'Well, she never made it,' said Pagano. 'I've got our hit man on the other line, holding. He says she's not there.'

'Has he been inside?'

223.

'Twice already. No problem getting in. She doesn't have a special lock. No Medico cylinder lock, nothing like that. Probably promised to her for later. For now, just a rinky-d.i.n.k one. A hairpin job.

He got in okay. But no one was there. He waited awhile and tried again. Still n.o.body there. You sure she was going to the apartment?'

'Where else would she go?' Dietz said with exasperation. 'I don't know what's delayed her but she'll be there.'

'What do you want our man to do?'

'Can't he just stay someplace outside the apartment and watch for her arrival? And then follow her in.'

'Won't work. He wanted to do that but there's no safe observation point on that floor.'

'Then let him go inside her apartment and wait for her.'

'Too dangerous,' said Pagano. 'What if she came in with three or four people? They might trap him.'

'G.o.ddam it,' said Dietz, 'then let him go on doing what he has been doing. Let him wait a half hour and go back. I want him to go back every half hour until he finds her and does the job.'

'I'll tell him,' Pagano hesitated. 'You know, each time he does it, he's exposing himself more. The risk is higher. It's going to cost more.'

'f.u.c.k the cost,' said Dietz shrilly, out of temper. 'We just want him to do the job. I have to go to the office now. The next time you call, I want to know we've got rid of her. You hear me?'

'Hear you loud and clear.'

'Call me there.'

Dietz hung up angrily. Only thing Pagano had to say was, It's going to cost more. Highway robbers.

All they ever thought of was money. Didn't anyone ever take pride in his profession anymore?

He swung off the bed, preparing for a late conference at the office with Armstead, with a man who took real pride in everything he did.

Kim Nesbit had tried to nap, and maybe she had. An hour had pa.s.sed since she'd gone to lie down, and now she was wide awake once more. Her hangover wasn't bad, all things considered - the smallest throb of headache, puffiness around the eyes, dry mouth and tongue. Overall, she felt somewhat sobered.

Sitting up, she wondered whether she should go to the bathroom for aspirin or go to the bar for a drink.

She went to the bar for a drink.

After pouring scotch on the rocks, she shambled about the living room. It was like being at the bottom of the Grand Canyon alone. She turned on the entry hall light, saw that tomorrow morning's two newspapers - the Record and the Times - had been slipped through the mail slot in the front door. She stopped, reached for them, brought them to the middle sofa, dropping them there to read later.

224.

Coming around the middle sofa, sipping her scotch, she saw that a cushion was indented and she bent to puff it up. She saw that a cushion on another sofa had been used and, patting that one to straighten it out, she dimly remembered that she'd had a visitor earlier in the evening.

The girl from the paper who'd wanted to know some personal things about Ed Armstead.

She sat down with her scotch, drank it and tried to recall more. Her memory, usually foggy, had more visibility than a few hours ago. She recalled the girl with clarity, and tried to hear her again. The girl had wondered about Ed's front-page exclusive stories on terrorist acts, and had speculated on the possibility that Ed might have a personal connection with terrorists. For some reason Kim had characterized Ed as a perfect b.a.s.t.a.r.d, which was true, and as a power-hungry monster, which was also true. After that, Kim could not recall their conversation.

Swallowing the last of her scotch, Kim trudged back to the bar for a refill, dropped two ice cubes into the empty gla.s.s and dribbled three ounces of scotch out over the ice. She held up the amber-colored gla.s.s, examined it, decided that she had been n.i.g.g.ardly with herself, deserved more, deserved a longer drink, and she lowered the gla.s.s and added two more ounces of scotch. Better.

Sipping her drink steadily, she began thinking of Ed Armstead once more.

He was a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, a lousy b.a.s.t.a.r.d. Neglectful of her needs and cruel to her person. She was glad to be rid of him.

She surveyed her barn of a living room. Inanimate objects as far as the eye could see. No living, pulsating, warm human being around, except her own lonely little self here in the corner of the sofa.

Christ, loneliness was the worst curse on earth, and she was lonely, isolated from all humanity and by herself, alone with herself, a person she could not cope with.

She needed someone, sometime, a flesh-and-blood man.

The only man she knew was Edward Armstead. A b.a.s.t.a.r.d, sure enough, but at least her b.a.s.t.a.r.d.

Yesterday they'd had a fight. She'd called him everything on earth, terrible things. He had done the same to her. He had roared out of the apartment in a fury. At the time, she had not wondered if he would ever come back. Now she wondered if he would. Had she alienated him forever? She wanted him in her unpopulated life once more. Even if he didn't come by enough, he did come by sometimes. Even if he wasn't loving and kind, he did want her body, did join her, did enjoy her.

A crumb, a morsel, not to be ignored when you are starving.

She sorted out strategies, means of winning him back.

One floated upward through the fog and appealed to her. The girl earlier this evening, the girl from his newspaper snooping around into his private life. That was a valid excuse for calling him, calling him with a favor, to alert him, to warn him that one of his staff was prying into his affairs behind his back.

He would be grateful, touched by Kim's concern for him and her caring, and appreciative of her intelligence and warning.

He would see who counted in his life. All would be forgiven. He would be back, and the room no longer a desert.

225.

She fumbled for the piece of paper with the girl's name, address, number that she'd left on the bar, found it under her gla.s.s being used as a coaster, and with the soggy piece of paper in hand she reeled to the sofa, fell into it next to the olive-green telephone, and dialed Ed Armstead's private number with its private line in the study of his apartment. She held on as it rang and rang. No answer, n.o.body there. That meant if he wasn't there, he was probably not out somewhere but still in his office.

Kim's forefinger sought the dial again. She misdialed twice, but the third time had the satisfaction of dialing it right. The phone rang twice, and was picked up.

'h.e.l.lo, Ed,' she said. 'This is Kim.'

'This isn't Edward,' a voice replied. 'This is Harry Dietz.'

'I was calling Ed on his private line. I want Ed.'

'I was at his desk, working. Let me see if he's around.'

'You go and see,' she said.

Abruptly, as though someone's hand had clamped over the other mouthpiece, all sound was choked off.

But not completely.

The hand over the mouthpiece had apparently slipped a little. She could hear a distant voice in the background, and she heard it state with annoyance, T told you what to say, dammit. Tell her I'm not here.' It was Ed's voice in the background. Then Dietz's voice full volume into the phone. 'I've been looking, Kim. He's not here.'

Kim was livid with rage. 'You p.r.i.c.k, he's right there, I heard him! You tell him to come to the phone right now, I have something important for him. Tell him if he won't come, he'll be sorry.'

There was a pause, and Dietz intoning again, 'Kim, he's not here.'

'You tell that motherf.u.c.ker to drop dead!' she screamed, and she slammed down the phone.

For five minutes she lay back in the sofa stewing, trying to give her heart time to stop pounding.

I'll get him, the b.a.s.t.a.r.d, she told herself. I'll get him if it's the last thing I do.

She resumed her drinking to help the fog descend.

While there was a shaft of clarity remaining, Kim tried to map her revenge.

That girl who had come calling, the one from his staff. She searched for the soggy piece of paper, and blurred as the name was, she was able to make it out. Victoria Weston. The one who had been looking into Ed Armstead, who had suspicions about him.

Yeah, that girl, maybe that was the way to get even, to find something to tell that girl. But what?

She beseeched her faded memory to provide some remembrance of yesterday's quarrel, for something Ed had revealed to her. She revived one crazy outburst, fragments she could recall of it: what happens to people depends on me - or something like that - and: I make the news, I make life that goes on in the world.

226.

Words to that effect. Had they implied that he was directing terrorists? Maybe yes, maybe no.

Would they be useful for Victoria Weston, have some special meaning to her? They might, but probably not.

Kim wanted to hurt the arrogant b.a.s.t.a.r.d the way he had hurt her. But her evidence against him was weak. Too weak to carry to Victoria Weston.

Oh, what the h.e.l.l, to h.e.l.l with it, Kim decided, drinking, feeling better.

She picked up the nearest next morning's newspaper, a habit, to go through it until she was so weary she would sleep without difficulty. She saw that she was holding the New York Record, andshe defied him by tearing at it and throwing it to the floor. She reached for the New York Times, and laughed at how angry this would have made him had he known. Blinking, she attempted to read the front page. Ezra - E. J. -used to advise her that a newspaper a day was better than an apple a day. It helped round out a woman, made her interested and interesting, so that when she appeared in public she was conversant with what was going on. There were some nice things to be said about Ezra. He had got too busy, of course, and too old, but he had always been kinder than his son. In the years after receiving his advice, she had never failed to read a newspaper a day. Blinking at the front page, she realized the true fact, that she hardly read anymore. At this hour, the newsprint was always out of focus. What she really did was go through the front section, fixing on the various headlines and concentrating on women's styles in the department-store advertis.e.m.e.nts.

She turned the page, then another and another, lingering over ads, peering at headlines. On page six, she had gone over a Bloomingdale's ad featuring new Italian purses and handbags when the headline of a small story directly above it caught her eye. It was a word in the headline that held her attention. The word was psychiatrist. Then she made out the words seriously injured.

Mildly piqued, she squeezed her eyes to make the newsprint stop jiggling and stand still.

She had started to read the small story when the name Dr. Carl Scharf leaped out at her. With supreme effort she made out the words that followed, and she could feel her heartbeat accelerate.

The fog in her head could not obliterate the sense of what she was reading. Dr. Carl Scharf, crossing the street to his office, had been the victim of a hit-and-run driver. Seriously injured, multiple injuries. At last report in critical condition in Roosevelt Hospital's intensive care ward.

Surgery, surgery, surgery. A list of Dr. Scharf s degrees, honors. Police said the driver had sped away after the accident, and there were no clues pointing to the person responsible.

Kim let the story go out of focus again, and dwelt on what part of it had adhered to her mind.

Accident... no clues to the person responsible.

She shuddered.

Wavering across her mind were the images and words that had taken place before the accident. Dr.

Scharf s talk with her about Edward Armstead. Scharf: I'm concerned about him.. . Seems under a lot of pressure. Herself: Sick, you know. . . Delusions. .. thinks he is running the world. Scharf: Wise for you not to mention that we spoke.

227.

Yet she had mentioned that Scharf had spoken to her -drunkenly, stupidly, unforgivably blurted it out to Edward Armstead. Herself: Even Dr. Scharf said. . . you were under pressure... he was concerned. And Ed had almost killed her.

Kim shook the newspaper helplessly.

And now Ed had tried to kill Dr. Scharf too.

There it was. No accident. A deliberate attempt. She knew the person responsible.

Oh, there was no doubt in her mind, no doubt whatsoever, that Edward Armstead had been responsible for trying to eliminate Dr. Scharf. Why? Because Scharf, his psychiatrist, had betrayed him? No, not that, because such a reaction would have depended on human sensitivity and emotion.

Ed Armstead no longer possessed either. Then what other motive? To prevent someone who suspected he was maniacal from exposing his behavior - and maybe his crimes.

His crimes.

That young woman, the one on the newspaper, she had hinted at it, or tried to speak of it, and had wanted corroboration.

By G.o.d, she would get it now, any help that Kim could give her.

Kim wobbled off the sofa, stood erect, her feet planted on the rug, her body swaying. She was terribly drunk she knew, but she was also sober, some sensibility of conscience in her was sober.

Could one be drunk and sober? No, of course not, but she was both.

There was one thing more she wanted to do before acting. A good pedestrian thing. A friendship thing. A caring thing.

She called Roosevelt Hospital.

Yes, nurse, I'm a relative and I must know.

Well, I shouldn't be talking until the attending doctor -well, I can tell you, the patient is out of the woods, still in intensive care, successful surgery, on the road to recovery, but it'll be a long haul, a long one.

He'll live?

'Yes, he'll live.

Thank G.o.d. The phone call over, Kim knew there was more to appreciate from G.o.d. There was his directive. Vengeance is mine; I will repay, saith the Lord.

She would be acting for the Lord.

Putting one foot before the other, Kim started for the bedroom, to change from her kimono and pajamas into an outdoors sweater and slacks and her fur coat."

To go to see Victoria Weston as quickly as possible.

At Victoria Weston's apartment door in the brownstone on West Seventy-third, Kim rocked dizzily, meant to knock, instead hammered her fists against it.