Richard Stark - The Mourner

“Screw you,” she said.

He finished the bourbon and put the glass down. “I’m leaving tonight,” he said, “and after that we’re finished. You can’t be trusted. You like to watch violence too much. But we’ve got hours yet before I take off.”

“How did you do it, Parker? Chuck, how did you do it?” she whispered.

“Menlo’s dead,” he said, “and I’m alive. I’ve got the dough he tried to take off with. I delivered the mourner to your father. And I got the gun from him. Yeah, I got the gun. So who’s the strongest now, Bett?”

He could feel it coursing through him, like electricity, strong enough to blot the twinges in his side, to make him forget any stiffness or soreness in his body. The job was over, and it was always like this after a job. A satyr, inexhaustible and insatiable. He was twelve feet tall.

He walked toward the bedroom. “This way, Bett,” he said. “We’ve got five or six hours yet.”

She followed him through the doorway, and shut the door behind her.

Kapor himself answered the door. It was colder than ever in Washington, after having been in Florida for a few days. Parker came in, carrying the suitcase, and set it down on the parquet floor. He unbuttoned his topcoat and Kapor said, “I take it you were successful.”

“In the suitcase there. There was a hundred and twenty dollars less than a hundred grand when I got to it. There’s sixty dollars less than fifty grand in that suitcase.”

“I will accept your bookkeeping,” Kapor replied. “May I offer you a drink?”

“Just give me the address where they’ve got my partner.

“Ah, yes. I believe I have one of their business cards.”

Parker waited in the hallway while Kapor went into the living room. He came back a moment later carrying the card, and handed it to Parker. The place was called Twin Maples, and it was out in Bethesda. Written on the card in pencil was the name Robert Morris.

“Your friend had three driver’s licenses in his wallet,” Kapor explained. “I chose that one. So that’s the name he was admitted under.”

“O.K.” Parker put the card in his pocket.

“Such a shame,” Kapor said, “to be leaving this way. I am going tonight.”

“Any rumbles yet?” Parker didn’t give a damn one way or the other, but Kapor seemed to feel like talking.

“Not yet, but one never knows. I had hoped to leave in a leisurely fashion, and in style. My books and coins and statues would be packed, various personal possessions crated, and I would remove myself to a safe place surrounded by my possessions. But I must travel fast, and light. I have less than half the money I’d expected to be taking with me and I must leave everything I love behind. Still, I have my life and my health, and this portion of my money which you have returned to me. I shall have a head start on those who most certainly will be coming after me, so I cannot complain too much.”

“I’m glad it’s all worked out for you,” Parker said, reaching for the doorknob.

“I’m leaving the United States, of course, at least temporarily. But perhaps we will meet again eventually, and perhaps someday I shall be able to repay you for what you have done for me.”

“Maybe so.”

“Good-bye, whatever your name is.”

“Good-bye, Kapor.”

Parker went back out into the cold and walked down the drive to the cab. He’d had the driver wait. It was another black woman in a crazy hat. Washington cabs were full of them, driving like snowbirds looking for the Man.

Parker got in, took the card from his pocket, and read off the address. The woman driver nodded and the cab shot away from the curb.

On the way, Parker wondered what Handy was thinking about right now. It was a funny thing, but Handy had been going to quit. There were a lot of them like Handy in the racket; one more job, for a stake, and then they’d quit. Handy had been quitting after one more job for years.

But this time, it had seemed like he really meant it. He’d bought himself a diner near an Air Force base at Presque Isle, Maine, and he was planning to short-order it himself. He’d even bought a legitimate car from a legitimate dealer and got legitimate plates for it. It was as though he was off the kinky forever.

Parker had the feeling that this time maybe Handy would be going to Presque Isle, Maine, for good and all.

The rest home was a big old brick building, with more than two maples surrounding it. It looked as though it had been somebody’s estate once, but the neighborhood hadn’t retained its high tone, so they’d sold out to somebody who wanted to start a rest home. Most of the patients would be alcoholics drying out or subpoena subjects hiding out. And in the middle of them, Handy McKay.

Parker paid the cab and went inside. A professional-looking nurse was sitting at a small desk in the front hallway and Parker asked her if he could visit Robert Morris. She asked him to wait, and he sat down on the wooden bench across from the desk and idly picked up a copy of Time. In a moment an overly bluff and hearty man came out and shook Parker’s hand overly long and said he was Dr. Wellman. He asked Parker if he was a friend of Mr. Morris’s and Parker said yes. The doctor asked if he knew about Mr. Morris’s bad stomach condition, and Parker said only that he’d heard there’d been an operation to remove something. The doctor smiled and nodded and said yes, and the patient was coming along just fine, and that he would personally show Parker up to his friend’s room.

There was a tiny elevator, an afterthought that obviously hadn’t been there originally, and Parker and the doctor crowded into it and went up to the second floor. Handy’s room was at the end of the hall. The doctor stayed just long enough to make sure that Handy actually did recognize Parker and had no objection to his being there, and then he withdrew, closing the door.

Handy looked pale, but he was conscious and grinning. “How are things?”

“Taken care of. Everything. I had to make a fifty per cent cut with Kapor, but the rest is safe.”

“Good.”

“You’re going to Presque Isle, Maine?”

“You guessed it. The worst that’s gonna happen to me from now on is grease burns.”

Parker nodded. He dragged a chair over near the bed and sat down. “How much longer?”

“They say I can get up and start walking in a week or so. Then I’m supposed to stay here another two or three weeks after that but I don’t think I will. The story the nurses have is I’m some clown who shot himself by accident, and since I wasn’t supposed to have a gun, no permit or something, that’s why I’m here instead of a hospital. Not breaking the law all the way, just bending it a little.”

“I’m going down to Galveston for a while. When you’re ready to pull out of here, give me a call. I’ll send you your share. You’ve got to pay for this place yourself.”

“I know, they told me. I’ll still have enough left over for what I want.”

“You know the place I stay in Galveston?”

“Sure.”

“O.K.” Parker got to his feet. “Give me a call, huh?”

“You bet.”

Parker went to the door. He was reaching for the knob when Handy called out to him.

He turned.

“What about Kapor?”

“He’s clearing out tonight. He’s free and clear, I guess.”

“No trouble from him?”

“No. He got half back, and that’s all he cared about.”

“What did he say about the mourner?”

Parker thought for a second, and then he laughed. “He didn’t even know,” he said. “He never even noticed it was gone.”