Эд Макбейн - Let’s Hear It For The Deaf Man

“The truth is I’ve never in my life been out with a girl as beautiful as you are, that’s the truth. And I can’t get over it. So I keep staring at you. That’s the truth.”

“Well, you’ll have to get over it.”

“Why?”

“Because I think you’re beautiful, too,” Augusta said, “and we’d have one hell of a relationship if all we did was sit around and stare at each other all the time.”

She stopped dead in the middle of the sidewalk. Kling searched her face, hoping she would recognize that this was not the same as staring.

“I mean,” she said, “I expect we’ll be seeing a lot of each other, and I’d like to think I’m permitted to sweat every now and then. I do sweat, you know.”

“Yes, I suppose you do,” he said, and smiled.

“Okay?” she said.

“Okay.”

“Let’s eat,” she said. “I’m famished.”

It was Detective-Lieutenant Peter Byrnes himself who identified the photostat of the silent silver-screen star. This was only reasonable, since he was the oldest man on the squad.

“This is Vilma Banky,” he said.

“Are you sure?” Meyer asked.

“Positive. I saw her in The Awakening, and I also saw her in Two Lovers with Ronald Colman.” Byrnes cleared his throat. “I was, naturally, a very small child at the time.”

“Naturally,” Meyer said.

“Banky,” Hawes said. “He can’t be that goddamn corny, can he?”

“What do you mean?” Byrnes said.

“He isn’t telling us it’s a bank, is he?”

“I’ll bet he is,” Meyer said. “Of course he is.”

“I’ll be damned,” Byrnes said. “Put it up there on the bulletin board with the rest of them, Meyer. Let’s see what else we’ve got here.” He watched as Meyer tacked the picture to the end of the row. Two of Hoover, two of Washington, two of a Japanese Zero, and now Miss Banky. “All right, let’s dope it out,” Byrnes said.

“It’s her last name,” Hawes said. “Maybe we’re supposed to put together all the last names.”

“Yeah,” Meyer said. “And come up with the name of the bank.”

“Right, right.”

“Hoover Washington Zero Bank,” Byrnes said. “That’s some bank.”

“Or maybe the first names,” Hawes suggested.

“John George Japanese Bank,” Byrnes said. “Even better.”

The men looked at the photostats and then looked at each other.

“Listen, let’s not...”

“Right, right.”

“He’s not that smart. If he doped it out, we can dope it out.”

“Right.”

“So it isn’t the last names, and it isn’t the first names.”

“So what is it?” Byrnes said.

“I don’t know,” Hawes said.

“Anyway, Cotton, he is that smart,” Meyer said.

“That’s right, he is,” Byrnes said.

The men looked at the photostats again.

“J. Edgar Hoover,” Hawes said.

“Right.”

“Director of the FBI.”

“Right.”

“George Washington.”

“Right, right.”

“Father of the country.”

“Which gives us nothing,” Byrnes said.

“Zero,” Meyer said.

“Exactly,” Byrnes said.

“Let’s start from the beginning,” Hawes said. “The first picture we got was Hoover’s, right?”

“Mmm.”

“And then Washington and the Zero,” Meyer said.

“All right, let’s associate,” Hawes said.

“What?”

“Let’s free-associate. What do you think of when I say Washington?”

“General.”

“President.”

“Martha.”

“Mount Vernon.”

“D.C.”

“State of.”

“Let’s take it back. General.”

“Revolution.”

“Valley Forge.”

“Delaware.”

“Cherry tree,” Meyer said.

“Cherry tree?”

“He chopped down a cherry tree, didn’t he?”

“How about president? What can we get from that?”

“Chief Executive.”

“Commander in Chief.”

“We’re getting no place,” Byrnes said.

“How about Hoover?”

“FBI.”

“Federal Bureau of...”

“Federal!” Hawes said, and snapped his fingers. “A federal bank!”

“Yes,” Byrnes said, and nodded, and the men fell silent.

“A federal bank in Washington?”

“Then why bother us with it?”

“What about the Zero?”

“Never mind the Zero, let’s get back to Washington.”

“No, wait a minute, maybe the Zero’s important.”

“How?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let’s try it. Zero.”

“Nothing.”

“Goose egg.”

“Zip.”

“Zed.”

“Zed?”

“Isn’t that what they say in England?”

“For zero? I don’t think so.”

“Zero, zero...”

“Zero, one, two, three, four...”

“Love,” Meyer said.

“Love?”

“That’s zero in a tennis match.”

“Let’s get back to Washington.”

“It has to be a federal bank in Washington,” Byrnes said.

“Then why send us a picture of Washington himself? If he’s trying to identify a place ...”

“A bank is a place, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but wouldn’t it have been easier to send a picture of the White House or the Capitol dome or...”

“Who says he’s trying to make it easy?”

“All right, let’s see what we’ve got so far, all right? Federal Washington Zero Bank.”

“Come on, Cotton, that doesn’t make any sense at all.”

“I know it doesn’t, but that’s the order they arrived in, so maybe...”

“Who says there has to be any special order?”

“Bank came last, didn’t it?”

“Yes, but...”

“So that’s where I’ve put it. Last.”

“And Hoover came first,” Meyer said. “So what?”

“So that’s where I’ve put him.”

“Federal Washington Zero Bank. It still doesn’t make sense.”

“Suppose the Zero means nothing at all? Literally zero. Suppose it’s just there to be canceled out?”

“Try it.”

“Federal Washington Bank.”

“That’s just what I said,” Byrnes said. “A federal bank in Washington.”

“If the bank’s in Washington, why’s he telling us about it?”

“Washington,” Hawes said.

“Here we go again,” Meyer said.

“Washington.”

“President?”

“Federal President Bank?”

“No, no.”

“General?”

“Federal General Bank?”

“Federal Martha Bank?”

“What the hell was he besides a general and the first president of the United...”

“ First Federal Bank,” Meyer said.

“What?”

“First president, First goddamn Federal Bank !”

“That’s it,” Byrnes said.

“That’s got to be it.”

“First Federal Bank,” Meyer said, grinning.

“Get the phone book,” Byrnes said.

They were all quite naturally proud of the deductive reasoning that had led them to their solution. They now felt they knew the name of the bank as well as the exact date of the planned holdup. Gleefully, they began going through the Yellow Pages, confident that the rest would be simple.

There were twenty-one First Federal Banks in Isola alone, and none of them were located in the 87th Precinct.

There were seventeen First Federals in Calm’s Point.

There were nine in Riverhead, twelve in Majesta, and two in Bethtown, for a grand total of sixty-one banks.

It is sometimes not so good to work in a very big city.

Sunday.

Take a look at this city.

How can you possibly hate her?