Authors: Robert B. Parker
I got tired of looking at the White House and sat down in one of the chairs and put my feet on the double bed and read the Post. By the time I finished the Post it was getting dark outside. I looked at the White House some more. I could go for a walk, but if I did, I might miss Susan if she called.
I turned on the TV and watched the early news and wondered why the early-news people in every city were wimps. Probably specified in the recruitment ads. Early-News Person Wanted. Must Be Wimp. Send resume and tapes to… I shut off the television and looked out the window some more. I could order up some Irish whiskey and get drunk. But if Susan did call… It was dark now and the White House gleamed in its spotlights. I thought about Ronni Alexander trying to be Yvonne De Carlo and the look on Alexander’s face when he left me there to watch. I thought about the lucky people that Susan was treating. Her undivided attention for fifty minutes. Son of a bitch.
They were having a party at the White House. Limousines pulled up the circular drive and let people out. Some people didn’t come in limousines. They simply walked up the driveway. Maybe they took a cab. I’d always wondered how you said that. Sixteen Hundred Pennsylvania Avenue, my good man, and don’t spare the horses. The President and the First Lady were probably dressing. Or maybe they were necking. Or… Someone knocked at the door of my room. I went and opened it and there was Susan wearing a silver raccoon coat and carrying a bottle of champagne and smelling like Eden in springtime.
”Did you really say ’succor the afflicted‘ to the department secretary?“ she said.
”Yeah,“ I said. ”I think she was offended.“
I stepped aside and she came in and put the champagne on the bureau and turned and smiled. I stood and stared at her. There were times when I wanted to strangle her. But never when she was with me. Her presence overcame everything.
”Jesus Christ,“ I said.
She opened her arms and I stepped in against her and hugged her. She raised her face and I kissed her. I felt liquid and dispersive, as if I might dissolve into the floor.
Susan was brisk and cheerful. ”Now you have a decision to make,“ she said. ”Do you want to drink the champagne before or after you jump on my bones?“
That was easy.
Afterward we sat up in bed drinking the champagne from water glasses.
”See,“ Susan said. ”I do succor the afflicted.“
”Yes,“ I said. ”You give good succor.“
Susan drank some of the champagne.
”Was Paul with you on Thanksgiving?“
”Yes. We ate out. How about you?“
”Super. There were five or six of us from the program and John, our supervisor, had us all out to his home in Bethesda. There were twenty-five people in all, including some very big people in the profession.“
”Yeah, but how many of them can do a one-armed pushup?“
Susan smiled and drank more of her champagne. ”Tell me about what you’re doing down here,“ she said.
”Besides seeking succor?“
She nodded.
”I’m working for a congressman,“ I said.
”You? That doesn’t seem like you.“
”Maybe it was an excuse to get to Washington,“ I said.
”I wouldn’t think you’d need an excuse.“
I shrugged. ”Anyway,“ I said, ”I’m working for a congressman named Meade Alexander.“
”Meade Alexander? Good God, what does he think of you?“
I poured the rest of the champagne evenly into our two glasses. ”He has not been fortunate in his marriage,“ I said.
Susan settled back a little against her pillows and I told her about Meade and Ronni Alexander.
When I got through, Susan said, ”The poor woman.“
”I hadn’t thought too much about that,“ I said. ”I’ve been kind of identifying with Alexander, I suppose.“
Susan nodded. ”She must be very desperate.“
”Most people are,“ I said.
I dropped Susan off at 8:15 the next morning in front of the Medical Center on Michigan Avenue.
”When you come to work wearing the same clothes, won’t people suspect you of shacking up?“ I said.
”I hope so,“ Susan said.
”Want me to pick you up after work?“ I said.
She shook her head. ”I can’t until late,“ she said. ”There’s a staff cocktail party. They have one every month on the assumption that morale will be uplifted.“
I nodded.
”I’ll make a reservation for nine,“ I said. ”Any suggestions? It’s your city, not mine.“
She shook her head. ”No, I’d trust you with a restaurant reservation in Sri Lanka.“
”Everybody’s good at something,“ I said. ”I’ll pick you up here.“
”Yes.“ She kissed me good-bye carefully, so that her lipstick didn’t smear, and then she was out and off to work leaving the smell of her perfume to gloss up the rented car.
I drove back intown on North Capitol Street and then rook M Street out to Georgetown.
Georgetown is nearly gorgeous. The buildings are elegant, the setting along the Potomac is graceful. You can run along the tow path of the old Chesapeake and Ohio canal and you can eat and shop and drink along M Street and Wisconsin Avenue with the heartening certainty that you’re chic. Like L. A. and New York, the dining and drinking spots were ornamented with the possibility that you might see somebody famous. Even if it was a politician.
I parked the car in the lot of a Safeway on Wisconsin Avenue. Early winter in D.C. was around fifty and pleasant. I went across the street and bought a cup of coffee to go in a small food store that advertised empanadas in the window, but didn’t have them made yet for the day. I strolled along Wisconsin Avenue and thought about a plan. The more I thought about it, the more I didn’t have one. I could work on my restaurant selection for tomorrow evening. But that didn’t do much for Meade and Ronni. Maybe there wasn’t much to be done for Meade and Ronni. I stopped at the corner of Reservoir Avenue to sip on my coffee. Only the second cup of the day. Then I went on. I couldn’t talk with Ronni. I couldn’t even let on that she wasn’t perfect. I had gotten all I was going to get from Vinnie, and Vinnie was the town crier compared to Joe Broz. The last communication I’d had from Joe Broz was some years back when he told me he was going to have me shot. Not many people follow up on a promise anymore. I knew that Broz had a copy of the videotape of Ronni’s indiscretion. I didn’t know how he’d gotten it. I finished my coffee and looked for a place to throw the cup.
Littering in Georgetown was probably a capital crime. Maybe if I reconstructed it. Broz had purchased Robert Browne some years back. This year Browne’s position seemed threatened by Meade Alexander. By a means not yet apparent, Broz had some tapes of Mrs. Alexander and he sent a copy to Meade and told him to drop out. He had probably, though not certainly, been responsible for the death threats that had got me hired in the first place. And he was demonstrably responsible for the two hoods in Springfield who had roughed up the kids. I could look into Broz’s candidate, Browne, but even if I nailed him, Broz would still have Alexander as long as he had the indiscreet tapes. And my business was to save Ronni’s reputation. The rest was unimportant. I understood that. I even agreed with it. I reached the corner of M Street and turned right. If I got the tape back, it didn’t solve much. There was no way to know how many copies there were, or even if Ronnie had made others. There was no guarantee she wouldn’t make another one. Across M Street there was something called the Market. I crossed and went in. It was a miniature version of the Quincy Market building in Boston, a collection of small food stands quaintly housed in an old brick building. I bought some coffee from a young woman wearing a red checked kerchief for a headband and a white T-shirt that said HOYAS above the college crest. The T-shirt was tight and the lettering in HOYAS was somewhat distorted. I read it carefully. A detective learns to study things. It was still early and the place was nearly empty. I cruised through, looking at all the food and wrestling with the urge to sample everything. Iron control won again and I went out with only my black coffee. One more cup wouldn’t hurt. I could stop in on my way back, after I’d walked some more and thought of a plan: A victory lunch. I’d have one of everything and maybe make small talk with the young woman and her T-shirt. HOYAS. A pugnacious bulldog wearing a derby had been on the flat lands of her abdomen and thus unbent. I turned down a side street and walked to the canal. Two joggers moved along the tow path at an easy pace. I’d seen the crest before on a beer mug in the tape of Ronni Alexander. I stopped dead. My coffee was half drunk. I stood stock still and finished it in small sips. Georgetown University. Joe Broz. Ronni Alexander. A plan?
I went into an ornate high-rise shopping mall where everything was marble and gilt and looked like something left over from Caligula’s birthday. Hidden down by the washrooms were a couple of utilitarian phones and under them hung some D.C. phone books. I looked under B and there he was-Gerald Broz with a Georgetown address. How many Brozes could there be? I found the number for the dean of students’ office at Georgetown University and called and asked if they had a Gerry Broz in the college. They said they did. I asked if they could give me his address and they said they couldn’t, but if I would leave my name and number they’d ask Mr. Broz to call me. I said never mind and hung up. My plan was taking shape. It was a little soon to go back to the Market and eat everything, but I’d keep it as a goal. A man’s no better than his dreams.
I checked Gerry Broz’s address in the phone book, then went back out and strolled west on M Street. Gerry’s place was on the corner of M and 35th Streets opposite Key Bridge. It rose three stories on the north side of M Street and looked out at the Potomac through window walls at each level. Perfect for indoor videotaping by daylight. Even the first floor insured privacy, for it began above a three-car garage on the street level. I went over and looked at the mailboxes. It was three apartments, one per floor, and G. Broz occupied the top. I went back out and stood on the corner. The D.C. weather wasn’t pleasant anymore. It was cloudy and the temperature had dropped and the wind had picked up. Compared to Boston in December it was like a morris dance, but for D.C. it was chilly. I turned up the collar on my leather trench coat. I looked at the apartment some more. It began to rain, and the temperature being what it was, it mixed some snow in. I moved a little closer to the wall of the liquor store on the corner where I was standing. Did Boston Blackie spend a lot of time standing on the corner in a freezing rain saying to himself, Now what? He did not. As time went along I seemed to be doing more of it. The Tightness of myself isn’t enough anymore. How would an eighteen-year-old kid know that? Thoughtful little bastard. Probably didn’t waste a lot of time standing on cold corners thinking, Now what?
I could burgle the apartment, but what would that get me? I wouldn’t know till I burgled it. If he caught me, he’d know I was onto the tape business, although if he was involved in it, and it was a hell of a coincidence if he wasn’t, he knew that already. Vinnie would have spoken to Broz and Broz would have spoken to Gerry. I decided it was better than what I had been doing, so I went across the street and rang Gerry Broz’s bell. No one answered. I rang a long time to be sure. Gerry was probably, in class. Probably discussing Savonarola and the Italian Renaissance, or pointing out the errors of Malthusian economics.
The outside door was easy. It took less than a minute. But Broz’s apartment door was not easy. It was clearly a special lock, specially installed, and it was better at staying locked than I was at picking it. The door was special too, and I knew I wasn’t going to kick it loose. I went down one flight andknocked at the door of the second-floor apartment. No answer. The door had a conventional lock.
When I was inside with the door closed I went directly to the window wall, opened the sliding doors, and went out on the little balcony. Without any hesitation, looking like I was supposed to be doing this, I took off my coat, tossed it down to the street below, stood on the balcony rail, caught hold of the bottom railing on Broz’s balcony, and chinned myself up. Then I got one hand over the top rail and pulled myself up and over onto his balcony. I wasn’t even puffing. The Great Wallenda. I glanced casually down toward the street. Nobody seemed to be gathering. No cops were screaming to a stop, no concerned citizens were pointing up at me. I stood close to the glass door, took out my gun, and banged out the glass around the door catch. Still no hue and cry. Even if there had been, I figured the cops in Georgetown carried fowling pieces and I’d be out of range. I reached through the hole and unlatched the door. Then I carefully pulled my hand back out. You never cut the hand going in, always coming out because you let down. I slid the door open and went in and closed it behind me.
It was the same room. Bed, bureau, desk, beer mug with pencils in it. To my left above a massive Mediterranean-type bureau was a very large mirror framed in ornate mahogany and secured to the wall at all four corners with triangular plastic hasps. I went through one of the bedroom doors into a large green-tiled bathroom with an Italian marble sink set in a mahogany cabinet. Above the sink was another large mirror. There was a door on the opposite side of the bathroom and when I opened it I found another bedroom. I took a quick house tour to make sure I was alone. The bedrooms and connecting bath lay along the front of the building; the building was a big living-dining area and an open kitchen at one end. Normal-sized windows looked uphill away from the river toward Georgetown. The place was ornately furnished in mahogany and expensive carpeting.
I went back to the bathroom and looked at the mirror over the sink. On the right side it was hinged, and I swung it open, ducking under it, and pushed it aside, up against the pebbled-glass tub enclosure. What remained was of course the see-through side of a one-way mirror. It commanded a full view of the bedroom beyond, and anyone who wanted to watch or photograph what went on there had only to do so from here. It was where Ronni Alexander had made her (as far as I knew) videotape debut.