16 Hitman

by Parnell Hall

"That's not the case at all. Though it's an awfully good suggestion"

  I sighed. "Okay. What about the other end?"

  "What other end?"

  "Marsden."

  "I ran Marsden for you, remember? Contract killer with ties to Tony Fusilli. Strictly small-time"

  "That was when he was alive and kicking. Now he's dead, he's more important.You say he worked for Tony Fusilli."

  "So?"

  "And Frankie Delgado?"

  "Same thing."

  "Just what is Tony Fusilli involved in that would require the services of a hitman? More to the point, what is Tony Fusilli involved in that might shorten the life of a Manhattan schoolteacher?"

  "Sounds simple, doesn't it?"

  "Simple and obvious. I don't know why you haven't already done it."

  "Well, for one thing, it's not my case. But if it were, what could I do? Investigating Tony Fusilli is no walk in the park."

  "The cops are scared of him? You ask him questions, wind up dead?"

  "That's not the point. You don't just walk up to Tony Fusilli. Tony Fusilli has lawyers, and layers and layers of protection. You wanna find out something about Tony Fusilli, you do it discreetly on the sly."

  MacAullif took out a cigar, drummed it on his desk. "That's for starters. Then you factor in the diversity of the man's holdings. Tony Fusilli has real estate. Tony Fusilli has trucking. Tony Fusilli has import/export of everything from olive oil to automobiles. And that's his legitimate business. Then there's all the fucking stuff he shouldn't be doing. Do you know how many people are lining up to talk about that?"

  "You don't have to dig into all that. You just have to find a logical connection to Martin Kessler."

  MacAullif stuck the cigar in his mouth as if he were going to smoke it. He wasn't, of course. His doctor had made him quit. But he waggled it at a jaunty angle.

  "Be my guest"

  42

  TONY FusILLI LIVED IN A fortress. A thirty-three-story building on Tenth Avenue in the garment district. Tony owned the whole thing. His penthouse triplex was rumored to be nice. Not that anyone had ever seen it. The majority of Tony's work force never made it past the thirtieth floor.

  I didn't even make it past the lobby.

  "Who?" demanded a uniformed security guard/doorman who looked like he could have played tackle for the New York Giants. At one time he probably did.

  "I want to see Tony Fusilli."

  "Is he expecting you?"

  That was one of those questions you answer it wrong, you're out on your ear. It was a close call, but I figured the wrong answer was yes. He'd check, discover the lie, and tie me into a few perfect sailor's knots. "No" didn't seem promising either, but it had the advantage of being the truth.

  I gave it a try.

  "Then he won't see you," the guard said promptly.

  "But he wants to see me," I said. "At least he will when he knows I'm here. How would I tell him I'm here?"

  "You would call him on the phone."

  "That phone?" I said, pointing to the one on the security desk.

  "Sure"

  I picked up the phone, said, "What's the number?"

  "You don't have the number?"

  No.

  "How you gonna call if you don't have the number?"

  "I'll buzz upstairs. How do you buzz upstairs?"

  "I punch in the number."

  "What number?"

  "Mr. Fusilli's number.You don't have it?"

  "No.

  "Too bad."

  I hung up the phone, said, "Who can I talk to?"

  Me.

  I took a breath. "No disrespect meant, but we're kind of talked out. Who else could I talk to?"

  "You want to talk to someone else?"

  "Yes."

  "Who?"

  "One of Tony Fusilli's officers"

  "Which one?"

  "The one you have the number for"

  "I have all their numbers."

  "Okay. I want to talk to whoever has Tony Fusilli's ear."

  He shook his head. "Sorry. I have to have a name."

  "I haven't got a name."

  "Or a number."

  "Extension 23."

  He nodded approvingly. "Nice try. I'm sure some phone systems work that way."

  The guy was a son of a bitch. It occurred to nie if this were a book, I'd come back in a later chapter and give him his comeuppance. In real life, I'd probably never see him again.

  While we were arguing, Tony Fusilli came in. I'd never seen Tony Fusilli, but I knew it was him because he was wearing a pinstripe suit that cost more than your average three-bedroom condominium, and more jewelry than a fortune-teller, rap star, and sultan combined. I also knew because he came with an entourage of henchmen whose total IQ probably didn't pass a hundred, but who obviously were heavily armed, plus two geniuses by comparison-a tall man in a three-piece suit and a pudgy, curly-haired man in a rumpled jacket and tie-most likely his lawyer and his accountant.

  I also deduced it from the fact the security guard snapped to attention and said, "Good afternoon, Mr. Fusilli."

  The bejeweled Donald Trump wannabe turned a cold eye on me and said, "Who's this?"

  I couldn't ask for a better cue. "Mr. Fusilli, I need to see you. It's rather urgent"

  Cold eyes burned into me. "Was I talking to you?" To the security guard he repeated, "Who's he?"

  "He wanted to see Mr. Fusilli, but he says you're not expecting him"

  "Then why is he still here?"

  That wiped the smile off the security guard's face. I grinned at his discomfort.

  "I was just getting his story before sending him along."

  Fusilli smirked. "Oh, big shot. As if you could actually do that. Instead of just impressing hint with how important you are." He jerked a finger at the tall lawyer-looking type in the three-piece suit. "Joey, stay down here, find out what the guy wants."

  Joey nodded, started for me.

  The pudgy, curly-haired man in the rumpled jacket put out his hand and stopped him. "Joey, I need you upstairs with me. Louie, you do it."

  The rude, aggressive son of a bitch I'd taken for the big boss said, "Yes, Mr. Fusilli," and the hierarchy fell into place. The pudgy, curly-haired man in the rumpled suit was Tony Fusilli. I had pegged everyone wrong. It was almost reassuring.

  Tony and the entourage went upstairs, which left me with faux-Fusilli and the security guard.

  "Tony doesn't have his own elevator?" I observed.

  "He does," the security guard said. "But it goes straight to the thirtieth floor."

  "Motor-mouth!" Louie said. He took me by the shoulders, led me out of earshot. "What do you want with Mr. Fusilli?"

  "I want to save him some trouble."

  He scowled. "Get specific, douchebag, and I do mean now."

  "Martin Kessler."

  He was poker-faced. I'd have thought the name meant nothing. If I didn't know better.

  "What about him?" he demanded.

  "You know who he is?"

  "No.

  "That's strange. How about Victor Marsden?"

  I think his eyes flicked on that one. Though I couldn't swear to it.

  "Who's that?" he said.

  I shook my head. "Not good. Kessler you say, `What about hint?' then deny you know him. Marsden you say, `Who's he?' to head off the question of whether you know him."

  "You talk funny. Are you a cop?"

  "No"

  "I didn't think so. Let's see some III"

  I took out my investigator's license. "I'm Stanley Hastings. I want to talk to Tony Fusilli."

  He looked at my ID and laughed. "Oh. Private.You must think you're hot shit."

  I said nothing, flipped my II) closed, slipped it back in my pocket.

  He scowled. "What's your business with Fusilli?"

  "The cops can tie him to a couple of murders. I thought he'd like to know."

  "Oh, sure. If the cops could tie him to a murder, they'd be here. You know it, they know i
t, I know it. Anything else is bullshit. Like what you're bringing me."

  "You don't wanna know what I know?"

  "You don't know dick. You're on a fishing expedition. You're in here pretending you know something, hoping to get someone to talk."

  For a moron, he was right on the button. I was on a fishing expedition, which was hard to deny since I didn't know dick.

  "I know Marsden worked for Fusilli. I know Frankie Delgado did, too. The cops know it, but they're chicken-shit to act. I thought Tony might like to know how I know"

  The "Tony" was pushing it. We didn't really have a personal relationship, and this goon knew it. Still, when you're bluffing with nothing, you might as well go all in.

  He wasn't buying it. "You aren't seeing Mr. Fusilli. Anything you want to say, you say to me."

  "Martin Kessler is under police guard. You can't get to him. Whatever he knows he's gonna tell. You can keep trying to take him out if you like, but, frankly, you're just wasting button men."

  "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "I think you do. And I think Tony Fusilli's gonna be real upset when he finds out you didn't let me warn him. I would imagine he is not a good man to have angry at you."

  If Louie was scared, he didn't show it. Except by acting even more belligerent, which could have been a sign of nervousness. Or could have been a sign of belligerence.

  "Get the fuck out of here!" he snarled.

  I did.

  43

  I PICKED UP A CRANBERRY currant scone and an iced latte from the Silver Moon Bakery and went home for lunch.

  My wife was crouching. Crouching wife, hidden agenda.

  "I've been thinking about the schoolteacher," Alice said, nibbling on my scone.

  That caught nie up short. I was two dead hitmen, one funeral, and a meeting with a mobster removed from thinking about Martin Kessler. Not to mention, when Alice said schoolteacher, my first thought was Miss Perky Breasts. In light of which, I was perfectly happy to talk about Martin Kessler.

  "What about the schoolteacher?" I said, covering beautifully.

  "If the hitman was supposed to be following him-"

  "Which hitman?"

  "Your hitman. Hitman Number 1. Victor Marsden. He was supposed to be following the schoolteacher, right?"

  "Right."

  "Did you see him?"

  "Who?"

  "The schoolteacher. Martin Kessler. When you followed Hitman Number 1, did you see him tailing the schoolteacher?"

  "No. I saw him tailing Hitman Number 2. What's-his-name. Frankie Delgado. The guy who killed him."

  "Allegedly."

  "I don't think we have to protect his reputation. The guy is dead."

  "But you saw your client tailing him?"

  "That's what I thought I saw. Now it appears what I actually spotted was Hitman Number 2 tailing him."

  "Did you see him after they dropped you at your office?"

  "Who?"

  "Hitman Number 2."

  I shook my head. "Not till he showed up at Marsden's apartment. But then I wouldn't have"

  "Why not?"

  "I was tailing Marsden."

  "You were always tailing Marsden."

  "Yeah, but he didn't know it. I mean then. Before, Marsden knew I was tailing him. It was part of the job. After he left me at the office, I figured I was done, he didn't want me anymore. So I was tailing him without his knowledge."

  Alice snorted. "As if."

  "Okay, okay. The point is, I didn't spot Hitman Number 2 because I was keeping far enough in the background so Marsden wouldn't spot me." I raised my finger. "And, Hitman Number 2 didn't spot me."

  "How do you know?"

  "If he had, he would have told Marsden."

  "What if he did?"

  I frowned. "What do you mean?"

  "Maybe that's why Marsden came down and shooed you away. Because Hitman Number 2 told him you were there. So he would have come down and chased you away even without the brilliant phone call."

  "Yeah, but . .

  "But what?"

  "Hitman Number #2 doesn't know me. How can he spot me? I'm just any other guy."

  "Who'd been following Marsden all day. He spots you following him from your office. He spots you following him back to your office. He spots you after you're presumably left at your office. It doesn't take a genius to figure out, wow, this guy's everywhere."

  I bit my lip.

  Alice took a sip of iced latte."What I can't understand is how you spot this hitman and you can't spot the schoolteacher. If Marsden was following the schoolteacher, you should have seen him."

  "I didn't know him."

  "Did you know Hitman Number 2?"

  "No. But I started seeing him in different places."

  "Ah! What a coincidence. The same way Hitman Number 2 spotted you."

  "Yeah. So?"

  "So, why didn't you spot the schoolteacher? The same way you spotted the hitman? Why didn't you see him in a few places? If Marsden's following him? You may not have known what he looked like, but you know what he looks like now, and you don't recall seeing him, do you?"

  "No"

  "So why would you miss the amateur and spot the pro?"

  "I spotted the pro because Marsden wasn't following him"

  Alice frowned. "What?"

  "Marsden was trying to keep me from spotting the guy he was following. Being a pro himself, he doesn't have much trouble doing that. On the other hand, Hitman Number 2 is following Marsden, and has no idea Marsden is being followed by anyone else. Hitman Number 2 probably spots the guy Marsden is following. He knows perfectly well who it is. He's following Marsden because Marsden hasn't killed him. Hitman Number 2 is keeping Marsden in sight, keeping the target in sight, and keeping the two of them from seeing him. What he's not looking for is someone else picking up his back trail."

  "All right, all right," Alice said. "Maybe that's why you spot the pro. But why don't you spot the schoolteacher?"

  "I have no idea. Unless Marsden wasn't following the schoolteacher."

  Alice spread her arms. "There you are.

  I blinked. "Alice. It was your idea that he was following the schoolteacher."

  "No, it wasn't."

  "With the bus, and the fish, and the Metrocard transfer. Remember?"

  Alice waved it away. "That was how it could have happened. I never said it did."

  My mouth fell open. I was sure she said it did. I just couldn't prove it. I wished, for the thousandth time, I had a microcassette recording to back me up. "Well, I certainly got that impression."

  She patted me on the cheek. "You're very impressionable."

  "If Marsden wasn't following the schoolteacher, what was he doing?"

  "Not following the schoolteacher."

  "Huh?"

  "He was supposed to be following the schoolteacher. But he wasn't. He was playing games with you. That's why he was killed. For not following the schoolteacher."

  "Isn't that the same as following the schoolteacher and not killing him? In terms of motivation, I mean?"

  "What's your point?"

  I had no idea. As usual, when talking to Alice, I found my brain two or three paragraphs behind. I had a feeling that Alice's theory about the schoolteacher was probably important, if I were only swift enough to pick up on it. But I wasn't, and Alice had once again outdebated me.

  She had also finished my scone.

  44

  I WAS IN QUEENS SHOOTING a wet floor inWendy's,always an iffy assignment.You either sit there all day waiting for someone to spill something, or you pour it on the floor yourself. Which makes me feel like a real sleaze. Which is stupid, since any picture you take is going to be staged. The soda the client slipped in isn't still there, it evaporated, or got licked up by a dog, or the floor was mopped, or whatever. So the photo for a slipped-in-water case doesn't mean shit. The attorneys for the defense will have an easy time arguing that it's inadmissible. But Richard will argue that it shows the layout
of the restaurant in question, and the judge will allow it for a limited purpose, and Richard will have won, because, limited purpose or not, the jurors aren't going to ignore the water on the floor.

  Anyway, I was contemplating buying a Diet Coke to spill, when Wendy/Janet beeped me to call MacAullif, and he told me to come in.

  "Why?" I asked, but he'd already hung up the phone.

  So I bagged the dubious photo assignment and headed back to Manhattan.

  MacAullif had a cigar out, a very bad sign. In fact, he was already drumming patterns on his desk.

  "What's up?" I asked him.

  "You recall a talk we had earlier? About Tony Fusilli?"

  "I'm not that senile, MacAullif. Get to the point."

  "I'm wondering if you made pass at the guy."

  "I'm not gay." I held up my hand. "Not that there's anything wrong with that."

  "Did you go anywhere near Fusilli, you make a move on Fusilli, you talk to anyone related to Fusilli? I mean in a business sense. Anyone in Fusilli's extended family. Anyone at all."

  "You gonna tell me why you're asking?"

  A large vein was bulging out in MacAullif's forehead. I couldn't recall having seen it before. "Just once could you answer a fucking question without asking one of your own? I need to know if you're involved with Fusilli. I'd like to get that information before someone else gets it who may not interpret it so kindly."

  "Jesus Christ, what the hell happened?"

  "Did you go see Tony Fucking Fusilli, yes or no?"

  "I saw him."

  "Jesus Christ!"

  "You broke your cigar."

  MacAullif had snapped it in two. He looked from hand to hand, seemed surprised to find it that way. "Unbelievable!"

  "You're the one who told me to do it," I protested.

  "I did nothing of the sort."

  "You said `Be my guest: When I asked if I could talk to him, you said `Be my guest. "

  "I was being sarcastic. Couldn't you tell I was being sarcastic?"

  "Must have missed it. Anyway, I went over to Fusilli's place. Not that he'd talk to me."

  "Did anyone?"

  "Now, that's another question."

  MacAullif stood up so hard his chair hit the wall. "I'm trying to cut you a break here.You don't seem to want it.' I

  "That's because I don't know what the fuck you're talking about, MacAullif. You want to stop being so cagey and let me in on the secret"