They kissed again.
She sighed.
And then she began telling him about her day.
He had known for quite some time now that she was interested in finding a job. Fanny had been with them since the twins were born, and she ran the house efficiently. The twins — Mark and April — were now eleven years old, and in school much of the day. Teddy was bored with playing tennis or lunching with the “girls.” She signed “girl” by making the “a” hand sign with her right fist, and dragging the tip of her thumb down her cheek along the jawline; to make the word plural, she rapidly indicated several different locations, pointing with her extended forefinger. More than one girl. Girls. But her eyes and the expression on her face made it clear that she was using the word derogatively; she did not consider herself a “girl,” and she certainly didn’t consider herself one of the “girls.”
Carella, listening to this — he was in fact listening, even though he was watching — thought about the second time the Deaf Man had come into the precinct’s busy life. Again, it had been Meyer who’d initially been contacted, purely by chance since he was the one who’d answered the ringing telephone. The Deaf Man himself was on the other end of the line, promising to kill the Parks Commissioner if he did not receive five thousand dollars before noon. The Parks Commissioner was shot dead the following night.
Well, I went to this real estate agency on Cumberland Avenue this morning, Teddy was saying with her hands and her eyes and her face. I’d written them a letter answering an ad in the newspaper, telling them what my experience had been before we got married and before I became a mother—
(Carella remembered. He had met Theodora Franklin while investigating a burglary at a small firm on the fringe of the precinct territory. She had been working there addressing envelopes. He had taken one look at the brown-eyed, black-haired beauty sitting behind the typewriter, and had known instantly that this was the woman with whom he wished to share the rest of his life.)
— and they wrote back setting up an appointment for an interview. So I got all dolled up this morning, and went over there.
To express the slang expression “dolled up,” she first signed “x,” stroking the curled index finger of the hand sign on the tip of her nose, twice. To indicate “doll” was in the past tense, she immediately made the sign for “finished.” For “up” she made the same sign anyone who was not a deaf-mute might have made: She simply moved her extended index finger upward. Dolled up. Carella got the message, and visualized her in a smart suit and heels, taking the bus to Cumberland Avenue, some two miles from the house.
And now her hands and her eyes and her mobile face spewed forth a torrent of language. Surprise of all surprises, she told him, the lady is a deaf-mute. The lady cannot hear, the lady cannot speak, the lady — however intelligent her letter may have sounded, however bright and perky she may appear in person — possesses neither tongue nor ear, the lady simply will not do! This despite the fact that the ad called only for someone to type and file. This despite the fact that I was reading that fat bastard’s lips and understanding every single word he said — which wasn’t easy since he was chewing on a cigar — this despite the fact that I can still type sixty words a minute after all these years, ah, the hell with it. Steve, he thought I was dumb (she tapped the knuckles of the “a” hand sign against her forehead, indicating someone stupid), the obvious mate to deaf, right? (she touched first her mouth and then her ear with her extended index finger), like ham and eggs, right? Deaf and dumb, right? Shit, she said signing the word alphabetically for emphasis, S-H-I-T!
He took her in his arms.
He was about to comfort her, about to tell her that there were ignorant people in this world who were incapable of judging a person’s worth by anything but the most obvious external evidence, when suddenly she was signing again. He read her hands and the anger in her eyes.
I’m not quitting, she said. I’ll get a goddamn job.
She rolled into him, and he felt her small determined nod against his shoulder. Reaching behind him toward the night table, he snapped off the bedside light. He could hear her breathing in the darkness beside him. He knew she would lie awake for a long time, planning her next move. He thought suddenly of the Deaf Man again. Was he lying awake out there someplace, planning his next move? Another girl hanging from a lamppost? Another young runner knocked down in her prime? But why?
That second time around, he had senselessly killed the parks commissioner, and then the deputy mayor (and a handful of unselected targets who happened to be in the immediate vicinity when the deputy mayor’s car exploded) and then had threatened to kill the mayor himself, all as part of his grander scheme. The scheme? To extort five thousand dollars from each of a hundred selected wealthy citizens. The dubious reasoning for believing they would pay? Well, the Deaf Man had warned his previous targets in advance, hadn’t he? And then had carried out his threats. And now he was promising to strike without warning if his new targets didn’t pay. So what would five thousand dollars mean to men who were worth millions? Even figuring on a mere one-percent return, the Deaf Man’s expenses would be more than covered. Never mind that he had already killed two selected victims and a handful of innocent bystanders. Never mind that he planned to kill yet a third, the mayor himself. All part of the game. Fun and games. Every time the Deaf Man put in an appearance, a laugh riot was all but guaranteed. For everyone but the cops of the 87th Precinct.
If those young girls hanging from lampposts were harbingers of something bigger the Deaf Man planned, the Eight-Seven was in for more trouble than it already had or needed. Carella shuddered with the thought, and suddenly pulled his wife close.
Sarah Meyer was wondering how to tell her husband that she thought their daughter should go on the pill. Meyer was wondering whether she liked his hairpiece. He was also wondering if the Deaf Man was once again in their midst. Not in their immediate midst, since he knew that he and Sarah were alone in bed together, but in the midst of hanging young women from lampposts.
Meyer did not like the Deaf Man. It had been Meyer’s misfortune, on three separate occasions now, to be the first detective contacted by the Deaf Man. Well, that wasn’t quite true. The first time around, it had been Dave Raskin who’d contacted him about the Deaf Man, who they didn’t even know was deaf at the time, if he really was deaf, which maybe he wasn’t. There were a lot of things they didn’t know about the Deaf Man. Like who he was, for example. Or where he’d been all these years. Or why he was back now, if indeed he was back, which Meyer hoped he wasn’t, but feared he was.
All Meyer wanted to do was ask Sarah if she liked him better with his hairpiece or without his hairpiece. He was not wearing his hairpiece to bed. If she told him she liked him better with it, he would get out of bed and put it on, and then he would make wild passionate love to her. Either way, with or without the hairpiece, he planned to make wild passionate love to her. He did not want to be thinking about the Deaf Man. He wanted to be thinking instead about Sarah’s splendid legs, thighs, and breasts.