He looked above him to the upper-floor veranda and additional shops, where an open stairway led up, but there was no little coffee shop tucked in there, either. Turning, he looked back toward the street and his car thinking he’d better go on, get checked in to a motel. With the help of a motel coffeepot, he could heat a cup of the instant soup he carried in his suitcase, something hot if not very filling. Get the child tucked up safe for the night, and then drop into sleep, himself. As he turned to leave the plaza and return to his car, he saw that they were not alone. A man stood behind him, had approached without sound, and light from the tree caught his face.
“Well, hey!” He laughed, clutching the child tighter, glad to see his friend, but then puzzled. “How did you…? Where did you come from? Why didn’t you…? Is this a surprise? How did you get here? And when?” When the other didn’t speak, he stepped forward, reaching out to clasp his shoulder.
When the man moved he glimpsed the weapon. “What…?” He twisted away, shocked, ducking and shielding the child, but he wasn’t quick enough. A jolt caught him and light exploded and he felt himself reel off balance. He fell, shielding and cushioning the child. Why? Why would he…? She had awakened, struggling and clutching him, she caught her breath staring up into the face of their attacker then drew back against him, trying to hide herself. She made one gasp, no other sound. He couldn’t see right, couldn’t see at all, felt himself falling into blackness, the child clutching him. He could only imagine her little white face, couldn’t see her, felt her shivering against him as deep darkness swarm over him.
T HE KILLER BENT over them, pressing the gun against the victim’s throat. The weapon felt awkward with the silencer on it. Well, he didn’t need it now, the man was limp, gone. He was going through the fallen man’s pockets when a cop car passed and slowed, he caught a glimpse of their uniform caps, heard their radio, and he ducked and froze in place as a spotlight shone in.
But it was just a routine patrol. The white Buick sedan moved on again slowly, the cop in the passenger’s seat sipping coffee from a white Styrofoam cup as he scanned the shop fronts that faced the street, scanned what he could see of the plaza and gardens.
The minute the law had gone he finished searching, made sure he had the billfold, the airline tickets and rental car keys. The child huddled away from him, staring at him white with shock. He didn’t speak to her. Rising, he rearranged some of the oversize toys so the body wouldn’t be visible from the street, then headed away through the \plaza to the back, keeping to the darkest doorways and to the gloom beneath the small, ornamental trees. The cops would be back. Would most likely circle the block, checking again before they went on. He hoped to hell they wouldn’t walk the plaza, walk right past the tree to look in the individual stores. They would if they had any feeling of unease. He’d planned for more time. He’d have to hustle to move the body, he hadn’t planned it this way, and he hated to hurry.
He’d waited for his quarry beside that house, cold and wet from the storm. When the car appeared at last, and stopped, and he could see the driver’s profile, then it turned around and took off, he’d expected them to head straight to a motel. He’d followed silently on the bike, keeping to the shadows, drew back when his victim went into the plaza maybe looking for a café. And wasn’t this ironic. This was too good. Shot beneath a Christmas tree, his death fitting right in with the season.
Not that he’d wished his victim any special bad luck. He just couldn’t have him around.
Watching for the cops, he knew they couldn’t have heard or seen any disturbance, couldn’t have heard the faint pop of the silenced weapon. He waited until they returned, shining their light in again across the lighted tree and the toys and rocking horse but missing the dead man where he lay in the dark behind the big toys. Missing the silent child cringing against him, hidden among the tangle. She was so scared she likely wouldn’t run. And she sure wouldn’t cry out for help. The minute they’d gone he slipped across the wide street, retrieved the old bicycle that was his transportation tonight, and wheeled it toward the empty store, one of a dozen dark retreats that he’d scoped out weeks earlier, scattered around the village.
He waited inside the dark store until the cops moved on down Ocean. He was returning for the body, entering the plaza, when he heard a soft noise like someone running; he melted into the shadows and was gone again fast, heading for the backstreet.
T HE BODY WAS discovered only a few minutes after the killer fled. It was glimpsed by a lone and silent prowler looking down from the roof of a plaza shop. By a four-footed wanderer trotting across the steep shingles enjoying the lull in the storm, a lone adventurer out to discover what might be new in the night. By a tortoiseshell cat out on the prowl, to see what she could see.
Below the darkly mottled cat, the streets were deserted. The only movement was the police unit making its way slowly up Ocean-out on the prowl, too, she thought companionably.
As she crossed the plaza roof, she smelled blood, and then cordite. Startled, she approached the plaza below her, and was suddenly shaken by the smell of death. Nose twitching, she padded to the edge of the roof’s rounded tiles and looked down into the enclosed gardens.
Here atop the single one-story shop at the front of the complex she was below the rest of the building, and below the top of the plaza’s Christmas tree, below its crowning star. For a moment the colored lights blinded her. As her pupils contracted, she saw the body under the branches and she hissed and backed away. But then she crept to the edge again, looking.
The man lay unnaturally twisted, his body angled awkwardly between the tangle of oversize toys, his face whiter than paper except for the dark blood spilling from a wide and gaping wound down the side of his forehead and cheek. He was dead, no question, the sour smell of death filled the night. He was beyond help now, beyond any help in this world-but the little child who clung to him was alive and shivering, a little girl lying curled against the dead man, clutching him tight, her face pressed against him and her little tense body shivering with silent sobs.
Crouching and still, the tortoiseshell cat looked out to the street. The deepest shadows were pitch-black, impenetrable even to feline eyes. The smell of death was so sharp it made her draw back her lips, her teeth bared, her whiskers flat against her darkly mottled cheeks. She lifted a paw but didn’t back away, she stood watching the dead man and the little silent child with her arms tight around his arm and neck, her face burrowed into his shoulder, her little white sweater soaked with his blood.
She thought the child might be five, maybe six years old; it was hard to tell with humans. Beneath her bloody white sweater she wore little blue tights, and little white boots with fake white fur around the tops. Her hair was jet-black, her skin milky. A ragged cloth doll lay forgotten beneath her, a doll that seemed to have little padded wings, a homemade angel doll.
Kit studied the black shadows of the plaza but did not see a lurking figure. She was crouched to leap down to the child when the little girl choked out a tiny, thin sob, a small, lost sound perhaps too faint for a human ear, and that sob frightened and hurt Kit all the more deeply. This child had been abandoned in a way no child should ever be abandoned, this child should be laughing and reaching up among the laden branches and golden bells and ribbons, not hovering terrified against a dead man, filled with incomprehensible loss; and a terrible pity filled Kit, and an icy fear.
The dying wind carried the scents of Christmas that lingered from the village shops, of baking, of nutmeg and ginger and hot cinnamon, all mixed, now, with the stink of death. Away across the roofs behind Kit, the courthouse clock struck midnight. Twelve solemn tolls that, tonight, were death tolls.