The Girl Hunters

for me at last, but I wasn't what you expected at all. That big one you knew and loved is gone, kid, long gone, and you can't come back that big any more. Hell, Velda, you know that. You can't come back...you should have known what would happen to me. Damn, you knew me well enough. And it happened. So how can you yell for me now? I know you knew what I'd be like, and you asked for me anyway.

I let out a little laugh and only the rain could enjoy it with me. She knew, all right. You can't come back just as big. Either lesser or bigger. There was no other answer. She just didn't know the odds against the right choice.

There was a new man on the elevator now. I signed the night book, nodded to him and gave him my floor. I got off at eight and went down the hall, watching my shadow grow longer and longer from the single light behind me.

I had my keys in my hand, but I didn't need them at all. The door to 808 stood wide open invitingly, the lights inside throwing a warm glow over the dust and the furniture and when I closed it behind me I went through the anteroom to my office where Art Rickerby was sitting and picked up the sandwich and Blue Ribbon beer he had waiting for me and sat down on the edge of the couch and didn't say a word until I had finished both.

Art said, 'Your friend Nat Drutman gave me the key.'

'It's okay.'

'I pushed him a little.'

'He's been pushed before. If he couldn't read you right you wouldn't have gotten the key. Don't sell him short.'

'I figured as much.'

I got up, took off the soggy coat and hat and threw them across a chair. 'What's with the visit? I hope you're not getting too impatient.'

'No. Patience is something inbred. Nothing I can do will bring Richie back. All I can do is play the angles, the curves, float along the stream of time, then, my friend, something will bite, even on an unbaited hook.'

'Shit.'

'You know it's like that. You're a cop.'

'A long time ago.'

He watched me, a funny smile on his face. 'No. Now. I know the signs. I've been in this business too long.'

'So what do you want here?'

Rickerby's smile broadened. 'I told you once. I'll do anything to get Richie's killer.'

'Oh?'

He reached in his pocket and brought out an envelope. I took it from him, tore it open and read the folded card it contained on all four of its sides, then slid it into my wallet and tucked it away.

'Now I can carry a gun,' I said.

'Legally. In any state.'

'Thanks. What did you give up to get it?'

'Not a thing. Favors were owed me too. Our department is very--wise.'

'They think it's smart to let me carry a rod again?'

'There aren't any complaints. You have your--ticket.'

'It's a little different from the last one this state gave me.'

'Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, my friend.'

'Okay. Thanks.'

'No trouble. I'm being smug.'

'Why?'

He took off his glasses again, wiped them and put them back on. 'Because I have found out all about you a person could find. You're going to do something I can't possibly do because you have the key to it all and won't let it go. Whatever your motives are, they aren't mine, but they encompass what I want and that's enough for me. Sooner or later you're going to name Richie's killer and that's all I want. In the meantime, rather than interfere with your operation, I'll do everything I can to supplement it. Do you understand?'

'I think so,' I said.

'Good. Then I'll wait you out.' He smiled, but there was nothing pleasant in his expression. 'Some people are different from others. You're a killer, Mike. You've always been a killer. Somehow your actions have been justified and I think righteously so, but nevertheless, you're a killer. You're on a hunt again and I'm going to help you. There's just one thing I ask.'

'What?'

'If you do find Richie's murderer before me, don't kill him.'

I looked up from the fists I had made. 'Why?'

'I want him, Mike. Let him be mine.'

'What will you do with him?'

Rickerby's grin was damn near inhuman. It was a look I had seen before on other people and never would have expected from him. 'A quick kill would be too good, Mike,' he told me slowly. 'But the law--this supposedly just, merciful provision--this is the most cruel of all. It lets you rot in a death cell for months and deteriorate slowly until you're only an accumulation of living cells with the consciousness of knowing you are about to die; then the creature is tied in a chair and jazzed with a hot shot that wipes him from the face of the earth with one big jolt and that's that.'

'Pleasant thought,' I said.

'Isn't it, though? Too many people think the sudden kill is the perfect answer for revenge. Ah, no, my friend. It's the waiting. It's the knowing beforehand that even the merciful provisions of a public trial will only result in what you already know--more waiting and further contemplation of that little room where you spend your last days with death in an oaken chair only a few yards away. And do you know what? I'll see that killer every day. I'll savor his anguish like a fine drink and be there as a witness When he burns and he'll see me and know why I'm there and when he's finished I'll be satisfied.'

'You got a mean streak a yard wide, Rickerby.'

'But it doesn't quite match yours, Mike.'

'The hell it doesn't.'

'No--you'll see what I mean some day. You'll see yourself express the violence of thought and action in a way I'd never do. True violence isn't in the deed itself. It's the contemplation and enjoyment of the deed.'

'Come off it.'

Rickerby smiled, the intensity of hatred he was filled with a moment ago seeping out slowly. If it had been me I would have been shaking like a leaf, but now he casually reached out for the can of beer, sipped at it coolly and put it down.

'I have some information you requested,' he told me.

While I waited I walked behind the desk, sat down and pulled open the lower drawer. The shoulder holster was still supple although it had lain there seven years. I took off my jacket, slipped it on and put my coat back.

Art said, 'I--managed to find out about Gerald Erlich.'

I could feel the pulse in my arm throb against the arm of the chair. I still waited.

'Erlich is dead, my friend.'

I let my breath out slowly, hoping my face didn't show how I felt.

'He died five years ago and his body was positively identified.'

Five years ago! But he was supposed to have died during the war!

'He was found shot in the head in the Eastern Zone of Germany. After the war he had been fingerprinted and classified along with other prisoners of note so there was no doubt as to his identity.' Art stopped a moment, studied me, then went on. 'Apparently this man was trying to make the Western Zone. On his person were papers and articles that showed he had come out of Russia, there were signs that he had been under severe punishment and if you want to speculate, you might say that he had escaped from a prison and was tracked down just yards from freedom.'