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“She could have told me that. And what he looked like, too.”

“She could have told you what he looked like, but Davey doesn’t think she would have got into the pet-name department.”

“Tell him Dick called her Golden Girl. What’s this all about?”

Her face looked harder. “Davey doesn’t want to take any chances. He needs money. This whole deal is hot. You don’t know how hot. Davey said to me that we got to check you all over again because he can’t figure why you should want to go to Peekskill, unless maybe it’s to take Davis’ offer back to her. There’s some people think she’s got what Denny took out of Eric’s apartment.”

“What did Denny take?” He hoped he had been able to cover his shock when she named the destination on the ticket in his wallet.

“Something that maybe she was smart enough to mail to herself. That way Helen could have got it.”

“And how would you know that Gorman didn’t get it. Candy?”

“You mean maybe I’ve been in touch with him?”

“Or your friend Lemon has.”

She stood up. She smiled in an odd way. “You’re lucky it’s us who found you. You take Gorman’s people — people like Paulie Brath — they wouldn’t treat you so nice, not if they thought you know something. Who did you see at the Roosevelt?”

“Ask Lemon.”

“Don’t try to be wise, Ben. If you know where Helen is, get hold of her and make her come in and give herself up.”

“Do you think I know where she is?”

She looked at him and pursed her heavy lips for a few moments, then shook her head. “No. But Davey thinks you know. He was resting easy until you went to the station.”

“How did he find out I bought a ticket to Peekskill?”

“That’s almost too easy. It proves you don’t know many tricks. Go back to the station and look. There’s a big rack full of tickets. From forty feet away you can see which slot the guy reaches up to. Then you go up and read the name on the tickets in that slot. Davey told me about that.”

She picked up her purse and slung her cape over one shoulder and walked slowly, thoughtfully, to the door. Then she turned and came back to where he stood. She tilted her head to one side. Barely moving her lips, she said, “What is she to you, anyway?”

“Why?”

“I’ve got a contact. I know where I can go direct and get paid off. We could split it right down the middle, Ben. And then it would be a good idea to get away from here — Havana or someplace. I wouldn’t mind crossing Davey. The pay-off would be in cash, Ben. Twenty-five thousand apiece. That’s how bad they want her. If you could find out where she is — or if you know already... I mean, I know a place where we could go. I’m sick of this town!”

She had moved closer to him, bringing the thick scent of her perfume closer, so close that he could see the shape of her lips beneath her lipstick.

“No, thanks.”

“Sixty-forty, then?”

“Not for ninety-ten. Not for the whole bundle.”

“Not with me, you mean?”

“Something like that.”

She turned so quickly that the cape swirled widely. She banged the door behind her when she left. Her perfume was still heavy in the room. He realized that she, like Davis, had seemed at home in the small, tawdry room. He could see how she would be, walking tall, camera poised, bending over the table, presenting to the customer her enameled smile, and saying, “A picture, sir?” He locked his door and went to bed...

He woke up at six thirty on Sunday morning, the light pale in the air shaft, the sheets sticky with the perspiration of that last unremembered dream. He lay quite still and remembered that there were now twenty-six days to go. He wiped the palms of his hands on the bedding. The train would leave at nine fifteen and he would be on it. And he began to see how he would make the trip, how it could be worked in case he were being followed. He packed quickly. There was little to pack. There was no one at the desk when he went down. He left the key and went down the last flight and out into a pale, quiet, overcast day.

There was moisture on the streets. They looked oiled. The city was as quiet as he had ever seen it. A bus hissed to a stop at the corner. His footsteps were loud in the empty block. When he got to the corner he looked back. A man stood staring at a window display. He looked as though he had been there for a long time, yet three minutes ago the street had been empty. Ben sensed that the deserted streets made it more difficult for whoever was following him. The light was odd. There was a milky pallor over everything, and when Ben looked up he saw the low clouds scudding by, moved by a wind that did not reach down into the streets. The tallest buildings were shrouded in clouds.

It was to his benefit to be followed. It kept him alert. He didn’t look back again. He had breakfast at a stand-up counter at the terminal. He bought a magazine and did not look up from it until five after nine. The information clerk, the only one in the big round booth, told him his track number in a weary voice. He found the track and walked to the forward car and climbed aboard. Some railroad men in billed caps and carrying black tin lunch buckets came in and sat and smoked and talked in low voices. Some teen-age boys got on, noisy and active. A couple more men came aboard, and settled down with the Sunday papers. Not one of them looked familiar or interested. Yet he knew that somewhere on the train, perhaps in this very car, was an individual who wanted to know where he was going. Or maybe there were two or three, if they wanted to make absolutely certain they didn’t lose him.

He looked at the timetable again. The train got to Peekskill at ten twenty-seven. First there was 125th Street, then Yonkers, Harmon, Peekskill. He opened his magazine and. as he looked at meaningless words, he thought of how he must look to the pursuer: a young man in a rumpled suit, a young man with a few old lines of strain in his face — bracket lines around the mouth, high-altitude squint wrinkles at the outside comers of the eyes. There was a bland young man with a magazine, one knee hiked up against the back of the seat in front of him; a blond young man with a cigarette.

The conductor came through and took his ticket and stuck his destination stub in the bracket in front of him. The train came out of the tunnel under Park Avenue and climbed slowly, and he turned and looked into the Sunday-morning windows near the high tracks, looked at the barren window boxes, wilted curtains, black iron fire escapes, sooted walls. The train rumbled to a stop at 125th Street. Two beefy blonde girls in slacks came into the smoking car. They carried big shoulder bags and their faces had a pasty, unhealthy look. They took the scat in front of him and one of them turned and gave him an appraising stare that lasted three seconds longer than necessary. Then she nudged her friend, leaned close, and whispered in her friend’s ear.

For a time, beyond Yonkers, the sun came pallid through the overcast, and then it disappeared again. He tried to relax all his muscles, but the back of his neck kept stiffening up, and his shoulders felt strained. In the Harmon yards he gave up the attempt to relax.

Twenty minutes later, the train slowed for Peekskill. He left his magazine and got up. The station was announced. He walked toward the rear of the car. According to the timetable — and the train was on schedule — there should be a two-minute stop. His legs felt as if they weren’t working right. They were puppet legs, on strings worked by an amateur.

The train stopped smoothly. He stepped off the last step onto the platform and walked slowly toward the rear of the train. He walked toward the platform exit. There was a mist that was almost rain. The air was chilly. He stopped and set his suitcase down and bent down and untied his shoelace and pulled it tight, knotted it again, slowly and carefully. He did not look at the others who had got off at Peekskill. A hoarse voice called, “ ’Board!” and the train began to move. Ben straightened up and picked up his suitcase and took another slow step toward the doorway and glanced casually at the train. A porter stood on the low step of one of the newer coaches, the next to the last car on the train. The train began to move a lot faster. As the steps were opposite Ben, the porter turned and went back up into the car.