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"Call Johnny again," he said. "Tell him to get right over."

Harriet hesitated, and her eyes were on Byrnes' face, and Byrnes said, "He's very sick, Harriet. He's really very sick."

Harriet, with the wisdom of a wife and mother, knew that this was not what Byrnes wanted to say at all. She nodded and went to the telephone.

The lions were really kicking it up.

Maybe they're hungry, Carella thought. Maybe they'd like a nice fat detective for dinner. It's a pity I'm not a fat detective, but maybe they're not very choosy lions, maybe they'll settle for a lean detective.

I am certainly a lean detective.

I have been leaning against this stupid cage since 2:00 P.M., and waiting for a man named Gonzo whom I have never seen in my life. I have been leaning and leaning, and the lions are roaring inside the building, and it is now 4:37, and my good friend Gonzo or anything resembling my good friend Gonzo has still not appeared.

And even when he does appear, he may not be very important at all. Except for the fact that he's a pusher, and it's always nice to grab another pusher. But he may not be important in the Hernandez case, even though he seems to have inherited at least some of the boy's customers. God, the girl! God, the job somebody did on that poor girl! Was it because of her brother?

What, what?

What is it? What's behind such a fishy goddamn suicide? It looks like a suicide setup, but it's obviously not a suicide setup, and whoever killed that boy knew that, whoever killed that boy wanted us to know it was not a suicide! He wanted us to dig deeper, and he wanted us to come up with a homicide, but why? And whose fingerprints are on that syringe? Do they belong to this Gonzo character I'm now waiting for, a nice grubby pusher who hasn't got a record? Are they his prints and will we find out what this whole goddamn mess is about the minute we get him? And is he the one who slashed the girl to ribbons or was that something separate and apart, something that just happened to a prostitute, an occupational hazard, something not at all connected with the earlier death of her brother?

Will Gonzo know the answers?

And if you know the answers, Mr. Gonzo, or Gonzo Mr., because I don't know whether Gonzo is your first name or your last name, you certainly have kept yourself well hidden in this precinct, you certainly have operated on a small quiet scale, but if you know the answers where the hell are you now?

Have you been operating before this, Gonzo?

Or did you suddenly inherit a nice business the night you knocked off Aníbal Hernandez? Was that why you killed him?

But what kind of a business did the kid have, when you really examined it closely? Kling beat that whole neighborhood with his feet, and he scared up a handful of Hernandez' erstwhile customers. A mule, pure and simple, shoving only enough stuff to keep him in the junk himself. So is a business of such miniscule size a reason for murder? Do people kill for a handful of pennies?

Well, yes, people do kill for a handful of pennies sometimes.

But usually the pennies are in plain sight, and the pennies are the temptation. Hernandez' business was a non-tangible thing, and if he were killed for that business then why, why in Christ's holy name, had the killer gone out of his way to indicate homicide?

Because surely the killer must have known that death by overdose could have been suicide. Had he left the body where it lay, syringe on the cot next to it, chances are a suicide verdict would have been delivered. The coroner would have examined the boy and said yes, death by overdose, as he had in fact said. Aníbal Hernandez would have been chalked off as a careless junkie. But the killer had affixed that rope to the kid's neck, and the rope had been placed there after the boy was dead, and surely the killer knew this would draw suspicion, surely the killer knew that. He had wanted suspicion of homicide.

Why?

And where is Gonzo?

Carella took a bag of peanuts out of his pocket. He was wearing gray corduroy slacks, and a gray suede jacket. He wore, too, black loafers and bright red socks. The socks were a mistake. He realized that after he'd left the house. The socks stood out like lights on a Christmas tree, God, what was he going to get Teddy for Christmas? He had seen some nice lounging pajamas, but she'd murder him if he spent $25.00 for lounging pajamas. Still, they would look beautiful on her, everything looked beautiful on her, why shouldn't a man be allowed to spend $25.00 on the woman he loved? She had told him with her lips that his love was enough, that he himself was the biggest and best Christmas present she had ever received, and that anything in excess of $15.00 worth of merchandise would be the silliest sort of extravagance for a girl who already had the nicest gift in the world. She had told him this, and he had held her close, but damnit, those lounging pajamas were still very pretty, and he could visualize her wearing them, so what the devil was an additional $10.00 when you got right down to it? How many people threw away $10.00 every day of the week without giving it a second thought.

Carella popped a peanut into his mouth.

Where was Gonzo?

Probably doing Christmas shopping, Carella thought.

Do pushers have wives and mothers, too? Of course they do. And of course they exchange Christmas gifts and they go to baptisms and bar mitzvahs and weddings and funerals just like everybody else. So maybe Gonzo is doing his Christmas shopping, the idea isn't such a farfetched one at that. I wish I were doing my Christmas shopping right now instead of munching on stale peanuts in this bitter cold outside the lion house. Besides, I don't like working outside my own precinct. All right, that's an idiosyncrasy, and I'm a crazy cop, but there's no place like home, and this park belongs to two other precincts, none of which is the 87th, and I like the 87th, and that makes me a crazier cop, have another peanut, idiot.

Come on, Gonzo.

I'm dying to make your acquaintance, Gonzo. I've heard so much about you that I feel I actually know you, and really, hasn't our meeting been postponed for just an unbearably long time? Come on, Gonzo. I am beginning to resemble the brass monkeys, Gonzo. I'd like very much to go inside and look at the lions—how come they're so quiet now? Feeding time already—and toast myself by their cages rather than stand out here where even my red socks are turning blue from the cold. So how about it, Gonzo? Give a flatfoot a break, will you? Give a poor honest cop a dime for a cup of coffee, willya? Oh brother, would I love a hot cup of coffee right this minute, mmmmm.

I'll bet you're having a cup of coffee in some department-store restaurant right now, Gonzo. I'll bet you don't even know I'm here waiting for you.

Hell, I sure hope you don't know I'm waiting for you.

Carella cracked open another peanut and then glanced casually at a young boy who turned the corner of the lion house. The boy looked at Carella and then walked past. Carella seemingly ignored him, munching happily and idiotically on his peanuts. When the boy was gone, Carella moved to one of the benches and sat, waiting. He glanced at his watch. He cracked open another peanut. He glanced at his watch again.

In three minutes, the boy was back. He was no older than nineteen. He walked with a quick, birdlike tempo. He wore a sports jacket, the collar turned up against the cold, and a pair of shabby gray flannel slacks. His head was bare, and his blond hair danced in the wind. He looked at Carella again, and then went to stand near the outdoor cages of the lion house. Carella seemed interested only in cracking open and eating his peanuts. He barely gave the boy a glance, but the boy was never out of his sight.