Strangled - Brian McGrory [114]
Didn’t matter. My man Hank Sweeney, attired in a blue blazer and a freshly pressed pair of khaki pants, stood at the airport end of the jetway, casually sipping on a cup of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee, as I got off the plane.
“You strike it rich out there?” he asked, his voice the damnedest combination of silkiness and raspiness that I’d ever heard.
“So to speak,” I replied, and the two of us immediately began walking with the flow toward the baggage claim and the parking lot.
I hadn’t seen Hank since that Tuesday dinner we had at Locke-Ober, four days before, when he tipped me off as to the importance of the knife and the potential help of his former colleague Bob Walters. I was no closer to finding the knife, and Detective Walters was dead. All in all, things still weren’t going as hoped or as planned.
He expressed condolences about Edgar’s death. I thanked him, and we walked for a stretch in silence.
Finally, I said, “Your advice on Bob Walters was good. The big problem is, he died the day I spoke to him.”
Hank nodded as if he knew this already, but didn’t say whether he did or he didn’t.
So I said, “And obviously Edgar was killed last night in a supposed robbery that I don’t think was a robbery at all. I remind you of this because I’m going to head into this men’s room here. While I’m in there, you might be smart to just keep walking down this corridor, get in your car, head home, and watch Wedding Crashers on pay-per-view. People around me have a way of dying lately, and I really don’t want that to happen to you, Hank.”
Cutting through my minidrama, Hank asked, “Then why’d you call me?”
It’s true, I had. I’d called him just before I got on the plane in Vegas, explaining some of my predicament, laying out the dangers, and asking for his help. I needed an able-bodied, street-smart guardian angel — to use Edgar’s term — over the next day or so, and so what if he happened to be about seventy years old.
“I might have been too rash. I’ve been thinking more about it on the airplane. I don’t want to see more people dead because of me. I really don’t.”
“Go use the men’s room.”
I did, looking around suspiciously at the other men in there, not alone because of how few of them took the time to wash their hands on their way out the door. I was starting to wonder who was following me, monitoring my moves, waiting constantly for the opportunity to strike.
When I got back outside, Hank was still standing there, virtually in the same place and position as he was when I went inside. “There,” he said, “now that we’ve got that little episode out of your system, maybe we can go find ourselves a strangler.”
And we were off.
Hank had a black Ford four-door idling at the curb with a state police trooper watching guard. Normally these troopers are hassling harried travelers to get their cars out of the no-parking zones, not necessarily in the nicest or politest way. This trooper said to Hank, “That was fast.”
“Life is fast,” Hank replied, opening the driver’s-side door. “Look at me. I feel like I’ve just begun, but I probably only have one bullet left in my gun — and I was never that good a shot to begin with.”
The trooper nodded and laughed. He looked over at me and said, “Good luck with the story.”
I thanked him, and Hank called out, “Trust me, Teddy, the whole damned thing just flies by.”
On the ride into the city, we went over a quick plan, which was barely a plan at all — basically what Hank described as a “lurk and listen strategy.” He was going to drop me off a block away from my meeting destination. He gave me a cellular phone with a two-way radio, which he had programmed to remain on at all times. He would be ready to descend on the scene if needed, but would stand down otherwise.
Me, I had an odd sense of faith in this situation, don’t ask me why. The Phantom Fiend was trying to get me information, lurid as that information inevitably ended up being. He didn’t want me dead, because then his conduit to the public at-large no longer existed. No, it was someone else who wanted me dead,