Widow’s Walk

CHAPTER NINE

There had been something lurking behind what Amy Peters had said. She knew something about Nathan Smith. I didn’t know what it was yet. I drove out of the parking garage next to the bank. A moment of brightness flicked past me from across the street and I looked over at a black Volvo sedan across from the entrance. I thought I saw binoculars, which would account for the reflected flash. I turned onto Broadway toward the Longfellow Bridge. The car didn’t move. As I got on the bridge I checked the rearview mirror and the Volvo was there, two cars back.

I punched up the number for the Harbor Health Club on the car phone. Henry Cimoli answered.

“Hawk there?” I said.

“Yeah,” Henry said. “Intimidating the patrons.”

What’s he doing?“ I said.

“Nothing.”

“Let me talk to him,” I said.

In a moment Hawk said, “Un-huh?” into his end of the phone.

“I’m on the Longfellow Bridge,” I said. “I think I’m being tailed by a black Volvo. Mass plates, number 73622. I’m going to park at the health club and go in. I want you to pick up the Volvo, if they leave. See who they are.”

“You care if they see me?” Hawk said.

“Yes.”

“Okay,” Hawk said.

On the Boston end of the bridge, to make sure, I went straight up Cambridge Street and through Bowdoin Square and down New Sudbury Street and back down Canal Street toward the Fleet. On Causeway Street I turned right and headed back through the North End. It was a way to get to the Harbor Health Club that no one would take. The black Volvo was still behind me.

When I started at the Harbor Health Club I was still boxing, and it was a dark ugly gym where fighters trained. Now I wasn’t boxing anymore. The club was three stories high, and they had valet parking. I gave my car to the valet and headed in. I didn’t see Hawk. But I didn’t expect to. Inside I went up to the second floor where there was a women-only weight room across from the snack bar and cocktail lounge, and looked down into the street from the front windows. The Volvo was there, idling across the street.

Henry, wearing a white T-shirt and white satin sweatpants, joined me at the window. Henry used to box lightweight, and it showed in the scar tissue around his eyes and the way his nose had thickened. The T-shirt showed how muscular he still was. Which is not a bad thing in a health-club owner.

“Hawk already left,” Henry said.

“I know.”

“You working on something?”

“I am.”

Henry looked down through the window. “The black Volvo tailing you?”

“Un-huh.”

“What kinda crook tails somebody in a Volvo?” Henry said.

“Hawk’s going to tell us,” I said.

“I get it,” Henry said. “You ditch them here and Hawk picks them up and then you’ve got a tail on the tail.”

“Pretty smart,” I said. “For a guy who got whacked in the face as much as you did.”

“Never got knocked down though,” Henry said. “You gonna work out?”

“Maybe later,” I said. “Isn’t it sexist to have a women-only weight room?”

“I think so,” Henry said.

The Volvo waited for two and a half hours, into the rush hour, until a cop pulled his cruiser up behind it and gave a short wail on his siren and gestured them to move the car. Which they did.

I looked down at the evening commuter traffic trying to jam past the Big Dig construction for a while and then went to the snack bar and had a turkey burger. Healthful.

I called Frank Belson while I waited and asked him to check the plate numbers on the Volvo. I ate another turkey burger. Belson called me back. After two hours and twenty minutes, Hawk came into the snack bar and slid onto the stool beside me.

“Went down to Braintree,” hawk said. “Shopping center right there where 3 and 128 fork off the expressway. Parked in the lot. Got out, got in another car, drove back up the expressway to a place called Soldiers Field Development Limited.”

“Would that be on Soldiers Field Road?” I said.

“How’d you guess that?” Hawk said.

I smiled modestly and looked at the floor.

“You get the plate number?” I said.

“You didn’t tell me to get no license plate number,” Hawk said.

“I was being racially sensitive,” I said. “I didn’t want to sound patronizing.”

“Yassah,” Hawk said and recited the plate number. Hawk never wrote anything down. As far as I could tell he never forgot anything.

“You get anything on the car they dumped?” Hawk said.

“Stolen car,” I said.

“They being careful,” Hawk said. “Tail you with stolen car. Dump it. Swap cars.”

“Not careful enough,” I said.

“‘Course not,” Hawk said. “How they gonna be careful enough when they up against you and me?”

“They didn’t make you? I said.

Hawk looked at me without speaking.

“No,” I said. “Of course they didn’t. They actually go in the development company?”

“Un-huh.”

“And didn’t go right on through and come out the front and get in a waiting car and drive off?” I said. “Leaving you confused and uncertain?”

“Un-un.”

“You got a good look at them?”

“Un-huh.”

“So you’d recognize them if you saw them again.”

It wasn’t a question, I was just thinking out loud. Hawk made no response.

“Okay so we know who,” I said. “Be good to find out why.”

“It would,” Hawk said. “Maybe next time they follow you we can stop and ask them.”

“We’ll see,” I said.