“He got shot from this platform, Mr. Quentin,” Meyer said. “For all we know, you could have done it.”
“Haha,” Quentin said.
“Why not?”
“Why not? Because I can’t even read what your shield says from a distance of three feet. How the hell could I shoot a man who’s all the way down in the street?”
“You could have used a telescopic sight, Mr. Quentin.”
“Sure. I could also be governor of the state.”
“Did you see anyone come onto the platform carrying a rifle?”
“Look,” Quentin said, “maybe you don’t understand me. I don’t see too good, you get that? I am the most cockeyed guy you’ll ever meet in your life.”
“Then why aren’t you wearing glasses?” Carella asked.
“What, and spoil my looks?” Quentin said seriously.
“How do you know how much money a person is giving you?” Meyer asked.
“I hold the bill up to my face.”
“So, let’s get this straight, all right? Even if somebody had come up here with a rifle, you wouldn’t have seen what he was carrying. Is that what you’re saying?”
“I thought I said it pretty plain,” Quentin said. “What do you mean, Alcatraz? How’s that named after me?”
“You work on it, Mr. Quentin,” Meyer said. “Have you got a train schedule here?”
“The company don’t issue schedules. You know that.”
“I know the company doesn’t, but isn’t there one issued to employees? Don’t you know when the trains come in and out of this platform?”
“Sure I know.”
“Do you think you might be willing to tell us?”
“Sure.”
“When, Mr. Quentin? We’re sort of anxious to get back to the party.”
“What party?”
“The one we’re out on the scavenger hunt from.”
“Haha,” Quentin said.
“So how about it?”
“You want to know every train that comes in and out of here?”
“No. We only want to know the trains that come in and out on the uptown side at about twelve noon. That’s what we’d like to know. Do you think you can supply us with the information?”
“I think so,” Quentin said. “Alcatraz, huh? Where’s that?”
“In the water off San Francisco.”
“They made a picture of that once, didn’t they?”
“That’s right.”
“What’d they do? Use my name in the picture?”
“Why don’t you write to the movie company?” Carella suggested.
“I will. Who made the picture?”
“It was an M-G-M musical,” Meyer said.
“Haha,” Quentin said. “Come on, who made the picture?”
“A couple of convicts,” Carella said. “It was part of the prison therapy program.”
“Can I sue a convict?”
“Nope.”
“Then what’s the use?”
“There’s no use. Just be grateful they named the joint after you, that’s all. And as a gesture of your gratefulness, tell us about the trains, okay?”
“You’re just a bunch of wise guys,” Quentin said sourly. “I knew that the minute you came up to the booth.”
“The trains,” Meyer prompted.
“Okay, okay. Weekdays?”
“Weekdays.”
“Around noon?”
“Around noon.”
“There’s one gets in at eleven-fifty-seven, pulls out about thirty seconds later.”
“And the next one?”
“Gets in at twelve-oh-three.”
“And leaves?”
“Same thing. Thirty seconds or so. They only open the doors, let the people off and on, and shove right off. What do you think this is? A first-class coach to Istanbul? This is the elevated system.”
“How are your ears, Mr. Quentin?”
“My what?”
“Your ears. Did you hear a shot at about twelve noon on the day Mr. Palumbo was killed?”
“What day was that?”
“It was May first.”
“That’s only a date. What was the day? I only remember days by days.”
“It was a Tuesday.”
“A week ago?”
“A week ago tomorrow.”
“Nope, I didn’t hear no shot on a week ago tomorrow.”
“Thanks, Mr. Quentin,” Meyer said. “You have been extremely helpful.”
“You know those guys at Alcatraz?”
“We know a lot of guys at Alcatraz,” Carella said.
“Tell them to take my name off it, you hear?”
“We will,” Carella said.
“Damn right,” Quentin said.
In the street downstairs, Meyer said, “So?”
“I think our man used a silencer.”
“Me, too.”
“That’s a lot of help, isn’t it?”
“Oh, yes. Oh, my, yes, that’s a great deal of help.”
“This case is making me giddy, you know that?”
“You want some coffee?”
“No, spoil my appetite. I want to go see the elevator operator at Norden’s apartment building again, and then I want to talk to the woman who witnessed Forrest’s death again, and then…”
“Let’s send some of our little helpers.”
“I want to talk to them myself.”
“Why?”
“I don’t trust cops,” Carella said, grinning.
The young blonde who walked into the squadroom while Bert Kling was poring over the files was Cindy Forrest. She was carrying a black tote bag in one hand and a manila folder under her arm, and she was looking for Detective Steve Carella, ostensibly to give him the material in the folder. Cindy—by her own admission—was a nineteen-year-old girl who would be twenty in June and who had seen it all and heard it all, and also done a little. She thought Steve Carella was an attractive man in a glamour profession—listen, some girls have a thing for cops—and whereas she knew he was married and suspected he had four dozen kids, she nonetheless thought it might be sort of interesting to see him again, the marriage contract being a remote and barely understood cultural curiosity to most nineteen-year-olds going on twenty. She didn’t know what would happen with Carella when she saw him again, though she had constructed a rather elaborate fantasy in her own mind and knew exactly what she wished would happen. The fact that he was married didn’t disturb her at all, nor was she very troubled by the fact that he was almost twice her age. She saw in him a man with an appealing animal vitality, not too dumb for a cop, who had just possibly seen and heard even more than she had, and who had most certainly done more than she had, her own experience being limited to once in the back seat of an automobile and another time on a bed at a party in New Ashton. She could remember the names of both boys, but they were only boys, that was the thing, and Steve Carella seemed to her to be a man, which was another thing again and something she felt she ought to experience now, before she got married herself one day and tied down with kids.
She hadn’t consulted Carella on the possibility as yet, but she felt this was only a minor detail. She was extremely secure in her own good looks and in an undeniable asset called youth. She was certain that once Carella understood her intentions, he would be happy to oblige, and they would then enter into a madly delirious and delicious love affair that would end some months from now because, naturally, it could never be; but Carella would remember her forever, the nineteen-year-old going on twenty who had shared those tender moments of passion, who had enriched his life, who had rewarded him with her inquiring young mind and her youthful, responsive body.
Feeling like Héloise about to keep an assignation with Abelard, she walked into the squadroom expecting to find Carella—and instead found Bert Kling.
Kling was sitting at his own desk in a shaft of sunlight that came through the grilled window and settled on his blond head like a halo. He was suntanned and muscular, and he was wearing a white shirt open at the throat, and he was bent over the papers spread on his desk, the sun touching his hair, looking very healthy and handsome and young.