The Malaspiga Exit (22 page)

‘Sit down,' he said to Nathan. Nathan didn't move.

‘I want a lawyer,' he said. ‘You've held me for eighteen hours without making a charge. That's illegal.'

‘This is Patrolman Regan from the 67th Precinct. I'm afraid we've got bad news for you.' Nathan looked at them, at Harper, at the policeman, who was young and looked uncomfortable, at Carpenter, stony-faced, and then back to Harper again. He felt as if he'd grown a lump inside his throat and couldn't speak.

‘What bad news?' Suspicion flared in him; this could be a game, a trap to get him off guard. He'd played that kind of trick on a suspect many times. ‘What are you trying to pull? I've sat on that side of the desk too often—I know the score.'

‘Your wife's dead,' Harper cut in. ‘Regan will tell you about it. He was on duty when it happened.'

Nathan didn't move. Now there was a lump; it was swelling up, choking him. ‘Marie …' The croak became a shout. ‘Marie? You say my wife…?'

‘She was knocked down by a car,' the patrolman said. ‘Right outside your apartment. I wasn't more than twenty feet away and she came staggering out like she was drunk or something. She just walked into the road and the car hit her. She didn't have a chance.'

Nathan was staring at him. A trick, his mind screamed, a lie, she isn't, she couldn't be … Regan was saying something else. ‘I was the first to get to her, and she was still conscious. She said something. It didn't make sense but it was meant for you, I guess. I told Mr. Harper about it.'

‘What was it?' Nathan said. His throat was clear now, he could speak, but a hammer was beating in his chest. ‘What did she say?'

‘“Tell Jim I didn't take it … they fixed me.” That was all. She died a couple of minutes later, before the ambulance came.'

When he began to cry Ben Harper looked away. He didn't have Carpenter's private motive, and human agony distressed him. He had known the man for many years. ‘I didn't take it. They fixed me.'

‘It looked like she'd been drinking,' Regan said. ‘She wasn't walking straight.' She wouldn't be, Nathan's reeling thoughts supplied the answer. She wouldn't be coordinated if they'd pumped her full of heroin. Fixed. Taylor had done it. He hadn't phoned through and Taylor had carried out his threat. He'd sent the rent collectors round to see her. He was hardly aware that he was crying. He found a handkerchief in his trouser pocket and wiped his face roughly.

‘Where is she?' he said.

‘In the city morgue. There'll have to be an inquest. I'm sorry, Nathan.' That was Ben Harper. Carpenter said nothing. It made sense.

‘Where's Taylor? Are you still holding him?'

‘No,' Harper said. ‘His lawyer came round half an hour ago and we had to release him. But we'll have him back. You'll be glad to know he sprung you too. Considering he says he's never seen you before, that was a mighty friendly thing to do. It won't do you any good. We'll have you back too.'

‘Maybe,' Nathan said. ‘Maybe not. Then I'm free to go.'

‘Yes.' Harper stood up. ‘Unless you want to come clean with us. You're in this and I can't believe you haven't got a reason.'

‘I'm not in anything,' Nathan said. He blew his nose and shoved the handkerchief back in his pocket. ‘You've made a big mistake.' He turned and walked out of the office. Harper looked at Carpenter and shook his head.

‘We blew that one, Frank. I thought for a moment he was going to crack.'

‘You think he'll contact Taylor?'

‘There's a twenty-four-hour watch on both of them from now on,' Harper said. ‘The telephone's been fixed and I had the apartment bugged this morning. If they so much as whistle at each other we'll know it.'

‘And Kate?' Frank Carpenter said. The patrolman had gone out after Nathan; they were alone in the office.

‘Okay,' Harper nodded. ‘Now Taylor's loose, we'll have to pull her out. Send a telex through to Raphael. She's to come home.'

Out in the street Nathan stood slowly fastening his jacket. His gun and his badge had not been returned to him, but he was a free man. Free except for the Bureau agents who would be watching him. And Taylor's men. He stood on the crowded sidewalk, jostled by people passing by, and a small smile twisted his lips for a moment. Taylor had got him out. Having murdered his wife, he had sprung Nathan to freedom. So that he could be shut up before he talked. Nathan had figured that as soon as he heard about the lawyer. He would be on a contract. He stepped forward and hailed an empty cab. He had let two go by without calling them.

He settled back against the seat and found that he was crying again. He gave way and sobbed with his hands covering his face. His imagination kept showing him pictures. Marie opening the door, being grabbed, bustled inside. Knowing what they were going to do to her, fighting as they put the needle in. Her terror communicated itself to him as if she were with him in the cab. As if he had been there and been forced to watch. He sat up and looked out of the window. He had told the driver to go to the morgue. They were drawing into a block at a traffic lights. Harper's men would be following him. And very soon the others. Maybe just one. A contract killer; a dead shot. A man with class, not the low punks who had manhandled his wife. The lights turned green and at the same moment Nathan opened the cab door and jumped out. Within seconds he was lost in the crowds on the street. He took the subway to East 52nd and Park.

He was a native New Yorker and he had never wanted to live anywhere else. He liked the hustle, the crowds, the tension which was said to be so wearing on the nerves. Nathan couldn't have spent more than a few hours in the country without the silence grating louder than the traffic belting up Madison Avenue. It was late afternoon in the city; the cars were creeping bumper to bumper, tempers were short, people pushed and grunted, the shutters were going up on the luxury store windows and the regular commuter flight had begun. He walked among them, his head slightly bent as if he were battling against a strong wind, gripped by pain and hate and loneliness. She had been typical of the city, typical of the frail and the lost who wandered through it and were tossed away like withered leaves. She would be with him as long as he lived; the little-girl face and the big scared eyes, warm with love and trust whenever they looked at him. Brown hair which was soft and straight, a laugh which she'd forgotten how to use till after they were married. The hammer was smashing away in his chest, every stroke a pain. His hands were damp and they trembled; he felt hot and cold in turn. Taylor lived midway on Park. He switched his route down a side street that brought him out on the block behind the shop. There was a side entrance to Taylor's apartment. It worked on an answer system after the janitor had gone home. He didn't want to get there after the man had gone. He began to walk faster.

There would be Bureau agents watching the building, waiting for him to contact Taylor. That didn't bother him. He didn't care what the agents saw. They wouldn't stop him getting inside; knowing the way Harper worked, the apartment would have been thoroughly penetrated while Taylor was being held. He wouldn't be able to sneeze without a Bureau recording machine putting it on record. He paused before a jeweller's window; it was full of expensive, useless costume pieces. Rabbits, bears, a grotesque cat with diamond eyes and tail. There was a mirror at the back and he could see himself. He carried a comb in his breast pocket; he used it to smooth the short, greying hair which was sticking up on his head. He straightened his tie and pulled at his jacket. He looked respectable enough for the janitor. They had become a nervous breed, subject to the nightly muggings and attacks which tormented the law-abiding.

He crossed the street to the unobtrusive entrance to Taylor's building. There were two more apartments and a penthouse on the top; Taylor lived on the floor immediately above the shop. Nathan walked up to the door and pressed the bell. There was a pause and then the janitor slid back a panel. Nathan grinned at him. ‘Hello,' he said. ‘Mr. Taylor is expecting me.'

‘What name is it?'

‘Mr. Lars Svenson,' Nathan said.

When the name was phoned through from the hallway Taylor panicked. Svenson. He was due in Rome; he should have been there by now, contacting Malaspiga. For Christ's sake, he wailed out loud, why had the fool not gone? What was he doing hanging around? All the Bureau needed was to pick him up and establish another link in the chain of coincidence. For a moment he shook with nerves; then his stubborn coolness reasserted itself. For a man of his type, he was extraordinarily tough. He'd put the word out for Nathan as soon as he got home. Nathan had to be released before he started answering any questions. Then he could be eliminated before there was any risk of re-arrest and further investigation. That was his first reaction. The second, and more pressing, was his terror of what Nathan would do when he discovered what had happened to his wife.

Taylor had been cowering in his apartment ever since he checked with the two hoods who had been given the job. Frantic for his own safety, he had ordered them to watch Nathan's apartment and get him. He didn't care how, but not to waste time. He would be going home after his release. Taylor had drunk a lot of whisky to steady himself. It had only given him a headache and upset his stomach. When the internal call system buzzed he had jumped with fright and spilt some of the Scotch on his favourite Persian rug. Svenson. Christ Almighty. He told the janitor to send him up.

Eddi Taylor was completely unprepared when he opened the door. There were moments of blind confusion while he tried to batter at the body of the man whose hands were round his throat. He choked and writhed, groping for Nathan's face but thumbs were pressing relentlessly into his neck and his vision grew dark. His head felt as if it were swelling, his eyes started out and froth foamed on his lips. His face turned blue. He made a last effort to tear the throttling hands away, ripping at the skin with nails he had kept rather long. Nathan gave a final, savage squeeze, using all the strength in his arms. Taylor gurgled horribly and his whole body jerked upwards. Then Nathan felt his body go slack. He didn't ease the pressure. He went on pressing, using his weight, until Taylor's eyes had turned up and his face was a dark blotchy purple. Slowly, reluctant to let go, Nathan opened his hands. He climbed off the body and stood looking at it. It looked grotesque, sprawled with its legs apart, the arms flung out and the discoloured face half hidden as the head rolled to one side. Nathan flexed his fingers; he straightened his jacket, and seeing blood on the backs of his hands where Taylor had torn him, wiped it on his sleeve. He went to the Spanish cabinet and poured himself a neat Scotch. Standing over the body of Taylor, he swallowed the drink straight down and after a moment he spat on the dead man. Then he let himself out of the apartment and the janitor let him into the street. The atmosphere was hot and sour with petrol and exhaust fumes; the traffic down Park Avenue was a motionless stream. He saw an empty cab and slipping between the cars he got inside it and gave the Bureau Headquarters address. He groped for his pipe and lit it; he felt calm and numb. His wrists ached and he rubbed them; Taylor had fought hard. There were sore places on Nathan's body which were just beginning to hurt. He wasn't really aware of physical feeling. His wife was dead and he had murdered the man who was responsible. His career in the service was finished after twenty-two years. The men who had trusted him and worked with him were his enemies. He had put the finger on Katharine Dexter and Frank Carpenter had heard him do it. There was no forgiveness for him, no redemption possible. Nothing to live for but revenge. Taylor was dead but there were others. Hate was fighting the numbness, setting the hammers in his chest to work. He had hated the thugs, the pimps, the racketeers, despite the humanists who argued that they were society's victims, and dealt as harshly with them as he could. When they corrupted him he had become a part of them with a speed that showed him truly to himself. He was no better, turned out of the same mould. He recognized that now, sitting in the cab on his way downtown, thinking while the meter ran up money and the traffic moved like sludge. Marie was the only good thing which had ever happened to him. She had brought him gentleness and love. Tears crept down his face, and he wiped them away with his scratched hand. Choking the life out of Taylor had preserved his sanity and satisfied his lust for vengeance, but it couldn't bring her back.

Even if every member of the heroin ring was caught and jailed there was no future for him. Twenty minutes later he was in Carpenter's office.

Frank got up from his desk when he saw him.

‘Get a stenographer in here. I want to make a full confession.'

‘Ah,' Alessandro said. ‘I wondered where you were—I didn't realize John had carried you off.' He was waiting in the hall when they came in from the garden. Although he smiled at Katharine, the Duke's expression was irritated when he spoke to Driver. ‘You shouldn't take my cousin sightseeing—that's my privilege. Come, Katerina. We shall make a little tour before lunch.' He took her by the arm and led her to the staircase. At the top they passed Uncle Alfredo. He was wearing a tall silk hat, and walking towards them with a look of purpose on his face. When he saw them he paused, raised the silk hat to Katharine and shook his head at his nephew.

‘You should have been at Mass,' he said. ‘Dino preached a sermon that sent me straight to sleep. You should care for your immortal soul, Alessandro!'

‘I do, Uncle,' the Duke said gently. ‘I don't need Father Dino boring me to death in the meantime. I hope you didn't snore?'

‘No, no!' the old man protested. ‘I didn't give offence—I just dozed for a moment. Where are you going?' His gaze had fixed upon Katharine. He took off the hat and suddenly collapsed the crown into the brim like a conjurer.