hiding places. He checked the ceilings and back walls of closets, and removed every drawer from every dresser and table and desk and built-in in the house. He stuck a knife in the coffee and in the flour, he took the backs off both TVs, he took off and then replaced every light switch and outlet plate. At the end, he put everything back the way it had been.
Nothing was hidden, nothing here changed the idea of Cathman as a solid citizen, predictable and dull. The only thing new Parker learned was that Cathman was looking for a job. He’d written more or less the same letter to about twenty government agencies and large corporations, listing his qualifications and stating his availability. The answers he got and he always got an answer were polite and respectful and not interested.
Clearly, he did this stuff at home, in this office upstairs at the back of the house that must originally have been a daughter’s bedroom, because he didn’t want his Rosemary Shields to know he was on a job hunt. That consulting business was just a face-saver, it cost him money instead of making money. He wasn’t strapped yet, but how long could he keep up the fake show? Was that reason enough to turn to the heisters?
Parker finished with the house at ten to five. There was no beer in Cathman’s refrigerator, but an open jug of Italian white wine was in there, cork stuck partway back in the bottle. Parker poured himself a glass, then sat in the dim living room and thought about the things that needed to be done. Noelle. The wheelchair. An ambulance or some kind of van that could take the wheelchair with a person in it. The limo for Lou. The chauffeur uniform. The guns. And Cathman’s part: ID.
He heard the garage door motor switch on, and got up to go to the kitchen, where the side door connected with the garage. He refilled his glass, and poured a second, and when Cathman walked in, slope-shouldered and discouraged, Parker was just turning with a glass in each hand. “You look like you could use this,” he said.
Cathman stared at him, first in astonishment, then in fear, and then, when he understood the glass that was extended toward him, in bewilderment. “What what are you”
“Take the glass, Cathman.”
Cathman finally did, but didn’t immediately drink. And now, because of having been startled and scared, he was moving toward anger. “You broke in here? You just come in my house?”
“We’ll talk in the living room,” Parker told him, and turned away, and Cathman had no choice but to follow.
The electric company jacket and the clipboard were on the sofa. Parker sat next to them, drank some wine, put the glass on the end table beside him, looked at Cathman standing in the doorway unable to figure out what to do next, and said, “Sit down, Cathman, we got things to talk about.”
Cathman blinked at him, and looked around the room. Trying to sound aggrieved, but coming off as merely weak, he said, “Did you searchin here?”
“Naturally.”
“Naturally? Why? What did you want to find?”
“You,” Parker said. “You don’t add up, and I want to know why.”
“I told you who I am.”
Parker said nothing to that. Cathman looked at the glass in his hand, as though just realizing it was there. He shook his head, walked over to sit in the easy chair to Parker’s right, and drank a small sip from the glass.
Parker wanted to shake him up, disturb him, see what fell out, but at the same time not to spook him so much he couldn’t be useful any more. So he’d come in here and show himself, but not make a mess. Not sit in the living room in the dimness when he comes home, but stand in the kitchen and offer him a glass of wine. Give a little, then get hard a little. Watch the reactions. Watch him, for instance, just take that tiny sip of wine and put the glass down. So he’s under good control, whatever’s driving him it isn’t panic.
Cathman put the glass down, and frowned at Parker. “Did you learn anything, coming in here like this?”
“You aren’t a consultant, you’re a guy out of work.”
“I’m both, as a matter of fact,” Cathman said. “I know your type, you know. You want to be just a little menacing, so people won’t try to take advantage of you, so they’ll do what you want them to do. But I don’t believe it’s just bluff, or I’d wash my hands of you now. It’s habit, that’s all, probably learned in prison. I’ll do you the favor of ignoring it, and you’ll do me the favor of not being more aggravating than you can help.”
“Well, you’re pretty cool, aren’t you?” Parker said. “I came in here to read you, so now you’re gonna read me.”
“I see you disguised yourself as a meter reader or some such thing,” Cathman said. “But I’d rather you didn’t do it again. If something goes wrong and you get arrested, I don’t want to be connected to a criminal named Parker.”
Ignoring that, Parker said, “What I need is ID, two pieces.”
Cathman frowned. “What sort of ID?”
“You tell me. If an assemblyman is out on an official job of some kind, he might ask for bodyguards, right?”
“Not bodyguards, not exactly,” Cathman said. “Oh, is that what you’re going to do, go on board as assemblyman Kotkind? Is that why I gave you his letterhead stationery?”
“What do you mean, not exactly bodyguards?”
“He might ask for a state trooper, to drive him, if it’s official.”
“In a patrol car?”
“No, a state car, with the state seal on the doors. Black, usually.”
“Trooper in uniform?”
“Probably not,” Cathman said. “He’d be a plain-clothesman from the security detail.”
“Then that’s the ID I want,” Parker said. “Two of them.”
