“My, my, my,” he said. He dropped the stack of bills into the bag and looked at Tricia. He still wore a thick cap of bandages on his head, and his nose and one eye were a few shades purpler than when she’d seen him last. “Let’s talk about your situation, Miss Heverstadt.”
“Can’t we talk about something more pleasant?” she said.
“I’d love to talk about pleasant things, Miss Heverstadt. But I’m afraid I’m out of practice. Now. Just to get it out of the way, I’m not going to charge you with assaulting a police officer in the execution of his duty.”
“Good. That wasn’t me.”
“I’m not charging anyone. I don’t need it. Or with attempted murder, reckless endangerment, kidnapping—”
“Kidnapping?”
“You tied me up, didn’t you? But forget it.” He waved a hand airily. “What do I need with chicken feed like that, when I’ve got two, maybe three actual, honest-to-God charges of murder? A Mister Roberto Monge, with a knife. A Mister Mitchell Depuis, gunshot. And we understand Al Magliocco got himself done earlier this evening, and that you were in attendance.”
“I wasn’t the one who—”
“No, of course not. What else’ve we got? Illegal possession of a firearm. Four counts of resisting arrest. That was somebody else, too? Breaking and entering, I forget how many counts. Grand larceny—let’s not forget that little item. Three million smackers, which you wrote a whole book about stealing. And of course these very interesting photos. Can I add blackmail to the list?”
“Do I look stupid enough to try and blackmail Salvatore Nicolazzo?”
“You’d be surprised, Miss Heverstadt. I don’t look stupid myself, and just look how stupid I’ve been over the past few days.” He leaned across the table, brought his face close to hers. “Listen, girlie. You’re looking at the max.”
“The hell I am,” Tricia said. “You’re bluffing.”
The man in the suit looked pained when Tricia said hell. “Miss Heverstadt,” he said, in a smooth, authoritative voice, “I’m afraid your attitude is not helpful. I can assure you that what Captain O’Malley says is correct.” He had a glistening crew cut, a wide, squarish jaw, and a short and very straight nose. He would have been handsome as a movie star if his eyes hadn’t been so close together.
“You sound like a radio announcer. Who is this guy?” Tricia asked O’Malley.
“Now that is a question I was asking myself not so very long ago. Miss Heverstadt, may I present Special Agent Houghton Brooks...” He turned to Brooks. “I’m afraid I keep forgetting. Are you Houghton Brooks the Third, or the Fourth?”
“Just Junior, Captain,” Brooks said with a strained smile.
“Agent Houghton Brooks, Jr. of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation. The federal authorities have been kind enough to interest themselves in our little case, Miss Heverstadt. They are very interested in you. And you still don’t think you’re looking at the max?”
“I don’t know,” Tricia admitted. “What’s the max?”
“The maximum penalty permitted under New York State sentencing guidelines, Miss Heverstadt. In your case, several consecutive sentences that’ll add up to life without parole.” O’Malley stood, leaned forward on both hands and looked down at her. “How old are you, Miss Heverstadt? Eighteen, nineteen? You haven’t done much living yet, have you? How’d you like to do the rest of the living you’ll ever do, spend the rest of the years you’ve got to spend, in the slam? How’d you like to grow old in a cage?”
“Right now, Captain, growing old anyplace at all sounds pretty inviting.”
“And how about your friends? Your bartender friend we don’t have much on except operating illegally after hours—but Miss Erin Galloway, now there’s a piece of work. Of course you’ll probably tell me she didn’t try and fracture my skull, either.” Tricia shrugged. “Well, never mind that. We’re charging her with Murder Two—an employee of Uncle Nick’s named Celestino Manzoni, by means of another firearm she wasn’t legally entitled to possess. Grand larceny again—a racehorse this time. And as an employee in good standing of Madame Helga’s organization, I’m sure she’s been up to a few things that might interest the boys in vice.
“And your friend Borden, now, where do I begin? He likes to assault cops and impersonate officers and steal cop cars. That’s when he isn’t publishing smut or running Madame Helga’s himself. Some breaking and entering for Mister Borden, too, as well as—”
“All right,” Tricia said. “All right.”
“I’m sorry, Miss Heverstadt. Am I boring you?”
“I’m tired. I’m very tired, and it’s—late. And I would like you to get to the point.”
O’Malley turned to Agent Brooks. “You see? She’s a pain in my thigh, and she’s rotten straight through, and she lies like a hundred-dollar Persian rug, and she’s keeping company with big piles of newspaper cut up the same size as money, God knows why. But like she says, she’s not stupid. She knows there’s a point.” He turned back to her and his eyes, shadowed by bandages, were suddenly savage. Very softly he said, “I don’t care about any of this crap, girlie, and I don’t care about you. I don’t care about you or your whore friends or your piss-ant smut-peddler boyfriends. You’re not even annoyances to me. You’re gnats. You’re something I’ve got to brush away from time to time so I can go about my business. And my business is Sal Nicolazzo. And you are going to bring him to me.”
Tricia stared at him.
“Permit me,” Agent Brooks said. “Captain O’Malley expresses himself a bit—”
“That’s right,” O’Malley said. “I expressed myself. You’ve got a way about you, sister. You seem to wiggle your little butt into and out of Uncle Nick’s place easier than anybody I’ve ever seen. He’s interested in you.”
“He’s interested in his three million dollars, Captain O’Malley. He thinks I’ve got it. He’s wrong—but that’s what he thinks. He’s also interested in those photos. And he’s given me until six AM tomorrow—six AM this morning—to get them to him, on that boat of his. That’s why the piles of newspaper. They’re going to pick me up at six at a pier in Brooklyn and I’ve got to have it all with me, or Charley and my sister...he’s got them out there, and he’s said he’ll kill them. They’ll die.”
“Well then,” O’Malley said. “That gives us something to work with.”
“To work with?”
“Yeah. You’re going to go out there to Uncle Nick’s boat. You’re going to bring—” He shouted toward the door. “Nevins!” A balding head appeared. O’Malley pointed to the leather case of photos. “Get Levitas out of bed. Now. Get him to copy these photographs. I want negatives by three this morning, and I want a set of dry prints on my desk at nine, and whatever fingerprints are on these photos and this case better still be on them and nobody else’s. Clear?” Nevins nodded and disappeared, and O’Malley turned back to Tricia. “You’re going to bring these photos, and your case of funny money, to that boat, and you’re going to bring a story with you, and that story, when you tell it, is going to bring Uncle Nick back to dry land where Agent Brooks and I can get at him. That’s what you’ll do, and that’s all you’ll do. And when you’re done, you and your whore friend and your smut-peddler sweetheart and your sister can all walk. The bartender, too. Understand? I’ll wipe the slate. You give me Nicolazzo, and we’re quits.”