The Anniversary Man (28 page)

′Thankfully no, I never had one.′

′You will now,′ she said, and signaled for the waiter.

 

She asked about his parents. He told her of his mother′s emphysema, her death in the early part of 1984. Of his father - playing dominoes, mumbling baseball scores from 1973, reciting the names of B-movie actors, always able to find the dime-width frequency on the radio dial where some out-of-nowhere independent jazz station played Wynton Marsalis and Dizzy Gillespie at three in the morning. It was the last thing they held in common. After forty-some years it seemed that ′One by One′ and ′Slew Foot′ was all they had left.

′My mother′s here in New York,′ Karen said. ′She′s doing okay. I see her once, maybe twice a week. She′s too independent really. She fights me trying to help her.′

Irving knew the deal. It was not an unfamiliar situation.

And then she asked, ′So how come you′re single? No Mrs Irving at home?′ and Irving paused and looked at her, and wondered whether she was on the up-and-up, or if he was being prepped for an inside line on the anniversary killings.

He shrugged.

′Never been married?′

′No, I′ve never married. You?′

′Sure,′ she replied. ′Was married for eleven years.′

′Who was he?′

Her face was deadpan. ′He was my husband.′

Irving rolled his eyes.

Karen smiled, raised her glass and sipped her cocktail. ′He was a reporter, like me,′ she said. ′We met early on. He was my boss for a while, and then he moved to The Times, and now he′s out in Baltimore as far as I know.′

′No kids?′

′No, career was everything for both of us. It was a mistake but, hey, what the hell. No use crying.′

′And is career still everything?′

′How old are you?′ she asked, ignoring his question, hers sudden, unexpected.

′How old am I? I′m forty-four. Why?′

′You ever think you screwed it up good?′

′Screwed what up?′

′Your life. Where you′re going, you know? You ever think that if you could have the time again you′d make one different decision and go in a completely different direction?′

′Sure,′ he said. ′Don′t we all?′

′But I mean for real . . . like you get to forty, and you start thinking that if you′re gonna do anything different then you better do it right now, ′cause if you leave it any longer it′s gonna be too late.′

′No, not now,′ Irving replied. ′I′m the kind of person that actually believes they′re doing something useful. Maybe I′m not, but I′ve worked on convincing myself I am for so long that I really believe it now.′ He paused, seemed thoughtful. ′I kinda think that I wouldn′t really be much good for anything else.′

Karen didn′t reply. She picked up the menu, seemed to be reading it again. Irving saw where she was, and for a little while she was not with him. She was elsewhere, most definitely, and he sat patiently until she returned.

′Enough already,′ she said after a few minutes. ′I guess we′re getting a little deep for a first date.′

′This is a date?′ Irving asked. ′I′m waiting for the interrogation to begin.′

′Interrogation?′ ′Stuff for the next article about this guy. I know you′re just waiting breathlessly for something else to happen on this thing.′

′Not true,′ Karen replied.

′Is.′

′Whatever, Ray. Think what you like. I′m here to have dinner and talk bullshit with you. I had a real date but he had to go away on business.′

′The hell he did.′

′Think whatever you like,′ she said. ′I′m ordering.′

 

She asked him to drive her back to the Herald building where her own car was parked. It was past eleven by the time she pulled away. She turned back on herself and drove past him as he stood there on the sidewalk. She raised her hand, and through the window he caught the flash of a smile. He walked a block, went into a diner and drank a cup of coffee until he felt grounded enough to drive home. He was DUI for sure. If he got pulled over he′d show his badge and that would be the end of that, but he didn′t care. He felt good. Well, perhaps good was a little strong, but he felt like a human being, at least a little, and he believed that what had happened that evening was a watershed, an emotional turning point. They hadn′t exchanged numbers. They didn′t need to. He was at the Fourth Precinct, she was at the City Herald. Parting company he told her that he′d had a good time.

′Me too,′ she replied.

′You wanna do this again sometime?′

She′d hesitated, looked thoughtful, and then shaken her head. ′No,′ she said. ′It wasn′t that good.′

′You are such a bullshitter,′ he replied.

She leaned forward, touched his arm, and kissed his cheek. Then she held her hand to the side of his face and used the ball of her thumb to wipe away the smear of lipstick.

Her hair smelled good - citrus, something like that - and the feel of her hand on his arm, her lips brushing his ear . . . these things reminded him of something he′d forgotten.

Something important. Something that gave life some significance.

So he said, ′I want to do this again, Karen.′

And she said, ′So do I.′

′I′ll call you.′

′I′ll answer the phone.′

′Drive safely.′

She smiled, he opened her car door for her, watched her climb inside and pull the belt across. He closed the door, and within a second the window came down a half dozen inches or so.

′Goodnight, Detective Irving.′

′Goodnight, Ms Langley.′

And then she was gone.

 

Later, alone, he felt something. The shadow of guilt again, perhaps? At first he attributed it to the fact that he had spent time with a reporter, and then he looked once more at the monochrome snapshot of Deborah Wiltshire and wondered what she would have thought. You are who you are, Ray Irving, she would have said. That′s something only you can learn to live with.

F
riday evening delivered a thunderstorm. The sky - overcast all day - finally broke around six, and when Irving hurried from the back exit of the precinct house to his car he was thrashed by rain that came vertically and sideways simultaneously.

He hadn′t shaved that morning; had pulled on black jeans, a dark sweatshirt, a burgundy windbreaker, clothes for doing chores outside the house - emptying garbage, clearing the front yard of leaves. He looked rough around the edges. He didn′t look like a homicide detective, did not want to look like a homicide detective. It was the better part of forty-eight hours since his date with Karen Langley, and he′d filled the time with reading back through everything. He hadn′t called her, had received no word that she had tried to call him. He′d located the minors′ statement disclosure agreement from the Mia Grant case, and a few other loose ends of paperwork that had gone astray. It had given him administrative closure, but no greater understanding of what he was facing. He couldn′t find the thread, couldn′t see the one thing that would reveal the truth. Four days since the last victim and he was none the wiser.

Farraday had not requested his presence. Irving had written his reports and filed them on time, but there had been no response. In a way he was grateful. He had been left to his own devices, and this was an operating basis he always preferred. New York was a city of millions. Eight people murdered - even if they were the work of one dedicated man - was a relatively insignificant percentage.

Tim Leycross was in the parking lot back of St Vincent′s when Irving arrived.

′This is bullshit,′ was his opening gambit.

′Don′t you think I know that?′ Irving said. He walked around the front of Leycross′s car and put his hand on the passenger side handle.

′My car?′

′My plate is registered to the precinct,′ Irving said.

Leycross laughed, shook his head. ′Who the hell d′you think these people are? The NSA? They don′t have any way of checking your license plate. Jesus, you act like they′re gonna do retina scans and DNA fingerprinting.′

′We′re going in your car, Timothy, end of story.′

Little more than a block, perhaps two, and Leycross pulled up near the Bedford Park Hotel. They could have walked, but Irving wanted them to be seen arriving together in Leycross′s car. True, these people were not the NSA. They were little of anything at all. But often the slightest lack of attention was sufficient to undo the most rigorous of plans. One time a Narc undercover forgot to remove his wedding ring. His wife and kids got a triangular flag and a pension.

The meet-and-greet guy looked like a bare-knuckle prizefighter on his last legs. He was top heavy, would have gone over with a swift kick to the knees, but he served his purpose. He looked perpetually annoyed rather than menacing, but he had a foot of height over Irving. There were no membership cards for this party, just an entrance fee of twenty-five dollars. It paid for the room hire, that was all. There were no cocktails, no hors d′oeuvres. Guys like this drank generic brand beer and Gatorade.

It could have been a trade show for a fan club. Minor celebrities should have been present - cameo actors and walk-ons available to sign posters for the original Battlestar Galactica TV series. A dozen guys, all of them heavy set, mostly bespectacled, in thick sweatshirts or V-necks. They stood behind tables, and on those tables were collections of photographs and DVDs. Crash victims, suicides, burns, dismemberments, decapitations, amputees, leapers and hangers. Images that had evidently come from murder case files - stabbings, fatal gunshot wounds, people with their throats cut, their eyes missing, their tongues removed. Which of them were genuine, and which were the work of extraordinarily good make-up artists Irving would never have been able to tell, but as with any pursuit or interest there were those that considered it their business to differentiate fact from fiction. In any field of interest, there were always experts, and the common denominator with experts was the fact that they always wanted to talk about how much they knew. They lived for such opportunities.

Irving browsed. Had he not been experienced, inured by repetition, he would have been sickened by what he saw. Despite his years in Vice and Narcotics, despite the recent tenure in Homicide, despite frequent visits to the morgue, standing patiently while some dead girl was unzipped from throat to navel, he was not completely without feelings. The image of a child rape victim said everything that needed to be said about the subculture of persons that purveyed such material. They were not very the lowest form of human life, but they were well on their way to getting there.

He spent an hour. He bought some crime scene pictures with the Third Precinct stamp on the back. They showed a woman who′d been strangled with her own lace stockings. He paid thirty dollars, didn′t get a receipt. He got talking to the seller, a bearded man in his late forties called Chaz. Chaz wore bottle-bottom lenses which made his eyes seem a lot larger than they were. Chaz peered myopically at the world, and the world must have seemed awful strange.

′Good pictures,′ Irving told him.

′Genuine, that′s why,′ Chaz replied. He leaned forward, his hand to the side of his mouth. ′Most of the stuff here is shit,′ he whispered conspiratorially.

Irving shrugged. ′I′m kinda new to this,′ he said. ′I′ve seen stuff on the net—′

Chaz nodded, smiling. ′The net is ninety percent bullshit, ten percent more bullshit.′

′You gotta study this stuff to know what you′re getting.′

′You gotta make it your business. You gotta do it professionally or not at all. I have a reputation to uphold,′ Chaz said. There was a sense of pride in his voice, as if he was providing a valid and honorable community service. This wasn′t so different from girl scout cookies after all. People had needs, needs required fulfilling. Better that he worked to cater for that need than people went out killing to get their own photographic subjects. There was always a rationalization. There was always a way to justify something.

′These are the real thing no doubt,′ Irving said. He turned over one of the pictures. He indicated the stamp on the back.

′Can get you anything you like out of PD archives,′ Chaz said. ′Within reason, of course.′

′Anything?′

′Give me a name, a date, a police precinct, whatever the hell you like . . . I can get you pictures. Got a contact. An inside man, you know?′ Chaz winked, half-smiled. He was the big man on campus. He could sell you the world for almost nothing at all.

′That′s really something,′ Irving said. ′I′m interested—′

Chaz raised his hand. ′Price is everything of course. The harder the material the higher the cost.′

Irving nodded. ′You get what you pay for.′

′How right you are,′ Chaz replied. ′Something you were interested in specifically?′

′Perhaps.′

′How perhaps? Big perhaps or little perhaps?′

Irving turned his mouth down at the corners. ′I have a thing . . . a thing for—′

′We all have our own particular tastes,′ Chaz said. ′Girls, boys—′

′Not kids,′ Irving replied. ′I don′t do kids.′

′So what can I find for you Mr—? ′

′Name′s Gary,′ Irving said.

Chaz extended his hand. They shook. Chaz smiled. He was doing the sales pitch. He had hooked a new boy. He was reeling him in and he knew it.

′So, Gary . . . you tell me the kind of thing you like, and then you let me see what I can do for you.′

′So we could have a private meeting?′

Chaz laughed. ′Sure. This is just the bring-and-buy sale. This is the village fair. This is nothing. This is just a way for people to network, make new contacts, know what I mean? I run a business downtown. I gotta library of material to die for - been doing this for fifteen years—′

′So when do you wanna meet?′ Irving asked.

Chaz glanced at his watch. ′This′ll run ′til eight-thirty, maybe nine. There′s no time like the present. I′m free tonight if you wanna have a sit-down talk.′