Sinner Man

by Lawrence Block

  “From there on I was looking. I noticed that drunk bothering you in the casino at the High Rise. I noticed how you sent a guard chasing after him. I was awake when he came back to report like a good little soldier. I heard the drunk’s name and address.”

  “And it was my home town.”

  “It was your home town,” she said. “We left Vegas the next day and I knew this Albert Durkinsen was something out of the past, something before Nat Crowley. I let it go for a while. I tried to figure out a little more—maybe I waited for you to turn back into a human being again. I don’t know. Then I flew to New York.”

  “And went to my home town?”

  “Eventually. Not at first—first I went through back issues of the New York Times looking for Durkinsen, which didn’t do anything for me. Then I tried Nathaniel Crowley and drew the same blank. But I didn’t expect to get anything that way. I took a train for your Connecticut town and went through the back issues of the newspaper there. I started two weeks after I met you in Buffalo and worked my way back. It wasn’t hard to find you, Nat. You were all over the front pages. You’re a local celebrity. You murdered your wife and stuffed her in a closet. That’s big news.”

  I looked down at my hands. My fingers weren’t even shaking. I was calmer than I thought possible.

  “Then I went back to New York. I found a lawyer, a very respectable lawyer. I left a letter with him. Know what it said?”

  “I can guess.”

  “I’ll save you the trouble. I’m supposed to call him once a day. When I don’t, he mails out a few copies of that letter. One goes to the police, in Buffalo. Another goes to your home town police. A third goes to the FBI. That’s my own personal insurance policy, Nat. But you know all about insurance, don’t you?”

  I didn’t answer her.

  “That leaves you sitting on a hot seat,” she continued. “You can get nailed even if you don’t kill me. All I have to do is get killed by a car on my way across the street. I can catch pneumonia and die of it and when I don’t call that lawyer—then off go my letters. If anything happens to me, Nat, the roof falls in on you.”

  I lighted another cigarette. “What’s the pitch? Blackmail?”

  “Extortion.”

  “There’s a difference?”

  “It’s only blackmail if I send you a threatening letter. It’s a technical difference, that’s all. Extortion carries a lighter sentence.” The smile was back again. “And a much lighter sentence than murder.”

  “What do they do to murderers in Connecticut?”

  “Don’t you know?”

  “I never bothered to find out.”

  “They electrocute them,” she said. “They strap them in a chair and throw a switch. But you don’t have to sit in that kind of chair, Nat. Not so long as I live.”

  “What’s in the letter?”

  “It’s a short letter. Just who you are and what you did and where you are now. Plus a few other names of people you killed here in Buffalo. But that’s extra. You could get away with those killings, Nat. But you couldn’t get out from under murdering your wife. Not with all the connections in the world.”

  And that was funny, because Ellen’s death had been manslaughter. The others were first-degree murder, and those I could get away with—if only on the grounds that New York no longer gives the death sentence except for cop killings.

  I asked her what the deal was.

  “First of all,” she said, “I move out. Out of here and into some other hotel. Maybe I’ll start with the Malmsly. Is it nice there?”

  “It’s all right.”

  “I’ll be Miss Anne Bishop again. Not somebody’s mistress. Just a nice independent girl. I’ll move out and tomorrow you can come to see me. Bring money, Nat. Ten thousand dollars.”

  “That’s a lot of money.”

  “You can spare it. I want it in cash, of course.”

  “And it’s only the beginning.”

  She shrugged easily. “Probably. Ten thousand dollars would last me a long time. But I’ve got the upper hand, Nat. I’ve got a hold. When you have a hold, then you have to put on the pressure. That’s why I went to Las Vegas with you. That’s why you’re going to pay me a lot of money for a long time. I’ve got you by the throat. I don’t intend to let go.”

  “You used to be a pretty nice kid,” I said.

  “You changed me.”

  “Nobody changes,” I said. “The more things change, the more they remain the same. I guess it holds for people, too.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It doesn’t matter. Do you hate me that much?”

  “It’s not hate. It was never love and it never got to be hate, not exactly. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Probably.”

  She walked to the closet and got her coat. I didn’t try to stop her, nor did I help her on with the coat. I just stood and watched her get into it.

  “Ten thousand dollars in cash,” she said. “I’ll be expecting you tomorrow. Make it around three in the afternoon. My lawyer will be waiting for a call at four-thirty. I don’t want to disappoint him. If I did, he’d put some letters in the mail.”

  “And that would be unpleasant.”

  “Wouldn’t it?” She smiled very sweetly. “Tomorrow at three. Pleasant dreams, Nat.”

  * * *

  I dreamed no dreams, pleasant or otherwise. I did not sleep that night. After she had gone I started to build myself a drink, then changed my mind and emptied the rye and soda in the sink. Instead I lit another cigarette and started pacing the floor. I did this until the sun came up and I didn’t get the least bit tired. When I stopped, the ashtray was overflowing for the fourth time and I was beginning to wear out the carpet.

  I had breakfast at the diner around the corner. I didn’t feel like eating but I forced a plate of scrambled eggs down my throat and washed my mouth out with coffee. I smoked another cigarette. I went back to my apartment, showered, shaved and put on a fresh suit.

  When your woman comes back, marry her, Tony had said.

  Thanks, Tony. I could do with a little advice.

  You don’t play around, Nat. You’ve got a steady deal with one broad. A good girl, not just a walking, talking piece. I knew her a long time ago. She’s a good kid.

  She was, then.

  You went nuts in Vegas. Gambling isn’t your kick, chasing isn’t your kick, nightlife isn’t your kick. You can do those things, but they don’t send you to the moon. Hell, I’m preaching a sermon. Let’s let it lie.

  Let’s.

  19

  I left the Stennett again around nine. I stopped at an army surplus store and bought a money belt. The clerk didn’t know what I was talking about at first. Then he found one somewhere in the back and sold it to me. I left it in the bag he put it in and carried it downtown to the bank.

  I went downstairs to the safe-deposit vault. A thin gray man led me inside, then used first his key and then my key on the box I’d rented, took it from its niche in the wall and gave it to me. I carried it across to one of the private booths along the wall and locked myself up with it. I opened the box and took out my money.

  There was a lot of it, all tax-free, all mine. I counted out seven thousand dollars. There was a lot more upstairs in the checking account, enough so that I could pay Annie with no trouble at all.

  I filled the belt with money. I hung my coat and jacket over the back of the chair, opened my pants and fitted the belt around me, underneath my slacks. I got dressed again, carried the empty box outside and gave it to the thin gray man. He used his key and my key to lock the box back in place.

  I went to the nearest five-and-dime store. I bought a cloth airlines bag, a package of absorbent cotton and a bottle of black hair dye. I walked farther downtown, turned east and went to three secondhand clothing stores. In one of them I bought a pair of work shoes in fairly good shape. In another I bought a pair of denim slacks and a plain flannel shirt. In the third I picked up a secondhand lumber jacket, a li
ttle frayed around the collar but in pretty good condition otherwise. I loaded the airlines bag with everything but the jacket and took a cab to the bus terminal. I found a locker and stowed the bag and the jacket in it.

  Around noon I had lunch downtown. I ate a few hamburgers and drank a few cups of coffee. I still wasn’t at all tired. Then I walked around downtown Buffalo. The weather was clear, a little snow underfoot but none falling—the town looked better than usual. I passed my office building and then went back and rode up to my office on the eighteenth floor. My secretary wasn’t around. I opened a few letters and left them on the desk. I looked around to see if there were anything I wanted. There wasn’t.

  From the window I could see most of the city. I stood by it for a few minutes and watched cars crawl through the streets like fat shiny beetles. I thought about the town. It had been good to me.

  I used my office phone to call the air terminal. I reserved a seat on a plane to Philadelphia leaving Buffalo at a few minutes to four. I used the name Nathaniel Crowley. I hung up and left the office.

  The air was cooler now. I walked around for a few minutes. I looked at my watch. It was after two.

  I didn’t go right away. I walked around a little more, thinking it over, trying to decide. It wasn’t absolutely necessary, wasn’t necessary at all. In fact it meant taking another chance, an extra chance. But it was something I had to do.

  Maybe it was an idea of justice that had seeped into Nat Crowley. A notion of balance, and right and wrong. Maybe it was a poetic hangover from the Donald Barshter period. There was poetry in it, certainly. And I was still both people, a hard-to-figure combination of Barshter and Crowley.

  Whatever it was, it had to be that way.

  So at two-thirty I walked into the Malmsly. I gave my name at the desk and they called her on the phone. She said to send me straight up. I went straight up.

  Her room was on a high floor. I knocked at the door and she opened it for me. She was wearing a white cashmere sweater and a pair of black toreador pants. I looked at them.

  “New York,” she said. “I bought them on my shopping trip. How do I look, Don?”

  “You look fine. We’re back to Don again?”

  “For the time being. Do you like the name?”

  “I don’t mind it.”

  “Good.” She turned her back on me and walked to the window. She looked out, leaning against the sill. She turned around slowly, her eyes amused.

  “Did you bring the money, Don?”

  “Sure.”

  “That’s good. It costs a lot of money to phone a lawyer in New York every day. This ten thousand will ease the burden.”

  “I’m sure it will.”

  “It will. May I have it now, Don?”

  There was a bottle of gin on the bureau. It was about half full. That was sort of an added touch, although it would have been even better if it had been a scotch bottle. You can’t have everything.

  “The money, Don.”

  I took out my wallet and tossed it past her, onto the bed. She looked at me, then at the wallet. And she turned around to pick it up.

  “This isn’t ten thousand,” she said. “Are you out of your—”

  I hit her before she finished the sentence. I picked up the gin bottle and in one motion brought it down on her head. The cork was in the bottle. Not a drop spilled.

  One blow wasn’t enough. She went down, sprawling at the foot of the bed, and she was too dazed and groggy to scream. I hit her again and again and I went right on beating her over the head until her skull was soft and it was very definitely over. I took her pulse, which was only a matter of form. She was very dead.

  I looked at her again. That was a mistake, because what I saw was that fine black hair and those fine blue eyes—blind eyes now. And I saw also, for just an instant or so, an image of what could have been. In another world, perhaps. Long ago, in another country. The wench was dead now. I had murdered her.

  I put the gin bottle down. I took my wallet and returned it to my jacket pocket. I did not wipe fingerprints from anything. That would have been silly.

  The hallway was quiet. I stepped out of it, closing the door and locking it. I rang for the elevator. It came along soon enough and I rode to the lobby and walked out into the street.

  * * *

  I took a taxi to the airport. On the way I made small talk with the driver. He let me off at the entrance to the terminal. I went inside, walked over to one of the flight desks and picked up the ticket I’d reserved earlier. I paid for it with a crisp, fresh hundred-dollar bill.

  Then I wandered outside again and caught another cab. I had him drop me at the bus terminal. There I got my lumber jacket and airlines bag from the locker I’d stuffed it in. I carried them upstairs to the men’s room. There was a large booth at one end where for a quarter you could do anything from taking a bath to sleeping for a quick hour. It was one of several favorite places for junkies looking for a spot to shoot up. I dropped my quarter in the slot and went inside.

  I took off my coat, my jacket, my pants, my shoes. I washed up, then uncapped the bottle of hair dye and rubbed it into my hair. I worked on it until my hair was black instead of mud-colored. Then I put the bottle of dye on the edge of the sink and played around with the absorbent cotton. I packed cotton in my cheeks, under my upper lip, I checked myself in the mirror. It made a difference. How much of a difference was something I couldn’t tell for sure.

  I dressed again. I put on the plaid flannel shirt, the denim work pants. I unlaced the work shoes and got my feet into them. I tied them. They weren’t as comfortable as my thirty-dollar pair but I had no complaint. The work shoes had not cost thirty dollars.

  I put my own clothes back in the airlines bag. I took all my cards from my wallet, shredded them and flushed them down the toilet. I folded the money and slipped it into a pocket of the work pants. I dropped the wallet into the airlines bag. It was a shame to part with it, but men in denim pants don’t carry alligator wallets.

  I looked at my watch—To Nat From Lou Baron. I dropped it into the bag. I looked at my lighter—To Nat From Tony—and dropped it into the bag too.

  I checked myself in the mirror again. Not perfect, not close to perfect, but as good as I was going to be able to do. I got into the lumber jacket, zipped the airlines bag, dropped my own coat over my arm, picked up the bag and left the men’s room. I walked down a flight of stairs and went back to the lockers. I found one, used a dime on it and left the bag and the coat there. They would open that locker in time, but not for a few days.

  Fifteen minutes later a bus left Buffalo headed for Cincinnati with a half-dozen minor stops along the way. I was on it.

  * * *

  We hit Cleveland at nine, then headed south and west. I sat in my seat and smoked a cigarette. An old man with whiskey breath dozed next to me. I tried to relax. It didn’t work.

  The lawyer would have mailed the letters by now. Tomorrow the FBI would get a letter, the Buffalo police would get a letter, the home town police would get a letter. By that time, or even by now, somebody would have found Annie’s body at the foot of her bed in her room at the Malmsly.

  I put out my cigarette. A minute later I scratched a match and set another one on fire. The bus kept rolling along an empty highway. I had a ticket to Cinci but somewhere along the way I was getting off. I had no idea where.

  The big towns were out now. Big towns were mob towns and mob people would be looking for me. I knew too much to go on outside the organization. The mob wouldn’t look too hard but people would be keeping eyes open.

  That left small towns. And a stranger stuck out like an infected pinkie in a small town.

  Last time it had been easier. Last time only a few people had been looking for me and last time I’d been able to run with my own face and my own hair. Now it wasn’t safe to do that any longer. Now I had black hair and cotton in my cheeks. Someday somebody would notice this. Somebody would wonder why, and then…

  I finis
hed my cigarette and lit another one. My throat was raw from a few thousand cigarettes. I was tired but sleep was impossible. I didn’t even try.

  Big towns, small towns. I had seven thousand dollars around my waist and no place to run to. Barshter was dead and Crowley was dead and I didn’t even have a new name picked out. Or a new personality, or a new person, or anything. I wondered who I would be, how I could hope to bring it off.

  I sat in darkness and smoked. The drunk next to me started snoring. I went on smoking.

  The Connecticut authorities were looking for Donald Barshter. The New York authorities were looking for Nat Crowley. The FBI was looking for us both.

  I wondered who they’d catch first.

  NAT CROWLEY, WE HARDLY KNEW YE

  An Afterword by Lawrence Block

  It was sometime in the summer of 2010, five years ago as I write these lines, that Miriam Parker, Mulholland Books’ resident Marketing Genius, recalled a story she’d heard about a lost early book of mine. Was I still searching for it? And would I like to enlist the help of a multitude of readers by recounting the saga on Mulholland’s new blog?

  Well, why not? A post on their site could only help A Drop of the Hard Stuff, the Matthew Scudder novel Mulholland was about to publish. And who was to say that someone, while reading the blog, might not have a lightbulb take shape directly above his or her head? “Crikey,” Gentle Reader might say aloud. “I remember that book! Why, I even have a copy, shelved between Forever Amber and A Boy’s Life of Gilles de Rais. Here’s my chance to help a favorite author and enhance the world of literature.”

  Hey, it could happen.

  So I wrote the following piece, which appeared in short order on the Mulholland website:

  HEY SINNER MAN, WHERE’D YOU GO?

  by Lawrence Block

  You’ve probably heard the song. It’s a spiritual, and it starts out something like this:

  Hey sinner man, where you gonna run to?

  Hey sinner man, where you gonna run to?

  Hey sinner man, where you gonna run to?

  All on that day…