called after that, and the next and the next and so on, as you said, I had to tell him we were together again and then deeply involved and then that I was marrying you and I couldn’t see him for dinner. For tea, perhaps, if he wanted, and I think he said he’d think about it but didn’t call back. And then even when I was pregnant the first time, while he probably thought that by then our marriage had busted up or was giving that idea a chance.” “Tell me, are you making all this up to have something — a big secret — to tell me to sort of take some of the awfulness off what I said? In other words, for me?” “No. And that was the end of him. But are you making up about killing that man the way you say you did to have something interesting to say to me?” “No, swear it.” “Or to get a big secret out of me, which if it was so I must have disappointed you with.” “No again; what a thing to say.” “Then are you sure you didn’t simply imagine it happening that way but after all these years have come to believe it? That the gun really did go off accidentally while you were tussling for it?” “No. I shot him in the heart intentionally or intentionally where I thought it was. I knew I was close to it and I happened to have been right.” “What’d the police say about shooting him twice? For once would have been enough, it seems.” “The police? Nothing. They seemed to immediately believe me. Patted my shoulder consolingly till they saw I didn’t need it, but mostly dealt with the body. Then some routine questioning at the police station — paperwork, formality, they even told me so, though maybe that was a ploy, though I don’t think so — and I was out in an hour and even offered a car escort home. And later at this inquest the city set up, it wasn’t a big deal either. They believed I squeezed the trigger twice because my finger was on it. In other words, that I did it that way instead of once for no other reason than that I did it. Impulse, instinct. That it wasn’t unfair or unusual or unjustified force or whatever the legal term is when you have a district attorney’s inquiry into it. ‘Improper defense’? A man’s scared to death, his life’s at stake, so in that state — and of course I made them convinced that was the case and said nothing about knowing where his heart was. I told them I didn’t know how many times I pulled the trigger. I think I could have emptied the clip into him, if there were more bullets in it — I didn’t check and never found out but at the time I was aware if I pulled it three times I might be in serious trouble — and they still would have bought it. In other words, they knew the guy was a killer and they wanted me to get off.” “Let me ask you this. You think the man, when he got out of prison, would have tried to kill you, if let’s say you had got him to the police and the city had been able to send him to prison for holding you up?” “At the time, yes. Now, I don’t think so. I doubt he would have remembered my face after so long. Because he would have had to be there, with his record, a couple of years, maybe a few. Though it was in the newspapers, my address and although no photos, though some were snapped of me when I left the inquest, so maybe he could have found me out that way. Sure he could have. But I doubt, judging by his speech and looks, he would have been smart enough to know how to go about it or remembered where he’d put the news articles when he went in. Then again, a relative or friend of his might have kept the articles — for some reason, such as thinking he was a celebrity because he was in the papers, cut them out and he got hold of them when he got out and there it was, my name and address. But it wouldn’t have made the papers if I hadn’t killed him. But if it had — after all, ordinary man stops killer from killing him and holds him for the police with the killer’s gun, they could have said. That doesn’t happen too often and especially in a fairly nice Manhattan neighborhood and everybody loves it when the good guy, we’ll call me for this supposition, wins. But by then, if it had made the papers and he hadn’t died and he’d got a copy of it or saved it himself, I had met you and moved into your place about two years after the incident, so he might not have been able to trace me. The post office doesn’t forward mail after a year, and to tell you the truth I wouldn’t have asked them to for even a day and also would have kept my name out of the phone book forever.” “What’s the mail got to do with it?” “He could have come looking for me and not finding me at my old address, asked the mailman where I moved to. They’re not supposed to, of course, but the killer could have conned him into giving it. ‘I owe him a hundred bucks.’ ‘He said he wants to sublet my girlfriend’s apartment.’” “So the mailman would say ‘Write him, it’ll be forwarded.’” “And he could say ‘It has to be done today. By tomorrow I’ll have blown the cash,’ or ‘The apartment will have been rented.’ Anyway, if he had come for me, then without knowing it I might have been protecting you too by killing him. He might have only been out for me but you were with me so he killed us both. Witnesses; get rid of them. And let’s face it, he was a killer, so in one more time, they could throw away the key, and what was one more life to him? Ah, maybe I shot him because I wanted to shoot someone or even kill someone most of my life and knew I could get away doing it to him. Perfect opportunity; gun, which I never had, and easiest way to kill someone, right? And ideal victim, someone just about everyone wants killed. No, that’s not it. Anybody I wanted to kill I’ve done it same way most people do, in my head.” “What’d it feel like after you shot him? I mean, were you disgusted, horrified? I’ve never asked you, and as long as we’re on it.” “I just looked at him and thought ‘Good, he’s dead, he won’t bother me anymore, the sonofabitch, but now I’ve got to start concocting a good case for myself. Also, there was some ecstasy to it. I stopped some filthy creep from threatening me and probably killing me when he had the jump on me and here I am to say it—’Unbelievable!’ I screamed. One word, and twirled around once with my hands in the air like this, like some Hasidic nut dancing, and then yelled ‘Help, police,’ but by this time some people were already looking over the park wall and said ‘Hey, what’s going on?’ And then I thought Holy shit, they saw me spinning around, I’ll have to give some excuse for that too.’ So I brought it up first to the police and said I was dizzy after I shot the man, didn’t know where I was, in some crazy mental state from what happened, and they bought that too. But that’s enough, right?” “You don’t want to go on? I could understand that.” “There’s nothing more really to say. I’ve brought you up to where you know the rest.” “Most of what you told me in the past, if I can be honest, I forget, but all right. The police came, I remember that, and then the questions there and at the precinct, which you mentioned before — all right.” “So what do you think?” “About you in all this? It was so long ago. What’s there to say? You might have been justified. Maybe there’s no justification in killing someone cold-bloodedly like that. But you might have been in such fear and panic for your life after being so menaced by him that you didn’t know what you were doing so you shot him, maybe to stop him from attacking you with what you thought might be another gun or a knife he had hidden. Did you think of that?” “Sure. I’m almost sure I said so. That he’d trick me somehow. But no, I was perfectly rational, or just rational about it, all the time. I thought I might get killed during the robbery but once I got the gun away from him—” “It’s amazing how you were able to do that. Just having done it successfully must have put you — or could have — into some strange state of mind. Power. The superhumanness of it. I mean, people are often having fantasies about it, but who actually does it? The adrenalin must have been overflowing. So much so—” “I suppose. That I don’t remember so I can’t say. Anyway, where was I?” “I don’t know — where, do you mean on the street?” “And it’s getting a little tiresome as a subject, don’t you think?” “It is a bit much, of course, but if you feel you want to go on with it…” “Nah, let’s forget it for now and maybe forever. I’ve told it all. Now maybe it can start dropping away from me; I wouldn’t mind. Finished?” and he pointed to her plate. “I’ll take them in.” “No, I’m getting up,” and stacked their plates, put the silver and wine glasses on them and brought them into the kitchen and put them in the sink. He finished her wine and his, though didn’t know whose glass was which, and went back into the dining room. She was still at the table, looking at him as if she didn’t know what to think. “Did I take your wine too soon?” he said. “No, I was done with it; you finish it.” “Yeah, I might.” “As long as you’re up and dealing with the dishes, mind if I just sit? The whole thing — what you did, went through that night, all that stuff — is really coming to me. It’s horrible. People shouldn’t have to go through such things but they do, right?” “For sure,” and took the bowls and platter and bottle of wine, brought them into the kitchen, poured another glass. “If you want to know what I’m doing — did you hear that pouring sound?” “No, what?” she said. “I was in some other thought.” “Well if you want to know what I’m doing now — I’m drinking some more wine, after finishing both of ours, to sort of obliterate — help make disappear faster and maybe for the rest of the night if I’m lucky — the memory of what I did.” “Do. It’s what I would. You deserve it.”