Inside the front door was a locked alarm panel. He put Parker’s file on a shelf, opened the panel, and checked the exterior camera on the small embedded screen; there was no one nearby. He nodded at the woman, and she opened the door while he activated the alarm. There was a ten-second delay once it began to beep, which was sometimes barely sufficient for him to get out and lock the door, but on this occasion he managed with a second or two to spare.
He winced as they crossed the street to his car.
‘Your hip?’ she said.
‘Those basement stairs,’ he said. ‘They kill me.’
‘You should have let me go down.’
‘What do you know about fuses?’
‘More than you.’
Which was true, even if he chose not to admit it.
‘Well, I needed—’
He swore. He’d left Parker’s file on the shelf beside the alarm panel.
‘– the file,’ he finished. He lifted his empty hands to her, and she rolled her eyes.
‘I’ll go back,’ she said. ‘You stay here.’
‘Thank you,’ he said, and leaned against the car.
She looked at him with concern. ‘Are you sure that it’s nothing more serious?’
‘I’m fine, I’m fine. Just a little tired.’
But she knew otherwise. He had no secrets from her: not about the Collector, not about Parker, not about anything. He was worried. She could tell.
‘Let’s go for dinner,’ she said. ‘We’ll talk about it.’
‘The Blue Ox?’
‘Where else?’
‘My treat, then.’
‘You don’t pay me enough for it to be mine.’
Which was both true and untrue: he paid her a lot, but he could never pay her enough.
She waited until a car passed, then walked back to the office, her fingers fumbling in her huge purse for her keys. Eldritch looked around. So empty the streets tonight; barely a soul in sight except for themselves. His skin prickled. A man was approaching, his hands buried deep in the folds of a parka jacket, his head down. Eldritch gripped the key fob of his car, the index finger of his left hand poised over the alarm button while his right drifted to the pocket of his overcoat that contained the small derringer. He thought that the man might have glanced at him as he went by, but, if so, it was the slightest shift of his eyes, nothing more, and his head barely moved. Then he was gone, and he did not look back.
Eldritch relaxed. The Collector had made him so wary that he occasionally tipped over into paranoia: justifiable paranoia, perhaps, but paranoia nonetheless. By now his secretary had opened the office door. He heard the alarm beep for a time before going silent as she briefly deactivated it. He could not see her in the gloom of the hallway.
There was movement to his right. The man in the parka had stopped at the corner and was staring back at him. Eldritch thought that he might have shouted something, but whatever he said was lost in the sound of the explosion that blew out the windows of Eldritch’s building, deafening him even as it sent plumes of fire and smoke shooting through the gaps, showering him with glass that ripped into his face and body, the wave of heat lifting him up and throwing him to the ground. Nobody came to help him. The man in the parka was already gone.
Eldritch crawled to his knees. He was temporarily deaf, and he hurt all over. For a moment he thought that he was hallucinating as a figure appeared in the doorway of the building, silhouetted against smoke and fire. Slowly the woman walked out, and even from this distance Eldritch could see the dazed look on her face. Her hair was smoldering. She put her hand to the top of her head and patted out the smoke. She stumbled slightly on the curb but kept walking, and she seemed to smile at him as she saw that he was safe, and he found himself smiling back at her in relief.
Then she turned round to take in the sight of the burning building, and he saw that the back of her head was devoid of hair, a deep, terrible wound gleaming wetly in her exposed skull. Her spine showed red and white through her ruined back, and he glimpsed the muscles exposed in her thighs and calves through the shreds of her dress.
She stayed upright just a moment longer before collapsing facedown upon the road, her body unmoving. By then Eldritch was on his feet, running and weeping, but he could not reach her in time to say goodbye.
36
While the lawyer knelt and wept, the rabbi Epstein prepared to catch a flight to Toronto.
Epstein had managed to get in touch with Eleanor Wildon, the widow of Arthur Wildon, and she had agreed to meet with him at her apartment in Toronto, where she had moved following her husband’s disappearance. She had never remarried, and had not sought to have her husband declared legally deceased. This had led to speculation in certain quarters that she had some knowledge of where he might be. Some said he had fled to avoid his financial obligations, others that he had committed suicide because of the depth of his money problems, a situation exacerbated by his grief. He had lost focus on his business interests following the deaths of his daughters, driven instead to find the person or persons responsible, and those to whom he had entrusted the care of his principal company and his investments had mismanaged both, with the result that, when he disappeared, he was worth only a fraction of what he once had been, and the Canadian revenue service was about to hit him with a massive tax bill.
Tonya Wildon was due to leave for a short trip to Europe the following evening: her nephew was being married in London, she told Epstein, and she was booked on Air Canada’s 6.15 p.m. flight to Heathrow. Rather than wait until the following morning, Epstein decided to catch American Airlines’ 9.25 p.m. flight out of LaGuardia and spend the night at the Hazelton Hotel in Toronto. Adiv and Liat would see him safely on to the plane. At Toronto he would be met by another associate, a former major in the Canadian armed forces who now specialized in personal protection details.
While Epstein rarely traveled without security, he was more conscious than ever of his safety and that of the men and women who worked alongside him. The existence of the list offered them a chance to strike at previously hidden enemies, but the actions of the Collector had endangered them all. Davis Tate was dead, and his producer, Becky Phipps, was reported to be missing, which led Epstein to believe that she was also being hunted by the Collector, or had already suffered at his hands.
It was possible that Barbara Kelly had died before revealing to her tormentors the names of those to whom she had sent the partial list. Even so, those who had ordered her death might have suspected that Epstein would be among the likeliest of recipients, and possibly the lawyer too. By starting to work through the list, the Collector would have confirmed those suspicions: if the Collector and the lawyer had received a communication from Barbara Kelly, then their enemies would surmise that Epstein almost certainly had received one as well.
Eldritch and Epstein: men of similar name, of similar age, and with similar aims, yet they had never met. Epstein had once suggested a meeting, and had received in return a handwritten note from the lawyer politely declining his approach. It had made Epstein feel like a spurned suitor. Now the lawyer’s pet killer was running loose, assuming Eldritch ever had any real control over the man to begin with, which Epstein doubted. Perhaps it was as well that they had never sat across a table from each other, for they were not really the same. Epstein did no man’s bidding, while the lawyer was the Collector’s creature.
Adiv, driving his own car, collected Liat and Epstein from the latter’s home on Park Slope. They were waiting to turn at the corner of 4th and Carroll when a young man dressed in jeans and an overlong sweater, and wearing worn sneakers, threw a carton of milk at the car, smearing the windshield. His skin was sallow but unhealthy, as though he were suffering from jaundice. Spying Epstein’s clothing and Adiv’s yarmulka, he then began kicking the side of the car while screaming, ‘Fucking Jews! Fucking Jews! You’re leeches. The whole country’s going to hell because of you.’
Epstein placed a hand on Adiv’s shoulder to res
train him.
‘Ignore him,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
And that might have been the end of it had not the young man struck the windshield a hard blow with something in his right hand. It appeared to be a pool ball, and it cracked the glass instantly. Furious, Adiv got out of the car, slamming his door shut behind him. A shoving match ensued, with the sallow-skinned man seemingly trying to get around Adiv, not away from him. It ended when the sallow-skinned man spat in Adiv’s face and tried to run away.
‘Leave him, Adiv,’ ordered Epstein, but Adiv’s blood was up. This had been a bad week for him, and he now had an outlet for his anger. He started running, but his prey was too fast for him, and Adiv’s legs still ached from the long walk through the Jersey Pine Barrens. He still managed to grab the strap of the running man’s battered satchel, which he was holding in his hand instead of wearing over his shoulder. The bag came away so suddenly that Adiv fell backwards, landing painfully on his coccyx. The young man paused and looked back, as if debating whether it was worth trying to retrieve his satchel and possibly take a beating for his troubles, then decided to sacrifice it.
‘Jew bastard!’ he shouted once more, before disappearing into the night.
‘I have your bag, asshole!’ cried Adiv. ‘You lose, you prick!’
He got to his feet and dusted himself off. His butt ached. He limped painfully back to the car. Liat had opened the passenger door on the far side and stood on the road, watching him. He could see the gun in her hand.
‘I got his bag!’ said Adiv, raising the satchel.
Liat shook her head. No, no, she mouthed. Her eyes were wide. She waved her arms. Drop it, Adiv. Drop it and run. Liat pulled Epstein from the car and began dragging him to safety, keeping her body between Epstein, and Adiv, and the satchel.
Understanding dawned on Adiv. He looked down at the satchel. It was made of soft brown leather, and only one of the buckles on the front was tied. Adiv lifted the unsecured end of the bag and peered inside. There was a package wrapped in aluminum foil, like sandwiches, and beside it a thermos flask.
‘I think it’s okay,’ said Adiv. ‘I think—’
And then he was gone.
37
I was anxious to head north to speak with Marielle Vetters again. Once I had done that, I could start figuring out how to get to the plane. For now, though, my daughter, Sam, and her mother, Rachel, were in Portland for an evening, which was good.
Unfortunately, so was Jeff, Rachel’s current squeeze, which was bad.
How did I dislike Jeff? Well, let me count the ways. I disliked Jeff because he was so right-wing he made Mussolini look like Che Guevara; because his hair and his teeth were too perfect, especially for a man who was old enough to have started losing most of the former, and some of the latter; because he called me ‘big guy’ and ‘fella’ whenever we met, but couldn’t seem to bring himself to use my actual name; oh, and because he was sleeping with my ex-girlfriend, and every ex-boyfriend secretly wants his former partner to get herself to a nunnery immediately after their separation, there to rue the day she ever let such a treasure slip through her fingers, and hold herself celibate forever after on the grounds that, having had the best, there really was no call to settle for an inferior product.
Okay, so mostly I didn’t like Jeff because of that last part, but the other reasons were pretty important too.
I wanted to see Sam more often, and Rachel and I were agreed that this was a good thing. I had tried to hold my daughter at a distance for too long, perhaps out of some not entirely misguided effort to keep her safe, but I didn’t really want things to be that way, and she didn’t either. Now we saw each other at least once or twice every month, which was both better and worse than before: better because I was spending time with her, but worse because I missed her more when she wasn’t there.
This night, though, was a bonus: Jeff was speaking at a dinner event at the Holiday Inn in Portland, and Rachel had used the trip as an opportunity to let Sam spend an extra night hanging out with me while she played the supportive partner to whatever self-serving bullshit Jeff was spouting about the banking system. According to the Portland Phoenix, his speech was entitled ‘The Return to Light-Touch Regulation: Making America Wealthy Again.’ The Phoenix’s columnist had been so stricken by apoplexy over this that the paper had given him an extra half page to vent his spleen, and it still hadn’t been enough. He would probably have filled the entire edition if Jeff’s appearance in the city hadn’t given him an opportunity to tackle the object of his rage in person. It might almost have been worth attending the event just to hear what the Phoenix reporter had to say to Jeff if only it wouldn’t have required listening to Jeff too.
I took Sam for pizza down at the Flatbread Pizza Company on the Portland waterfront, where she got to create intricate crayon drawings on the paper tablecloth, and then over to Beal’s ice-cream parlor for a sundae to finish. Angel and Louis joined us as we were finishing our meal at Flatbread, and the four of us walked up to Beal’s together. Sam tended to be slightly in awe of Angel and Louis on the rare occasions she got to meet them. She was comfortable with Angel, who made her laugh, but she had also developed a certain shy fondness for Louis. She hadn’t yet managed to convince him to hold her hand, but he seemed to tolerate the way that she clutched the belt of his overcoat. Deep down, I suspected that he even liked it. So we presented quite the picture walking into Beal’s, and it was to the server’s credit that she recovered herself so quickly when it came time to serve us.
I ordered one-scoop sundaes for us all, except for Angel who wanted two scoops.
‘The fu—?’ Louis began to say, before he remembered where he was, and the fact that there was a small child holding onto his belt and gazing up at him adoringly. ‘I mean,’ he went on, struggling to find a way of expressing his disapproval without the use of obscenities, ‘maybe one scoop might be, uh, sufficient for your, uh, needs.’
‘You saying I’m fat?’ said Angel.
‘If you ain’t, you can see fat from where you’re at. You may not be able to see your feet, but you can see fat.’
Sam giggled.
‘You’re fat,’ she told Angel. ‘Fat fat.’
‘That’s rude, Sam,’ I said. ‘Uncle Angel isn’t fat. He’s just big boned.’
‘Go fu—’. Angel too realized where he was, and with whom. ‘I’m not fat, honey,’ he told Sam. ‘This is all muscle, and your daddy and Uncle Louis are just jealous because they have to watch what they eat, while you and I can order any sundae we want and we only get prettier.’
Sam looked dubious, but wasn’t about to argue with someone who said that she was getting prettier.
‘You still want the two-scoop?’ asked the server.
‘Yeah, I still want the two-scoop,’ said Angel, then added quietly, as Louis swept by him, trailing Sam, ‘but make it with sugar-free ice cream, and hold the cherry.’
The server went to work. Beal’s was quiet, with only one other table occupied. It was almost the end of Beal’s season. Shortly it would close for the winter.
‘Maybe I should have had something with sugar,’ said Angel. ‘The flavors are better.’
‘And you have the fat to worry about anyway.’
‘Yeah, thanks for reminding me. I’m making sacrifices and I still feel guilty.’
‘Soon you’ll have no pleasures left at all,’ I said.
‘Yeah, I remember pleasures,’ said Angel. ‘I think. It’s been so long.’
‘As you get older, they say that certain physical needs grow less urgent.’
‘Who the fu—?’
Sam tapped him on the thigh, and handed him a napkin. ‘For when you mess up,’ she said, then trotted off to join Louis at a table.
‘Thank you, honey,’ said Angel, before returning to the subject in hand, minus the swearing. ‘I mean, who are you calling old?’
‘Older,’ I corrected.
Our sundaes came, and we carried them over to
where Louis and Sam were waiting.
‘Like that makes it better,’ said Angel. ‘Fat, old: you want to add anything else before I go throw myself in the sea?’
‘Don’t do it,’ said Louis.
‘Why, because you’d miss me?’
‘No, ’cause you’d just float. Bob like a cork until hypothermia took you, or you got eaten by sharks.’
‘No!’ said Sam. ‘Not eaten!’
‘It’s okay, Sam,’ Angel assured her. ‘I won’t get eaten. Am I right, Uncle Louis?’
Sam looked to Louis for confirmation of this.
‘That’s right,’ said Louis. ‘He won’t get eaten. Shark’s mouth wouldn’t be big enough to fit him in.’
Sam seemed content with this, even if Angel wasn’t, so she started work on her sundae and forgot about everything else.
‘I’m substituting ice cream for affection,’ whispered Angel glumly, in deference to Sim’s presence. ‘I’ll be watching The View next, and considering male HRT.’
‘It’ll never get that bad,’ I said.
‘HRT?’
‘Watching The View. What are you, gay?’
‘I used to be. I’m a sexless being now.’
‘That’s good. I didn’t like thinking of you as a sexual being. It was kind of gross.’
‘What, gay sex?’
‘No, just you and any form of sex.’
Angel thought about this. ‘I guess it kind of was,’ he concluded.
Behind us, at the other occupied table, a couple of loud-mouths were discussing a mutual acquaintance in borderline obscene terms. One of them was wearing a Yankees cap even though his accent was Down East. In a town like Portland, a Yankees cap invited harsh words at best, but being a Mainer and wearing one was an act of treachery that made Benedict Arnold and Alger Hiss seem harmless by comparison.
The men moved from borderline to outright obscenity. They smelled of beer. What they were doing in an ice-cream parlor, I couldn’t quite figure.