"To go piss up a stick."
"Give her Penta instead. She'll love you for it."
"I can do without that. Who is she, anyway?"
Pat got up and poured himself a cup of coffee. He dropped in a couple of Sweet 'n' Lows, sipped it and said, "Somebody the DA has been keeping under wraps. She was the tactician on the two major cases that jumped him into the office last year. Suddenly she wants into field work and you drew her, buddy."
"Great."
"Don't try screwing with her brain. She's a real whiz kid."
"Not if she tried pulling a stupid bluff on me. Who the hell does she think I am, some kid with a new ticket?"
"Believe me," Pat said, she's got something going for her. I'd cover my ass if I were you."
The big clock on the wall read ten twenty-five and I reset my watch. I told Pat I had some things to do and would call in later. He damn well knew what I had in mind and just said so long.
Weekends are the odd times when the regular shift of office maintenance personnel is off and the occasional help comes on. Some are the steadies picking up a few extra bucks, a few are retirees bolstering their pensions and Social Security, and most of them I knew over the years. They were on yesterday and they were on today. The guard in the lobby was an old-timer who let me know the cops had spoken to everyone on the job yesterday and from what he could find out, nobody had anything to offer. Saturday had been a quiet day and, as always, there had been strangers in the building, but that was common and nobody seemed to have stood out from the rest.
I went in the office and Nat Drutman, the building manager, gave me a typed list of the help. "You had some reporters looking for you earlier," he told me.
"Let them in?"
"Temptation almost got me. One guy offered me five bills for a couple of photos."
"What kept you back?"
"Man, the place was still wet from the cleaning. That carpet is going to have to come up."
"They still around?"
"As of an hour ago they were."
"I'll keep my eyes open."
"Why don't you check your office? Those guys'll do anything for a photo."
There were four on the list that could possibly have seen someone going to my office. Unfortunately, the first two hadn't seen anything and like they said, "We wouldn'a told dem cops nothing anyway, Mike. To you we'd say. To them, nuts."
It was the third name that came up with something curious. Her name was Maria Escalante. She changed the sand in the ashtrays at the elevator banks and she was new in the building. I found her dusting the blinds at the far end of the third floor and said, "Miss Escalante?"
She turned, saw me and stiffened. "I have a green card," she said almost defiantly. "I told the others, I have a green card." She reached under her sweater and pulled out a wallet, thumbing its contents. "Look," she told me. "I show it to you." Her Mexican accent was thick.
"That's all right, lady, I believe you."
She tightened up at that. "You are a policeman?"
I rarely ever did it, but I popped my own wallet open to my license. It looked pretty damn official. She shook her head. It wasn't enough.
"Let me see your pistola."
That she could understand. I wondered what part of Mexico she came from. I opened my coat and let her see the .45 in the speed rig on my left side.
"Si. I believe. My name is Maria Escalante and I live at . . ."
I waved her off. "I don't need that, Maria."
"I tell the other policemen I don't see nothing. They want to know about the trouble on the floor ocho . . . floor eight. I-"
"Maria . . ." I reached out and took her hand and she was shaking. "They scare you about your green card?"
Immediately her mouth tightened and she held back the tears. "One said . . . he could take it . . . that maybe it was no good . . ."
"Is it good?"
"Yes. After the amnesty I get it. I am legal now. I am going to be a US citizen."
"He couldn't take it. He was just trying to shake something out of you, understand?" After a moment she frowned, then bobbed her head. "Where were you yesterday?" I asked.
"From the bottom to floor number . . . five. I did the ashtrays. I ran the sweeper."
"Many people?"
"Some. Mostly it was a day off."
"You know them?"
She nodded again. "They come in, they leave, nobody stay after noontime. Maybe four people."
"Think about ten o'clock. You see anybody then?"
"Who you want me to see?"
I let go her hand. "Beats me. I wish I could answer that."
"One walker is all."
"What's a walker?"
"He comes up the stairs. He walks. The elevator is downstairs a long time, but he walks. He come to floor five and he keeps walking up."
"What time?"
"Just before my break. I go for coffee at ten."
I motioned with my hands, trying to draw some information out of her. "What was he like?"
All I got was a noncommittal shrug.
"Think."
She looked up at the ceiling a few seconds. "He was a big man. He wore a hat." I waited. She shook her head. There was nothing more to add.
"He see you?"
"I did not see his face so he did not see my face," she stated flatly.
"Very big?" I asked her. "Middle-size big?"
She shrugged again. "He wore a coat. Like for the rain."
Like he could put on after a kill to cover up any bloodstains.
"He carry anything?"
Another shrug.
"Did you mention any of this to the other policemen?"
A flash of fear touched her eyes again. "I . . . they made me afraid and I could not think to tell them. Do you think they will . . ."
"Forget it, Maria. You have nothing to worry about at all. Just be a good US citizen, okay?"
I got a little smile then. "Si, si, very okay," she said.
And now I had a walker. He was big. He wore a raincoat and a hat. There would be a thousand other guys just a few blocks away who could answer that description, but at least it was a start.
There was more that went with the description. He carried some kind of a billy club, but most likely a straight professional blackjack. He had a knife that was honed razor-sharp. It would have to be functional, small enough to carry discreetly, big enough to work efficiently. It could be single- or multi-bladed. I elected for a standard brand-name pocketknife with a four-inch main blade with a possible smaller one opposing. He could have a gun, but guys who prefer steel don't seem to use guns.
That took care of the weaponry.
His personal profile was pretty damn shaggy. He had no compunction about taking out a woman. He felt no revulsion about torturing a victim. He could kill with absolute ease and apparently took a great deal of satisfaction from a grotesque act of murder. He was a deliberate killer and seemed to be acting as an avenger of sorts.
Fear wasn't in his makeup either. He came at me knowing I could put a gun in my hand pretty quickly and would have used it just as fast, but it was his expertise against mine and he was counting on his own.
But he was a dumb son of a bitch because he killed the wrong guy. And if he wasn't so dumb he'd know that and come back to have another try at me. And this time I'd have a little avenging going for me too.
Somebody who was very good had gotten into my office. A pick had been used on the lock and the place had been thoroughly searched. The desk drawers had been pulled open, and only shut to get at the ones beneath. Both closet doors swung wide and the filing cabinets had the drawers completely removed and set on the floor. There was no ransacking, simply a fast search job for something big enough to be seen easily.