“Heels or flats?”
“Entirely up to you. You may have to — well, he may give you a rough time. If heels will hamper you, wear flats.”
“He can hear heels better,” Eileen said.
“It’s up to you.”
“I’ll wear heels.”
“All right.”
“Will anyone else be in on this? I mean, will you have a walkie-talkie or anything?”
“No,” Willis said, “it’d be too obvious. There’ll be just the two of us.”
“And Clifford, we hope.”
“Yes,” Willis said.
Eileen Burke sighed. “When do we start?”
“Tonight?” Willis asked.
“I was going to get my hair done,” Eileen said, smiling, “but I suppose that can wait.” The smile broadened. “It isn’t every girl who can be sure at least one man is following her.”
“Can you meet me here?”
“What time?” Eileen asked.
“When the shift changes. Eleven forty-five?”
“I’ll be here,” she said. She uncrossed her legs and rose. “Lieutenant,” she said, and Byrnes took her hand.
“Be careful, won’t you?” Byrnes said.
“Yes, sir. Thank you.” She turned to Willis. “I’ll see you later.”
“I’ll be waiting for you.”
“Good-bye, now,” she said, and she left the office.
When she was gone, Willis asked, “What do you think?”
“I think she’ll be okay,” Byrnes said. “She’s got a record of fourteen subway-masher arrests.”
“Mashers aren’t muggers,” Willis said.
Byrnes nodded reflectively. “I think she’ll be okay.”
Willis smiled. “I think so, too,” he said.
At two o’clock on the morning of Thursday, September 21, Eileen walked the streets of Isola in a white sweater and a tight skirt.
She was a tired cop.
She had been walking the streets of Isola since eleven forty-five the previous Saturday night. This was her fifth night of walking. She wore high-heeled pumps, and they had definitely not been designed for hikes. During the course of her early morning promenades, she had been approached seven times by sailors, four times by soldiers, and twenty-two times by civilians in various styles of male attire. The approaches had ranged from polite remarks such as, “Nice night, ain’t it?” to more direct opening gambits like, “Walking all alone, honey?” to downright unmistakable business inquiries like, “How much, babe?”
All of these, Eileen had taken in stride.
They had, to be truthful, broken the monotony of her otherwise lonely and silent excursions. She had never once caught sight of Willis behind her, though she knew with certainty that he was there. She wondered now if he was as bored as she, and she concluded that he was possibly not. He did, after all, have the compensating sight of a backside which she jiggled jauntily for the benefit of any unseen, observant mugger.
Where are you, Clifford? she mentally asked.
Have we scared you off? Did the sight of the twisted and bloody young kid whose head you split open turn your stomach, Clifford? Have you decided to give up this business, or are you waiting until the heats off?
Come on Clifford.
See the pretty wiggle? The bait is yours, Clifford. And the only hook is the .38 in my purse.
Come on, Clifford!
From where Willis jogged doggedly along behind Eileen, he could make out only the white sweater and occasionally a sudden burst of bright red when the lights caught at her hair.
He was a tired cop.
It had been a long time since he’d walked a beat, and this was worse than walking any beat in the city. When you had a beat, you also had bars and restaurants and sometimes tailor shops or candy stores. And in those places you could pick up, respectively, a quick beer, cup of coffee, snatch of idle conversation, or warmth from a hissing radiator.
This girl Eileen liked walking. He had followed behind her for four nights now, and this was the fifth, and she hadn’t once stopped walking. This was an admirable attitude, to be sure, a devotion to duty which was not to be scoffed aside.
But good Christ, man, did she have a motor?
What propelled those legs of hers? (Good legs, Willis. Admit it.)
And why so fast? Did she think Clifford was a cross-country track star? He had spoken to her about her speed after their first night of breakneck pacing. She had smiled easily, fluffed her hair like a virgin at a freshman tea, and said, “I always walk fast.”
That, he thought now, had been the understatement of the year.
What she meant, of course, was “I always run slow.”
He did not envy Clifford. Whoever he was, wherever he was, he would need a motorcycle to catch this redhead with the paperback-rover bazooms.
Well, he thought, she’s making the game worth the candle.
Wherever you are, Clifford, Miss Burke’s going to give you a run for your money.
He had first heard the tapping of her heels.
The impatient beaks of woodpeckers riveting at the stout mahogany heart of his city. Fluttering taps, light-footed, strong legs and quick feet.
He had then see the white sweater, a beacon in the distance, coming nearer and nearer, losing its two-dimensionality as it grew closer, expanding until it had the three-sidedness of a work of sculpture, then taking on reality, becoming woolen fiber covering firm high breasts.
He had seen the red hair then, long, lapped by the nervous fingers of the wind, enveloping her head like a blazing funeral pyre. He had stood in the alleyway across the street and watched her as she pranced by, cursing his station, wishing he had posted himself on the other side of the street instead. She carried a black patent-leather sling bag over her shoulder, the strap loose, the bag knocking against her left hipbone as she walked. The bag looked heavy.
He knew that looks could be deceiving, that many women carried all sorts of junk in their purses, but he smelled money in this one. She was either a whore drumming up trade or a society bitch out for a late evening stroll — it was sometimes difficult to tell them apart. Whichever she was, the purse promised money, and money was what he needed pretty badly right now.
The newspapers shrieking about Jeannie Paige, Jesus!
They had driven him clear off the streets. But how long can a murder remain hot? And doesn’t a man have to eat?
He watched the redhead swing past, and then he ducked into the alleyway, quickly calculating a route which would intersect her apparent course.
There are three lampposts on each block, Eileen thought.
It takes approximately one and one-half minutes to cover the distance between lampposts. Four and a half minutes a block. That’s plain arithmetic.
Nor is that exceptionally fast. If Willis thinks that’s fast, he should meet my brother. My brother is the type of person who rushes through everything — breakfast, dinner…
Hold it now!
She was reaching for the .38 in her purse when the strap left her shoulder. She felt the secure weight of the purse leaving her hipbone, and then the bag was gone. And just as she planted her feet to throw the intruder over her shoulder, he spun her around and slammed her against the wall of the building.
“I’m not playing around,” he said in a low, menacing voice, and she realized instantly that he wasn’t. The collision with the wall of the building had knocked the breath out of her. She watched his face, dimly lighted in the alleyway. He was not wearing sunglasses, but she could not determine the color of his eyes. He was wearing a hat, too, and she cursed the hat because it hid his hair.
His fist lashed out suddenly, exploding just beneath her left eye. She had heard about purple and yellow globes of light which followed a punch in the eye, but she had never experienced them until this moment. She tried to move away from the wall, momentarily blinded, but he shoved her back viciously.