Lullaby

'Uh-huh. What was this man's name?'

'The one I killed?'

'Yes. Why? Who did you think I meant?'

'I thought you meant the one I killed. That's what we were talking about, wasn't it? Halloween night?'

'Yes.'

'His name was Robert Wilson. Well, Bobby. He called himself Bobby.'

'Why did you kill him, Eileen?'

'Because he was coming at me with a knife.'

'Uh-huh.'

'He'd already killed three hookers here in this city.'

'Nice person.'

'He was, actually. I mean . . . this sounds stupid, I know . . .'

'Go on.'

'Well, 1 had to keep reminding myself I was dealing with a killer. A man who'd killed three women. One of them only sixteen years old. They showed me pictures up the Seven-Two, he'd really done a job on them. I'm talking genital mutilation. So I knew this, I knew he was very dangerous but he seemed charming. I know that's crazy.'

'Uh huh.'

'Kept telling jokes.'

'Uh huh.'

'Very funny jokes. It was strange. I was sitting there with a killer, and I was laughing. It really was strange.'

'What did he look like?'

'Bobby? He was blond. Six-two, six-three, in there. Two hundred pounds or so, well, a bit over. Maybe two-ten, fifteen. A big man. With a tattoo near his right thumb. A blue heart outlined in red.'

'Anything in it?'

'What do you mean?'

'The heart. Any lettering in it?'

'Oh. No. Nothing. I thought that was strange, too.'

'At the time?'

'No. Later on. When I thought about it. A heart without a name in it. Usually there's a name, isn't there?' Eileen shrugged. 'All the thieves I've dealt with, if they've got a heart tattoo, there's always a name in it. But not him. Strange.'

'So let me understand this. He was telling jokes while you were in this rented room with him?'

'No, earlier. In the bar. They planted me in a bar. In hooker's threads. Because . . .'

'Because the previous three victims were hookers.'

'Yes. And he hit on me in the bar, and I had to get him out of there so he could make his move. So we went to this rented room.'

'Where he came at you with a knife and you had to shoot him.'

'Yes.'

'Where were your backups?'

'I lost them. But that's another story.'

'Let me hear it?'

'Well,' Eileen said, and sighed. 'My SO thought I needed a little help on the job. So he . . .'

'What's his name?'

'Kling. Bert Kling. He's a detective up in the Eight-Seven.'

'Do you think of him as that?'

'As what? A detective?'

'No, your Significant Other.'

'Yes. Well, I did.'

'Not any longer?'

'I told him I didn't want to see him for a while.'

'Why'd you do that?'

'I figured while I was trying to sort things out . . .'

'Uh-huh.'

'. . . it might be best if we didn't see each other.'

'When did this happen?'

'Well, I told him Friday night.'

'How'd he take it?'

'He didn't like it very much.'

'What'd he say?'

'First he said he didn't think it was such a good idea, and then he said it was a lousy idea. He also wanted to know whether you were the one who'd suggested it.'

'And what'd you tell him?'

'I said it was my own idea.' Eileen paused, and then said, 'Would you have suggested it?'

'I really couldn't say at this point.'

'But do you think it's a good idea? Until I get myself straightened out?'

'How long have you known him?' Karin asked.

'Quite a while now. I was doing a job for the Eight-Seven, and we met up there. A laundromat. This guy was holding up laundromats. They planted me like a lady with a basket full of dirty laundry.'

'Did you catch him?'

'Oh, yeah.'

'And this was when?'

'A long time ago. I sometimes feel I've known Bert forever.'

'Does he love you?'

'Oh, yes.'

'And do you love him?' Eileen thought about this.

'I guess so,' she said at last.

'I'm assuming you've been intimate . . .'

'Oh, sure. Ever since . . . well, I had another job shortly after the laundromat, some guy who was raping nurses in the park outside Worth Memorial. The Chinatown Precinct, you know?'

'Uh-huh. Did you catch him, too?'

'Oh, yeah.'

'Then you must have been very good.'

'Well, I was okay, I guess. But that was then.'

'But you were saying . . .'

'Only that when it was over, the thing in the park, I went up to Bert's place and we, you know.'

'And that was the start of it.'

'Yes.'

'And you've been intimate since.'

'Yes. Well, no.'

'No?'

'Not since . . .' Eileen shook her head.

'Not since when?'

'Halloween,' Eileen said. 'But that's another story, too.'

Maybe they're all the same story,' Karin said.

* * * *

Andrew Fields was waiting outside José Herrera's apartment building when he came downstairs at three o'clock that Tuesday afternoon. It was a cold gray shitty day like the ones you always got in January in this city. In Jamaica, you never got days like this. Never. It was always sunny and bright in Jamaica. Even when it rained it was a different kind of rain than you got here in this shitty city. There were times when Fields was sorry he'd ever left Jamaica except for the money. Here there was money. In Jamaica, you wiped your ass on last year's newspaper.

Herrera was wearing his overcoat like a cloak, thrown over his shoulders, unbuttoned to accommodate the cast on his left arm. Fields wondered what he had on under the coat. A sweater with only one sleeve? After he shot him, he would take a look under the coat, see what he was wearing. He would also steal the wristwatch he saw glinting on Herrera's left wrist, which looked like gold from this distance, but which may have been only junk. Lots of spics wore fake jewelry.

Fields planned to approach Herrera soon as he found an opportunity, fall into step beside him, tell him in English - if the fuckin' spic understood English - that this was a gun here in Fields's pocket and that he should walk very nice and quiet with him and keep walking till they came to 704 Crosley, which was an abandoned building in this lovely spic neighborhood Herrera lived in. Fields planned to walk him up to the third floor of that building and shoot him in the back of the head. Very clean, very simple. No fuss, no muss.