Роберт Паркер - Double Play

“How do you feel about this?” Lauren said to Burke.

Burke picked the matches up and put them in his pocket.

“Fine with me,” Burke said.

“You’re prepared to spend every day with me even though I can’t stand your presence?”

“I am,” Burke said.

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Not enough,” Burke said.

“What would bother you enough?”

Burke almost smiled.

“If you paid me more than your father.”

“Oh God,” she said. “Another flunky. My father buys them by the carton.”

She set her cigarette into a big abalone shell ashtray and let it burn.

“Mr. Burke will be here at nine in the morning,” Roach said, “to take you where you want to go.”

Lauren looked Burke up and down slowly.

“At least,” she said, “get rid of that suit.”

She turned and walked from the room.

Wearing his other suit, a dark blue flannel, with a polka dot tie and a white shirt with a Mr. B collar, Burke was outside the Roach apartment on Fifth Avenue at Eighty-first Street when Lauren came out and walked across the sidewalk. The doorman hurried to open the back door. She ignored him and walked around and got in the front seat next to Burke. She had big violet eyes and a wide mouth and honey-colored hair that she wore in a long pageboy. Her clothes cost more than Burke had to his name and she smelled of perfume that Burke knew he couldn’t afford. Burke caught a momentary flash of stocking top as she swung her legs into the passenger side and closed her own door. She punched in the lighter on the dashboard. She took a silver cigarette case from her purse and took out a cigarette. When the lighter popped she lit the cigarette. Cigarettes always smelled best, Burke thought, that first moment, with a car lighter. She put the case away, and crossed her legs and shifted a little in the seat so that she could look at Burke.

“Well,” she said, “you look better, at least.”

“Good.”

“Do you know where the Waldorf Astoria is?” she said.

“Park Avenue,” Burke said. “Fiftieth Street.”

“I’m impressed,” she said. “I’d have said you were more the flophouse type.”

“I am,” Burke said. “I just know where it is.”

At Seventy-sixth Street Burke went east for a block to Park Avenue and turned downtown. He could feel Lauren’s gaze.

“Are you carrying a gun?” she said.

“Yes.”

“What kind.”

“Forty-five automatic,” Burke said.

“It’s making a bulge in your jacket,” she said.

“Big gun,” Burke said.

“Have you ever shot anyone?” she said.

“Yes.”

He glanced at her. The tip of her tongue appeared briefly on her lower lip.

“Tell me about it,” she said.

“No.”

Her tongue touched her lower lip again.

“You could at least be pleasant,” she said.

“You too,” Burke said.

She opened her mouth, and closed it and looked at him some more. Then she laughed.

“Well,” she said. “My goodness.”

Burke didn’t say anything. Lauren shifted further in the front seat so that she was facing Burke with her legs tucked up under her. She let some smoke out through her nose and watched it dissipate.

“Do you know why you’re protecting me?”

“Hundred bucks a week,” Burke said.

“Do you know what you’re protecting me from?”

“Whatever shows up,” Burke said.

“And you think you can do that?”

“Yes.”

“Well,” Lauren said, “if we’re to be together, however gruesome that may be, at least we should know each other. Are you married?”

“No.”

“Were you ever?”

“Yes.”

“Were you in the war?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me about all of that,” Lauren said.

“I was in the Marine Corps,” Burke said. “I got shot. I came home. I got divorced.”

Lauren waited. Burke didn’t say anything else. Lauren laughed.

“You should work for Reader’s Digest ,” she said.

Burke didn’t say anything.

“Okay,” Lauren said. “I’ll talk.”

Traffic downtown was heavy, mostly cabs. Burke didn’t mind the traffic. He wasn’t going anywhere.

“I’m a bad girl,” Lauren said.

She looked at Burke. He had no reaction.

“I’m rich and dreadfully spoiled,” she said. “I spend summers in Bar Harbor and winters in Manhattan. I’m selfish. I’m frivolous. I drink too much and smoke too much and am drawn to the worst kind of men.”

“Like Louis,” Burke said.

“Ah. You do pay attention. Yes. Just like Louis.”

Burke nodded. He cut off a taxi. The taxi blew his horn and held it. Burke paid no attention. Lauren watched him. Again she started to speak, and stopped.

“Louis is like me,” she said. “And his father’s a gangster.”

They stopped at the light at Sixty-first Street. She looked at Burke. Burke was silent, his eyes on the traffic light.

“Frank Boucicault,” she said.

The light turned, Burke let the clutch out and they moved forward.

“I’ve met him,” Lauren said.

Burke nodded.

“He’s very old school, gangsterish. Like the movies,” Lauren said.

“Swell,” Burke said.

“But he has an odd charm about him,” Lauren said. “Power, I suppose.”

“Probably,” Burke said.

“He’s more charming than you are,” she said.

She took out another cigarette and lit it from the dashboard.

“Most people are,” Burke said.

“And Louis is heavenly,” she said.

He could see the tip of her tongue again.

“He’s very handsome, tall, slim, dark. He has all his clothes made. He’s a wonderful dancer...”

Burke was aware that she was watching him closely. She wet her lower lip again.

“And he’s a splendid lover.”

“I’m happy for both of you,” Burke said.

“Does that shock you?”

“That he’s a good lover?” Burke said.

“No. Not that. That a girl would say right out that a man was her lover.”

“It doesn’t shock me,” Burke said.

The traffic had cleared below Sixtieth Street. Burke made an illegal U-turn at Forty-ninth Street and pulled up in front of the Waldorf. The doorman stepped out and opened Lauren’s door.

“Not yet,” she said sharply.

“Excuse me, ma’am,” the doorman said and closed the door.

“Does anything shock you?” Lauren said to Burke.

“Not so far,” Burke said.

“Oh God,” Lauren said.

She opened the car door before the doorman could reach it and got out and walked toward the hotel. Burke got out his side and handed the doorman a five-dollar bill.

“Hold this for us,” Burke said.

The doorman palmed the five as if it had never existed. And Burke went after Lauren into the Waldorf.

They were at a very small table in Café Madagascar. Lauren was drinking martinis. Burke had a glass of beer. Lauren was singing along with the band.

“In a quaint caravan there’s a lady they call the gypsy...”

A heavy man in an expensive tuxedo came to the table and said hello to Lauren. She didn’t introduce Burke.

“Tony Bixley,” Lauren said to Burke when the heavy man left. “He owns the joint.”

“Friend of your father’s?” Burke said.

“He’s a friend of both of us,” Lauren said and finished her martini. A cocktail waitress dressed in harem pants brought her another one. Lauren took the olive out and nibbled on it. The band started a new song. Lauren knew the lyrics.

“A rose must remain with the sun and the rain...”

She looked straight at Burke as she sang. Her voice was light but it seemed to be on key. She would probably flirt with a Christmas tree if that was the best available.