fish on his hands.
He is beginning to shake all over now.
From the table just inside the front door, she take her handbag, begins searching in it, and at last finds what she's looking for, a white envelope with someone's name written on the front of it.
'Take this to the front desk at the Hotel Powell,' she says. 'My granddaughter's name is written on it. Ask the clerk to send it up to her suite. Make sure you say suite. She has a suite there, you know.' He nods, accepts the envelope. 'Promise me,' she says. 'I promise,' he says.
He slides the envelope into the left-hand pocket of his coat, the one containing the envelope with the twenty-five thousand dollars in it. The blood money. His right hand is in the pocket where the gun is. He is sweating nw. His hand in the pocket is slippery on the handle of the gun.
It is now ten minutes past eleven.
The cat is in the hallway with them now. Looking up at them. First at Svetlana's face, then his. As if expecting to be fed.
'Her carrying case is in the kitchen,' Svetlana says. 'On the table. She's used to it, she'll think you're taking her to the vet.'
He looks at her, nods. Looks down at the cat. The cat is rubbing herself against his leg. It gives him the chills. He is sweating and shivering at one and the same time.
'Swear to me you'll take good care of her.' He says nothing for a moment. 'Swear,' she says. 'I swear.'
'Swear to me you'll feed her fresh fish every day.' 'I promise.' 'Swear.' 'I swear.'
'On your mother's eyes.'
'On my mother's eyes, I swear.'
The apartment goes very still.
In the kitchen, he can hear a clock ticking.
He looks at his own watch.
It is almost twenty minutes past the hour.
From the same hall table, Svetlana picks up a brown paper bag with a bottle of whiskey in it. 'I drink,' she says in explanation. 'Son' un ' umbriaga,' she says.
'I'm a drunk.' 'Everyone knows that.'
As a matter of fact, he doesn't know this.
As a matter of fact, he doesn't know this woman at all.
But he is about to kill her. 'Are you ready?' she asks. 'Yes,' he says.
She is standing just inside the door. The bag with the whiskey is cradled in her right arm. He removes the gun from his coat pocket. The cat keeps rubbing against his leg, purring. Sweat is beading his face, sweat is rolling down under the collar of his shirt, sweat dampens his armpits and the matted blond hair on his chest. His hand is shaking violently. 'Thank you for doing this,' she says. He steadies the gun in both hands.
'Take good care of Irina,' she says, and closes her eyes.
The interrogation room went silent. Q: Did you shoot her at that time? A: Yes.
Q: How many times did you shoot her?
A: Twice.
Q: Did the shots kill her?
A: Yes.
Q: What did you do then? A: I shot the cat. Nellie looked at him.
'Why'd you do that?' she asked.
'I didn't want to take care of her. I know I promised
Svetlana. But cats are not to be trusted.' Men, either, Nellie thought. 'So you took her money...'
'Yes, but only because I was afraid Bernie would do something bad to me.'
'Did you pay him the twenty you owed him? Or did you stiff him, too?'
'I don't know what stiff means.'
'Tell him what it means to stiff somebody,' Nellie said to the interpreter.
'Ever leave a restaurant without tipping the waiter?' McNalley asked.
'I always tip waiters,' Lorenzo said. 'What does that have to do with Bernie?'
'She's asking did you go back on your word with him, too?' Moscowitz said. 'Isn't that right, Counselor?'
'It's close enough,' Nellie said. 'Ask him' she told McNalley, who immediately translated the question.
'I didn't go back on my word with him or anyone else,' Lorenzo answered. 'I didn't stiff anybody, however you say it. I paid Bernie his money, and I did everything Svetlana paid me to do. Except for the cat.'
'Except for the cat, right,' Nellie said. 'The cat, you shot in the head.'
'Well.'
'Well, didn't you?'
'Yes. I don't like cats.'
'Gee, I love them' Nellie said.
And I'm the D.A.' she thought.
'What'd you do with the other five thousand?'
'I bet it on the horses.'
win?
'Did you ' '
'I lost.'
'All around,' Nellie said.
All during lunch, Priscilla kept complaining about her cheap grandmother leaving her a mere five thousand clams. Georgie kept thinking about the ninety-five thou hidden in one of the black patent-leather dancing slippers in a shoebox in his closet.
First thing he did when he got back to the apartment was check the stash. There it was, in a spanking-clean envelope with a rubber band around it, as beautiful as when he'd put it there yesterday, bulging with money. He counted the money. He wanted to throw it up in the air and let it come down on his head. Instead, he put it back in the envelope and put the rubber band around it again, and put the envelope in one of the shoes, and then put the lid back on the box and put the box back on the top shelf. He closed the closet door. The phone on the kitchen wall was ringing. He went out to it.
It was Tony.
'When do we split the cash?' he wanted to know.
I'll come by your place before we go to the club tonight,' Georgie said.
'What's half of ninety-five?' Tony wanted to know. 'Forty-seven and change.' 'How much change?' 'Five bills.'
'Bring the change, too,' Tony said, and hung up.
'What we've got here,' Moscowitz said, 'is a mercy killing, pure and simple.'
'What we've got here, pure and simple,' Nellie said, 'is Murder Two. In fact, what we may have here, Alan, is murder for hire, which just may qualify for the death penalty.'
'Oh, come on, Nellie, really.'
'Man takes money to kill someone, that sounds to me like a contract killing.'
'Woman gives a man money to assist her in committing suicide, that sounds to me like a mitzvah.' 'What's a mitzvah?'
'You don't know what a mitzvah is?'
'No, what's a mitzvah?'
'How long have you been practicing law in 'this city?'
'Are you going to tell me what a mitzvah is?' 'It's a good deed.'
'Man shoots a woman ..' 'She asked him to shoot her.' 'That's a good deed by you?'
'That's a mitzvah. Nellie, this man isn't a criminal, he's .. .'
'Then what is he? An angel? He murdered a woman in cold blood. Shot her twice in the chest.'
'She wanted to die!'
'How about the cat? Did she want to die, too?' 'Okay, I'll give you the cat.'
'You'll give me more than the goddamn cat, Alan.' 'What are you looking for?'
