Ed McBain - Poison

He was just coming around the corner when he saw Willis walking up the street toward him. He backpedaled away, ducked into the nearest doorway. What now? he wondered, and then saw Willis unlocking the door to his car. Well, well, he thought, the man ain't making it with her, after all, the man's going home to his own little—

Two shots cracked the brittle night air.

Two shots in a row, coming from somewhere in the small park across the street from the building.

Willis threw himself flat to the ground.

Brown came out of the doorway, pistol already in his hand, and started running for the park.

Another shot, and then another, bullets ricocheting off the car door above Willis's head.

"I'm with you, Hal!" Brown shouted over his shoulder. "Artie Brown!"

Insurance against Willis pumping a few slugs into his back.

Willis was off the ground now, yanking his pistol from its holster, running across the street toward the footpath Brown had already entered. He heard Brown pounding along up ahead there, heard other footfalls in the distance, someone running up the path and then thrashing into the bushes. What the hell is Brown doing here? he wondered. And realized in an instant that they'd put a tail on Marilyn.

"Police officer!" he heard Brown shout. "Stop or I'll shoot!"

Two shots in the blackness up ahead, muzzle flashes on the night. He came running up to where Brown was standing on the edge of the path, gun in hand, breathing hard, peering into the bushes.

"Did you get him?" he asked.

"No."

"He still in there?"

"I don't think so," Brown said. "Let's check it out."

They fanned out into the bushes, moving in a slow, steady, flushing pattern some twenty feet apart from each other, until finally they reached the edge of the park closest to the river.

"Gone with the wind," Brown said.

"Did you get a look at him?"

"No. Man was trying to shoot you, though."

"Tell me about it."

They began walking back through the bushes, up toward the path again.

"You on a stakeout?" Willis asked.

"Yeah," Brown said. "You on it, too?"

"No. Who set it up?"

"The Loot."

Meaning Carella had requested it.

"Better see we can find any spent cartridge cases," Brown said.

"We'll need lights," Willis said. "I'll call in."

He went out of the park and was walking toward his car when the front door of the house opened. Marilyn was standing there in a robe.

"Were those shots?" she asked.

"Yes," he said.

"Who?"

"I don't know. He got away."

"Was he trying for you?"

"Yes."

She came over to the car. Light from the open doorway of the house spilled onto the sidewalk. Willis thumbed open the glove compartment and took out the walkie-talkie.

"Eight-Seven," he said into it. "This is Willis."

"Go ahead, Hal."

"Who's this?"

"Murchison."

"Dave, I'm here at 1211 Harborside Lane. Somebody just tried to blow me away, Brown and I need lights at the scene."

"You got "em," Murchison said.

"Who's catching upstairs?"

"Kling and Fujiwara just relieved."

"Ask them to check on Charles Endicott, Jr., his address is in the files, they can look in the McKennon folder. I want to know if he's home. If he's not home, I want them to wait there till he gets home."

"I'll tell 'em," Murchison said.

"Thanks," Willis said. He took a flashlight from the glove compartment, came out of the car, clipped the walkie-talkie to his belt, and then closed and locked the door. "I guess I won't have to move it, after all," he said.

"You think it was Chip, don't you?" Marilyn said.

"I don't know who it was," Willis said.

"Then why are you sending policemen there?"

"Because he's the one you kissed off this afternoon."

"Why do you need lights?"

"If he was using an automatic, there'll be spent cartridge cases. You'd better go back inside, this may take a while."

He turned on the flashlight, played it on the car door.

"Son of a bitch put two holes in it," he said. "Right above where my head was."

Marilyn looked at the holes in the car door. One was about sixteen inches above the pavement. Another was two inches above that. He saw the puzzled look on her face.

" That short I'm not," he said, and smiled. "I was lying flat on my belly." He began playing the flashlight on the pavement at his feet.

"What are you looking for?" she asked.

"Bullets," he said.

"What'll they tell you?"

"The kind of gun he used."

She came into his arms and held him close. "See?" she said. "I'm trying to be family."

The lights in the park were on until two in the morning. A lot of neighbors gathered to watch the policemen milling around over there. None of them knew what was going on. If any of them had heard the earlier shots, they'd dismissed them as backfires. When the police finally turned off the lights, the neighbors went back to their houses. They figured something had happened, but they still didn't know what. The police van carrying the portable equipment drove off. One by one, the patrol cars angled into the curb, backed out and moved off into the night. Willis went to the house across the street, and let himself in with his key.

Marilyn was already in bed. He undressed silently, and climbed into bed beside her. She moved instantly into his arms.

"Did you find anything?" she asked.

"Three bullets and four spent cartridge cases."

"That's good, isn't it?"

"If we ever come up with a gun that matches them."

"Your feet are cold," she said, and snuggled closer to him. "Do you want to make love?"

"No, I want to talk," he said.

"About what happened tonight?"

"No. About what happened this afternoon. While you were having lunch with Endicott."

"I already told you. He was very nice about it… well, he's a very nice man. Wished me the best of…"

"Marilyn," he said, "I found a clipping in the storeroom. An ad for an electric distiller. Costs three hundred and ninety-five bucks."

"Want to buy it for me?" she said.

"No. I want to know if you bought it."

"Why would I buy something like that?"

"You tell me. Why'd you save the clipping?"

"I thought it might be fun to make my own perfume."

"Or your own poison," Willis said.

She was silent for a moment.

"I see," she said at last. "So what do you want to do? Search the house?"

"Do I have to?" he said.

"If you think I've been making poison here…"

"Have you?"

"Let's search the fucking house."

"Just tell me you didn't buy that distiller."

"I didn't."

He nodded.

"Is that enough for you?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, and kissed her fiercely.

They talked the night away, they loved the night away, as they had that first time here in this house, only now there was the scent of woodsmoke on the air from someone's fireplace up the street, wafting through the open window, and when Marilyn screamed in orgasm, she tried to muffle it because she didn't want cops knocking on the door wanting to know who was being murdered. Nobody was being murdered. Little deaths aside, nobody was getting killed.

But if theories of conspiracy take into account the moment when hands are irrevocably clasped and allegiances permanently sworn, then yes, they were witch-whispered Macbeth and his ambitious lady, confirming to each other in the crucible of dawn that this metal and this metal had been fused into this alloy, and that come what might they were locked into each other as immutably as iron and carbon into steel.

"I love you," he said, "oh, Jesus, how I love you!"

"I love you, too," she said.

She was crying.