Hope to Die

THIRTEEN

Bierman was never in the house, I told her. Never on West Seventy-fourth Street, never anywhere near Manhattan the night of the murder. Bierman never left the apartment on Coney Island Avenue, and in fact he couldn't leave, because he was already dead.

Sometime late that afternoon the third man pays Bierman a visit. He's been there before, and this time he brings along a bolt from the hardware store and the tools he'll need to install it. First, though, he manages to catch Bierman unawares.

He overpowers him, or simply knocks him out. He strips Bierman down to his underwear, props him up in the corner of the room where he'll be least visible to someone entering the apartment, presses the butt of a little Italian automatic into his hand, sticks the business end of the gun in his mouth, wraps his own hand over Bierman's hand, and gives the trigger a squeeze.

It's just one shot from a small gun, and there's not much likelihood anyone'll take any notice of it. It's a pistol, not a revolver, so he could even have a suppressor on it. But even without a suppressor it's not all that loud, and both their hands are clutching it, his and Bierman's, and that should muffle the report some. And it's not like it's a whole string of shots, and there's nobody screaming, no doors slamming. It's just one little gunshot, about as noisy as blowing up a paper bag and smashing it with your fist. But it's enough to kill Bierman.

You'd think he'd be in a hurry to get out of there, but you'd be wrong. He's pleased with himself, exhilarated by how well it went with Bierman. First thing he does is put on Bierman's shirt and pants. It might be messy later on, in fact he'll want to make sure it's messy later on, and wearing Bierman's clothes serves a double purpose, keeping his own clothes clean and providing some solid physical evidence for the cops. He leaves his own clothes in Bierman's closet, where they'll be handy later on.

If Bierman's body is discovered before he can get back to the apartment, well, that'll be inconvenient, but nobody's going to look twice at his clothes in Bierman's closet. They'll look twice, or even three times, at the body in the corner, an obvious suicide, you'd think, but what happened to the gun? Maybe they'd decide it wasn't suicide, maybe they'd figure someone else wandered in, found Bierman dead, and walked off with the gun.

But the odds are nobody's going to find the body. He'll be back in a matter of hours, and then he'll be ready to return the gun to Bierman's hand.

Until then, though, he has a use for it.

But first he has that bolt he bought earlier, and a drill or an awl to make holes for the screws, and a screwdriver. It doesn't take him long to mount the bolt, and when he's finished he takes his tools with him and walks out the door, leaving the bolt unfastened and locking the door with the key- he's got Bierman's keys now, and he's wearing Bierman's shirt and jeans, and no neighbor's going to give him a second glance.

Then, as arranged, he goes to meet Ivanko.

Ivanko has never met Bierman, doesn't know Bierman exists. Ivanko knows he and his friend are going to pull a job, and there's money in it, and an opportunity to have some fun.

The friend, the third man, drives. He has a car, although he may tell Ivanko it's stolen. He drives, and finds a place to park.

He has a key to the house on West Seventy-fourth Street. As soon as he's inside he opens the closet door, where he keys in the code to deactivate the burglar alarm. They go through the house, and he guides Ivanko, tells him where to look, what to take. Meanwhile he holds the pillowcases so Ivanko can drop in the loot. That way he's not touching anything, not leaving his prints anywhere. He encourages Ivanko to be messy, dumping drawers, pawing through their contents, because he doesn't mind if Ivanko leaves prints here and there. But Ivanko's not entirely unprofessional, and may even be wearing surgical gloves. That's annoying, he'd like a print or two left behind, but for the time being it can't be helped.

Then they're done, and waiting for the Hollanders to return. Now he has to keep Ivanko eager to stick around for the last part. They've got two sacks of money and valuables, and Ivanko would have to feel the natural impulse to get out while the getting's good, to take the money (and jewelry and silver) and run.

She's pretty and she's hot-looking, he tells Ivanko, and you can have her and do anything you want to her. Anything you want, anything at all.

Knows what to tell him, knows how to keep him right at the end of his leash.

Then the Hollanders come home…

And it's really not that difficult. He killed earlier that day, killed Bierman, and that went just as smooth as silk. He didn't mind doing it again. Sort of looked forward to it, actually, had been looking forward to it all along. Nothing tricky this time, no gun in the mouth, no hand clamped over Hollander's hand, because this is supposed to look like what it is, a murder committed by burglars. And so he shoots Byrne Hollander twice in the chest. For insurance (and perhaps because he likes it, pulling the trigger, feeling the little gun buck in his hand) he fires a third round into Hollander's temple.

Smooth as silk, easy as pie.

And it's time to let Ivanko off his leash. Take the gloves off, he tells him. You want to feel everything, don't you? Wearing gloves, be as stupid as wearing a rubber. You don't think you're going to catch AIDS from her, do you? Nice respectable married lady?

Except Ivanko still doesn't leave prints, he's ripping cloth and grabbing skin, nothing that will take a print. Oh, he'll leave his DNA, but a set of prints would be so handy. If they knew who it was before they found the bodies…

Don't forget the best part, he says, and hands Ivanko the fireplace poker. Imagine it's burning hot, he says. Go ahead, he says, you know what you want to do.

And Ivanko takes the poker. It's metal, it ought to take a print.

And how'll he finish up? Shoot her? He'd reloaded after killing Bierman earlier, had a full clip when the Hollanders walked in, but he's used three bullets on Hollander and he'll need more when they get back to Brooklyn. He has a spare clip in the car, he could always reload, but how would that look?

Besides, Hollander hadn't bled much, and it would be good to have some blood now. Blood on him, blood on Ivanko.

He'd brought the knife from the kitchen, just in case. Wicked-looking thing. Let Ivanko do her? He'd probably enjoy it, the pervert. On the other hand, he'd probably fuck it up. You wanted something done right, you did it yourself. And he didn't mind doing it himself, might find it interesting, might even get, oh, not a thrill, but a certain sort of satisfaction out of it…

Done.

He'd had the presence of mind to pick up the three ejected cartridge cases while Ivanko was thrusting into the woman. Picked up Ivanko's gloves, too. Now what? Reset the burglar alarm? No, that made no sense. Just walk out the front door and pull it shut after you. Stroll off without a care in the world, two roommates looking for a coin laundry. Young men on the way up, putting in long hours, stuck with doing their wash in the middle of the night.

He drives to Brooklyn, while the woman's blood dries on his shirt and pants. He's careful not to get any on the upholstery, and hopes Ivanko exercises similar care.

Maybe he should have shot Ivanko and left him at the scene. Would have been easy, the way he was grunting and straining like an animal. He never would have seen it coming, could have died in the act. Wasn't that how men were always saying they wanted to go?

Shoot him and leave him and what message are you leaving? Bierman got disgusted and killed his partner? And then went all the way home and got depressed enough to kill himself? And, if you shoot Ivanko in the act, what do you do with the woman? Shoot her? Cut her throat? You were so disgusted with Bierman that you killed him to keep him from raping the woman, and then you were so disgusted with her that you cut her throat?

Better the way he'd done it, with the two of them driving to Brooklyn, where Ivanko knows there's a kindly old Jew waiting to pay them top dollar for the jewelry and sterling.

He gets there, he parks the car, he unlocks the door and ushers Ivanko inside. Does Ivanko wonder how come he has keys? No, because this is a friend's apartment, one he uses sometimes, and a handy place to sort their loot and divvy up the cash before they go to the fence's place, which is only a few blocks away.

They're inside, and he points Ivanko toward the bedroom. "Open a window," he says, steering him toward it, moving up behind him. Does Ivanko see Bierman's body out of the corner of his eye? Before he can turn, before he can do anything, there's a gun pressed against his back and two bullets fired into him.

And one more in his temple. How's that for symmetry?

The ejected cartridge casings roll around on the floor. They can stay wherever they wind up. No prints on them anyway. Should he press a finger of Bierman's to one of them? No, not worth the bother. He returns the gun to Bierman's hand, poses the stiffening Bierman just as he wants him.

Then, quickly, he returns to the kitchen, fastens the bolt he installed earlier. Strips off his shirt- Bierman's shirt, originally, and now Bierman's once more- and tosses it on the floor. Unbuttons Bierman's jeans, steps out of them, leaves them. The clothes smell of Bierman, the animal stink of his crotch and armpits, so they're probably swarming with his DNA, and wet with her blood. Perfect. Just perfect, nails the lid on tight.

He gets his own clothes from the closet and puts them on. Empties one of the Hollander pillowcases, puts the chest of sterling flatware on the table in the kitchen, strews the rest of the booty on the floor, wads the case itself and tosses it in a corner. Leaves the other pillowcase on the floor, its contents undisturbed.

Has he forgotten anything? Missed anything, left anything undone? He looks around quickly, sees nothing amiss. Still wearing his sheer surgeon's gloves, he raises the window in the bedroom, steps out into the rubbish-strewn back yard. Closes the window. By the time he is back on the street his gloves are off, tucked away in a pocket. Later he'll discard them, along with the brass cartridge casings he picked up from the Hollanders' living room floor.

The car's where he left it. He pulls away from the curb. Is there any reason to get rid of the car? He could, but it should be more than enough if he just takes it to the car wash, lets them give it the full treatment. Detail it, make it showroom-new.

Or maybe not. Trace evidence won't matter, not really. Nobody is going to look at his car, or at him. His crime is perfect, and brilliantly so, the case essentially closed before it can be opened. The criminals, tied inextricably to their crime by heaps of solid physical evidence, have already been punished. And he's nowhere near them, and in no way involved.

Perfect.