Laura Lippman - Baltimore Noir

Tania put a hand on his arm. “I’m okay, Yoshi,” she said.

“It’s nothing, a scratch. I’m fine.”

“It was the traffic,” he said with furious frustration. “I was stuck on the Beltway, and then this boulevard-I didn’t know what to do. I finally left the car at a hydrant and ran the last eight blocks, and then the guy at the desk wouldn’t give me a key.” His eyes were still frantic. “I was going to call you, call the police, but-”

“It would have ruined everything,” she said. “You did right.”

She went up on her toes and kissed him on the cheek, which at last seemed to calm him a little. “Check the bags,” she said. “I’ll see what he has to say.”

Yoshi took a deep breath, another, and nodded.

She went back into the bathroom, where Gary had propped himself against a wall. His face was flushed a deep red, but his eyes were like blue glass beads.

“You set me up,” he said. “Both of you.”

Tania made a scornful gesture with her hand. “It was easy.”

“You’re robbing me,” he said.

“Among other things.”

She sat beside him, reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet. Glanced at the address on his driver’s license and sighed.

She could tell that he was looking at her. Tania thought that, despite all his praise for her beauty, he probably hadn’t paid much attention to her face till now. It was her body, and how much of it she would expose to the camera, that had mattered.

He said, “How old are you?”

She raised her gaze to his. “Twenty, Gary. I’m twenty. Much, much too old for TeenHeaven.”

She heard someone enter the room behind her and got back to her feet. “Gary Sims,” she said, “this is my uncle, Joshua Blumen.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Yoshi said, and planted his boot in Gary’s face.

“Shut up,” Tania said.

She was wearing her own clothes, the clothes Gary had assumed were a costume or a sign of rebellion. Herself again, though not quite. Each time she emerged she was changed.

Gary lay there at her feet, hands on his face, exploring the jagged edges of his broken teeth with his tongue, blood from his cut lips streaking his fingers. He hadn’t said anything.

“I’m sick of hearing your voice,” she went on. “I feel like I’ve spent half my life listening to you babble. It’s my turn to talk now. My turn.”

The rabbi always said that any class that had Tania in it automatically ran a half hour late. People who wanted to see Jews as stereotypes saw her as one of the pushy, noisy types, only concerned about herself. But they were wrong too.

“First of all,” she said, “if you say one more word about Jewish girls-if you ever even use the word ‘Jewess’ again-Yoshi will find you and kill you.”

“Can I?” Yoshi asked. Then he scowled. Jewess?

He’d gotten most of his good mood back after breaking Gary’s teeth. But not all of it. Gary cowered away from his dark gaze.

“You don’t know a thing about Jewish girls, if you believe every one of us is hidden away, protected, pure, and innoent-” She brought her face close to his, jabbed him in the chest with a forefinger. “Helpless under your hands.” She made a fist, hit him harder. “Some of us know more than you think. Some of us go to temple and wear jeans and read the Bible and have computers too. We live here-” Another blow. “In Park Heights, yes, but also in this city. In the shtetl and in Baltimore at the same time. Understand?”

He moaned.

“And for those who choose a different way, it’s their choice,” she said. “So next time, you keep your fantasies of peeking under the dress of an Orthodox Jewish girl to yourself, okay?”

Gary’s head lolled. Yoshi said in a mild voice, “I think you made your point, T. And you want him to stay awake for a while, don’t you?”

She sat back, breathing hard. “ God, ” she said. “No, I don’t.”

Then she sighed, reached into the pocket of her jeans, pulled out and unfolded the sheet of paper she’d printed out the night before. Yoshi squatted beside her as she showed it to Gary.

Gary moved his lips. “Jane?” he said.

“Yes, Joyful Jane,” Tania replied. “The one who never smiles. Is she still your model?”

Gary nodded.

“You still see her-work with her?”

Another nod.

“You swear?” She poked him. “You can talk now.”

“Yes,” he said. “She’s my model.”

Tania felt herself open up. Blooming Tania. “Where does she live?”

He licked the drying blood from his lips. “I told you. Milwaukee.”

“Where in Milwaukee?”

“I don’t know.”

She slapped his face. Fresh blood flew. “Tell us where Jane lives,” she said.

“I told you.” His voice was thick. “Milwaukee. I’ve never-never seen where she lives. We meet-in a motel.”

Tania raised her arm again. “But you do have her address somewhere, don’t you?”

He spat bloody saliva onto the floor beside him, then slumped back against the wall. His eyes were dull. “It hurts,” he said.

“Concentrate, Gary,” she warned him.

He let out a breath that bubbled at the end. “At home,” he said vaguely. “My desk.”

“He lives in New York City,” Tania told Yoshi. “Queens.”

“I know.” Yoshi gave a resigned grunt. “Could have been Kansas City, I guess.”

Gary lifted his head. His eyes focused a little. “Jane,” he said. “Why?”

“She is my cousin,” Tania said.

“My niece,” added Yoshi. “My brother’s youngest daughter. Zhenya.”

Gary’s gaze went from the picture to Tania’s face.

“You saw it too,” Tania reminded him. “Remember? Zhenya and I, we come from the same tribe.”

She splashed water on his face. Pink rivulets got caught in his patchy beard.

“Now you better talk,” she said in a low voice.

They could hear Yoshi on the phone. “Yes, this is Mr. Sims in 213,” he was saying. “There’s no ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign here to hang on the doorknob. I want to make sure no one bothers me till I check out tomorrow morning… You sure?… Great. Thanks.”

“He learns what you tried to do to me, I tell him the details, he really will kill you,” Tania said.

Gary’s tongue ran around the inside of his mouth. “What?”

“Those pictures you took of me-the ones in here.” She clasped her hands to keep from hitting him again. “Do you take ones like that of Zhenya?”

He nodded.

“And the other girls?”

“Most.”

“Do they ask you to stop?”

He just looked at her, as if the question made no sense.

She touched him with a forefinger. “Do they want you to stop?”

Fresh sweat broke out on his face. “Sometimes,” he said. The unspoken words in his mind: As if that mattered.

She sighed, weary of his presence. “Just one more question. Those pictures? The ones of-of naked bodies. What do you do with them?”

“I sell them,” Gary said. Even now, he couldn’t quite keep the pride out of his voice. “Special clients buy them.”

Tania had heard enough. “Not anymore they won’t,” she said.

Panic made him more alert. “You can’t leave me here!”

Yoshi grinned, twisting Gary’s arms behind him and expertly binding his wrists. “Just for one day,” he said. “Just long enough for us to find what we need without you getting in our way. Tomorrow the cleaning lady will come in to make the bed, and she’ll find you. You won’t die before then.”

But Gary was barely listening. “I’ll shout-I’ll tell the cops.”

“Really?” Yoshi leaned in close. “I don’t think so. You seem like a smart guy. I think what you’ll do is disappear, turn up in another city, find a new line of work.” He yanked on the rope and Gary whimpered. “If you tell a soul about us and what happened here today, we’ll deliver everything we find in your apartment-and in your cameras-to the police.”