Scimitar

by Ed McBain

  “How about those other two?” a woman said. She was wearing purple slacks and a white silk blouse unbuttoned very low on her tanned chest.

  “Got to be some kind of satanic cult,” the man with her said. He was wearing a boldly striped Tommy Hilfiger sports shirt.

  “The newspapers didn’t say what kind of tattoos, though, did you notice?” someone else said.

  Sonny was instantly alert.

  “Or where on the body they were located.”

  “Probably you-know-where,” a woman said, and giggled.

  “Tell us where, Sally,” a man suggested.

  “Two women with tattoos, I think that’s odd,” another woman said. “You don’t find too many women with tattoos these days.”

  “Oh, there must be thousands of them, Jean.”

  “Two women with tattoos? Both of them shot with the same gun?”

  “Very odd.”

  “Very very odd.”

  “I think this new one is even odder. A man in a laundry bin? Jesus!”

  “Wasn’t a musician killed on the roof of the Hilton a little while back?” a woman asked.

  “That was Carnegie Hall,” the man with her said. “The roof of Carnegie Hall. She was some kind of musician.”

  “Lincoln Center,” someone said.

  “A cellist,” someone said.

  “I thought a flautist,” someone said.

  “Watch your language,” someone said, and everyone laughed.

  “Will you be covering the President’s speech on the Fourth?” Sonny asked the man from CBS.

  Geoffrey was telling her that once, when he was thirteen years old, he pretended he’d had a fist fight—and faked a resultant black eye—just to impress a girl with hair as blond as Elita’s.

  They were sipping their cocktails and munching on the complimentary bruschetta their waiter had brought to the table. The place was an Italian restaurant on Fifty-third and Third. Geoffrey had earlier told her that he often came here for lunch, but that it sometimes got hectic at dinnertime.

  “Unless you enjoy looking at Woody Allen,” he’d said.

  Woody Allen wasn’t here tonight. Nor was the place particularly crowded at a little past seven o’clock.

  “Although hers was curly,” he said.

  “Mine used to be curly,” Elita said. “It got absolutely straight when I turned twelve.”

  “A miracle,” he said.

  “No, I think it had something to do with … well, never mind. But how can anyone fake a black eye?”

  “With water-soluble pencils,” he said.

  “With what?”

  “They’re these colored pencils you can draw with dry, or else dip them in water and use them like water colors.”

  “I still don’t …”

  “I used them wet. Under my left eye. To draw a bruise. I must tell you it was an absolutely perfect shiner, all blues and greens and yellows, magnificent, a bruise of monstrous proportions. Judith never once doubted its authenticity. That was her name. Judith. I was madly in love with her. Well, with her hair, actually.”

  “But why’d you pretend you’d had a fist fight?”

  “To show her how much I adored her. I told her a great bully of a boy had said something derogatory about her honor, and I’d punched him halfway round the crescent before he landed a solid blow to my eye. I allowed the bruise to fade a bit each day, using the wet pencils, changing the color. It was quite the most brilliant bit of art I’d ever done.”

  “Do you still draw?”

  “Not under my eye anymore. And only every now and again.”

  “Are you good at it?”

  “Not very.”

  “I can’t draw a straight line.”

  “I do it because I find it relaxing.”

  “No one’s ever faked a black eye for me,” she said.

  “I’ll paint one on the next time I see you,” he said. “I still have the pencils.”

  She imagined him at thirteen, probably long and lanky, with the same eyelashes he had now, lashes a girl would kill for, standing before a mirror and decorating his eye with blues, yellows and greens …

  The scimitar.

  Under Sonny’s left pectoral.

  The brightest green imaginable.

  The green of a lizard’s eye.

  She visualized him standing before her naked …

  “Something?” Geoffrey said.

  She blinked at him as though coming out of a trance.

  “You seemed very far away for a moment,” he said.

  “Sorry, I was … just thinking how hungry I am.”

  “Shall we get some menus then?” he asked.

  “Do you live in New York?” a woman was asking Sonny. Except for Carolyn, she was quite the most attractive woman here. Sonny expected she was somewhere in her fifties, with a face-lift engineered by an expert. She was standing very close to him. Dark hair cut close to her face. Brown eyes looking up at him.

  “No, I’m from San Diego,” he said.

  “Where in San Diego?” Carolyn asked. She had not moved an inch from his side the moment the brunette appeared.

  “Well, El Cajon, actually,” he said. “Are you familiar with it?”

  “No,” Carolyn said, “not really.”

  “I live on Garwood Avenue,” he said, making up a name on the spot.

  “I love San Diego,” the brunette interrupted.

  Careful, he thought.

  “But I haven’t been there in years,” she said.

  “It’s changed a lot,” he said.

  “I’m sure. What do you do out there?”

  “I run a small cable company,” he said.

  “You do? How exciting!”

  Careful, he thought again.

  “We do informational programs,” he said. “Mostly medical.”

  Back to safer ground.

  “Like what?” Carolyn asked.

  “Oh, a wide variety of topics intended to keep the layman informed. As for example, how to detect the early signs of various diseases. Or when to consider surgery. Or how to …”

  “Are you married, Mr. Hamilton?” the brunette asked.

  “No, I’m not. And call me Scott,” he said. “Please.”

  “Then it’s Sally,” she said, and smiled.

  “Sally,” he repeated, and returned the smile.

  “Sally,” Carolyn asked sweetly, “when does your husband get back from Boston?”

  “The food’s really quite good, don’t you think?” Geoffrey said.

  “It’s delicious.”

  “But do you see what I mean about it getting sort of crowded and noisy?”

  “That’s okay, I like noisy places,” she said.

  “You do?”

  “Yes. This pasta is fabulous.”

  She was eating penne with broccoli. He was eating the red snapper.

  “I’m glad you like it,” he said. “Shall I order another bottle of wine?”

  “No, no. Whoo, no,” she said, covering her glass with the palm of her hand. “So is New York the first assignment you’ve ever had?” she said.

  “No, my first one was in Dublin.”

  “Is Ireland nice?”

  “Oh, terrific. Well, not where they’re shooting and killing people. But, yes, Dublin is …”

  “How about that murder right here at the Hilton?” she said, and rolled her eyes.

  “The city’s getting absolutely frightening, isn’t it?”

  “Getting?”

  “Well, it is already, isn’t it? You’re quite right.”

  “I didn’t catch all of it, I turned it on when I came out of the shower. Was he a guest there, or what?”

  “No, a detective. The victim, do you mean?”

  “Yes.”

  “A detective. Actually, it’s the oddest thing. I know him.”

  “You do?” she said, and opened her blue eyes wide, causing him to want nothing more in that instant than to lean over the table and kiss her.


  “Well, he’s not a personal friend or anything near,” he said, “but we did have some business of a sort, Do you remember the two women I told you about? With the tattoos and the false passports?”

  “Yes?”

  “He was the detective who … you don’t suppose they’re related, do you?”

  “The women?”

  “No, the murders. His murder and theirs. He was investigating them, you see. The other murders. Do you think they know that?”

  “Who?”

  “The police. His superiors.”

  “I would guess so.”

  “Perhaps I should give them a call. Mention the possibility.”

  “Might not be a bad idea. But I’m sure they know what he was working on. That’s something they’d check immediately.”

  “Yes, I’m sure you’re right. Do you really enjoy noisy places?”

  “Yes. Truly.”

  “Do you like to dance?”

  “Yes.”

  “Would you like to meet Margaret Thatcher?”

  “Sure,” she said breezily. “Frank Sinatra, too.”

  “You’re really quite lovely, do you know?” he said.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Would you like to walk up to Fifth?” he asked. “When we’re finished here? I love Fifth Avenue in the summertime, don’t you?”

  “I love it all the time,” she said.

  “Well, shall we then?” he asked. “We can walk up to Fifth and then up Central Park South to Rumpelmayer’s. Do you like ice cream sundaes?”

  “I love them,” she said.

  “In England, we’re sadly lacking places that specialize in them, more’s the pity. There’s one called Marine Ices, on the way to Hampstead, in Chalk Farm, but it’s not widely known and not very central. There’s always Fortnum’s, I suppose, but really there’s nothing in London quite like Rumpelmayer’s. Do you think you might care for some ice cream?”

  “Yes, I think I would.”

  “Well, splendid,” he said, beaming. “Super!”

  “Sunsets out here always remind me of a Syd Solomon painting,” Carolyn said.

  Sonny didn’t know who Syd Solomon was.

  “A marvellous abstract expressionist,” she explained. “He lives out here part of the year. Sagaponock. I met him at a party once. He’s a delightful man, and a wonderful artist.”

  The crowd was beginning to thin, one or two guests disappearing each time the sun dropped a bit lower on the horizon, the brilliant colors of the sunset dissipating, the sky becoming streaky and blurred.

  “Looks like we should be leaving,” she said. “Before they put the chairs up on the tables. Let’s say good night to our hosts, shall we?”

  She took his arm, and led him off the deck, back into the house. Out on the ocean, the sun was all but gone, the sky stained a violent purple immediately above the water, the color graduating to a deep blue, and then the blackest black high above, where only a single star shone.

  “Good night, Phil,” Carolyn said to their host, and offered her cheek to him. “Marge,” she said, and kissed her hostess as well.

  “Thank you for including me,” Sonny said.

  “It was a pleasure having you,” Marge said by rote, and turned to another departing guest.

  “Want to walk back on the beach?” Carolyn asked.

  “Sure,” he said.

  They climbed the wooden steps over the dune. The night was still except for the sound of the waves rushing the shore. She took off her sandals, holding his hand for support. Still holding his hand, the sandals dangling by their straps in her other hand, she began walking with him up the beach.

  “If we’re going into town,” she said, “we’ll need a car. That is … well … would you like to have dinner together?” she asked;

  “Sure,” he said.

  “I should have asked first,” she said. “I just thought …”

  “I’d really like to,” he said.

  “Good,” she said. “Though to tell the truth, I’m not all that hungry.”

  “Neither am I,” he said.

  They walked in silence for several moments. He could hear the murmur of the ocean against the shore. He could hear her breathing beside him in the darkness.

  “Why don’t I take some hamburgers out of the freezer?” she said.

  “Okay,” he said.

  They walked a bit farther in silence.

  “Start a little fire on the grill,” she said.

  “Okay,” he said.

  She stopped suddenly. Turned to him. She was still holding his hand. Standing quite close to him now. Sandals hanging from the other hand. She looked up into his face. Raised the hand holding the sandals, and draped it over his shoulder, the sandals dangling. Moved in closer to him, released his hand, and brought her liberated hand up behind his neck, the fingers widespread. He heard her catch her breath.

  “Start a little fire,” she whispered, and kissed him.

  10

  Tuesday morning, the last day of June, dawned bright and hot and harsh. In the four-poster bed in the master bedroom of Martin Hackett’s beach house, Carolyn blinked her eyes open as sunlight struck her full in the face, a single slash of light knifing its way through the narrow opening where the drapes failed to meet. Disoriented for a moment, the blink of annoyance turned to one of confusion. Where …?

  And then she remembered.

  And rolled over to see if he was still there, her delicious swordsman with the green tattoo on his chest.

  There were only rumpled sheets beside her.

  “Scott?” she called.

  There was no answer.

  “Scott?”

  “Yes?”

  Thank God, she thought.

  “Good morning,” she called.

  “Good morning.”

  His voice was coming from the bottom of the stairs. She got out of bed, went to the chair where she’d tossed her slip the night before, and slipped it on over her head. Not quite as form-fitting as the one Kathleen Turner had worn in Cat, but that one had been hand-tailored, and this one was snug enough. Carolyn was thirty-nine years old and knew that whereas total nudity might be wonderful at the Metropolitan, it wasn’t too terrific when it came to seduction.

  Nobody had eaten any hamburgers last night.

  They’d come directly back here, which she’d preferred, anyway, just in case the gentleman turned out to be a dud, a premise she’d sincerely doubted after their first kiss, when she was standing close enough to him to make some fairly accurate predictions and entertain some reasonably great expectations. Better nonetheless to be in his bedroom, or at least Martin Hackett’s bedroom, where she could leave whenever she chose, rather than in her own bedroom, where she might have difficulty evicting a poor lover at best or a violent maniac at worst.

  Barefoot now, and wearing only the white slip, she stepped into the doorframe at the top of the stairwell. He was standing below, looking up at her.

  “Hi,” she said.

  “Hi.”

  “You’re up early.”

  “I got hungry.”

  “Is there coffee?”

  “Eggs, too, if you’d like me to make some.”

  “I’ll be right down,” she said.

  She went into the bathroom at the end of the hall, squelched a desire to peek into Martin Hackett’s medicine cabinet, washed her face instead, squeezed toothpaste from a tube on the sink, used her forefinger to brush her teeth, and then performed what The Late Colonel used to call her “morning toilette”—didn’t his redheaded driver ever pee?

  She went back into the bedroom, and debated putting on the high-heeled sandals again; the first time he’d fucked her last night, she was wearing only the sandals. She decided they might look a little trashy so early in the morning, opted instead for the Barefoot Contessa look, and went downstairs to where he was sitting at the kitchen table reading The New York Times. He was wearing a black silk robe sashed at the waist, a red monogram over the
breast pocket, the letters MH. For Martin Hackett, she thought. Wears a black silk robe, how about that for a lobster fisherman?

  He put down the newspaper at once.

  “How would you like your eggs?” he asked.

  “No good-morning kiss?” she said, and went immediately into his arms.

  “Good morning,” he said.

  “Good morning,” she said, and kissed him fiercely.

  “Listen, if you want those eggs …” he said.

  “You know what I want,” she said, and kissed him again.

  She could feel him growing immediately hard in the opening of the black silk robe, pressing his naked hardness against the thin nylon of the slip. Let him suffer a bit, she thought, and pulled away from him, and said, “Know how to make an omelette?”

  “How many eggs?” he asked, and grinned. Knowing the game. Enjoying it. The grin telling her he was going to fuck her brains out the minute she finished breakfast. Good, she thought. Do it.

  “Two,” she said, and sat at the kitchen table, and crossed her legs.

  “Want some orange juice?” he asked.

  “Please,” she said.

  Watching him. The way he moved. So sinuously.

  He poured a small glass of juice for her, carried it to the table. She picked up the glass, drank.

  “Coffee now or later?” he asked.

  “Some now, some later,” she said.

  “Mmm,” he said, and slid his hand up her leg and under the slip.

  She let his hand stay on her for a moment, working her for a moment, then gently took it away.

  “My coffee,” she said.

  He went to the stove, poured her a cup, carried it back to the table. She poured a little milk into it, and then sipped at it. It was strong and it was hot. At the stove, he was cracking eggs into a bowl.

  “What’s in the paper?” she asked, and picked up the Times.

  “I didn’t get past the front page. Bush is coming to town.”

  “So I see, the bastard.”

  “You don’t like him?”

  “Do I like scorpions? I wish someone would shoot him.”

  “That would leave us with Quayle.”

  “Shoot him, too,” she said, and turned to where he was beating the eggs. There was an odd look on his face. Smile on his mouth, eyebrows raised in surprise. “Don’t tell me,” she said. “You’re a staunch Republican, right?”