Thomas Perry - The Informant

"Love you."

She pocketed her phone and hooked the bow of a pair of sunglasses over her collar because the sinking sun was still bright in the west. Finally she took one last look at the enlarged street map she had printed of Vincent Pugliese's neighborhood. As a final precaution, she took the pair of police handcuffs out of her suitcase and put them in the inner pocket of her jacket. She was sure they wouldn't be of use, but carrying the proper equipment seemed to her the responsible thing to do.

As she passed the mirror, she touched her hair to get it to look fuller, but couldn't avoid looking into her own eyes. She had never planned to search for the Butcher's Boy alone. It was a stupid, risky thing to do. But things had changed radically in the past few hours. He had killed a lot of people during the night, but he hadn't done what was necessary for his purposes, which was to make the sweep total. He had to get Salvatore, the last Castiglione brother. If he wanted to terrorize the old men, he had to end the dynasty and exterminate the family. And he had to get Vincent Pugliese, the man who offered him help and then sent men to kill him in his sleep. But with the city full of Castiglione soldiers and police, she could save him, offer him another way of staying alive. If he saw her with FBI agents, he would never come near her. If she was completely alone, there was a chance.

She stepped out of her room and closed the door, then walked down the hallway. She wasn't used to filling her pockets with things before she went out, particularly things as big and heavy as a pistol. Every item seemed to her to bulge or hang, but she reminded herself that there wasn't another choice this time. She was the only one who would recognize him and the only one he would recognize.

When her elevator stopped, she looked across the lobby and saw Irwin and Manoletti. They were wheeling their suitcases to the front desk. Neither of them had seen her, so she backed into the elevator and pressed the button to go to the top of the building. The doors opened and she saw the entrance to a restaurant with a small podium and a young hostess with hair that was so carefully gathered into a bun that no single loose strand showed, and it looked more like polished wood than hair. Elizabeth pressed the button for the lobby again and descended.

As she waited, she reflected that it was ridiculous to avoid the two men she had asked Morris to assign to her for this trip. She found she didn't care about being gracious. She felt a strong reluctance to talk to anyone right now. She didn't want to explain or make up a lie or answer questions or pretend. For the moment, there were only two people who mattered-her and the Butcher's Boy-and the rest of the people in Chicago were distractions or enemies.

He woke up in Milwaukee in the evening. He had driven out of Chicago after Salvatore Castiglione had escaped. The drive had been only a bit over an hour and took him out of Illinois and into Wisconsin. It had been a small irony to him to be taking the same drive he and Vincent Pugliese had made together the day they had broken the ambush in the cornfield.

In Milwaukee he had checked into the first large hotel he had seen, a Marriott Residence Inn, gone into his room, showered, and slept. It was now after six o'clock, and he had caught up on the portion of last night's sleep that he had lost. He felt alert and energetic and restless.

He had suffered a serious setback last night in not being able to finish the job. All three Castiglione brothers had to go. It wasn't that he had a strong feeling of dislike for Salvatore Castiglione. He had never really known young Sal in the old days. Sal had been no more than fourteen when Schaeffer had arrived to do some more work for the Castiglione family. He had seen him, but they had never spoken. He remembered young Sal in his grandfather's house when he had come in to negotiate a deal on a man named Harrow.

Harrow was a problem for the family, and old Salvatore hated to let problems go on for very long. Harrow had made some odd but unforgivable moves when he had arrived in Chicago. He had gone to a number of restaurants and demanded that they pay him a monthly fee in exchange for a guarantee that the Health Department would pass them on their inspections. He said he was an official for the public employees' union and that he was trying to work with the restaurant owners to improve conditions so the members of his union didn't have to fill out a lot of forms listing hazards and violations. He said it would help the restaurants, the city, and the customers.

Some restaurants paid him, and others didn't. The following month, the ones that hadn't paid were cited for vermin infestation, incorrect water temperature, or dirty kitchens, and closed temporarily by the Health Department. It had apparently not occurred to Harrow that he was not the first person to think of this way of making money. The ancient Romans had done it, and it was familiar to the Castiglione organization, which was already being paid to protect some of these same establishments. There were even some-the Palermo and the Bella Napoli-that were owned by people connected to the Castigliones.

Old Salvatore had not made any telephone calls or filed a complaint with City Hall, as some important men might have done. He simply told one of the young men who hung around his house all day waiting for orders to go call someone who knew how to reach the Butcher's Boy. When the Butcher's Boy arrived, they had a talk, and then Schaeffer went out to study Harrow's movements.

Two days later he reported back to old Salvatore. Harrow was not involved in any way with any union. He had simply put one of the health inspectors on his payroll. But he did have several friends, maybe relatives, who were cops. At the end of the day shift Harrow would sometimes go meet these cops at the Shamrock for a few beers.

"Cops?" said old Salvatore. "What the fuck? He hangs out with cops and they didn't tell him what he was doing to himself?"

"I don't know what they told him, or if they know about his way of getting money. But before I kill him and his inspector, I thought you should know about the cops."

"You're right. Thank you," said Castiglione. "I appreciate your manners and your good judgment. But go ahead and kill the bastards. I'd be happy if you got it done by dinnertime so those cops that drink with him will find out right away."

He went to the Health Department and waited for the inspector, followed him to his first stop, a Chinese restaurant on South LaSalle Street. He waited until the inspector left, walked up the street behind him, and shot him in the back of the head with a silenced pistol. Before the inspector collapsed onto the pavement, Schaeffer was in the middle of a crowd of people walking to the next corner. He turned at the intersection instead of waiting to cross, while some of the others turned around and went back to join the gaggle of people looking down at the fallen man.

He drove directly to Harrow's house. He knew Harrow would have some way of knowing if anyone stood on his front steps, so when he rang the doorbell, he held an envelope full of cash in his left hand, flapping it absentmindedly against his thigh. A man who was used to getting cash in envelopes would know the exact look, feel, sound, and flexibility of money. First-time blackmailers and drug thieves might be fooled by cut paper, but not Harrow.

After a few moments the door opened, and Harrow stood there looking watchful. He was a big man, about forty years old, with a fringe of strawberry blond hair above his pink face. He glowered. "What can I do for you?"

"Compliments of the Bella Napoli restaurant." He held out his left hand with the envelope.

Harrow reached for it as Schaeffer's right hand came up holding the silenced pistol. He fired one shot into Harrow's chest and pushed him backward into the house, where Harrow fell. He stood over him and fired another round through his skull, closed the front door, and walked to his car. As he reached the sidewalk, he had to stop to let three ten-year-old boys flash past on bicycles. They were moving too fast to look at his face or to see him as anything more than a blur.