I started into the room.
Something came out of nowhere and slammed down onto my arm a few inches above the wrist. My hand went dead and the .38 went flying.
Two hands fastened on my arm, one in the middle of the forearm, one near the shoulder. He heaved, and I went stumbling across the room as if launched by a catapult. I careened into a table, upending it, and my feet went out from under me. I reached out for support, grabbed at empty air, bounced off a wall and wound up on the floor.
He stood there and laughed at me.
"Come on," he said. "Get up."
He was wearing Echevarria's uniform, everything but the jacket.
The shoes were wrong, though. The uniform code calls for plain black shoes with laces. He was wearing brown wing tips. He'd switched on a lamp; otherwise I wouldn't have noticed the color of his shoes.
I got to my feet. He just didn't look like a cop, I thought, and it wouldn't make any difference what shoes he wore. There are a lot of cops who don't look like cops either, not since they killed the height requirement and allowed facial hair, but he didn't look like any kind of cop, regular or auxiliary, old or
new style.
He leaned in the doorway, flexing his fingers, looking at me with evident amusement. "So noisy," he said.
"You're not much good at sneaking up on people, are you?
Climbing on garbage cans and running up fire escapes at your age. I was worried about you, Scudder. I was afraid you might fall and break a bone."
I looked around, trying to track the Smith. I spotted it on the other side of the room, half-hidden under an armchair with a needlepoint back and seat. My eyes went from it to him, and his smile flashed.
"You dropped your gun," he said. He picked up Echevarria's nightstick and slapped his palm with it. My forearm was still numb where he'd struck it with the stick. It would hurt for days once the feeling returned.
If I lived that long.
"You could try to get it," he said, "but I don't think your odds are very good. I'm closer to it than you are, and I'm faster. I'd have you before you got the gun. All in all, I think you'd have a better chance of getting out the door."
He nodded toward the front door, and I obediently glanced over toward it. "It's unlocked," he said. "I had the chain on but I took it off when I heard you making a racket in the backyard. I was concerned that you might see the chain and know somebody was home. But I don't think you'd have noticed.
Would you?"
"I don't know."
"I hung the jacket on the closet doorknob for your benefit, you know. Otherwise you might have gone into the apartment next door.
You're such a buffoon, Scudder, that I've had to make things as easy for you as possible."
"You're making it all very easy," I said.
I looked within myself, scanning for fear, and I couldn't find any. I felt curiously calm. I wasn't afraid of him. I didn't have anything to be afraid of.
I shot a glance at the door, as if I was considering making a run for it. It was a ridiculous idea. It very likely wasn't unlocked, even if the chain was off, but even if it were he'd be on me before I could get the door open and myself through it.
Besides, I hadn't come here to run away from him. I'd come here to take him down.
"Go ahead," he said. "Let's see if you can get out the door."
"We'll go through it together, Motley. I'm taking you in."
He laughed at me. He raised the nightstick and pointed it at me and laughed again. "I think I'll stick this up your ass," he said. "Do you think you'll like it? Elaine liked it."
He was looking at me carefully, watching for a reaction. I didn't give him one.
"She's dead," he said. "She died hard, the poor darling. But I guess you know that."
"You're wrong about that one," I said.
"I was there, Scudder. I could report in detail, if I thought you could stand hearing it."
"You were there but you left early. The doorman got there in time and called an ambulance. She's in New York Hospital and doing fine.
She already gave them a statement, and the doorman backed up her ID."
"You're lying."
I shook my head. "But I wouldn't worry about it," I said.
"Remember what Nietzsche said. It'll just make you stronger."
"That's true."
"Unless it destroys you, of course."
"You're becoming tiresome, Scudder. I like you better when you're begging for mercy."
"Funny," I said. "I don't remember doing that."
"You'll be doing it soon."
"I don't think so. I think you've had your run and now you're finished. You were very careful early on.
Lately you've been getting sloppy. You're ready for it to end, and you know how things always end for you. You wind up losing."
"I'll tape your mouth," he said, "so nobody can hear the screams."
"You're done," I said. "You lost the momentum when you left Elaine alive. You had her for two hours and you couldn't even manage to make sure she was dead when you left. Now all you can do is stand there and make threats, and threats don't mean much when the person you threaten isn't afraid of you.
You have to back them up, and you can't do that anymore."
I turned away, as if to show contempt for him. He stood there, getting ready to do something about it, and I reached down for a bronze Chinese incense burner. It was about the size of a half-grapefruit and it had been on top of the table until I'd come crashing into it.
I picked it up and threw it at him, and I went in under it.
This time he didn't make the mistake of trying to catch what I tossed his way. He swung out a hand, knocking the incense burner aside, then moved forward to meet my charge. I feinted at his head, ducked in and hammered punches at his middle. There was no softness there, nothing but ridged muscles. He swung a fist that caught me on the side of the head. It was a glancing blow and it didn't do much. I ducked the next punch he threw, tucked my chin into my chest and hit him just below the navel, then swung a knee up at his crotch.
He pivoted, blocking with his hip. He grabbed at my shoulder and his fingers dug in. His grip was as strong as ever but he wasn't on a pressure point now and the pain was nothing I couldn't stand.
I hit him again in the gut. He tensed in response, and I bulled forward, shoving him back against the wall.
He rained blows on my shoulders and the top of my head, but he was better at pressing and probing and squeezing than he was at infighting. I tried for his groin again, and when he moved to protect himself I stomped down on his instep. That hurt him, and I pressed the advantage and did it again, raking his shin with the heel of my shoe, stomping down hard on his foot, trying to break a couple of its small bones.
His hands moved, one settling on my upper arm, the other fastening on the back of my neck. He let his fingers look for hot spots now and he hadn't lost his touch. His thumb dug in behind my ear and the pain came in Technicolor.
But it was somehow different. It was there, God knows, and it could not have been more intense, but this time I was able to feel it without feeling it. I was aware of it but unaffected by it. Something enabled me to allow it to pass through me and leave me whole.
He shifted his grip, both of his hands on my neck now, the thumbs at the base of my ears, the fingers reaching to circle my throat. Maybe the pain wouldn't stop me, but if he shut off my air or blocked the flow of blood through the carotid I'd be just as dead as if I died in agony.
I went for his foot again. His grip loosened a little, and I crouched lower. He loomed over me, his hands finding their grip again, and I gathered my legs under me and thrust straight up, leading with the top of my head, using it as a battering ram.