Here Karp could be blunter, because he knew more, and because he had already expressed his doubts about the case. “Sometimes even scumbags tell the truth,” he said, “and this is one of those times. The Obregons came in with brown heroin, major weight. They claim they got ripped off, and sure enough, the town is flooded with Mexican brown, but most of it hit the streets only after they were arrested. There’s no real evidence Detective Morilla was chasing the Obregons. He was chasing someone else—who we don’t know, but the name Lucky comes up a lot.”
“Lucky? You can’t be serious?”
“Yeah, me too, but it’s all pretty vague at this point. Netski, the cop in the case, backs up the party line pretty good, and we’ve got the right gun. The only real question is, Can you believe a conscious, planned frame against a couple of out-of-town nogoodniks? Roland and I have a difference of opinion over that, as you probably know already.”
“I do,” said the D.A., “and I don’t like it, but I can’t walk these cocksuckers until I have something to put in its place.”
“I understand that and I’m not suggesting it,” said Karp, “but there’s another angle. Roland’s been getting letters, death-threat-type letters, about the Obregons. They’re innocent, if you don’t let them go you die, Yankee dog, that kind of thing. Not what you would expect from a couple of guys who didn’t do it.”
Keegan’s face clouded. “I hope Roland’s taking this seriously.”
“No, he’s not, as a matter of fact. I was hoping you’d mention it.”
“I’ll do that.” A moment later, “Why isn’t he? His famous macho image?”
Karp had given the matter some thought, and he replied, “That, but it’s mainly that none of us have much experience with a criminal class that operates against law enforcement authorities directly. The wise guys never do that here, although the Sicilian Mafia does it all the time, and it’s practically the national sport in Mexico, bribe ’em or kill ’em.”
“You’re thinking some segment of our colorful immigrant community is bringing in those kinds of customs?”
“I don’t know, but it’s probably safe to say it’s not all knishes, pizza, and shish kebabs. Face it, I just got finished talking about people who might be planning to blow up something in New York to make a point over in the Middle East. Threatening a prosecutor seems like spare change compared to that. And we know somebody executed a police officer.”
“Something else to talk with my friends down the street about,” said Keegan, rapping his knuckles lightly on the desk. “Meanwhile, keep doing what you’re doing and keep me informed.” He picked up the cigar again, twirled it, replaced it carefully on the desk. That part of the conversation was over. Karp waited for the next shoe to drop, but the D.A. only leaned back, smiled, and asked, “So, who do you like in the playoffs?”
Marlene sat upright in bed, instantly awake, her heart pounding, her stomach clenched, in the sort of dreadful rising that occurs when we have overslept an appointment, or fallen asleep at the switch, or suffer from a bad conscience. She wiped her eyes, which were blurred with tears shed during sleep, an evil sign. It was full morning, and the loft was silent but for the whisper of the heat-pump fan and the noises filtering up from the street. She got out of bed, groaning as the events of the previous night re-occupied her mind and she distinguished them from her unhappy dreams. She checked the bedside clock, which bore the unlikely message that it was ten forty-five. Throwing on a silk robe—her whore’s robe, as she thought of it, a wrapper printed with green leaves and pink flamingoes—she stomped out of the bedroom.
Complete silence: no clattering of utensils in the kitchen, no baby voices, no TV, no Posie singing or talking to herself or to the boys, nothing. In the kitchen, which was spotless, the breakfast dishes put away, the counters wiped, she found the notes. One from her husband read, “Sleep in, Tiger. I’ll bring Chinese home. Love, B.” The other was in Posie’s third-grade dyslexic scrawl: “Took the boyes to the zoo. Buctch siad OK,” signed with a little heart with a curly P in it.
Marlene sat down at the table and fingered both notes. Had she been a certain type of woman, familiar from the movies, she would have clutched them to her breast and wailed tears of gratitude. Instead she dragged the somewhat grubby sleeve of her robe across her face a couple of times to stem a certain dampness, loaded the espresso maker, showered, washed her hair, dried it, and lolled about with her mind more or less blank, as the sages of the Orient advise, until the enticing odor of the finished coffee brought her back to the kitchen, where she had two big cups of jet fuel with plenty of warm milk in them, with (her secret vice) a couple of sticks of the boys’ zwieback, which she dipped biscotti-style into the brew, and a single cigarette smoked free of poisoning-her-children guilt and thus superbly delightful.
She then strolled down to her little home office and called Bello & Ciampi, where she found all in order, the miraculous Tran having covered her neglected responsibilities of the morning, and the messages not that urgent. Sym reminded her that she had an appointment at one at Osborne uptown.
Ah, yes, Osborne. She walked back to her bedroom and threw open the doors of her wardrobe closet. She noticed the heap of black rip-stop nylon she had worn the night before and, wrinkling her nose, tossed it and the underwear that went with it into the hamper. No terror clothes for Osborne, she thought. No, instead she would give him the full KL, see what he was missing and eat his liver out. She took down her one genuine Karl Lagerfeld suit, an item that must have cost five grand new, but which clever little Marlene had picked up for $450 in a consignment shop belonging to a woman whose persistent ex Marlene had discouraged, and who had given her the first crack at it. It was made of wool mixed with cashmere, had a hand like a baby’s kiss, and was colored the darkest possible shade of plum. The jacket was cut lush too, with wide shoulders, which meant the pistol didn’t break its line, probably not something old Karl had in mind, but welcome. The $250 perfectly matching fuck-me pumps that Marlene had bought new to celebrate this bargain and an ecru silk blouse completed the outfit. She did her face and hair, popped in the glassie, checked her image in the full-length mirror, declared it not bad for an aging, one-eyed, mother-of-three felon, and, lusting after the now unobtainable noir look, wished she had a black mink and one of those little velvet hats that sat cocked on one’s head like a bird, with a half veil. It was while unashamedly primping in this manner that the solution to her problem with Harry popped into her mind, as if the diversion of cerebral blood to the fashion lobes had somehow released a blockage in the region of sneaky creativity, something that may happen more frequently than neuroscientists suspect. Grinning and chuckling, she grabbed up her beloved trench coat, one of the old Burberrys, from before they changed the color, and her gun, and left.
El Chivato waited for the phone to ring three times before he leaned over and picked it up. The woman was watching him. He glared at her and made a shooing gesture, and she went immediately into the other room. It was the elder Obregon brother on the phone, as arranged by Connie during her recent jail visit. The conversation lasted the full ten minutes allowed by the jail authorities and was not pleasant for either party. El Chivato put, as he thought, the very sensible case for modifying the contract, since the man Lucky was guarded in such a way as to make capture and subsequent modification of his attitudes impossible. As an alternative, El Chivato would be happy to simply kill the man and his associates and, if desired, the mysteriously unbribeable prosecutor, but in any case, the business had to be finished before the end of the month, as he had pressing business back in Mexico. But this plan Obregon absolutely rejected, as it would not accomplish his main purpose, which was to win release from jail. Lucky had to be captured and made to confess. Here Jodón Obregon made the tactical error of suggesting that El Chivato’s talents were overrated, that perhaps he was losing his nerve. El Chivato objected in the strongest terms to this analysis, hinting also about how relatively easy it was to get at people who were incarc
erated. Jodón withdrew his comment. In the last few minutes of the call they cooked together a compromise: El Chivato would make one last attempt to snatch Lucky, and failing that, he would directly approach the blond prosecutor and use his justly famous skills to win an appreciation of the innocence of the Obregon brothers, all by the end of the month, of course.
When El Chivato hung up, he was in a fury, not only because of the conversation and the insulting remarks (which he would remember) but also because, for the first time, he was experiencing a vague feeling that things were going on that he did not quite get. The way his quarry was being guarded was remarkable. He had, naturally, studied the various methods of bodyguarding available to him thus far, as a cheetah may be said to study the herding patterns of antelope, but he had never before experienced a system so elaborate, so multi-ringed and impenetrable. There were never, for example, any free parking places in front of the Palm café, and there was always a car full of men double-parked outside. He had spotted any number of lookouts on the streets surrounding the place, although these were changed in a pattern that he had not yet been able to figure out. Lucky arrived and departed according to no fixed schedule, and when he left it was in one of never less than three vehicles. Several times El Chivato had tried to follow one of these cars, and each time it had led him in a meaningless loop, at the end of which a different set of men would emerge than had entered it at the origin of the ride. He was, in fact, competing against a system designed to foil the most aggressive and efficient counterintelligence operation in the world, bringing to his mission only what he had learned in rural Mexico, where the authorities were well bribed and lax. He was out of his league, and the growing apprehension that this was so was making him crazy, or to be precise, more crazy than he already was, which was crazy indeed.
El Chivato cursed, picked up a straight chair, smashed a table lamp with it, then battered the chair into sticks against a door frame. Holding a chair leg in his hand like a club, he kicked open the door of the bedroom through which the woman had passed, but Connie, being familiar enough with the behavior of men conforming to El Chivato’s type when they were angry, had silently slipped away. The young man smashed one of the bedroom lamps and beat the cosmetics and perfumes laid out on the dresser into a mash of glass and scented mud. Ticking like a bomb, he threw on his gun-heavy canvas coat and went out.
“Karp, you complete shit!”
“Good morning, Roland,” said Karp brightly into the phone. He had been expecting this call since his meeting with the D.A., and while he had not looked forward to it, he was, in the event, glad that it was a telephone call and not a red-faced, jaw-tightening in-person visit.
“You bastard, how could you rat me out like that!”
“I didn’t rat you out at all, Roland, unless you’re referring to the threat letters. That’s not ratting, that’s reporting the commission of a crime, perpetrator unknown. I’m supposed to do that.” And you too, schmuck, was the implication, but Hrcany, if he caught it at all, was off on another grievance.
“And what’s all this crap about the terrorists? You’re running your own little private investigation and you don’t see fit to tell me? How the fuck do you think that makes me look?”
“Probably like someone who has problems listening to advice. If you recall, I discussed the possibility of a wider conspiracy in Shilkes, and you pissed all over me. So did Raney and Camera, as I recall, and you pissed on them too.”
“Oh, yeah, if I didn’t have the facts, what the fuck was I supposed to do?” was Hrcany’s response to this, inane but very loud. Karp moved the phone some inches away from his ear and let the screaming issue into the air for a moment or two. When he brought the earpiece close again, he heard, “… balls in an uproar! All of a sudden, because the great Butch Karp has fucking concerns about my case, Keegan thinks I don’t know what I’m doing. Well, I’ll tell you something, buddy—”
“What did he tell you to do?” Karp interrupted.
“Oh, like you don’t know.”
“I don’t know. Jack just said he’d talk to you, period. On a personal note, I hope he told you to take the threat business more seriously.”
“Oh, fuck that! I can take care of myself.”
“Yeah, right, but are you going to get the cops in on it?”
“Yeah, shit, I’ll get Ray Netski to check it out. I’m telling you, you’re both acting like a couple of old ladies on this thing—”
“Netski?” said Karp without thinking, and then, a second later, realized why: that the very last policeman to send to investigate something Roland did not consider important was Ray Netski, who lived to confirm Roland’s suppositions.
“Yeah, Netski. Something wrong with him? Or are you taking over all the fucking investigations in this bureau?”
Karp sighed. “No, Roland, he’s fine, great. How are you going to proceed on the Arab thing?”
“I’ll let the district attorney know if I find anything,” snapped Hrcany, and hung up.
While Karp was mulling over this conversation, and wondering how many more friends his job was going to cost him, the phone rang again, and it was Aaron Zwiller, speaking in what seemed an unusual tone for him, nervous and confidential. He had heard some disturbing things, which he would not like to relate over the telephone. Would he like to come in to the office here? No. Karp volunteered to drive out to Williamsburg. No again. Zwiller mentioned the name of a dairy restaurant on Second: could Karp meet him there at one on Sunday afternoon? He could. After that Zwiller seemed anxious to end the call, but Karp asked, “Could you give me some idea of what this is all about, sir?”
“Terrible things, Mr. Karp. Such terrible times we live in, I would not have believed it. They have forgotten pikua nefesh.”
“Pardon?”
“The most important principle in the Torah, Mr. Karp: pikua nefesh—the preservation of human life. I’ll see you Sunday, at one on the dot.”
The Osborne Group was housed in a new building on Third, in the high Sixties, just slightly out of the posh-most district of Midtown, but still an acceptable place for a Beautiful Person to visit without losing caste. In the suite itself, of the two acceptable upwardly mobile decors, they had opted for the Starship Enterprise rather than Ye Olde Cozy English Barrister. What was not glass and chrome was matte, all in colors that ended in the letter e: taupe, mauve, beige. The magazines on the glass-chrome coffee table in the reception area were either upscale or security-trade rags. The receptionist was the usual sort of decorative young person in crisp linen (beige) who offered coffee or Coke (declined) and a seat (taken). Marlene read the company brochure and learned that the principal had guarded the president of the United States for nearly twenty-five years, and had lost only one of his clients, and that he staffed largely with ex-Secret Service. After that she amused herself with an article on the relative merits of night-vision equipment in the latest Industrial Security and had just about decided to go with the Meyers Dark Invader 3000 when Osborne’s secretary (non-decorative, chunky, fortyish, frosted flip, black pants suit) came out and led her to the boss’s office for her appointment.
Osborne had gone for oak, red leather, and the oriental rug as a way of differentiating the captain’s quarters from the rest of the interstellar vessel. Both he and Harry Bello rose when she entered, and she shook Osborne’s hand. Osborne was a tall, well-set-up man with a rugged pink face, blue eyes sharp and cool, and a remarkable thick crop of snow-white hair, which he wore en brosse in the manner once favored by Chancellor Bismarck. He was wearing navy blue suit trousers, white shirt, blue and gold rep tie, and dark blue suspenders, which she was glad to see were unadorned by any cute little devices indicating his profession, tiny eyes perhaps. This disposed her well toward him.
Marlene was ushered to a comfortable red leather Windsor chair, the two men sitting in similar chairs across a low table, coffee was offered again and declined, pleasantries were exchanged, and then, smoothly, Osborne began his pitch. The Gr
oup (as he called it) worked mainly for corporations and non-governmental organizations of a certain size, specializing in large-meeting security. They offered a complete package, including venue inspection, travel arrangements for the officers, and operations during the event, whether convention or corporate annual meeting. In this work they often used local security firms—Osborne believed in keeping a small central staff and contracting out much of the grunt work. The system had worked well, and he expected major growth in the next few years, but he also wanted to extend his business into celebrity personal security, which was why he had contacted Harry. Bello & Ciampi would, if they agreed, become a subsidiary of the Osborne Group. The parent firm would handle the business paperwork, billing, bonding, personnel, record keeping, and supply expertise and hardware for specific jobs. Osborne had the numbers prepared on paper, in slick plastic binders, which he presented to both of them.
Marlene flipped through the pages, not really reading. She understood that the deal was a good one, with many advantages for both her and Harry, but she was starting to resent the smooth tone of the pitch, as if it was already a done deal. She cleared her throat and said, “Mr. Osborne, one thing I didn’t hear you mention is what Osborne gets out of the association. I mean, why us?”
“Oh, I would’ve thought that it was obvious,” he said, smiling. “You’re good, we’re buying your rep on stalking cases, and, frankly, it doesn’t hurt with female clients. I mean you personally.”
“Uh-huh. And this is notwithstanding my approach to stalking cases?”
Osborne cocked his head slightly in inquiry. “Your approach?”
“Yeah. You know the standard security book says, harden the target. Throw up a screen, use the courts, report the perp to the cops, and so on. In heavy cases, where you don’t have a public figure, you move the client, make her vanish, and so on. I have problems with that approach.”
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