After the First Death - Lawrence Block [60]
“Worried?”
“You were gone so long.”
“I thought you’d still be sleeping.”
“No, I’ve been up for hours. I went out and got something to eat a little while ago. Where were you?”
“I had to find out about this Phil. You know, look around, talk to people. And then I had to work a little, you know, and I had to find a dealer and make a buy. The stuff I used before was the last of what I had around, and I had to work for awhile and then buy some more. And—”
“I had some money.”
“Only twenty dollars.”
“Wouldn’t that have been enough?”
“I like to buy for a few days at a time. And I don’t want to take money from you, Alex. I wouldn’t want to do that.”
“You went to bed with me and then you went out tricking.”
“You think I wanted to?”
“You went to bed with me and then—”
Her face fell apart She said, “Alex, you got no right, you got no goddamn right!” And ran into the bathroom and slammed the door. I heard the lock click. I went to the door and tried to tell her I was sorry. She wouldn’t answer me. After a few minutes I heard the shower running, and I returned to the living room and walked around. I tried to sit down but couldn’t stay still, so I got up and smoked and wore out the rug.
When she came back smelling fresh and clean and wearing a different dress, I told her again that I was sorry.
“It’s all right.”
“I didn’t think.”
“No, I was the one didn’t think, Alex. I figured you would know why I went out. It was my fault for saying anything.” She scooped up her purse and headed for the bedroom. I followed her. “But you can’t be jealous or anything. It’s not like when we make love. It’s what I do, that’s all. It’s who I am.” She turned to me. “You hate me now, don’t you?”
“No.”
“But you hate what I am.”
“Not even that.”
“Because I can’t help what I am, Alex. I don’t like it and I’m not proud of it but it’s what I am.”
The history professor’s wife in the little college town, dressing the children and bundling them off to school, mingling with other wives at faculty teas, sitting up nights proofreading my books and articles. How I had miscast this girl.
“I found out about this Phil,” she was saying. “That’s not his name but a lot of people call him Phillie because he comes from South Philadelphia. His name is Albert Schapiro. He’s not Italian, he’s Jewish.”
“You’re sure he’s the one?”
“Pretty sure. I asked around, and he sounds right.”
“Is he a killer?”
“I don’t know.”
“But he must have killed Robin.”
“I guess so.” She took an envelope from her purse. “I want to stash this stuff now. Then I thought we could go find Phillie. Somebody said they heard he was staying in a hotel at Twenty-third and Tenth. You want to go?”
“Now?”
“He’s probably there now. It would be a good time.”
I wanted him. Oh, how I wanted him. “Let’s go,” I said.
That afternoon we had been a prostitute and her man. Now we were a prostitute and her client. Jackie knew the hotel, she had worked there now and then when the Times Square area was too hot, and the desk man seemed to remember her. The hotel was filthy, the lobby cluttered with winos. The desk man had a bottle of Thunderbird in an open drawer. I signed Doug MacEwan’s name on the registration card and paid the man $5.75 and we headed for the stairs.
And Jackie said, “Just a minute, honey. Wait right here, something I want to ask the man.”
I waited while she doubled back to the desk. I heard her ask what room Albert Schapiro was in. “Something I got to leave with him,” she said. “Soon as I handle this John.”
He flipped through a stack of cards and found the right one. She hurried back and joined me. “305,” she said. “He gave us 214, we better go there long enough for him to forget about us.”
We went to 214. It was dirtier than the Times Square hotels, and, in the light of dawn,