Cone hangs up, satisfied that he’s started one wheel turning. Figuring he’s given Hiram Haldering enough sweat for one day, he pulls on his parka and cap, shoves the solid Buddha in Samantha’s shopping bag, and, carrying that, heads for home.
As he leaves the building, he spots a tall, scrawny guy wearing a ratty trench coat and a black slouch hat, like a foreign correspondent from the 1930s. He’s leaning against a mailbox, mumbling to himself and shifting his weight slowly from foot to foot.
Just one of your Manhattan weirdos, Cone figures, and turns north on Broadway. Two blocks later, he stops for the sign to change from DON’T WALK to WALK, and sees the nut case in the trench coat standing at his elbow, still mumbling.
Having learned to live defensively in New York, Cone slows to let the mumbler get ahead of him. But no dice; the trench coat begins to saunter, too, staying about fifteen feet behind the Wall Street dick. Cone stops to look in a shop window with a tasteful display of plastic Christmas trees and Styrofoam ornaments. The weirdo stops and stares around vaguely.
If he’s shadowing, Cone figures he’s got to be the most inept tail since General Hood lost track of General Sherman at the Battle of Atlanta. The mumbler sticks at Cone’s heels for three more blocks. Then the investigator decides to dump him. Cone darts out into oncoming traffic on Chambers Street, sprinting, pausing, pirouetting like a ballet dancer. He makes it to the other side, bones intact, ignoring the screams of infuriated drivers. He looks back. The trench coat is still hesitating on the curb, waiting for the light to change.
He walks home at a faster pace, proud of his performance. He stops at a local deli, picks up barbecued pork ribs, a container of potato salad, and a cold six-pack of Heineken. When he comes out of the store, the mumbler is across the street, inspecting the heavens.
“Shit!” Timothy says aloud, startling a young couple who are walking by, holding hands.
Up in the loft, door locked, bolted, and chained, he sets out his evening meal. Cleo sits patiently on the floor at his side, waiting for discarded bones.
Cone works his way through two pounds of ribs, a half pound of potato salad, and two cans of beer. Then he goes to the front window and pulls the torn shade aside. The tall, scrawny guy is standing in the doorway of a closed Japanese sushi joint across Broadway. Even at a distance, Cone can see him slowly weaving from side to side. Got to be stoned out of his gourd, Cone decides.
“Ah, the hell with it,” he tells Cleo. “I shall return carrying my shield or on it.”
That doesn’t impress the cat at all.
He pulls on his cap and anorak. Then he transfers the .357 Magnum from ankle holster to the parka’s right-hand pocket, goes downstairs, and crosses to the other side of Broadway.
“Mr. Laboris, I presume,” he says, walking up to the tail.
“Beat it, bum,” the guy says. He doesn’t look like a Laboris: too tall, too pale, too thin. He’s got a saber of a nose, his teeth are tarnished clunks, the eyes are black aggies.
“What are you on?” Cone asks. “I’ll make one guess: smack—right? Really good stuff?”
“Get lost,” the man says hoarsely. “I’m waiting for someone.”
“You’re waiting for death,” Cone says. “It could be me if you keep tramping up my heels. Who hired you?”
The guy straightens up from his slouch. He takes a deep breath. “You asked for it,” he says.
“Oh-ho,” the Wall Street dick says. “We seem to have a little altercation brewing here. Okay, put up your dukes.”
Cone raises balled fists, begins dancing about the other man, tossing short punches at the air, stubbing his nose with a thumb.
“Come on,” he says. “Lay on, Macduff, and damned be him who first cries, ‘Hold, enough!’”
“My name ain’t Macduff.”
Cone reaches out to slap the man’s face lightly. “No?” Slap. “What is it?” Slap. “What is it?” Slap.
“You stop that!” a woman says. “Stop beating that man!”
Cone turns to see a middle-aged couple: mink coat and British short-warm. The man is trying to tug the woman away.
“I’m not beating him,” Cone says. “I just want to punish him. He raped my cat.”
“He what?!”
“You heard me,” Cone says. “Bestiality. Disgusting.”
“Come along, Cynthia,” the man says.
“I’m going to call the police,” the woman says defiantly.
“Yeah,” Cone says, “you do that. Tell them I’ve cornered the mad cat rapist who’s been terrorizing lower Manhattan.”
“You prick,” the mumbler says when the couple scurries away. “You’re a rotten, no-good prick.”
“Who hired you?” Cone asks, slapping the guy’s face again, harder this time.
Cone thought he was stoned, out on his feet, but the gink moves fast. His hand comes out of his trench coat pocket, there’s a snick and a click, and six inches of raw knife blade gleam dully. And he knows how to use it, not gripped like a dagger, hand raised to strike a blow, but knuckles down, ready for a smooth stab or slash.
“Come ahead,” Cone says, knowing he hasn’t got time to start fumbling for his iron. “Make your play. Do what you’re getting paid to do.”
The guy lurches, but he’s clumsy, hasn’t got the moves. Cone feints, then goes in under the steel. He gets a solid wrist lock, twists, then turns the whole arm. He raises his own knee and brings the other man’s arm down hard. There’s a satisfying crack! The knife clatters to the sidewalk.
“You hurt me,” the man says wonderingly, looking down at his dangling arm. “I think it’s busted.”
“I think so, too,” Cone says. “I’ll bet it hurts.”
Then, when the guy’s eyes glaze over and he begins to fall, the Wall Street dick catches him under the arms and eases him down. He’d like to search him, but Cynthia in the mink coat might have made good on her threat to call the cops. So Cone recrosses Broadway and climbs the six floors to the loft.
He mixes a muscular vodka and water and paces up and down the loft, drinking, waiting for his adrenaline level to get back to normal, and trying to figure who sicced the mumbler on him, and for what reason. It just doesn’t make sense. Why hire a spaced-out junkie to scrag someone? And Laboris Importers already knew his home address—if the hophead was paid to track him to his wallow.
He gives up trying to puzzle it out. He freshens his drink (with vodka, not water), and sits again at the rickety table. He takes the solid Buddha from the Macy’s shopping bag and sets it on the floor. Cleo comes padding over to investigate.
The denutted tom stares at the statuette, sniffs it all over, then begins rubbing his flanks against the smooth teak belly.
“Keep rubbing, kiddo,” Timothy Cone says, “and make a wish. Maybe you’ll get your balls back.”
The next morning, he’s on his second cup of black coffee and second cigarette when the wall phone rings in the kitchen. It makes a loud, shrill jangle and sends Cleo scuttling under the bathtub.
“Yeah?” Cone says.
“Neal Davenport,” the NYPD detective says. “Don’t you ever go to work on time?”
“Nah. But I make up for getting in late; I leave early. What’s up?”
“Not me, that’s for sure,” Davenport says. “Had your first laugh of the day?”
“I could use a mild chuckle.”
“Late last night the blues in your precinct picked up a clunk in the doorway of a sushi bar right across the street from where you live. That’s a laugh, isn’t it?”
“A corpse?”
“Deader than Paddy’s pig.”
“How’d he go?”
“Knife. The preliminary report says he was stabbed three times in the gut, and then a final cut tickled his heart, and that was it. He’s been ID’d as Sidney Leonidas. That name mean anything to you?”
“Yeah,” Cone says. “Leonidas was the king of Sparta in the fourth century B.C.”
“I don’t think i
t was him,” Davenport says. “This one was a junkie. He was covered with ulcerated needle tracks. The docs figure that even if someone hadn’t offed him, he’d have OD’d from shooting shit, probably sooner than later.”
“Very interesting. But why are you telling me all this?”
“Because every time something happens on your block, I get antsy about you. You do crazy things and then leave it to us to pick up the garbage.”
“Yeah, but I deliver, don’t I? Maybe not right away, but eventually.”
“Well … maybe,” the city dick says grudgingly. “How’s the Laboris thing coming along?”
“Slowly. Nothing to report.”
“And if there was, you wouldn’t talk, you tight-mouthed bastard. Look, Cone, if you’ve got anything that’ll help us on this homicide, spit it out.”
“I don’t know a damned thing about it.”
“The guy had a busted right wing. You know anything about that?”
“Not a thing.”
“Shit!” the city bull says disgustedly. “You and your goddamned secrets. One of these days you’re going to realize that you’ve got to go along to get along.”
“Did you find the knife?” Cone asks.
“What?”
“The knife that killed this Sidney Leonidas. Did you find it?”
“That’s just when I mean,” Davenport says indignantly. “You want to pick my brains, but you won’t open up to me. All right, I’ll toss you a crumb: No, we did not find the murder weapon. Now just remember you owe me one.”
“Thanks,” Cone says. “I’ll be in touch.” And he hangs up.
He peers out his front window and, across Broadway, sees NYPD sawhorses around the sushi bar. There’s one uniformed cop on duty, talking to a few of the rubbernecks. Otherwise no activity. Cone pulls on cap and parka, checks his ankle holster, and sets out to trudge down to John Street.
Meteorologists have been predicting a white Christmas, and it sure smells like one. It’s cold enough for a wet snow, and the air is thick, clotted, and beads on Cone’s leather cap. He plods along steadily, reacting automatically to traffic lights and pedestrian flow, but oblivious to the cityscape. He’s pondering the murder of Sidney Leonidas.
He knows from experience that nine times out of ten the solution to any problem is the most obvious one. In the case of the mumbler’s death, the evident explanation is that some villain came along, maybe a junkie himself, saw a guy passed out in a dark doorway, and decided to pick him clean. But Leonidas roused and put up a fight. The knife was there, handy on the sidewalk, so the mugger grabbed it up and made the muggee’s quietus with a bare bodkin.
It listens—but could Leonidas put up a fight with a busted right arm? Cone doesn’t think so. A little old lady on crutches could have lifted the guy’s wallet and shoes; he was in no condition to offer resistance. He was out when Cone left him.
So the obvious doesn’t have all the answers. The next best guess is that Sidney Leonidas was done in deliberately, with malice aforethought. Someone wanted him gone.
The Wall Street dick doesn’t enjoy that idea. Because the logical perpetrator might well be a guy who hired the mumbler to waste Cone and followed him to make sure the job was done properly. Then, when he witnessed the confrontation between the two and saw his assassin chopped down and laid to rest in the doorway, the boss decided he better get rid of his junked-up mug in case he had told or might tell Cone or the cops who he was working for.
That scenario holds together, but it makes Timothy look like a pointy-head. It means that while the mumbler was following him to his loft from the office, there was a second shadow behind both of them, keeping an eye on the action and ready to take over if things got hairy. And Cone had never been aware of a second tail.
He doesn’t like it. There are a lot of desperadoes in New York, and the knave who hired Sidney Leonidas will probably not quit after one failure. He’ll come on again. And again. That realization makes for an itch between the shoulder blades and a tendency to flinch at any loud street noise.
Now I know how the President feels, Cone thinks—but that’s no comfort.
Sergeant MacEver is waiting in the reception room of Haldering & Co. He’s dressed dapperly and carrying an attaché case of black alligator. Cone leads the way to his office.
“Beautiful,” the sergeant says, looking around. “This place should be condemned.”
“It has been,” Cone tells him. “We’re just waiting for the wrecker’s ball. I think they’re going to build a skyscraper or a parking lot or something. Take a chair.”
MacEver sits down, still wearing his natty fur-collared chesterfield and a trooper’s cap of black mink.
“About that sting on the Laboris Gallery,” he says. “I think maybe we can finagle it.”
“Good,” Cone says. “Best news I’ve had today.”
“But I don’t have an absolute go-ahead. You know how the Department works; no one wants to stick his neck out, in case it ends up a complete disaster. But I did get tentative approval to put the play in action. Here’s how I plot it: We follow your original scenario. You make the first approach. I’m your rich brother-in-law, in New York on a business trip. I’m a nut collector of antique swords, and I’m especially interested in getting hold of some old blades from the Near East. You with me so far?”
“I’m following.”
“Okay,” the sergeant says. He leans down to open his attaché case, pulls out an 8 x 10 b & w photo and hands it to Cone. “That’s what we’re looking for.”
Cone inspects the grainy photograph. “Looks like a hunk of junk to me.”
“Does it? Well, they’re maybe seventy or eighty of them in the world that have been definitely identified and dated. This particular blade is Assyrian and was hand-forged around the sixth century B.C. They were still making iron swords then, but using bronze for the hilts. Anyway, this one was stolen from a Beirut museum about six months ago.”
“What’s it worth?” Cone asks.
“Hard to say. Who would want a rusty piece of old iron except a museum or a collector? It’s worth whatever you can get for it. I’m just telling you all this stuff as background, d’ya see. When you make your pitch to Erica Laboris, all you know is that you’ve got a wealthy relative who’s ape for antique swords from the Middle East.”
“I dig. I make the intro and then you show up and take it from there.”
“Right,” MacEver says approvingly. “We’ll play this very cozily and see what the lady suggests. When can you start the ball rolling?”
“Today,” Cone says. “Maybe this morning. You want me to use your real name?”
“No,” the sergeant says. “Too risky. I’ve got some business cards from an insurance outfit in Dallas that I’ve helped out on a few things. They’ll cover for me. Here, take it and leave it with the mark.”
He hands a card to Cone. It reads: J. Ransom Bailey, Agent, Fugelmann Insurance Co., Inc., Dallas, Texas.
“If Erica Laboris checks with them,” MacEver says, “they’ll swear I’m one of their most successful salesmen.”
“J. Ransom Bailey,” Cone says, pocketing the card. “Very elegant. And what are you doing in New York?”
“Attending a convention of insurance agents at the Hilton: guys who have topped fifty million in sales for the past year. It’s legit; the convention is starting tomorrow, and Bailey is registered at the Hilton.”
“You make a great diddler,” Cone says admiringly. “Looks to me like you’ve covered your tracks just fine.”
“Not the first time I’ve done this,” Terry MacEver says. He snaps shut his attaché case and rises. “Give me a call after you’ve seen Erica Laboris and tell me how it went. Don’t press too hard and don’t, for God’s sake, mention that stolen Assyrian sword I showed you.”
“I’m not an amateur bamboozler myself,” Cone says. “I’ll act the rube. I’ll do everything but say, ‘Aw, shucks.’ Don’t worry; if the lady can be had, she will be had.”
“Tell her I’ll only be in New York till Christmas Eve, and then I’m flying back to Dallas. Just to put a little heat on her, d’ya see. When I talk to her, I’ll turn the burner up a bit higher. If she’s dealing stolen art, she’ll want to close the deal as soon as possible.”
“I’ll call you as soon as I’ve made contact,” Cone promises.
After MacEver leaves, he lights a Camel and reviews the planned sting. He can’t see any glaring loopholes. If Erica Laboris is foursquare, then the whole scam is dead. But if she takes the bait, then they should be able to hang her by the heels. It all depends on the intensity of the lady’s greed.
Which has, of course, apparently nothing to do with Laboris Investments, Inc., of Wall Street. This case, which started as a simple investigation of an investment firm, has now flushed a covey of cousins, and Cone is up to his pipik in possible heroin smuggling and possible art theft.
What it calls for, he decides, is juggling, sleight of hand, and a dark vision of the human race which may or may not be one of God’s jokes.
He gets up to the Laboris Gallery a little before noon, and walks by once, scoping the place. As far as he can see, no customers—which pleases him.
When he goes marching in, doffing his cap, Ingrid Laboris, the cream puff, comes dollying up, giggling like a maniac.
“I knew you would return,” she says. “I just knew it!”
“Did you?” Timothy Cone says, beaming. “That’s more than I did. How’ya doing? Busy?”
“Not so much,” Ingrid says, pouting prettily. “Not so many people shop for Levantine antiques for Christmas presents. You are interested in something?”
“Yeah. Your cousin Erica. Is she around?”
“Oh, yes. In the back office. I shall tell her you are here.”
She sashays away. He watches her go, cursing his unbridled lust.
But then Erica comes stalking, cooling him down. She’s wearing a black leather sheath that looks like a tube, tight enough to squeeze her out both ends. But there’s no come-on about her; she’s aloof, sure.
Timothy Files Page 30