‘And yet,’ his brother said, ‘right to the day he died, he was the sweetest, most loving person on earth.’
‘A wonderful human being.’
‘A mensch,’ the uncle agreed.
* * * *
Only one of the girls was really beautiful, but the other one was cute, too. He hadn’t expected either of them to be prizes. You call an escort service, they’re not about to send you a couple of movie stars.
The woman on the phone yesterday had said, ‘You know what this is gonna cost you, man?’
She sounded black.
‘Price is no object,’ he’d said.
‘Just so you know, it’s a thousand for each girl for the night. Comes to two K, plus a tip is customary.’
‘No problem,’ he’d said.
‘Usually twenty percent.’
He thought this was high, but he said nothing.
‘Which’ll come to twenty-four hundred total. You could make it an even twenty-five, you were feeling generous.’
‘Credit card okay?’ he’d asked.
‘American Express, Visa, or MasterCard,’ she’d said. ‘What time did you want them?’
‘Seven sharp,’ he’d said. ‘Can you make it a blonde and a redhead?’
‘How about a nice Chinese girl?’
‘No, not tonight.’
‘Or a luscious sistuh?’
He wondered if she had herself in mind.
‘Just a blonde and a redhead. In their twenties, please.’
‘Le’me find you suppin nice,’ she’d said.
The blonde was the real beauty. She told him her name was Trish. He didn’t think this was her real name. The redhead was the cute one. She said her name was Reggie, short for Regina, which he had to believe because who on earth would chose Regina as a phony name? He guessed Trish was in her mid-twenties. Reggie said she was nineteen. He believed that, too.
‘So what are we planning to do here tonight?’ Trish asked.
She was the bubbly one. Wearing a short little black cocktail dress, high-heeled black sandals. Reggie was wearing green, to match her green eyes. Serious look on her Irish phizz, she should have been wearing glasses. Better legs than Trish, cute little cupcake breasts as opposed to the melons Trish was bouncing around. Neither of them was wearing a bra. They both wandered the hotel suite like it was the Taj Mahal.
‘Lookee here, two bedrooms!’ Trish said. ‘We can try both of them!’
Before morning, they’d used both beds, and the big Jacuzzi tub in the marbled bathroom. It hadn’t worked anywhere.
‘Why don’t we try it again tonight?’ Trish suggested now.
‘I have other plans,’ he told her.
‘Then how about tomorrow night?’ she said.
‘Maybe,’ he said.
‘Well, think about it,’ she said, and gave his limp cock a playful little tug, and then went off to shower. Reggie was drinking coffee at the dining-room table, wearing just her panties, tufts of wild red hair curling around the leg holes. Freckles on her bare little breasts. Nipples puckered.
‘We could do this alone sometime, you know,’ she said.
He looked at her.
‘Just you and me. Sometimes it works better alone.’
He kept looking at her.
‘Sometimes two girls are intimidating. Alone, we could do things we didn’t try last night.’
‘Like what?’
‘Oh, I don’t know. We’ll experiment.’
‘We will, huh?’
‘If you want to,’ she said. ‘Give it another try, you know?’ She lifted her coffee cup, drank, put it down on the table again. ‘And you wouldn’t have to go through the service,’ she said.
Down the hall, he could hear the shower going.
‘You could call me direct,’ she said, ‘forget Sophisticates,’ and shoved back her chair and walked to the counter, and began writing on the hotel pad under the wall phone. Leaning over the counter, writing. White panties tight across her firm little ass. Nineteen years old. She tore the top sheet of paper from the pad, turned to him and grinned. Little Bugs Bunny grin. Freckles spattered on her cheeks and nose. Strutted back to the table barefooted. Plunked down the sheet of paper like a warrant.
‘Call me,’ she said.
He picked up her number, looked at it.
‘Whenever,’ she said, serious now, the grin gone.
‘Well, not tonight,’ he said.
Tonight he would have to kill Alicia Hendricks.
* * * *
He was worried that he wouldn’t have the strength to see him through all this. Not the mental conviction, no, not that - he knew he was doing the right thing, was convinced of that the moment he decided on what had to be done now, if ever, so that he could at last come to terms with what he bitterly labeled his so-called life. But would he have the actual physical strength he would need to carry him through to the end?
The corrections had to be made, however painful.
Yes. All the decisions not his own, all the paths traveled against his will, all the journeys to places he had not chosen for himself, these had to be adjusted. Now. They had to learn he was cognizant of the sins committed, they had to be made to realize. Even blind Sobolov, who could not see who was about to fire two shots into his face, had recognized in that last moment that this was redemption, had whispered a name on the sullen night air - ‘Charlie?’ - just before the thunder roared and the blood spurted.
The problem now was staying strong.
Not allowing the pain to divert him.
Then he would get through this.
* * * *
Louis Hawkins was asleep when Carella and Meyer knocked on his door at noon that Friday.
He told them at once that he’d worked till two A.M. last night, and didn’t get home till three, and he appreciated his sleep and didn’t much care for the police knocking on his door at the crack of dawn. Carella apologized for both cops, explained the urgency of constructing a timetable before a case got cold, and then politely asked if Hawkins could spare them a few moments of his time. Reluctantly, he let them into the apartment.
All over the walls, there were photographs of a balding, gray-haired man playing a violin.
‘Stephane Grappelli,’ Hawkins explained. ‘You want coffee? What the hell, I’m awake now.’
Barefooted and in his bathrobe, he stood at the kitchen counter, measuring out coffee by the spoonful.
‘Greatest jazz violinist who ever lived,’ he said. ‘Died in Paris seven years ago. Still playing when he was eighty-nine. You know what he said when he was eighty-five? A reporter asked him if he was considering retirement. Grappelli said, “Retirement! There isn’t a word that’s more painful to my ears. Music keeps me going. It has given me everything. It’s my fountain of youth.” I feel the same way. I’m almost fifty, lots of people start considering a condo in Florida at that age. Hell, I could get a job down there easy, same as the one I have here at Ninotchka, playing gypsy music for old farts. But you know something? I moonlight at jazz clubs. Sit in with some of the best musicians in this city. That’s what keeps me going. You ever hear of Django Reinhardt? The great jazz guitarist? You never heard of him?’
‘I heard of him,’ Carella said.
‘Grappelli used to play with him. Can you imagine that sound? They took the world by storm! The stuff they did with the quintet? At the Hot Club in Paris? Nothing like it, man, nothing on earth. He’s my hero. If I could ever play like him…’ Hawkins let the sentence trail. ‘I hope you like it strong,’ he said, and set the coffeepot on the stove to perk. ‘So this is about Max, huh?’
‘It’s about Max,’ Meyer said.
‘I figured. You know what Grappelli once said? He said, “I play best when I’m happy or sad.” I think Max played best when he was sad. In fact, I don’t think I ever saw him happy.’