"Some trouble where you work."
"I never cause trouble."
"I didn't say that. The trouble doesn't involve you.
At least not directly. But you might have seen something important. You
might have been a witness."
"To what?"
"That will take a while to explain."
"I couldn't have been a witness. Not me. I wear blinders in that
place."
"Miss Mowry," he said sternly, "if I must get a warrant in order to
question you, I will."
"How do I know you're really the police?"
"New York," Bollinger said with mock exasperation.
"Isn't it just wonderful? Everyone suspects everyone else.
"They have to."
He sighed. "Perhaps. Look, Miss Mowry, do you have a security chain on
the door?"
"Of course."
"Of course. Well, leave the chain on and open up. I'll show you my
identification."
Hesitantly, she slid back a bolt lock. The chain lock allowed the door
to open an inch and no farther.
He held up his wallet. "Detective Bollinger, " he said. The knife was
in his left hand, pointed at the floor, pressed flat against his
overcoat.
She squinted through the narrow crack. She peered for a moment at the
badge that was pinned to the inside of his wallet, then carefully
studied the photo identification card in the plastic window below the
badge.
When she stopped squinting at the ID and looked up at him, he saw that
her eyes were not blue, as he had thought-having seen her no closer than
when she was on stage and he was in the shadowed audience but a deep
shade of green. They were truly the most attractive eyes he had ever
seen. "Satisfied?" he asked.
Her thick dark hair had fallen across one eye. She pushed it away from
her face. Her fingers were long and perfectly formed, the nails painted
blood red. When she was on stage, bathed in that intense spotlight, her
nails appeared to be black. She said, "What's this trouble you
mentioned?"
"I have quite a number of questions to ask you, Miss Mowry. Must we
discuss this through a crack in the door for the next twenty minutes?"
Frowning, she said, "I suppose not. Wait there just a minute while I
put on a robe."
"I can wait. Patience is the key to content."
She looked at him curiously.
Mohammed," he said.
"A cop who quotes Mohammed?"
"Why not?"
"Are you-of that religion?"
"No." He was amused at the way she phrased the question. "It's just
that I've acquired a considerable amount of knowledge for the sole
purpose of shocking those people who think all policemen are hopelessly
ignorant.
" She winced. "Sorry." Then she smiled. He had not seen her smile
before, not once in the entire week since he had first seen her.
She had stood in that spotlight, moving with the music, shedding her
clothes, bumping, grinding, caressing her own bare breasts, observing
her audience with the cold eyes and almost lipless expression of a
snake. Her smile was dazzling.
"Get your robe, Miss MoryS he closed the door.
Bollinger watched the foyer door at the end of the hall, hoping no one
would come in or go out while he was standing there, exposed.
He put away his wallet.
He kept the knife in his left hand.
in less than a minute she returned. She removed the security chain,
opened the door and said, "Come in."
He stepped past her, inside.
She closed the door and put the bolt lock in place and turned to him a
him and said, "Whatever trouble-" Moving quickly for such a large man he
slammed her against the door, brought up the knife, shifted it from his
left hand to his right hand, and lightly pricked her throat with the
point of the blade.
Her green eyes were very wide. She'd had the breath knocked out of her
and could not scream.
"No noise," Bollinger said fiercely. "if you try to call for help, I'll
push this pig sticker straight into your lovely throat.
I'll ram it right out the back of your neck. Do you understand?"
She stared at him.
"Do you understand?"
"Yes," she said thinly.
"Are you going to cooperate?"
She said nothing. Her gaze traveled down from his eyes, over his proud
nose and full lips and strong jaw-line, down to his fist and to the
handle of the knife.
"If you aren't going to cooperate," he said quietly, "I can skewer you
right here. I'll pin you to the damn door." He was breathing hard.
A tremor passed through her.
He grinned.
Still trembling, she said, "What do you want?"
"Not much. Not very much at all. just a little loving." She closed
her eyes. "Are you-him?"
Dew R Kovatz A slender, all but invisible thread of blood trickled from
beneath the needlelike point of the knife, slid along her throat to the
neck of her bright red robe. Watching the minuscule flow of blood as if
he were a an extremely rare scientist observing bacterium through a
microscope, pleased by it, nearly mesmerized by it, he said, "Him? Who
is 'him'? I don't know what you're talking about."
"You know," she said weakly.
"I'm afraid not."
"Are you him?" she bit her lip. "The one who-who's cut up all those
other women?"
Looking up from her throat, he said, "I see. I see how it is. Of
course. You mean the one they call the Butcher. You think I'm the
Butcher."
"Are you?"
"I've been reading a great deal about him in the Daily News. He slits
their throats, doesn't he? From one ear to the other. Isn't that
right?" He was teasing her and enjoying himself immensely.
"Sometimes he even disembowels them. Doesn't he? Correct me if I'm
wrong. But that's what he does sometimes, isn't it?"
She said nothing.
"I believe I read in the News that he sliced the ears off one of them.
When the police found her, her ears were on the nightstand beside her
bed."
She shuddered more violently than ever.
"Poor little Edna. You think I'm the Butcher. No wonder you're so
frightened." He patted her shoulder, smoothed her dark hair as if he
were quieting an animal. "I'd be scared too if I were in your shoes
right now.
But I'm not. I'm not in your shoes and I'm not this guy they call the
Butcher. You can relax."
She opened her eyes and searched his, trying to tell whether he spoke
the truth.
,What kind of man do you think I am, Edna?" he asked, pretending to
have been hurt by her suspicion. "I don't want to harm you. I will if
I must. I will cause you a great deal of harm if you don't cooperate
with me. But if you're docile, if you're good to me, I'll be good to
you. I'll make you very happy, and I'll leave you just like I found
you. Flawless. You are flawless, you know. Perfectly beautiful. And
your breath smells like strawberries. Isn't that nice?
That's such a nice touch, that scentful way for us to begin, smell of
strawberries on your breath. Were you eating when I knocked?"
"You're crazy," she said softly.
"Now, Edna, let's have cooperation. Were you eating strawberries?
" Tears began to form in the corners of her eyes.
He pressed a bit harder with the knife.
She whimpered.
"Well?" he said.
"Wine."
"What?"
"It was wine."
"Strawberry wine?"
"Yes."
"Is there any left?"
"Yes.
"I'd like to have some."
which Graham had suddenly found himself so uncomfortable.
"You're a most interesting guest, Mr. Harris."
"Thank you. You're interesting yourself. I don't see how you can keep
your wits about you. I mean, doing this much live television, five
nights a week-"
"But the fact that it's live is what makes it so exciting, " Prine said.