Naked Cruelty

didn’t hit on me. I don’t think he gave me a last name, but his first name was Brett. I said that sounded as if he’d been named after a movie star, but he laughed and denied it. It was a family name.”

Helen stifled her sigh; there was no Brett on Sugarman’s party lists.

“Did he have an opportunity to rifle your bag?”

“Only when I went to the toilet. I wasn’t gone long.”

“Have you seen Brett since?”

“No, never. That’s not surprising, Captain. I have no need of people, either at work or at home. Everything I do is art of some kind. I like solitude, I guess.”

“Don’t you feel-well, imprisoned?” Helen asked.

Catherine dos Santos laughed, a high, clear sound of true amusement. “Good lord, no! Detective, in here I feel safe! No one can get at me. That’s always the terror of women who love living alone, that they’ll be targeted by a predator. I love my bars, which is why I went to a lot of trouble over my weak point-the door. Noise is the best deterrent-really loud, siren noises. They always deter. I installed the sirens myself, bought them in an electronics hobby store.” She smiled jubilantly. “I’m especially fond of the one that sounds like a submarine. With the Hochners for neighbors, I’m safe, believe me.”

“Oh, I believe you,” Helen said. “What I find hard to credit is that you really like your life.”

“You were at Mark’s party-how do you live?” Catherine asked.

“I have a security penthouse,” said Helen, smiling.

“Lucky you.”

***

“My chief criticism of you, Miss MacIntosh,” said Carmine in biting tones after they left, “is that you have no idea how the other half lives, even after some exposure. That leads you to speak before you think. The moment Miss dos Santos said she did some of her art as a hedge against an indigent old age, you should have put a censor on your tongue. Why are you so quick to inform the world that you have millions, when what you ought to remember is that extremely few people are in your boat? I haven’t heard you contemplating giving any of your millions away to those less fortunate.”

“I apologize, Captain. I knew it was the wrong thing to say the minute I said it, but I didn’t know how to get out of such an awful predicament-I apologize, Captain, I do!”

“Why are you apologizing to me, Miss MacIntosh? You only offended me at second-hand. By rights you ought to go back and apologize to Miss dos Santos. This kind of apology is rather self-serving, don’t you agree?”

“Too much time’s gone by for me to go back,” Helen said quickly. “If you like, I’ll write her a note.”

“Yes, do that,” said Carmine, still simmering.

He spoke no more until they were in his office, where Nick and Delia joined them.

“How did he manage to get away?” Helen asked, still desperate to retrieve lost ground with the Captain.

“By being prepared for all eventualities, I suspect,” said Carmine. “And helped by the Hochners, who should have stayed put and watched for him, not rushed to Catherine’s door and impeded the cops.”

“They’re famous with the uniforms,” Delia said.

“Ask Fernando Vasquez. He’s inherited Danny Marciano’s file on them. Eternal complaints, then they missed the Dodo.”

Nick pulled the knapsack that lay on Carmine’s table closer to him. “Cool,” he said. “While the back of Catherine’s apartment block seethed with cops, he hunkered down in a bush on Hochner property and changed his appearance. He left the Dodo’s gear in the bush and emerged somewhere as a different person, I’m picking wearing gaudy clothes. But what was in these, Carmine?” Nick pointed to ruches in the knapsack’s exterior.

“Struts that maybe kept the knapsack rigid?” Delia offered.

“Why?” Nick asked.

“Whatever they were, he took them out,” Carmine said slowly.

“Unless they’re an intrinsic part that hampered him?” Helen asked. “Something that stopped him hiding the thing?”

“No, the cavities are still distended by whatever was inside. Round pipes or rods…” He counted the ruched bulges. “Six. Added together, about six feet. But what would he do with something six feet long? Subtract one, and it comes down to between four and five feet, depending on the length of the components. Not all the cavities are the same length.”

A conversation with two uniforms crashed into Nick’s mind. “It’s a crutch,” he said.

The rest gaped at him.

“Ike Masotti and his partner found a crippled guy on Cedar Street hobbling toward Persimmon. Not far from Catherine’s apartment. Crutch under his arm, dragging his right foot. He was wearing pants in that Scotch check that’s almost all yellow, and a red windcheater. Ike got no joy out of him, wrote him down as mildly retarded.”

“The Dodo!” Helen cried.

“He’s good, Carmine,” Nick said. “Fooled two smart cops nearly right outside where it happened. You know Ike Masotti-not easy to fool. It was early, mind, the sirens were still yowling because Catherine wasn’t home. A little later, the cops would have been less confused.”

For answer, Carmine picked up his phone and asked Fernando Vasquez if he knew how many cops had encountered a luridly dressed cripple.

“The guy’s brilliant,” he said, hanging up.

“Slipped through our fingers,” Nick mourned.

“Yes, but Ike Masotti set eyes on his face,” Carmine said, “and while he may have attempted disguise hiding in the Hochner bushes, he didn’t have the time or the facilities to do anything dramatic. The cops who saw the cripple later might not have been so lucky, so it’s Ike’s description we go on. Who was his partner?”

“Muley Evans.”

“What’s he like?”

“Sharp. We’ll get a good drawing.”

It was long after midnight before Didus ineptus went to earth. The red windcheater had been turned inside out to display its black side, and the MacLeod tartan pants were now showing their black lining. Thank his lucky stars for the verdure of Carew! He had gone nowhere near his car, still parked on Persimmon; the walk to his own car wasn’t impossible for someone who kept in shape by walking. When he hid to reverse his clothing, he dismantled the crutch and polished every inch of it outside and in. They’d not nail him with a print inside, even if they had the wit to think of it. Then he pushed the sections deeply into a bush and walked on, a man of ordinary mentality clad in black. Who wasn’t accosted at all. The crutch and flashy clothes had been a part of Plan C, an escape which he wouldn’t use again. When pulled up by three different sets of cops-one on foot (the first) and two in squad cars-he had given a sad, braying laugh that branded him as slightly retarded and been let go without being asked for so much as his name. It was worth noting for the future that a man in black who didn’t want to be seen tended not to be seen, even if he didn’t behave furtively. Black is better, black is definitely better! For flashy apparel, be retarded.

On the border of Carew and Busquash was his rented apartment; he let himself in, still wearing surgeon’s gloves, and undressed. The stash of clothing was folded carefully and slipped through a manhole in the hall ceiling; they were too hard to get, necessitating a trip to New York City and theatrical suppliers, so while the apartment lasted, he’d hang on to them. After that he donned hiking gear and shouldered a new knapsack, filled with exactly the things a hiker would need for the Appalachian Trail.

On the border of Busquash and Millstone was his own car; he reached it without seeing a cop, got in and drove away. If a cop should stop him, he had his story straight.

But no cop did. Home at last, he realized he was ravenously hungry, took a Stouffer’s lasagna from the freezer and used the forty minutes heating time it gave him to put out his pajamas, secret the knapsack in his special place, and revel in a shower. Refreshed, clad in silk, he opened a bottle of French claret and sipped the wine with relish; no guzzling for Didus ineptus! It had been a close thing tonight. He never wanted a closer. The killer in him slavered at the thought of putting paid to Catherine dos Santos, but the survivor in him was stronger. There were other names in his book, other lives to take. The fucking bitch had tricked him, and, in tricking him, had evaded him forever. He would not be