Ed McBain: Like Love

LIKE LOVE

[An 87th Precinct Mystery]

Ed McBain

Scanned & Proofed By MadMaxAU

* * * *

The woman on the ledge was wearing a nightgown. It was only three-thirty in the afternoon, but she was dressed for sleep, and the brisk spring breezes flattened the sheer nylon fabric against her body so that she looked like a legendary Greek figure sculptured in stone, immobile, on the ledge twelve stories above the city street.

The police and the fire department had gone through the whole bit-they had seen this particular little drama a thousand times in the movies and on television. If there was anything that bored civil service employees, it was a real-life enactment of an entertainment cliché. So the firemen spread their nets in the street below, and got their loudspeakers going, and the policemen roped off the block and sent a couple of detectives up to the window where spring flattened the girl against the brick wall of the building.

She was a pretty girl, a young girl in her early twenties, with long blond hair caught by the April breeze and whipped furiously about her face and head. Andy Parker, one of the sweet-talkers sent over by the 87th Squad was wishing the girl would come in off the ledge so he could get a closer look at the full breasts beneath the sheer nightgown. Steve Carella, the other detective, simply didn’t think anyone should die on such a nice spring day.

The girl didn’t seem to know either of the detectives was there. She had moved away from the window through which she had gained access to the ledge, had gingerly inched her way toward the corner of the building and stood there now with her arms behind her and her fingers spread for a grip on the rust-red wall of the building. The ledge was perhaps a foot wide, running around the twelfth floor, broken at the building’s corner by one of those grotesque gargoyles which adorned many of the city’s older structures. The girl was unaware of the grinning stone head, unaware of the detectives who leaned out of the window some six feet away from her. She stared straight ahead of her, the long blond hair whipping over her shoulders in a bright gold tangle against the red brick of the wall. Occasionally, she looked down to the street below.

There was no emotion on her face. There was no conviction, no determination, no fear. Her face was a beautiful blank washed clean by the wind; her body a voluptuous, thinly sheathed, wind-caressed part of the building.

“Miss?” Carella said.

She did not turn toward him. Her eyes stared straight ahead of her.

“Miss?”

Again, she did not acknowledge his presence. She looked down into the street instead and then, suddenly remembering she was a good-looking woman, suddenly remembering that hundreds of eyes were fixed upon her nearly naked figure, she moved one arm across her breasts, as if to protect herself. She almost lost her balance. She tottered for an instant, and then her hand moved quickly from the front of the gown, touched the rust-red brick again in reassurance. Calla, watching her, suddenly knew she did not plan to die.

“Can you hear me, miss?” Carella said.

“I can hear you,” she answered without turning toward him. “Go away.” Her voice was toneless.

“Well, I’d like to, but I can’t.” He waited for an answer, but none came. “I’m supposed to stay here until you come off that ledge.”

The girl nodded once, briefly. Without turning, she said, “Go home. You’re wasting your time.”

“I couldn’t go home in any case,” Carella said. “I don’t get relieved until five forty-five.” He paused. “What time do you think it is now?”

“I don’t have a watch,” the girl said.

“Well, what time do you think it is?”

“I don’t know what time it is, and I don’t care. Look, I know what you’re trying to do. You’re trying to get me in conversation. I don’t want to talk to you. Go away.”

“Listen, I don’t want to talk to you either,” Carella said. “But the lieutenant said ‘Go over and talk to that nut on the ledge.’ So here I…”

“I’m not a nut!” the girl said vehemently, turning to Carella for the first time.

“Listen, I didn’t say it, the lieutenant did.”

“Yeah, well you go back and tell your lieutenant to go straight to hell.”

“Why don’t you come back with me and tell him yourself?”

The girl did not answer. She turned from him again and looked down into the street.

It seemed she would jump in that moment. Quickly, Carella said, “What’s your name?”

“I don’t have any name.”

“Everybody has a name.”

“My name is Catherine the Great.”

“Come on.”

“It’s Marie Antoinette. It’s Cleopatra. I’m a nut, isn’t that what you said? All right, I’m a nut, and that’s my name.”

“Which one?”

“Any one you like. Or all of them. Go away, will you?”

“I’ll bet your name is Blanche,” Carella said.

“Who told you that?”

“Your landlady.”

“What else did she tell you?”

“That your name is Blanche Mattfield, that you come from Kansas City, and that you’ve been living here for six months. Is that right?”

“Go ask her , that nosy bitch.”

“Well, is your name Blanche?”

“Yes, my name is Blanche. Oh, for God’s sake, do we have to go through this? I can see clear through you, mister. You’re made of glass. Will you please go away and leave me in peace?”

“To do what? To jump down into the street?”

“Yes, that’s right. That’s exactly right. To jump down into the street.”

“Why?”

The girl did not answer.

“Aren’t you a little chilly out there?” Carella asked.

“No.”

“That’s a strong wind.”

“I don’t feel it.”

“Shall I get you a sweater?”

“No.”

“Why don’t you come in off there, Blanche? Come on. You’re gonna catch cold out there.”

The girl laughed suddenly and startlingly. Carella, unaware that he had said anything funny, was surprised by the outburst.

“I’m ready to kill myself,” the girl said, “and you’re worried about my catching cold.”

“I’d say the chances of your catching cold are better than the chances of your killing yourself,” Carella said softly.

“You would, huh?”

“I would,” Carella said.

“Mmm-huh,” the girl said.

“That’s right.”

“Then you’re going to be in for a hell of a surprise.”

“Am I?” Carella asked.

“I can guarantee it.”

“You’re pretty set on killing yourself, huh, Blanche?”

“Really, must I listen to this?” she said. “Won’t you please, please go away?”

“No. I don’t think you want to die. I’m afraid you’ll fall off that ledge and hurt yourself and some of the people down below, too.”

“I want to die,” the girl said softly.

“Why?”

“You really want to know why?”

“Yes. I’d really like to know.”

“Because,” she said slowly and clearly, “I am lonely, and unloved, and unwanted.” She nodded, and then turned her head because her eyes had suddenly flooded with tears, and she did not want Carella to see them.

“A pretty girl like you, huh? Lonely, and unloved, and unwanted. How old are you, Blanche?”

“Twenty-two.”

“And you never want to get to be twenty-three, huh?”

“I never want to get to be twenty-three.” she repeated tonelessly. “I don’t want to get another minute older, not another second older. I want to die. Won’t you please leave me alone to die?”

“Stop it, stop it,” Carella said chidingly. “I don’t like to hear that kind of talk. Dying, dying, you’re twenty-two years old! You’ve got your whole life ahead of you.