Cold Service

55

WE WERE ALONE with the Gray Man in the mayor's office. Tony had said not a word when Johnson left. He just jerked his head at Rimbaud and they departed. We all watched them go.

"Brock seems a lot more exultant about things than Tony," I said when they were gone.

"If this actually go down, then the Brockster be actually running it," Hawk said. "Tony knows he can't."

"But it's not going down," I said, "is it."

"I suspect Mr. Johnson understands Rimbaud's limitations," the Gray Man said.

"Ain't gonna see no more of him," Hawk said.

"Or you," I said to the Gray Man.

"Unless someone hires me to kill you," he said.

"Which one," Hawk said.

"Either."

"Hope they don'," Hawk said.

"As do I," the Gray Man said.

"Jesus," I said, "I may cry."

The Gray Man smiled his smile.

"I have no sentiment," he said, "and if employed to, I would kill you as promptly as possible. But I admire certain traits, and both of you have them in no small measure."

"Gee," I said.

Hawk said, "When you found Johnson, wasn't you supposed to kill him?"

"Ives had suggested that," the Gray Man said.

"Wasn't that why he gave you to us?" I said.

"I do speak Ukrainian," the Gray Man said.

"But you were supposed to use us to find the Afghan connection, and when you found him, you were supposed to ace him," I said.

"Yes."

"So," Hawk said. "You going to?"

The Gray Man shook his head.

"It would have ruined everything else if I did it sooner," he said. "And now"-the Gray Man shrugged-"he's gone again."

"And it pleases you," I said. "The way it's going to work out."

"It does."

"Hawk gets to clean up the people who killed Luther," I said.

"Except for Podolak," the Gray Man said.

"That will come," I said. "The city gets pretty well cleaned up of its, ah, criminal element, and Tony's kid gets to take over."

" 'Cept there ain't nothin' to take over," Hawk said. " 'Cause the Afghans have moved on, and when they come to ask you 'bout it, 'pears you done moved on, too."

The Gray Man said, "You sound like a minstrel show."

Hawk's voice dropped a pitch. With no expression he said, "I speak in many voices, my gray friend."

"Apparently," the Gray Man said.

"So there's Brock Rimbaud in charge of a business with no product, and no supplier, in a town that is probably going to be run by the state."

The Gray Man smiled.

"And you like that," Hawk said. "You like thinking 'bout the little twerp coming to the office and you ain't there."

"And trying to find Mr. Johnson, and he ain't there," the Gray Man said.

He put his hands on the desktop and pushed himself gracefully to his feet.

"So that's why you didn't shoot Johnson," I said.

"Certainly," the Gray Man said. "Even if I did, there would shortly be another Johnson."

I nodded.

"And Ives?" I said.

The Gray Man smiled.

"Ives expects to be disappointed," the Gray Man said. "It is the nature of his work."

He glanced around the damaged office.

"And our work here has not been fruitless," he said.

"No," I said. "It hasn't."

The Gray Man looked around the room again, then at Hawk and me.

"Down the road somewhere," he said, and walked across the room and out the same door that Johnson had gone through.