“
Valentine stared up at the fresco in the dome. The voice seemed to be coming from the air, and he stared at the angels and demons carousing above his head.
“
He continued to stare, seeing nothing.
“Something wrong?” Doyle said.
Valentine again looked over his shoulder. His partner was standing beside the guard. “You didn’t hear that voice?”
“No, Tony, honest, I didn’t hear a thing.”
There was a doorway next to the stage. Valentine walked over to it, and stared down a dimly lit hallway at the dressing rooms in the back. It was the only place in the theater to hide. Drawing his .38, he pointed the barrel straight ahead, then glanced back at his partner. “Cover me,” he said.
Doyle limped up behind him, his weapon drawn. Valentine walked down the hallway remembering all the famous actors that used to play the Bijou. His leg hit a trip wire, and he heard a sickening
Valentine landed on his side, and watched as a baby grand piano came crashing down on the spot where he’d just stood. The piano once sat in front of the stage, where a lady in a white dress would play old show tunes. As it hit the earth, music rushed out like a drowning symphony.
He got up off the floor, then helped Doyle to his feet. His partner was grimacing and holding his crippled leg.
“You okay?”
“I’ll live,” Doyle said.
The guard came running down the hallway, looking scared to death. He pulled a flashlight out of his back pocket, and shone it up at the ceiling. The piano had been hanging from a pulley. “I don’t remember that being there,” the guard said.
Valentine went to the dressing rooms and checked them. They hadn’t been used in years, and there was no sign of anyone being in them recently. Then, he checked the back entrance to the theater, and found it locked.
There was a pay phone at the end of the hall. Valentine fished a dime out of his pocket, and called Banko.
“You better come down here,” he told his superior.
“You heard a voice?” Banko said fifteen minutes later.
They were standing in front of the stage. In the hallway, they could hear the guard cleaning up the broken piano. Every time he threw a piece of wood in a wheelbarrow, the instrument emitted a mournful chord. Valentine had explained everything — from hearing the voice, to the misspelled message on the typewriter mimicking the messages he’d typed as a kid — and Banko was looking at him like he’d lost his mind.
“It was a man’s voice,” Valentine said. “He whispered my name.”
“Did Doyle hear it? Or the guard?”
“No.”
Banko made an exasperated face. “Tony, this isn’t good. You’re hearing things, and making connections that no one else is making. I want you to do your job at the casino. Stop running around town every time someone calls you on the phone.”
Doyle stood a few feet away, listening. He mouthed the words
“Okay,” Valentine said.
“Terrific. If it makes you feel better, I’ll have another detective look into this, and see what turns up.” Banko started to walk away, then came back. “We have a meeting with the CCC tomorrow regarding Louis Galloway.
Valentine said, “Of course I remember.”
“What time am I picking you up at your house?”
“Uh… seven-thirty?”
Banko walked away muttering under his breath.
Chapter 37
“You’re not going crazy,” Lois said reassuringly that night.
Valentine lay on the couch in the living room with his head in his wife’s lap. He had told her everything that had happened that day, hoping it would make him feel better. So far, it wasn’t working. “No,” he said, “but I’m headed in that direction.”
“Stop talking like that. It’s not like you. Lots of people hear voices.”
“Do say their name, and tell them they hate them?”
“Oh, Tony, it was just…”
“My imagination?” He shook his head. “My imagination isn’t that good. Someone was in that theater besides me and Doyle and the guard. Someone from my past who holds a grudge and who’s also killing hookers on the island.” He looked into her eyes. They were soft and beautiful and had never failed to melt his heart. “I just wish I could
