The Shadow Man (39 page)

Simon Winter realized that was a chance he’d take.

The patio door would crash back, making a racket, but he could cross the kitchen space in a single stride, heading directly for his weapon. At least this small element of surprise would be his, he thought. Then he corrected himself: unless he was watching, and he saw your hesitation in the courtyard.

What then?

He didn’t want to think of this. He reached out slowly and just touched the sliding door. A residual part of him thought: This is all crazy - you are alone. But the door moved. He pulled on it as quietly as he could, and it slid an inch, just past the lock, which rattled slightly, as the door traveled on its runners. He realized in a second that the lock had been broken, and then he rose and threw

the door back, slamming it hard. In the same motion, he vaulted through the kitchen, heading for the bedside table and the gun he hoped was there.

From the living room, a darkness to his left, there was an explosion of sound, a smashing noise of alarm that he ignored as he soared toward his weapon. He reached out through the blackness of the apartment for the bedside table. His hand found the knob and he jerked it open, hearing the gun within the drawer thud against the wooden frame. He thought himself fumbling, hurrying, wrapping his hand around the familiar shape. He slipped as he spun around, facing the nighttime that had chased him into the room, sliding down to a sitting position on the floor. He brought the gun up to his eyes, two hands on the weapon, into a shooting position, his ears listening for the hurried sounds of attack.

There were none.

His breathing filled the room, a cacophony of tension.

In his haste he had knocked the reading lamp to the floor, sending the shade skittering across the room. He found the lamp with his foot, then slowly he reached over and switched it on.

The room flooded with light.

Like a sailor raising a beacon against a storm, he lifted the lamp up as he slowly climbed to his feet. He could see his own shadow streaking away from him, toward the living room. He set the lamp down, and stepped forward gingerly, searching for the wall switches as he moved. He could see a thin shaft of light coming from the living room. He continued forward, keeping the wall at his back, the pistol raised in firing position, hammer cocked. He moved slowly and deliberately around the corner, ready to formulate the command to freeze, halt, whatever, his own training coming back after lying dormant for so long.

But he quickly saw that he wouldn’t need the word.

Simon Winter breathed out slowly, staring at the sliver of light from the apartment vestibule. The front door was cracked open about six inches.

He moved forward, ready to pursue the man across the night, then stopped himself, recognizing he would already be gone.

He let air whistle between his teeth.

So, he spoke inwardly, you were waiting right where I thought.

He shook his head. But I didn’t think you’d be that smart. Or be able to move that quickly. You heard the noise behind you, and instead of letting it cripple you with surprise, you acted instantly, and you saved yourself.

This impressed the old detective. Not many people can function with an animal’s cunning or instinctive sense of preservation, knowing to flee at the first sound that is unexpected. People are generally more clumsy and hesitant.

But not the Shadow Man.

So, he thought, now you are already away, racing ahead. And you are more than a little concerned, aren’t you, because now you know I’m not like Sophie or the others. I’m a little closer to you, aren’t I? And that probably will keep you awake tonight, but it will also make you more careful the next time. And it will make you decide that maybe the next victim should be someone a little easier, correct? But you will be worried too, perhaps for the first time in how many years? Truly worried, because you will know that I know something about you, and that frightens you more than anything, doesn’t it? But you will reassure yourself, because you know that you’re still hidden, that I do not know your name or your face. Your anonymity is intact, and that will help you finally fall asleep, feeling

your safety is secure. What you don’t know is that soon I’m going to take that away from you too.

Simon Winter nodded, almost congratulatory. I’m beginning to know you, he said to himself. But the sensation of satisfaction was short-lived, because he realized now that the Shadow Man knew just as much about him, as well.

There were several messages waiting for Walter Robinson when he returned to his desk in the homicide offices. He flipped through these rapidly. A few had to do with other open cases he had. There was one from a Mark Galin at the Miami Herald, but he didn’t know the reporter, although he had a vague recollection of reading his byline. It was late, however, and he knew the only message he would return was from Espy Martinez.

She sounded groggy when she picked up the telephone.

‘Espy? It’s Walter. Were you asleep?’ ‘No,’ she lied. ‘Well, maybe a little. Where are you?’ ‘In my office. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have awakened you.’

‘It’s okay.’ She was stretched out in her bed, like a cat awakening from a perch on a sun-strewn shelf. ‘I tried to reach you earlier. Where were you?’ ‘Out getting to know our Mr Winter. An interesting

guy’

‘Sharp?’

‘As sharp as they come. You should see his service record. Nothing but commendations and awards. I think we’ve got something worked out. What about you?’

“Jefferson gets his deal tomorrow morning. As short and

sweet as I can make it. Zip, zip, zip, so I don’t have to

spend too much time watching Tommy Alter pat himself

on the back for finally finding someone to represent who’s more important alive than wasting away on Death Row. Then, as soon as the plea is finished, you get him. Will you meet me there?’

Robinson hesitated. ‘Uh, yes. Sure.’

She sat up in the bed. ‘What is it?’

He smiled. ‘I guess my adrenaline is pumping away. You know, you get so used to working late at night that you forget other people aren’t quite so midnight-orientated. Maybe in my next life I should come back as a vampire. Or a werewolf, howling at the moon. Something who skulks around after dark. So, forget it. I’ll meet you there in the morning.’

‘Wasn’t there a horror movie about—’

‘Yeah. It was called Blacula. Dracula with an Afro. It set race relations back maybe a hundred years. Not one of Hollywood’s finest. I saw it when I was a kid. All the kids in my neighborhood thought it was pretty funny. So, anyway, go to sleep. I’ll see you at the hearing.’

‘No,’ Espy Martinez said softly. ‘You were going to say something. What was it?’

Walter Robinson hesitated once more, then shrugged. He told himself that tumbling off a cliff was easier if you just jumped. ‘Well,’ he said slowly, ‘I know it’s late, but I was sort of hoping I could drive you. In the morning, that is.’

He stopped, embarrassed. Then he quickly added: ‘Oh, look, forget it. We can get together tomorrow. Or this weekend. I can hold my libido in check until then. It’s late. Go back to sleep.’

Espy Martinez had sat up in her bed and, holding the telephone in one hand, was searching around the bed for a hairbrush with the other.

‘You can’t come here,’ she said. She pictured her

parents asleep or, more likely, trying to listen through the thin walls that separated the two duplexes. ‘Don’t ask why, because it’s complicated and all wrapped up not in who we are, but who we might seem to be.’

‘You lost me,’ Robinson replied.

‘No,’ she continued. ‘I’ll come to your place.’

He hesitated, caught between practicality and desire. ‘Maybe you shouldn’t. You’ll need to be fresh in the morning. On top of things.’

She laughed. ‘There’s a good dirty pun in that last statement.’

He grinned. ‘You know what I meant. Or at least what I thought I meant.’

‘Walter,’ she said slowly as she began sliding the brush through her hair, ‘I need to say something.’

‘Go ahead.’

‘We play by so many rules and regulations. That’s what

our jobs are: enforcing the rules. Policeman and

prosecutor. And in my family, there were always

expectations, which are precisely the same thing as rules.

The dutiful daughter filling in for the murdered son …’

She took a deep breath and continued: ‘So, maybe in a

little way, you, who you are, and me, being myself, well,

we’re a little outside all the accepteds and normals. And

so. if I want to come over there and be with you, I think

that’s a good thing, maybe because it’s not right and

reasonable. What’s reasonable is getting a good night’s

sleep. Well, maybe I don’t want what’s reasonable. Not

all the time. Not tonight. Maybe what I want is something

far different’

She stopped. ‘Jesus,’ she whistled slowly. ‘What a speech. I should save all that for the judge. Did I make any sense at all?’

He wanted to say: more than I could ever have hoped for.

But instead he answered: ‘I’ll be waiting for you. Please hurry.’

And so, she did.

Espy Martinez left Walter Robinson asleep in his bed. He had tossed and turned throughout the night, once calling out a name that she did not recognize before falling back into a deep, solid sleep. She slid gingerly from his side, dressing quietly in the thin morning light, then carrying her shoes until she reached the hallway outside his apartment. Leaving him like some cat burglar who’d robbed his night of passion, gave her a sense of accomplishment, made her feel unpredictable and perhaps a little mysterious, and she enjoyed this.

But by the time she reached the Justice Building downtown, she’d let these sensations slip away from her, replacing them with the tough edge that she suspected she’d need in that morning’s hearing. She parked her car and then paced swiftly through the lot, letting her heels click determinedly against the macadam, her stride purposeful and directed, giving her the appearance of someone who knew not only where she was going, but someone who wouldn’t tolerate any departures from her pre-established route. She nodded at other attorneys and court personnel heading into the building, still moving quickly; if not precisely eager to confront the morning’s task, at least prepared inwardly to accept it and move on.

The escalator deposited her in the center of the fourth floor, in the midst of a jam of people waiting outside the entranceways to the eight courtrooms located there. Occasionally a bailiff would emerge through one of the sallyport doors and call out a name in an exasperated voice. Clutches of people circled around various lawyers; defendants and their families with eager, worried expressions, cops in uniform, cops in plainclothes biding time, drinking coffee from plastic cups, waiting their turns. The hallway was a sea of people, all gathered for different cases, filled with fear, doubt, disgust, anger, a cacophony of emotions. She could hear laughter and sobs, often coming from competing groups. The lawyers in her office likened calendar calls to cattle roundups, complete with similar deep lowing noises. She could hear at least a half-dozen different languages being spoken loudly; Spanish, Haitian-French, Jamaican patois, tourist German, and many English variations, ranging from the deep-South drawl to New Yorkese. She pushed through the crowd of people until she found the right courtroom, then hesitated briefly before heading inside. As she paused, she heard a voice say:

‘There she is, there she is! I told you, I told you, we should go get seats.’

She turned and saw an elderly woman standing between two white-haired men. The men wore the basic Miami retiree outfit: Bermuda shorts, checked shirts, and porkpie hats. The woman had on a flower-print dress and a cardigan sweater with stripes. One of the men brandished a cane.

Buzzards, she thought instantly. She smiled in their direction. All courthouses attract a percentage of older people, who perch inside the courtrooms, following the various cases with the determination of soap-opera addicts. They come to know the jail and court personnel,

have opinions on the cases, review the performance of prosecutors and defense attorneys, critique the jurors’ decisions, cheer when bad guys are sentenced. Mostly, they were harmless, fixtures with an occasionally astute observation or two. More often than not, they fell asleep during the longer hearings, and sometimes their snoring had to be interrupted by a quick shake on the shoulder by an irate bailiff. Some had been hanging around the courthouse for years, long enough to see some defendants several times. Like their nickname, they arrived early, roosted on the sidelines, then disappeared at night. Espy Martinez had always tried to be friendly to them, call them by their first names when she knew them, which made her popular amidst a group seemingly oblivious to the brutish comments made by most of the younger, less experienced lawyers.

‘Hi, Espy,’ the woman said. ‘All the excitement’s for you, dear.’

‘What?’ she asked stupidly.

‘Why, your case was in the paper this morning,’ the woman continued. ‘Right on page one of the Local section. That’s what’s brought out the crowd.’

‘I’ve got it here,’ said one of the men. He put down his cane and began searching through a tattered newspaper. ‘See?’

He thrust the newspaper at her, and her eyes fell on the story, played across the middle of the page: accused man

CLEARED IN KILLING; PLEA SEEN IN COP-SHOOTING CASE.

‘Shit!’ The expletive burst from her lips.

‘Is there a problem, dear?’ the old woman asked.

She shook her head, but this was a lie. ‘Can I keep this?’ she asked.

The old man nodded his head, touching his index finger to his cap rim.

‘We’ve got to get in,’ the other old man said. ‘Otherwise all the good seats will be taken.’

‘Is it true, dear?’ the old woman asked. ‘The story says he’s going to help you on another case, that’s why he’s getting a deal. Is it right? I hate it when these awful men get deals. I wish you’d just put them in jail, Espy dear. Even if he is going to help, I still wish you’d make him go to prison, because I think he’s not a very nice man, is he? Not this man, no. A bad man. Are you sure you’ve got to do this?’