Robert Parker - The Professional

“Oh, sure, apologize,” he said. “Anyway, it was duck soup. So I started doing it regular. I made sure the women were married and had money, preferably married to older rich men, so they might be looking for action but would never want to give up the husband and his money.”

“Estelle help you with that?” I said.

“Boy, you don’t miss much,” Gary said. “How’d you know that?”

“She fingered me for you,” I said.

“Oh,” he said. “Yeah.”

“She’d have access to the membership records,” I said.

“She does,” Gary said. “She knows what we’re looking for.”

“Many failures?” I said.

“Now and then,” Gary said. “Not as often as you’d think.”

He was a very handsome man. Six feet tall, maybe a little more, wide shoulders, narrow hips, good color, dressed like a male model.

“She doesn’t mind you having sex with all these women?” I said.

“I think she likes it,” he said.

I nodded.

“So how often do you practice your, ah, profession,” I said.

“It’s still a hobby, too,” Gary said. “I do it every day.”

“Why?” I said.

“Why?”

“Yeah,” I said. “Why?”

“’Cause I can, for crissake.”

“Well,” I said, “it’s nice to like your work.”

GARY WAS ON HIS THIRDbourbon. But it was going in much more slowly, and he showed little effect from the first two. I had my second beer.

“So where do we stand?” Gary said.

“What’s the E stand for,” I said.

“E?”

“As in E. Herzog.”

Gary looked at me for a long moment.

“Oh, shit,” he said.

I waited.

After a while, Gary grinned at me.

“Okay,” he said. “You’re smart. That dumb stuff is just a ploy.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But what I’ve done so far doesn’t prove anything.”

“You think?” he said.

“Your big mistake was trying to tail me. If you hadn’t made it, I would have had a much harder time finding you.”

“You spotted me following you the other day and turned it around and followed me.”

“Yep.”

Gary shook his head.

“Amateurs and professionals, huh?”

“What’s the E stand for?” I said.

“Elliot,” he said.

“Is Elliot Herzog your real name?” I said.

Again, Gary grinned at me.

“One of them,” he said.

I nodded.

“So what are your plans,” I said, “for the ladies who employed me?”

He smiled.

“Abigail, Beth, Nancy, Regina,” he said. “The gang of four.”

“Are they the only ones with whom you are at the moment practicing your profession?”

“Not hardly,” Gary said.

“Maybe you should plan to stick with them,” I said. “And leave my gang alone.”

He picked up a butter knife and tapped a little beat on the table with it while he looked at me.

“I got no reason to change my plans,” he said.

“I’m supposed to give you a reason,” I said.

He shrugged.

“What are you gonna do?” he said. “These ladies are willing to pay because they don’t want their husbands to know. That hasn’t changed. None of them will press charges. If you tell the cops or whatever, every one of them will deny that they ever had anything to do with me.”

“I could keep punching your lights out,” I said, “until we reach an agreement.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said. “I have a sense that it might not be your style. But say it was. If you did it once, okay, I’m sore for a few days. I might be tougher than you think I am. And when I felt better, I’d get hold of your employers and they’d call you off, for fear I’d expose them.”

“And if they didn’t?” I said.

“I’d expose them,” he said. “They’re not the only fish in my creel, you know?”

“I don’t seem to terrify you,” I said.

“I been living this life for a long time,” he said. “I’m pretty light on my feet.”

“And the cops don’t terrify you,” I said.

“Nothing much does,” he said. “You got the tab on this?”

“Sure,” I said. “Expense account.”

“Sort of like me,” he said, and stood up.

“See you around,” he said.

“Yep,” I said.

He picked up his shopping bags and strolled out of the lounge. I watched him go and smiled. I kind of liked him. I picked up his butter knife by the blade and slipped it into my coat pocket. Then I paid the bill, tipped handsomely, and strolled out of the lounge, too.

GOT SIX E. HERZOGS,”Quirk said to me. “None of them named Elliot. Got no Gary Eisenhowers.”

“There’s a surprise,” I said.

We were having lunch at Locke-Ober.

“How come you know everybody?” I said.

“Been coming here a long time, most of them are politicians or lawyers.”

“That you met in your work,” I said.

“Yep,” Quirk said.

He grinned.

“Arrested some of them,” he said.

“Not enough,” I said.

“Everybody got arrested that should get arrested,” Quirk said, “we wouldn’t have no place to put them.”

“How about the butter knife?” I said.

Quirk nodded.

“There were prints on the butter knife,” he said. “Yours were on the blade, and there were two others.”

“One would be whoever set the table,” I said.

“Young woman named Lucille Malinkowski,” Quirk said.

“Why have you got her prints on file?”

“Don’t know, nothing criminal. Maybe she was in the army, maybe she has a gun license, maybe she used to work someplace where she had to have clearance. I didn’t know you’d care.”

“And the other one?

“Belongs to a guy named Goran Pappas,” Quirk said.

“ ‘Goran’?”

“Aka Gary Pappas,” Quirk said.

“Why is Gary in the system,” I said.

“He did three in MCI-Shirley for swindling,” Quirk said.

“From a woman?” I said.

“Yes.”

“What’d Gary look like?” I said.

“Six feet one inch, one hundred seventy pounds, dark hair, brown eyes, even features, age thirty-eight at the time of his arrest.”

“Which was?”

“In 2002,” Quirk said.

He produced a computer printout of Gary Pappas’s mug shot. It was Gary Eisenhower.

“Anybody want him now for anything?” I said.

“He’s not in the system,” Quirk said. “Course, the system’s imperfect.”

“It is?” I said. “How did that happen?”

Quirk didn’t bother to answer.

“You want to discuss Gary with me?” he said.

“He’s blackmailing a bunch of women,” I said.

“Tell me about it,” Quirk said.

I told him most of it, leaving out the names.

“Not a bad gig,” Quirk said. “Banging good-looking women every day, getting money for it.”

“It might get boring,” I said.

Quirk looked at me.

“Or not,” I said.

Quirk nodded.

“So they hired you to make him stop,” Quirk said.

“Yes.”

“You got any evidence?” Quirk said.

“Got no evidence we can use.”

“Women won’t testify?”

“No.”

“So what are you supposed to do?” Quirk said. “Scare him?”

“I tried that,” I said.

“How’d that work for you?” Quirk said.

“It didn’t,” I said.

“Disappointing,” Quirk said.

“Makes me feel old,” I said.

“Want me to stop by and have a talk with him?” Quirk said. “Unofficially?”

I shook my head.

“Don’t think he’d care,” I said.

“About the homicide commander?” Quirk said.

“I don’t think cops worry him,” I said.