"He would have killed me." The old man's breath smelled of ether.
"Yeah," said Kurtz and had to stifle the immediate urge to throw the old man down onto the concrete terrace fifteen feet below. First the files.
"What will I do now?" Dr. Conway was sobbing, hiccuping. "Where will I go?"
"You can go to" began Kurtz and saw the old man's rheumy eyes focus wildly, hopefully, on something low behind Kurtz.
He grabbed the dentist by his shirtfront and swung him around just as Timmy, who had left a bloody trail across the parquet floor, fired the last two bullets from the pistol he'd retrieved.
Conway's body was too thin and hollow to stop a.32 slug, but the first bullet missed and the second hit Conway in the center of his forehead. Kurtz ducked, but the spray of blood and brain matter was all from the entry wound; the bullet had not exited.
Kurtz dropped the dentist's body on the icy balcony and walked over to Timmy, who was clicking away on empty chambers. Not wanting to touch the weapon even with his gloves on, he stepped on the man's hand until he dropped it and then rolled Timmy over with his boot. Two of the original.32 slugs had hit the big man in the chest, but one had caught him in the throat and another had entered below the left cheekbone. Timmy would bleed out in another minute or two unless he received immediate medical assistance.
Kurtz walked into what had to be Dr. Conway's study, ignored the row of locked filing cabinets, found the big wall safe behind a painting of a naked man, and tried the combination. He thought that Conway had rat tied it off too quickly, under too much stress, to be lying. and he was right. The safe opened on the first try.
Lying in the safe were metal boxes holding $63,000 in cash, stacks of bonds, gold coins, a sheaf of stock certificates, and a thick file folder filled with dental X-rays, insurance forms, and newspaper clippings. Kurtz ignored the money and took the folder out into the light slamming the safe door and scrambling the lock as he did so.
Timmy was no longer twitching and the viscous flow of blood ran out onto the cement balcony where it had pooled around Dr. Conway's ruined skull and was coagulating in the process of freezing. Kurtz set the folder on the round table next to the empty wheelchair and flipped through it. He didn't think that this was a neighborhood where people would dial 911 at the first sound of what could be a gunshot.
Twenty-three news clippings. Fifteen photocopies of letters to various urban police headquarters, dental X-rays attached. Fifteen different identities.
"Come on, come on," whispered Kurtz. If Hansen's current Buffalo identity wasn't here, this whole mess had been for nothing. But why would it be here? Why would Conway know Hansen's current alias before it was necessary to identify him to the next round of homicide detectives?
Because Hansen has to have the cover story ready in case the old dentist dies. Timmy would do the honors then. But there has to be a dentist of record.
The next-to-last paper in the folder had the record of an office visit the previous Novembera cleaning and partial crown. No X-rays. There was no bill, but a handwritten note in the margin read "$50,000." No wonder Dr. Howard K. Conroy accepted no new patients. Beneath it was an address in the Buffalo suburb of Tonawanda, and a name.
"Holy shit," whispered Kurtz.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
which they guessed he would bethe attempted resisting arrest, the subduing, and the arrest.
Brubaker and Myers were ready. Besides wearing body armor, each man was carrying a telescoping, weighted baton in addition to his 9mm dock, and Myers had a 10,000-volt Taser stun gun in his pocket.
"Where the fuck is he?" repeated Myers. Kurtz's Volvo was nowhere in sight.
"Maybe he left early for that shithole office of his," said Brubaker.
"Maybe he never came back from Orchard Park last night."
"Maybe he was kidnapped by fucking UFOs," snarled Brubaker. "Maybe we should quit speculating and go find him and get this over with."
"Maybe we should just skip it." Myers was not eager to do this thing. But then, Myers was not being paid $5,000 by Little Skag Farino to bust Kurtz and get him back into prison so he could be shanked. Brubaker had considered telling his partner about the payment and sharing the money. Considered it for about two milliseconds.
"Maybe you should shut up," said Brubaker, shifting the van into gear and driving away from the Royal Delaware Arms.
James B. Hansen had to wait for the two other homicide detectives to drive off before he could park his Cadillac SUV where their van had been, and then go in the back entrance of the fleabag hotel. He took the back stairs up all seven flights to the room number Brubaker and Myers had listed in their report. Hansen could have used his badge to get the passkey for Joe Kurtz's room, but that would have been terminally stupid. However legitimate his excuse for checking on Kurtz might sound later, Hansen wanted no connection between the ex-con and himself until the investigation of the murder of one John Wellington Frears.