Hit List

One

Keller, fresh off the plane from Newark, followed the signs marked Baggage Claim. He hadn’t checked a bag, he never did, but the airport signage more or less assumed that everybody checked their luggage, because you got to the exit by heading for the baggage claim. You couldn’t count on a series of signs that said This is the way to get out of this goddam place.

There was a down escalator after you cleared security, and ten or a dozen men stood around at the foot of it, some in uniform, most holding hand-lettered signs. Keller found himself drawn to one man, a droopy guy in khakis and a leather jacket. He was the guy, Keller decided, and his eyes went to the sign the man was holding.

But you couldn’t read the damn thing. Keller walked closer, squinting at it. Did it say Archibald? Keller couldn’t tell.

He turned, and there was the name he was looking for, on a card held by another man, this one taller and heavier and wearing a suit and tie. Keller veered away from the man with the illegible sign-what was the point of a sign that nobody could read?-and walked up to the man with the Archibald sign. “I’m Mr. Archibald,” he said.

“Mr. Richard Archibald?”

What possible difference could it make? He started to nod, then remembered the name Dot had given him. “Nathan Archibald,” he said.

“That’s the ticket,” the man said. “Welcome to Louisville, Mr. Archibald. Carry that for you?”

“Never mind,” Keller said, and held on to his carry-on bag. He followed the man out of the terminal and across a couple of lanes of traffic to the short-term parking lot.

“About the name,” the man said. “What I figured, anybody can read a name off a card. Some clown’s got to figure, why take a cab when I can say I’m Archibald and ride for free? I mean, it’s not like they gave me a picture of you. Nobody here even knows what you look like.”

“I don’t come here often,” Keller said.

“Well, it’s a pretty nice town,” the man said, “but that’s beside the point. Which is I want to make sure I’m driving the right person, so I throw out a first name, and it’s a wrong first name. ‘Richard Archibald?’ Guy says yeah, that’s me, Richard Archibald, right away I know he’s full of crap.”

“Unless that’s his real name.”

“Yeah, but what’s the odds of that? Two men fresh off a plane and they both got the name Archibald?”

“Only one.”

“How’s that?”

“My name’s not really Archibald,” Keller said, figuring he wasn’t exactly letting state secrets slip by the admission. “So it’s only one man named Archibald, so how much of a long shot is it?”

The man set his jaw. “Guy claims to be Richard Archibald,” he said, “he’s not my guy. Whether it’s his name or not.”

“You’re right about that.”

“But you came up with Nathan, so we’re in business. Case closed. It’s the Toyota there, the blue one. Get in and we’ll take a run over to long-term parking. Your car’s there, full tank of gas, registration in the glove box. When you’re done, just put her back in the same spot, tuck the keys and the claim check in the ashtray. Somebody’ll pick it up.”

The car turned out to be a mid-size Olds, dark green in color. The man unlocked it and handed Keller the keys and a cardboard claim check. “Cost you a few dollars,” he said apologetically. “We brought her over last night. On the passenger seat there you got a street map of the area. Open it up, you’ll see two spots marked, home and office. I don’t know how much you been told.”

“Name and address,” Keller said.

“What was the name?”

“It wasn’t Archibald.”

“You don’t want to say? I don’t blame you. You seen a photo?”

Keller shook his head. The man drew a small envelope from his inside pocket, retrieved a card from it. The card’s face displayed a family photograph, a man, a woman, two children and a dog. The humans were all smiling, and looked as though they’d been smiling for days, waiting for someone to figure out how to work the camera. The dog, a golden retriever, wasn’t smiling, but he looked happy enough. “Season’s Greetings…” it said below the photo.

Keller opened the card. He read: “… from the Hirschhorns-Walt, Betsy, Jason, Tamara, and Powhatan.”

“I guess Powhatan’s the dog,” he said.

“Powhatan? What’s that, an Indian name?”

“Pocahontas’s father.”

“Unusual name for a dog.”

“It’s a fairly unusual name for a human being,” Keller said. “As far as I know it’s only been used once. Was this the only picture they could come up with?”

“What’s the matter with it? Nice clear shot, and I’m here to tell you it looks just like the man.”

“Nice that you could get them to pose for you.”

“It’s from a Christmas card. Musta been taken during the summer, though. How they’re dressed, and the background. You know where I bet this was taken? He’s got a summer place out by McNeely Lake.”

Wherever that was.

“So it woulda been taken in the summer, which’d make it what, fifteen months old? He still looks the same, so what’s the problem?”

“It shows the whole family.”

“Right,” the man said. “Oh, I see where you’re going. No, it’s just him, Walter Hirschhorn. Just the man himself.”

That was Keller’s understanding, but it was good to have it confirmed. Still, he’d have been happier with a solo headshot of Hirschhorn, eyes narrowed and mouth set in a line. Not surrounded by his nearest and dearest, all of them with fixed smiles.

He didn’t much like the way this felt. Hadn’t liked it since he walked off the plane.

“I don’t know if you’ll want it,” the man was saying, “but there’s a piece in the glove box.”

A piece of what, Keller wondered, and then realized what the man meant. “Along with the registration,” he said.

“Except the piece ain’t registered. It’s a nice little twenty-two auto with a spare clip, not that you’re gonna need it. The clip, I mean. Whether you need the piece altogether is not for me to say.”

“Well,” Keller said.

“That’s what you guys like, isn’t it? A twenty-two?”

If you shot a man in the head with a.22, the slug would generally stay within the skull, bouncing around in there, doing no good to the skull’s owner. The small-calibre weapon was supposed to be more accurate, and had less recoil, and would presumably be the weapon of choice for an assassin who prided himself in his artistry.

Keller didn’t spend much time thinking about guns. When he had to use one, he chose whatever was at hand. Why make it complicated? It was like photography. You could learn all about f-stops and shutter speeds, or you could pick up a Japanese camera and just point and shoot.

“Just use it and lose it,” the man was saying. “Or if you don’t use it just leave it in the glove box. Otherwise it goes in a Dumpster or down a storm drain, but why am I telling you this? You’re the man.” He pursed his lips and whistled without making a sound. “I have to say I envy a man like you.”

“Oh?”

“You ride into town, do what you do, and ride on out. Well, fly on out, but you get the picture. In and out with no hassles, no complications, no dealing with the same assholes day in and day out.”

You dealt with different ones every time, Keller thought. Was that supposed to be better?

“But I couldn’t do it. Could I pull a trigger? Maybe I could. Maybe I already done that, one time or another. But your way is different, isn’t it?”

Was it?

The man didn’t wait for an answer. “By the baggage claim,” he said, “you didn’t see me right away. You were headed for one of the other guys.”

“I couldn’t make out the sign he was holding,” Keller said. “The letters were all jammed together. And I had the sense that he was waiting for somebody.”

“They’re all of them waiting for somebody. Point is, I was watching you, before you took notice of me. And I pictured myself living the life you lead. I mean, what do I know about your life? But based on my own ideas of it. And I realized something.”

“Oh?”

“It’s just not for me,” the man said. “I couldn’t do it.”

It cost Keller eight dollars to get his car out of the long-term lot, which struck him as reasonable enough. He got on the interstate going south, got off at Eastern Parkway, and found a place to have coffee and a sandwich. It called itself a family restaurant, which was a term Keller had never entirely understood. It seemed to embody low prices, Middle American food, and a casual atmosphere, but where did family come into the picture? There were no families there this afternoon, just single diners.

Like Keller himself, sitting in a booth and studying his map. He had no trouble finding Hirschhorn’s downtown office (on Fourth Street between Main and Jefferson, just a few blocks from the river) and his home in Norbourne Estates, a suburb a dozen miles to the east.

He could look for a hotel downtown, possibly within walking distance of the man’s office. Or-he studied the map-or he could continue east on Eastern Parkway, and there would almost certainly be a cluster of motels where it crossed I-64. That would give him easy access to the residence and, afterward, to the airport. He could get downtown from there as well, but he might not have to go there at all, because it would almost certainly be easier and simpler to deal with Hirschhorn at home.

Except for the damned picture.

Betsy, Jason, Tamara, and Powhatan. He’d have been happier not knowing their names, and happier still not knowing what they looked like. There were certain bare facts about the quarry it was useful to have, but everything else, all the personal stuff, just got in the way. It could be valuable to know that a man owned a dog-whether or not you chose to break into his home might hinge upon the knowledge-but you didn’t have to know the breed, let alone the animal’s name.

It made it personal, and it wasn’t supposed to be personal. Suppose the best way to do it was in a room in the man’s house, a home office in the basement, say. Well, somebody would find him there, and it would probably be a family member, and that was just the way it went. You couldn’t go around killing people if you were going to agonize over the potential traumatic effect on whoever discovered the body.

But it was easier if you didn’t know too much about the people. You could live easier with the prospect of a wife recoiling in horror if you didn’t know her name, or that she had close-cropped blond hair and bright blue eyes and cute little chipmunk cheeks. It didn’t take too much in the way of imagination to picture that face when she walked in on the death scene.

So it was unfortunate that the man with the Archibald sign had shown him that particular photograph. But it wouldn’t keep him from doing the job at Hirschhorn’s residence any more than it would lead him to abort the mission altogether. He might not care what calibre gun he used, and he didn’t know that he took a craftsman’s pride in his work, but he was a professional. He used what came to hand, and he got the job done.

“Now I can offer you a couple of choices,” the desk clerk said. “Smoking or non, up or down, front or back.”

The motel was a Super 8. Keller went for nonsmoking, rear of the building, first floor.

“No choice on beds,” the clerk said. “All the units are the same. Two double beds.”

“That still gives me a choice.”

“How do you figure that?”

“I can choose which bed to sleep in.”

“Clear-cut choice,” the clerk said. “First thing you’ll do is drop your suitcase on one of the beds.”

“So?”

“So sleep in the other one. You’ll have more room.”

There were, as promised, two double beds in Room 147. Keller considered them in turn before setting his bag on top of the dresser.

Keeping his options open, he thought.

From a pay phone, he called Dot in White Plains. He said, “Refresh my memory. Didn’t you say something about an accident?”

“Or natural causes,” she said, “though who’s to say what’s a natural cause in this day and age? Outside of choking to death on an organic carrot, I’d say you’re about as natural a cause of death as there is.”

“They provided a gun.”

“Oh?”

“A twenty-two auto, because that’s the kind guys like me prefer.”

“That’s a far cry from an organic carrot.”

“ ‘Use it and lose it.’ “

“Catchy,” Dot said. “Sounds like a failure to communicate, doesn’t it? Guy who furnished the gun didn’t know it was supposed to be natural.”

“Leaving us where? Does it still have to be natural?”

“It never had to, Keller. It was just a preference, but they gave you a gun, so I’d say they’ve got no kick coming if you use it.”

“And lose it.”

“In that order. Customer satisfaction’s always a plus, so if you can arrange for him to have a heart attack or get his throat torn out by the family dog, I’d say go for it. On the other hand-“

“How did you know about the dog?”

“What dog?”

“The one you just mentioned.”

“It was just an expression, Keller. I don’t know if he has a dog. I don’t know for sure if he’s got a heart, but-“

“It’s a golden retriever.”

“Oh?”

“Named Powhatan.”

“Well, it’s all news to me, Keller, and not the most fascinating news I ever heard, either. Where is all of this coming from?”

He explained about the photo on the Christmas card.

“What a jerk,” she said. “He couldn’t find a head and shoulders shot, the kind the papers run when you get a promotion or they arrest you for embezzlement? My God, the people you have to work with. Be grateful you were spared the annual Christmas letter, or you’d know how Aunt Mary’s doing great since she got her appendix transplant and little Timmy got his first tattoo.”

“Little Jason.”

“God, you know the kids’ names? Well, they wouldn’t put the dog’s name on the card and leave the kids off, would they? What a mess.”

“The guy was holding a sign. ‘Archibald.’ “

“At least they got that part right.”

“And I said that’s me, and he said, ‘Richard Archibald?’ “

“So.”

“You told me they said Nathan.”

“Come to think of it, they did. They screw that up too, huh?”

“Not exactly. It was a test, to make sure I wasn’t some smartass looking for a free ride.”

“So if you forgot the first name, or just didn’t want to make waves…”

“He’d have figured me for a phony and told me to get lost.”

“This gets better and better,” she said. “Look, do you want to forget the whole thing? I can tell you’re getting a bad feeling about it. Just come on home and we’ll tell them to shit in their hat.”

“Well, I’m already here,” he said. “It could turn out to be easy. And I don’t know about you, but I can use the money.”

“I can always find a use for it,” she said, “even if all I use it for is to hold on to. The dollars have to be someplace, and White Plains is as good a place as any for them.”

“That sounds like something he would have said.”

“He probably did.”

They were referring to the old man, for whom they had both worked, Dot living with him and running his household, Keller doing what he did. The old man was gone now-his mind had gone first, little by little, and then his body went all at once-but things went on essentially unchanged. Dot took the phone calls, set the fees, made the arrangements, and disbursed the money. Keller went out there, checked out the territory, closed the sale, and came home.

“Thing is,” Dot said, “they paid half in advance. I hate to send money back once I’ve got it in hand. It’s the same money, but it feels different.”

“I know what you mean. Dot, they’re not in a hurry on this, are they?”

“Well, who knows? They didn’t say so, but they also said natural causes and gave you a gun so you could get close to nature. To answer your question, no, I don’t see why you can’t take your time. Been to any stamp dealers, Keller?”

“I just got here.”

“But you checked, right? In the Yellow Pages?”

“It passes the time,” he said. “I don’t think I’ve ever been in Louisville before.”

“Well, make the most of it. Take the elevator up to the top of the Empire State Building, catch a Broadway show. Ride the cable cars, take a boat ride on the Seine. Do all the usual tourist things. Because who knows when you’ll get back there again.”

“I’ll have a look around.”

“Do that,” she said. “But don’t even think about moving there, Keller. The pace, the traffic, the noise, the sheer human energy-it’d drive you nuts.”

It was late afternoon when he spoke to Dot, and twilight by the time he followed the map to Winding Acres Drive, in Norbourne Estates. The street was every bit as suburban as it sounded, with good-sized one- and two-story homes set on spacious landscaped lots. The street had been developed long enough ago for the foundation plantings to have filled in and the trees to have gained some size. If you were going to raise a family, Keller thought, this was probably not a bad place to do it.

Hirschhorn’s house was a two-story center-hall colonial with the front door flanked by a symmetrical planting of what looked to Keller like rhododendron. There was a clump of weeping birch on the left, a driveway on the right leading to a garage with a basketball hoop and backboard centered over the door. It was, he noted, a two-and-a-half-car garage. Which was handy, he thought, if you happened to have two and a half cars.

There were lights on inside the house, but Keller couldn’t see anybody, and that was fine with him. He drove around, familiarizing himself with the neighborhood, getting slightly lost in the tangle of winding streets, but getting straightened out without much trouble. He drove past the house another couple of times, then headed back to the Super 8.

On the way back he stopped for dinner at a franchised steak house named for a recently deceased cowboy film star. There were probably better meals to be had in Louisville, but he didn’t feel like hunting for them. He was back at the motel by nine o’clock, and he had his key in the door when he remembered the gun. Leave it in the glove compartment? He went back to the car for it.

The room was as he’d left it. He stowed the gun in his open suitcase and pulled up an armchair in front of the television set. The remote control was a little different from the one he had at home, but wasn’t that one of the pleasures of travel? If everything was going to be exactly the same, why go anywhere?

A little before ten there was a knock on the door.

His reaction was immediate and dramatic. He snatched up the gun, chambered a round, flicked off the safety, and flattened himself against the wall alongside the door. He waited, his index finger on the trigger, until the knock came a second time.

He said, “Who is it?”

A man said, “Maybe I got the wrong room. Ralph, izzat you?”

“You’ve got the wrong room.”

“Yeah, you sure don’t sound nothin’ like Ralph.” The man’s voice was thick, and some of his consonants were a little off-center. “Now where the hell’s Ralph? Sorry to disturb you, mister.”

“No problem,” Keller said. He hadn’t moved, and his finger was still on the trigger. He listened, and he could hear footsteps receding. Then they stopped, and he heard the man knocking on another door-Ralph’s, one could but hope. Keller let out the breath he’d been holding and took in some fresh air.

He stared at the gun in his hand. That wasn’t like him, grabbing a gun and pressing up against a wall. And he’d just gone and done it, he hadn’t even stopped to think.

Very strange.

He ejected the chambered round, returned it to the clip, and turned the gun over in his hands. It was supposed to be the weapon of choice in his line of work, but it was more useful on offense than defense, handy for putting a bullet in the back of an unsuspecting head, but not nearly so handy when someone was coming at you with a gun of his own. In a situation like that you wanted something with stopping power, something that fired a big heavy slug that would knock a man down and keep him there.

On the other hand, when your biggest threat was some drunk looking for Ralph, anything beyond a rolled-up newspaper amounted to overkill.

But why the panic? Why the gun, why the held breath, why the racing pulse?

Why indeed? He waited until his heartbeat calmed down, then shucked his clothes and took a shower. Drying off, he realized how tired he was. Maybe that explained it.

He went right to sleep. But before he got into bed he made sure the door was locked, and he placed the little.22 on the bedside table.