That was a good question, and it was still on Nolan’s mind even as Angelo wheeled the black Chevy down a side street and slid into a diagonal parking stall next to the cycle shop over which Charlie’s daughter lived.
“Don’t tell me,” Angelo grunted. “You want me to keep my ass in the car, right?”
Nolan nodded. “And if somebody comes at you with a silenced grease gun, try to get out of the way.”
“I’ll do my best.”
“But if you can’t, fall on the horn and warn me before you breathe your last, okay, Angelo?”
“Nolan, what the fuck makes you such a nice guy?”
“The company I keep.”
To the left of the row of motorcycles and the window full of Yamaha signs was a doorless doorway, beyond that a stairway. At the bottom of the stairs were two mailboxes: apartment one had somebody called Barry West in it; apartment two had Joyce Walters. Walters wasn’t Charlie’s name, and Joyce wasn’t married, but she was Charlie’s kid just the same.
Nolan didn’t like this. It gave him a bad taste in his mouth. Charlie was a crazy man, and that made anyone who chose to play by Charlie’s rules a crazy man, as well.
But shit. What else was there to do? Where else could he turn? Milwaukee was out; it was a madhouse at the moment, and the two men he needed to talk to were both dead. Chicago? Might be a few people there worth seeing, but he doubted it, doubted he’d find out anything he hadn’t found out already, from Joey Metrano. No, it was obvious Charlie had done his most recent arranging through Harry, in Milwaukee, so Chicago was no good, and besides, Felix would have Family men poking around the city, and as for that meeting at the air field, that was the same damn thing: Family people would be in control there, too. And Charlie wasn’t likely to show anyway; he’d much more likely be holed up, trying to regroup, trying to find some new way to get out of the country, now that the plane was out. Unless Felix was right and Charlie was going around shooting those who’d helped him. But Nolan simply couldn’t believe that, even though there was a cockeyed Charlie-like logic to it.
There was only one name on that list worth talking to. Only one person he could try.
The daughter.
And he knew that the best thing for him to do would be grab her, take her with him and try to work out a trade with Charlie — the girl for Jon and the money. If anyone would know where Charlie was, the daughter would, and if Nolan kidnapped her and worked out a swap, the whole damn problem could be solved in one easy stroke. Nolan wouldn’t even have to kill the old bastard; he could leave that to Charlie’s Family friends.
So it was easy. Just take the girl. Exchange of prisoners. Simple.
But he’d be playing Charlie’s game, doing what Charlie had done to Jon, and that gave him a bad taste in his mouth.
He knocked. A voice from within said, “One moment,” a girl’s voice, medium-range, firm.
She opened the door a crack and peered out at Nolan, looked him over, said, “Oh. You’re a friend of my father’s, I suppose.” She gave out a heavy sigh. “I imagine you want to come in and talk to me.”
“If I could,” Nolan said.
She let him in, with another sigh, as if she’d known he was coming and was resigned to the fact. “Come in,” she said, though he already was, “if you feel you have to.”
Nolan walked over to a worn green couch, sat. The apartment was spare but spotless; the furniture old but service-able. The only concession to luxury was a tiny portable TV that sat in a corner so low that your neck would have to ache no matter where you chose to watch, perhaps as punishment for doing so. The floor was hard varnished wood, scrubbed but too old to shine. The walls were flat, unpebbled plaster, white and very clean; they were bare except for a wooden carved thing over the couch, from some culture Nolan couldn’t conceive of, and three posters, all on the wall directly across from him. One poster had an abstract drawing and the words “War Is Not Healthy for Children and Other Living Things,” while the other two showed photographs of starving children, one labeled Biafra, the other Cambodia. It wasn’t the most cheerful apartment Nolan had ever been in.
“Excuse me if I was rude before,” she said. “Would you care for something to drink?”
He shrugged. “Coffee,” he said.
“I have a pot of tea in the kitchen.”
“Fine.”
She wasn’t gone long. She gave him the tea and on the saucer next to the cup was a single cookie, a vanilla Hydrox. Nolan bit the Hydrox in half and a hungry-eyed kid from Biafra caught his attention; the mouthful went down hard.
“I don’t believe this is necessary,” she said. “But I suppose you people mean well doing it.”
She was a girl who might have been pretty, had she a mind to. She was small and had those same dark, close-set eyes her father had, though on her the effect was much different; there was a softness in the eyes that outer layers of strength couldn’t mask. She sat in a straightback chair across from him, right by the Cambodia poster, and crossed her legs, tugging down her long skirt. She wasn’t bad-looking, really, he thought, considering she was Charlie’s kid and dressed like a goddamn nun, black skirt and short-sleeve white blouse, tucked neatly in. Her dark hair probably looked good when it hung loose to her shoulders; right now it was in a tight bun, pulled back from attractive features that had been totally denied make-up.
“I said, I don’t believe this is necessary,” she repeated, “but I suppose you people mean well doing it.”
“Pardon?”
“Believe me, I know this is awkward for you. But I do understand what this is all about. As you must know, when Daddy died, Uncle Harry came down and talked to me, to try to soothe me, calm me. What upset Uncle Harry was I wasn’t upset. I wish he could have understood that as far as I was concerned my father had died long before that stupid crash, and that my brother’s death was of a far greater importance to me, because I had... I had hope for Walter. But Walter was stubborn. Stubborn as hell, and he wanted to walk in his father’s footsteps, God alone knows why. So I could accept his death, too.”
Nolan sipped his tea. He felt uncomfortable. He wished he’d thought this out better, planned exactly how he was going to handle the daughter. But who could have planned for a girl like this, anyway? Nothing to do but sit here and let her talk.
“So, as I said, this is entirely unnecessary. I heard the news on the television, and I was saddened for a moment, but I must admit that while Uncle Harry was a nice man in his way, I feel the world will be a better place without him. People like my uncle, and my father, are destructive, to themselves and to their society. My family had long been a part of organized corruption, our family history is long and illustrious in that regard. My mother’s father, my grandfather, why they write books about him! Famous people played him in the movies, I was a celebrity as a little girl because of it — the only kid on the block whose grandpa was on ‘The Untouchables’! No, I won’t miss Uncle Harry, just like I won’t miss my father. You want to know who I miss? Walter, sure, Walt, but mostly, I miss my mother, I wish I could sit and talk to my mother. She was ten years older than Daddy, she was a good woman and always pretended she didn’t realize Daddy married her because she was somebody’s daughter. She was young when she died, in her early sixties, and she died more of neglect than anything else, but she was too much in love with Daddy ever to complain — at least she never complained loud enough for me to hear. My whole family was caught up in that other Family, it drained the life out of all of us, and so please tell your people not to come bother me anymore. It’s so ridiculous now, there’s not a close blood relative left and yet still they feel obliged to send you, out of some insane, archaic sense of duty or custom or something. Excuse me. I hope I haven’t offended you. But you must understand. My father was dead long before he was killed in that crash. He was morally dead. My uncle, too. Can you understand that?”