19 Purchase Street (32 page)

Whenever Darrow thought of the terms, the pit of him shuddered. Sometimes he woke up in the night with the consciousness of the consequences squatted on the top of his mind, poking at him, warning him to be more thorough, more exacting with everyone. He would lay there with his neck dampening the pillow and make a pledge to himself. It was the only way he could get back to sleep. Come morning, however, the anxiety would recede to a more reasonable level; not leave, but at least draw back into a crouch. Darrow would shave one more shave, appreciate himself in the mirror one more time and go down to breakfast at a Chippendale table that could seat eighteen.

Most breakfasts he sat alone at the end of the table, the polished length of it like a dark icy surface that the servants hurried around. When Hine's wife Lois ate with him, they would sit mid-table facing one another, and Darrow would enjoy letting his imagination have her fix him immodestly with her eyes, scrunch down and reach across underneath with her bare foot to play her toes at his crotch. Lois, more than anyone, had the power to ease his chronic apprehensions—she with her mix of wickedness and High Board blood. Once she had admired Darrow's hands, said the things he himself liked about them; it had instantly aroused him.

Lois was one reason why it was impossible for Darrow to be more tolerant of his nephew Hine. Another was his dependency that Hine had constructed, taking advantage of Darrow's laxity by making up for it himself—filling in, smoothing things over so that with him there, Number 19 ran like a veritable money machine. Darrow knew it was not loyalty that motivated Hine, and every so often when Darrow took stock of his position he thought he should do something about it. But then his second thought was to let things be. Hine's inroads wouldn't get him anywhere, would lead to nothing. Cunning he might be, but Darrow trusted what else he read in him. Hine did not have the starch it took to be a thief. Probably Hine's count of The Balance was within a thousand of being right on the money, Darrow thought. And that alone mattered.

Besides, Darrow held the ultimate edge.

Like the ten other men who headed such divisions or installations for the High Board, Darrow had absolute authority over those under him. Could not be gotten around. Along with that, he had access to the faction of Intelco that dealt particularly with punishments. So Darrow was able to wield the same sort of final, irresistible power over his people that the High Board held over him.

Darrow was certain he caused Hine to come awake nights. Sometimes he purposely sounded disgusted with Hine just to intimidate him.

When someone committed a wrong, Darrow did not need to argue the case or even present it. All he had to do was put in a call to Hunsicker at Intelco, ask him to drop around.

Hunsicker came to take the order but not to discuss it. It was the way the High Board wanted things handled.

An order from Darrow was as brief as any Hunsicker ever got. In the course of their sit-down Darrow would maneuver to a pause in which his eyes would harden and convey that the next words heard from him would be the order—the name.

This time was a bit different. Darrow was not altogether sure how he should deal with it. It involved outsiders, and another touchy complication. There was no one but Hunsicker that he could talk to about it, yet he didn't want to come right out and ask Hunsicker's advice. He placed his sweating cold glass against his sweating hot cheek. “It could all be coincidental.”

“We doubt that,” Hunsicker said.

“Your people must have bungled the order somehow, otherwise I wouldn't have to be bothered with any of this.”

“They weren't my people.”

“All right then, your people's people.”

“The middlemen.”

“Has such a thing ever happened before?”

“Not exactly.”

The moment was underscored by the pock-ta-pock of Hine and Sweet playing tennis on the court down from the terrace. Darrow had observed snatches of the match and noticed Hine wasn't up to his usual superior game. He believed he knew why. Hine was well aware of who Hunsicker was.

Now Darrow told Hunsicker: “Run it down again for me.”

“I'm not supposed to.”

“As a favor.”

“You know, Darrow, it doesn't matter to us how it's resolved or whether it is or not. The loss to us isn't all that great. The world is full of middlemen. It's entirely up to you. It's on your account.”

“Mine,” Darrow agreed.

“I would think you'd take into consideration the three million.”

“You're convinced he got it?”

“I have no opinion.”

“Your people believe he did.”

“They lean toward that.”

“The middlemen probably had a better chance at it.”

“They're gone. The point is, do you want to clean the rest of it up or what?”

Darrow wished Hunsicker would stop coming right at him for a decision. “A three million loss won't kill me,” he said.

Hunsicker nodded.

Darrow didn't know which way to take that. “The woman is the hitch.”

“She is.”

“If it were only him, if she weren't involved, I wouldn't hesitate.”

“I believe that.”

“Thank you.”

Darrow glanced to the tennis court again. Hine was looking up to the terrace. Darrow casually gestured as though he was pointing out Hine. Hine stood stock-still for a long moment, then turned and slammed a ball over the tall tennis court fence. It landed in the rose garden that occupied most of the area between that fence and the perimeter wall. Darrow had the delightfully gruesome thought of Hine trying to retrieve the ball at two in the morning. “I've decided,” he told Hunsicker, “if I order anything the woman won't be included.”

“All right, not her.”

“But she'll still be affected. Damn it!” Darrow was back to his ambivalence.

“What kind of plant is that?” Hunsicker asked.

“Which one?”

“The blue lacy one in the urn over there.”

“Lobelia.”

“Eleanor put some in this spring and they didn't do well, dried up.”

“It doesn't like sun.”

Hunsicker moved his chair a bit to his right, his left shoulder and arm had been out of the moving shade. He sipped from his cup of coffee now long gone cold. “When you order him, you more or less order her as well, don't you?”

“I gather that's how it is from what you've told me,” Darrow said.

“I'm only repeating.”

“Couldn't she be talked to?”

“Possibly.”

“After the fact.”

“But is that what you want, Darrow, for it to get up into that level?”

“No, definitely not.”

“The three million lost could become an issue.”

They wouldn't treat me that way, not me, Darrow thought, never.

“She was your carrier, and your order,” Hunsicker reminded him with a trace of satisfaction.

A conceding grunt from Darrow. He flexed the fingers of his right hand, studied the backs of them. A tiny shred of cuticle flawed the moon of his thumbnail. He wouldn't think of biting it off. Later, with the help of a magnifying glass, he would very carefully clip it. He glanced over at Hunsicker, imagined him at his granddaughter's debut, white-tied and -tailed, hiding all that sick-looking skin, imagined Hunsicker's Eleanor, pigeon-chested, a garden club type. He closed his eyes slowly, as though lowering a curtain on Hunsicker. He wished the problem could be made to disappear that easily. Keeping his eyes closed, he turned his head, opened his eyes abruptly. His view was on Hine, whose tennis game was still suffering from the distraction of Hunsicker's presence.

As soon as he'd given his decision to Hunsicker, Darrow thought, he'd go to Boston. That very afternoon, if they'd see him on such short notice. It had been six months since his last request. Perhaps they would respond to a different tack, a smattering of humility and lesser expectations. No gripes about how much he disliked being there on the shady underside, or why he deserved better. He would sit and balance on his knee a bone china tea cup on a napkin and convince them that he was owed. He would recommend Hine as his successor, praise Hine to the high heavens. They might go for it, Darrow thought. If not, the next best thing that might come of it would be his retirement, with a substantial financial pat on the back. From where he was sitting at the moment, that didn't seem so bad.

Yes. Boston. While he was there he'd spend another time with that special friend, the little black one who never made him feel she would ridicule him. Never made him feel ridiculous.

“Well, what shall it be?” Hunsicker was asking.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

G
AINER
had been back in New York City for two weeks.

It seemed to him there should be several urgent things for him to do, but then nothing seemed important. He still had the feeling that he was off-register with his surroundings, and now being in the city where everything was more familiar only increased that feeling. For example, a mere taxi ride had an element of illusion to it, and the view of the city skyline from his Roosevelt Island apartment was like a cardboard cutout mounted under glass, not something he could go over to and fit into. Fortunately this sense of detachment was not as constant as it had been, which made him believe it would eventually leave altogether. Sometimes it was there, other times it wasn't. The only time it left for long was when he was making love with Leslie.

She was wonderful. There for him, understanding him, as though she had some special emotional gauge she could read. Such as the way she reacted to the plants in his apartment. They had died. All of them. Even the huge favorite fern that had appeared so vigorous. She did not mention that he should have arranged for someone to water them while he was away. Nor did she immediately set about to get the plants out of sight. She left them where and as they were until he thought they were beyond hope and was about to say so. At that moment she picked one up and headed for the incinerator chute. Gainer was only faintly aware that perhaps the plants had died more from a sympathetic act than from lack of water.

He was careful not to brood too much in her presence. When he felt a bad one coming on, he got away from her. No matter what the hour …

“Going out?”

“Yeah.”

“If you happen to be near that all-night stand on Fifty-third get some seedless grapes?”

From her it was never
where
.

Gainer walked alone a lot. It seemed to relieve the tightening in him when he was on the move. He hadn't gotten much out of his system with the killing of Becque and Ponsard. It put some on his side of the scale but nowhere near a balance. Strange about those two, Becque and Ponsard. As together as they'd been, it was impossible to accept them as a pair, Gainer thought. They couldn't have been buddies, graveyard keeper and art expert bullshitter. The only things they had in common had been their guns. And Norma.

And, of course, their motive.

What had brought them to it? Gainer was convinced it was something more than just sexual. Men who raped together usually had a lot in common. The sure giveaway, though, was the coke and the ludes. Definitely not Norma.

Her carry. The millions she took over the last time.

That could have been the connection between Becque and Ponsard, what they were really after together. Perhaps they got it and then set up all the sex and drug evidence to throw everyone off. Including the people Norma worked for. Make it appear to them that she was the blame, her irresponsibility, hoping not to have to contend with them, especially not them, the ones she worked for.

Mostly, Gainer accepted that scenario.

But not entirely.

It walked with him, as though asking to be kicked full of holes, and, after a while, when he knew he could never entirely accept it, another explanation took shape for him, one that fit the irregularities and circumstances of Norma's death in so many ways it had to be the truth. It wasn't a revelation. Rather, step by step it eased forward in Gainer's mind, as though it had been there all the while and he hadn't wanted it out: what Becque and Ponsard had done was their
job
. They had hit Norma, not just murdered her. Had done it for some reason, for someone. Surely the people she was carrying for had everything to do with it. But who exactly? Who immediately came to mind was that man Darrow. Maybe he was the one, Gainer thought, but more likely the word had been given by someone beyond and above Darrow, one of the upper-level mob guys Darrow fronted for. How the hell could he go up against one of those? But Darrow … he'd think on that … And he wanted to know
why
Norma had been killed. He remembered her as being so good he was nearly able to convince himself that they'd made a mistake, taken her for someone else.

Gainer tried to get back to routine. Went over to Pointwise, Inc. Business was good. The phones were ringing and a half a shoebox of money orders and certified checks had already come in. The start of the regular season was only a couple of Sundays off. It would be best to begin with a winner, demonstrate right off that he was worthy of confidence. All the better if his pick was an upset.

He sat in his office with his feet up and the air-conditioner unit blowing the back of his neck cold and paged through the recent issues of
Pro Football Weekly
, looking for some helpful information. He might as well have been reading the
Wall Street Journal
. Nothing. To him the Chargers were going to be as bad as the Cowboys were going to be as bad as the Saints. After an hour of that sort of reading but not seeing, he signed enough blank checks to take care of his payroll and went out to walk some more.

All the way down through Soho, all the way up along Madison, around the drives of the park to get away from exhausts, and even resenting the runners, skaters and bikers. He spent most of one afternoon at the Fifth and Forty-second Street library on a hard chair at one of the long hard tables in the main reading room. Just sat there watching the numbers on the call panel above the in-and-out counter light up like a literary bingo game, wondering what it was like now down in the stacks and who was down there, maybe with an Edna.