“What happened this afternoon?”
“I think Thornhill intends to carve up the department.”
“You told me that already. I thought he was just playing with the idea.”
“You can’t trust that son of a bitch for five minutes. He’s famous for turning the vaguest, the filmiest of ideas into boilerplate with no further discussion.”
“Maybe he’ll turn it back the other way round just as fast?”
“Dream on. He wants my guts for garters, and I can’t figure out how to keep what I have. It’s only this murder thing that might slow him down. He knows that everybody’s watching. I don’t think he wants a shake-up in Entertainment until I stop being the Victim of the Week.” She had argued around in a circle. I was about to point that out when I noticed it had a mild calming influence. So I left it alone. “You were going to tell me about Barbara Turnbull, from the Star.”
“I just ran into her.”
“Don’t tell her a thing about me or about the department. You can’t trust newspaper people.”
“I haven’t lost my grip yet.” I didn’t bother telling her of the incident in the lobby of the Hilton, or that my relationship with reporter Turnbull did not involve Vanessa or NTC. She might not know how to take it.
Vanessa leaned back against the eggshell white of the wall, flattening her body, trying to make a smaller target. When the wall failed to enclose her, she shifted her weight and came over to the couch where I was sitting. She moved slowly, giving me a sense of her perfume, and sat next to me. I wondered where George, the car jockey and computer animator, was at this time of night. When she started to get close, I let her. Anything to calm her down. It’s funny, I mean, I’d always been attracted by Stella Seco, even though I’d put it on hold for a dozen years or so. Now that she was Vanessa and my employer, I thought of what she needed before consulting my own usually healthy appetite. I thought of Anna, off in Tuscany. I thought of all she meant to me. I thought of Tuscany and the peanut-grower from California. Mushrooms. What the hell?
She had allowed her dressing gown to fall open both at the neck and again lower down, so that there was a fair amount of Vanessa on display and in the most beguiling way. I decided that what she wanted was a hug. Where’s the disloyalty in that? It was the least I could do. We all need hugs from time to time. Especially when we’re scared. Possibly good-looking women don’t get their fair share. Men are easily discouraged in a face-to-face encounter with the object of their desires. A pretty face, in spite of a come-hither look in those beautiful eyes, often has the effect of forcing a strategic retreat on the timorous seducer. So, I didn’t get either flustered or my hopes up. It was, as I said on my way in, all part of the service. While I was still seeing myself in terms of the steadfast little sentry at the door, the hug developed into something more serious, and the brave sentry could hardly abandon his musket at a time like this. Besides, the steak for my eye was still thawing in the kitchen.
ELEVEN
Friday
Staff Sergeant Jack Sykes shook his head sadly. He fussed with paper on his desk.
“You’ve made some powerful asshole mad at you, Benny.”
“What are you talking about? I told you, I walked into a door. It can happen to anybody. You can hardly see it.”
“It’s not the eye I’m talking about, Benny. It’s your making free with the division offices and your fraternization with two of its finest officers.”
“Somebody’s been on the blower, Benny,” Boyd added, just to make me feel good, “and he or she’s been complaining.”
“For crying out loud, I don’t even know anybody in Toronto. I’ve only been here since Wednesday.” Now he was nodding, agreeing with me, as though that made a difference.
“I know. I know. But I have my orders. I’m sorry, but I can’t have you dropping in here any more.”
“What do you mean?” I was leaning over Jack’s desk, trying to keep my eyes off the word FRAUD, written on the open edge of the Toronto phone book. The last one said VICE. He just couldn’t help swiping things. He was also busy trying not to look me straight in the eye. Jim Boyd was sitting off to one side, attempting to look neutral, still wearing that silly summer hat. He, too, was not big on eye contact.
“I shouldn’t even be seen talking to you. That’s how bad it is. The way I see it is that somebody in NTC has raised a stink about you being so close to the investigation, and you working for one of the leading suspects in the case. You haven’t been passing out your professional cards down there, have you?”
“Vanessa Moss is the only person who knows. Except-”
“Except for all the part-time snoops that run around like laboratory mice from office to office, telling tales out of school. One of them thinks he can pick up the phone and complain. I don’t like getting pressure from College Street, which just happens to be the source of most of my headaches, but in this case, I have to agree the Chief’s got a point.”
“The Chief!”
“Yeah. For a snoop from Grantham you’ve been making big waves.”
“So, let me get this straight: we’re no longer cooperating? Is that it?”
“That’s right.”
“Wait a minute! When were we co-operating anyway? I paid a courtesy call. That’s all.”
“I’m not going to argue with you, Benny. I’ve heard the word from on high. When does a plain cop get to be so independent he can ignore a straight order?”
“You’re not going to tell me about those 222s, are you? And I’ll never hear about the combination lock on Vanessa’s locker either.”
“Of course not. That would be a direct contravention of my orders. What do you think, Jim?”
“Oh, yeah. The order says all contact must stop at once. No more free lunch, Benny.” Jim was trying to free a piece of his breakfast, lodged between molars, with the corner of an official-looking piece of bond paper. Then he looked over at his partner. “Jack, my mind’s going soft. What was it Art Dempsey said about those pills? Refresh my failing memory.”
“How many times …? Jeez! Twenty-five of the thirtyeight pills were a powerful anti-depressant. Among its listed side effects are drowsiness. You wanna stay away from machinery, especially cars, unless you’re riding in the back seat. Take some of that and you don’t want to be behind the wheel of a Range Rover. Not even in Grantham. You want to know the name? Desyrel. One hundred milligrams. Little devils look like 222s if you don’t look close.”
“Well, thanks at least for that.”
“For what? I wasn’t even talking to you.”
“Right. And thanks for … for … giving me street directions to the YMCA.”
“Okay, always happy to help out the tourist trade, but that’s the end of it.”
“Have you checked out that lock yet?”
“Get out of here! What’s with you and that goddamned lock, Benny? I swear to God I think you think the killer’s hiding inside the lock like a-a-troll.”
“Imp?” I suggested.
“Sprite?” Boyd said. Both were better than troll.
“Will you get out of here? Until I see how this bounces, Benny, I gotta watch my ass. In the meantime, don’t walk into any doors on your way out.”
“Sure. See you fellows around,” I said lamely, and backed away from the desk and out the open door. Slowly-because I didn’t want to outrun them-I walked down the echoing corridor and out into the marble halls of the lobby or whatever they call it. The desk sergeant looked at me, and I read into his expression that he too had been instructed to give no help. I thought of asking him for directions to the art gallery next door, but I felt too bad to be playful. The Yellow Brick Road to Paranoia was stretched out before me. I knew I had to get a grip on myself. I felt like the fat man in Shakespeare, the one who gets shafted by the young king. Falstaff! I thought, Yeah, Jack will call me tonight. He’s only going through the motions. That wasn’t Jack Sykes talking. That’s why the door was open, in case someone was listening.