Ed McBain - Fiddlers

He still said nothing.

‘You still think I’m a hooker, don’t you? My, my,’ she said. ‘Just how drunk were you, Bert?’

‘Pretty drunk. I’m sorry. Forgive me if I…”

‘Do you remember my name?’

‘I’m sorry, no.’

‘Sadie,’ she said. ‘Sadie Harris.’

He nodded.

‘Librarian,’ she said.

He nodded again.

‘Really,’ she said, ‘I’m a librarian. Last night didn’t cost you a nickel. Go ahead, count your money.’

‘Well,’ he said, and put the wallet back on the dresser.

‘How much of last night do you remember, by the way?’

He spread his hands helplessly.

‘Well, I enjoyed it,’ she said. ‘Have you got a robe I can put on? Or are you going to kick me out without breakfast?’

He went to the closet, took a robe from its hanger, carried it to her, held it for her while she shrugged into it. His earlier guilt was changing to something else. He was beginning to feel rotten for the girl. If she really was a librarian, then…

‘So where do you work?’ he asked. ‘Which library?’

‘Still don’t believe me, huh?’ she said, and walked familiarly to the cabinets over the sink, and opened one of them, and found a tin of ground coffee. ‘Chapel Road Branch, uptown near the old Orpheum Theater. I have to be in at nine, by the way. And I still have to go home to change into my librarian threads.’

‘I have to be in at seven forty-five.’

‘So we still have time,’ she said, and raised one eyebrow. ‘For breakfast,’ she added.

* * * *

This time, he was cold sober.

This time, he was wide awake.

When she let his robe fall from her shoulders, he opened his arms wide to her and drew her close to him, and when she raised her face to his, he kissed her fiercely on the mouth. And then he lifted her off the floor and into his arms, and carried her to the bed.

* * * *

‘You still think I’m a hooker, don’t you?’ she said afterward. She was lying beside him, cradled in his arms. One hand was on his chest. Long slender fingers. Bright red painted fingernails.

‘No,’ he said. ‘I don’t think you’re a hooker.’

‘Then why did I behave so sluttily last night in that bar?’

‘Why?’ he asked.

‘Cause I liked what I saw,’ she said. ‘And librarians don’t get out much.’

‘You seemed to know the bartender pretty well,’ he said.

‘Louis. Yes, I do know him. I live right around the corner from there.’

‘Do you play that game often? Pretending to be a hooker?’

‘Depends what I’ve been reading that week. Sometimes I pretend to be a rich Jewish girl from the suburbs.’

‘Are you really a librarian?’

‘How many times I got to tell you, man? You want me to ‘splain the Dewey Decimal System to you?’

‘Is that another role?’

‘The Dewey… ?’

‘No, the li’l cornpone black girl.’

‘I can talk white, black, whatever suits you, dollink,’ she said, suddenly going Jewish. Then, for some reason, she reached up to touch his mouth. Her hand lingered there, her long fingers tracing his lips. ‘You have a beautiful mouth,’ she said. ‘I think I’m in love with you,’ she said. ‘Oh, pshaw,’ she said. ‘I got that expression from a British spy novel. Oh, pshaw. Man named Sykes keeps saying that to his assistant. “Oh, pshaw, Shaw,’ which is the assistant’s name. Ask Louis. Two months ago I walked in talking British and being a spy. But I do believe I’m seriously in love with you,’ she said, and sat up, and leaned over him, and kissed him on the mouth. She pulled her own mouth away, looked him full in the face. ‘What’s my name?’ she asked.

‘Sadie,’ he said.

‘I’ve got a BA from Radmore U,’ she said. ‘I’m thirty years old. How old are you?’

‘Thirty-three,’ he said.

‘Well now, that’s nigh on perfect, ain’t it?’ she said.

‘Is that black?’ he asked.

‘That’s white trash,’ she said. ‘Am I your first black girl?’

‘No,’ he said.

‘You’re my first white man.’

‘Was I okay?’

‘Oh my dear boy!’ she said, and kissed him on the mouth again.

They both looked at the bedside clock again.

‘I can’t get enough of you,’ she said.

‘Sadie…”

‘Don’t tell me you’re married, or engaged, or even dreaming of having a relationship with anyone else,’ she said. ‘Because right now, you are going to make love to me again, and then we are going to discuss our future together, you unner’stan whut I’m sayin, white boy?’

‘Sadie…’

‘Now just hush ,’ she said.

He hushed.

* * * *

‘We’re beginning to get overwhelmed here,’ Byrnes said.

‘I told you. The garbage can of the DD,’ Parker said.

‘Where’d this one go down?’ Hawes asked.

‘The Three-Eight. In Majesta. Old lady and her dog.’

‘How old?’ Carella asked.

‘Seventy-three.’

‘He’s upping ages,’ Meyer said.

‘Softer targets.’

‘Same Glock?’ Brown asked.

‘Identical. Shot the dog for good measure.’

‘Killed him, too?’

‘Her. A bitch.’

‘The dog, I mean.’

‘Right. A female.’

‘Where’d you get that?’

‘From the Three-Eight’s report. They sent us their paper soon as Ballistics confirmed.’

‘Sure,’ Parker said knowingly.

‘What kind of dog was it?’ Genero asked.

‘We already went by the dog, Richard.’

‘I’m curious.’

‘A golden,’ Byrnes told him.

‘That’s a nice dog, a golden.’

‘Some people get very offended when dogs are killed,’ Hawes said. He was sitting by the window, his red hair touched by sunlight, looking on fire. ‘You can kill all the cats in the world, they don’t care. But kill a dog? They march on City Hall.’

‘Goldens?’ Genero asked. ‘Or all dogs?’

‘Point is we’re overwhelmed here,’ Byrnes said. ‘Five homicides now…”

‘Plus the dog, don’t forget,’ Genero said.

‘Fuck the dog,’ Parker said.

‘Eileen, Hal? What are you guys working?’

‘The liquor store holdups on Culver.’

‘Can you take on the dog lady?’

‘Don’t see how,’ Willis said. ‘We’re sitting four stores alternately.’

‘Me and Andy’ll take the dog lady,’ Genero said.

‘We’ve already got the cosmetics lady,’ Parker reminded him.

‘I like dogs,’ Genero explained.

‘How’re you doing with your professor?’ Byrnes asked.

‘Getting nowhere fast,’ Brown said.

‘Where’s Kling, anyway?’ Byrnes said.

Brown shrugged.

Everyone looked up at the clock.

‘So what do we do here?’ Byrnes asked. ‘Cotton? You want to fly solo on this one?’

‘Sure,’ he said. ‘Who caught it up the Three-Eight?’

‘Guy named Anderson. We’ve got all his paper.’

‘I’ll give him a call.’

‘Ask him what the dog’s name was,’ Genero said.

* * * *

According to Helen Reilly’s neighbors, the dog’s name was Pavarotti. A female. Go figure. Apparently, Helen was single when she was killed, but she’d been married twice before. This from several sources in her building, but primarily from her closest friend, a woman who lived across the street at 324 South Waverly. Hawes didn’t get to her until almost three that Saturday afternoon.

Her name was Paula Wellington, and she was in her early fifties, he guessed, some twenty years younger than the dog lady. Good-looking woman with a thick head of white hair she wore loose around her face. Blue eyes. She told Hawes almost at once that three months ago she’d weighed two hundred pounds. Right now, she looked fit and trim.