Death of the Extremophile

by Stuart Parker

  *

  After a few blocks, confident he was not being followed, Hope hailed a cab. He rode it to his apartment building just around the corner of Third Avenue and East 19 Street. The driver was a nervous type, his lips puckered and his head perpetually swinging to a fro like a pendulum. Perhaps he was a victim of shell-shock. He was the right age. And there was no doubt the heavy artillery of the trenches was still reverberating in the heads of many a veteran. Possibly it was that. But then New York could take credit for well enough conjuring its own brand of shell-shock. Hope did not care to pry, merely added a little extra to the tip and left it at that.

  He waved his way past Max, the night concierge, who always seemed too wide awake to blink no matter what hour it happened to be, and there were three flights of stairs to his apartment floor. His door was 32, but as was the custom, when he heard music in 31, he gently knocked on the door and entered without delay - before his neighbour could be put to the trouble of opening it.

  The neighbour was a seventy year old widower named John Badami. At night, Badami would sit in his black leather reclining chair and reflect over the lights of New York, smoking and listening to jazz. During the days he would read. A simple life but his walls were crammed with books that deserved to be read – like years that deserved to be lived, or in the case of an old man, days were of value enough. The coffee table before the old man was stacked with records and pipes. No evidence of food. Not so much as a single crumb.

  ‘Good evening, George,’ said Badami. ‘Have you been out? It was pleasant, I trust.’

  Hope poured himself a port and sat down in one of the silver framed settees. ‘This is pleasant.’

  ‘That’s why it’s dull.’ Badami tapped away some ash into his enameled, jade encrusted ashtray. He was bright in his red satin pajama jacket and trousers. His brush-over white hair was a tad off-centre on his bald scalp. But this was not an apartment of mirrors.

  ‘Been on one of your trips down memory lane?’ queried Hope.

  Badami seemed half there still and replied only after a time. ‘I’ve been thinking about the family of young Davey James. I don’t believe I have mentioned them to you.’

  ‘No, the name is not familiar.’

  Badami sucked in some cigar smoke, listened to a moment of Billie Holiday on the turntable and exhaled and began to explain. ‘Young Davey was born into a wealthy family. Real silver spooner. His parents had set out his life ready to live even before he was born. His name was on the lists of the best schools and societies in New York. He even had a real estate portfolio. It was a life destined for privilege and success. Meningitis, however, cut in early on this particular moment of life and Davey was gone on the very week of his fifth birthday.’

  He sipped his port and continued.

  ‘Sometimes through heartbreaking tragedy people become repulsed by any sense of a tomorrow. That is what happened to Davey’s parents. They had another child, a daughter, Suzanna, and this time they did not plan anything regarding her future, only they made sure they were there every night when she closed her eyes and every morning when she opened them again. They kept her warm. Kept her safe.’ He looked at Hope. ‘I learned all this when Suzanna engaged me to bury them, many years later. And I could see in her kindness how successful they had been. They had given her their future, and it was the way the future should be.’ He put a finger to his temple and sighed. ‘We bury them in six feet of ground, but there is not that much dirt in our heads. So we remember.’ He picked up the newspaper that had been lying on the coffee table and flashed it at Hope: it was the Brooklyn Chronicle evening edition, a few days old, with Hope on the front page. ‘I never saw anyone shed a tear over a newspaper. People might be amused by this kind of thing, but it’s only a real relationship that makes a lifelong impact. The kind that crushes people when it’s over, yet gives them the strength to carry on as well.’ He glanced again at the picture accompanying the article: Hope, brush in hand, leaning proudly upon the City Hall’s flagpole like he were a deep sea fisherman with his latest giant catch. ‘Up on all those roofs, you might be getting a nice view of things but the distance between you and the rest of New York is only getting bigger. Forgive the sentimentality, but that is the concern of the tired, old undertaker living next door.’ He put the paper back down. ‘All I’m saying is you need to burn bright when you’re young, for there will only be the embers afterwards to keep you warm. And the closer people get to each other, the hotter they burn. Sometimes for better, sometimes for worse.’

  ‘Sure thing, old man,’ smirked Hope. ‘So, what did you think of the article? Did you read it?’

  ‘Yeah, I read it. If you were paying this Donovan Black to write about you, I’d say you owe him more than the retainer. It read like he is trying to have you canonised as a saint. Or possibly to one day turn you into a war bond.’

  ‘I’m not paying him,’ muttered Hope, ‘but I do owe him a tip or two.’

  The needle slowly lifted off the record and Hope took it as his cue to stand, leaving the sediment of the glass of sherry behind. ‘Well, I’ve got another building to climb tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes, there will always be another flagpole. Good night, young man.’

  Hope headed into his apartment, pulling out the bundle of money he had taken off Faldon Rainey. He clenched the bundle into in a fist and massaged the knuckles he had bruised in punching Rainey, and he pondered which charity he might donate the money to. Perhaps, an orphanage. Badami would like that. Hope tucked the money between two volumes of a series on African wildlife, figuring it as safe a place from burglars as any. He went to the living room phone and called Detective Warren Longworry.

  ‘You know what time it is?’ Longworry was soon barking down the other end.

  ‘Well, this is me being unconventional.’

  ‘Give me something better than sleep and we won’t have a problem.’

  ‘Her name is Rose Dovetail. Apparently she’s been getting a lot of men into trouble by being better than sleep. The kind of men you might want to get something on.’

  There was a pause on the other end of the line. ‘What did you say her name was?’

  ‘Dovetail?’

  ‘Never heard of her.’

  ‘And she wouldn’t mind that at all.’

  ‘Alright, tell me about her.’

  Longworry listened silently to what followed. Hope did not stop to check if the line had gone dead. When he finished there was a pause before Longworry finally said, ‘You are a policeman’s friend to be sure. You’re getting me cases and I’ve been specifically ordered by the Assistant District Attorney not to keep any paperwork. Good for me, but if something goes awry, it probably won’t be so good for you. You’ll be on your own, just like you are on those rooftops. And it will be a long way down.’ He laughed hoarsely. ‘But no paperwork and no desk. I really do hope you manage to last a while longer yet, my friend.’ More laughter. It ebbed into static and the line went dead.

  7. ‘It would be unpatriotic to see you dead in my premises.’

  Hope had found a bar near the Waldorf Astonia. It was called the Salvation and he liked the look of it. There was no reason for it other than the mix of bright light and imposing steel door and the name suiting his mood after a long afternoon on the Waldorf’s bleak, windswept roof.

  Hope pulled open the door to a flight of dark stairs that needed to be negotiated with a well-judged stoop as he descended under a low roof to the basement level bar. The bar warm was warm and cosy and not so brightly lit as the evening on the outside.

  Hope ordered a bourbon whiskey from the tall, solidly built bartender and looked around for someone to share it with. There was a woman sitting alone at a near table. Hope could see little more than her back even though her chair was facing his way. Her hair was tied up in a tight bun, her shoulders hunched over her drink, and her back was as bent as a question mark. Hope strategically placed himself at a table near to hers and was able to make ou
t the bruising high on her cheek. It was a faded black and probably a few days old. If not for her long brown hair being caught on her shoulder, it would have been concealed.

  Hope sipped his bourbon and tried to make eye contact with her; her head, however, remained down over her glass like it were an exam. A cold, languid expression was on her face. Tears were streaking down her cheeks.

  A gentleman should not impose himself too quickly, Hope thought, so he put down his glass on the table and idly stirred it with a finger, waiting for her cue, primed like an athlete crouched over the starting line. And finally it came: her eyes flicked up to him with a pain both bloodshot and raw. It was over in an instant, but for Hope it was invitation enough.

  ‘I would be honoured if you dried your eyes with this,’ he said, swinging out his chair towards her and offering up his black bandana handkerchief.

  After a moment of surprise, the woman accepted it. ‘Thank you.’ There was a dignity about her voice.

  ‘Not at all.’ Hope moved into an empty chair at her table. ‘It’s hard for me to enjoy a drink when I see someone feeling so down.’

  The woman patted at her tears sparingly, careful of her make up. She looked at him. ‘You’re not a cop, are you?’

  ‘No, I’m not. I’m a gentleman by profession.’

  ‘Gentleman?’

  ‘Any work I do is not for money.’

  ‘Is that so? I haven’t met too many of that sort. It certainly rules you out as being a cop then. But that’s a good thing. You see, Harold does not take kindly to cops.’

  Hope frowned ever so slightly. ‘Who’s Harold?’

  ‘My husband.’ The woman glanced at the entrance stairs. ‘He’s just on his way here now.’

  Hope turned and there he was. With his sheer forehead and a nose like a runny egg, the approaching man might not have been much of a romantic rival, but with his height and broad shoulders, he would have made a more than adequate physical match.

  ‘No, Harold,’ said the woman sternly, springing up from her chair. ‘I’ll handle this.’ The sad indifference in her gaze was long gone now, life flooding back.

  The man glared at Hope a moment before doing what he was told, murmuring under his breath as he moved away. ‘At the door then.’

  The woman planted her hands on the table and bent forward at Hope as though contemplating a bite. ‘A gentleman may help a gal with a handkerchief when there are a few tears spilt. But what else is he good for? Is he there when a gal is bedridden for weeks at a time? Will he sit in the same old chair year after year listening to the same radio shows? Will he hold a crying baby when the noise is too much for her to bear? A gentleman won’t do ugly. And that’s all that’s on offer here.’ She looked across to her husband who had stopped at the base of the stairs. She lightly prodded her bruised cheek. ‘I’ve wounded him too. In other ways. I say things. It’s all I can do in this crummy world. Say things. I do my worst.’ She dropped Hope’s handkerchief onto the table and walked away. ‘A gentleman wouldn’t approve.’

  The bartender quickly stepped in to fill the void the woman left behind at the table. ‘Brave, my friend. Very brave. I thought you were a goner. A beast treats his wife like that, what’s he gonna' do to you?’

  Hope folded up his handkerchief and put it back into his pocket. ‘He could only do his worst. And since he didn’t even try, I’d have to say the night is still young.’ He gulped the last of his drink and slammed down the glass. ‘I’m rich and famous and I want to meet bad people.’ He enjoyed the look of disapproval the bartender gave him.

  ‘Famous you say? What movie you been in then?’

  ‘Wrong idea. It’s what roof I’ve been on.’

  ‘What roof?’ Then it twigged. ‘Oh, you’re that paint guy.’

  ‘Yeah, now you got it.’

  ‘You were in the newspaper.’

  ‘Sure was.’

  The bartender frowned. ‘It would be unpatriotic to have you dead in my premises. Bad for business what’s more. But you come in here asking dangerous questions about the clientele and I tell you to buzz off ‘cause I’ve seen enough mad things in this joint that I don’t need to see any more.’ He leaned furtively closer. His breath was stale. ‘This is different, isn’t it? Now that I know who you are. You look like someone who will be taking a lot of secrets to the grave and I’d be chuffed knowing one of them was mine. So, I’ll give you something. Wanna’ meet someone with a gun or three?’

  8. ‘If you can crack a few skulls during the working day, I’m sure you’ll go home as content as a kitten.’

  ‘Gotten rusty, Captain?’ came a taunt from a few steps lower on the stairwell. ‘You ain’t got that same spring in your step.’

  It was true that Longworry had lost much of his conditioning with his desk job. At least he still had enough wind in his lungs to be able to fire back at his taunter. ‘For that, Stevens, you’re going first through the door.’

  ‘Will be a pleasure, Cap,’ was the self-assured reply. The uniformed police officer, Bo Stevens, was short of breath too, though for him it was due more to the excitement of the impending bust than the exertion up the stairs. The Buster and the Treatment were back on the job. Once the holders of the most commendations on the force, the unit had been disbanded with Longworry’s demotion to a desk, its members siphoned away to other precincts, other duties, and a lot fewer arrests. What Longworry had done in knuckle-jawing a businessman cum hoodlum outside the Mayor’s office was to find out how deep the roots of rotten fruit really went descended into the office, and how quick the city rags were to sing the tunes blowing from that direction, and he suddenly found his career gathering dust, like one of those boxes in archives; so it seemed to defy comprehension how he could have got back enough clout to reform his crew and put them back out to work. No matter the wherefores, two long years in purgatory and it would be the criminal element paying the price as the Buster and the Treatment set about making up for lost time. And it would all start in this ransacking of a downtrodden Queen’s apartment.

  The ever agile Davenas was the third member on the stairs, while the more solidly built Randi and Linde were a few steps further back. Pistols were drawn, hands were steady and eyes were wildly alive.

  ‘Good to be off a desk anyway, isn’t it, Captain?’ remarked Randi. ‘If you can crack a few skulls during the working day, I’m sure you’ll go home as content as a kitten.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ snapped Longworry. ‘Shut the hell up, damn it.’

  ‘Safety’s off, isn’t it, Captain?’ chimed in Linde.

  ‘You shut the help up too.’

  Longworry led his squad off the stairs onto the fourth floor landing. Someone down the corridor was cooking sausages. Maybe the Bavarian kind that Longworry had known as a kid. The truly delicious smells filled the air and he suddenly found himself standing flat-footed salivating over the musings of how good the sausages would taste and what beer would best accompany them: it was the kind of food that had filled the void left behind by his demotion and its scent had brought with it the whispers of a malaise that he had sometimes succumbed to as he found respite from his mind numbing office work with crowded lunches that stretched deep into the afternoons. On this occasion, however, a gun wielding Stevens was unceremoniously pushing past him to get at the target door, and his mind was drawn back on the job: he filed in with the unit as they assumed their customary positions around the door for a forced entry assault, and it was time to see if they could still do the things that had earned them their name all those years ago.

  Randi holstered his pistol in order to apply two hands to his tire-iron - the way he could rip a door from its hinges the squad never wanted to knock.

  Whatever odor was emanating from apartment 403, it was not fine dining. More like one part cabbage, one part old tennis shoes.

  Randi wedged the tire-iron into the door crack and sucked in air between his teeth. Then the door was opening like it
were made of Japanese paper.

  ‘Freeze!’ cried out Stevens as he ran inside. ‘This is the police!’

  There was a deafening pop in reply. Someone was welcoming them with potshots. Longworry pushed his way into the apartment, uncertain if the tumbling Stevens was hit or just scrambling for cover. The perpetrator was in a far doorway, brandishing a revolver: to Longworry he was just an overweight slob in a grimy white singlet and probably his greatest crime was the amount of chest and back hair spilling out over it. Somehow it seemed appropriate to Longworry that this man be taken down by someone in a well-tailored suit, and that’s what happened: a shot right in the gut, not a pretty place for it and he had been aiming higher - he wondered if the bullet had been following his train of thought regarding those sausages - or maybe that tomato sauce stain on the singlet had formed the shape of a target. Longworry considered putting another bullet into him to finish him off, but the way the fat man dropped so helplessly managed to inspire sympathy, so he resolved to let the doctors do their best.

  There were another three occupants in the entry living room who had been standing there like furniture and they threw up their hands in surrender. There was nowhere for them to run anyway as their exit was now blocked by the fallen man and the rest of the apartment including the windows was stacked with stolen department store merchandise. Radios, lighting and kitchenware were piled high and every inch of furniture was crammed with suits, dresses, furs and hats. Rolled carpets and rugs were wedged between the cracks.

  Longworry took in the scene with an air of satisfaction. ‘This is my kind of place. Macy’s without the crowds. Cuff em’ boys. And call an ambulance for our fast draining friend.’ He backed out of the apartment, holstering his gun. ‘Don’t put your sticky fingers on anything until I get back.’

  He strode out the apartment, noticing doors slightly ajar as frightened neighbours tried to peak a look at the disturbance and he had to fight himself not to go at them. His blood was up such that every fibre was tingling with a desperate thirst for action. He had never been able to holster that feeling as easily as he could his gun but it seemed worse now than ever. As painful as it had been, his desk job had purged him of the addiction. The grotesque, incomparable excitement of gunplay. And the first taste of his relapse was pure, intoxicating adrenalin. Yes, this was what he used to gorge himself on.

  He corralled himself onto the stairs and down onto the street. George Hope was parked in his race-modified Ford - his version of being a gentleman was that adrenalin could be taken with just as much candor as a high tea, and he would never need to kick the habit. He leaned out the window as Longworry approached.

  ‘How did it go? I thought I heard shots.’

  ‘One of the gang was not willing to come quietly. I’d say a nasty little bunch one and all. You actually wasted a night drinking with them?’

  ‘Wasted is the right word. Listening to them brag about their version of shopping. Shopping from shoppers. Pulverising people out on the streets for the sin of carrying a shopping bag.’

  Longworry nodded. ‘Well, now it’s their turn to pay. A whole different kind of layaway scheme.’

  Hope smiled and started the engine. ‘I told them the next round would be on me.’

  ‘There’s quite a toy shop upstairs,’ yelled Longworry over the roar of engine. ‘If there’s anything you want, a radio or a suit, I can put aside a good one.’

  Hope shot him an incredulous look from the corner of his eye.

  Longworry shrugged. ‘At least I offered.’ He patted the roof affectionately. ‘Keep up the good work. Rose Dovetail is keeping us amused with all her friends in high places but we’ve always got time for dirty busts like this one.’

  Hope put his hands on the steering wheel and paused a moment. ‘Actually, if there’s a decent phonograph player in there, I’ve got a neighbour who might appreciate it.’

  ‘That’s more like it. I’ll see what I can come up with.’

  ‘The reporter from the Brooklyn Chronicle, Donovan Black, is on his way. Tell him whatever version of events you think would make a good read.’

  ‘Always do.’

  ‘Probably something about sweet old-timers being robbed as soon as they leave the department stores. That will make you look good.’

  Longworry smirked. ‘Won’t it just.’

  Hope removed the handbrake and let the car slowly roll. ‘When you’re done with Black, send him to the Chrysler Building. They’ve got me painting fenders where a roof should be and it would be a shame not to make a feature of it.’

  He hit the accelerator and sped away.

  9. ‘The simple truth is, darling, if I can’t do it, nobody can. Control me, I mean.’

  It was a week or so later and Hope was sitting alone at a table at the Chesterville in Soho, drinking ice cold gin. There was a band to listen to and a frolicking dance floor to look at. The atmosphere was so effervescent in fact that even sitting alone on the edge of it felt like activity.

  A young man came from nowhere and announced himself with a tap on his arm. He did not immediately speak. He just stood there. He had a baby-smile and a meticulously thin mustache that had no doubt seen its fair share of tweezers. He leaned closer to get his voice out above the music.

  ‘Miss Sophia Allworthy would like to invite you for a drink at her table.‘

  He pointed away into the darkness and Hope had no idea where. Hope, nevertheless, accepted without hesitation, for he was curious to know whether this was the proof he was now famous enough that strangers came looking for him.

  ‘Lead on,’ he said.

  The tables in the club were arranged like a traffic jam, making passage awkward and potentially bruising - especially as there was more than one reveler who had drunk the dance floor all the way to them.

  The course set by the stranger eventually came to a table towards the back of the club and there was a pretty brunette sitting there, nursing two empty glasses under her arms as she swayed to the music. The young woman’s cheeks were heavily powdered, her eyes an intense blue and her jaw was quite pronounced, to the point of being jutting. She was wearing a sparkling black sequin dress complemented by gold earrings and pearl necklace. She looked up at Hope with a rather tipsy gaze and gave the glasses a rest.

  ‘See,’ she said with a shake of her shoulders. ‘That’s what happens when I’m provided a chaperone. I use him to fetch a strange man to my table. How dastardly of me.’ Her voice was cheerful but sounded very much like both glasses in her hand had once been very full. She stared at Hope a protracted moment, seemingly amused merely by his presence. ‘And you are strange in so many ways,’ she finally said. ‘You climb skyscrapers for no other reason than to point them out. And you sit alone in a club when plenty of girls would allow you to buy them a drink.’

  Hope took that as a hint and asked the chaperone to fetch from the bar a gin and whatever they were having. Then he sat down.

  ‘I believe your name is Sophie Allworthy. If I heard your friend correctly.’

  ‘Indeed it is. And I have had my fair share of pictures in newspapers and magazines. You don’t have anything on me in that respect.’

  ‘Is that so?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Hope. I have worked as a petticoat model, you see. I am told I have quite the figure.’ She leaned closer, allowing a little more cleavage to swell up from her dress. ‘I’ll let you know a secret that I wouldn’t tell any of my other boyfriends.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I‘m married.’ She giggled and recoiled back almost out of the chair. ‘Poor old Michael thought he had snared himself the wife of the century. Or at least of the Depression. I cooked and cleaned prodigiously. Our little apartment was a Manhattan oasis. But I was working so hard because the reality I was trying to hide from was really that bad. I was not a housewife at all.’ She extended her arms out to the club. ‘I was this. So the dream wife has become a nightmare. Poor David gets plenty upset, but there’
s no use trying to control me. The simple truth is, darling, if I can’t do it, nobody can. Control me, I mean.’ She laughed heartily. Laughed so loud it could be mistaken for funny. ‘Wedding vows don’t sound anything like that, do they, Mr George?’

  Hope shrugged. ‘I can’t say I’ve ever listened to the finer details.’

  ‘So, you’re not married? You climb all those skyscrapers and yet you still know your limits. Good for you.’ She laughed again and put a hand on his. ‘Very respectable limits. And, to be honest, I asked you over here on the hope that you might be able to extend mine.’

  ‘Which direction?’

  Allworthy pointed upwards. ‘I’m tired of being afraid of heights. When I saw you on those buildings in the damned colourless rag, I wanted to join you.’ She started tracing circles on his hand with a sharp, highly varnished red fingernail. ‘That would make you my cure.’

  Hope looked into her eyes. ‘What about your chaperone over there?’

  ‘I’m offering you the job. How high are you going to take me?’

  Hope stood up and offered a hand to escort her upright. Allworthy’s nails dug into his wrist like the claws of a monitor lizard climbing a tree. Once she was standing up in his arms, Hope said, ‘We’ll start small and work our way up.’

  ‘How small is small?’

  ‘Third floor.’

  Allworthy started swinging her hips to the music. ‘We’ll just have to see how scary that is.’

  The chaperone was still over at the bar, trying to catch the bartender’s eye. They left him and the Chesterville without another word. It was a cold, dark night awaiting them outside. Although Hope liked the way Allworthy continued to hold his hand as they walked, he was not so sure he liked the way she did not let go. They were heading for his car parked a block away in a quiet, sleepy neighbourhood: the silence that had emerged between them since they had left the bar was beginning to fester, but restarting the conversation without the booming band as backing seemed a daunting prospect.

  ‘Give us your money,’ barked a voice suddenly and the initial relief that this was some kind of circuit breaker was lost in an instant as the meaning and tone fully sank in. Allworthy gasped as a blade flashed in front of her with what little street light there was. The mugger was short, stocky and twitchy and was using a wide-brimmed sombrero to cover the top of his face. ‘I said, give it.’

  ‘I don’t have any money,’ urged Allworthy.

  ‘Shit, I’m not surprised at that,’ spat the mugger, lifting his eyes just a fraction. ‘A cute broad in a bar doesn’t need money to get a drink. Plenty of suckers to take care of that.’ He turned at Hope. ‘And here he is. I’m cynical enough to reckon the guy that escorts a dame like this out of a bar like the Chesterville is gonna’ be loaded. It’s your wallet I want. If you don’t give it, I can’t say what I’m going to take from you.’

  ‘Alight,’ said Hope, extracting his wallet, having concluded that taking a lunge at the man in such darkness was fraught with unlikelihoods. He removed its paper dollars and held them out.

  ‘Who wants the book without its cover,’ scoffed the mugger. ‘Put the fruit back in the basket and hand the whole thing over.’

  Hope complied without resistance. The mugger snatched it up greedily and turned his attention back to Allworthy. ‘Give me those pearls too, lady. Hurry up about it. Don’t make me have to cut em’ from your neck.’

  ‘Not my necklace,’ pleaded Allworthy, her hands gripping them in a panic, fingers as pale as the pearls themselves. ‘Please.’

  ‘Shut up.’ The knife flashed closer. ‘Which do you really want to lose most?’ He said it like he meant it.

  Breaking into a sob, Allworthy unclipped the necklace and handed it over.

  ‘And that’s how you survived,’ said the mugger as he backed away and bolted into a nearby alley.

  ‘Wait here,’ said Hope, squeezing Allworthy’s arm and starting after the mugger.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she said called out.

  Hope ran back to her, grinned and kissed her on the cheek. ‘Not waiting.’

  He was off running again. The alley lay between ailing fences, its grimy dirt floor crackling with broken glass. The mugger had slowed down into it, not wanting to sprain an ankle. Hope, however, was moving fast: he was not sure if it was his eyes or his body that had done the most adjusting but he could see the mugger more clearly now even though the alley was darker.

  The mugger thrust his knife with some purpose as he realised he was being pursued; that, however, merely allowed Hope to apply a wrist lock and hurl him down onto his back. Hope stomped on his chest and twisted the wrist within a breath of snapping. The knife dropped amidst an agonising cry.

  ‘The wallet,’ said Hope, ‘was my father’s. And it’s all I’ve got left of him. So, it’s worth a lot more to me than your life.’

  ‘I didn’t know,’ grimaced the mugger.

  ‘If you give it back we can still be friends.’ Hope lent a foot on his face. The shards of glass stuck by mud to the sole of his shoe were starting to cut. ‘And everything else in your pockets as well. It’s like slicing open the belly of a great white shark. It’s always interesting to see what it has been digesting.’

  ‘Okay!’ The mugger used his free hand to empty his pockets. He had soon made a pile of wallets, watches and jewelry.

  Hope stabbed a knee into his ribs while he gathered it all up and then kicked him hard in the stomach to ensure an unimpeded departure. He found Allworthy to be standing where he had left her.

  ‘Are you alright? she asked.

  ‘Fine.’ He handed back her pearl necklace. ‘He said he was sorry.’

  They were walking again, quicker now than before and with the occasional glance over their shoulders, but, nonetheless, still only walking.

  ‘I hope you didn’t risk your life for me,’ Allworthy said. ‘To be honest the necklace doesn’t really mean that much to me at all. It’s imitation.’ She giggled. ‘I was just taking the opportunity for a bit of acting practice. One can’t model petticoats forever.’

  Hope smiled. ‘You did a fine job. I’m sure you convinced him he had scored a necklace to retire on.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Allworthy was holding his hand again. This time Hope liked it more than before.

  10. ‘I get the feeling you two haven’t been introduced yet.’

  Hope was standing at street level to the Chanin Building, swaying from side to side like a flagpole in a gale as he gazed far up to the crenellated top. He was pale and haggard and was on the verge of tumbling over. Bobby Senton Carpets strode forward and grabbed him.

  ‘You alright?’ he railed. ‘You look like dog-droppings. Did you even sleep last night?’

  ‘Sort of.’

  ‘This ain’t the type of job where you can catch up on a few winks on the company’s time.’ Before letting him go, Carpets gave him a hard shake. ‘I’ve spent much of my life high above the ground and if there’s one thing I’ve learnt is that gravity is an unforgiving son of a bitch. I mean it. Watching good people fall makes a bigger impression on you than it does on the ground.’

  Hope looked at him through bloodshot eyes and scratched the stubble where a razor might usually have passed. ‘I’m really alright. You bring the paint?’

  ‘It’s over by the entrance. And the rope, which I’ll be tempted to tie around your neck.’

  Hope sighed. ‘And you went to bed early last night?’

  ‘By your standards excruciatingly early.’

  ‘Well, why would I want to sleep if it’s going to make me as grumpy as you?’

  Carpets pushed him away. ‘The rarefied air of skyscrapers has been starving your brain of oxygen. Now you’re sure you want to go up today? They’ve installed a flagpole just so we can paint it and they have it sitting way over the edge of the observatory. And believe me, you won’t hit the pavement any less hard just because your picture is in the pa
per. In fact, it would merely be something to mop up the mess with.’

  Hope rubbed his forehead. He had been managing to separate the words from his headache, but not anymore.

  ‘Let’s go up,’ he said. He spotted out the paints, ropes and other supplies and headed that way. The entrance was hectic with the last of the rush hour office crowd scampering to not be late, far removed from the artistry of terra-cotta frieze above them. One portly man, however, exquisitely dressed in an auburn tweed suit, was in no rush. He ambled over to Hope with dead eyes and a sneer leaking a glimpse of pearly white teeth.

  ‘If I’m not mistaken, you’re the roof painter,’ he said in a voice of studied formality. ‘You’re here to do the Chanin?’

  Hope squinted. He looked at the man but did not say anything. With a shrill laugh the man added: ‘Well, if that’s what it takes these days for the great American hero to make ends meet, the least I can do is chip in.’ He plucked twenty dollars out of his over-sized wallet and stuffed it into Hope’s breast pocket. ‘Buy yourself a new brush, my friend.’

  Hope watched him walk away into the building. He did not even notice that Carpets had returned beside him.

  ‘So you’re taking tips now?’ Carpets murmured. He was holding a can of Oregon Prime paint and brushes and utility belts, and coiled ropes were hanging off his shoulders.

  ‘You’re right, I might not quite be in a condition for painting roofs just yet,’ said Hope with a taut voice. ‘Get yourself a late breakfast or an early lunch or whatever you want to call it.’

  ‘A gentleman would know it’s called brunch.’

  ‘And I suppose a gentleman wouldn’t know who he was?’

  ‘But you do?’

  ‘His name is Ario Flinger. A bad sort. He married a wealthy socialite and she married into an early grave. Murdered in an alley. And Flinger could never explain why they had wandered that way in the first place. But the cops didn’t have enough to ask him to spell it out in front of a judge and jury. And so that’s how it is for him. A life of giving tips.’

  ‘What are you going to do about it?’ Carpets was suspicious.

  Hope took the twenty dollars out of his pocket and looked it over. ‘Just a drop in the ocean. But it’s the kind of drop that gives a fish a taste.’ He stuffed the money into Carpets’s pocket in turn. ‘For your brunch. I’ll meet you back here in an hour.’

  He started for the Chanin Building lobby. Carpets followed. ‘Twenty dollars is not lunch, it’s dinner for the whole family. I’ll keep it for that. I’ll be on the roof.’

  ‘Suit yourself.’ Hope hastened his steps away, getting the feeling Carpets would be trying to tie the safety rope around his waist right now given half the chance. He entered the skyscraper and Carpets did not follow. The lobby was busy, particularly around the elevators. Ario Flinger was nowhere to be seen. Not surprising, for he was not the type for the back of queues. Hope, however, was unphased, having already decided upon his course of action: to know what went on in the streets there was no better source than a taxi driver, and for a building it was the elevator jockeys. He pulled out the police badge Assistant District Attorney Errol Jones had provided him for emergencies and stepped in amongst the throng of office workers jostling to go up.