F. Paul Wilson: The Tomb

He checked the peephole in the front door, then twisted the central knob, retracting the four bolts at the top, bottom, and both sides. The heat in the third floor hall slammed against him at the threshold. He was wearing Levis and a lightweight short-sleeved shirt. He was glad he had skipped the undershirt. Already the humidity in the hall was worming its way into his clothes and oozing over his skin as he headed down to the street.

Jack stood on the front steps for a moment. Sunlight glared sullenly through the haze over the roof of the Museum of Natural History far down the street to his right. The wet air hung motionless above the pavement. He could see it, smell it, taste it—and it looked, smelled, and tasted dirty. Dust, soot, and lint laced with carbon monoxide, with perhaps a hint of rancid butter from the garbage can around the corner in the alley.

Ah! The Upper West Side in August.

He ambled down to the sidewalk and walked west, along the row of brownstones that lined his street, to the phone booth on the corner. Not a booth, actually; an open chrome and plastic crate on a pedestal. At least it was still in one piece. At regular intervals someone yanked out its receiver, leaving multicolored strands of wire dangling from the socket like nerves from an amputated limb stump. At other times someone would take the time and effort to jam a small wedge of paper into the coin slot, or the tips of toothpicks into the tiny spaces between the pushbuttons and the facing. He never ceased to be amazed by the strange hobbies of some of his fellow New Yorkers.

He dialed his office number and sounded his beeper into the mouthpiece. A recorded voice—not Jack's—came over the wire with the familiar message:

"This is Repairman Jack. I'm out on a call now, but when you hear the tone, leave your name and number and give me a brief idea of the nature of your problem. I'll get back to you as soon as possible."

There was a tone and then a woman's voice talking about a problem with the timer on her dryer. Another beep and a man was looking for some free information on how to fix a blender. Jack ignored the numbers they gave; he had no intention of calling them back. But how did they get his number? He had restricted his name to the white pages—with an incorrect street address, naturally—to cut down on appliance repair calls, but people managed to find him anyway.

The third and last voice was unique: smooth in tone, the words clipped, rapid, tinged with Britain, but definitely not British. Jack knew a couple of Pakistanis who sounded like that. The man was obviously upset, and stumbled over his words.

"Mr. Jack… my mother—grandmother—was beaten terribly last night. I must speak to you immediately. It is terribly important." He gave his name and a number where he could be reached.

That was one call Jack would return, even though he was going to have to turn the man down. He intended to devote all his time to Gia's problem. And to Gia. This might be his last chance with her.

He punched in the number. The clipped voice answered in the middle of the second ring.

"Mr. Bahkti? This is Repairman Jack. You called my office during the night and—"

Mr. Bahkti was suddenly very guarded. "This is not the same voice on the answering machine."

Sharp, Jack thought. The voice on the machine belonged to Abe Grossman. Jack never used his own voice on the office phone. But most people didn't spot that.

"An old tape," Jack told him.

"Ahhh. Well, then. I must see you immediately, Mr. Jack. It is a matter of the utmost importance. A matter of life and death."

"I don't know, Mr. Bahkti, I—"

"You must ! There can be no refusal!" A new note had crept in: This was not a man used to being refused. The tone was one that never set well with Jack.

"You don't understand. My time is already taken up with other—"

"Mr. Jack! Are the other matters crucial to a woman's life? Can they not be put aside for even a short while? My… grandmother was mercilessly beaten on the streets of your city. She needs help that I cannot give her. So I've come to you."

Jack knew what Mr. Bahkti was up to. He thought he was pushing Jack's buttons. Jack mildly resented it, but he was used to it and decided to hear him out anyway.

Bahkti had already launched into his narrative.

"Her car—an American car, I might add—broke down last night. And when she—"

"Save it for later," Jack told him, happy to be the one doing the cutting off for a change.

"You will meet me at the hospital? She is in St. Clare's—"

"No. Our first meeting will be where I say. I meet all customers on my home turf. No exceptions."

"Very well," Bahkti said with a minimum of grace. "But we must meet very soon. There is so little time."

Jack gave him the address of Julio's Bar two blocks uptown from where he stood. He checked his watch. "It's just shy of ten now. Be there at ten-thirty sharp."

"Half an hour? I don't know if I can be there by then!"

Fine! Jack liked to give customers as little time as possible to prepare for their first meeting.

"Ten-thirty. You've got ten minutes grace. Any later and I'll be gone."

"Ten-thirty," Mr. Bahkti said and hung up.

That annoyed Jack. He had wanted to hang up first.

He walked north on Columbus Avenue, keeping to the shade on the right. It was opening time for some of the shops, but most had been going strong for hours.

Julio's was open. But then, Julio's rarely closed. Jack knew the first customers wandered in minutes after Julio unlocked at six in the morning. Some were just getting off their shift and stopped by for a beer, a hard boiled egg, and a soft seat; others stood at the bar and downed a quick bracer before starting the day's work. And still others spent the better part of every day in the cool darkness.

"Jacko!" Julio cried from behind the bar. He was standing up but only his head and the top half of his chest were visible.

They didn't shake hands. They knew each other too well and saw each other too often for that. They had been friends for many years, ever since the time Julio began to suspect that his sister Rosa was getting punched around by her husband. It had been a delicate matter. Jack had fixed it for him. Since then the little man had screened Jack's customers. For Julio possessed a talent, a nose, a sixth sense of sorts for spotting members of officialdom. Much of Jack's energy was devoted to avoiding such people; his way of life depended on it. And, too, in Jack's line of work he very often found it necessary to make other people angry in the course of serving a customer's interests. Julio also kept an eye out for angry people.

So far, Julio had never failed him.

"Beer or business?"

"Before noon? What do you think?"

The remark earned Jack a brief dirty look from a sweaty old codger nursing a boilermaker.

Julio came out from behind the bar and followed Jack to a rear booth, drying his hands on a towel as he swaggered along. A daily regime with free weights and gymnastics had earned him thickly muscled arms and shoulders. His hair was wavy and heavily oiled, his skin swarthy, his moustache a pencil line along his upper lip.

"How many and when?"

"One. Ten-thirty." Jack slipped into the last booth and sat with a clear view of the door. The rear exit was two steps away. "Name's Bahkti. Sounds like he's from Pakistan or someplace around there."

"A man of color."

"More color than you, no doubt."

"Gotcha. Coffee?"

"Sure."

Jack thought about seeing Gia later today. A nice thought. They'd meet, they'd touch, and Gia would remember what they'd had, and maybe… just maybe… she'd realize that he wasn't such a bad guy after all. He began whistling through his teeth. Julio gave him a strange look as he returned with a coffee pot, a cup, and the morning's Daily News .