"Maybe," Carella said.
"Meyer?" Byrnes asked.
"Only if they were trying to shut Danny up."
"You sure they weren't after Steve?"
"No, it was Danny," Kling said.
"Neither of them even fired a shot at me."
"Ten, twelve people saw them go straight for Danny," Brown said.
"They'd seen a lot of movies."
"Kept describing it as a gangland execution."
"In broad daylight?" Hawes asked, and shook his head
skeptically. He was sitting in sunlight. It caught his red
hair, setting it on fire. The single white streak over his
left temple looked like a patch of melting snow.
"Nobody says your goons are brain surgeons."
"Black and white, huh?"
"And red all over."
"Could've been an old beef," Hawes suggested. "Finally caught up with him."
"Be a coincidence, the day he's meeting with Steve. But I buy coincidence," Byrnes said. "I've been a cop long enough."
"Coulda been they wanted him before he told Steve whatever it was he had to tell him," Brown said. He was straddling a wooden chair near the bookcases, a huge man with skin the color of a giant grizzly's coat. His shirt collar was open, and he was wearing over it a green sweater. His arms were resting on the chair's top rail.
"Did
he tell you anything?" Kling asked. "Before they
got him?"
"Not really. He wanted to get paid first."
"Gee, there's a surprise."
"How much was he looking for?" Hawes asked.
"Five grand."
Hawes whistled.
"What'd he promise?" Willis asked, giving in at last to his curiosity. He was the shortest man on the squad, wiry and intense, dark eyes reflecting the day's cold light. Parker turned to him with a sharp look, as if his best friend in the entire world had suddenly moved to Anniston, Alabama, to wallow in pig shit.
"He said he knew the name and address of the guy who did Hale," Carella said.
"Where'd he get thatT Willis asked, totally involved now. Parker stepped a little bit away from him.
"Pal of his was in a poker game with the hitter."
"Let me get this straight," Hawes said. "Danny was in a poker game with the hitter?"
"No, no," Meyer said. "A. friend of Danny's was in the game."
"With the guy who hung Hale from the bathroom door?"
"Hanged him, yeah."
"Yeah, him?"
"The very."
"What is this, a movie?" Willis asked.
"I wish," Carella said.
"Fda paid him on the spot," Parker said suddenly, and then realized with a start that he'd broken his own sullen silence. Everyone turned to him, surprised by the vehemence in his voice, surprised, too, that he'd bothered to shave this morning. "That kind of information," he said, plunging ahead, "Fda asked him to wait while I went to rob a bank."
"I should've," Carella said.
"Who's this pal of his?" Kling asked. He was wearing
this morning a brown leather jacket that looked like it
had come from Oklahoma or Wyoming, but which he'd
bought off a pushcart at a street fair this summer. Blond
and hazel-eyed, with a complexion and lashes most women would kill for, he projected a country bumpkin air that worked well in Good Cop/Bad Cop scenarios. He was particularly well-paired with Brown, whose perpetual scowl could sometimes be intimidating. "Did Danny give you a clue?"
"Somebody named Harpo."
"It is a movie," Willis said.
"Harpo what?"
"Didn't say."
"He's gay," Meyer offered.
"White, black?"
"Didn't say."
"Where'd the card game take place?"
"Lewiston Av."
"The Eight-Eight."
"Yeah."
"Probably black," Parker said. "The Eight-Eight."
Brown looked at him.
"What?" Parker said. "Did I say something bothered
you?"
"I don't know what you said."
"I said a card game in the Eight-Eight, you automati
cally figure black players," Parker said, and shrugged. "Anyway, fuck you, you're so sensitive."
"What'd I do, look at you?" Brown asked.
"You looked at me cockeyed."
"Break it up, okay?" Byrnes said.
"Just don't be so fuckin sensitive," Parker said. "Everybody in the world ain't out to shoot you a hundred and twelve times."
"Hey!" Byrnes said. "Did you hear me, or what?"
"I heard you. He's too fuckin sensitive."
"One more time, Andy," Brown said.
"Hey!"
Byrnes shouted.
"All I'm sayin," Parker said, "is if this was a black card game, then Danny's friend Harpo, and the guy who hanged Hale, could both be black, is all I'm sayin."
"Point taken," Brown said.
"Boy," Parker said, and rolled his eyes.
"We finished here?" Byrnes asked.
"If we're finished," Parker said, "I'd like to talk about
settin up a bust on a . . ."
"I meant are you two finished with this bullshit here?"
"What bullshit?" Parker asked.
"Let it go, Pete," Brown said.
Byrnes glared at both of them. The room was silent for several moments. Hawes cleared his throat.
"It's possible, you know," he said, "that one of the two
shooters in the pizzeria was the guy who also did Hale."
"How do you mean?"
"He finds out Harpo told Danny about him, figures he'll take Danny off the board before he spreads the word. That's possible, too, you know."
"A hangman suddenly becomes a shooter?" Parker
said.
"It's possible."
"There's a twenty-five grand policy, huh?" Willis said.
"Daughter and son-in-law the sole beneficiaries," Carella said.
"They know about it?"
"Oh yes."
"They're alibied to the hilt," Meyer said.
"So you're figuring a contract job."
"Is what Danny said it was. He said the killer got five
grand to do the old man."
"Were those his exact words?" Byrnes asked.
"No, he said the old man had something somebody
else wanted real bad and he wouldn't part with it. Some
thing worth a lot of money."
"What'd he say about having him killed?"
"He said somebody was willing to pay five grand to
kill the old man and make it look like an accident."
"But why?" Willis asked.
"What do you mean why?"
"You said the old man had something somebody else
wanted . . ."
"Right."
"So how's this somebody gonna get it if he has the
old man killed?"
The detectives fell silent, thinking this over.
"Had to be the insurance money," Hawes said at last.
"Only thing anyone could get by having him killed."
"Which leads right back to the daughter and son-in-law."
"Unless there's something else," Carella said.
"Like what?"
"Was the guy tortured?" Hawes asked.
"No."
"Cause maybe the killer was trying to get whatever
it was, and when he couldn't. . ."
"No, he wasn't tortured," Meyer said. "The killer doped him and hanged him. Period."
"Smoked some pot with him, dropped roofers in his
drink . . ."
"Which is what the guy in the card game offered Harpo."
"Did these two guys know each other?" Parker asked.
"They met in the card game."