Max Collins - Quarry's list

“Can I finish my food first?”

“Fuck, yes.”

“And then I just take all that money I made off killing the Broker, and go to Canada or Mexico.”

“Wherever you want. It’s your money.”

“There isn’t any money. But suppose there was. Suppose I killed Broker, and got money for it. Why should anybody care?”

“How the fuck should I know?”

“I want to talk to the man you’re working for. “

“Why?”

“I want to find out exactly why he wants me dead. I want to explain what really happened with the Broker.”

“Then what?”

“Who knows? If he’s taking over, maybe I’ll want my old job back.”

“I don’t know, Quarry.”

“Ask him.”

“I don’t know.”

“It’d be a good idea to ask him.”

“What the fuck… you threatening me, Quarry? What kind of shit is that?”

“You didn’t ask me yet when I got in town.”

“When’d you get in town?”

“Couple days ago.”

“Couple days ago. What you been doin’, since you got in town?”

“Nothing. Looking at dirty pictures and playing with myself.”

“You’ll go blind.”

“I’ll cover one eye.”

“What the fuck you tryin’ to say, Quarry? What you been up to, around here?”

“Nothing. Vacationing. You know. Sightseeing.”

“Sightseeing? In the Quad fucking Cities?”

“Sure. I got this camera. I take pictures of the sights.”

“What sort of sights?”

“Oh, like the river. Important buildings. Classic old homes. Like that brown brick number, up on the hill. You know. That place that looks like some sort of castle or something.”

“When do you want to talk to him?”

“Give me a number I can call.”

He got out a pen and wrote a number on a napkin. “Call this afternoon. Before four.”

“I’ll call sometime before midnight.”

“Whatever.”

“I want to thank you for your help, old buddy.”

“It’s okay. After all, you saved my life once.”

“It was nothing. Believe me.”

“You think I should’ve warned you, huh? Fuck, Quarry, you better than anybody ought to know it’s not that kind of business.”

“How much does it cost you, to get your hair puffed up like that, Ash? Covers up that shiny spot terrific.”

“Fuck you, man. I like my car, and my clothes…”

“And your hair.”

“And my fuckin’ hair, too. I’m doing okay, Quarry, and you shouldn’t begrudge me.”

The Oriental woman came with the check.

“Look,” he said, “I realize I owe you, for that time out west. Maybe I can find some way to pay you back for that, in spite of everything.”

I pushed the check over to him. “Just pay for lunch. That’ll make us even.”

I had him leave before I did, and didn’t follow him.

I had somewhere more important to go.

He was still up there. Watching. The sun was out again, and would glint occasionally off the binoculars, and that’s how I knew. He was up there, in that dingy little efficiency apartment, on the second floor of that decaying yellow woodpile that used to be a mansion, watching out the window, watching the brown brick house across the way.

I’d been here all afternoon, sitting in the Buick, parked along the street across from where the apartment house parking lot met the castle’s lawn. I was still dressed casually, like a college kid, and the nine-millimeter was in my lap, with Penthouse over it. It was five-thirty, and it had been a boring afternoon, but I’d found out what I came to find out.

They were going through with it.

It was a job that should have been scrapped a couple times already, but they were going through with it.

Last night Ash seriously screwed up, going in to make the kill and finding an empty house. That alone was enough to consider shelving all plans, stepping aside to let some other team come in and handle it, at a later date.

Then today, over a plate of sweet and sour shrimp, he’d learned from me I’d been in town a couple days and had been watching him and his backup man, and knew they were planning to hit somebody in that brown brick house, and had pretended even to have been taking pictures, of ’em, as I went.

And still they were going through with it.

I’d allowed Ash all afternoon to get in touch with his backup, plenty of time to tell the bogus hippie to get the hell out, which was the only logical thing to do in the situation. But here it was five-thirty, and there the guy was, sitting at his window, with his binoculars, watching the brown brick house across the way.

They were going through with it.

In spite of screwing up last night.

In spite of me.

And that meant whoever lived in that brown brick castle over there was somebody pretty goddamn special. Special enough to make a professional like Ash take risks he would normally never think of taking.

Somebody who had something to do with the takeover of Broker’s operation, maybe. Otherwise, what the hell was Ash doing behind a gun? Ash wasn’t a hit man, anymore. He was an organization man. Second in command. Setting jobs up, not carrying them out. Now that Ash was moving up the criminal corporate ladder, it would take some very special target to rate his attention.

I sat there wondering who lived in that brown brick castle, wishing I’d checked into it sooner, not having realized before the importance of the potential victim living in that house, wondering if it would do any good to take down the address and go over to the public library and check the city directory, where I could match a name to the address, but who was to say that name would mean anything to me?

I got an answer to my question almost immediately, and without going to any library.

Just after six the Pontiac Grand Prix pulled out from the garage on the other side of the brick house, and glided out of the driveway and into the street. The car skimmed right by me, but the driver didn’t notice me.

I noticed the driver.

She was on her way to meet me for an evening swim, even though I hadn’t got around to calling her.

She was in a phone booth, in the Concort lobby, when I caught up with her.

I knocked on the glass, she opened the door and gave me an embarrassed look, and said, “I was just trying your room…”

“Never mind that.”

“… you must think I’m terrible, chasing you like this. If you’d wanted to see me, you’d have called. I had no right coming around here and…”

I grabbed her by the arm and squeezed. Hard.

“I said never mind that.”

“Wh… what’s wrong? You’re hurting me.”

“I’m sorry,” I said, easing my grip but not letting go.

“What’s this all about, Jack?”

“You really don’t know, do you, Carrie?”

“Know what?”

“Listen. Later we can sort this out. Right now I want to get you out of here, okay?”

“Why.”

“Because someone’s going to try to kill you.”

At first she smiled, at first she thought I was putting her on, but then she studied my expression and thought a minute, and it sobered her.

“Does this have anything to do,” she said, “with my husband being killed?”

“Yes, it does… and unless you’re in a real hurry to join him, why don’t you come with me?”

“Jack,… I really don’t know who you are. I mean, I… please don’t misunderstand… but you’re just a man I slept with once. Hell, not even that. We just, well, I just got laid by you a couple times, and that’s about all there is to it, between us. That’s about all I know about you.”

“That’s all I know about you, too, Carrie.”

“No. No, you know more. I don’t want to go anywhere with you until you explain this to me so I can understand it, all of it. Don’t try to force me. I have friends here at the hotel I can turn to, if necessary. Some of them within earshot.”