'Sure, Aine.'
'I'm just a sorry fucked-up piece of shit.'
'I can help you, Aine.'
'I need to make up. I need a fix real bad.'
'I can see that.'
'I need to find the candy man.'
'I can help you do that.'
She blinked at him in the falling rain.
'Tell me where you met Melissa Summers. Tell me where it was.'
'Who?'
'Melissa Summers. Either a redhead or a girl with long black hair.'
'I'm a natural redhead,' Aine said. 'Wanna see my pussy?'
'Focus, Aine. Melissa Summers.'
'Black hair. Bangs.'
Yes.'
'Slipped me a deuce to deliver a letter.'
'That's her.'
Yeah,' Aine said, and nodded in the falling rain.
'Where?' Ollie said.
'How much?' Aine asked.
'SO HOW'D THE meeting go?'Kling asked.
It was ten minutes past eleven. They were in his small studio apartment in the shadow of the Calm's Point Bridge. She'd been here waiting for him when he got home. Here in bed waiting for him, in fact. Wearing a white baby-doll nightgown.
'Boring stuff,' she said.
'Like what?'
He was in the bathroom, brushing his teeth. In the bedroom, propped against the white pillows behind her, Sharyn was watching the Eleven O'Clock News on Channel Four.
'The new Medicare stuff,' she said. 'How we'll be handling prescriptions, who becomes eligible, da-da, da- da, da-da,' she said, twirling her fingers in the air.
Lying.
She hadn't been at any hospital meeting. She'd been in her own apartment with a woman whose name was either C. Lawson, L. Matthews, or J. Curtis.
'What time did it end?' he asked.
'Around eight-thirty,' she said.
Which was the exact time she and either Lawson, Matthews, or Curtis had come down from her apartment, walking together arm in arm to the bus stop on the corner, where Lawson, Matthews, or Curtis had hailed a taxi, and Sharyn . . .
'Come straight home?' he asked.
'Caught a bus,' she said.
True enough. But not from any damn hospital.
In a second taxi, Kling had followed the white woman, no clue to her name as yet, just a tall, slender woman with dark hair and dark eyes, apparently comfortable enough to afford taxis all over the city, something Kling himself wasn't too cozy with. 'Follow that taxi,' he'd told his driver, and flashed the tin like a cop in a movie. Joined at the hip, they came over the bridge, yellow cab glued to yellow cab.
Like a cop in a movie, he'd followed Sharyn's three-way lesbian lover to her building after the taxis let them each off, waited till she entered the elevator, and then watched while the indicator showed her getting off on the fourth floor. He checked the lobby mailboxes, no doorman here, no need to conceal or reveal, all the time in the world to check the mailboxes at his leisure.
There were six apartments on the fourth floor. Three of the mailboxes carried men's names: George Santachiaro, James McReady, and Martin Weinstein. The other three carried androgynous, but most likely female, names: C. Lawson, L. Matthews, and J. Curtis. Kling didn't know why the women in this city thought an initial in
front of their surnames would fool anyone into thinking a man lived here. Usually, that single letter was a good invitation to a would-be rapist. He jotted the three names into his notebook, and took the subway uptown. The time was nine-twenty.
He stopped in a Mickey D's for a hamburger and some fries.
Walked around in the rain a little, thinking, wondering what to do.
The city seemed glittery and bleak, bright white lights reflecting on black shiny roadways.
Black, he thought.
White, he thought.
Now, at fifteen minutes past eleven, Sharyn called, 'Come look, it's Honey Blair.'
Black skin against white nightgown against white pillows. He climbed into bed beside her.
Honey Blair, blond and white, wearing a sexy little black mini and standing in her trademark legs-slightly- apart pose, was thanking all of the good citizens out there . . .
'. . . for phoning or e-mailing tips on the man or woman who tried to kill me, I can't thank you enough. And mister, sister, whoever you may be . . .'
'Is that racist?' Sharyn asked.
'. . . we're gonna get you!' Honey said, pointing her forefinger directly at the camera.
'I mean the sister part,' Sharyn said.
'You'd better believe it,' Honey said, and turned to the anchor. 'Avery?' she said.
'Now why do I think that girl's lying?' Sharyn asked.
You should know, Kling thought.
12.
HE HAD BEEN STANDING outside her building since eight this morning, but no sign of Miss (or possibly Mrs.) Lawson, Matthews, or Curtis. If she had a nine-to-five job, which was possible even though she'd met with Sharyn and her doctor boyfriend at a little before three on Tuesday, she'd be leaving for work sometime between eight and nine, was what he figured. But no sign of her yet.
A white girl, not her, came out of the building at eight-twenty, began walking off into what was shaping up as a sunny day, all that rain last night. Another white girl, again not the one he was looking for, came out at eight- thirty, and then a flurry of them a few minutes later, but still not his target. Was it possible she'd slept with the busy Dr. Hudson at his place last night? Nine o'clock, then nine-fifteen, and nine-thirty, no Lawson, Matthews, or Curtis. Maybe she'd overslept. The mailman arrived at a quarter to ten. Kling followed him into the building.
'Detective Kling,' he said, and flashed the buzzer. 'Eighty-seventh Squad.'
The mailman looked surprised.
'Social Security checks?' he asked.
'Something like that. Do you know any of these women by sight?' he said, and showed the three names.
'Lawson's not a woman,' he said. 'Man name of Charles. Charles Lawson.'
'How about these other two? L. Matthews? J. Curtis?'
'Lorraine Matthews is a blonde. Around five-six, sort of stout
'And Curtis?'
'Julie, yeah. Julia Curtis. Around thirty, thirty-five, long black hair, brown eyes. Five-seven, five-eight. That the one you're looking for?'
'No,' Kling said.
But that was the one.
'What'd she do?'
'Wrong party,' Kling said. 'Sorry to've bothered you.'
THE FIRST NOTE was delivered at twenty to eleven that Thursday morning, the tenth day of June.
