"Well, I wouldn't say you were exactly a stable person, would you? No offense meant, Mrs. Dodge, but the run of-the-mill citizen doesn't run around waving a gun and a bottle of soup."
"Don't they?" Virginia was smiling now, enjoying herself immensely.
"Well, it's a slightly crazy stunt. I mean, even you have to admit that. I can see the gun, okay. You want to kill Steve, that's your business. Listen, am I going to fight City Hall? But the nitro's a little dramatic, don't you think? How'd you manage to get it over here without blowing up half the city?"
"I managed," Virginia said.
"I walked gently. I didn't sway my hips."
"Yeah, well, that's a good way to walk, I guess. Especially when you've got a high explosive in your bag, huh?" King smiled disarmingly. The clock on the wall read 5:33. It was beginning to get dark outside.
Dusk spread across the sky, washing a deeper blue behind the color-riot trees in the park. You could hear the kids shouting for a last innings of stickball before real darkness descended. You could hear mothers shouting from windows. You could hear men greeting each other as they entered bars for their before-dinner beers.
You could hear all the sounds of life outside the grilled windows and you could hear, too-a sound as real as any of the others-the silence inside the squad room
"I like this time of day," King said.
"Do you?"
"Yes. Always did. Even when I was a kid. Something nice about it. Quiet." He paused.
"Are you really going to shoot Steve?"
"Yes," Virginia said.
"I wouldn't," Kung said.
"Why not?"
"Well .
"Is it all right to turn on some lights in here, Virginia?" Byrnes asked.
"Yes. Go ahead."
"Cotton, snap on the overheads. And can my men get back to work?"
"What kind of work?" Virginia asked.
"Answering complaints, typing up reports, making calls to ..
"Nobody makes any calls. And nobody picks up a phone unless I'm on the extension."
"All right. Can they type? Or will that disturb you?"
"They can type. At separate desks."
"All right, men," Byrnes said, "then let's do it. And listen to everything she tells you, and let's not have any heroics. I'm playing ball with you, Virginia, because I'm hoping you'll see reason before it's too late."
"Don't hold your breath," Virginia said.
"He's right, you know," Kung said softly, boyishly.
"Is he?"
"Sure. You're not doing yourself any good, Mrs. Dodge.
"No?"
"No. Your husband's dead. You're not going to help him by killing a lot of innocent people. And yourself, too, if that soup should go off."
"I loved my husband," Virginia said tightly.
"Sure. I mean, Jesus, I should hope so.
But what's the good of this? I mean, what are you accomplishing?"
"I'll be getting the man who killed him."
"Steve? Come on, Mrs. Dodge. You know he didn't kill your husband."
"I kiow nothing of the sort!"
"Okay, let's say he did kill him. I know that's not true, and you know it too-but we'll say it if it makes you happy, okay? So what do you accomplish by revenge?"
Kung shrugged boyishly.
"Nothing. Jill tell you something, Mrs. Dodge."
"Yes?"
"I've got a girlfriend. Her name is Claire.
She's a dream. I'm gonna marry her soon.
She's full of life, do you know? But she wasn't always that way. When I met her, she was dead. I mean dead, really dead. Do you know why?"
"Why?" Virginia asked.
"Why?"
"I'll tell you," Kung said boyishly.
"She'd been in love with a fellow who got killed in Korea. And when he died, she let herself die, too. She went into this big shell, and she just wouldn't come out. A young girl! Hell, you can't be much older than she is. And in this shell." He shook his head.
"She was wrong, Mrs. Dodge. She was so wrong. You see, she just didn't realize the guy was dead. She didn't realize the minute that bullet hit him, he wasn't the guy she loved any more, he was just another corpse. Dead! Finished! Out of it! She was carrying on an affair with a pile of fleshy rubble covered with maggots."
KIng paused and rubbed a hand over his chin.
"If you don't mind my saying so, you're doing the same thing."
"I'm not," Virginia said.
"Sure. Sure, you are. You're coming in here, and you're bringing the stink of death with you.
Why, you know, you even look like Death, you know that? A pretty woman like you, and you've got death in your eyes and hanging around your lips. You're being stupid. Mrs. Dodge. Really. If you were smart, you'd put up that gun and..
"I don't want to hear any more," Virginia snapped.
"You think Frank would want you to do this?
Get in all this trouble over him?"
"Yes! Frank wanted Carella dead. He said so.
He hated Carella!"
"And you? Do you hate Carella, too? Do you even know him?"
"I don't care about him. I loved my husband.
That's enough for me."
"But your husband was breaking the law when he got arrested. He shot a man! Now you couldn't expect Steve to give him a medal, could you? Now come on, Mrs. Dodge, be sensible."
"I loved my husband," Virginia said flatly, "Mrs. Dodge, I'll tell you something else.
You've got to make up your mind. Either you're a woman who really knows what love is all about, or else you're a coldblooded bitch who's ready to blow this dump to hell and gone. You can't play both sides of the fence. Now which one is it?"
"I'm a woman. I'm here because I'm a woman."
"Then act like one. Put the gun up, and get the hell out of here before you get more trouble than you've had in all your life."
"No. No."
"Come on, Mrs. Dodge... Virginia stiffened in her chair.
"All right, sonny," she said, "you can knock it off now."
"Wha ... ?" Kung started.
"The big blue-eyed baby routine. You can just cut it. It didn't work."
"I wasn't trying to .
"Enough," she said, "damnit, that's enough!
Go find somebody else's fit to suck!"
"Mrs. Dodge, I .
"Are you finished?"
The squad room went silent. The clock on the squad-room wall, white-faced and leering, threw minutes onto the floor where they lay like the ghosts of dead policemen. It was dark outside the grilled windows now. The windows, half-way open to let in the October mildness, also let in the night sounds of early traffic. A typewriter started.