Lawrence Block - Hit List

“Regis Buell,” Maggie murmured. “It’s his gallery. No wonder he’s pleased.”

Buell kept his own remarks brief and introduced Declan Niswander. Keller had known what the artist looked like-there was a photo in the brochure, Niswander with his arms folded, glaring-but the man had a presence beyond what the camera revealed. Perhaps the paintings might have suggested it, because there was a passive strength to him that was almost arboreal in nature. Keller thought of the old hymn. Like a tree standing by the water, Niswander would not be moved.

Keller looked at him and took in the wiry black hair graying at the temples, the blunt-featured square-jawed face, the thick body, the square shoulders. Niswander was wearing a suit, and it was a black suit, and his shirt was black, and so was his necktie. And was that a black hanky in his pocket? It was hard to tell from this distance, but Keller was fairly sure it was.

He looked like his paintings, Keller decided, but his appearance was also somehow of a piece with the two pages of artsy twaddle in the brochure. The twaddle and the paintings hadn’t seemed to go together, but Niswander managed to bridge the gap between the two. Like a tree, Keller thought, tying together the earth and the sky.

And wasn’t that an artsy-fartsy way of looking at it? That’s what happened when you put him in a place like this, he thought. Next thing you knew he’d be wearing black.

Mourning, if all went well.

“I don’t know about this,” Dot had said the other day. “I probably shouldn’t even run this by you, Keller. I should stop right now and send you home.”

“I just got here,” he said.

“I know.”

“You called me, said you had something.”

“I do, but I had no business calling you.”

“It’s not the kind of work I do? What is it, addressing envelopes at home? Telemarketing?”

“Now there’s something you’d be great at,” she said. “’Hello, Mrs. Clutterpan? How are you today?’”

“They always say that, don’t they? ‘How are you today?’ Right away you know it’s somebody trying to sell you something you don’t want.”

“I guess they figure it’s an icebreaker,” she said. “They ask you a question and you answer it, they’re halfway home.”

“It doesn’t work with me.”

“Or me either, but would you ever buy anything from some mope who called you on the phone?”

“The last time I got a phone call,” he said, “I hopped on a train to White Plains, and now I’m supposed to turn around and go home.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Can we back up and start over? A job came in, and it’s what you do, and there’s no problem with the fee.”

“And I’ll bet the next sentence starts with but .”

“But it’s here in New York.”

“Oh.”

“It happens, Keller. People in New York are like people everywhere else, and sometimes they want somebody taken out. It’s hard to believe there are New Yorkers with the same callous disregard for the sanctity of human life that you get in Roseburg, Oregon, and Martingale, Wyoming. But there it is, Keller. What can I tell you?”

“I don’t know. What can you tell me?”

“Obviously,” she said, “this has happened before. When a New York job comes in, I don’t call you. I call somebody else and he comes in from somewhere else and does it.”

“But this time you called me.”

“There are two people I’d ordinarily call. One of them does what I do, he makes arrangements, and when I’ve got something I can’t handle I call him and sub it out to him. But I couldn’t call him this time, because he was the one who called me.”

“And who did that leave?”

“A fellow out on the West Coast, who does the same sort of work you do. I wouldn’t say he’s got your flair, Keller, but he’s solid and professional. I’ve used him before in New York, and once or twice when you were busy on another assignment. He’s my backup man, you might say.”

“So you called him.”

“I tried.”

“He wasn’t home?”

“Phone’s been disconnected.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means he’s not going to hear me unless I shout at the top of my lungs. I don’t know what else it means, Keller. Plain and simple, his phone’s been disconnected. Did he change his number for security reasons? Did he move? You’d think he’d give me his new number, but I don’t send him much work and I’m probably not one of the low numbers on his Speed Dial. In fact…”

“What?”

“Well, I’m not even positive he has this number. He must have had it once, but if he lost it he wouldn’t know how to reach me.”

“Either way-“

“Either way he hasn’t called and I can’t call him, and here’s this job, and I thought of you. Except it’s in New York, and you know what they say about crapping where you eat.”

“They don’t recommend it.”

“They don’t,” she said, “and I have to say I agree with the conventional wisdom this time around. The whole idea is you go in where you don’t know anybody and nobody knows you, and when you’re done you go home. You’re out of there before the body is cold.”

“Not always. Sometimes you can’t get a flight out right away.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Sure.”

“I’m a big believer in keeping things separate.”

“Like crapping and eating.”

“Like crapping and eating. New York ’s for you to live in. That leaves the whole rest of the world to work in, and isn’t that enough?”

“Of course three-quarters of the earth’s surface is water,” he said.

“Keller…”

“And how much work do you get up around the North Pole, or down in Antarctica? But you’re right, there’s a lot left.”

“I’ll call the man back and tell him we pass.”

“Hang on a minute.”

“What for?”

“I came all this way,” he said. “I might as well hear about it. Just tell me it’s a connected guy, has a couple of no-neck bodyguards with him night and day, and I can go home.”

“He’s an artist.”

“At what, mayhem? Extortion?”

“At art,” she said. “He paints pictures.”

“No kidding.”

“He’s got a show coming up. In Chelsea.”

“I heard there were galleries opening over there. Way west, by the river. Is that where he lives?”

“Uh-uh. Williamsburg.”

“That’s in Brooklyn.”

“So?”

“Practically another city.”

“What are you doing, Keller? Talking yourself into something?”

He was silent for a moment. Then he said, “The thing is, Dot, it’s been a while.”

“Tell me about it.”

“And the last one, that business in Louisville…”

“Not a walk in the park, as I recall.”

“It actually went pretty smoothly,” he said, “when you look back on it, but it didn’t seem so smooth while it was going on. We got paid and everybody was happy, but even so it left a bad taste.”

“So you’d like to rinse your mouth out?”

“Is there a lot of fine print in the contract, Dot? Does it have to look like a heart attack or an accident?”

She shook her head. “Homicide’s fine, and as noisy as you want it.”

“Oh?”

“So I’m told. I don’t know what it’s supposed to be, unless it’s an object lesson for a player to be named later, but if you can arrange for the guy to get decapitated at high noon in Macy’s window, nobody would be the least bit upset.”

“Except for the artist.”

“Keller,” she said, “you can’t please everybody. What do you think? You want to do this?”

“I could use the money.”

“Well, who couldn’t? The first payment’s on its way, because I said yes first and then looked for someone to do it. I don’t have to tell you how I hate to send money back once I have it in hand.”