Lawrence Block - Hit Man

He could have had several showers. It was fully forty minutes from the time he sat down in front of the television set until he heard Andria ’s key in the lock. As soon as the door was open Nelson came flying across the room, leaping up to greet Keller, tail wagging furiously.

Keller felt wonderful. A wave of contentment passed through him, and he got down on his knees to play with his dog.

“I’m sorry you had to come home to an empty house,” Andria said. “If we’d known you were coming-”

“That’s all right.”

“Well, I’d better be going. You must be exhausted, you’ll want to get to bed.”

“Not for a few hours,” he said, “but I’ll want a shower. There’s something about spending a whole day in airports and on planes-”

“I know what you mean,” she said. “Well, Nelson, what’s today? Tuesday? I guess I won’t be seeing you until Friday.” She petted the dog, then looked across at Keller. “You still want me to give him his regular walk on Friday, don’t you?”

“Definitely.”

“Good, because I’ll be looking forward to it. He’s my favorite client.” She gave the dog another pat. “And thanks for paying me, and for the bonus. It’s great of you. I mean, if I wind up having to get a hotel room, I can afford it.”

“A hotel room?”

She lowered her eyes. “I wasn’t going to mention this,” she said, “but it’d give me a bad conscience not to. I don’t know how you’re going to feel about this, but I’ll just go ahead and blurt it out, okay?”

“Okay.”

“I’ve sort of been staying here,” she said.

“You’ve sort of… ”

“Sort of been living here. See, the place I was staying, it didn’t work out, and there’s one or two people I could call, but I thought, well, Nelson and I get along so good, and I could really spend lots of time with him if I just, like-”

“Stayed here.”

“Right,” she said. “So that’s what I did. I didn’t sleep in your bed, Mr. Keller-”

“Why not?”

“Well, I figured you might not like that. And the couch is comfortable, it really is.”

She’d tried to keep her impact on his apartment minimal, she told him, stripping her bedding from the couch each morning and stowing it in the closet. And it wasn’t as though she were hanging out there all the time, because when she wasn’t walking Nelson she had other clients to attend to.

“Dogs to walk,” he said. “Plants to water.”

“And cats and fish to feed, and birds. There’s this couple on Sixty-fifth Street with seventeen birds, and there’s something about birds in cages. I get this urge to open the cages and open the windows and let them all fly away. But I wouldn’t, partly because it would make the people really crazy, and partly because it would be terrible for the birds. I don’t think they’d last long out there.”

“Not in this town,” Keller said.

“Just the other day one of them got out of his cage,” she said, “and I just about lost it. The windows were closed so he wasn’t going anywhere, but he was swooping and diving and I couldn’t think how to get him back in his cage.”

“What did you do?”

“What I did,” she said, “is I centered all my energy in my heart chakra, and I sent this great burst of calming heart energy to the bird, and he calmed right down. Then I just held the cage door open and he flew back in.”

“No kidding?”

She nodded. “I should have thought of it right away,” she said, “but when you panic you tend to overlook the obvious.”

“That’s the truth,” he said. “Let me ask you something. Do you have a place to stay tonight?”

“Well, not yet.”

“Not yet?”

“Well, I didn’t know you were coming home tonight. But I know some people I can call, and-”

“You’re welcome to stay here,” he said.

“Oh, I couldn’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“Well, you’re home. It wasn’t really right for me to stay here when you were out of town-”

“It was fine. It meant more company for the dog.”

“Anyway, you’re home now. The last thing you need is a houseguest.”

“One night won’t hurt.”

“Well,” she said, “it is a little late to start looking for a place to stay.”

“You’ll stay here.”

“But just for the one night.”

“Right.”

“I appreciate this,” she said. “I really do.”

Keller, freshly showered, stood at the sink and contemplated shaving. But whoever heard of shaving before you went to bed? You shaved in the morning, not at night.

Unless, of course, you expected to have your cheek pressed against something other than your pillow.

Cut it out, he told himself.

He got into bed and turned out the light, and Nelson sprang onto the bed beside him, turned around the compulsory three times, and lay down.

Keller slept. When he awoke the next morning, Andria was gone. The only trace of her presence was a note assuring him that she’d come walk the dog at her usual time on Friday. Keller shaved, walked the dog, and rode the train to White Plains.

It was another hot day, and this time Dot was on the porch with a pitcher of lemonade. She said, “Keller, you missed your calling. You’re a great diagnostician. You gave the man a little time and he died of natural causes.”

“These things happen.”

“They do,” she agreed. “I understand he fell in his food. Probably never get the stains out of his tie.”

“It was a nice tie,” Keller said.

“They said it was cardiac arrest,” Dot said, “and I’ll bet they’re right, because it’s a hell of a rare case when a man dies and his heart goes on beating. How’d you do it, Keller?”

“I centered all my energy in my heart chakra,” he said, “and I sent this bolt of heart energy at him, and it was just more than his heart could handle.”

She gave him a look. “If I had to guess,” she said, “I’d have to say potassium cyanide.”

“Good guess.”

“How?”

“Switched salt shakers with him. The one I gave him had cyanide crystals mixed in with the top layer of salt. He used a lot of salt.”

“They say it’s bad for you. Wouldn’t he taste the cyanide?”

“The amount of salt he used, I don’t think he could taste the meat. I’m not sure how much taste cyanide has. Anyway, by the time it occurs to you that you don’t like the way it tastes-”

“You’re facedown in the lasagna. Cyanide’s not traceless, is it? Won’t it show up in an autopsy?”

“Only if you look for it.”

“And if they look in the salt cellar?”

“When Dinsmore had his attack,” he said, “a few people hurried over to see if they could help.”

“Decent of them. You don’t suppose one of them picked up the salt cellar?”

“It wouldn’t surprise me.”

“And got rid of it somewhere between the restaurant and the airport?”

“That wouldn’t surprise me either.”

He went upstairs to make his report. When he came downstairs again Dot said, “Keller, I’m going to start worrying about you. I think you’re going soft.”

“Oh?”

“There was only one reason to pick up the salt cellar.”

“So they wouldn’t find the cyanide,” he said.

She shook her head. “If they ever start looking for cyanide, they’ll find it on the uneaten food. No, you figured they wouldn’t find it, and somebody else would use that salt and get poisoned accidentally.”

“No point in drawing heat for no reason,” he said.

“Uh-huh.”

“No sense in killing people for free, either.”

“Oh, I couldn’t agree with you more, Keller,” she said, “but I still say you’re going soft. Centering in your heart choker and all.”