The Busy Body

23

Once again he went down the fire escape and through the window and across the black bedroom to the light switch, but this time when he turned on the light he remained alone.

He hadn’t expected to find her here, and he was right. She was gone, taking nothing with her. On the kitchen table, where he’d left his note, there was a new note in its place. It read:

It was there all right, clean and glimmering and without a wrinkle. The socks were even rolled in a ball.

That girl, Engel reflected, was going to make some guy in some far-off clime a hell of a wife. Cook and wash and sew for him, take care of him just fine in the bedroom, devote herself to him day and night. And what a dowry: a quarter of a million bucks in uncut heroin!

“She deserves to keep it,” Engel told himself aloud, “and Nick Rovito, that faithless friend, deserves not to get it.”

He went over to the phone and dialed Nick Rovito’s home number, and pretty soon Nick Rovito himself came on the line, saying, “All You okay, boy?”

“I’m fine, Nick. You heard from Rose and the other guys?”

“They’ll pay, Al, I guarantee you they’ll pay.”

“Why? They were muscled into it. You can’t down a guy for doing something when he was muscled into it.”

“Al, boy, you got a heart as big as all outdoors, you know that, kid? To forgive like that, that’s a magnificent gesture.”

“Yeah, well...”

“Rose tells me I’ll get the rest of the story from you.”

“Yeah. A woman named Margo Kane hijacked Charlie’s body in order to...” And for the next five minutes Engel told the full story, leaving out only the final discovery about the blue suit. When he was done, Nick Rovito said, “Well, that’s the way it goes. Burned up, huh?”

“Cremated. Nothing left but ashes.”

“That disappoints me, but it could be worse. I could of not found out the truth about you, huh, kid? I could of gone on thinking you were disloyal and a bastard. I’m happy to have it straightened out, kid. It’s worth the loss of the snow to have you back.”

“What about the Menchik frame?”

“Squared. Done tonight, within the last hour. We worked hard, kid, believe me we did. And cost? An arm and a leg. You know, it cost just as much as if you’d been guilty!” And Nick Rovito laughed.

Engel said, “That’s good. So I’m in the clear.”

“Right. Take a week off, a couple weeks, then come in, we’ll—”

“No, Nick.”

“What’s that?”

“Not after what’s happened, Nick. I don’t work for you any more.”

“Kid, I squared it, it’s all square.”

“Not with me, Nick. We’re quits. No hard feelings, but I just don’t want to work for you any more.”

Suspicion in his voice, Nick Rovito said, “You got an offer from somebody else? Winocki in Chicago?”

“Nobody else, Nick.”

“Let me tell you something. You say you want to quit, okay, quit. But all the way, kid. If you quit, it means out of the organization all the way. I send your name down to the Committee, nobody should ever hire you. Nobody’s out for you, but nobody hires you.”

“That’s okay, Nick. I want to stay out of the organization anyway.”

“Well, I think you’re crazy. You got a great future with the organization. Some day you could be one of the guys on the Committee yourself.”

“No, Nick.”

“Have it your own way,” Nick Rovito said grumpily, and hung up.

Engel gathered up his underwear and went home.