The Split p-7 Page 7

  ‘You’re doing fine,’ Parker told him.

  ‘I’m not so sure. Okay, come on along upstairs.’

  Parker let Dougherty lead the way. Upstairs had the feeling of a house normally full and unexpectedly empty. The rooms seemed to hum with emptiness.

  They went through a tiny bright white kitchen with Dougherty’s dinner cold on a white plate on the red formica top of a kitchen table with tubular chrome legs. Then through a dining room filled to the brim by a maple table and chairs, and through a little square of leftover space where the stairs went up to the second floor, and on into the magazine littered living room.

  There was a closet near the front door, and Dougherty opened it and took out a baggy suitcoat that matched the baggy trousers he was wearing. From its inside pocket he removed a black notebook and handed it to Parker. ‘First page,’ he said.

  Parker opened the notebook. On the first page front and back, were nine male names. Five of the names included addresses. Next to three of the names were little checks. Dan Kifka’s name wasn’t there at all.

  Dougherty said, ‘You need paper? Pencil?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Come along.’

  Dougherty led the way back to the dining room, while Parker, following him, riffled quickly through the rest of the black notebook and found all the pages blank.

  There was a glass-doored secretary standing crammed into a corner of the dining room. Dougherty got a pencil and sheet of yellow paper from this and put them on the maple table.

  Parker stood to transcribe the names and addresses. The room was too small and jumbled for him to want to pull one of the chairs away from the table and sit down. When he was finished transferring all the names and addresses and check marks to the paper he said, ‘What do the marks mean?’

  ‘Those are the ones I’ve talked to.’

  Parker looked at him. ‘Talked to? Or cleared?’

  Dougherty smiled gently. ‘You keep your secrets, Joe, I’ll keep mine.’

  Parker shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  Dougherty said, ‘That’s all you want, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  They walked to the front door, Dougherty saying, ‘I wonder what my boss’ll say about this.’

  ‘He’ll say you should have taken me.’

  Dougherty shook his head. ‘Not me. The robbery detail will catch you.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Oh, they’ll catch you. They’re very good.’ Dougherty opened the front door. ‘See you around,’ he said.

  ‘Goodbye,’ Parker said.

  Five

  Daylight was fast fading when Parker came out on the roof. He looked around, saw no one, and moved off to his left. He stepped over a low wall defining where two buildings met, and kept moving.

  He’d come up onto the roofs at the eastern end of the block, and the building he wanted was about hallway down. He passed clotheslines, passed a pigeon cote, passed a rumpled, frayed, faded blanket left behind by someone in a hurry. When he’d counted buildings and knew he was at the one he wanted, he moved to the rear and over the side and down the fire escape.

  There was no light in the apartment at all, and both windows opening onto the fire escape were locked. Parker look a roll of Scotch tape from his pocket, ran some piece’s of tape back and forth across one of the windows near the inside lock, and then took a gun from his overcoat and used the butt of it to tap the taped window gently until it cracked several times. It was reasonably quiet this way and didn’t take too long. When he peeled some of the tape off again, pieces of glass came off with it, leaving a hole large enough for him to get his hand through and unlock the window.

  He doubted there was a plant in the apartment at all, but just to be on the safe side he opened the window with slow caution and climbed in the same way. He could assume there was a police guard outside the apartment door, in the hallway out there, but other than that he should have the place to himself.

  He did. The bedroom looked strange with one of the swords missing from the wall and with the messed-up bed, but the body was gone and so were the guns from the closet. The rest of the apartment was unchanged.

  Parker went through it quickly but thoroughly. He wanted names. Male, female, it didn’t matter. What he wanted to know was Ellie Canaday’s life. It was someone from that life who’d come in here and ended that life, and taken the money; that was his mistake.

  There were a couple of telephone numbers jotted down on the cover of the phone book, without any names or other identification. Parker wrote them down without expecting much from them.

  On various papers here and there in the apartment Parker found four of the names he’d already gotten from Detective Dougherty, but no new names, and no female names at all.

  Sometimes it was a bad thing to be devoid of small talk. If he’d had meaningless little conversations with her the last few weeks he might have learned something he could use now. lint Parker couldn’t stand meaningless conversations, couldn’t think of anything to say or any reason to say it.

  The only time he talked about the weather, for instance, was when it had something to do with a job he was on.

  All right, the apartment was useless. Still, he’d had to check it out before going back to Dan.

  He went out the apartment the same way he’d gone in and started up the fire escape again. He went half a flight, and an automatic boomed above him, a metallic sting went pinging and ricocheting around him, slicing off the metal parts of the fire escape.

  He flattened himself against the wall, dragging the pistol out of his left topcoat pocket, and above him again the automatic boomed and the slug went whining and whizzing on down the fire escape.

  The first shot is for time. Not even bothering to look up, Parker raised his hand up over his head and fired upward, generally in the direction from which the shots had come. With the echoes of that shot still sounding around him, he ducked away again, back down the fire escape.

  He could hear the sound of running feet within Ellie’s apartment as he went on by the window he’d broken. So the cop on guard duty out in the hall had heard the shooting and was coming to see what was happening.

  Parker felt a cold rage pouring through him. The bastard was right there, right up there on the roof! It had to be him again, hanging around, hanging around, taking his stupid potshots at Parker just as though he knew what he was doing. Right up there on top of the goddam building, and instead of going up and taking the stupid bastard apart piece by piece until the money fell out, Parker was running like a rabbit the other way.

  Because of the cop. Because the maniac on the roof was so stupid he’d stand up there and shoot off a gun with a cop on plant inside the same damn building.

  So he was up there, and by rights Parker had him cold, but instead of having him cold Parker was forced to let him go. And more than that. He didn’t want the law to get its hands on the silly bastard yet, either, so he was going to have to make a distraction, he was going to have to cover for the bastard.

  He had to make it possible for the bastard to get away.

  Cursing, raging, Parker went on down the fire escape, firing a couple of shots nowhere in particular in order to distract the cop’s attention from the roof. Above, the cop had found the broken window and had become aware of Parker going down the fire escape and was hollering for him to stop.

  The bottom was a square pit, a concrete hole spotted with dented garbage cans. A black metal door led into the basement of the building, through blundering darkness in which Parker cursed and kicked and hurried, and then to a flight of stairs, and up, and through another metal door to the first floor hallway.

  He stopped running at the front door. The pistol went back into his pocket, he closed his overcoat, took a deep breath, and walked calmly out the front door. He turned to the right, and a block away heard sirens coming from the other way. But he was clear now.

  And so was the quarry. No matter how stupid he was, he had to be clear
now.

  Ready for refolding.

  Six

  Janey was a disappointment with her clothes on; still pretty, but young and dull. She was wearing a pink sweater that made her breasts look like hard and youthful buds and a green skirt that gave no hint of the round rump underneath. She wore neither stockings nor socks, and on her feet were rumpled loafers.

  She opened the door to Parker’s knock, saw Parker standing there in the hall, and said, ‘Oh, it’s you. You might as well come in. We’ve got a whole convention going here.’

  ‘Think you’ll need help?’

  ‘Don’t talk dirty.’

  Parker heard sounds of talking from the kitchen and went over there first. Negli and Rudd and Shelly were sitting around the kitchen table drinking beer and playing knock poker. They looked up when Parker came in, and Negli said, ‘You must have it by now. You couldn’t of been gone this long and come back without it. They didn’t swipe it from you again, did they, Parker?’

  ‘In a little while, Negli,’ Parker said, ‘I’m going to use you for toilet paper.’

  Shelly said, ‘What’s the score, Parker?’

  ‘Tied, nothing-nothing at the half.’

  Negli said, ‘Where’ve you been all this time?’

  ‘Hiding from you.’ To Shelly and Rudd he said, ‘I’ve got to talk to Dan, I’ll be back in a minute.’

  Negli had the last word, but Parker didn’t listen to it.

  Kifka, still holding his own with the virus, was sitting up in bed with two large yellow bath towels draped over his shoulders and torso to keep him warm. Clinger was sitting hunched in a chair like a bankrupt laundromat owner in his lawyer’s outer office. Feccio, over at the window, was studying the world with an eye that reserved judgment.

  Kifka looked up when Parker came in, and said, ‘Where’ve you been?’

  ‘Getting started.’

  Clinger roused himself a little bit, and said, ‘I would never have expected it from you, Parker. Not you.’ He said it like it was Parker’s fault the laundromat was bankrupt.

  And it was; Clinger was right. Parker said, ‘I’ll get it back myself, you want that. You want to help, fine.’

  Feccio, coming over from the window, said, ‘Parker, don’t lose your logic. It could have happened to any of us. Some things you can’t account for, you can’t plan in advance.’

  Parker walked around the room with his arms swinging at his sides, his hands opening and closing. ‘The bastard can find me,’ he said. ‘He’s got no brains, no sensible plan, he’s a lousy shot, he’s an amateur, but he can find me like that. And I can’t find him at all.’

  Feccio said, ‘Dan told us. He’s the one ambushed you last night.’

  ‘Twice,’ Parker told him. ‘Just this afternoon.’

  From the doorway, Negli said, ‘You keep up like that, Parker, you’ll turn into a figure of fun.’

  Parker looked carefully at Feccio. ‘Turn your angelino off,’ he said.

  Feccio’s face darkened. ‘Don’t start on me, Parker.’

  Kifka said, ‘Negli, what’s your little problem?’

  ‘My seventh,’ Negli told him. ‘Where’s my seventh, that’s my problem.’

  Kifka said, ‘We’ll find it for you, okay?’

  From his gloomy corner, Clinger said, ‘Squabble, that’s what we need now. A nice long squabble.’ Rudd and Shelly had come in now and were just standing around.

  Feccio said to the room in general, ‘Bob won’t say anything more, you got my guarantee.’ He looked at Negli. ‘My guarantee,’ he said.

  Negli looked insulted, and walked over into a corner.

  Kifka said, ‘What’s the story so far, Parker?’

  Parker told them of his afternoon: Detective Dougherty and Ellie’s apartment and the madman on the roof. ‘I had to unload the Buick,’ he said. ‘And sooner or later that cop’s going to get your name, Dan; you knew Ellie, and he’ll come around here to ask questions, so we’ve got to find a different place to meet.’

  Feccio said, ‘Vimorama. We’ve got the run of the place. Dan could move right on out there now.’

  ‘Fine. All right with you, Dan?’

  ‘As long as I got my Janey with me,’ Kifka said, ‘I don’t care where I am.’

  Parker took Dougherty’s list out of his pocket and gave it to Kifka. ‘You know any of these people?’

  Kifka glanced down the list and said, ‘Sure. About all of them. This is the list you got from the cop, huh?’

  That’s right.’

  Clinger said, ‘One thing I got to admit. I got to admit, Parker, you’ve got gall. You go to the cop to get your information.’

  Parker said, ‘He was the only one had it.’

  Rudd said, ‘One thing.’

  They all looked at him. Rudd was a silent workman type; it was a strange thing to hear him speak.

  Kifka said, ‘What is it?’

  Rudd said, ‘What we’re talking about here is maybe twenty thousand bucks. Less than that. And financing out of that, maybe eighteen grand. For eighteen grand, Parker is walking into cops’ houses, we’re all hanging around here where a cop is going to show up sometime, maybe five minutes from now, and we’re going to keep poking around in the same places where the cops are poking around. They’re looking for the same guy as us.’

  ‘So what do you want to do?’

  ‘Pack it in. I don’t blame Parker, it could have happened to me, to anybody. But I say pack it in.’

  It was the most anyone had heard Rudd talk in years, so it had its effect. Much more effect than if Little Bob Negli had said the same things.

  But Parker was aggravated. Somewhere in this dirty city there was a guy who had stolen two suitcases full of money from Parker. And shot at Parker twice. And killed the girl Parker was living with. And tried to set Parker up to take the fall.

  What he wanted now was the appearances of logic and good sense. If the other six stayed active in this thing, then it was a simple sensible matter of getting the group’s money back. But if they all quit, Parker knew he himself wouldn’t quit, and he’d be going after the guy instead of the money.

  He didn’t like to catch himself doing things that weren’t sensible, and that just aggravated him all the more.

  He said, ‘Anyone wants to give up his seventh, just turn it over to me.’

  Negli rose to the bait. ‘Not you, Parker. Don’t you even think it.’

  Kifka said, ‘I’m not going to pack it in. But face it, I won’t be able to help much; I’m weak as a kitten.’

  Parker said, ‘Feccio? You in or out?’

  ‘In, you know that. And so’s Bob.’

  ‘Good. Clinger?’

  Clinger shrugged and looked pessimistic. ‘It’s good effort thrown after bad,’ he said, ‘but what can we do? Twenty thousand dollars is still and all and nevertheless twenty thousand dollars.’

  Feccio smiled and said, ‘Well spoken.’

  Parker turned around. ‘Shelly?’

  Shelly grinned. ‘I got nothing else to do with my time,’ he said. ‘This might be interesting.’

  Kifka said to Rudd, ‘You’re the only one doesn’t want his seventh. You want us each to have a sixth?’

  ‘I don’t walk out alone,’ Rudd told him. ‘You people mess around, with or without me, I’m still in the same trouble, it could still get back to me if you louse yourselves up.’

  ‘So you’re in?’

  ‘I’m in.’

  Parker said, ‘Dan, you’ve got to know more of Ellie’s friends, names not on that list.’

  ‘Sure I do.’

  ‘Then write them down. We can’t go near one of those nine unless we’re pretty sure it’s the guy we want. The reason I had to talk to the cop, I had to know which of Ellie’s friends the law was on to and watching, and I had to know if they were on to you.’

  ‘Ellie hung round with different groups different times,’ Kifka said. He tapped the list of names. ‘Most of these are in a different kind of crowd fr
om me. I know some of them, we’ve met here and there, but we’re not buddies. Starting from these guys, the world these guys hang around in, it’s going to take that cop a hell of a long while to get to me.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Kifka shrugged. ‘All right, maybe. What about these phone numbers on the list here?’

  ‘They mean anything to you? I got them in Ellie’s apartment.’

  Kifka shook his head. ‘Not a thing. Let’s check them out.’

  ‘Me,’ Clinger said. ‘My kind of proposition.’

  Kifka ripped that part of the sheet of paper off and handed it to Clinger, who went out to the living room to make the calls. Kifka took a pencil from the bedside table, wet the tip with his tongue, and said, ‘Other people Ellie knew.’

  Parker said, ‘With a grudge, if you know any.’

  ‘That I wouldn’t know. Let me just give you the names.’

  Feccio said, ‘Then we go play detective?’

  Parker said, ‘Something like that.’

  Rudd said, ‘We’re looking for trouble.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Pete,’ said Kifka. ‘This won’t be as bad as you think.’ He shifted around in the bed and started writing names and addresses down on the paper.

  For a couple of minutes there was silence, everybody sitting around waiting for Kifka to get his list finished. Clinger came back in and shook his head and said, ‘A pizzeria and a movie theater.’

  Parker said, ‘It figured.’

  Shelly said, ‘Who’s for poker?’

  They all trooped out but Parker and Kifka. Kifka sat on the bed, frowning in concentration like a wrestler trying to remember who’s supposed to win this bout, and Parker went over to the window and looked out at the night-dark city.

  He was out there, somewhere.

  PART THREE

  One

  He was standing in a small square room with beige walls.

  The room was nine feet long, ten feet wide, nine feet high. Paint was peeling from the ceiling. A gray carpet covered most of the floor. The furniture was old and nondescript.

  He was looking out the window at the night-dark city, feeling Parker’s eyes. Somewhere, looking out. from some other window in some other part of this city, were Parker’s eyes, searching for him.