Ed Mcbain - Nocturne

"Probably there right this minute," he said. "Doesn't leave for work till about eight-thirty."

Georgie fell in love at once with the slender young woman who opened the door to apartment 3C. He guessed she was in her mid-twenties, a very exotic-looking person who reminded him of his cousin Tessie who once he tried to feel up on the roof when they were both sixteen. Tessie later married a dentist. But here was the same long black hair and dark brown eyes, the same bee-stung lips and high cheekbones, the same impressive bust, as Georgie's mother used to call it.

Karen was just finishing breakfast, but she cordially invited them into the apartment batting her lashes at Georgie, Priscilla noticed and told them she had to leave soon, but she'd be happy to answer questions until then. Although, really, she'd already told the police everything she knew.

Priscilla suggested that perhaps the police hadn't asked her the same questions they were about to ask. Karen looked puzzled.

"For example," Priscilla said, "did you ever happen to notice a tall blond man visiting my grandmother's apartment?"

"No," Karen said. "In fact, I did not."

"How well did you know the old lady?" Georgie asked kindly.

Karen looked at the clock.

Then she gave them much the same she'd given the police, telling all about her sitting with Svetlana sipping tea together in the late afternoon listening to her old 78s... "It reminded me of T. S. Eliot somehow," she said and smiled at Georgie, who didn't know who T. S. Eliot was.

She told them, too, about accompanying Svetlana to her internist's office one day... "She had terrible arthritis, you know..." and another time to an ear doctor who told her she ought to see a neurologist. Because of the ringing in her ears, you know.

"When was this?" Priscilla asked.

"Oh, before Thanksgiving. It was awful. She was crying so hard in the taxi, I thought her heart would break."

"And you're sure you never saw her with a blond man?"

"Positive."

"Never, huh?"

"Never. Well, not with her."

"What do you mean?"

"I don't think he went inside."

"Inside?"

"Her apartment. But one morning, when she was sick..."

"Yes?" Priscilla said.

"He brought fish for the cat." "Who did?" Tony asked. "A tall blond person."

"His name wouldn't have been Eliot, would it?" Georgie asked shrewdly.

"I have no idea what his name was."

"But he brought fish to her apartment?" Tony said. "Fish. Yes."

"But didn't go in?"

"Well, actually, I don't really know. I was leaving for work when he knocked on her door. Svetlana answered, and he said.." mm, yeah, that's right, wait a minute. He did give her his name, but I don't remember it. It was something very foreign. He had a foreign accent."

"Russian?" Priscilla asked.

"I really don't know. He said he was here with the fish for Irina."

"For Irina. So he knew the cat's name. Which means he knew my grandmother, too. But he didn't go in? When she opened the door?"

"Well, in fact I really can't say. I was already starting down the stairs."

"What kind of fish?" Georgie asked. "I have no idea." "Where'd he get this fish?"

"Well, I would guess at the fish market, wouldn't you?"

"What fish market?" Priscilla asked.

"Where Svetlana went for the cat every morning."

"And where's that?" Priscilla asked, and held her breath.

"Let's try a timetable on this thing, okay?" Byrnes said. He was getting exasperated. He didn't like little

old ladies in faded mink coats smelling of fish shot with a gun stolen from a limo that had transfered: a fighting rooster uptown. He didn't like period. Turtles, canaries, dogs, cats, fish, cockroaches, whatever.

"Where do you want us to start, Pete?" Carella asked.

"The gun."

"Belongs to a man named Rodney Pratt. He Keeps it in the glove compartment of his limo. breaks down Thursday night, he takes it to the garage off the Majesta Bridge. Place called

Texaco. Forgets the gun in the glove box." "Okay, next."

"How do you know he's not the murderer?" Byrnes asked.

"We know," Hawes said, dismissing the very

"Gee, excuse me for fucking breathing!" Parker said.

"Next," Carella said, "they work on the car all Friday. One of the mechanics, guy named Santiago, borrows the car, quote unquote, to drive prize rooster uptown that night to a cockfight at Riverhead."

"Excuse me while I puke," Parker said. "Puke," Kling suggested.

"A fuckin bird in the backseat of a limo?" "So puke," Kling suggested again. "Santiago's bird loses. He finds the gun in the box, decides to shoot the winning bird, changes mind when the Four-Eight raids the place. He goes nearby after-hours joint called The Juice Bar..."

"I know that place," Brown said."... where this tall blond son of a bitch we're trying to find is meeting with a bookie named Bernie Himmel who tells him he's gonna be swimming with the fishes unless he pays him by Sunday morning the twenty grand he lost on the Cowboys-Steelers game."

"Swimming with the fishes," Hawes corrected. "What?"

"He stressed the word 'swimming." "

"I don't know what you mean."

"He told Schiavinato he'd be swimming with the fishes."

"As opposed to what?" Meyer said. "Dancing with them?"

"I'm only telling you what I heard."

"Let me hear the rest of the timetable," Byrnes said. "Okay. Saturday night, a quarter to twelve, we get a DOA at 1217 Lincoln Street, old lady named Svetlana Helder, turns out to be Svetlana Dyalovich, the famous concert pianist."

"I never heard of her," Parker said. "Two to the heart," Hawes said. "I saw that picture," Kling said. "Was that the name?" "I'm pretty sure."

"Next morning, around seven, we get a dead hooker in an alley on St. Sab's." "Any connection?" "None."

"Then why bring her up?"

"A policeman,s lot," Carella said, and shrugged.

"He also called them the blond guy's fish," said.

"I'm lost," Parker said.

"So am I," Byrnes said.

"Himmel. The bookie. Bernie the Banker. He then didn't have much to talk about after he mentioned

Schiavinato swimming with his little fishies."

"I'm still lost," Parker said.

"Yes, can you please tell us what the hell you are driving at?" Byrnes asked.

"His little fishies. Not the little fishies, but his fishies. Schiavinato's little fishies."

Everybody was looking at him.

Only Carella knew what he was saying.

"The cat," Carella said.

"Not the goddamn cat again," Byrnes said.

"She went out every morning to buy fresh fish for the cat."

"Where'd you say her apartment was?"

asked, suddenly catching on.

"1217 Lincoln."

"Simple," Parker said. "The Lincoln Street Market."

"Selling fish," Meyer said, nodding. "As opl swimming with them."

At eight-fifteen that morning, the Lincoln Street Fish Market was not quite as bustling as it had been between four and six A.M. when fish retailers from all over the city arrived in droves. As Priscilla and the boys pulled up in a taxi, only housewives and restaurant owners were examining the various catches of the day, all displayed enticingly on ice well, enticingly if you liked fish.

The market was a sprawling complex of indoor and outdoor stalls. On the sidewalk outside the high-windowed arching edifice fishmongers, wearing woolen gloves with the fingers cut off, woolen caps pulled down over their ears, and bloodstained white smocks over layers of sweaters, stood hawking their merchandise while potential customers picked over the fish as if they were inspecting diamonds for flaws.

It was a clear, cold, windy, sunny Monday morning. "Where do we start?" Georgie asked.

He was hoping to discourage her. He did not want her to meet the man who'd dropped off' that key to the bus terminal locker. He did not want her to learn that nobody had been in that locker except him and Tony here, who was backing away from the fish stalls as if his grandmother had cooked fish for him whenever he visited her on a Friday, which she had, and which he'd hated. He learned after her death that she'd hated fish, too. His mother, on the other hand, never had to cook