“Hello, there,” Handy said. “The fact of the matter is, I need to come out of retirement.”
That was a surprise. It had been nine years since Handy had done anything in the way of business; he and Parker had gotten involved in stealing a statuette for a rich man, and in the course of it Handy had been badly shot in the stomach. That’s what had led to his retirement in the first place. Hesitating, Parker said, “I thought you were through for good.”
“So did I. Little money trouble. The new interstate took all my truck business away, and this just ain’t a family joint.”
“Uh huh.”
“So if you’ve got anything going,” Handy said, “or hear about anything—”
”All right,” Parker said. He could understand the situation now. “Nothing right now,” he said, “but I’ll keep you in mind.”
“Thanks,” Handy said. “Not as a favor, you know, but because I’m still good.”
“I don’t do favors,” Parker reminded him. “I’ll let you know if anything turns up.”
“Good. So long.”
Parker hung up and went out to where Grofield was waiting in the Impala. He slid in behind the wheel, and Grofield said, “We got the evening off, boss?”
“We just hang loose,” Parker said, “till we call Lozini tomorrow at seven.”
“Then I do believe,” Grofield said, “I’ll make a little call of my own.” Opening the door, he hesitated halfway out of the car and, grinning, said, “Should I ask her if she has a friend?”
“No,” Parker said.
Fifteen
While standing in the phone booth, receiver hunched between shoulder and ear as the phone did a lot of clicking and beeping before going into the ring sound, Grofield breathed on the glass wall, drew a heart in the steam, and inside the heart put AG and a plus sign. Then he paused, suddenly at a loss. What the hell was the girl’s name?
It was ringing. What was her name, for the love of God?
Click. “Hello?”
Dori! Dori Neevin; it came to him in a flash at the sound of her voice, bringing him both the look of her as he’d last seen her in the library and the earlier sound of her telling him her name. “Hi, there, Dori,” he said, pleased with himself, and then fumbled for a second as he tried to remember his own name. That is, the name he’d given her. Green, that’s right. “This is Alan,” he said. “Alan Green.”
“Oh, hi,” she said as he scribbled in a quick DN inside the heart. “How are you?” She sounded very pleased to hear from him; that business of the overreaction again, her trademark.
“I just couldn’t get away last night,” he said. “Business, you know.”
“Well, you told me that might happen,” she said. He could hear in her voice her willingness to forgive him anything, anything at all.
“But tonight,” he said. “Ah, tonight.”
“You’re free?”
“Totally.” He looked at his watch. “It’s just seven now. Why don’t I come around for you at eight?”
”That would be just wonderful.”
“I don’t have your address.”
“Oh, ah . . .” He could practically hear the wheels spinning in her head as she worked something out. “I’ll, um,” she said, “I’ll meet you at the corner of Church Street and Fourth Avenue, at eight. Okay?”
Parent trouble. Possibly also a boyfriend to be cooled out. “Fine with me,” he said.
“There’s an old monastery on the corner there,” she said. “Lancaster Abbey. Do you know it?”
“I can find it.”
“I’ll be waiting right in front.”
“Fine. See you then.”
He left the phone booth and went back over to the Impala. Parker was sitting at the wheel, listening to the seven o’clock news. Grofield slid in next to him and said, “My love life bubbles.”
“You’re all set?”
“Just fine.”
Parker put the car in gear, and headed out toward the southern end of town, where a number of motels were clustered together. They’d arrange a place for tonight, and then Grofield would take the car for his date. Parker, aside from the fact that he seemed to be monogamous with Claire, never did have anything to do with women while he was working. Grofield understood that in a theoretical sort of way, but it wasn’t natural for him not to have something stirring in his own life, and he’d never tried to emulate Parker’s monkishness.
Not at home, though. Around the theater he limited his activities strictly to Mary; partly because he liked her enough to be content with no one but her, and partly because he liked her too much to humiliate her. But away, while working, he almost always found some girl to help brighten the laggard hours.
“Listen!”
Grofield looked at Parker, frowning, and saw him pointing at the car radio. The newscaster was talking about a dead policeman, a uniformed cop named O’Hara, shot dead in a diner this afternoon. Possibly, the newscaster said, the work of the same people who had done those robberies last night.
Grofield said, “What’s the matter?”
“O’Hara,” Parker said. “That’s one of the cops from Fun Island. He helped them look for the money.”
“Oh ho,” Grofield said.
“Watch for a phone booth,” Parker said. “We have to call Lozini.”
Grofield sighed. “And I’d better call my little Dori back,” he said.
Sixteen
Parker got out of the Impala three blocks from the address. “Luck,” Grofield said. Parker nodded, acknowledging the meaningless word, and walked away. Behind him, the Impala U-turned as Grofield went off to position himself.
Not quite nine o’clock on a Saturday night in July; two hours since he’d heard the news report about O’Hara. Tyler was a big enough city to have a substantial downtown, and a small enough city to have its office buildings and its weekend entertainment area all in the same place. Dark office blocks loomed over blinking movie marquees, and the traffic on London Avenue and Center Street was thick and slow-moving.
It was another clear night; high above, the sliver of moon was thinner even than last night, giving off no illumination to speak of, shining no more brightly than the white dots of the stars. Tuesday would be the new moon; no moon at all.
The Nolan Building took up a city block, bounded by London Avenue and Center Street and West Street and Houston Avenue. The ground floor was taken up mainly by a bank on the Center Street side and a stock brokerage and a large restaurant called the Riverboat on the London Avenue side. Next to the Riverboat was the entrance to the office building lobby, the elevators and the building directory.
Parker got there a few minutes early, and spent a while studying the copy of the Riverboat menu taped to one of the restaurant windows. In five minutes he saw four men enter the lobby, none of them Lozini. Was he there already, earlier than his assistants? It didn’t sound right.
Parker was about to go on in when one more car stopped at the curb in front of the lobby entrance, the same black Oldsmobile Lozini had used this afternoon. Watching, Parker saw Lozini and another man get out of the Olds and walk across the sidewalk as the Olds drove immediately away. The second man was fat and ungainly, walking as though he’d be more comfortable with a cane. Or more comfortable sitting down.
Fine. Parker let another two minutes go by, then followed the rest of them in.
The lobby reminded him of the one they’d been using in that jewelry-store robbery that went bad. It even had the same kind of skinny old man in uniform as the night guard, except that this one seemed awake and alert. He also had an assistant, a grinning young Puerto Rican, in a blue uniform jacket and tattered dungarees, who operated the elevator. Parker signed a name and destination in the night book—”Edward Latham, City Property Holdings, 1712”—and was about to get into the elevator when another man arrived. Parker, looking at him, knew that this was somebody else for the meeting, and waited for him.