Ed McBain - The Big Bad City

So he goes through the same routine once again, and then another time after that until he finally hits the right numbers, and boldly yanks down the handle, and flamboyantly flings open the safe door. All grand movements. Everything big and baroque. Like drunken Charlie himself.

The night's proceeds are in there. Charlie's crowd is composed largely of teenagers, and they pay in cash. He starts counting out the bills, has to count them three times, too, before he gets it right. He puts the rest of the money back in the safe, hurls the door shut, gives the dial a dramatic twist. He's now holding a wad of hundred-dollar bills in his left hand. With his right hand, he braces himself against the safe and pushes himself to his feet.

He turns to Sal where he's sprawled half-asleep in the black leather chair.

"Hey, Piano Boy," he says, and staggers over to him. "You want this money?”

Sal opens his eyes.

"Would you like to get paid?" he says.

"That's why we're here, boss," Katie says.

"You want this money?" Charlie asks again, and shakes the bills in Sal's face.

"Stop doing that," Sal says, and flaps his hands on the air in front of him, trying to wave the money away.

"Sweet Buns, you want this money, here's what you got to do," he says, and shoves the wad of bills into the right-hand pocket of the jacket.

They bulge there like a sudden tumor. He unzips his fly. And all at once he's holding himself in his hand.

"Come on, Charlie, put that away," Katie says.

"What you want me to put away, girl?" Charlie says. "The money or my pecker?”

"Come on, Charlie.”

"You want me to put this money back in the safe? Or you want me to put my pecker in little Sally's mouth here?”

"Come on, Charlie.”

"Which?" Charlie says. "Cause that's the way it's gonna be, Katie.

Either the boy here sucks my dick, or you don't get paid.”

Sal doesn't know how to deal with this. He's a city boy unused to the ways of wild land crackers. He thinks for a moment he'll run outside and get the others, all for one and one for all, and all that. But Charlie has grabbed Sal's chin in his hand now, and he is squeezing hard and moving in on him with a drunk's bullheaded determination, waving his bulging purple cock at him the way he waved the wad of money only minutes ago.

City-boy coward that he is, Sal sits frozen in Charlie's grip, incapable of movement.

It is Katie who says, yet another time, "Come on, Charlie," and hits him from behind with the beer bottle he left on the safe. Beer flies in a fine spray as she swings the bottle at his head. The man staggers, but he is not essentially wounded, Katie's blow is ineffectual at best. But Sal is instantly on" his feet, shoving out at Charlie's chest, pushing the fat drunken fool through the open French doors and out onto the deck, and then lunging at him one last time, his fingers widespread on Charlie's chest, a hiss escaping his lips as he pushes him over the railing. There is a splash when he hits the water, and then, instantly, a terrible thrashing that tells them the alligators are getting to him even before he surfaces.

Sal is breathing very hard. He has just killed a man. "The money," he says.

"You killed him," Katie says. "The money. It was in his pocket?”

"Never mind the money.”

"Do you remember the combination?”

“Sweet mother of God, you killed him!”

“The combination. Do you remember it?”

On the river below, there is an appalling stillness. Three to the right, stop on twenty, two to the left, past twenty, stop on seven. One to the right, stop on thirty-four.

Katie recites the numbers aloud to him as he slowly turns the dial to the right, and to the left, and then to the right again. He opens the door. From the wad of money in the safe, he peels off the money due them, and returns the rest to the safe, and closes the door, and twists the dial to lock it again. Katie watches as he wipes the dial and the handle clean. She is moving. from foot to foot, like a little girl who has to pee. He wipes the beer bottle, too, and puts it back on the safe top where Charlie had earlier left it. He looks around one last time, and then they leave the office.

In the van, he says, "Got the bread, let's go," and Katie -pulls her T-shirt away from her body, encouraging the cool flow from the air conditioner.

They were afraid he might Spock. They had read him his rights and taken him back to the precinct, and now they were fearful he might not say another word. He was still in tears. They didn't want him to collapse entirely, so they decided to let Carella handle it alone, less threatening that way. They were in the Interrogation Room now. The other detectives were behind the one-way mirror in the room next door, watching, listening, scarcely daring to breathe. Carella turned on the video camera, and read Roselli his rights again.

Sometimes they-spooked when they heard the Miranda recitation for the second time. It made everything seem irrevocable beyond that point.

Made them think Hey, maybe I should ask for a lawyer. With professionals, there was never any question. They always asked for a lawyer first thing. With the amateurs, like Roselli, they either figured they could outsmart the police, or else they were so guilt-ridden they wanted, to spill it all. Carella waited. Roselli nodded.

Yes, he understood his rights and was willing to answer questions without a lawyer present. Carella needed it in words.

"Okay to go on then, Mr. Roselli?”

"Yes.”

No more Sal. Now they were equals. Mr. Roselli and Mr. Carella, two old friends sipping cappuccino and discussing politics at a round outdoor table in the sunshine. But the light was fluorescent, and the table was long and cigarette-scarred, and the coffee was made down the hall in the Clerical Office and served in cardboard containers, and the subject was murder. "Want to tell me what happened, Mr. Roselli?”

Roselli sat there, looking at his hands. "Mr. Roselli?”

“Yes.”

"Can you tell me?”

"Yes.”

Carella waited.

"I spotted her by accident.”

“Katie?”

“Yes?”

"Katie Cochran?”

"Yes. I hadn't seen her in four years, she'd changed a lot.”

He fell silent, remembering.

"She used to look like a teenager," he said. "Now she looked ... I don't know. Mature?”

Carella waited.

"She seemed so ... serious," Roselli said. "I didn't know she was a nun, of course. Not just then. Not when I first saw her.”

He began weeping again.

Carella moved a box of tissues closer to where Roselli was sitting. The tears kept streaming down his face. Carella waited. The room was still except for the sound of Roselli's sobbing and the faint whirring of the video camera. Carella wondered if he should risk a prod. He waited another moment.

"Where'd you run into her?" he asked.

Gently. Softly. Casually. Two gents sipping their coffees. Sunshine gleaming on white linen.

"Mr. Roselli?”

"At St. Margaret's.”

He took another tissue from the box, blew his nose. Dried his eyes.

"The hospital," he said, and blew his nose again. He sighed heavily.

Carella was hoping he wasn't about to quit. Call it off. That's it. No more questions. He kept waiting.

"I thought a friend of mine had OD'd, I rushed him to the emergency room," Roselli said. "It turned out he was okay, but Jesus, his face had turned blue! Katie just walked through, I couldn't believe it. I was busy with my friend, I thought he was going to die. I see this woman who looks like Katie, but doesn't look like Katie. I mean, you.

had to know Katie back then. When she was singing.? A million kilowatts, I swear. This woman looked so ... I don't know ... serene? Walking into the emergency room. Straight out of the past. Composed.