Donald Westlake: Why Me?

"She isn't going anywhere," Freedly said. "Are you, Mrs. Skoukakis?"

Irene Skoukakis was a bit old to smolder, but she managed. "I shall get a divorce," she said. "But first I shall be unfaithful with a Turk."

Her husband moaned.

"Let's go," Freedly said.

Okay, okay; Zachary turned the pages, skipped ahead, found his place, and said, like an FBI man, "Right. Let's go get that ring. Come along, Skoukakis."

"Good night, Irene."

Zachary and Freedly and the suspect went outside, and the wife slammed the door very hard after them. Their agency car, an avocado Pontiac, was across the street under a maple tree. They started in that direction and Skoukakis said, "Do you want to follow me?"

Zachary didn't understand the question. Apparently Freedly did, though, because he grinned at Skoukakis and said, "Oh, no, Mr. Skoukakis. You'll ride with us."

"Oh, yes," Skoukakis said. "Of course. I wasn't thinking."

"Naturally you'll ride with us," Zachary said, having caught up. "What are you trying to pull?"

"Nothing," Skoukakis said.

Freedly drove, Zachary and Skoukakis riding in back, Skoukakis giving directions to his store. Freedly radioed in while they were stopped at a red light, saying, "We picked up Skoukakis. He says the object is at his shop. We're on the way there with him."

"Wrapping it up fast," said the radio, in a loud, distorted, but cheerful voice. "That's the way to do it."

"You bet," Freedly said. He stopped talking on the radio and drove the car forward.

Skoukakis said, "Excuse me."

"You were on our list," Freedly told him.

"Ah," Skoukakis said.

Zachary frowned. "What?"

"I didn't know you had a list," Skoukakis said.

"We've got lots of lists," Freedly told him. "The hit squad was Greek. It seemed political rather than criminal. They'd want to get it out of the country, and you were one of the likelier possibilities."

"The FBI has its methods," Zachary said. He'd caught up again.

At the shop, Skoukakis unlocked the door and went in first, switching on the lights and then stopping dead. "Move along," Zachary said.

Skoukakis cried out in Greek. He ran forward. Zachary made a grab for him but missed, and Skoukakis stopped again.

"Oh, for Christ's sake," Freedly said. "Say it isn't so."

Zachary said, "What?"

Skoukakis turned toward them a dead-white face and gestured at his open safe. "I've been robbed!"

"Shit," said Freedly, and went out to the car to call in. Zachary said, "What?"

Dortmunder's breakfast was: sweetened grapefruit juice (at which he made a face), two fried eggs over hard, white bread toasted with apricot preserves, instant coffee with a lot of milk and sugar. He had finished everything but the second piece of toast and the third cup of coffee when May came into the kitchen, wearing her coat. "Don't forget to call Andy Kelp," she said.

Dortmunder was fiddling with the digital watch. "Mm," he said, and pressed the button on the side; the pink numbers said 6:10:42:08. "Mm," he said.

"You'll be home for dinner?"

"Yeah. I'll take that stuff over to Arnie this morning. Maybe we'll eat out."

"That'd be nice," she said, and left the kitchen.

Dortmunder drank some coffee, turned the watch around and around in his hands, poked it a bit, and pressed the button on the side. 6:10:42:08.

The front door closed.

Dortmunder chewed toast and considered the watch. When you weren't pressing the button on the side, the rectangular black face was blank; it looked like Dick Tracy's wrist TV. Dortmunder held the watch near his mouth. "Hello, less?" he said. "This is Tracy."

The phone rang.

Dortmunder removed the remaining toast from his mouth by drinking the remaining coffee, patted his lips with a paper napkin, and walked into the living room. He picked up the phone on the fifth ring. "Yeah," he said.

"What took so long?"

"Hello, Andy."

"You were in the kitchen, I bet." The real Andy Kelp sounded just as cheery as the machine Andy Kelp.

"You got a machine on your phone," Dortmunder accused him.

"You want an extension for your kitchen?"

"What do you want with a machine on your phone?"

"It'd save you steps. I could install it myself, you wouldn't pay any monthly fee."

"I don't need an extension," Dortmunder said firmly, "and you don't need a machine."

"It's very useful," Kelp said. "If there's people I don't want to talk to, I don't talk to them."

"I already do that," Dortmunder said, and the phone went guk-ick, guk-ick, guk-ick. "Now what?" Dortmunder said.

"Hold on," Kelp told him. "Somebody's calling me."

"Somebody's calling you? You're calling me." But Dortmunder was speaking into a dead phone. "Hello?" he said. "Andy?" Then he shook his head in disgust, hung up, and went back to the kitchen to make another cup of coffee. The water was just boiling when the phone rang. He turned off the flame, walked back to the living room, and answered on the fourth ring. "Yeah," he said.

"Wha'd you hang up for?"

"I didn't hang up. You hung up."

"I told you hold on. That was just my call-waiting signal."

"Don't tell me about these things."

"It's terrific," Kelp said. "Say we're talking like this—"

"Yeah."

"And somebody else wants to call me. Instead of a busy signal, the phone rings. That's the click-click you heard."

"It wasn't click-click, it was guk-ick."

"Well, whatever. The point is, I've got this button on the phone here, and I press it to put you on hold and answer this other call. Then I tell them I'll call them back, or whatever I do, and I press the button again, and we go on with our conversation, same as ever."

"We could go on with our conversation same as ever without all that stuff."

"But I'd miss that other call."

"Andy," Dortmunder said, "if you want to call me, and the line's busy, what do you do?"

"I hang up."

"Then what do you do?"

"I call back."

"So I didn't miss the call, did I?"

"But this is more efficient."

"Fine," said Dortmunder. Another argument saved.

"See what it is," Kelp said, "I got access—You know what I mean?"

"Access. You can get into."

"Right. It's a wholesaler for telephone equipment. Not the phone company; you know, one of those private companies."

"Yeah."

"Their warehouse fronts on the street behind me."

"Ah," said Dortmunder.

"I got lots of stuff."

"Terrific."

"I got—You know how I just dialed your number?"

"With your nose?"

"Heh, heh. That's pretty good. Listen, lemme tell you. I got these cards. I got this card with holes punched in it for your telephone number, and I put the card in a slot in this phone here, and the card dials the number."

"More efficient," Dortmunder said.

"You got it. I got phones now all—You know where I'm calling you from?"

"The closet?"

"The bathroom."

Dortmunder closed his eyes. "Let's talk about something else," he said.

"You know, I was home here when you called yesterday." Kelp sounded a bit aggrieved.

"Not according to the machine."

"I kept trying to tell you it was me."

"You said you were the machine."

"No, afterward. Did you do the thing?"

"Yeah."

"Who with?"

"Single-o."

Kelp chuckled, and said, "You didn't do the big jewel thing out to Kennedy, did you?"

Skoukakis Credit Jewelers was near Kennedy Airport. Dortmunder said, "How'd you know? Was it in the papers?"

"In the—John, are you—" Guk-ick, guk-ick, guk-ick. "Oop! Hold on."

"No," said Dortmunder, and hung up, and went back to the kitchen and turned the heat on under the kettle. He rinsed his breakfast dishes, and the water was just boiling when the phone rang. He went ahead and made coffee, added lots of milk and sugar, stirred, put the spoon in the sink, walked back to the living room, and picked up the phone on the fourteenth ring. "Yeah."