"Why, Joe? You are were a good P.I."
Kurtz frowned and stood to go.
"You're not driving are you?" asked Arlene.
"Can't. The cops have my Pintoeither impounded or wrapped up in crime-scene tape in the garage."
"Probably improves its looks," said Arlene. She stubbed out her cigarette. "Want a ride?"
"Not yet I'll grab a cab. I have some people to talk to."
"Pruno's on his October sabbatical, remember?"
"I remember," said Kurtz. One of his best street informants, the old wino, disappeared every October for three weeks. No one knew where he went.
"You should talk to that Ferrara woman," said Arlene. "Anything dirty goes on in this town, she usually knows about it. She's usually part of it."
"Yeah," said Kurtz. "Which reminds me, some mobster in Armani is going to drop by here with a folder full of paperwork. Don't shoot him with that cannon you keep under your desk."
"A mob guy in Armani?"
"Colin."
"A mob guy named Colin," said Arlene. "That head injury made you delusional, Joe."
"Pick me up at nine-thirty at the Harbor Inn," said Kurtz. "We'll go to the Civic Center together."
"Nine-thirty. You going to last that long?"
Kurtz touched his hat brim in farewell and went out and down the long stairway. There were thirty-nine steps and every one of them hurt.
CHAPTER SIX
The guy's address was in the old suburb called Lackawanna and the guy's place was a shitholea tall, narrow house with gray siding in a long row of tall, narrow houses with gray siding. The guy had a driveway but no garage. Nobody had a garage. The guy had a front stoop four steps up rather than a porch. The whole neighborhood was dreary and gray, even on this sunny day, as if the coal dust from the old mills had painted everything with a coating of dullness.
The Dodger parked his AstroVan, beeped it locked, and strolled jauntily to the front door. His fatigue jacket hid his erection, but the jacket was open so that he could get to the pocket of his pants.
A little girl answered on his third knock. She looked to be five or six or seven Dodger had no idea. He didn't really pay attention to kids.
"Hi," he said happily. "Is Terrence Williams home?"
"Daddy's upstairs in the shower," said the little one. She didn't comment on the Dodger's unusual face, but turned on her heel and walked away from him, back into the house, obviously expecting him to follow.
The Dodger came in, smiling, and closed the door behind him.
A woman came out of the kitchen at the end of the hallway. She was wiping her hands on a dishtowel and her face was slightly flushed, as if she'd been cooking over a hot stove. Unlike the little girl, she did react to the sight of his face, although she tried to hide it.
"Can I help you?" she asked She was a big woman, broad in the hips. Not the Dodger's type. He liked spinnersthe kind of little woman you could sit down, place on your cock, and spin like a top.
"Yes, ma'am," said the Dodger. He was always polite. He'd been taught to be polite as a boy. "I've got a package for Terrence."
The big woman's frown grew deeper. She didn't really have friendly eyes, the Dodger decided. He liked women with friendly eyes. The little girl was running from the dining room through the little living room, past them both in the hallway, and then back around again. The house was tiny. The Dodger decided that the place smelled of mildew and cabbage and that the big woman with the unfriendly eyes probably did, too. But there was a good smell in the air as well, as if she'd been baking.
"Did Bolo send you?" she asked suspiciously.
"Yes, ma'am," said the Dodger. The kid ran past them both again, flapping her arms and making airplane noises. "Bolo sent me."
"Where's the package?"
The Dodger patted the lower right pocket on his fatigue jacket, feeling the steel in the cargo pocket of his pants.
"You'll have to wait," said the woman. She nodded toward the crappy little living room with its sprung couch and uncomfortable La-Z-Boy
recliner. "You can sit in there." She frowned at the Dodger's baseball cap as if he should take it off in the house. The Dodger never took off his Dodger cap.
"No problem," he said, smiling and bobbing his head slightly.
He walked into the little living room, removed the Beretta with the supressor, shot the kid when she came buzzing in from the dining room again, shot the wide-hipped woman on the stairway, stepped over her body, and went up to the sound of the water.
The fat man pulled the shower curtain aside and stared at the Dodger as he came in with the gun. The fat man's white, hairy skin and bulges were really repulsive to the Dodger. He hated looking at naked men.
"Hi, Terry," the Dodger said and raised the pistol.
The fat man jerked the shower curtain closed as if that would protect him. The Dodger laughedthat was really funnyand fired five times through the curtain. It had blue, red, and yellow fish on it, and they were swimming in clusters. The Dodger didn't think that blue, red, and yellow fish swam together like that.