“Tell him what we were talking about,” Beevers said.
2
“Harry wants us to do a few things for him,” Conor said, resenting the way Beevers got his kicks by ordering everybody around.
“For
“Okay, you can explain it yourself if you don’t like the way I do it, Harry.”
“I have my reasons.”
With Beevers you never reached the end of these little games.
“Well,” Conor began, “when we were just sort of shooting the breeze in here we found something out.”
And there Mikey was—he heard it and he was tuned in, all of him.
“It was something I didn’t tell you about, back in Bangkok. I figured I wanted to think about it myself, and then, you know, Tina got killed and we came back, and all that.”
Poole nodded.
“Remember when we were talking about that place where you go—where a bunch of rich guys watch somebody kill a girl?”
“I remember.”
“Well, I figured Tim was lying when he said he never went there. Because I got in by using his name. That’s the reason I got in. Tim’s name was like a kind of code, like a password or something.”
“Exactly,” Underhill said.
“So when he dodged around it on the plane, I figured he didn’t want to admit he went in for this sick little death trip, you know?”
“But I had never been there,” Underhill said.
“And a lot of other things. He didn’t know anybody named Cham, and the Cham I met knew all about him. And he was never blackballed from all the bars and places I went to, but the guy who took me around heard that Tim Underhill had been kicked out of at least half of them.”
“I thought you had a picture,” Poole said.
“Well, I forgot it that day. But everybody knew his name, so I thought it must be Tim. But—”
Mikey got it right away.
“It was another man,” Mike said.
“Bingo.”
“Truth is,” said Tim, “in Bangkok I pretty much laid low. I was busy getting myself together. Mainly I was trying to get back to work. In the two years I lived in Bangkok, I don’t think I set foot in Patpong more than twice.”
“So,” Beevers said, unable to be silent any longer, “remember the time we went to Goodwood Park?”
“He used Tim’s name.”
“He always used Tim’s name. Everywhere he went. Even when they were in the same city.”
“Which explains why my reputation was even worse than my own efforts should have made it,” Tim said. “The amazing Victor Spitalny was going around telling people he was me.”
“So it’s perfect that Murphy is looking for Underhill,” Beevers said. “And what I have been suggesting to our friends while we were waiting for you is the next logical step. It’s what we were talking about on the plane. We look for him too.”
“Just the way we did in Singapore and everywhere else.”
Very pleased with himself, he took a big swallow of his drink. “We do exactly what we did before. With this difference. Now we know who we’re really looking for. I think we have a better chance of finding him than the police do. Where do you think he would be most at home?”
Nobody spoke.
“Where in New York City?”
Conor could not stand this anymore, and said, “Go on, tell us.”
Beevers smirked. “Chinatown. I think he’d roll down to Mott Street the way a stone rolls downhill. The man has not been in this country in fifteen years! How does it look to him? Like a foreign country! It is a foreign country to him.”
“You want us to go around Chinatown looking for him, like instant replay?” Conor asked. “I don’t know.”
“We’re five yards from the end zone, Conor. Do you want to quit now?”
Poole asked if Beevers really wanted Tim Underhill to go around Chinatown looking for himself.
“I have a couple of other ideas for you and Tim. What I’m talking about isn’t just walking around Chinatown talking to waiters and bartenders. That part of it I’m willing to take on myself. But do you remember my mentioning advertising? I want to put Tim’s name where Koko will see it every time he goes outside. Let’s surround him with it. And when he’s feeling totally hemmed in, let’s give him an out. And run him straight into a trap.”
“A killing box,” Mikey said.
“A trap. We capture him. We hear whatever he has to say. And then we turn him over to the police.”
He looked around as if he expected disagreement and was prepared to face it down. “We’ve spent too much time and money to settle for anything less. Spitalny killed Tina Pumo. He is out there right now, trying to figure out how to kill
Sometimes Conor could almost admire Harry Beevers.
“So I’m talking about putting up flyers on windows, on lampposts, bus shelters, anywhere he might notice them. And I worked out a couple of ads for the
Beevers’ eyes shone with his satisfaction in this scheme. For one thing, it got Tim Underhill out of his hair for a couple of days. Beevers had already asked Conor if he wanted to go to Milwaukee too, but he had refused. Ben Roehm needed a second carpenter for a small renovation job, and he had told Conor that Tom Woyzak “wasn’t a problem anymore.” His niece Ellen had filed for divorce in December. Woyzak had beaten her up once too often, and was now in a drug and alcohol treatment center.
Mikey surprised Conor by saying, “I’ve been thinking along those lines myself. Do you want to give it a try, Tim?”
“It could be interesting,” Underhill said.
“Tell me what you think of the newspaper ads first.” Beevers handed Poole the sheet of paper on which he had printed the messages for the back page of the
TIM UNDERHILL—END THE WAR AND COME HOME. CALL HARRY BEEVERS 555-0033.
UNDERHILL—THE GRUNT CAN STOP RUNNING. 555-0033.
“And here’s one of the flyers I had run off.” Beevers stood up and removed the top sheet from a stack of papers on a bookshelf above his head. “I had three hundred of these made up at a print shop around the corner. I can put one on every lamppost—he’ll see it, don’t worry about that.”
On the flyer’s yellow paper was a message in large black letters:TIM UNDERHILL
YOU WHO WERE AT IA THUC
AND LAST SEEN IN BANGKOK
COME HOME WE
WHO KNOW YOUR REAL NAME
