’t think you know Jack French,” motioning at the man who’d been sitting next to him on the sofa.
“No, I don’t.”
French stood up as he was introduced, and Parker shook hands with him. He thought French looked all right; lean and rawboned and self-contained, maybe thirty-five, with level eyes and an expressionless face. French said, “Good to know you,” and sat down again.
“Now we’re all here,” Billy was saying, beaming and rubbing his soft hands together.
Parker said to Lempke, “What’s the pitch?”
But Lempke said, “Lebatard ought to tell you, it’s his baby.”
“Sit down, Mr. Parker,” Billy said, happy and eager. “Take the comfortable chair there, I’ll tell you all about it.”
Flanking the television set opposite the sofa was a pair of mismatched armchairs, both with frayed backs and arms. Claire was sitting in one of these now, legs crossed, absorbed in a study of her stocking. Parker went to the other and sat down, liking this situation less and less. Billy Lebatard seemed to be running this operation, and Billy Lebatard was an obvious amateur and fool. Sweet jobs were occasionally fingered by amateurs and fools, but the odds weren’t good. Feeling more and more that he’d been dealt a hand he should fold, Parker sat down and waited for the fool to tell him what it was all about.
Billy stood in the middle of the room, turning this way and that, trying to smile at everybody at once. “For the benefit of the two new men,” he said, in his child’s voice, “I’ll start at the beginning. My name is Billy Lebatard, and by profession I’m a numismatist. A coin dealer. And stamps, some stamps, but mostly coins.”
Jack French abruptly said, “How come you’re heeled?”
That was nicely done. Parker set himself to back French’s play, if called upon.
But Billy just looked flustered for a few seconds, and then looked down at himself, at the bulge under his jacket on the left side, and laughed sheepishly and said, “That’s just habit. I didn’t even think about that.” He looked at French, grinning like a kid who’s finally got to play with the big boys, and he said, “I carry valuable coins with me a lot. Sometimes sixty or seventy thousand dollars in the back of the station wagon.”
French said, “You got coins on you now?”
“I’ll put it away if you want me to,” Billy said. “But aren’t you all—?” He gestured vaguely, and looked around at Parker, and then at Lempke.
