to relight. This time I get it right.'
'Good for you.'
'But there's moments when I could kill the whole world.'
'Well, I'd better stay on your good side,' I said, and drew an unsealed envelope from my hip pocket and slipped it among the papers on his desk. He glanced around, lifted the flap, and counted the contents without removing the bills from the envelope.
There were two bills, hundreds.
'Couple of suits,' he said.
'If that's low-'
'No, it's fine,' he said. 'What did I do, use the phone on the city's time? I'm happy. But it's not enough, Matt.'
'What do you mean?'
'What do I mean? I want to know what it's about. You're looking for information on four homicides over a twelve-year stretch, all of them unsolved-'
'Cloonan was solved.'
He gave me a look. 'I stuck my neck out,' he said, 'and I can use the suits, but I want to know what's going on. If you've got something that can break these cases, you can't just sit on it.'
'I don't have anything, Joe.'
'What case are you working? Who's your client?'
'You know,' I said, 'one reason a person goes to somebody like me is to keep things confidential.'
'What I figure,' he said, watching me carefully, 'is AA.'
'Huh?'
'Wouldn't be the first time you got a client who knew you from your AA meetings. There's things you have to do when you get sober, right?'
'All you have to do is not drink.'
'Yeah, but isn't there a whole program? Almost like going to confession, but instead of a couple of Hail Marys you make restitution, set things straight.'
' 'Cleaning up the wreckage of the past,' ' I said, quoting one of the immortal phrases from the literature. 'Say, Joe, if you think you're interested, I'll be happy to take you to a meeting sometime.'
'Fuck you, okay?'
'Well, if you just wanted to see what it was like.'
'I repeat, fuck you. And quit changing the subject.'
'You're the one who brought up AA. I never realized you had a problem, but-'
'Jesus, why do I tolerate you? What I was starting to say, I figure you know somebody from AA who's got guilty knowledge of some crimes, including the four homicides we've been talking about. I wouldn't want to think you're gonna sit on something that ought to be brought out and looked at. Whoever did the gay fellow, Uhl, is probably dead himself by now, and Cloonan's file's closed for the time being, but the boys in the One-oh would love to catch a break in the Shipton case, and Watson, Jesus, the body's barely cold, that's still an active investigation. If you know anything, it should get channeled to the right people.'
'I don't.'
'There's probably a way to keep your client out of it, at least in the early stages.'
'I realize that.'
He looked at me. 'Your client didn't do all four guys himself, did he?'
'No.'
'You answered that one awfully quickly.'
'Well, I knew you were going to ask it. And the answer didn't require a whole lot of thought.'
'I guess not. Matt-'
I had to give him something. Without planning to, I said, 'They knew each other.'
'They? Meaning your client and who? Wait a minute. The vics knew each other?'
'That's right.'
'What did they all do, wipe out some Vietnamese village together and some slope's looking to get even?'
'They were part of a group.'
'A group? What kind of a group?'
'Like a fraternity,' I said. 'They got together once in a while to have dinner and compare notes.'
' 'Bet my note's bigger than your note.' Let's see, you got a commodities broker, a famous artist, a cabdriver, and a faggot. That's a hell of a fraternity. Wait a minute, was this a gay thing?'
'No.'
'You sure of that? Shipton and his wife ran in a kind of a kinky crowd. Wouldn't surprise me to hear he swung from both sides of the plate.'
'It wouldn't surprise me to hear it about anybody,' I said, 'but this wasn't about sex. I can't go into details without clearing it with my client, but there's nothing out of the ordinary about the group. The only thing unusual is that four of them have been murdered.'
'How big's the group?'
'Around thirty.'
'Thirty men and four of 'em murdered, Jesus, that's high even for New York.' His eyes narrowed. 'Same killer?'
'No reason to think that.'
'Yeah, but you think it yourself, don't you? You asked if a single killer could've done the Shiptons.'
'Never forget a thing, do you?'
'Not if I can help it. You got a suspect? A motive? Anything?'
'Nothing.'
'I won't say level with me, Matt, but don't hold out the moon and the stars on me, will you?'
'I'm not holding out anything concrete.'
'Yeah, and what the hell does that mean? What's the opposite of concrete?'
'Asphalt,' I suggested. 'Plaster of Paris.'
'Twelve years between Uhl and Watson,' he said, 'you're talking about a killer who likes to take his time. The other twenty-six guys, time he gets around to them they'll be too old to care. You know what he's like, this guy? He's prostate cancer. By the time he kills you you're already dead of something else.'
10
There was a message from Wally Donn at the hotel desk. 'I'll be here for the next hour,' he said when I called. 'I've got those credit reports for you, and something else you'll like.'
First I called TJ on his beeper. He must have been close to a phone; he called me back in well under five minutes. 'Who wants TJ?' he demanded.
'No one with any sense,' I said. 'How come you have to ask? If you don't recognize my voice, you still ought to know the number by now.'
' 'Course I do, Boo. 'Who wants TJ' just be a trademark. Part of my rap, like.'
'Well, I can see where a fellow like you would need a trademark,' I said. 'Something to set you apart from the faceless masses.'
'If we was on one of them video phones,' he said, 'you could see me rollin' my eyes.'
'I'm sorry to miss that. You want to meet me? I might have some work.'
'Say where and when.' I named a coffee shop on Twenty-third Street half a block from the Flatiron Building. 'Let's shoot for a quarter to twelve,' I said, 'but I might be a few minutes late.'
'Not me,' he said. 'We meetin' in a restaurant, I'm gonna be there on time.'
