A moment later she said, her voice clearing, 'You're a Catholic. Do you believe in visions? You know, like the Virgin Mary and all of that, talking to shepherds?'
'I'd want to see it myself,' Kennett said wryly.
'The thing is, I keep seeing Petty…' She laughed, a short, sad laugh, and poked him. 'No, no, no, I don't see him floating around my room, I see him in my mind…'
'Whew.'
'But the thing is, it's so clear. Walt running down the street, and his hair plastered down and his ears sticking out… Jesus Christ. Walt was the only guy who ever loved me and didn't want anything from me. No sex, no kids, no favors, just me being there and he was happy.'
Kennett found nothing to say, and they sat there, their feet up, watching the dark river. After a while, Lily began to cry again.
CHAPTER
25
Lucas called Fell from Lily's, apologizing for the late hour.
'I was going down to the tavern,' she said. 'Why don't you meet me…'
He flagged a cab, Lily watching from her window, smiling down at him. He waved, and she lifted her purse in her left hand, slipped her right inside the gun tote. Remember the last time?
At the tavern, Lucas pulled a twenty out of his Muskies Inc. money clip and tipped the driver two dollars for the eight-dollar ride. Fell was in the back booth, a beer on the table with a bowl of peanuts. She was reading a free newspaper.
'Hey,' he said, slipping into the booth.
'Hi. Any developments at Rothenburg's?'
'No…'
'Good,' she said.
Lucas shook his head. 'Jesus.' And then: 'I gotta get a beer.' He waved at a waitress, pointed at Fell's glass and gave her a victory/two sign. While they waited, a swarthy man in a light-blue sport coat and khaki slacks, a glass of dark beer in his hand, wandered up to the table and said to Fell in a bad imitation Bogart, 'Howdy, shweet-heart. Sheen your name in the public prints.'
'Hey, Tommy. Sit down.' Fell patted the seat beside her, then pointed her trigger finger at Lucas. 'That's Lucas Davenport, who's a cop.'
'I know who he is,' Kantor said, dropping into the booth. 'But somehow I got left off the invitation list for the Welcome to New York interviews.'
'And Lucas,' Fell continued, 'this is Tommy Kantor, who's a columnist for the Village Voice…'
They talked about the case for a while, and Kantor attracted the attention of a free-lance magazine writer and his girlfriend. They pulled up a chair and ordered a pitcher of beer. Then a TV producer stopped by and began talking to Fell.
'You'd make a good piece,' she told Fell.
'I'd certainly agree with that,' Lucas said, straight-faced.
'Fuckin' Davenport…' Fell said.
They got back to Fell's apartment at two o'clock, spent ten soapy minutes in the shower, dropped into her bed.
'That was fun, talking to those people,' Lucas said. 'As long as your friend Kantor doesn't get us in trouble.'
'He takes care of sources,' Fell said. 'It'll be okay. I'm surprised you get along so well with media people…'
'I like them, mostly,' he said. 'Some are a little stupid and half of them would kill for two dollars, but the good ones I like.'
'You like this?' she asked.
'Ooo, I think I do,' he said. Then: 'I'm sure of it.'
He came out of the shower the next morning, rubbing his hair dry with a terry-cloth towel, and heard Fell's voice from the living room. She came down the hall to the bedroom as he was pulling on his underwear. She was still naked and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him.
'I just talked to Carter. Not a thing, nada.'
'All right. Did you bring those files?'
'In the front room, on the floor,' she said.
'I'd like to sit around and read for a while, then maybe go back and change clothes. I don't know, I'd like to be there when they get him…'
'Bullshit. You'd give your left nut to get him yourself. So would I.'
'You'd give my left nut?' he asked, appalled.
'Well… you want a bagel with chive cream cheese and some juice?'
'Yeah, as a matter of fact.'
They read the files and talked, and sometime after one o'clock Lucas chased her back into the bedroom, and they didn't make it back out until two.
'I'm going back to the hotel to change,' he said, pulling on his jacket. 'Why don't we get together at Midtown. Like four-thirty, for the daily roundup.'
'All right…'
He looked at the floor by his feet, at a Xerox copy of the crime-scene photograph of Whitechurch, dead in the hospital. The few pitiful twenties stuck out from under his body like a comment on greed.
'Change oxen in midstream and you'll come to a bad end,' he said.
'What?'
'An old English proverb my mom used to tell me,' Lucas said.
'Bullshit,' she said.
'You're calling my mom a liar?'
'Get out of here, Davenport. See you at four-thirty.'
He took the elevator to the lobby, nodded at a guard who knew a one-night stand when he saw one, spotted a cab pulling up to the curb to drop a passenger, stopped and slapped his coat pocket where his wallet was.
'Dammit,' he said.
'Hub?' The guard looked up from his desk.
'Sorry. Not you… I forgot something upstairs.'
He went back up, knocked on the door. Fell, wrapped in a robe, let him in. 'You got twenty bucks you can loan me?' he asked. 'I got like two dollars left after last night. All the traveler's checks are at the hotel.'
'Oh, jeez…' She went to her purse, opened it, took out a billfold. 'I've got six bucks,' she announced. Then she brightened and dug further. 'And a cash card. There's a machine down the block. I'll trust you with my code and change it when you skip on me.'
He looked at the cash card, looked down past it to the floor, at the Xerox of Whitechurch, the twenties under his body. The money, the money. Bekker.
'Get dressed,' Lucas snapped. 'Hurry the fuck up.'
Three twenty-dollar bills had been found around and under Whitechurch's body. They drew the money from the evidence locker, under the watchful eye of the custodian.
'Consecutive?' Fell whispered. She was excited, barely controlled.
Lucas scanned the numbers, rearranged the bills on the countertop. 'Two of them,' he said. He took the numbers down on a notepad. 'Let's go talk to the feds.'
