The Judas Goat (8 page)

“I don’t want ink,” I said. “I’ll shoot them away.”

“I hope so,” Downes said. “I hope too that you’ll not be staying with us a great many more days, hmm?”

“We’ll see,” I said. “Yes,” Downes said. “Of course we will.” 

 I sat on the bed and read the dialing instructions on the phone. I was exhausted. It was hard even to read the instructions. I had to run through them twice before I figured out that by dialing a combination of area codes I could call Susan Silverman direct. I tried it. The first time nothing happened. The second time I got a recorded message that I had screwed up. The third time it worked. The wires hummed a little bit, relays clicked in beneath the hum, a sound of distance and electricity hovered in the background, and then the phone rang and Susan answered, sounding just as she did. Mr. Watson, come here, I need you. “It’s your darling,” I said. “Which one,” she said. “Don’t be a smartass,” I said. “Where are you?” she said. “Still in London. I just dialed a few numbers and here we are.”

“Oh, I had hoped you were at the airport wanting a ride home.”

“Not yet, lovey,” I said. “I called for two reasons. One to say that I love your ass. And second, to ask you to do me a service.”

“Over the phone?”

“Not that kind of service,” I said. “I want you to make a phone call for me. Got a pencil?”

“Just a minute… okay.”

“Call Henry Cimoli”-I spelled it-“at the Harbor Health Club in Boston. It’s in the book. Tell him to get hold of Hawk and tell Hawk I’ve got work for him over here. You got that so far?”

“Yes.”

“Tell him to get the first plane he can to London and call me at the Mayfair Hotel when he gets to Heathrow.”

“Mm hmm.”

“Tell him money is no problem. He can name his price. But I want him now. Or sooner.”

“It’s bad,” Susan said. “What’s bad?”

“Whatever you’re doing. I know Hawk, I know what he’s good at. If you need him it means that it’s bad.”

“No, not too bad. I need him to see that it doesn’t get bad. I’m okay, but tell Henry to make sure that Hawk gets here. I don’t want Hawk to come to the hotel. I want him to call me from Heathrow, and I’ll get to him. Okay?”

“Okay. Who is Henry Cimoli?”

“He’s like the pro at the Harbor Health Club. Little guy, used to fight. Pound for pound he’s probably the strongest man I know. Before it got fancy, the Harbor Health Club used to be a gym. Hawk and I both trained there when we were fighting. Henry sort of trained us. He’ll know where Hawk is.”

“I gather you don’t have Hawk’s address. I would be willing to talk with him direct.”

“I know you would. But Hawk doesn’t have an address. He lives mostly with women, and between women he lives in hotels.”

“What if he won’t come?”

“He’ll come.”

“How can you be sure?”

“He’ll come,” I said. “How’s Techniques of Counseling doing?”

“Fine, I got an A - on the midterm.”

“Minus,” I said. “That sonovabitch. When I come home I want his address.”

“First thing?”

“No.” There was a small pause. “It’s hard on the phone,” I said. “I know. It’s hard at long distance in any event. And… it’s like having someone in the war. I don’t like you sending for Hawk.”

“It’s just to help me do surveillance. Even Lord Peter Wimsey has to whiz occasionally.” Susan’s laugh across the ocean, only slightly distorted by distance, made me want to cry. “I believe,” she said. “that Lord Peter’s butler does it for him.”

“When this is over maybe you and I can come,” I said. “It should be very fine for you and me to go around and look at the sights and maybe up to Stratford or down to Stonehenge. London gives me that feeling, you know. That excited feeling, like New York.”

“If a man tires of London, he is tired of life,” Susan said. “Would you come over?”

“When?”

“Whenever I’m through. I’ll send you some of my profits and meet you here. Would you come?”

“Yes,” she said. There was another small pause. “We’d better hang up,” she said. “This must be costing a great deal of money.”

“Yeah, okay. It’s Dixon’s money, but there’s not much else to say. I’ll call tomorrow at this same time to see if Henry got Hawk. Okay?”

“Yes, I’ll be home.”

“Okay. I love you, Suze. ”

“Love.”

“Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.” She hung up and I listened to the transoceanic buzz for a minute. Then I put the phone down, leaned back on the bed, and fell asleep fully dressed with the lights on and my folded handkerchief still pressed against my chin. When I woke up in the morning the dried blood made the handkerchief, now unfurled, stick to my chin, and the first thing I had to do when I got up was to soak it off in cold water in the sink in the bathroom. Getting the handkerchief off started the cut bleeding again, and I got a butterfly bandage out of my bag and put it on. I showered even more carefully than yesterday, keeping the water off both bandages. Not easy. If they kept after me in a while I’d have to start going dirty. 

I shaved around the new cut and toweled off. I changed the dressing on my bullet wound, turning half around and watching in the mirror to do it. There didn’t seem to be any infection. I bundled last night’s clothes into a laundry bag and left it for the hotel laundry. My shirt was a mess. I didn’t have much hope for it. If I stayed here long enough they’d probably hire a blood removal specialist. I had juice, oatmeal and coffee for breakfast, and went back out to watch my suspect. It was raining and I put on my light beige trench coat. I didn’t have a hat but there was a shop on Berkeley Street and I bought one of those Irish walking hats. Me and Pat Moynihan. When I got home I could wear it to the Harvard Club. They’d think I was faculty. With the hat turned down over my eyes and my trench coat collar up I wasn’t terribly recognizable. But I was terribly silly-looking. The broken nose and the scar tissue around the eyes somehow didn’t go with the Eton and Harrow look. It was a pleasant rain and I didn’t mind walking in it. In fact I liked it. Come on with the rain, there’s a smile on my face. 

I varied my route, going east on Piccadilly and Shaftesbury and up Charing Cross and Tottenham Court Road. All the way I kept an eye out for a tail, doubling back on my route a couple of times. I came in Tottenham Street to her apartment building staying close to the wall. The only way she could see me was if she stuck her head out the window and looked straight down. If anyone was following me they were very goddamned good. I turned into her apartment house doorway and looked in the foyer. There were three apartments. Two were Mr. and Mrs. One was simply K. CALDWELL. I was betting on K. Caldwell. I rang the bell. Over the intercom a voice, distorted by the cheap equipment but recognizably female, said, “Yes?”

“Mr. Western?” I said, reading the name above Caldwell’s. “Who?”

“Mr. Western.”

“You’ve pushed the wrong button, mate. He lives upstairs.” The intercom went dead. I went out of the foyer and across the street and by the hospital, underneath an overhang, and waited concealed by some shrubbery. Shortly before noon she came out and headed up Cleveland Street. She turned right on Howland and was out of sight. I waited five minutes. She didn’t reappear. I walked across to the foyer again and rang the bell under K. CALDWELL. No answer. 

I rang it again and kept my thumb on it. No one. The front door to the building wasn’t even locked. I went in and up to the second floor. Her door was locked. I knocked. No answer. I got out my small lock picker and went to work. I’d made the lock picker myself. It looked a little like a buttonhook made of thin stiff wire, and it had a small L on the tip. The idea was to slip it into the keyhole and then one by one turn the tumbler, working by feel. Some locks if you got it in one of the tumbler slots all the tumblers would turn at once. Sometimes, in better locks, you had to turn several. K. Caldwell did not have a good lock. It took about thirty-five seconds to get her apartment door open. I stepped in. It was empty. There’s a feel to a place almost as soon as you step in that says if it’s empty or not. I was rarely wrong about that. Still, I took my gun out and walked through the place. It looked as if it were ready for inspection. 

Everything was immaculate. The living room was furnished in angular plastic and stainless steel: On one wall was a bookcase with books in several languages. The books were perfectly organized. Not by language or topic, but by size, highest books in the center, smallest at each end, so that the shelves were symmetrical. Most of the books I’d never heard of, but I recognized Hobbes, and Mein Kampf. There were four magazines stacked on the near right-hand corner of the coffee table. The one on top was-in a Scandinavian language. The title was spelled with one of those little o’s with a slash through it. Like in Søren Kierkegaard. On the far left-hand corner was crystal sculpture that looked sort of like a water jet, frozen. In the center, exactly between the magazines and the crystal, was a round stainless steel ashtray with no trace of ash in it. 

I moved to the bedroom. It too was furnished in early Bauhaus. The bedspread was white and drawn so tight across the bed that a quarter probably would have bounced on it. There were three Mondrian prints in stainless steel frames on the white walls. One on each. The fourth wall was broken by the window. Everything in the room was white except the Mondrians and a steel-gray rug on the floor. I opened the closet. There were skirts and blouses and dresses and slacks precisely folded and creased and hung in careful groupings on hangers. The clothes were all gray or white or black. On the shelf were six pairs of shoes in order. There was nothing else in the closet. 

The bathroom was entirely white except the shower curtain, which was black with silver squares on it. The toothpaste tube on the sink was neatly rolled up from the bottom. The water glass was clean: In the medicine cabinet was underarm deodorant, a safety razor, a comb, a brush, a container of dental floss, a bottle of castor oil, and a can of feminine deodorant spray. No sign of make-up. I went back in the bedroom and began to go through the bureau. The top two drawers contained sweaters and blouses, gray, black, white and one beige. The bottom drawer was locked. I picked the lock and opened it. It contained underwear. Perhaps twelve pairs of French string bikini underpants in lavender, cerise, emerald, peach and flowered patterns. There were bras in 36C that matched the underpants. Most of them trimmed with lace, and diaphanous. There was a black lace garter belt and three pairs of black fishnet stockings. I thought pantyhose had put the garter belt people out of business. There was also a collection of perfume and a negligee. 

The drawer was heavy. I measured the inside roughly with my hand span. Then I did the outside. The outside was about a hand span deeper. I felt the inside bottom of the drawer all around the edge. At one spot it gave, and when I pressed it the bottom tilted. I lifted it out and there were four guns, .22 caliber target pistols, and ten boxes of ammunition. There were six hand grenades of a type I hadn’t seen. There was also a notebook with lists of names I’d never heard of, and addresses next to them. There were four passports. All with the girl’s picture on them. One Canadian, one Danish, one British, one Dutch. Each one had a different name. I copied them into my notebook. The British one had the name Katherine Caldwell. There were a couple of letters in the Scandinavian language full of o’s, and one bayonet that said U.S. on it. The letters were postmarked in Amsterdam. 

I took down the address. I looked at the list of names. It was too long to copy. The addresses were street addresses without cities attached, but obviously some were not English, and, as far as I could tell, none was American. My name wasn’t on the list. Neither was Dixon’s. It could be a list of victims, or a list of safe houses, or a list of Liberty recruits, or a list of people who’d sent her Christmas cards last winter. I put the false bottom back in the drawer and slid it back and locked it. The rest of the house didn’t tell me much else. I found out that Katherine was into bran cereal and fruit juices. That she dusted under the bed and behind the sofa, and that she owned neither television nor radio. Probably spent her free time reading Leviathan and breaking bricks with the edge of her hand. 

I was back out in the street by the hospital behind my shrub in the rain when Katherine returned. Her real name was probably none of the four, but Katherine was the easiest one so I called her that. Having a name made her easier to think about. She was wearing a white belted raincoat and carrying a transparent plastic umbrella that had a deep bow so that she was able to protect her whole head and shoulders. There were black slacks and black boots showing under the raincoat. I speculated on the undies. Hot pink perhaps? She went in her apartment and didn’t come out again. No one else went in. 

I stood in the rain for three more hours. My feet were very wet and very tired of being stood on. I walked back to the Mayfair. That night I made a sixty-three-dollar phone call to Susan. The first dollar’s worth told me that Henry had got in touch with Hawk and Hawk would be over right away. The next sixty-two dollars were about who missed who and what we’d do and see when she came over. There was some brief talk about whether anyone was going to do me in. I maintained that no one was, and Susan said she hoped I was right. I thought I wouldn’t mention my wounds right then. I hung up feeling worse than I had for a while. Talking on the phone from 5000 miles away was like the myth of Tantalus. It was better not to. The telephone company has lied to us for years, I thought. Always tell you that long distance is the next best thing to being there. All those people call up and feel swell afterward. I didn’t. I felt like beating up a nun. 

I had room service bring up some beer and sandwiches and I sat in my chair by the airshaft and read Regeneration Through Violence and ate sandwiches and drank beer for nearly four hours. Then I went to bed and slept. Hawk didn’t make it the next day, and I didn’t either. Katherine stayed in her apartment all day, modeling her lingerie and spraying herself with deodorant or whatever she did. I stayed outside in the rain modeling my walking hat and trench coat and listening to my shoes squish. No urban guerrillas appeared. No one went in or out of the apartment building that looked even vaguely like he might carry a knuckle knife. The rain was hard and steady and persistent. No one wanted to be out in it.