They walked into a backyard and kept going west. Freddy said, “Look for a gypsy cab. Not metered, a gypsy. The hell happened?”
“The shield recognized me,” Nick said. “Gave me some lip. Would’ve been okay . . . Only, only our boy here’s got a piece.”
“Yeah, so?” Von was defensive.
Freddy turned on him, furious. “What? I told Art: No weapons. Period. My man here just got out.”
“Art didn’t say nothing to me. I don’t know. I was meeting some stranger in the Ridge. I’m not stupid.”
“Well, you’re stupid enough to get mandatoried one year in Rikers, for the piece. How’d that sit with you?”
“All right, all right.”
“He get your name?” Freddy asked Von.
“No,” Nick said. “But he’ll come back, looking. And he does have your descrip, Von. And he knows me. Ditch the piece. And I mean now. In the water.”
“These things cost money.”
Freddy said, “No. I don’t trust you. Give it to me. I’ll do it myself.”
“Man . . .”
“You want me to call Art?”
“Shit.” He handed over the gun, which Freddy took in wad of tissue.
“It’s cold?” Freddy asked,
“Yeah, yeah, can’t be traced.”
Freddy asked, “You got the list, Nick?”
“Yeah.”
Freddy said, “Thanks for that, Von. But now, separate ways.”
“I didn’t get my meal.”
“Jesus.”
Von grimaced and started off along the dark sidewalk.
“I’m going to the bay, get rid of this.” Freddy tapped his pocket.
“Thanks, man . . . You’re the best.”
“The list look good?”
“It’s something. A good start. I’ll just have to do a little more detective work.”
“Hell, you were a detective. Piece of cake.”
“Thanks, Freddy. Man, I owe you. Big.” A faint smile.
Freddy touched his forehead, a half salute, then headed west, to the shore, where he’d pitch the gun into the Narrows. A few minutes later Nick found a gypsy cab; they were more plentiful in the outer boroughs since medallion cabs were harder to find. He settled into the seat and inhaled deeply. Then his phone hummed and he panicked, thinking the detective from the restaurant was following up and wanted him to come downtown. But he looked at caller ID.
Felt a thud in his gut all right. Though a different sort than the kind he’d just experienced.
He answered.
“Amelia. Hi.”
CHAPTER 36
Rhyme and Archer sat in their chairs before the evidence boards. They were alone.
The speculation, the guesswork, the suppositions had gone on for several hours—several extremely unproductive hours—before the team called it quits for the night. Pulaski and Cooper were gone. Sachs was in the hallway making a phone call. Her voice was low and he wondered whom she was speaking to. Her face looked grave. The shooting incident at the mall seemed resolved largely in her favor. What else could it be?
She ended her call and walked back into the parlor, offering nothing about the conversation. She didn’t remove her Glock—again she’d be staying in Brooklyn. Sachs pulled her jacket off a hook.
“Better go.”
She glanced at Archer then back to Rhyme and seemed about to say something.
Rhyme cocked an eyebrow. The equivalent of a taciturn man, which he was, saying, “Talk to me. What is it?”
A moment of debate within Sachs. Then she balked, snagged her purse, slung it over her shoulder and nodded farewell. “I’ll be back early.”
“See you then.”
“ ‘Night, Amelia,” Archer said.
“ ‘Night.”
Sachs strode into the hallway and Rhyme heard the front door as it opened and closed.
He turned back toward Archer. Had she fallen asleep? Her eyes were closed. Then they opened.
She said, “Frustrating.”
Looking at the board. “Yes. Loose ends. Too many of them. This riddle’s not that easy.”
“You figured it out? Ours?”
“The letter ‘e.’ ”
“You didn’t cheat? No, you wouldn’t. You’re a scientist. The process is the most important part of solving a problem. The answer’s almost secondary.”
This was true.
She added, “But I’m not speaking of the case. The frustration in general.”
The life of the disabled, she meant. And she was right. Everything takes longer, people treat you like pets or children, there’s so much in life that’s not accessible—in all senses, more than just second floors and restrooms: love, friendship, careers you otherwise would have been perfect for. The list goes on and on.
He’d noted her struggling with the phone not long before, trying to call her brother for a ride back to his apartment. The unit was on speaker but not recognizing her commands. She’d given up and used the controller with her right hand, angrily entering the digits. Her Celtic bracelet jangling with each number. Her jaw had been trembling by the time she got through.
“You fall into a rhythm,” he said. “And you learn, you plan ahead, you take the route where you minimize frustrations. You don’t need to make unnecessary challenges for yourself. Most stores are accessible but you learn which ones have narrow aisles and protruding endcaps and you avoid them. Things like that.”
“A lot to learn,” she said. Then seemed uncomfortable with the topic. She said, “Oh, Lincoln. You play chess.”
“I did. Haven’t for a long time. How did you know?” He didn’t own a physical chess set. When he played, he did so online.
“You’ve got Vukovic’s book.”
Art of Attack. He glanced at the bookshelf. It was at the far end, where the personal, not forensic, books were kept. He himself couldn’t read the spine from here. But he recalled that eyesight—and fingernails—were among her God-given strengths.
She said, “When we were together, my ex and I played quite a bit. We did bullet chess. It’s a form of speed chess. Each player has a total of two minutes to make a move.”
“Per move?”
“No, the entire game, first move to last.”
Well, she was an aficionado of an esoteric form of chess as well as being a riddle-mistress. Not to mention well on her way to being a damn good criminalist. Rhyme could not have asked for a more interesting intern.
He said, “I never played that. I like some time to strategize.” He missed the game. There was no one to play with. Thom had no time. Sachs had no patience.
Archer continued. “We also played a limited-move variant. Our goal was to win in twenty-five moves or fewer. If we didn’t, we both lost. Say, if you’d like to play sometime . . . I don’t know anybody who’s really into it.”
“Maybe. Sometime.” He was looking at the evidence charts.
“My brother won’t be here for fifteen minutes or so.”
“I heard that.”
“So,” Archer said, a coy lilt to her voice, “I can’t hold two pieces behind my back for you to pick black or white. But I won’t cheat: I’m thinking of a number one through ten. Even or odd?”
Rhyme looked her over, not understanding at first. “Oh, I haven’t played for years. Anyway I don’t have a board.”
“Who needs a board? Can’t you picture one?”
“You play in your head?”
“Of course.”
Well . . . He was silent for a moment.
She persisted. “Even or odd?”
“Odd.”
“It’s seven. You win the virtual toss.”
Rhyme said, “I’ll take white.”
“Good. I prefer defense . . . I like to learn as much about my opponent as I can. Before I trounce them.”
The gold Celtic bracelet clinked against the controller as her fingers maneuvered her chair close to his and faced him, about three feet away.
He asked, “No time limit, you said.”
“No. But the game has to result in a mate or draw—in which case black wins—in twenty-five moves or fewer. Otherwise . . .”
“We both lose.”
“We both lose. Now”—she closed her eyes—“I’m seeing the board. Are you?”
Rhyme continued to gaze at her face for a moment, the freckles, the narrow brows, the faint smile.
She opened her eyes. He looked away quickly and closed his, nestled his head back in the rest. The chessboard, fully loaded, was as clear as Central Park on a crisp spring afternoon, as today’s had been. He thought for a moment. “E2 pawn to e4.”
Archer said, “Black pawn e2 to e5.”
Rhyme imagined:
He shot back with, “White king’s knight to f3.”
Archer: “Black queen’s knight to c6. You’re seeing it clearly?”
“Yes.”
Well, she was certainly aggressive. Rhyme was pleased. No uncertainty. No hemming or hawing. He said, “White king’s bishop to c4.”
Archer snapped, “Black queen’s knight to d4.”
Her knight was now nestling between Rhyme’s bishop and pawn.
How many moves were they up to? he wondered.
“Six moves,” Archer said, unknowingly responding to his question.
He said, “White king’s knight takes black pawn on e5.”
“Ah, yes, yes.” Archer then said, “Black queen to g5.” Bringing her most powerful piece into the middle of the field. Vulnerable. Rhyme was tempted to open his eyes and see her expression. He opted for concentration.
Rhyme saw an opportunity. “White king’s knight takes black pawn on f7.” In position to take her rook. And safe from her king, because the piece was guarded by his bishop.
“Black queen takes white pawn on g2.”
Rhyme frowned. He’d have to abandon his tactics in the upper right-hand corner of the board. Her brash moves were bringing the assault to his home territory—with most of his pieces not even in play.
He said, “White king’s rook to f1.”
Archer’s buoyant voice said, “Black queen takes white pawn on e4. Check.”
Eyes still closed, Rhyme could clearly see where this was going. He chuckled. And said what he had to: “White king’s bishop to e2 to block the check.”
And there was no surprise when Juliette Archer said, “Black queen’s knight to f3. Checkmate.”
Rhyme studied the board tucked into his mind. “Fourteen moves, I think.”
“That’s right,” Archer confirmed.
“Is that a record?”
“Oh, no. I’ve won in nine. My ex in eight.”
“The game, it was elegant.” Lincoln Rhyme was a loser gracious on the surface but filled with knobby resolve not to be one again. “A rematch soon?”
After he’d practiced.
“Love to.”
“But now—the bar’s open! Thom!”
She laughed. “You’re teaching me forensics. You’re teaching me how to be a productive gimp. But I think you’re also teaching me some bad habits. I’ll pass.”
“You’re not driving,” Rhyme said. “Well, not exactly.” A nod at the Storm Arrow motor, which could propel her along the pavement at a zippy seven mph.
“Better keep a clear head anyway. I’m seeing my son tonight.”
Thom poured Rhyme’s Glenmorangie. The doorbell hummed. It was Archer’s brother, who, when Thom escorted him into the parlor, greeted them cheerfully. He seemed like a nice guy. “Fellow” was the word that fit. Rhyme wouldn’t want to spend much time with him, but he seemed the rock that his sister would need facing her life as a quad.
She wheeled toward the archway. “I’ll be back early tomorrow,” she said, echoing Sachs’s farewell.
He nodded.
She wheeled out the door, her brother behind her.
The door closed. Thom returned to the kitchen. And Rhyme was suddenly aware of the immense silence of the room. He had a curious feeling. “Hollowness” was the word that came to him.
Thom was in the kitchen. The sound of metal against metal, wood against ceramic, water filling pots, emanated from there into the parlor. But no sound of human voices. Unusual for him, he didn’t care for this manifestation of solitude.
A sip of the scotch. Rhyme was aware of the scent of garlic, meat and the perfume of vermouth, heated.
Something else too. A fragrant smell. Appealing, comforting. Ah, Sachs’s perfume.
But then he recalled that she didn’t wear any—why give the perp a clue as to your position in a potential firefight? No, the scent would have to be that, of course, of whatever Juliette Archer had worn that day.
“Dinner is served,” Thom said.
“On my way,” Rhyme said and left the parlor, instructing the controller to shut out the lights as he did so. He wondered if the voice-controlled lighting system in the town house happened to be embedded with a DataWise5000.
CHAPTER 37
Just a fast one.”
“Honey, no.”
Her husband persisted, “Twenty minutes. Arnie said he’s got a new scotch. From the Isle of Skye. Never heard of it before.”
If there was a scotch that Henry was unfamiliar with it must’ve been something.
They’d finished dinner, Ginnie surprised that he’d actually complimented her on the chicken fricassee (though there had been: “Good fix over last time, dear”), and she was rinsing dishes.
“You go,” Ginnie told him.
“Carole wanted you to come too. They’re starting to think you don’t like them.”
I don’t, Ginnie thought. While she and Henry were transplants to the Upper East Side, Arnie and Carole were natural products of the effete neighborhood. She found these neighbors up the hall arrogant and pretentious.
“I really don’t want to. I’ve got to clean up here. There’s that project for work.”
“Just thirty, forty-five minutes.”
Double what it had been a moment ago.
Of course there was more to this than a neighborly visit. Arnie was head of a small tech start-up and Henry wanted him as a client for his law firm. Her husband didn’t admit it but this was obvious to her. She knew too that he liked to have Ginnie accompany him as he tried to win over people like Arnie—and not because she smart and funny, but because of what she’d overheard him say once to a fellow attorney, when he didn’t know she was nearby: “Let’s face it, a potential client’s on the borderline, who’s he going to sign with? The partner with the wife he can fantasize about fucking.”
The absolute last thing that Ginnie wanted to do, go have drinks with the Bassetts. He’d probably make her try the scotch, which however expensive all tasted like dish soap to her.
“But we just got Trudy down.” The two-year-old could be a fitful sleeper and sometimes impossible to get to fall asleep at a reasonable hour. Tonight, the 7 p.m. target had been a bull’s-eye.
“We’ve got the Nanny.”
“But still, you know I don’t like leaving her.”
“Forty-five minutes, an hour. Just to say hi. Sip a little whisky. Did you know about the spelling. Whiskey with an ‘e’ is bourbon. Irish too. Without it is scotch. Who thought that up?”
Henry was oh-so good at deflecting.
“Really, can’t we take a pass, honey?”
“No,” Henry said, grit to his voice. “I told them yes. So. Go scoot and throw something on.”
“It’s just drinks,” Ginnie said. Glancing at her jeans and sweatshirt. Then realizing she’d caved.
Henry turned his handsome face toward her (yeah, yeah, they were the perfect-looking couple). “Ah, for me, honey? Please. That little blue thing.”
Gaultier. Thing.
He gave her a seductive wink. “You know I like it.”
Ginnie went into the bedroom and changed, peeked at their daughter, still asleep, an angel with golden ringlets of hair, and then walked silently to the window, which faced a quiet side street, one flight below. Made sure the window was locked—though she’d checked it earlier—and drew the shades. Curiously Trudy might wake up at the sound of a cooing pigeon on the sill but would sleep through a fire engine siren and blaring intersection horn. She wanted to kiss the girl or touch her cheek, cradled by blond curls. But that might wake her and disrupt the impromptu get-together. Henry wouldn’t be happy.
