The Frumious Bandersnatch

by Ed McBain

  He was so young then.

  Handsome, too, he guessed.

  Or maybe not.

  He had graduated from high school at the age of seventeen, had attended college for a year before he was drafted to fight in one of America’s far too many wars. Transported to a foreign land, he saw for the first time in his life (and grew old all at once) a wasteland that was a far cry from Eliot’s poignant mix of memory and desire. Wounded in battle and shipped back to America when he was still only nineteen, he’d returned to college for a year and a half, and then, abruptly, decided to join the police force.

  The Wasteland through which he and Barney Loomis drove on this fading May afternoon was not very much different from that devastated landscape in which Carella had fought all those years ago. Not so very different at all.

  “Christ, what is this place?” Loomis asked, appalled, and parked on the corner of Norman and 185th.

  “DON’T PULL NOTHING funny now,” Kellie said, and hefted the rifle onto her hip to show she meant business.

  Tamar pulled a face. Her left hand was handcuffed to the radiator, what the hell could she try to pull?

  Kellie set the glass of tea on the floor, within reach of Tamar’s right hand. She picked up the glass and took a sip of tea.

  “Who are you supposed to be?” she asked.

  “President Bush.”

  “After next year, that mask may be dated.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He might not be elected again.”

  “Who cares?” Kellie said, and shrugged.

  “You wear that mask, people will ask who you’re supposed to be.”

  “You already asked that. Anyway, I won’t have to wear it after tonight.”

  “Why? What happens tonight?”

  “We drop you off. Goodbye, Tamar Valparaiso.”

  “You mean that?”

  “That’s the plan.”

  “Whose plan?”

  “Ours. Me and the guys.”

  “Arafat and Hussein?”

  “Yeah,” Kellie said, and grinned behind her own mask. “Those are good masks, ain’t they?”

  “Very good.”

  “Better than this one. I wanted Queen Elizabeth. Or Hillary Clinton. Instead, he gets me this jackass.”

  “How do you know that’s the plan?”

  “Cause we’re partners, the three of us. They’re out right this minute, picking up the ransom money.”

  “How much are you supposed to get?”

  “None of your business.”

  “I hope it’s a lot of money.”

  “Oh, it’s plenty all right.”

  “How much?”

  “Never mind.”

  “I just want to know how much you guys think I’m worth.”

  “You’re worth plenty, honey. Especially now.”

  “Why now?”

  “You’ve been all over television. You don’t sell ten million copies of ‘Bandersnatch,’ I’ll eat this friggin mask!”

  “So how much did you ask for?”

  “How’s the tea?”

  “Fine. Did you make it?”

  “No, it’s Snapple.”

  “Who’s paying the ransom?”

  “Barney Loomis, who do you think? You know him, right?”

  “Of course I know him.”

  “You know everybody in the business, I’ll bet.”

  “No, but he’s the CEO of my label.”

  “You know Mariah Carey?”

  “Never met her. How much ransom is Loomis paying for me?”

  “Enough to make it worth our while. J. Lo? Do you know her?”

  “How much is that?”

  “How much do you think you’re worth?”

  “Ten million records, you said? How about a million bucks?”

  “Oh, sure, he’s just about to pay a million.”

  “How much is he about to pay?”

  “Enough.”

  “How much is enough?”

  “A quarter of a mil, okay?”

  “Nice payday,” Tamar said, and drained her glass.

  Kellie looked at her watch.

  “In fact,” she said, “they should be picking it up just about now.”

  LOOMIS picked up the ringing telephone.

  “Hello?”

  “Mr. Loomis?”

  “Yes.”

  “I want you to make a right turn on a Hun’ Eighty-fifth. Drive south for five and a half blocks. On the lefthand side of the street, you’ll see a wrecked automobile in front of a red brick building with no address numbers on it. Park behind that car. We’ll be watching you from that minute on. We’re in telephone contact with our partner. Any tricks and the girl dies. Repeat.”

  “Five and a half blocks south on a Hundred Eighty-fifth. Park behind the wrecked car on the left.”

  “And about tricks?”

  “Tamar dies.”

  “I think you’ve got it. By George, he’s got it!” Avery said playfully, and hung up.

  “You heard,” Loomis told Carella.

  “I heard. I should be giving all this to our people. You’re making a mistake here, Mr. Loo…”

  “Then you didn’t hear. Any tricks, and she dies. You want that on your head, Detective Carella?”

  Carella guessed he didn’t want that on his head.

  “WRECKED CAR” had to be a euphemism for the rusted automobile skeleton that had been stripped, torched, and then abandoned in front of a building whose probably-brass address numerals had been similarly desecrated. Only the ghostly images of an 8, a 3, and a 7 remained on the wall to the right of the entrance door, brighter in absence than the surrounding soot-covered bricks. Carella was thinking he could have phoned in an address. 837 South 185th. Get the Feds to throw a net over the surrounding five blocks. Follow whoever picked up the cash. But no.

  Loomis parked the limo behind the skeletal wreck. The black Lincoln basked in bright sunshine like a sleek black cat. In front of it, the rusted Whatever-It-Once-Had-Been crouched like a starving hyena, its ribs showing. The two men sat in silence, waiting. The caller had told them they’d be watched from this moment on. Carella scoped the area. Any one of five deserted tenements could be a sniper’s observation post. A rifleman could be kneeling behind any one of a hundred windows that looked down at the street.

  “Why here, for God’s sake?” Loomis asked.

  “Deserted area, number one,” Carella said. “Clear sight lines. From any one of these buildings, they can see for blocks around.”

  The car phone rang.

  He reached for it at once, but Loomis said, “I’ll take it,” and lifted the receiver.

  “Hello?”

  “Mr. Loomis?”

  “Yes?”

  “Put Steve on, could you please?”

  “He wants you,” Loomis said, and handed him the phone.

  “Carella,” he said.

  “Are you armed, Steve?”

  “I am.”

  “What kind of weapon?”

  “A Glock nine.”

  “Do you have the money?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is it in a dispatch case?”

  “Yes.”

  “Step out of the car, Steve. Just you. Tell Mr. Loomis to stay in the car. Take the case with you. The phone, too. Don’t forget the phone, Steve. Wouldn’t want to lose touch, now would we? When you’re out of the car, talk to me, Steve. We’re not through here yet.”

  Carella reached over for the dispatch case on the back seat. “He wants you to stay in the car,” he told Loomis.

  “Why?”

  Carella gave him a look, and then opened the door on his side, and stepped out onto the curb, the dispatch case in his left hand, the phone in his right. He closed the door behind him. He brought the phone to his mouth.

  “I’m out,” he said.

  “Go to the back of the car,” Avery said.

  Carella went around to the back of the car.

  “Look at the lic
ense plate.”

  “I’m looking.”

  “I want you to believe we’ve got binocs on you right this minute,” Avery said. “Is the license plate number BR-2100?”

  “It is,” Carella said.

  “Do something with your hands.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Perform some sort of action.”

  Carella put the dispatch case flat on the roof of the car, and then raised his left hand over his head.

  “You put the dispatch case on the roof and raised your left hand, is that correct?” Avery asked.

  “Yes,” Carella said.

  “And the case is black, is that also correct?”

  “Yes, it’s black.”

  “I want you to believe that we can see you and that a rifle with a telescopic sight is trained on your head. Do you believe that?”

  “I believe it.”

  “Good. Ask Mr. Loomis to come out of the car, please.”

  Carella went around to the driver’s side of the limo, rapped on the glass there. The window slid down.

  “They want you to get out of the car,” Carella said.

  “Why?” Loomis asked again.

  Carella looked at him.

  Loomis got out and slammed the door behind him.

  “We see him,” Avery said. “Give him the dispatch case.”

  Carella handed it to him.

  “Tell him we’ve got rifles trained on both of you.”

  “They’ve got us covered from somewhere around here,” Carella told Loomis, looking up at the surrounding buildings. “Rifles with telescopic sights.”

  “Okay,” Loomis said, and looked up, too, and nodded.

  “Steve?”

  “Yes?”

  “Here’s what I want you to do, Steve. Unholster your weapon. Remember, we’re watching you.”

  Carella transferred the phone to his left hand. He reached down into his holster, yanked the Glock up and into his hand.

  “It’s out,” he said.

  “This is a bad neighborhood,” Avery said. “I guess you noticed that.”

  “I noticed it.”

  “We don’t want anything to happen to that money. Keep the piece in your hand, Steve. Make sure it’s visible in case any stray squatters get any brilliant ideas.”

  “Okay.”

  “Now I want you and Mr. Loomis to walk that money right into the red brick building there. Remember, we’re watching you.”

  “He wants us to go inside that building,” Carella told Loomis.

  “Why?” Loomis asked, and again Carella looked at him.

  Together the men walked toward the building where the absent 8-3-7 numerals left stark reminders on the entrance wall. The barricade was gone from the front door, fragments of wood still clinging to the door frame where the boards had been torn free. Carella walked into the building first, gun hand leading him. He heard a frenzied scurrying and squealing up ahead, and stopped dead in his tracks.

  He did not appreciate rats.

  When he and Teddy had been living in their Riverhead house for just a week, he’d opened the basement door and was heading downstairs when he spotted a rat the size of an alley cat sitting on the steps, staring up at him with his beady little eyes and twitching whiskers. He’d slammed the door shut at once, whirled on Teddy, and frantically signed, We’re selling the house!

  He definitely did not appreciate rats.

  “What the hell is that?” Loomis asked behind him, and then saw one of the rats and let out a short sharp shriek.

  Into the phone, Carella said, “The place is overrun with rats. Tell me what you want us to do, okay?”

  “Go up to the first floor. Apartment 14. The numerals are still on the door.”

  “Are you walking us into a trap?” Carella asked.

  “You’ve got a gun in your hand,” Avery reminded him.

  They started up the steps, Carella in the lead. The hand railing was gone. They braced themselves against the opposite wall. The building stank of garbage and human waste. Loomis covered his nose with a handkerchief. Carella felt like wretching. A single unboarded window on the first-floor landing cast uncertain light into the hallway. Apartment 14 was the fourth door down the hall.

  “We’re here,” Carella said into the phone.

  “Go inside.”

  They went into the apartment. They were standing in the middle of a small kitchen. There were still boards on the only window in the room. In the semi-darkness, they heard the scurrying of more rats.

  A dead Golden Retriever lay on the floor in front of a gas range that had been disconnected and overturned.

  It looked as if the dog’s throat had been recently slit.

  Flies were still buzzing around the open wound.

  “Do you see the dog?” Avery asked.

  “Yes?”

  “That’s what we’ll do to the girl if there are any tricks.”

  Carella said nothing.

  “See the refrigerator?” Avery asked.

  “Yes?”

  “Open the door, Steve.”

  Carella opened the door.

  “The fridge doesn’t work, Steve,” Avery said. “No electricity in the building. I hope you didn’t bring us hot money.”

  He sounded almost jovial now. Big joke here, the son of a bitch. Slits a dog’s throat, rats running all over the place, he jokes about hot money.

  “What do you want me to do here?” Carella asked.

  “You sound peeved, Steve.”

  Carella said nothing.

  “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “What did you ask?”

  “Is the money hot?”

  “No.”

  “I certainly hope it’s not marked or anything.”

  “It’s not marked.”

  “Because I wouldn’t want anything to happen to the girl.”

  “It’s not marked. Just tell me what you want me to do, okay?”

  “What’s he saying?” Loomis asked.

  Carella shook his head.

  “Put the dispatch case on one of the shelves, Steve.”

  Carella slid the case onto the shelf under the ice cube compartment.

  “Now close the door and hang up. When you’re outside the building, I’ll call again.”

  Carella closed the refrigerator door, and hit the END button.

  “Let’s go,” he told Loomis.

  They stepped out into the hallway again. Everywhere around them, there was the sound of chittering little creatures in the near-dark, glittering little eyes suddenly disappearing as the rats turned and ran off. He remembered being a rookie, remembered other cops telling him about babies in their cribs getting their faces chewed to ribbons by rats. Moving slowly and cautiously, he scraped his feet along the floor, feeling his way toward the stairwell.

  “Here it is,” he told Loomis.

  With his right hand, he felt for the wall again. With his left foot, he reached out for the first stair tread, afraid he would step on a rat. Behind him, Loomis said, “He’s gone too far. Why’d he kill that dog?”

  “To show us he’s serious,” Carella said.

  “That wasn’t the deal.”

  “He wanted me along to bear witness. So I’d go back and tell the others he’s serious about killing the girl.”

  “We already knew that. He already told us that.”

  “Show is better than tell, Mr. Loomis.”

  “That wasn’t the deal,” Loomis said again, sounding very much like a petulant child. “Nobody gets hurt, that was the deal. He didn’t have to kill the goddamn dog.”

  They came down the stairs and out of the building. Both men blinked against the sunlight.

  “Do you think they’re holding her in one of these buildings?” Loomis asked.

  “I hope not,” Carella said.

  The phone rang immediately.

  “Hello?” Carella said.

  “This is what I want you and Mr. Loomis to do,” Avery said. “Are you
listening?”

  “I’m listening.”

  “Walk back to the car. Put the phone to your ear again when you get there.”

  The two men walked back to the limo. Carella put the phone to his ear again.

  “We’re here,” he said.

  “I see you,” Avery said. “Just stand right where you are. I’ll call you again when we have the case. You can hang up now.”

  Carella hit the END button.

  THEY CAME DOWN from the seventh floor of the building at 5107 Ambrose, from which they’d been watching the action across the street at 837 South 185th. Hidden by the building itself, they crossed the empty lot behind it, and entered 837 through the rear door. They were both carrying the AK-47s they’d used on the boat gig two nights ago, but this time Cal’s rifle was fitted with a scope. On the first floor of the building, he told Avery he felt like shooting himself some rats. Avery told him to resist the urge.

  They found the black dispatch case in the refrigerator, right where Carella had left it. Cal threw the beam of a flashlight on it, and Avery unclasped it. There was no time to count the money right now, but those looked like a whole lot of nice brand-new hundred-dollar bills in there.

  They went downstairs and out the back door again. This time, they crossed the lot to where they’d parked the stolen Montana behind a twelve-story building on Lasser. Carella and Loomis may have heard them starting the car, but it wouldn’t matter, anyway. The girl was their insurance. Nobody was going to do anything stupid while they had the girl.

  They didn’t call again until almost an hour later. By that time, they’d dumped all the cell phones they’d used since three this afternoon. It was now close to five-thirty, and Avery was using yet another stolen phone when he called from the house out on Sands Spit.

  Barney Loomis answered on the second ring.

  “Hello?” he said.

  “You can go back to your office now,” Avery said. “We’ll call you again after we’ve counted the money. If it’s all here, you’ll get the girl back tonight. I promise.”

  “Where will you…?” Loomis started, but Avery had already hung up.

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