Poison

CHAPTER 15

Meyer figured it was boring to tail a lawyer because lawyers were essentially boring. He had met only three interesting lawyers in his entire life. The rest of them were as dull as the telephone book. And more often than not, they were his adversaries. Tell me, Detective Meyer, when you made this arrest, were you aware of the fact that…?

But Meyer had not yet met every lawyer in the world, and the possibility existed that one day he might run across yet another interesting one: Hope is the thing with feathers. Meanwhile, he did not like lawyers. And Charles Endicott, Jr., was a lawyer.

Moreover, he was a lawyer who may or may not have poisoned two people and stabbed a third. Which, if such proved to be the case, made him a bit more interesting but far more dangerous than your usual learned adversary. Meyer did not appreciate tailing him, and he wished the lieutenant had chosen someone else for the job.

Besides, it was raining cats and dogs.

Meyer had started his surveillance two hours earlier by reading all the D.D. reports Willis and Carella had filed.

He then called Endicott's office, identified himself as Lieutenant Charles Wilson, in charge of public relations, and asked if the police officers assigned to his earlier protection had been courteous and respectful. Endicott said they had been, and wanted to know why they had been pulled off the case. Meyer said he didn't know anything about that, but he was glad the assigned men had done their jobs properly.

He had called only to ascertain that Endicott was in his office.

That was at seven minutes past eleven, five minutes after he'd finished reading the D.D. reports. He wanted to get downtown before the lunch hour, start the actual tailing. The lieutenant had told him that Hawes would relieve on post at four o'clock. Hawes, in turn, would be relieved by O'Brien at midnight. Wall to wall coverage.

At a quarter to twelve, Meyer called Endicott again, this time from a phone booth across the street from his office on Jefferson Avenue. Lowering his voice to a deep growl, he asked if Endicott handled divorce cases, and when he was assured that the firm of Hackett, Rawlings, Pearson, Endicott, Lipstein and Marsh did indeed handle such cases, he gave his name as Martin Milstein and made an appointment to see Endicott at four-thirty on Friday. He would call sometime later in the week to cancel the appointment; in the meantime, he knew that Endicott was still in his office, and he hoped he would be going out for lunch sometime between twelve and one, when most people did.

The only detective on the squad who knew what Endicott looked like was Hal Willis. For reasons not divulged to Meyer, it was thought best that he not be assigned to the surveillance. That was why a patrolman in plainclothes was waiting for Meyer when he came out of the phone booth. The patrolman was one of the six men earlier assigned to protect Endicott. He was with Meyer only for purposes of initial identification. The moment he pointed out Endicott, he was expected to go back to his duties uptown.

For now, both men stood in the rain outside the office building.

The patrolman complained bitterly about the lousy weather.

Meyer kept watching the front door of the building. Only one way in or out. If Endicott left, he would have to come through those revolving doors.

"Keep your eye on the doors," he told the patrolman.

"Don't I know that?" the patrolman said.

Meyer wondered if he did.

At ten after twelve, the patrolman nudged Meyer.

The man coming through the revolving doors was tall and slender, with brown eyes and white hair. Endicott's description in the D.D. reports. The patrolman nodded, and Meyer took off. Endicott was wearing a Burberry raincoat, not a good thing for somebody following him. In this city, when it rained, Burberry raincoats sprouted like mushrooms.

He was a fast walker, Endicott was, and apparently he enjoyed the rain. Hatless, he bounded through it like Gene Kelly, mindlessly stepping in puddles, dashing across streets against the lights, a man in one hell of a hurry. Meyer did not like surveillances involving fast walkers. Meyer preferred stakeouts that took place in cozy liquor stores.

The man walked eight goddamn blocks in the pouring rain.

Meyer could swear he was whistling.

He turned off Jefferson Avenue at last, into a side street where the rain was blowing in sheets from north to south off the River Harb. Endicott plunged into the rain like a galleon under full sail, went halfway up the block, turned in under a red, white and green awning, opened a brass-studded wooden door, and disappeared from sight. The lettering on the awning identified the place as Ristorante Bonatti. Feeling very much like Popeye Doyle in The French Connection, Meyer hunched his shoulders against the wind and the rain and hoped Endicott's lunch would not be a long one.

The trouble with tailing your partner's girlfriend was that it made you feel like some kind of a shit. Carella had picked up Marilyn Hollis outside the building on Harborside Lane at ten-thirty this morning, had followed her to her hairdressing salon, was waiting outside for her when she emerged at twenty after twelve, and followed her on foot crosstown to the Stem where she hailed a taxi. He'd immediately flagged another taxi, identified himself to the driver, and told him not to lose that taxi up ahead. The cabbie did not appreciate driving a cop. Visions of getting stiffed danced through his head.

Marilyn's cab proceeded downtown, first on the Stem, then on Culver, then around Van Buren Circle and southward on Grover Park West, continuing southward to Hall Avenue, hanging a right, driving three blocks farther downtown, then hanging a left and pulling up in front of a building with a red, white and green awning. Marilyn got out of the cab, paid the driver, and walked swiftly toward a brass-studded door. Carella's cab pulled into the curb some two cars back. To the driver's enormous surprise, Carella tipped him generously and then stepped out into the rain.

The lettering on the awning read Ristorante Bonatti.

Meyer Meyer was standing outside the restaurant, peering through the plate glass window, his hands cupped to the sides of his face.

Carella came up beside him, and tapped him on the shoulder.

Meyer turned, surprised. "Well, well," he said.

"Enjoying the rain?" Carella asked.

"Oh, yes, very much, thank you."

"Is Endicott in there?"

"With a blonde who just joined him," Meyer said.

At four-fifteen that Monday afternoon, Arthur Brown relieved Carella on post outside the Hollis house. Carella told him the joke about the black penis, and Brown burst out laughing and then immediately wondered if it was a racist joke. He knew his customer well, though, and just as quickly decided it wasn't. Still laughing, he said, "Got to tell that to Caroline when I get home. Who's relieving me?"

"Delgado."

"Hope he's on time. I don't like standing around in the rain."

Carella had been standing around in the rain since ten this morning, give or take an hour or so for taxi rides around town, following Marilyn hither and yon and finally back here to the house.

"Fill me in," Brown said.

"Blonde white woman, twenty-four years old, five eight, weighing about a hundred and twenty, more or less. Her name's Marilyn Hollis."

"What are you looking for specifically?"

"She may be a killer. Maybe she'll make another move."

"Very nice," Brown said.

"I'll talk to you in the morning," Carella said, and walked off through the rain.

The first surprise Brown got was at four-thirty, when a car pulled up across the street from where he was standing under a tree in the park, and a man got out of the car, and locked it, and began walking toward 1211 Harborside Lane. The man was either Hal Willis or his double. The man climbed the low, flat steps to the front door, took a key from his pocket, inserted it into the latch, and let himself into the building.

Brown blinked.

Had that really been Willis?

It sure as hell looked like Willis.

But Carella hadn't mentioned Willis being in on the stakeout. Was that a skeleton key he'd let himself in with? He hadn't looked like a man messing with a ringful of skeleton keys. He'd looked like a man who had the key to the front door of a house occupied by a lady Carella thought might be a killer.

The second surprise Brown got was at twenty minutes past seven when the front door opened again and first out came the blonde Marilyn Hollis girl Carella had described, and next out came Willis, who pulled the door shut behind him, and then the girl took Willis's arm and they walked off up the street together, making a right turn on the corner, heading crosstown toward the Stem.

Brown wondered what the hell was going on here.

He followed them to the Stem, and then downtown on the Stem, the neon lights filtered by a fine, soft drizzle now, the sound of automobile tires swishing on the black asphalt, keeping a decent interval behind them because if Willis wasn't in on the stakeout, Brown didn't want to be made by an experienced cop. But if he wasn't in on this, then what the hell was he doing with a broad who maybe killed somebody?

Up ahead was a Chinese restaurant named Buddha's Feast.

Willis opened the door for the girl, and the girl went in, and Willis went in behind her.

Brown peeked in through the plate glass window, and that was when he got his third surprise.

Because sitting there in one of the booths was a person who looked very much like Bert Kling, who was in fact Bert Kling, and sitting with Kling was his girlfriend, Eileen Burke, who was also a working cop, and Willis and the Marilyn Hollis girl came over to the booth, and it looked as if Willis was introducing her to them, and then Willis and the girl sat down and Willis signaled to the waiter.

Man, Brown thought, this is a bigger stakeout than I figured! The whole damn police department is in on it!

Eileen Burke kept trying to hide her left cheek. The plastic surgery looked very good to Willis, you could hardly tell she'd been slashed not too long ago, even if you were looking for a scar. But Willis noticed that she kept bringing up her left hand to cover her cheek.

"Eileen does a lot of work with the Rape Squad," he told Marilyn.

"Really?" Marilyn said.

"As a decoy," Willis said.

"I'm not sure I'd like that kind of work," Marilyn said, and rolled her eyes.

Willis was sitting beside Kling on one side of the booth, Marilyn and Eileen opposite them on the other. Willis thought the two women looked very beautiful together, Eileen with her red hair and green eyes, Marilyn blonde and blue-eyed, one a big-boned, full-breasted woman, the other slender and pale and somehow fragile-looking. A nice combination.

He wanted tonight to be a very special one. Marilyn's coming-out party, so to speak. Her introduction to two people he liked and admired, both of them working detectives. And, perhaps more important, their introduction to her. He knew Carella well enough to be certain he hadn't revealed to the other cops on the squad anything about Marilyn's past. The lieutenant, yes, Carella would have felt duty-bound to tell him that Willis had moved in with a former hooker whom Carella considered a murder suspect. But beyond the lieutenant, no. Carella was a working cop, not a gossip. Carella was a friend.

There were secrets at this table.

Marilyn's secret was that she'd been a hooker.

Eileen's secret was that she'd been raped and slashed in the line of duty.

There were also mysteries at this table.

Willis wondered if two experienced, eagle-eyed detectives would take one look at Marilyn and know what she'd been.

Kling wondered if Marilyn would ask questions that would again trigger memories of what had been the most horrible night in Eileen's life. He wished Willis hadn't mentioned her work as a decoy.

Willis wished nobody would ask Marilyn what sort of work she did.

"What sort of work do you do?" Eileen asked.

"I'm independently wealthy," Marilyn said breezily, and then said, "How about the orange chicken?"

Eileen looked at Kling.

"How does a person get to be independently wealthy?" Kling asked.

"I have a rich father," Marilyn said, and smiled.

Kling was thinking he'd once been married to a woman who earned a hell of a lot more money than he did. He wondered if Willis was serious about this girl. If so, did she know how much a Detective/Third earned?

"What do they do?" Marilyn asked. "Just turn you out on the street?"

"Sort of," Eileen said. "Would anyone like the crispy fish?"

"I'd be terrified," Marilyn said.

I am terrified, Eileen thought. Ever since that night, I've been scared to death.

"You get used to it," she said, and again brought her hand up to her cheek.

"Why don't we just order the special dinner?" Kling said. "Do you think that'd be too much to eat?"

"I'm starved," Marilyn said.

"Sure, let's do that," Willis said, and signaled to the waiter.

The waiter padded to the table.

"The special dinner for four," Willis said. "And another round of drinks, please."

"I go on at midnight," Kling said. "No more for me."

"Oh, come on," Eileen said.

"No, really," Kling said, and covered the top of his glass with his palm.

"The night shift's a good time for cooping," Eileen said. "Have another drink."

"What's cooping?" Marilyn asked.

"Sleeping on the job," Willis said.

"Special dinner for four," the waiter said. "More drinks." And walked off.

"Why do Chinese waiters always sound surly?" Marilyn asked. "Have you noticed that?"

"Because they are surly," Kling said.

"Racist remark," Eileen said.

"Who me? I have nothing against Chinks," Kling said.

"Compounding the felony," Eileen said.

Marilyn wondered if they were going to use police jargon all night long.

Eileen wondered if Marilyn knew Kling had used the word "Chinks" deliberately, as a reverse joke.

"That was deliberate," she said.

"What was?" Marilyn asked.

"Him saying 'Chinks.' "

"Actually, I like Chinks," Kling said. "Japs, too. We have a Jap on the squad."

"That, too," Eileen said. "Deliberate. His sense of humor."

"I have no sense of humor," Kling said, dead-panned.

"Have you ever wondered why there are no blue-eyed Chinese?" Willis said.

"Mendel's Law," Marilyn said. "If you mate a black cat and a white cat, you get one white kitten, one black kitten, and two grey kittens."

"What's that got to do with blue-eyed Chinese?" Willis asked.

"Brown eyes are dominant, blue eyes are recessive. If everybody in a country has brown eyes, then everybody's children will also have brown eyes. Well, that isn't quite true. It doesn't always work with people the way it works with fruit flies or cats, unless everybody's got dominant genes to begin with. For example, my father had brown eyes and my mother had blue eyes, but there must have been some recessive blues in previous generations. When two recessives get together, you get another recessive, which is what I am, a recessive blue."

"How do you happen to know that?" Willis asked.

"I saved a clipping on it," Marilyn said.

He wondered why she had saved a clipping for an electric distiller. He had not yet asked her. She had told him the moment he walked into the house this afternoon that she'd broken the news to Endicott. Met him for lunch, told him she didn't want to see him again. So he'd put off asking her about the distiller, even though Carella's last report had mentioned that one way to make homemade nicotine was by distilling tobacco.

"Are both your parents dead?" Kling said.

Uh-oh, Willis thought. Cop catching a discrepancy. She'd used the present tense in talking about her father earlier: I have a rich father. And just now she'd switched to past tense: My father had brown eyes.

Kling was waiting for an answer. Not probing, not a cop on the job, no suspicion here, just puzzlement. Waiting for clarification.

"Yes," Marilyn said.

"Because earlier," Eileen said, "I got the impression your father was still alive."

Another county heard from, Willis thought.

"No, he died several years ago. He left me quite a bit of money," Marilyn said, and lowered her eyes.

"I thought that was only in fairy tales," Eileen said.

"Sometimes in real life, too," Marilyn said.

"I used to love reading Grimm's fairy tales," Eileen said, somewhat wistfully, as if talking about an uncomplicated time long ago.

"Did you know that Jakob Grimm… the one who wrote the fairy tales… is the same Grimm who formulated Grimm's Law?"

Fancy footwork, Willis thought. Reverse the field, change the subject. Nice work, Marilyn.

"What's Grimm's Law?" Kling asked.

"Section 314.76," Eileen said. "Consorting with fairies."

"Sexist remark," Kling said.

"Something to do with p's becoming b's, and v's becoming w's or vice-versa, I forget which," Marilyn said. "It was in a clipping I saved. In German, of course, the German language."

"The clipping was in German?" Eileen said.

"No, no, the law. Grimm's Law. It pertained to the German language. He was German, you know."

"What's taking him so long with those drinks?" Willis said, and signaled to the waiter.

"Drinks coming," the waiter said, and went into the kitchen.

"See?" Kling said. "Surly as a boil."

"Maybe he doesn't understand English," Eileen said.

"Does anybody here speak Chinese?" Kling said.

"Marilyn speaks fluent Spanish," Willis said, and then immediately thought Jackass! You're opening the wrong can of peas!

"I wish I spoke fluent Spanish," Kling said. "Come in handy around the precinct."

"Well, you know a few words," Eileen said.

"Oh, sure, you pick them up, but that's not fluent. Where'd you learn it?" he asked Marilyn. "In school?"

"Yes," she said at once.

"Here in the city?" Eileen asked.

"No. In Los Angeles."

Getting in deeper and deeper, Willis thought.

"Did you go to college out there?"

"No. I learned it in high school."

Deeper and deeper and deeper.

"It's a much simpler language than English, actually," Marilyn said, sidestepping again. "I'd hate to be a foreigner learning English, wouldn't you? All those words that sound alike and are spelled differently? Like joke and oak and folk. Or all the words that have the same spelling but are pronounced differently? Like bough and though and rough. I'd go crazy."

"Say something in Spanish," Willis said.

"Yo te adoro," she said, and grinned.

"Talk about English," Eileen said, "I know a girl who when she knocks on the door and you ask, 'Who is it?' she answers, 'It is I.' "

"Well, that's proper English," Kling said. "Isn't it?"

"Oh, sure, but who ever uses it? Most people say 'It's me.' "

"Even when it's somebody else?" Kling said.

The second round of drinks arrived at the same time the dinner did.

"Terrific," Willis said sourly.

But he was happy for the intrusion. He'd felt back there a few minutes ago that Marilyn's diversionary tactic had become a bit obvious, so eager was she to get off the topic of where and how she'd learned Spanish. Were two experienced cops, both adept at detecting nuances of speech and behavior, really buying everything she told them? He wondered.

But only once during the meal was there an open clash, cop versus civilian, police mentality versus—hooker mentality? Kling was talking about a recent case he'd handled where this guy was regularly and repeatedly raping the woman who lived next door to him and the victim never told her husband about it because she was afraid the husband would beat her up if she did.

"I'd have killed them both," Marilyn said, with such sudden vehemence that all conversation stopped.

Eileen looked at her.

Kling said, "Actually, that's what almost happened. She took a cleaver to the guy next door. A neighbor heard all the ruckus and called 911. Before they got there, though, the husband came home. She'd already hacked off the neighbor's hand and was going for his head when all at once there's the husband. So she turns on him, goes at him with the cleaver. That was when 911 walked in. It took four cops to get her off him."

"The husband?" Eileen asked.

"Oh, sure. The other guy was passed out cold on the kitchen floor."

"So what happens to her now?" Marilyn asked.

"We charged her with two counts of attempted murder."

"Her lawyer'll plea-bargain it down to assault," Willis said.

"No, I'll bet he tries for self-defense," Eileen said.

"With the neighbor maybe," Kling said. "The husband didn't do anything but walk in there."

"Either way, she goes to jail, right?" Marilyn said.

"Well, she did chop both of them up a little," Kling said.

"They had her terrified," Marilyn said. "They deserved to be chopped up."

"There are laws against chopping up people," Eileen said.

"Go tell that to Lizzie Borden," Kling said. "She got away with it."

"Which makes the song wrong," Eileen said.

"What song?"

"About chopping up your Mama in Massachusetts."

"I really don't see anything funny about it," Marilyn said, and the table went silent again.

Willis cracked open his fortune cookie.

" 'You will have new clothes,' " he read out loud.

"Maybe that means you'll get a promotion," Kling said. He had turned his eyes away from Marilyn, who shook a cigarette loose from her package of Virginia Slims, held a flaming match to it, her hand trembling, and then let out a furious stream of smoke.

Eileen looked at her watch.

"Have you really got the Graveyard?" she asked Kling.

"Would I kid about the Graveyard?" Kling said.

"Come on," Eileen said, "I'll treat you to a taxi."

In the taxi, Kling said, "What'd you think of her?"

"Who, the Encyclopedia Britannica?" Eileen said, and then fell into a fairly good imitation of Marilyn. "Are you familiar with Mendel's Law? Black cats and white cats, brown eyes and blue, dominant and recessive? Do you know that a great many words in the English language sound the same but are spelled differently? Like pause and paws and sent and scent. Or vice versa, like bass the fish and bass the fiddle? Did you know that Grimm's Law changes blue fairies to pink fairies? Did you know that Yo te adoro means 'I adore you' in Spanish? Did you…?"

"Is that what it means?"

"No, it means 'Would you like to play with my yo-yo?' This is one tough customer, Bert, I'm telling you, hard as nails. Did you catch the murderous intent in those baby blues when she said she'd have killed those two guys? Man, I believed her. Last time I saw eyes like that was on a guy who'd just used a Sten gun on his whole family."

"Maybe that's how you get when you're independently wealthy," Kling said.

"And, yeah, what about that?" Eileen said. "Was I dreaming, or did I hear her say, 'I have a rich father'?"

"That's what you heard."

"So how come five minutes later she's an orphan?"

"Slip of the tongue."

"Sure, because the English language is so contrary, right? Is Hal serious about her?"

"I think he's living with her."

"I hope he's not asking for more trouble than he needs," Eileen said.

"I gather you didn't like her much."

"Not much," Eileen said.

"I didn't think she was so bad," Kling said.

"Well," Eileen said, and shrugged. "One man's mead…"

"What'd you think of them?" Willis asked.

"They were okay," Marilyn said.

They were walking up toward Harborside Lane. It had stopped raining, but the night had turned very cold; you couldn't trust April in this city. She was clinging to his arm, her head bent against the wind that blew in off the river.

"Only okay?"

"Limited," she said. "Why'd Eileen take the side of those two bums?"

"She wasn't taking their side. She was taking the law's side. She's a cop. The woman did use a meat cleaver on…"

"So Eileen's ready to throw her in jail, never mind the circumstances. She ought to try spending a little time in jail herself. Then maybe she wouldn't make jokes about chopping up your Mama in…"

"She's got a heavy load to carry," Willis said. "I don't deny her any jokes she cares to make."

"Yeah, life is tough all over," Marilyn said.

"Tougher for her maybe," Willis said. "She was raped a while back, messed up pretty bad in the process."

"What do you mean?"

"A case she was working. Guy cut her and raped her. It takes a while to get over something like that. Especially if your job throws you on the street as a decoy."

Marilyn was silent for several seconds.

Then she said, "I wish you'd told me that."

"Well… it's sort of family," Willis said.

"I thought I was sort of family, too."

"I meant… well… what happened to Eileen isn't something we talk about."

"We," Marilyn said.

"The squad," he said.

She nodded. They walked in silence, turned the corner.

"I'm sorry I said that about her."

"That's okay, don't worry about it."

"Really, I'm sorry."

"That's okay."

They were approaching the house. He was thinking he had to ask her about that electric distiller, that clipping she'd saved. Had she gone out to buy that thing? Was it somewhere in the house? Had she already used it? Too many questions. He sighed deeply.

"What is it?" she said.

"I have to move the car."

"What?"

"Alternate side of the street parking. Got to move it before midnight."

"Don't you have some sort of identification on it?"

"Yes, but…"

"Some kind of cop thing?"

"I don't like breaking the law," Willis said, and smiled. "I'll just be a minute, you go on in."

"Hurry," she said, and went to the front door to unlock it.

Willis started walking up the street to where he'd parked his car.

Brown had followed them from the Chinese restaurant, keeping back a good distance, no danger of losing them, the streets were virtually empty at this time of night. Eleven-thirty, he'd tuck the girl in, wait for Delgado to relieve him fifteen minutes from now. He wondered if Willis planned to spend the night here. Was he shacking up with the Hollis woman? Was that part of the stakeout?

He was just coming around the corner when he saw Willis walking up the street toward him. He backpedaled away, ducked into the nearest doorway. What now? he wondered, and then saw Willis unlocking the door to his car. Well, well, he thought, the man ain't making it with her, after all, the man's going home to his own little—

Two shots cracked the brittle night air.

Two shots in a row, coming from somewhere in the small park across the street from the building.

Willis threw himself flat to the ground.

Brown came out of the doorway, pistol already in his hand, and started running for the park.

Another shot, and then another, bullets ricocheting off the car door above Willis's head.

"I'm with you, Hal!" Brown shouted over his shoulder. "Artie Brown!"

Insurance against Willis pumping a few slugs into his back.

Willis was off the ground now, yanking his pistol from its holster, running across the street toward the footpath Brown had already entered. He heard Brown pounding along up ahead there, heard other footfalls in the distance, someone running up the path and then thrashing into the bushes. What the hell is Brown doing here? he wondered. And realized in an instant that they'd put a tail on Marilyn.

"Police officer!" he heard Brown shout. "Stop or I'll shoot!"

Two shots in the blackness up ahead, muzzle flashes on the night. He came running up to where Brown was standing on the edge of the path, gun in hand, breathing hard, peering into the bushes.

"Did you get him?" he asked.

"No."

"He still in there?"

"I don't think so," Brown said. "Let's check it out."

They fanned out into the bushes, moving in a slow, steady, flushing pattern some twenty feet apart from each other, until finally they reached the edge of the park closest to the river.

"Gone with the wind," Brown said.

"Did you get a look at him?"

"No. Man was trying to shoot you, though."

"Tell me about it."

They began walking back through the bushes, up toward the path again.

"You on a stakeout?" Willis asked.

"Yeah," Brown said. "You on it, too?"

"No. Who set it up?"

"The Loot."

Meaning Carella had requested it.

"Better see we can find any spent cartridge cases," Brown said.

"We'll need lights," Willis said. "I'll call in."

He went out of the park and was walking toward his car when the front door of the house opened. Marilyn was standing there in a robe.

"Were those shots?" she asked.

"Yes," he said.

"Who?"

"I don't know. He got away."

"Was he trying for you?"

"Yes."

She came over to the car. Light from the open doorway of the house spilled onto the sidewalk. Willis thumbed open the glove compartment and took out the walkie-talkie.

"Eight-Seven," he said into it. "This is Willis."

"Go ahead, Hal."

"Who's this?"

"Murchison."

"Dave, I'm here at 1211 Harborside Lane. Somebody just tried to blow me away, Brown and I need lights at the scene."

"You got "em," Murchison said.

"Who's catching upstairs?"

"Kling and Fujiwara just relieved."

"Ask them to check on Charles Endicott, Jr., his address is in the files, they can look in the McKennon folder. I want to know if he's home. If he's not home, I want them to wait there till he gets home."

"I'll tell 'em," Murchison said.

"Thanks," Willis said. He took a flashlight from the glove compartment, came out of the car, clipped the walkie-talkie to his belt, and then closed and locked the door. "I guess I won't have to move it, after all," he said.

"You think it was Chip, don't you?" Marilyn said.

"I don't know who it was," Willis said.

"Then why are you sending policemen there?"

"Because he's the one you kissed off this afternoon."

"Why do you need lights?"

"If he was using an automatic, there'll be spent cartridge cases. You'd better go back inside, this may take a while."

He turned on the flashlight, played it on the car door.

"Son of a bitch put two holes in it," he said. "Right above where my head was."

Marilyn looked at the holes in the car door. One was about sixteen inches above the pavement. Another was two inches above that. He saw the puzzled look on her face.

"That short I'm not," he said, and smiled. "I was lying flat on my belly." He began playing the flashlight on the pavement at his feet.

"What are you looking for?" she asked.

"Bullets," he said.

"What'll they tell you?"

"The kind of gun he used."

She came into his arms and held him close. "See?" she said. "I'm trying to be family."

The lights in the park were on until two in the morning. A lot of neighbors gathered to watch the policemen milling around over there. None of them knew what was going on. If any of them had heard the earlier shots, they'd dismissed them as backfires. When the police finally turned off the lights, the neighbors went back to their houses. They figured something had happened, but they still didn't know what. The police van carrying the portable equipment drove off. One by one, the patrol cars angled into the curb, backed out and moved off into the night. Willis went to the house across the street, and let himself in with his key.

Marilyn was already in bed. He undressed silently, and climbed into bed beside her. She moved instantly into his arms.

"Did you find anything?" she asked.

"Three bullets and four spent cartridge cases."

"That's good, isn't it?"

"If we ever come up with a gun that matches them."

"Your feet are cold," she said, and snuggled closer to him. "Do you want to make love?"

"No, I want to talk," he said.

"About what happened tonight?"

"No. About what happened this afternoon. While you were having lunch with Endicott."

"I already told you. He was very nice about it… well, he's a very nice man. Wished me the best of…"

"Marilyn," he said, "I found a clipping in the storeroom. An ad for an electric distiller. Costs three hundred and ninety-five bucks."

"Want to buy it for me?" she said.

"No. I want to know if you bought it."

"Why would I buy something like that?"

"You tell me. Why'd you save the clipping?"

"I thought it might be fun to make my own perfume."

"Or your own poison," Willis said.

She was silent for a moment.

"I see," she said at last. "So what do you want to do? Search the house?"

"Do I have to?" he said.

"If you think I've been making poison here…"

"Have you?"

"Let's search the fucking house."

"Just tell me you didn't buy that distiller."

"I didn't."

He nodded.

"Is that enough for you?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, and kissed her fiercely.

They talked the night away, they loved the night away, as they had that first time here in this house, only now there was the scent of woodsmoke on the air from someone's fireplace up the street, wafting through the open window, and when Marilyn screamed in orgasm, she tried to muffle it because she didn't want cops knocking on the door wanting to know who was being murdered. Nobody was being murdered. Little deaths aside, nobody was getting killed.

But if theories of conspiracy take into account the moment when hands are irrevocably clasped and allegiances permanently sworn, then yes, they were witch-whispered Macbeth and his ambitious lady, confirming to each other in the crucible of dawn that this metal and this metal had been fused into this alloy, and that come what might they were locked into each other as immutably as iron and carbon into steel.

"I love you," he said, "oh, Jesus, how I love you!"

"I love you, too," she said.

She was crying.