Роберт Паркер - Double Play

Lauren didn’t answer.

“Please,” Louis said again. “Don’t. Please.”

It was almost as if he were chanting.

“Kill him? Yes or no,” Burke said.

Lauren still didn’t speak. Burke suddenly took the gun away from Louis and put it in the pocket of his coat.

“Oh God,” Louis said. “Oh God, thank you. Thank you.”

Burke hit him with a left hook and knocked him back against the car. Then he hit him with a right hook. And left, and right. The punches were heavy and professional and they came fast. Louis covered his head with his arms and started to cry. Lauren crouched by the car making her little squealy noises again.

Then it was over. Louis had slid down the side of the car to the sidewalk and his head flopped limply against Burke’s car. Burke looked at him for a moment and then walked around and looked in the window of the Cadillac on the driver’s side. The keys were in the ignition. Burke got in and started the Caddy up and pulled it forward a couple of car lengths. Then he got out, and reached down and took Lauren’s arm, got her on her feet, pushed Louis out of the way, and put Lauren in his car and drove her away.

They lay naked in bed together in Burke’s apartment, smoking, and listening to Martin Block. He lay on his back. Lauren lay on her side looking at the scars across his chest and stomach.

“Are those all bullets?” she said.

“Some is surgery,” Burke said.

“Did it hurt?”

Burke was silent for a time thinking about her question. Lauren rested her left cheek against his right shoulder and looked at him from very close up.

“Would you rather not talk about it?” she said.

“Hurt’s not the right word,” Burke said.

“What is?”

“When you first get it, you feel like you’ve been hit but there’s no big pain right away. And if you’re lucky the medics get there and fill you full of morphine and it kind of smoothes you out for a while, and then it’s like going into a bad tunnel and nothing makes much sense.”

“Were you in the hospital for a long time?”

“Yes.”

“Was that awful?”

“Yes.”

“Do you want to talk about that?”

“The funny thing,” Burke said, “is I don’t mind talking about getting shot. But I mind talking about the hospital.”

Lauren was quiet. The blue cigarette smoke drifted toward the ceiling.

“You killed two men last night,” Lauren said after a while.

“Yes.”

“You were protecting me.”

“Yes.”

“So why didn’t you shoot Louis?”

“You didn’t want me to.”

“I mean before. Why did you shoot those other men first.”

“They were dangerous.”

“And Louis wasn’t?”

“Not like that,” Burke said.

“How does it feel?”

“Doesn’t feel like anything,” Burke said.

“Did you like beating up Louis?”

“Seemed like a good idea at the time.”

“Was it like you think shooting your wife’s boyfriend would be?”

“Ex-wife,” Burke said.

“Of course,” Lauren said. “Was that what it felt like?”

Burke didn’t answer.

“Was it?” Lauren said.

Again Burke paused.

Then he said, “No. It wasn’t like that.”

On the radio, Buddy Clark was singing “Linda.” They listened to it. Lauren finished her cigarette and snubbed it carelessly in the ashtray by the bedside, so that it wasn’t completely out, and a small acrid twist of smoke rose from it still. Burke leaned across her and put his cigarette out in the ashtray, and then put Lauren’s out completely.

“What do you think Louis will do?” Lauren said.

“Hard to say.”

“Do you think he’ll try to get even?”

“Maybe,” Burke said. “Maybe not. Maybe it’s the first time anyone ever rubbed his nose in it.”

“Which means?”

“Maybe he’s learned something.”

Lauren moistened her lower lip with the tip of her tongue.

“I think he’ll try to get even.”

Burke shrugged.

“That’s up to him,” Burke said.

“Do you care?” Lauren said.

Burke almost smiled.

“No more than usual,” he said.

“It frightens me,” Lauren said.

“Un huh.”

“And maybe... I don’t know... titillates me?”

“Un huh.”

“But you’ll be protecting me.”

“Un huh.”

“You won’t let him hurt me.”

“No.”

“Or you.”

“No.”

“I care about you.”

Burke didn’t say anything. He fumbled another Camel from the pack on the bedside table and lit it and lay on his back smoking.

“I do care about you, you know,” Lauren said.

“Sure,” Burke said.

“I care about myself a little,” Lauren said. “As long as you’re with me, Louis can’t get me. Can’t get me in any way.”

“Any way?”

“I don’t need him,” Lauren said, “when I’m with you.”

On the radio Martin Block was signing off. Burke inhaled deeply and let the smoke out slowly, watching it rise.

Burke didn’t know how much of what he remembered was based on things he’d heard spoken or hinted at, and how much was sheer fantasy which had ripened beneath the ceaseless scrutiny of his imagination. Whatever it was it was detailed and exact.

This boy was Airborne, 101st, Screaming Eagles, wounded at Bastogne. He wore his jump wings, his CIB, his campaign ribbons. His wound had healed, except that he still used a cane to walk.

“Can you dance, Mr. Paratroop?” she said.

Bare-legged, blue dress, tiny white polka dots, red high-heeled shoes.

“Sure can,” the boy had said and leaned the cane against a chair. “Cane’s mostly just for meeting girls.”

The band played “Sentimental Journey,” she sang softly to him, “...gonna set my heart at ease...”

“Are you in any pain?” she said softly.

“No. Just a little stiff now, another couple months I’ll be fine.”

He was a slim kid, with smooth black hair combed back, and nice even features.

“Where’d you get wounded?” she said, moving her hips against his.

“Bastogne. Last winter.”

“Nuts?” she said.

The boy laughed.

“General McAuliff? They tell me he said that. I didn’t hear him.”

“Was it a bad wound, Mr. Paratroop?”

“Depends,” he said, “what you mean by bad. It hurt like hell. But it got me out of there.”

“Oh God,” she said. “I’d have been so scared.”

“I was,” he said.

“But you did it.”

“I guess I had to,” he said.

“That’s so brave.”

“No braver than anyone else,” he said.

The music changed. “Kiss me once, and kiss me twice, then kiss me once again...”

“You going home to anyone, Mr. Paratroop?”

“Not really,” he said. “My parents, I guess.”

“No sweetheart?”

“No.”

“Well, maybe, for now, anyway, that will be me,” she said.

When the club closed they walked back to her apartment.

“Do you like scotch?” she said.

“I like pretty much everything,” he said.

She put out Vat 69 and ice and put the soda siphon beside it on the coffee table. He made her a drink and one for himself. She sat on the couch beside him.

“What did you do before the war?” she said.

“I was in college.”

“Did you finish?”

“No. I’ll probably go back when I get out.”

She had her legs crossed. Her bare legs were white and smooth. She pressed her thigh against his.