Ed Mcbain - The Frumious Bandersnatch

“Yeah, but I picked the movie.”

“Makes no difference. This is my treat. You want to take me out sometime, then you ask me.”

Patricia grinned.

“Okay,” she said, “I’ll do that.”

“Hey, Detective Weeks,” a man sitting at the bar said, and immediately rose with his hand extended. “Long time no see, how you been?”

“Patricia,” Ollie said, “this is Artie Di Domenico, owner and proprietor of this fine restaurant. Artie, meet Patricia Gomez, a fellow police officer.”

“Nice to meet you,” Di Domenico said, and took her hand and graciously kissed it. Patricia felt like the queen of England. “Come,” he said, “I have a nice table for you,” and led them across the room to a table near the windows. This was only five-thirty, the place was almost empty. They had walked here from the precinct, directly after the shift changed. It was not yet dark outside.

“Something to drink?” Di Domenico asked.

“Some wine, Patricia?”

“I really can’t let you…”

“Tut tut, m’dear,” Ollie said. “Artie, do you have any of that fine Simi chardonnay?”

“Ma, certo,” Di Domenico said, spreading his hands wide the way Patricia had seen Henry Armetta do in an old black-and-white movie on television. “ Subito, Detective Weeks!”

“This is so nice of you, really,” Patricia said.

“But we can’t eat too much,” Ollie said. “Because zee clock, she is ticking.”

Patricia looked puzzled.

“The movie starts at seven-forty-five,” he explained.

“Ah,” she said. “Well, I don’t eat much, anyway.”

“Ah, but I do,” Ollie said. “And this is very fine Italian food here.”

“I should have dressed more elegantly,” she said, looking around at the neat little tables with their white tablecloths and the candles burning everywhere and the posters of Italian villages on the walls.

“You are dressed to the nines,” Ollie said.

She was, in fact, wearing tailored brown slacks, and a pumpkin-colored cashmere sweater with a neat little tan jacket over it, and a string of pearls around her throat. Ollie thought she looked beautiful. He looked at his watch.

“Five-thirty-five,” he said.

“Zee clock, she is ticking,” Patricia said.

“I learned that from the smartest man I ever met,” Ollie said.

“Who’s that?”

“Henry Daggert. Though, actually, I never met him in person.”

“Is he a cop?”

“No, he’s an editor. Though maybe a spook, too.”

“A spy, you mean?”

“CIA, maybe,” Ollie said, nodding.

“Get out!”

“I’m serious. Being an editor might have been just a cover. But he certainly gave me some good advice. To use in my work.”

“On the job, you mean?”

“No. Writing books, I mean.”

“I sure hope you catch that guy.”

“Oh, me, too.”

“Cause if for no other reason, I’d love to read your book.”

“I’d love you to read it. It’s called Report to the Commissioner. This cross-dressing hooker named Emilio Herrera stole it, the little prick, excuse my French. I’ll get him, though. What he don’t realize is zee clock, she is ticking.”

“What’s that supposed to mean, anyway?” Patricia asked. “I mean, as it pertains to writing books?”

“What it means is that a vital element of all good suspense fiction is a ticking clock. Take a truly great master of literature like James Patterson, are you familiar with his uv?”

“His what?”

“His uv. That’s French for ‘body of work,’ an uv, they call it.”

“I forgot you were learning languages.”

“Yes, I am.”

“That’s so impressive, you have no idea.”

“Patterson always has a ticking clock in his books. If I may quote Henry Daggert, fiction editor and master spy for all I know, ‘You Must Introduce a Ticking Clock.’ ”

“Introduce it to who?” Patricia asked.

“Introduce it into your story. ‘You must give your protagonist only a limited amount of time to solve his problem,’ quote unquote. And to quote once again, ‘The reader should be regularly reminded of the urgency via Countdown Cues,’ quote unquote.”

“Gee, I never realized it was so complicated,” Patricia said.

“Ah yes, there are many tricks of the trade,” Ollie assured her, and looked at his watch again. “Five-forty-one,” he said. “Shall I get menus?”

Patricia waggled her eyebrows.

“Zee clock, she is ticking,” she said.

A HUGE POSTERof Tamar Valparaiso standing spread-legged in her torn and tattered “Bandersnatch” costume was in each front window of Lorelei Records on St. John’s Avenue. The poster did not show the actual beast attacking her, but its frumious shadow fell over her body, the jaws and claws threatening by implication. Scattered everywhere around each of the framed posters were stacks of the jewel-boxed CDs containing the title song and the album itself.

The manager was a black man named Angus Held.

Tall and narrow, he was wearing black jeans, a black sports shirt, and a gray sweater with a shawl collar when he came out of his office at the back of the shop. He knew why they were there; they had called ahead.

“Is Cal in some kind of trouble?” he asked at once.

Same thing he’d asked on the phone.

Same thing they always asked.

This time, they played it straight.

“He’s broken parole,” Carella said.

“Didn’t even know he was on parole,” Held said, shaking his head.

“When’s the last time you saw him?” Hawes asked.

“When he left the job. Middle of April, must’ve been. Right around Easter time.”

“Did he say he was going to Jamaica?”

“No. Is that where he went?”

“We don’t know where he went,” Carella said. “We’re trying to find him.”

“How long did he work here?” Hawes asked.

“Started just before Christmas. Comes and goes with the holidays, seems like. What was he in jail for?”

“A bank holdup.”

“Whoo,” Held said.

“Did he give you any trouble while he was here?”

“None at all. You say he was on parole, huh?”

“That’s right.”

“Can’t understand why he broke it. Had himself a good job here.”

“What’d he do?”

“Worked in the stock room. This is a good location, we do lots of volume here. Wonder why he broke parole.”

Carella was wondering the same thing. Wilkins left a job as a dishwasher, got a better job here, you’d think he’d run to his parole officer and ask for a medal. Instead, he absconds. To do what? Kidnap Tamar Valparaiso? Whose picture was now in both front windows?

“Mind if we talk to some of the people in your stock room?” Hawes asked.

“I’ll take you back,” Held said.

THERE WEREthree people in the Lorelei stock room. One was Hispanic, one was Asian, one was black. Only the Asian guy had known Wilkins while he was still working here.

“Quiet type,” he said.

Which was what most of them said about people who’d committed crimes of violence.

“Kept mostly to himself.”

Which is what they also said.

“Can’t imagine him doing anything wrong.”

Ho-hum, Carella thought.

“Did he mention why he was quitting the job?” Hawes asked.

“Said he had bigger plans.”

“Like what?”

“Said he was going to retire to Jamaica.”

Jamaica again.

“Did he say how he planned to do that?”

“Nossir, he did not.”

“Mention any get-rich-quick scheme?”

“Nossir. I told you. He kept mostly to himself.”

“Ever see him with a redheaded girl and a…”

“Nope.”

“…guy about my height?” Carella said. “They might’ve been friends of his. Brown eyes, curly black hair, good build.”