Darker Than Night

47

When Quinn had first brought up the subject of Petit Poisson, Pearl assumed he was inviting her to lunch, and someplace expensive. But this was work, the Job. They were being colleagues, not lovers. She wondered if it was possible to be both.

When she walked into the restaurant, she understood why the prices were high. This was a premier rent area, and there was room for only about a dozen tables.

What Petit Poisson lacked in size, it made up for in elegance. Pearl could imagine sitting at one of the smaller round tables with Quinn, next to thick red drapes over leaded windows facing the street. Chairs and a large sideboard were elaborate and gilded. Light was furnished mainly by candles and an ornate brass chandelier dangling low on a thick chain from the center of the beamed ceiling. The restaurant tried, but it wasn’t a cute place as its name suggested; it was more as if a rowdy peasant tavern had been bought and redecorated by decadent dandies just in time to beat the revolution.

Pearl dealt firmly with the imperious maître d’, who referred her to a waiter named Chan, who pronounced his name as “Shawn.” He spoke with what sounded like a genuine French accent.

Chan was amiable and cooperative and of indeterminate lineage. Yes, he must have waited on that table at the time on the charge receipt. Yes, he recognized the charming woman in the photograph Pearl showed him. (Here if he had a mustache, Pearl was sure he would have twirled it.) No, he hadn’t realized she was the latest victim of the Night Prowler. He shook his head sadly at the waste and the pity. No, she hadn’t dined alone. There were two women with her, approximately her age. Of course there would be a record of their presence if they paid by charge, and who paid with cash these days?

The restaurant manager, who wore a silky, flawlessly tailored blue suit, sashayed over and introduced himself as Yves with a silent S. He politely inquired if there was a problem. When Pearl flashed her ID and explained that the problem was a homicide, he guided them to a far corner of the restaurant in case one of the few early diners might glance over and be gastronomically upset by police presence.

Pearl was polite but gave the impression she might any second draw her weapon and shout “Freeze!” Yves was cooperative, though not as friendly as Chan, and without nearly as convincing an accent.

He used the accent to instruct the waiter to return to his station. Yves said it as if he meant Chan’s station in life.

When Chan had departed, Yves ushered Pearl into a tiny, cluttered office. It wasn’t nearly as elegant as the dining area, or as Gallic, though there was a big color photo of the Eiffel Tower framed and mounted on the wall behind the desk. It was taken on a misty night starred by the many lights of Paris, and the famous landmark had probably never looked better.

Yves said the charge and debit forms from the date of Lisa Ide’s lunch hadn’t yet been transferred to the bank, so there should be a record of who shared the table with her, assuming of course they paid separately by card.

He got several banded reams of receipts from a safe alongside his desk and sat rummaging through them, flicking them rapidly with his thumb like a gambler counting money. The receipts were apparently in chronological order, because when he got to the desired date and time, he slowed his rampage through the forms and settled on one, then two more, and separated them from the others.

Pearl already had a copy of Lisa Ide’s signed receipt, so she waited while Yves duplicated the other two forms on a printer hooked up to his computer.

She looked at the copies after he handed them to her. Chan’s name and the same table number were at the top of each copy, along with the printed date and time. And there were the signatures of the women who’d dined with the dead: Abby Koop and Janet Hofer.

Pearl thought Chan should have drawn a smiley face alongside his signatures—lent some cheer to the place. But it wasn’t that kind of restaurant. Pearl smiled and thanked Yves as she stood up and shook his hand. “Montand,” she said.

He appeared puzzled.

“That’s why your name was familiar to me. The famous French actor, Yves Montand. He starred with Marilyn Monroe in something or other.”

“I’m afraid I never heard of the man,” Yves said. “Marilyn Monroe, though.”

“Are you or were you ever French? This is the police asking.”

“Not really.” Yves smiled, but the admission seemed to pain him.

“It doesn’t matter,” Pearl said.

And she meant it. She was happy. She had names. Soon she would have addresses. Soon she would talk to the two women who were friends, or at least acquaintances, of Lisa Ide.

Wouldn’t Quinn be pleased? Mon Dieu!

At the office door she turned and said, “Au revoir.”

“I hear that all the time,” Yves said.

Quinn agreed to meet Pearl at the Nations Café, a multi-cultural eatery on First Avenue near the UN Building. She’d phoned and told him she had the information she needed and they could question the two women who’d lunched with Lisa Ide at the West Side French restaurant near the time of her and her husband’s murders. They were, as it turned out, old college chums of Lisa.

Quinn thought the three women probably spent most of their lunch conversation reliving the past, unaware of how short Lisa’s future was, and would have little to add to the investigation. But Pearl seemed proud, and she had a right. There was real satisfaction in doing detective work and knowing you’d inched forward. And talking with the two women would explore a lead that should be investigated, even if it came to nothing.

The more Quinn saw of Pearl’s work, the more impressed he was by her insight and thoroughness. And the more he understood the underlying fear and loneliness that had created her protective shell. Or might his newfound emotions be affecting his judgment? Might Pearl be deliberately playing him? It had been so long since Quinn felt this way about a woman.

How the hell could a man know?

Quinn did know Pearl played hard and for keeps. And Pearl could be tricky. That was what attracted him to her in the first place. Well, maybe not in the first place….

Such were Quinn’s thoughts as he waited for the traffic signal to change, then crossed East Fifty-sixth and continued strolling along First Avenue toward the diner. He wasn’t in any hurry. He was only a short block away from his meeting with Pearl and was fifteen minutes early.

It was a warm evening but cooling down. Good weather for walking in the city he loved despite its warts. As usual there was plenty of traffic on First, all heading north at a fast clip. He breathed in diesel exhaust as a truck pulled away from a loading area. The lumbering vehicle drew angry horn blasts as it edged into a convoy of taxis cruising the curb lane for fares.

Quinn didn’t mind the mingled exhaust fumes, maybe because they reminded him of the city and cars. He liked cars, though owning one in Manhattan hadn’t made sense to him even when he could afford it. But he felt good standing near the rush of traffic and hearing its constant, growling din.

Later, if he could afford it again, maybe a car.

A photo clipped from the newspaper and taped to the inside of a florist’s shop window caught his eye. The shop was closed and dim inside, so the rectangle of newsprint on white was particularly noticeable. He walked closer to examine it.

What he’d thought at first glance turned out to be true. The photo in the clipping was that of Luther Lunt, along with a rendition of a projected older Luther with less hair and heavier features. The present Luther. Approximately.

The city was spooked, Quinn thought, standing and staring at the clipping. Then he noticed the decal or etching just above it, a spiderweb of what looked like cracks in the glass.

As he watched, another web appeared, along with a white-edged hole in its center.

Not decals or etchings at all.

There was no sound of shots over the noise of the traffic, so it took Quinn a few seconds to realize the significance of what he was looking at—bullet holes!

Someone’s shooting at me!

He crouched low and ran for the cover of a parked car, peering through its windows at the people on the opposite sidewalk. No one seemed to have noticed anything unusual. Had the shots come from a window?

He was about to look up when he caught movement in a passageway between two buildings across the street. A dark shape moving fast. The flit of a sneaker sole, rising, disappearing. Running!

Getting away!

Like hell!

Quinn was out from behind the car and dashing across the street. Horns blared and someone shouted; he heard the screech of brakes an instant after a front bumper brushed his pants leg. He zigzagged to avoid another oncoming car, stopped cold to let another pass, then was up on the sidewalk and running hard toward the passageway where he’d seen the dark figure disappear. The Night Prowler—he could feel it!

He bumped someone walking along the sidewalk and heard the man’s expulsion of breath. Then he was in the darkness of the passageway, running toward faint light at the opposite end.

For an instant he glimpsed movement and was sure the Night Prowler was still in the passageway, moving as if picking up speed. Perhaps he’d paused halfway and begun to walk, thinking he hadn’t been seen, that he was safe.

Quinn ran faster, seeing movement again, this time to the left, as his quarry reached the next block. All right, he knew which way the figure had turned; he had direction. His side ached and he was breathing in fire, but he kept his legs pumping, lifting his knees higher.

At the end of the passageway Quinn slowed, gripped rough brick wall, and half ran, half swung around the corner.

Gasping for breath, he smelled the East River. He was on a street running parallel to its bank. Sutton Place. Again he saw movement, ahead of him, more than one figure.

No one behind him.

Then up ahead, faster movement, and he saw the figure he’d been pursuing turn onto East Fifty-seventh Street.

Good! As he approached the corner, Quinn saw the sign at East Fifty-seventh: DEAD END.

Thank God!

He ran down the short block to a concrete ramp with a black iron handrail. In the corner of his vision he saw NO DOGS ALLOWED as he negotiated the ramp and found himself in a small parklike area where neighborhood pet owners walked their dogs, despite the sign, or wandered down to the river’s edge and stared at the listless slide of gray water.

There was a brick surface lined with benches, some large trees in grassy rectangles, a sandbox where the kids could play, and a statue of a wild boar to disturb their dreams. On his right was a raised brick walkway. A low concrete wall topped with a curved iron rail faced the murky water.

Half a dozen people were in the park. All were walking dogs, except for a couple leaning on the iron rail and watching the river while they held hands. No Night Prowler….

A tall woman wearing a ball cap, tank top, and jeans was standing off by herself, but her animal, a large black Lab, was off leash and bounding around. The woman had a clear plastic bag over her hand like a glove and was calling, “Jeb! Jeb!” Presumably the Lab. The dog skidded to a halt, then stood gazing back at her in a calculating way, then in the direction it had been running. It yearned to go but was frozen by command. “Jeb! C’mere, baby!”

The conflicted Jeb reluctantly turned around and began slouching toward his owner.

Had Jeb been chasing someone?

It was possible to scale a fence and escape from the park through the grounds of the building next to it.

Quinn sucked in air and began running again, in the direction the dog had strained to go.

As he passed the crouching, resigned dog, he saw it glance up at him.

A few seconds later he heard the scratching and clatter of paws. Jeb, running behind him, gaining ground.

“Jeb! You get back here!”

Quinn saw a low dark streak flash past him. Jeb, rocketing out on four good legs and with sound canine lungs. Jeb with a solid sense of purpose at last.

He’s chasing something, all right! He’s—

Everything heavy on earth slammed into Quinn’s chest.

He stumbled, stopped running, and stood bent over, trying to endure the pain that was tightening around him. His left arm was stiff, aching.

Heart attack!

“You okay, bud?” A man’s voice.

Quinn tried to say he wasn’t, but he couldn’t speak. Couldn’t even croak. He sank to his knees, then went all the way down. A small brindled dachshund stared at him in watery brown-eyed sympathy.

“Is he all right, you think?” A woman. Jeb’s owner.

Quinn saw lower legs, shoes, men’s and women’s, a pair of dark pants with cuffs. Lying doubled up on the ground, he couldn’t lift his head to see higher.

“Guy looks plenty sick.” The man. The dachshund was yanked back on its leash, as if its owner feared Quinn might be contagious. “Anybody got a cell phone to call nine-eleven?”

“I do!” answered several voices.

Shit! An ambulance…emergency room. Well, maybe not a bad idea. Steel bands contracting around my chest…that’s how it’s supposed to feel and it does….

“There you are, you bad dog!”

Something pink and wet and warm was suddenly on Quinn’s cheek and nose, then all over his face.

Don’t ever be a police dog, Jeb.

The Night Prowler stood in the steel and Plexiglas bus stop shelter, but he didn’t board either of the buses that pulled to the curb near him to take on or let off passengers. He was able to lean in a corner of the kiosk and gaze through the clear plastic over the top of an advertising poster touting a Broadway play about marriage and infidelity. Apropos, thought the Night Prowler.

What he could see over the top of the poster were the twin wooden green doors of the small brick church that had been in the Village for years. There were more than the usual number of cars parked nearby, and half a block down from the church a white limo sat at the curb, its uniformed chauffeur waiting patiently behind the steering wheel. But those were the only signs that a wedding was taking place inside. The chauffeur was busy studying a newspaper, and the Night Prowler was certain the man hadn’t noticed anyone letting buses pass by at the stop half a block away on the other side of the street.

It was a beautiful morning for a wedding. A gold-and-blue day. The sun was no captive of clouds, and its pure light illuminated the white wooden cross on the church’s roof as if to shout, She’s here! She’s here! Claire Briggs in white, with eyes like the blue mystery of oceans, so alluring, so deep, about life, about death…the old knowledge…blue and deep unto darkness….

Both church doors opened at the same time, and tuxedoed ushers leaned down and fixed kick-plates so they wouldn’t swing closed. Claire would be coming out! The Night Prowler swallowed his breath, a bubble of life.

People began filing out of the church. Some were dressed in suits with ties, others more informally, a few even in jeans. Friends from the theater world. Most of the women were dressed up. Everyone was smiling as they tried to obey the frenetic, arm-waving instructions of a skeletal-thin man in a gray suit. They milled about, then formed lines down each side of the dozen or so concrete steps. The steps didn’t allow enough room, so the lines extended along the sidewalk. Several people not connected to the wedding stopped on the Night Prowler’s side of the street and stood waiting to see what was happening. Wedding? Or funeral?

There she is!

Claire in a wedding white dress, standing next to her new and not-so-handsome husband Jubal Day! Putting on a little weight around the middle lately, Jubal?

The Night Prowler stood transfixed, his breathing shallow, as bride and groom made their way down the church steps beneath a shower of birdseed (rice being prohibited at the church, as it was harmful to the birds as well as a waste of human sustenance), running a gauntlet of grins and good lucks.

Claire smiled and gracefully used her left hand to brush the shower of airborne well wishes out of her hair, then adjusted her turned-back veil. Over the distance the Night Prowler could smell the fresh white shampoo scent of her hair, could hear the music of her happiness. It was amazing, the force and foresight of his mind!

Astounding! I’m with her, seeing her from here and beside her! Now and later. Two places at once? Why not? It’s called objectivity. It’s called destiny. And it’s there to see, if you can see it. What’s the future but the present roaring toward us?

He realized the doctor would have a medical term for what he was thinking, the priest a religious term, yet they wouldn’t believe, not really. It distressed him sometimes, the failure of imagination in the highly educated.

They’re fools hamstrung by their torrent of facts and fears, their comforting black-and-white delusions. Like…. Well, never mind that now.

Claire!

She tossed her bouquet high into the air, and a girl about twelve who would never be pretty caught it and hugged it to her spindly body as if a prince might spring from it.

Claire laughing…mouth wide, throwing her head back the way she does….

Into the limo…new car smell, slick leather seats…slide, slide…the door shuts; then the chauffeur’s door up front…the smooth vibrant power of the engine, the engine, the faces at the windows, all smiling in, shouting silently…our wedding guests…. The wedding, the engine, the blue-gold day beyond the tinted glass, running figures like the palest of shadows, life, sliding, sliding away outside the window as the limo gains speed….

The kiss to the clean white future! Lips, teeth touch…the cleaving unto the husband…white and flesh…

Happy Wedding Day, Claire!

Yours and mine.