The Triumph of Evil by Lawrence Block Page A

me a moment. Yes. Sergeant?”
    “Yes.”
    “The number is 868 … .”
    Another telephone conversation: “Hello?”
    “Mr. William Tompkins, please.”
    “Right. Just a minute. Bill? Take your time, it’s a man.”
    “Hello?”
    “Is this William Tompkins? Mr. Tompkins, this is Sgt. Bernard Cleary … .”
    Another telephone conversation: “Hello?”
    “Mr. Karnofsky, this is—”
    “Yes, Bill, I was waiting for you to call. It’s your mother?”
    “They just called me. They—”
    “Are you all right, Bill?”
    “Yes, sir. I’ll be all right. She—”
    “Take your time, Bill.”
    “Someone broke in and beat her real bad, Mr. Karnofsky. Some crazy man. A woman like that, a sweet woman like that, to break into her house and beat her—”
    “Is she all right?”
    “They got her down at the hospital. They don’t know, you know, how she’s … . how she’s gonna—”
    “Go straight there, Bill. Take the car. Unless you don’t think you should drive.”
    “No cab’s going to Astoria at this hour. I’m all right now, Mr. Karnofsky. And driving calms me. I relax myself driving whereas I worry when someone else drives me.”
    “Go ahead, then. And don’t worry about me. I want you to stay with your mother as long as she needs you, as long as you feel you want to be with her.”
    “You’re a good man, Mr. Karnofsky. You are good to me.”
    “Oh, now.”
    “I don’t like to leave you, Mr. Karnofsky.”
    “Am I a child afraid of the dark? I can take my own shot, I can turn off my own lights, and in the morning I can make my own breakfast. And if I have anywhere to go tomorrow or the next day or as long as it takes, Bill, I can call downtown, and they will send me a car and a driver. Now go to your mother and stop wasting your time talking to an old man… .”
    Another telephone conversation:
    “Hello?”
    “Hello, is this Rebecca Warriner?”
    “Yes.”
    “Rebecca, my name is Milton Burdett. Howard Kleinman said I ought to give you a call.”
    “Howard Kleinman.”
    “From Kansas City?”
    “I guess so.”
    “He may have just said Howard, I don’t—”
    “Yeah, right. Be cool on the phone, right?”
    “Oh.”
    “It’s okay. Did you, uh, you wanted to come up?”
    “I would like that.”
    “You know the address?”
    “Yes, I have it.”
    “Give me your name again, because the doorman will have to announce you.”
    “Milton Burdett. With two T’s.”
    “He’s not going to spell it, Milton.”
    “Oh, of course. There won’t be any trouble with the doorman, will there? Howard—I didn’t know about a doorman.”
    “Not the way I tip, there won’t be, Milton. You come right up. I’m glad you called, I was lonely.”
    Dorn rode the elevator to the fourteenth floor. He rang the bell of Apartment 14-D, and the door was opened almost immediately by a tall girl with very long black hair. She was wearing skintight black slacks and a yellow sweater. She had large breasts.
    She said, “Milton? Come in, let’s get acquainted. Do I call you Milton or Milt?”
    “Milton,” Dorn said. “I don’t have much time.”
    “Oh, that’s a shame. I thought we could have a good long time together.”
    Dorn found it remarkable that she could invest the words with such sincerity.
    “I have … a special thing,” he said.
    “Uh-huh.”
    He drew a pair of fifty-dollar bills from his wallet and handed them to her. She reached out for the money, then drew her hand back.
    “I don’t take beatings,” she said. “Except with a cloth belt that I have. Or being tied up, I don’t do that.”
    “I wouldn’t ask you to do anything like that.”
    “Well, maybe you could tell me in front what it is you want me to do.”
    “In front?”
    “Now, I mean.”
    “Oh. I understand. I would like you to take off all your clothing.”
    “So far we’re in business. And?”
    “And I want you to do jumping jacks.”
    “Huh?”
    “Jumping jacks,” he said happily. “Have you never done jumping