Andrew Vachss - Choice of Evil

She came back with a large rectangular magnifier, the kind that comes with the Oxford English Dictionary inside that little tray at the top of the two volumes. And a clip-on gooseneck halogen light. “How’s this?” she asked, bending forward like a stewardess. In a porno movie.

“Perfect, I think. Let me try it.”

I attached the light, turned it on. Then I placed the magnifier over the photocopy of the icon. Blown up, it turned out to be a meticulously drawn little dinosaur with T. rex jaws and monstrous talons, but much shorter in every department—almost like a miniature.

“I got it,” I told her.

“You mean. . . you mean you know who he is?”

“No. But I know something I can use to find him. Maybe. If he wants to be found.”

“Wants to be—?”

“It’s. . . complicated,” I told her.

“And you can’t tell me?” she asked, perching herself back on the ottoman the same way she had hours ago.

“Not now.”

“But I did what you wanted, right?”

“Yeah, you did,” I admitted. “In spades.”

“So you believe me now?” she questioned, rubbing her eyes like a sleepy child, but showing me she was all grown up at the same time.

“I believe you have a friend on the force,” I told her. “One that’ll do what you want.”

“She did a lot, didn’t she?”

“Sure did. This had to take some time. And it’d mean her job if she got caught.”

“I know. Do you think they’d. . . suspect her?”

“How would I know? I don’t know who’s got access to—”

“I don’t mean suspect her of making the copies. I mean suspect her of being in with. . . him.”

“Not a chance,” I assured her. “The sleaze tabs broke the mold when they published autopsy pictures of that little girl who was raped and murdered in her own home. Remember, the baby beauty queen?”

“In Colorado? Oh God, yes! I couldn’t believe when they. . . and they still haven’t caught the people who. . .”

“Yeah. Anyway, these pictures, they’d be worth a fortune to one of the rags. That’s what they’d think she was up to.”

“Oh,” she said, sounding more relieved than I would have expected.

“Anyway, she sure as hell can’t put these back, right? I mean, they aren’t originals. And there aren’t supposed to be any copies. So I’d better keep them.”

“You?”

“You want them around here?” I asked her. “It’d be insane to burn them—there might be a real clue in here somewhere, even though there’s stuff missing.”

“Really? When I saw how much it was, I thought she got everything. ”

“Is that what you asked her for?”

“No. I just. . . what you said. The ‘polygraph-key’ thing.”

“Well, you can tell her she came through, no question.”

“Me too.”

“You too, what?”

“I came through too, didn’t I?”

“Yes. I already said that. You made. . . you proved your point.”

“So I can. . . help you with this?”

“Yeah.”

“When do we start?”

“We already did,” I told her. “I’ll get back to you, let you know when the next move is.”

“That’s it?”

“What did you expect? You want to put some clothes on and go running after him right now?”

“Oh. I didn’t think you noticed.”

“Noticed?”

“My. . . clothes,” she said, trailing the back of her hand across her breasts.

“Hard to miss,” I said.

“Look good to you?”

“I’m not that old.” I laughed.

“I didn’t mean you were. . . old. You’re older than me, sure. But I can see you’re not too old to. . .”

“No, you can’t see anything,” I told her. And it was the truth. Her eyes were on my crotch, but it was about as active as the Vanilla Ice fan club.

“How come?”

“What?”

“How come I can’t see anything? You can see everything. And I know you like girls.”

“You scare me, Nadine,” I told her, letting her see the truth if she wanted it. “And nothing turns me off more than fear.”

“It doesn’t everybody,” she said in a throaty whisper. “Some people get very excited by fear. Do you know what it’s like to be wearing a mask? A leather mask with only a zipper for your mouth and two little holes to breathe through? To be chained. And waiting. Not knowing what you’re going to get?”

“You know what?” I told her, my voice quiet, but harder than any silly leather games she liked to play. “I do know. Not about your little masks and whips. But I know exactly what it’s like to be chained. And to not know what’s coming next. But knowing it’s going to hurt. Hurt real bad. And not being able to do a thing about it.”

“You mean for real?” she asked, leaning forward, listening now, not on display.

“Oh yes,” I promised.

“When you were in. . . prison?”

“Prison? Prison was a fucking joke by the time I got there. For me, it was like going to college after prep school. No. Not in prison. When I was a kid. A little kid.”

“You mean your parents—”

“I didn’t have parents. I had the State. That was my mother and my father and my jailer. I served time in POW camps before I was old enough to go to school. You like to play around in your little ‘dungeons,’ wear your costumes. . . . You try it sometime without mercy-words, try it when you can’t pick your partners, you stupid little game-playing bitch—see how much fun it is.”

She gasped, swallowed some words. Sat back on the ottoman and looked at me like I was whatever had crashed at Roswell that the government wasn’t talking about.

I took out a cigarette and lit it, hating myself for losing control. I bit deep into the filter, feeling the pain lance through my jaw, ready to grind the butt out on her pretty carpet when I was done.

She didn’t move, a piece of white stone in the rosy light.

I blew a jet of smoke into her face.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“You are fucking sorry,” I told her. Then I stood up. She started to do it at the same time and we bumped. She fell to the carpet. I didn’t look back.

“Can you get word to. . . your friend?” I asked Lorraine over the phone.

“Same place?”

“Yeah. Whenever’s convenient for. . . your friend.”

“I’ll reach out. When I link up, should I. . .?”

“Just leave word. Whenever the meet’s made for at your end is okay—I’ll be here.”

“All right,” she said.

“Crazy, yes?” Mama challenged the minute I sat back down in my booth.

“Yeah, Mama. Crazy. You’re right.”

“So?”

“So I’m going to see it through,” I told her. “And I’m going to get Max to help me,” challenging her now.

“Good,” she said, surprising me. “Balance. Good.”

Sure. I got it. At least Max wasn’t crazy. Thanks.

I went back to my hot-and-sour soup. Mama disappeared. I don’t know how she reaches out for Max. There’s a lot of ways to get messages to deaf people, but Mama was a techno-phobe. She’d use an abacus to work percentages on six-figure scores without missing a beat, but she didn’t trust anything electronic, doling out words on the phone like they were her life savings.

I went out the back door.

Pansy was glad to see me. Always was, no matter what. If she thought I was crazy, she kept it to herself. I dumped the entire quart of beef in oyster sauce I’d taken from Mama’s into her steel bowl, waiting the thirty seconds it took her to make it disappear, then let her out onto the roof to do some dumping of her own.

When she came back down, she stood next to me, both of us looking into the night. I wondered what she saw.