“This is the address he gave me,” the young John Smith said. “Who areyou?”
“When did he give you the address?”
“We’ve been writing to each other. I was down in Guantanamo Bay on a shakedown cruise,” Smith said. His eyes narrowed. “You a cop or something?”
“That’s what I am.”
“I knew it. I can smell fuzz a mile away. Is the old man in some trouble?”
“When did you hear from him last?”
“I don’t know. Beginning of the month, I guess. What’s he done?”
“He hasn’t done anything.”
“Then what are you doing here?”
“Your father’s dead,” Hernandez said flatly.
Smith backed up against the wall as if Hernandez had hit him. He simply recoiled from Hernandez’s words, inching backward until he collided with the wall, and then he leaned against the wall, and he stared into the room, without seeing Hernandez, simply stared into the room blankly, and said, “How?”
“Murdered,” Hernandez said.
“Who?”
“We don’t know”
The room was silent.
“Who’d want to kill him?” Smith asked the silence.
“Maybe you can tell us,” Hernandez said. “What was his last letter about?”
“I don’t know. I don’t remember,” Smith said. He seemed dazed. He kept leaning against the wall, his head tilted back against the plaster, looking up at the ceiling.
“Try,” Hernandez said gently. He holstered the .38 and walked to the bar unit. He poured a stiff hooker of brandy and carried it to Smith. “Here. Drink this.”
“I don’t drink.”
“Take it.”
Smith took the glass, sniffed it, and tried to hand it back. Hernandez forced it to his mouth. Smith drank, almost gagging. He coughed and pushed the glass away from him.
“I’m all right,” he said.
“Sit down.”
“I’m all right.”
“Sit down!”
Smith nodded and went to one of the modern easy chairs, sinking into it. He stretched out his long legs. He did not look at Hernandez. He kept studying the tips of his highly polished shoes.
“The letter,” Hernandez said. “What did it say?”
“I don’t know. It was a long time ago.”
“Did he mention a girl named Lotte Constantine?”
“No. Who’s she?”
“Did he mention anyone called the deaf man?”
“No.” Smith looked up. “Thewhat?”
“Never mind. Whatdid he say in the letter?”
“I don’t know. I think he started off by thanking me for the shoes. Yeah, that’s right.”
“What shoes?”
“I got a pair of shoes for him from ship’s service. I’m on a destroyer, we were just commissioned last month up in Boston. So my father sent me his shoe size and I picked up a pair for him in the ship’s store. They’re good shoes, and I get them for something like nine bucks, he couldn’t come anywhere near that price on the outside.” Smith paused. “There’s nothing dishonest about that.”
“Nobody said there was.”
“Well, there ain’t. I paid money for the shoes. It ain’t as if I was cheating the government. Besides, it’s all one and the same. Before he got this job, his only income came from the government, anyway. So it’s six of one and half a dozen of—”
“What job?” Hernandez asked quickly.
“Huh? Oh, I don’t know. In his last letter, he was telling me about some job he got.”
“What kind of job?”
“As a night watchman.”
Hernandez leaned closer to Smith. “Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“Didn’t he say where?”
“No.”
“Hemust have said where!”
“He didn’t. He said he was working as a night watchman, but that the job would be finished on May first, and after that he could afford to retire. That’s all he said.”
“What did he mean?”
“I don’t know. My father always had big ideas.” Smith paused. “None of them ever paid off.”
“Afford to retire,” Hernandez said, almost to himself. “On what? On a night watchman’s salary?”
“He only just got the job,” Smith said. “He couldn’t have meant that. It was probably something else. One of his get-rich-quick schemes.”
“But he said he’d only be working until May first, is that right?”
“Yeah.”
“He didn’t give the name of the firm? He didn’t say where he was working?”
“No, I told you.” Smith paused. “Why’d anyone want to kill him? He never hurt a soul in his life.”
And suddenly he began weeping.
THE COSTUME RENTAL SHOPwas in downtown Isola on Detavoner Avenue. There were three dummies in the front window. One was dressed as a clown, another was dressed as a pirate, and the third and last was dressed as a World War I pilot. The window was grimy, and the dummies were dusty, and the costumes looked moth-eaten. The inside of the shop looked grimy, dusty, and moth-eaten, too. The owner of the shop was a jovial man named Douglas McDouglas who’d once wanted to be an actor and who had settled for the next best thing to it. Now, rather than creating fantasies on stage, he helped others to create fantasies by renting the costumes they needed for amateur plays, masquerade parties and the like. He was no competition for the bigger, theater rental shops nor did he wish to be. He was simply a man who was happy doing the kind of work he did.
The deaf man entered the shop, and Douglas McDouglas recognized him at once.
“Hello there, Mr. Smith,” he said. “How’s every little thing?”
“Just fine,” the deaf man answered. “And how are things with you?”
“Couldn’t be better,” McDouglas answered, and he burst into contagious laughter. He was a fat man, and the layers of flesh under his vest rippled when he laughed. He put his hands on his belly as if to control the pulsating flesh, and said. “Are you here for the costumes?”
“I am,” the deaf man said.
“They’re ready,” McDouglas said. “Nice and clean. Just got them back from the cleaners day before yesterday. What kind of a play is this one, Mr. Smith?”
“It’s not a play,” the deaf man said. “It’s a movie.”
“With ice-cream men in it, huh?”
“Yes.”
“And night watchmen, too huh?”
“What do you mean?”
“The two night watchmen uniforms. The one you got ’way back, and the one you came in for near the beginning of the month. Ain’t they for the movie, too?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” the deaf man said.
“Will you be returning them all together?”
“Yes,” he lied. He had no intention of returning any of the costumes.
“What’s the movie called?” McDouglas asked.
The deaf man smiled. “The Great Bank Robbery,” he answered.
McDouglas burst into laughter again. “A comedy?”
“More like a tragedy,” the deaf man said.
“You filming it here in Isola?”
“Yes.”
“Soon?”
“We start shooting tomorrow.”
“Sounds exciting.”
“I think it will be. Would you get me the costumes, please? I don’t want to rush you, but…”
“Sure thing,” McDouglas said, and he went into the back of the shop.
The Great Bank Robbery, the deaf man thought, and he grinned. I wonder what you would say, fat boy, if you really knew. I wonder what you will think when you hear the news over your radio. Will you feel like an accessory before the fact? And will you rush to the police with a description of “John Smith,” the man who rented these costumes? But then, John Smith is dead, isn’t he?
And you don’t know that, Mr. McDouglas, do you?
You don’t know that John Smith, garrulous old John Smith, was shot to death while wearing a costume hired from this very shop, now do you? Garrulous old John Smith who, we discovered, was dropping just a few hints too many about what is going to take place tomorrow. A dangerous man to have about, that John Smith. And he remained talkative even after we’d warned him, and so Goodbye, Mr. Smith, it was lovely having you in our friendly little group, but speech is silver, Mr. Smith, and silence, ahhh, silence is golden, and so we commit you to eternal silence, BAM!