Dance of Death (8 page)

The client voice followed him. "Are-are you going?"

The question was so inane, so inappropriate, that Sawtelle broke into a choking, hoarse laugh. "Going?" he repeated, clearing his ear with a tug. "Yeah. I'm
going."
He lurched toward the door, coughing with laughter, his feet crunching across glass and ruin, anything to get away from this terrible place. He hit the sidewalk and turned south, his walk breaking into a run, scattering pedestrians in his wake.

From now on, people would just have to come to Keokuk.

NINE

William Smithback Jr. got out of the cab, tossed a crumpled twenty through the front passenger window, and looked up Broadway toward Lincoln Center. A few blocks uptown he could make out a vast throng of people. They'd spilled out into Columbus and across 65th Street, creating one mother of a traffic jam. He could hear people leaning on their horns, the shriek of sirens, the occasional earth-shuddering
blaaaat
of a truck's air horn.

Smithback threaded his way through the sea of motionless vehicles, then turned north and began jogging up Broadway, his breath misting in the cold January air. It seemed he ran just about everywhere these days. Gone was the dignified, measured step of the ace
New York Times
reporter. Now he rushed to get his copy in on time, dashed to each new assignment, and sometimes filed two stories a day. His wife of two months, Nora Kelly, was not happy. She'd had expectations of unhurried dinners, sharing with each other the events of the day, before retiring to a night of lingering pleasure. But Smithback found he had little time for either eating or lingering. Yes, he was on the run these days: and for good reason. Bryce Harriman was running, too, and he was hard on Smithback's heels.

It had been one of the worst shocks of Smithback's life to return from his honeymoon and find Bryce Harriman lounging in his office doorway, grinning smugly, wearing the usual insufferably preppie clothes, welcoming him back to "our paper."

Our
paper. Oh, God.

Everything had been going his way. He was a rising star at the
Times,
had nailed half a dozen great scoops in as many months. Fen-ton Davies, his editor, had started turning automatically to Smithback when it came time to hand out the big assignments. He'd finally convinced his girlfriend Nora to stop chasing old bones and digging up pots long enough to get hitched. And their honeymoon at Angkor Wat had been a dream-especially the week they'd spent at the lost temple of Banteay Chhmar, hacking through the jungle, braving snakes, malaria, and stinging ants while exploring the vast ruins. He remembered thinking, on the plane ride home, that life couldn't possibly get any better.

And he'd been right.

Despite Harriman's smarmy collegiality, it was clear from day one that he was gunning for Smithback. It wasn't the first time they'd crossed swords, but never before at the same paper. How had he managed to get rehired by the
Times
while Smithback was halfway around the world? The way Harriman sucked up to Davies, bringing the editor lattes every morning, hanging on his every word like he was the Oracle of Delphi, made Smithback's gorge rise. But it seemed to be working: just last week, Harriman had bagged the Dangler story, which by rights belonged to Smithback.

Smithback quickened his jog. Sixty-fifth and Broadway-the spot where some guy had reportedly fallen right into the midst of dozens of people eating lunch-was just ahead now. He could see the cluster of television cameras, reporters checking their cassette recorders, soundmen setting up boom microphones. This was his chance to outshine Harriman, seize the momentum.

No briefing under way yet, thank God.

He shook his head, muttering under his breath as he elbowed his way through the crowd.

Up ahead, he could see the glassed-in cafe of La Vielle Ville. Inside, police were still working the scene: the periodic flash of the police photographer lit up the glass restaurant. Crime scene tape was draped everywhere like yellow bunting. His eye rose to the glass roof of the cafe and the huge, jagged hole where the victim had fallen through, and still farther, up the broad facade of Lincoln Towers, until it reached the broken window from which the victim had precipitated. He could see cops there, too, and the bright bursts of a flash unit.

He pushed forward, looking around for witnesses. "I'm a reporter," he said loudly. "Bill Smithback,
New York Times.
Anybody see what happened?"

Several faces turned to regard him silently. Smithback took them in: a West Side matron carrying a microscopic Pomeranian; a bicycle messenger; a man balancing a large box filled with Chinese takeout on one shoulder; half a dozen others.

"I'm looking for a witness. Anybody see anything?"

Silence.
Most of them probably don't even speak English,
he thought.

"Anybody
know
anything?"

At this, a man wearing earmuffs and a heavy coat nodded vigorously. "A man," he said in a thick Indian accent. "He fall."

This was useless. Smithback pushed himself deeper into the crowd. Up ahead, he spotted a policeman, shooing people onto the sidewalk, trying to clear the cross street.

"Hey, Officer!" Smithback called out, using his elbows to dig through the gawking herd. "I'm from the
Times.
What happened here?"

The officer stopped barking orders long enough to glance his way. Then he went back to his work.

"Any ID on the victim?"

But the cop ignored him completely.

Smithback watched his retreating back. Typical. A lesser reporter might be content to wait for the official briefing, but not him. He'd get the inside scoop, and he wouldn't even break a sweat trying.

As he looked around again, his eye stopped at the main entrance to the apartment tower. The building was huge, probably sported a thousand apartments at least. There'd be people inside who knew the victim, could provide some color, maybe even speculate on what happened. He craned his neck, counting floors, until he again reached the open window. Twenty-fourth floor.

He began pushing his way through the crowd again, avoiding the megaphone-wielding cops, tacking as directly as he could toward the building's entrance. It was guarded by three large policemen who looked like they meant business. How on earth was he going to get in? Claim to be a tenant? That wasn't likely to work.

As he paused to survey the milling throng of press outside, his equanimity quickly returned. They were all waiting, like restless sheep, for some police brass to come out and begin the briefing. Smithback looked on pityingly. He didn't want the same story everybody else got: spoon-fed by the authorities, telling only what they wanted to tell with the requisite spin attached. He wanted the
real
story: the story that lay on the twenty-fourth floor of Lincoln Towers.

He turned away from the crowd and headed in the opposite direction. All big apartment buildings like this had a service entrance.

He followed the facade of the building up Broadway until he finally reached its end, where a narrow alley separated it from the next building. Thrusting his hands back into his pockets, he turned down the alley, whistling jauntily.

A moment later, his whistling stopped. Up ahead lay a large metal door marked
Service Entrance
-
Deliveries.
Standing beside the door was another cop. He was staring at Smithback and speaking into a small radio clipped to his collar.

Damn.
Well, he couldn't just stop dead in his tracks and turn around-that would look suspicious. He'd just walk right past the cop like he was taking a shortcut behind the building.

"Morning, Officer," he said as he came abreast of the policeman.

"Afternoon, Mr. Smithback," the cop replied.

Smithback felt his jaw tighten.

Whoever was in charge of this homicide investigation was a pro, did things by the book. But Smithback was not some third-rate line stringer. If there was another way in, he'd find it. He followed the alley around the back of the building until it turned a right angle, heading once again toward 65th.

Yes.
There, not thirty yards in front of him, was the staff entrance to La Vielle Ville. Deserted, with no cop loitering around outside. If he couldn't get to the twenty-fourth floor, at least he could check out the place where the man had landed.

He moved forward quickly, excitement adding spring to his step. Once he'd checked out the restaurant, there might even be a way to get into the high-rise. There had to be connecting passages, perhaps through the basement.

Smithback reached the battered metal door, pulled it ajar, began to step in.

Then he froze. There, beside a brace of massive stoves, several policemen were taking statements from cooks and waiters.

Everybody slowly turned to look at him.

He put a tentative foot in, like he was going somewhere.

"No press," barked one of the cops.

"Sorry," he said, flashing what he feared was a ghastly smile. "Wrong way."

And, very gently, he closed the door and stepped back, walking back around to the front of the building, where he was once more repelled by the sight of the vast herd of reporters, all waiting like sheep to the slaughter.

No way, not him, not Bill Smithback of the
Times.
His eye cast around for some angle of attack, some idea that hadn't occurred to the others-and then he saw it: a pizza delivery man on a motorbike, hopelessly trying to work his way through the crowd. He was a skinny man with no chin wearing a silly hat that said
Romeo's Pizzeria,
and his face was splotched and red with frustration.

Smithback approached him, nodded toward the carrier mounted on the back. "Got a pizza in there?"

"Two," the man said. "Look at this shit. They're gonna be stone-cold, and there goes my tip. On top of that, if I don't get it there in twenty minutes, they don't have to pay-"

Smithback cut him off. "Fifty bucks for your two
pizzas
and the hat."

The man looked at him blankly, like a complete idiot.

Smithback pulled out a fifty. "Here. Take it."

"But what about-"

"Tell them you got robbed."

The man couldn't help but take the money. Smithback swiped the hat off the man's head, stuck it on his own, opened the rear carrier on the motorbike, and hauled out the pizza boxes. He moved through the crowd toward the door, carrying the
pizzas
in one hand and jerking off his tie with the other, stuffing it in his pocket.

"Pizza
delivery, coming through!" He elbowed his way to the front, came up against the blue barricades draped in crime scene tape.

"Pizza delivery, SOC team, twenty-fourth floor."

It worked like a dream. The fat cop manning the barricade shoved it aside and Smithback hiked through.

Now for the triumvirate at the door.

He strode confidently forward as the three cops turned to face him.

"Pizza delivery, twenty-fourth floor."

They moved to block his way.

"I'll take the
pizzas
up," one said.

"Sorry. Against company rules. I got to deliver directly to the customer."

"Nobody's allowed in."

"Yeah, but this is for the SOC team. And if you take it up, how am I going to collect my money?"

The cops exchanged an uncertain glance. One shrugged. Smithback felt a glow. It was going to work. He was as good as in.

"They're getting cold, come on." Smithback pressed forward.

"How much?"

"Like I said, I have to deliver
directly to the customer.
May I?" He made one more tentative step, almost bumped into the large gut of the lead cop.

"No one's allowed up."

"Yes, but it's just for a-"

"Give me the pizzas."

"Like I said-"

The cop reached out. "I
said,
give me the damn
pizzas."

And just like that, Smithback realized he was defeated. He docilely held them out and the cop took them.

"How much?" the cop asked.

"Ten bucks."

 The cop gave him ten, no tip. "Who's it for?"

"The SOC team."

"Your customer got a name? There're a dozen SOC up there."

"Ah, I think it was Miller."

The cop grunted, disappeared in the dim lobby carrying the
pizzas,
while the other two closed rank, blocking the door. The one who had shrugged turned back. "Sorry, pal, but could you bring me a fifteen-inch pie, pepperoni, garlic, and onions with extra cheese?"

"Up yours," Smithback said, turning and walking back to the barriers. As he squeezed through the press of reporters, he heard some snickers and someone called out, "Nice try, Bill." And another shrilled out in an effeminate voice, "Why, Billy darling, that hat looks
dreamy
on you."

Smithback pulled the hat off in disgust and tossed it. For once, his reportorial genius had failed. He was already getting a bad feeling about this assignment. It had barely started and already it was smelling rotten. Despite the January frost in the air, he could almost feel Harriman's hot breath on the back of his neck.