The Nicholas Linnear Novels (33 page)

He waved at it drunkenly and it pulled over to the curb. A Checker, big and roomy. And air-conditioned.

It was a custom job, not fleet-owned. Inside, there was no plastic partition and the front seats were beige leather buckets.

Vincent gave the driver his address and settled back. The cab started up.

Even in the crowded modern streets of Tokyo, Vincent was thinking, amid the urban clutter, the European business suits, one would abruptly come upon an ancient Shinto shrine tucked away somewhere between two buildings. One could hear the ghostly tinkling of the bronze bells, sewn in a vertical strip, green with the patina of time; one could smell the incense gently swirling the air. For those moments the exhaust fumes, the pollution were eliminated and the soul of ageless Japan reigned unsullied by Western encroachment, summoning the ancient gods.

It was dark in the cab. He gazed out at the glowing lights of the city, realized that they were moving quite slowly. He leaned forward. “Hey,” he said, “I’d like to get home within the hour.”

He saw the back of the driver’s head move and, raising his gaze, saw his eyes in the strip of the rearview mirror. He saw that the man was Japanese, looked for his name on the I.D. card on the extreme right of the dashboard. The light was out and he could not make it out. He spoke to the driver in Japanese, apologizing for his rudeness.

“That’s all right,” the man said. “It’s been a hard night for everyone.”

They had come around onto Forty-fifth, heading west. The taxi swung right at the corner onto Eighth Avenue. Here the street was lined on both sides by a combination of junk food restaurants and sleazy porn theaters. The sidewalks were filled with hookers looking to feed their habits, black con men, low-grade pushers and Puerto Rican strong-arm boys: the vast white underbelly of the city in all its gritty, sorrowful splendor.

The driver went through one intersection on the change, hit a red light on the next.

“It’s a night like home,” Vincent said in Japanese.

“No one wanted it,” the man said. “It should never have come.”

Vincent thought again of Perry’s four warships, riding in the harbor at Uraga. Perhaps he’s right, he thought. We never should have—

The driver had turned around. His face was blue and green in the dancing garish lights from a movie theater. His mouth opened in a smile. A black oblong that might have belonged to a Nō mask. The eyes were like stones, radiated no possibility of warmth or friendship. This contrast between smile and animosity made him appear to leer frighteningly. Vincent was reminded of the first Nō play he had seen with its terrifying demon’s mask; at least that was how it seemed to him at the age of six.

There was something odd about this face but in the low light he couldn’t tell—he leaned forward. It seemed as if the skin on the man’s face was blotchy as if—

He drew back, his mind stunned at what it had perceived. But his reflexes had been dulled by the alcohol and, even as he retreated, he saw the man’s face ballooning out toward him like the wedge of a viper. The cheeks billowed and the lips curled into an O. A fine mist shot from the aperture, caught him in mid-gasp. He had already inhaled some of the spray before he stopped breathing.

Croaker sat in the tatami room, cross-legged, his head propped on one fist, after Vincent had left. He called for more sake and thought savagely about going home. He gulped at the liquor. It was cold and he waited patiently for the fresh bottle. He liked the stuff. It had hardly any taste but generated a hell of a high.

He didn’t want to go home. No, no, he thought. That’s not it. I don’t want to go home to Alison. This both surprised and annoyed him. Surprised because even though he had known this might be coming for a while, it had now surfaced so strongly, so blatantly. Annoyed with himself because he had allowed things to slip this far. It wasn’t even that he was angry with Alison, he thought. He just didn’t want to have anything to do with her anymore. He wondered for a time that two people could feel so much together for a time and then, later, not feel anything at all. Part of the human condition, he concluded philosophically, but a hell of a part.

The sake came and he allowed the waiter to pour the first cup. He downed it, immediately poured himself another. He itched to call Matty the Mouth but he suspected that if he did he might break this Didion thing to smithereens. It seemed to him now that the entire case was balanced on one shining point: getting the name and address of this broad.

He didn’t have to close his eyes to be able to picture again Angela Didion’s apartment, but he did so anyway. He went over it all again.

The first thing he noticed when he walked in was the smell. Sickly-sweet, it was ether combined with what? The darkened living room had given up nothing but in the bedroom he saw the American Indian bone pipe and, sniffing it, had smelled the opium. Tasted it on the tip of his tongue. Very high grade indeed. Hardly street stuff. But then this was Angela Didion’s bedroom and a woman who was purportedly the world’s highest-paid model could hardly be expected to have anything but the best—of everything. He didn’t touch the pipe; he didn’t touch anything.

Slipping on his surgeon’s gloves, he crossed to the closet opposite the enormous bed. The bedroom was done all in midnight blue, from the silk wallpaper to the satin lampshades. There was only one lamp on when he had come in, next to the bed. He left the room that way.

Carefully he opened up the sliding door. Inside he found silk dresses by Calvin Klein and Ferragamo. There were six fur coats, ranging from a full-length dyed Russian sable to a spectacular three-quarter silver lynx. Below, shoes from Botticelli and Charles Jourdan.

On the deep-pile rug between the bed and the closet was a black silk teddy. He skirted that on the way to the bed. It was a custom-made affair, moon-shaped. The sheets were midnight-blue percale but the rumpled comforter was covered in silk. It lay around Angela Didion’s ankles like dark surf, ready to claim her.

She lay half on the bed, half off. Her head was in midair, the long honey-blond hair streamed over her head, pooling on the floor. She was made up. Her eyes were mascaraed, her cheeks blushed, her lips painted. She was naked save for a thin gold chain which she wore around her waist. There was no other jewelry. She lay on the left side of the bed. The right side was empty but the pillow on that side was indented as if someone had lain there. There were stains on the sheets, still damp. There was no blood. A pillow was wedged beneath the small of Angela Didion’s back.

Someone had done quite a job on her. Bruises, just beginning to darken, lay like boils along the sides of her neck, her chest and rib cage, her stomach. Her back was arched as if in ecstasy. There was no expression on her face whatsoever. No sign of pain or fear—or of passion.

It should have been grotesque, would have been with any other victim—Croaker had seen too many like it. But this wasn’t anyone, it was Angela Didion. She must have been an extraordinary woman, Croaker thought as he stood staring down at her corpse, because her beauty transcended even this degradation; even death. Croaker knew that he was looking at a magnificent piece of humanity and it saddened him that it should have been destroyed so recklessly. He felt that about most of the bodies he found, if they weren’t the punks who got blown away by their own cupidity; the city breathed easier without them.

He tore his gaze away from the bed and, going around it, knelt beside the black silk garment on the carpet. In this twilight of the room, it was almost invisible: black against the deep blue that was almost black itself.

Dipping one forefinger down, he lifted it up slightly. Bending, he touched his nose to it, breathed in, caught the faint whiff of a perfume. He got up, crossed to Angela Didion’s dressing table. He passed over the ivory comb and brush set, the tortoiseshell oval vanity mirror, the odds and ends of mascara, eyeliner, blush, powder, creams, taking them all in as he did so. There were two perfume bottles on a silver tray against the wall. Joy and Bal à Versailles. He sniffed at both of them, one at a time, slowly. Then, to make certain, he returned to the silk teddy, confirming for himself that it emanated another perfume; that it bore the imprint of another woman.

It had taken time and a lot of hard work but, in the end, Matty the Mouth had come through. Now it was this woman’s name and address Croaker was anxiously waiting for. Angela Didion’s lover. Or, more accurately, one of them. She could not, of course, have been the murderer. Judging from the size of the teddy, she was far too small to have inflicted such terrible wounds on another human adult.
There were no instruments used
, the M.E. had said,
other than the fists.
That meant someone strong and with a massive build; some of the bruises were quite large.

No, this woman was no murderer but, Croaker was convinced, she had been a witness to the murder. She knows, he thought now. She knows. And she’s scared shitless of what she’s seen. No one had gotten to her. No one would but Croaker. He must see to that.

Come on, Matty, deliver the goods. He found his hand trembling against the table, stared down at it as if it belonged to someone else. He knew he wanted this conviction badly. More than he had wanted any other in his career. And the hell of it was, he knew who had killed Angela Didion. Knew it as surely as he knew his own name. But without this witness, there was nothing: nothing but conjecture and theory and circumstantial evidence that McCabe wouldn’t even touch, let alone ask for an arrest. Jesus, he hated counting this heavily on someone else but he had spent seven years cultivating Matty the Mouth and now it looked as if it would finally pay off. If he came through.
When
he comes through, Croaker corrected himself. Think positively.

Which all led him back to this ninja. The case was going nowhere, spinning on its own momentum. That, Croaker knew from long hard experience, was extremely dangerous. It meant he had no handle and
that
meant he had no control. People tended to get severely hurt when that happened.

And then there was the problem of Nicholas Linnear. Vincent had been right, he felt instinctively. Linnear had been highly offended by what he’d said. It had been a stupid thing to say. He had known it as soon as he had said it. Now he realized that Linnear might be the key to the case.
He knows more about the ninja than anyone in or out of Japan,
Vincent had said toward the end of the evening.
Trust him. He knows what he’s talking about.
Now he’s working for that bastard Tomkin, Croaker thought. He had a strong urge to back off then, to let events happen without him. Perhaps Tomkin would fall. But that, he knew, he could never do. It was not the way he wanted it to happen. And then there was the consideration of the four other deaths. If the ninja was after Tomkin, why had he killed four people who did not know the man, let alone have any kind of association with him? No one seemed to know the answer and there was certainly no one on the force he could talk this over with. It came back to Linnear again. If anyone might have a clue, he would.

Croaker looked at his watch, thought about calling Linnear, then quickly changed his mind. The telephone wasn’t the right medium and, anyway, he was too high to be able to think things through with enough clarity to satisfy himself. He sighed, finished off the bottle of sake. He’d had enough.

Still he could not face the thought of going home. Yet he wanted a woman. Into his mind swam an image and abruptly he was as hard as a bar of iron. Her face seemed familiar but where had he seen her before? Perhaps nowhere. Perhaps on some billboard. The image had surfaced from deep inside of him. Perhaps she was long gone. Or, again, had never even existed.

Vincent exhaled in a rush, attempting to free his lungs of the mist. It was a useless gesture, his mind knew, yet his body would not be denied its chance.

His eyes began to burn and tear. He reached blindly for the door handle. The cab started up as the light changed. He leaned on the handle, got it open on the second try. The city rushed in on him as he half tumbled out. His foot caught for a moment and then he was free, rolling along the street for a moment while horns blared. He could hear the harsh squeal of brakes and muted shouts. Then he was up and running clumsily, slipping on dogshit as if it were a banana peel. He balanced himself with his arms outspread and hit the curb, sprinted up onto the sidewalk.

Behind him he could feel the looming presence of the Checker cab as the driver pulled hard over and jumped out.

“Hey!” he called. “Come back! I want my fare!”

Vincent stumbled along the crowded street, bumping into people. Black faces turned, wide-eyed, to stare.

He’s a cool bastard, he thought as he was spun around by an enormous black man with an open shirt and tight maroon pants. “Hey, man! Be cool. Watch yo’self.”

He wove in and out of the crowd, wondering how long he had. He had no illusions about what he had inhaled. Even without the characteristic odor, he would have known it was a neural toxin.

He turned his head but could not see his pursuer. He took a chance, darted off the curb, trying to hail a passing cab—it was no good expecting a cop to pop up here. But immediately he saw the man stalking him along the periphery of the crowd and, spying him, he leaped forward.

Vincent whirled, darting back into the thick of the throng on the sidewalk. He began to run again but this, he knew, would only spread the toxin more quickly. Already his heart was pounding furiously and the tips of his fingers felt numb: a bad sign. Yet the man was pursuing him so perhaps there was a chance he had not inhaled a sufficient amount of the poison.

Death was very close now, Vincent knew. It rode his shoulder like an expectant predator. He realized now just how much he wanted to live; how strong the drive was still inside him. This knowledge came like a revelation and it buoyed him for a time. He would need all his wits to overcome this demon, he knew. He was overmatched but he put this thought out of his mind as he ran on and on into the spangled night.