"Two days."
"Two D.O.A.s."
"Okay, Mike, say it."
"That guy in the car was trying to take me out. He got the girl instead."
"You're not in the report," he said quietly.
"Right, and there's no sense getting me in it either." I took a deep breath, sat in a different position, and told Pat how it had gone down.
When he had mulled it over, he said, "How do you see it?"
"Somebody doesn't appreciate me snooping around. Whether it's Doolan or the Mathes girl that has made me popular, I can't say yet."
"Mike, you were already popular."
"Like with Alberto Bonetti?"
"Hell, man, that makes zero sense. Like old Alberto so cleverly put it to you the other night, he could have had you pickled or fried anytime he wanted to."
"He didn't say it that cleverly, but you have a point.... Shit."
"What?"
"Nothing. These damn pills are still working on me. Give me a while and I'll think this thing through."
"And the answer will come out just the same," he told me. "You were inside a hit-and-run, and came out lucky. Try looking at it that way. You're the one always saying coincidences do happen."
We said so long and hung up.
Suppose, I thought.
Suppose somebody had picked me up coming out of the hotel, tailed me all day trying to figure a way to nail me, watched when the little hooker and I went to that restaurant for supper, and—knowing we'd be there at least an hour—snagged a car, parked, and waited, hoping he'd get a crack at us.
The possibility was limited, but it was a possibility. And if it happened that way, the killer was in a real bind. That "accident" was a murder with the wrong one down, and whoever pulled it would know damn well I'd figure it out.
I felt a grin grow and blossom teeth. Whoever tried to hit me—whether for Doolan or the Mathes kid or both—would have to start all over again.
Only this time I'd be expecting it.
Chapter 6
I WALKED TO BING'S Gym to work out the body ache from the love tap that Caddy gave me the night before. Bing's top trainer, Clarence, knew something had happened when he saw the bruises across my back and on my leg.
"Mixing it up already, Mr. Hammer?" Clarence asked. He was a black guy about thirty-five who'd long since retired from the ring. "You ain't been back in the city that long."
"Maybe somebody mistook me for an out-of-towner."
"Well, they gonna learn a lesson, I bet. You better work an easy routine today, on the apparatus."
Bing had taught everybody that word.
But I still worked up a good sweat, and even with the new aches and pains, I was feeling more myself. Clarence made sure I had a good rubdown and a shower before turning me loose. I was still sore, but clean as a whistle, and feeling better than I could remember. I hoofed it back to the hotel to change from my sweatshirt and slacks into a suit and tie, and to dump my gym bag.
I had made some changes. You would think I'd have doubled up on the meds last night, after that hit-and-run scrape. You would be wrong. I stopped taking the pills. I didn't flush them—I just put them away. They were mostly for pain and sleep and something that I suspected was an antidepressant meant to cool me out.
Well, a long time ago I had gone to sleep fine in foxholes in the kind of tropical rainstorms that could turn your safe haven into a drowning bath and had artillery for thunder, and if I could deal with those pains and pressures as a kid, I could sure as hell manage without medication as a man.
I'd left the million-dollar marble in an envelope in the hotel safe—nobody knew I had the pebble, so it should be secure. I just didn't want to go around carrying the damn thing. After all, a person could get mugged here in Fun City.
But I was carrying something else now—the .45 in its speed rig. With the weight I'd lost, its bulk didn't show under my shoulder at all. Not that it ever had, since all my suits and sport jackets were cut for concealment. This was no simple precaution. Somebody had tried to kill me last night. No time to be keeping the gun packed away in a drawer—time for packing period.
I didn't bother looking around the street for a tail. If he was there, good. Whether a killer with an unknown agenda, or a copper sent by Pat for protection, I'd pick him up sooner or later. The weight under my arm had given a looseness to my shoulders, and I was getting the feeling that I was back in my own ballpark again. I flagged a cab, slipped in back, and gave the driver an East Side address.
The building was turn-of-the-century stylish, a former residence turned into a fashionable men's club. In the basement was the Enfilade, the most exclusive gun club in New York State, snugged away in the midst of Manhattan.
Of course, New York has always had a reputation for being trigger-happy, but these days even buying a gun is a hassle, licensing one is even worse, and finding a place to shoot the goddamn thing is nearly impossible.
So the deep-pocket supersports had come up with their own clubhouse—outfitted with a hundred-foot range and all the technology of a police academy with reloading equipment from cap-and-ball antiques to Israeli Arms .45s.
Membership was pretty damn selective. Social status could always do it, and money generally could too, while occasionally allowances were made for unique personalities, whom the gun fraternity decided could liven up their scheduled events—like the mayor or a Broadway star.
Or a respected retired cop like Bill Doolan.
Ten years ago I had been presented with a membership card so I could mingle during a rare-weapons exhibition, one of the few times select segments of the public had been invited into the shooters' sanctuary. They had a ten-million-dollar display up and I handled the guard duty personally. When the job was over, I was paid handsomely, but they didn't take the card back.
One ancient gent of British extraction said it really was "a bit of a whimsy" to have a member who had actually used a gun to shoot people.
I opened the interior door and the little grayed gnome of a man at the antique mahogany desk looked at me, squinted, then broke into a wide smile.
"Ah," he said. This diminutive guard at the gates wore a dignified black suit and necktie suitable for a high-class undertaker. "Mr. Hammer, is it not?"
"Right on," I told him. "And you're Gerald."
"I am indeed."
You could smell the age when you were inside, the tingling odor of wood polish and real leather, not tainted by the smoke of cigars or covered with cigarette haze. By the door Gerald sat guarding, a brass plate simply read: SMOKING NOT ALLOWED ON THESE PREMISES. A large ornate ashtray stood beside it to make the message clear and provide an exit for any cigar or cigarette that had made it that far. Those with brains would realize that the place was full of barrels of shot and powder, and the ordinance was a safety device.
"Gerry, it's great to see you, and to be seen. But I didn't bring my card."
"No problem, sir—I know all the members. It has been some time though, hasn't it?"
"Five years, I guess. Back when Hagley won the International Trophy. Some party that night."
"The exception not the rule, sir. We like to keep our affairs rather dull. Stuffiness has its own benefits, when your hobby is firing off weapons."
"I can dig it," I said with a grin. "Who's lurking in the Enfilade today?"
"At this relatively early hour?" He glanced at the book in front of him. "Only the professionals. A former United States champion in small arms, a gun-manufacturing executive, and our present club president, an ex-Marine marksman, recently retired from Wall Street. Are you going to join them?"
I shrugged. "I don't play with guns anymore."