Part 79 (1/2)

'You jiving?'

'You're a minority group member. There's agencies just waiting to lend you money.'

'What a notion,' he said.

In front of my hotel he said, 'That Colombian a.s.shole, I still can't remember his name.'

'Pedro Marquez.'

'That's him. When he registered at your hotel, is that the name he used?'

'No, it was on his ID.'

'That's what I thought. Like he was C. O. Jones and M. A. Ricone, and I wondered what dirty word he used for you.'

'He was Mr. Starudo,' I said. 'Thomas Edward Starudo.'

'T. E. Starudo? Testarudo? That a curse in Spanish?'

'Not a curse. But it's a word.'

'What's it mean?'

'Stubborn,' I said. 'Stubborn or pig-headed.'

'Well,' he said, laughing. 'Well, h.e.l.l, you can't blame him for that one, can you?'

THIRTY-FOUR.

In my room I put the two pounds of coffee on the dresser, then went and made sure n.o.body was in the bathroom. I felt silly, like an old maid looking under the bed, but I figured it would be a while before I got over it. And I wasn't carrying a gun anymore. The.32 had been impounded, of course, and the official story was that Durkin had issued it to me for my protection. He hadn't even asked how I'd really come by it. I don't suppose he cared.

I sat in my chair and looked at the place on the floor where Marquez had fallen. Some of his bloodstains remained in the rug, along with traces of the chalk marks they place around dead bodies.

I wondered if I'd be able to sleep in the room. I could always get them to change it, but I'd been here a few years now and I'd grown accustomed to it. Chance had said it suited me, and I suppose it did.

How did I feel about having killed him?

I thought it over and decided I felt fine. I didn't really know anything about the son of a b.i.t.c.h. To understand all is to forgive all, they say, and maybe if I knew his whole story I'd understand where the blood l.u.s.t came from. But I didn't have to forgive him. That was G.o.d's job not mine.

And I'd been able to squeeze the trigger. And there'd been no ricochets, no bad bounces, no bullets that went wide. Four shots, all in the chest. Good detective work, good decoy work, and good shooting at the end.

Not bad.

I went downstairs and around the corner. I walked to Armstrong's, glanced in the window, but went on walking to Fifty-eighth and around the corner and halfway down the block. I went into Joey Farrell's and stood at the bar.

Not much of a crowd. Music on the jukebox, some baritone crooner backed up with a lot of strings.

'Double Early Times,' I said. 'With water back.'