The Shadow Man (44 page)

‘… And some injuries accomplish all three. Right, Mr Jefferson?’

Leroy Jefferson wouldn’t allow himself to answer this question. Fear like a mist obscured his thoughts. He felt himself ensnared in some net that threatened to choke him no matter how he twisted or squirmed. He tried to force himself to think clearly, but it was difficult, with the man’s even, cold voice echoing in his ears and the knife blade dancing around his body. Leroy Jefferson felt trapped within a whirlpool of pain and terror; he knew little, except that if he told this man the truth, if he told him that he had seen him before and seen him kill Sophie Millstein and that he had told these things to Walter Robinson and Espy Martinez and had provided them with his picture and had ‘agreed to testify against him at a trial, then the man would surely kill him. And then he would probably kill the detective and the prosecutor and anyone else that threatened him. He knew this with a clarity that defied all the hurt that surged throughout his body, knew it because he recognized if it were he standing over some similar witness with a blade of his own, anger and fear and the threat of arrest might force him to do much the same, and this gave him a certainty that was as unwelcome in the small, hot room, as was the visitor himself.

He felt tears welling up in his eyes, dripping down, mingling with the blood on his cheeks. ; ‘So, Mr Jefferson, who am I?’

The question rang in his ear, urgent, terrifying. He took a

sharp, deep breath, trying to contain himself. He knew, in

that second, that nothing he said was going to make any

difference whatsoever. The visitor was going to kill him.

There was nothing he could say or do, that might save his

life. All he could do, by telling the man what he wanted, was

prolong it perhaps a few minutes. Maybe only a few seconds.

The thought pushed panic through him. He pulled at the duct tape that seized his hands, but could not break it. In the silence in the room, he felt the man maneuver around him, like a wayward breath of cold wind on a hot day. He swallowed hard, the dryness in his throat as parched as if he’d held a red-hot coal on his tongue. And in that second, abruptly, surprisingly, an entirely different sensation settled over his heart.

Leroy Jefferson felt a sudden, complete calm settle within him.

There was, he realized, no way out.

He could not fight. He knew no one would answer his call for help. And he knew no lie, nor no truth, could save him.

He thought he should be scared, but instead felt filled with an acceptance that bordered on defiance. He understood, in that second, that he had done precious little in his life that amounted to anything good or anything that anyone would have considered brave or even honest, and that now, facing his death, it saddened him to realize that no one would see him become these things. He would have liked it if someone like Walter Robinson or maybe Espy Martinez could have seen him change, in that moment, and that they realized that he had fought to protect them and maybe even had saved their lives. In that moment he hoped that when he was found, that they understood that he had died being something that he had never been before.

‘ Who am I, Mr Jefferson?’

He finally knew the answer to this question: death.

But he decided he was not going to give the man and his knife the satisfaction of a reply. Instead Leroy Jefferson spoke out in a determined voice that pushed past the parched thickness of fear. ‘Old man, I don’t know about all

those other people. Maybe they told you what you wanted to know. Maybe they didn’t. That be their business. But I know this: I ain’t gonna tell you shit.’

And then he quietly surrendered to the relentless agony that awaited him.

Simon Winter thought: I could have had him.

But then,, in the next second, he realized: He could have had me.

‘Stalemate,’ he whispered out loud.

The old detective sat deep in an armchair, heavy in thought, amidst the rows of books and periodicals of the Miami Beach Library. Fluorescent lights and steadily droning air-conditioning gave the room an independence from the blistering day outside. For a library, there was significantly less devotion to utter silence than one might have expected. Sturdy shoes clicked against the linoleum floor; an old man snored, a newspaper fluttered open on his lap; occasionally raised voices ruptured the still air as one elderly woman sought to explain something to another, defying the hearing loss that afflicted both. The room had a busyness to it that would have irked any true scholar; but it served a slightly different purpose, existing both as a place where information was gathered, and as a cool, well-lit world where some of the older people living on the Beach could meet and spend a few unconcerned hours surrounded by safety.

This, he recognized, was more or less the same reason he was there. In the twenty-four hours since the Shadow

Man had fled from his apartment, Winter had decided several things. First, for the time being he was going to keep quiet about this new threat to himself. Secondly, he knew he was going to have to work harder and faster.

He had encircled himself with texts on the Holocaust, of

which, understandably, there were many collected at the

Miami Beach Library. He was riven with frustration. He

was unable to shake the belief that somewhere in the past

there was some bit of information that would open the

door to the present. He was simply at a loss as to how to

find that piece of history. All the books piled beside him,

spread about on a small table and gathered at his feet, told

him immense amounts about Nazis. They told him about

what the Nazis did, and how they did it and where they did

it and to whom they did it. He thought it an odd thing, to

create, as they had, a world dedicated so completely to

terror that it became commonplace and routine, and

wondered if this were not amongst their greatest evils. But

this observation did nothing to assist him in his pursuit of

the Shadow Man; it told him nothing about what he felt he

Deeded: some light that might penetrate the man’s psyche.

None of the books helped him in this pursuit. Some,

admittedly, sought to examine the personalities behind the

acts of men in black uniforms. There were political

explanations describing how men came to join the Nazi

Party, how they decided to participate in S.S. actions, how

they came to justify murder and genocide. These political

explanations dovetailed with psychological profiles, but

none of these even came close to touching the soul of the

Shadow Man, because, as Frieda Kroner and Rabbi

Rubinstein had pointed out, he was never a Nazi, he was

supposed to be one of their prey. Yet he managed to

rerverse that equation somehow, and emerge from events

that had left their marks on everyone connected to them.

He was something entirely different, a unique player at the game of evil.

Simon Winter closed another thick history book with a snap that echoed in the large room.

If I do not understand this man, even if only a little bit, then he will slip past me again, Winter thought. He is not a man that has ever made the same mistake twice.

He slid deeper into his chair, dropping his head into his hands. He abruptly pictured himself standing outside his apartment, next to the trumpeting cherub, the night before, and he wondered what was it that had told him something was wrong.

Luck? Instinct? The old detective’s sixth sense?

Winter exhaled slowly.

There had been no sound. No footstep. No tortured breathing.

There was not a light on that should have been off. No window open that should have been closed. He’d discovered the door ajar in the rear only after persuading himself that the Shadow Man was inside.

The night had been like every other. The darkness held the heat. The city pulsed on as it did every evening.

The only thing that was out of place was that a man with a knife had been waiting for him, and that if he’d not been overcome suddenly by some ancient sensation of dread and danger, he would no longer be hunting for the Shadow-Man. He wondered where that sensation had come from, and did not know, but knew that he would be foolish to think that he would ever be fortunate enough again to have it come to his rescue as it had the previous night.

You should be dead, Simon Winter, he told himself.

He looked up suddenly, his eyes sweeping the room filled with old folks, reading books, magazines, newspapers. Some simply sat, lost in dreams of faraway times.

His eyes widened and he felt a sudden surge of fear tumble through his body.

Are you here?

Am I hunting you, or are you hunting me?

He fought off the urge to rise and run, steeling himself inwardly, forcing himself to examine all the people within the range of his eyes. The man in the hat poring over the Herald. The wizened man who seemed to be studying the ceiling. Another man, wearing white socks and black oxfords beneath madras shorts, who walked slowly past, carrying a pair of detective novels, one in either hand.

Winter half rose and stared behind him, at the people gathered in other chairs, at other desks, partially hidden by the stacks of books and reading cubicles. Then he settled back into his chair. He took a moment to compose himself.

He smiled.

How did you know about me?

He knew the answer to that: Irving Silver.

But what did he tell you?

Just enough to make you decide to kill me.

But what do you really know about me? You weren’t

inside the apartment long enough, were you? There were

no signs that you took the time to discover who I really am.

Drawers weren’t ransacked. Clothing untouched. You

didn’t find the gun, and you still don’t know that I have it,

and that I will use it, and that once, a long time ago, I was

an expert with it, and that I doubt it will fail me should I

call upon our old camaraderie. No, you were merely going

to kill me because you thought I was a threat, and it was

easier for you to do that than anything else.

Simon Winter nodded. You arrogant bastard.

But it wasn’t as easy as you thought it would be, and now you’re probably a little bit worried, and that’s something I

can use. And you probably want to learn more about me, don’t you? Well, that might prove harder than you think. So, for now at least, you are in the dark. Perhaps not as much as I am, but still, you are groping about, and that may make you take a chance you wouldn’t ordinarily consider.

Winter felt himself fill with harshness.

They were always easy, weren’t they? Once they were young and scared or old and scared, but always they were lost and desperate, and you were never that way, were you? No, you were always in control. But you made a mistake when you killed Sophie Millstein because you never imagined her neighbor would rise up against you. You never thought that there might be someone out there in this great wide world who would consider finding you as immense a challenge as you consider staying hidden. And it never occurred to you that this man who decides to hunt you would come from a world you do not know. And I too know a great deal about the ways of death, and maybe just as much as you, and I too am old, and have not so much time left that I care about, so that makes me unpredictable and that also makes me a dangerous man, and you’ve never been faced by a dangerous man, have you?

Winter reached out and seized a ballpoint pen and a pad of yellow legal-sized paper and started to scratch some notes to himself.

What do I know? he asked himself. Then he answered the question: more than I think.

I know you are old, but appear perhaps younger. I know you are strong, because the years have been good to you.

Why do you kill?

To stay hidden.

Winter paused. That’s not enough, is it? There’s much more to it than simply staying safe, isn’t there?

He smiled. You like it, don’t you? You like the idea that someone might recognize you? When Sophie Millstein spotted you outside the ice cream store in the middle of the Lincoln Road Mall, it didn’t send a shiver of fear through your body, did it? No, the shiver you felt was pleasure, because you were once again in the hunt and that is what you like, isn’t it?

An awful thought occurred to Simon Winter at that moment, and for a second his pen quivered above the yellow legal pad. Maybe Sophie Millstein didn’t spot you by accident. Maybe you’d been hunting her for some time. And the others too. How many?

He gritted his teeth. Everything seems to be one thing, then it turns into other possibilities. He admonished himself: stick close to what you can grasp.

All right. He kept talking to himself, maneuvering through the maze of contradictions that might be the Shadow Man. All right, what else do you know? I know he doesn’t fear the police, because he came after me without much preparation. He was simply going to cut the life out of me, and then leave my remains for Detective Robinson to clean up. So, he does not think he can be arrested. Why?

The answer to that question was immediately clear.

Because he is not a criminal.

If I were to discover your name today, what would it tell me? That you’ve never been arrested. Never fingerprinted. Never typed into any criminal data bank for suspicion of any crime. Never cheated on your taxes. Never made a late payment or defaulted on a loan or returned a rental car late. Never pulled over for driving under the influence. Never even received a speeding ticket. You’ve lead a quiet, unnoticed existence; an exemplary life with one small exception: you kill people.

Simon Winter breathed out slowly. He nodded to himself. That’s what makes you feel safe. You know that the police operate in a world circumscribed by routine. He was reminded of Claude Rains’s famous line in Casablanca: ‘Round up the usual suspects.’ But you’d never get caught in that corral, would you? Because you don’t fit into what we were taught to look for. Leroy Jefferson did, and that was why Detective Robinson was so expert at finding him. But you’re not some low-life, crack-addled junkie, are you?