“Who else is dead?”
Rudy slicked back his dirty hair, pressed a hand against his abdomen. “Stomach’s kind of wacky lately,” he explained apologetically. He took a couple of hard breaths. “Clemente went back to Cuba after the war. I think it was about seven months after Porter was killed that Macy got the story about Clemente. In Spanish, yet. His woman found him hung upside down in some Havana crib, slit open from throat to groin.”
“Another clipping about the fire with this newspaper story?”
“Right... Let’s see. It was Tin Ear next. New Orleans, this time. Throat cut and belly opened. About a year after Clemente. Three weeks ago Lundquist was knifed in an old folks’ home outside of Tampa.”
“Any message with these clippings? Some kind of threat?”
“Hell, no. It’s clear enough, ain’t it?”
“Yeah. Macy’s getting shook about all this?”
“Not too much. But he wants to get this thing off his back. He’s got other problems. He wants you to find the guy with the knife who’s sending him these newspaper stories.”
“How about you, Rudy?” I said. “You getting worried?”
He rubbed the back of his hand across his lumpy chin. His eyes weren’t happy. He was beginning to look like an old man. “The guy sticks with it,” he said, his voice rasping. “It takes a lot of patience to hunt down men like he does.”
“And a lot of hate to use a knife like that.”
“Yeah,” Rudy said. He squirmed in the chair.
I packed the ice chest with ice from the refrigerator, put the fish inside. It was time for me to pick Elaine up. She would begin to wonder what was keeping me. I thought of the menace of Rudy Mask, and Macy Barr, who should have been untouchable, but was feeling the pressure from a slow and patient killer. I wondered if I was going to be able to say no to Macy again and get away with it.
Without looking at Rudy I said, “Tell Macy to get another boy. I made a clean break. I want it to stay clean.”
Rudy was silent.
“If he told you to bring me whether I wanted to come or not, forget that too,” I told him.
“He didn’t figure you’d come back because you love him so much,” Rudy said. “So he wanted me to remind you of something. About what a nice girl you’re engaged to.”
I turned, my jaw tight with rage. Rudy wasn’t gloating. He looked at me soberly. “He wouldn’t hurt your girl,” Rudy said. “He wouldn’t have somebody brought in to hurt her and leave her in an alley without her clothes like he’s done to others. He just said he’d take a letter you wrote a long time ago and wrap it up and send it to her so she could read it.” He was watching me closely. He must have seen what happened to my eyes, because he grunted, satisfied, and walked away, poking his bad teeth with the end of a match.
No, Macy wouldn’t hurt Elaine. Not in the old manner, breaking bones and faces. Once in a while this was the best way, the only way to make sure a warning was obeyed, to maintain control of the uncertain human element in a sprawling illicit operation. But through the years Macy had learned better and safer ways of control: how to bring a man to his knees through the gentle pressure of his own mistakes; how to hit a man through others close to him so that it is more painful than any beating.
The letter would tell Elaine what I had never told her: about a wife named Jean, whose home for five years had been an institution in New York State until in a lucid moment some time ago she had slashed herself and bled to death. It would be the beginning of ruin. Maybe Elaine could take it. But if her mother and father found out... They weren’t sure of me, anyway. And if they should start looking into my past, I was through.
Rudy stood near the front window watching the cars go by in the street, jingling change in his pocket. I heard the telephone and picked up the receiver without thinking about it.
“Pete?” Elaine said cheerfully. “You break your leg or something?”
“I was just leaving,” I said thickly. “Be right over.”
“Nothing wrong, is there?”
“No. Of course not. See you in a little while.”
I put the receiver down. Rudy yawned. “We’ll have to get moving. Macy was expecting us today.”
“You bastard,” I said.
“I’m sorry, Pete,” he said, sounding as if he really meant it.
Elaine answered the door when I rang the bell. She was wearing a pastry-pink semiformal dress and the edges of her short black hair sparkled. A welcoming smile faded when she saw me.
“Pete, you’re not dressed!”
I went on inside. “Anyone else home?”
She frowned as if she were beginning to get angry with me. “No. Mother and Dad left ten minutes ago. Why —”
I couldn’t look at her. “I’m going away for a few days, Elaine. I have to leave tonight.”
She didn’t get it right away. She stood silently looking at me as if I were out of my mind.
“What are you talking about, Pete?” Her voice was high.
It was getting worse by the second. I tried not to yell at her because of the hurt I was feeling. “I just said I have to go away. That’s all. I’ll be back in a few days.”
“Oh.” Her hands brushed at the crisp ruffles on her dress. “It’s kind of sudden, isn’t it? Where are you going that you have to leave in such a hurry?”
“To the south. It’s — business. I didn’t know about it until a few minutes ago.”
She put a hand to her cheek. Her mouth turned down at the corners. “Nice of you to come by and tell me about it.”
“Damn it, Elaine, don’t—”
She took two quick steps and put her arms around me. Her eyes were frightened. “Pete, what is it? You’re acting — I never saw you like this. Are you in some kind of trouble? Is that — Oh, Pete, what’s the matter?”
“Does anything have to be the matter? I’m just going to Castile for a few days.”
“Tell me why,” she whispered. “You can do that.”
I held her. “No. I — It’s not imp—”
She broke away from me, looked at me, her eyes full of rage and hurt. “You don’t really love me so much after all, do you?”
“There are some things it’s better for you not to—”
“
I walked to the door. It wasn’t doing any good to stay there.
“I love you, Elaine,” I said quietly. “I’m not really in trouble. A long time ago I worked for a man. A big and important man. I guess you’d call him a gangster. I owe my life to him. Now I’m going to pay an installment on it. The last payment, I hope.”
I opened the door. She tried to stop me. “No, Pete! Whatever it is, don’t go!”
I kept walking, out to the car. She followed me, caught my arm. “Please, Pete. It’s all right, I’m not angry with you, just don’t go, stay with me, please!”
“I’ll come back,” I said.
She was crying now. “What are you going to do?”
“This man I worked for, his name is Macy Barr. Somebody’s trying to kill him. I’ve got to find out who. It’s the only chance we’ve got, Elaine. This time I’ll make sure the past stays dead. Believe me.”
I held her suddenly and kissed her, then got into the car quickly. She watched me silently, holding both arms across her stomach, hurting too much to speak. I saw her image in the mirror as I drove away, then the drive twisted and I couldn’t see her any more. Once I thought I heard her call me, but maybe it was just a sound I made
