Hostile Witness Part 52

"North, south, what do I know from directions," said Morris. "Thank you, sir, but north might as well be up for all I can tell." He continued fumbling with his map.

"Come along inside," I said. "I'll draw it on the map for you."

"That won't be necessary," said Wayman, his voice deep and precise now, the voice of a college lecturer. "It's very simple. Go out this little street. Take a right, that's north, and go down four blocks, until you hit Arch Street. Then take a left. It is a little brick house with a small courtyard on the far side of Arch Street, between Second and Third. There is a colonial flag out front, you can't miss it."

I looked at Wayman, flabbergasted by his new voice. He smiled a dangerous smile at me and suddenly, with Wayman having fled from even the shallowest pretense of my comprehension, I was absolutely terrified.

"Aah, thank you, sir, thank you," continued Morris. "I should write that down but already it is gone from mine head. Mine memory is like a sieve with a hole in the middle, that bad. If you could just show me on the map, if you could just..."

He continued to fumble with the map, struggling to open it, and then, with a sudden, frustrated jerk, his elbows flared and the paper ripped with a quick rasping tear and there were now two confused and jumbled pieces of map where before there had been only one.

"Accht, this is just like me," said Morris, staring forlornly at the pieces in his hand. "Now I must to get another one inside. And then, if it is not asking too much to help a visitor, then if one of you gentlemen can draw the way on the map, that would maybe let me get there without going first through Pittsburgh."

"Sure," I said, grabbing hold of his arm. "Let's go."

"That would be just peaches, yes," said Morris.

"We're not finished here, Victor Carl," said Wayman.

"I'll be right back, Wayman," I said as I headed for the entrance. "Just wait."

Morris maneuvered so that he was between Wayman and me as we headed for the doors. In the gla.s.s's reflection I could see Wayman reaching over Morris's shoulder for me, and then I could feel his hand grabbing the collar of my s.h.i.+rt, could feel the cloth tighten around my neck. My throat let out a surprised little squeak.

Just then a doorman pa.s.sed us on his way out from the lobby and seemed to accidentally knock Wayman's arm away. The doorman had huge shoulders, he was dressed in green, he stepped in front of Wayman and said, "Can I help you, sir?" The doorman's voice was startlingly familiar and even as Morris pushed me inside ahead of him I turned and saw the broad back of the doorman and the yarmulke on his head. The doorman placed his hand on Wayman's chest. "Is there anything I can do for you, sir?" said Sheldon Kapustin to Wayman as Wayman jerked his head in frustration while Morris and I escaped to inside the lobby.

"Don't run now," said Morris. "Like a hawk he is watching."

"It would have been nice if you had told me Sheldon was inside," I said. "Sweat stains are so hard to clean. And even so you took your time."

"Was there a rush?" Morris pointed to the right, where the front desk sat, out of the view of the doors. We scooted around the lobby furniture, wrought-iron tables and thick couches, and headed straight for the desk. "I will be feeling in mine pocket for a pen until we are out of sight from the door," said Morris as we walked. "And when we are where he can't see us anymore, then we will run."

Which is exactly what we did.

"Who was he?" asked Morris on the elevator to the fourth floor.

"He's an enforcer for a drug dealer."

"So this drug dealer then has the missing money?"

"Evidently, and he killed a man already to keep me from finding out about it."

"Ahhh, now this is worse than your original telling."

"But he shouldn't know Veronica was here."

"So how did he learn?" asked Morris as the elevator doors slid open at the fourth floor.

"I don't know," I said.

"Careful now," said Morris, and I followed him down the empty carpeted hallway. At Room 4016 he pointed at me. I shook my head. He knocked lightly on the door.

"Yes?" said the voice from inside.

"I'm sorry, miss," said Morris, "but I need to be checking on the heat inside your room."

"One minute," she said and one minute later the door opened and a loosely draped Veronica, still wet from the shower, peered out. Before she could slam the door in my face I stuck one Florsheim wing tip in the opening. What they don't tell you in vacuum cleaner salesman school is that sticking your foot in the door can hurt like h.e.l.l, but pain or no pain it worked.

"You've been subpoenaed to appear in court today to testify," I said when Morris and I were inside her room, the door locked and chained behind us.

"Who's he?" she said, motioning with her head at Morris. She was wrapped in a light silk robe, her arms were crossed on her chest. Her hair fell flat and clean against her beautiful shoulders. I could barely stop myself from dropping to my knees before her, she was that beautiful.

"He's a friend who is here to protect you," I said.

"How comforting," she said.

"Thank you, miss," said Morris, ignoring her sarcasm.

"Who is he protecting me from, Victor? From you?"

"From Goodwin. His men are outside. He doesn't want you to testify."

"f.u.c.k," she said in a desperate voice. "Dammit, Victor. See what you're doing to me." She walked back into the room and sat on the far bed.

I followed her, like I seemed always to be following her, and stood beside the bed. Morris stayed by the door, listening to the outside, so we were talking in private. "He is probably going to kill you whether you testify or not," I said quietly. "At least that is what it sounded like. How much do you owe him, Veronica?"

She shrugged her shoulders even as she hugged her chest and wouldn't look at me. "Not too much," she said unconvincingly.

"Is there ever too much for you?" I said.

She said nothing, her gaze still on the floor.

"Tell me something else, Veronica. How did Goodwin end up with the missing quarter of a million?"

"Is that who has it?"

"You didn't know?"

She shook her head. "I was just holding it for Jimmy in the account."

"The one with Chester's name on it?"

"Right, but then he asked for it back, said he needed it all."

"But first he wanted it in an account with Chester's name on it. Setting Concannon up for the fall from the start, just in case."

"I never knew what Jimmy did with the money," she said.

"How would Goodwin have gotten it?"

"He must have stolen it somehow," she said with a shrug.

"No," I said. "I don't think so." I looked around her fancy hotel room: two king-size beds, color TV, easy chairs, and velour curtains, and began wondering. "You've been here a couple days now. Have you been buying any c.r.a.p from Goodwin?"

"No, not from him, Jesus. One of the reasons I decided to leave was to get away from him and his d.a.m.n dead animals."

"So only Jimmy knows you're here."

"And you."

"Yes, and me. But I wasn't the guy who told Goodwin."

She looked up at me questioningly. I shrugged. Her eyes opened wide and she shook her head. I nodded my head sadly. She screwed up her face in incomprehension, but then it started working, like the surface of an old computer, lights flas.h.i.+ng, tapes winding, as the logic of it all unfolded for her, one syllogism after another, leading ultimately to a look of shock. Jimmy Moore had set her up, her face said, the b.a.s.t.a.r.d had put her in this hotel so that Goodwin could take care of both their troubles. Her head shook no, it couldn't be. But she knew it could be, she knew it was. She turned from me quickly and began to cry. It was that moment, for the first time really, that I knew Veronica Ashland would tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth on the witness stand.

I bent over to pick up some of her clothes off the floor and took them to the suitcase laying open on the top of the bureau.

"Nu?" said Morris from the door. "Is she coming?"

"No," said Veronica weakly.

"She's coming," I said.

"If she is coming then she must come now," said Morris. "Because I think that maybe our nice friend from outside might decide to force his way past Sheldon and come up here himself to find out what is happening."

"Who exactly is outside?" she asked.

"Wayman," I said. "And he's the one who killed Chuckie."

That ended all hesitation; in ninety seconds her bag was packed, she was in a pair of jeans, a s.h.i.+rt, her overcoat, and we were out of the room, running down the hallway, following Morris.

"Where are we going?" she asked me.

"d.a.m.ned if I know," I said.

As we ran, we heard an elevator opening. We ran away from the elevator, around a corner and another. By the time we turned the last corner and reached the stairs we could hear a door banging and Wayman's thick and slippery voice yelling, "Open up, b.i.t.c.h. Open the f.u.c.k up."

We rushed down the stairs, Morris leading as quickly as he could, which was quicker than I would have thought, down two flights. The sign said no reentry from stairwell, but Morris pulled open the door to the second floor, snapping tape off the lock as he went by, and we stumbled through the doorway after him, into the hallway, and a quick left to the room beside the stairwell, Room 2082, where Morris, without knocking, pushed open the door and rushed inside. We fell in after him, as if sucked in by a vacuum. The door closed quietly but quickly behind us.

The room was the same as Veronica's, same size, same furnis.h.i.+ngs, same two huge beds, same color TV. The door to the bathroom was closed, the window curtains drawn. Morris locked and bolted the door behind us.

"Okay now, Miss Veronica," said Morris. "You must give to me your fine coat."

"My overcoat?" she said.

"Yes, of course. By now they have people watching the front and the back, there is no way out. So what we need is what is called in the profession the holtzene kochka. A wooden duck."

"A decoy?"

"That's it, yes. The holtzene kochka."

"Who?" I asked.

"Why, you, of course, Victor," he said. "And someone else to look like Miss Veronica, and for that we need the overcoat."

"With all due respect, Morris, I don't think you'll pa.s.s."

"Don't be so much the cham, Victor. You think I would let myself be the holtzene kochka? You don't live as long as I have lived in this business setting up yourself as the holtzene kochka. No, rule number two is that the detective is never the holtzene kochka. Maybe that should be rule number one and the coffee rule number two. The numbering, sometimes, it gets so confusing."

"Then who?" I asked.

Just then the bathroom door opened and out she walked in jeans and a wig, a brown wig with soft shoulder-length hair, hair that was styled exactly to match Veronica's. Beth. It was more than strange, my best friend styled to look like the lover of my dreams, a disorienting blend of comfort and kink. In a way, standing there, framed by the bathroom door, was my ideal woman, a fusion of all I could ever want or love. So I stared for a bit and then a bit longer, stared until Beth started to giggle, which broke the mood and let my fantasies slip away until I realized why she was there.

"No," I said. "Not Beth. Absolutely not."

54.

WAYMAN SPOTTED US as we ran out the hotel's front door. I held tight to the suitcase. Veronica's unb.u.t.toned overcoat swung like a cape behind us. Before Wayman could catch us we were in the Honda, windows closed, engine straining in rhythmic moans to life. He had just reached the car, his huge gun waving in our general direction, when I popped it into gear and shot out.

I took a quick turn left on Walnut and another left up 4th Street. I raced past Spruce Street, past Lombard, ran a red at South Street, and kept going. I hadn't gone but two blocks past South before the silver BMW was cruising behind us and gaining.

At Was.h.i.+ngton I spun into a right turn and headed west, BMW tight behind. It rammed me once as I tore along Was.h.i.+ngton, then once more. I ran another red and the Beemer followed and I wondered where the cops were, wondered where the closest donut shop was, and then with a screech of tire I turned down 7th and slammed on my brakes smack in front of the Sons of Garibaldi Men's Club.

The silver BMW came to a turning stop right behind us and Wayman jumped out as if his seat was afire. I barely had the time to open my door before he stuck his arm in, jabbing the point of a huge switchblade knife into my throat. The drummer was guarding the pa.s.senger door, grinning into the window.

"Run from me again, Vi'tor Carl, you just try and run from me again without I say so and I'll slice another smile in your motherf.u.c.king neck."

I tried to say something but with the knife sticking into my larynx and me shaking like a stripper nothing came out.

"But don't you worry yourself, it's all cool now. Ronnie, sweetie, let's you and I take a little drive, what you say?"

Beth turned from the drummer to face Wayman and Wayman's jaw dropped and when he spoke his voice was deep and precise with shock.

"Who are you, lady?"

"She's my partner," I managed to get out between shakes.

"Get the f.u.c.k out of here," he said, and then he added, "s.h.i.+t," drawing out the word until the T just disappeared. "Where is she, Vi'tor Carl? Tell me now or your neck be history. Tell me, Vi'tor Carl." He twisted the knifepoint into my neck, almost lifting me from the car seat. I could feel a line of blood run down my throat. "Tell me quick, tell me now, tell me, tell me, tell me. Tell me, Vi'tor Carl, my knife here it is thirsty once again and it don't got much more patience."

I was about to tell him something when a thick, hairy hand landed on Wayman's shoulder. Beth gasped, or maybe it was me, I couldn't tell. There was something obscene about that hand landing there, like a bony spider. The pressure of the knifepoint slipped from my neck and when Wayman turned to see what it was the hand slid over and grabbed hold of his neck. Before Wayman could say a word of complaint, the hand's owner slammed a brick into Wayman's head. Blood burst from Wayman's forehead. The blow sent him spinning away from the car, his knife sliding with a sweet scrabble across the asphalt. The man with the brick was Dominic and for the first time ever I saw him smile.

It was not a pleasant sight.

I swiveled to check the drummer on the other side of the car, but he was no longer leering inside the window. Instead he was being lifted in a great bear hug, his arms struggling futilely against the pin of some giant whose waist only I could see through the pa.s.senger window.