Desperate Measures (15 page)

That wasn't the only thing that bothered him. What if the address Sean O'Reilly had given the authorities was out of date or else a lie? Suppose he wasn't there?

The latter worry intensified when Pittman finally reached the address and discovered that it wasn't an apartment building but a restaurant instead, a sign in the front window announcing PADDY'S.

Shit. Now what am I supposed to do?

Needing to get off the street, he did his best to hide his nervousness when, unable to think of an alternative, he enter-ed the restaurant.

He barely noticed its Irish decor-green tablecloths, shamrocks on the menus, a large map of Ireland on one wall. What he did notice was the handful of late-afternoon customers, most of them at the bar.

A few looked in his direction, then returned their attention to their Pittman's approached the man who was muscular, wore a green apron, and stood behind the cash register. "What'll it be?"

"I'm looking for a friend of mine. Sean O'Reilly." The bartender used a towel to wipe the counter. "I heard he was staying at this address," Pittman said, "but this is a restaurant. I don't see . 'How?' "%at?"

"How did you get this address?"

"My parole officer's the same as his. Look, is Sean around?" The man kept wiping the counter.

"Sean and I go back to when he was doing those publicservice announcements for the police department," Pittman said. "When he was telling people how to keep their homes safe from burglars."

"So? What do you want him for?"

"Old times. I've got some stories to tell him." Pittman drew his key chain from his pocket and held up the tool knife. "About this." The bartender watched Pittman remove the lock-pick tools from the end of the knife.

The bartender relaxed. "You've got one of those, too?"

He answered and pulled out a set of keys, showing his own knife. "Sean only gave these to guys he likes. Yeah, Sean stays here. In a room upstairs. At night, he subs for me."

"But is he around?"

"Ought to be waking up around now. He sure was drunk last night." A half dozen people came into the restaurant.

"Looks like we're getting busy" The bartender poured. tomato juice into a glass, added Tabasco sauce, and dropped in a raw egg. "Stairs dmugh the door in back. Second floor. The room at the end of the hall He'll be needing this.

In a musty upstairs hallway that smelled of cabbage, Pittman knocked on the door. When he didn't get an answer, he knocked again. This time, he heard a groan. His third knock caused a louder groan. He tried the door. It wasn't locked. Pushing it open, he found a sparse room with its shades closed, its lights off, and Sean O'Reilly sprawled on the floor.

"The light, the light," Sean groaned.

Pittman thought that the dim light from the hallway must be hurting Sean's eyes. He quickly shut the door. In darkness, he listened to Sean keep moaning, "The light, the light."

"There isn't any," Pittman said.

"I've gone blind. Can't see anything. The light, the light. "You mean you want me to turn the lights on?"

"Blind. Gone blind."

Pittman groped along the wall, found a light switch, and flicked it. The unshielded yellow light that dangled from the ceiling gleamed and made Sean start thrashing while he pawed at his face.

He wailed, "Blind. You're trying to make me blind."

Oh, for God's sake, Pittman thought. He knelt and pulled one of Sean's hands away from his face, exposing his left eye, which was very bloodshot. "Here. Drink this."

"What?"

"Something the bartender sent up."

Sean clutched the glass and took several swallows, then suddenly made a gagging sound. "What is it? Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, there's no vodka in this."

"Sit up. Drink more of this." After a struggle, Pittman managed to make Sean empty the glass.

Sean squirmed so that his back was against the side of the bed and scowled. His short stature still reminded Pittman of a jockey. He was as thin as ever. But alcohol had aged him, putting gray in his hair and ravaging his face. "Who are you?"

"A friend."

"Can't remember."

"That's because you need something to eat."

"Couldn't keep it down."

Pittman picked up the phone. "Order something, anyhow.

The corned-beef sandwich and dill pickle that the bartender carried up were delicious. Pittman tried to savor them, but his hunger couldn't be controlled. He hadn't eaten anything since the orange juice and Danish this morning. Taking huge bites, he gulped the food down. His empty plate depressed him. From the bed, Sean looked horrified at Pittman's appetite. "I think I'm going to throw up."

When Sean came back, Pittman had finished the sandwich that the bartender had carried up for Sean.

Sean sat on the bed, scowled at Pittman, and shook his head. "I still don't remember."

"You gave me a crash course on how to break into houses. "Doesn't ring a bell."

"You said I was a natural."

"Still doesn't ring a ... Wait a minute. Weren't you a reporter?" Pittman nodded. "I gave you . Pittman held up the tool knife. "Sure, that's who you are."

"But I've graduated," Pittman said. "What do you mean?"

Pittman reached inside his gym bag, took out a newspaper that he'd bought on the way to the restaurant, and tossed it over to Sean. "The story under that colorful headline. 'Suicidal Obit Writer on Killing Rampage.' There's an 'alleged' in there someplace, but it doesn't feel sincere."

With a frown, Sean read the article. From time to time, he paused, looked at Pittman, deepened the furrows in his brow, and went back to reading the story.

Finally he set down the newspaper. "It makes you sound very busy."

"Yeah, all that killing. It's almost more work than one man can handle."

"Do I need to be afraid of you?"

"Let's put it this way. Have I done anything to hurt you so far?" "Then you didn't do what the paper says?"

Pittman shook his head.

"Why did you come here?"

"Because of all the criminals I've met, you're the only one I trust." "What do you want?"

The phone rang.

Sean picked it up. "Hello?" He listened intensely, then straightened in alarm. "The police are coming up? Jesus, they must have found out about the washing machines."

Pittman didn't understand what Sean was about.

Sean scrambled toward the window, jerked the curtains apart, yanked the window up, and scurried out onto a fire escape.

Pittman heard heavy footsteps on the other side of the door. He lunged to lock it.

Fists pounded on it. He grabbed his gym bag and darted toward the open window. Banging his shoulder as he squirmed out onto the fire escape, he cursed and stared below toward where he assumed Sean would be scurrying down the metal stairs. Instead, what he saw were two policemen who stared up, shouted, and pointed.

Footsteps clattered above him. Twisting, craning his neck, he saw Sean rapidly climbing stairs toward the roof. Pittman got to his feet and charged up after him.

"Stop!" he heard a policeman yell from the alley below. Pittman kept racing upward.

"Stop!" the policeman yelled.

Pittman climbed harder.

,,STOP!"

They'll shoot, Pittman thought. But he didn't obey. He reached the top, leapt over a guardrail, and scanned the rooftop for Sean. There! The roofs of all the buildings on this block were connected, and Sean was sprinting past ventilation pipes and skylights toward a door on a roof near-the end of the block, his short legs moving in a blur. "Wait, Sean!"

Pittman raced after him. Behind him, he heard shoes scraping on the fire escape.

Sean reached the door, tugged at it, and cursed when he discovered it was locked.

He was banging his shoulder against it, cursing again, when Pittman caught up to him. "Damn it, I left my keys in my room. I don't have my knife."

"Here." Breathing heavily, Pittman pulled out the knife Sean had given him several years earlier.

With a smile, then a desperate look beyond Pittman toward two policemen who had just climbed onto the roof, Sean yanked the lock-pick tools from the knife, twisted and poked, freed the lock with astonishing speed, and jerked the door open.

As a policeman yelled, Sean and Pittman darted through the doorway. At once, in the dim light of a stairwell, Sean locked the door behind them.

"The washing machines. They know about the washing machines," Sean blurted to himself. "Who the hell told them about the washing machines?" Fists pounded on the door. Sean raced down the stairs. Pittman followed. "Who told them about the washing machines?", Sean kept muttering. Or are they after me? Pittman wondered.

"Don't look behind you. Just keep walking toward the corner. They rounded it. "So far so good," Sean said. He hailed a taxi.

"Don't let the driver think you're in a rush," he told Pittman. They got in.

"Lower Broadway," Sean told the driver, then started humming. "Here's your knife back."

"Thanks. I'm sorry I couldn't help pay for the taxi."

"Hey, I'm not in jail. That's payment enough."

They were in a loft on lower Broadway. The loft, which seemed to have once been a warehouse, had almost no furnishings, and those were grouped closely together in the middle of what felt like a cavern. Although sparse, the furnishings were expensive-an Italian-made leather sofa, a large Oriental rug, a brass coffee table and matching paint. Otherwise, in the shadows beyond the pale light from the lamp, there were crates stacked upon crates in every direction.

Sean slumped on the sofa and sipped from a Budweiser that he'd taken from a refrigerator next to some of the crates. "What is this place?" Pittman asked. , "A little hideaway of mine. You still haven't told me what you want. "Help."

"How?"

"I've never been on the run before."

"You're telling me you want advice?"

"Last night I slept in a park. It's been two days since I

I've been scrounging food. I can see how criminals run get caught. They finally just get worn down."

Then I take it you were smart enough not to try to get in touch with your family and friends."

"My only excuse for a family is my ex-wife, and I wouldn't ask her for anything," Pittman said. "As for my friends, well, I have to assume the police will be watching them in case I show up."

So you came to me."

'I kept asking myself who I knew to get help from but who the police wouldn't know about. Then it occurred to me-all the people I interviewed over the years. Some of them have the kind of expertise I need, and the police would never think I'd go to them."

Sean nodded in approval of Pittman's reasoning. "But I don't know what advice I can give you. There's a bathroom and a shower in back. You can spend the night here. For sure, I am. Other than that .

"There has to be something you can tell me."

"If they catch you, you've already got a brilliant defense. "Oh? What's that?"

"Insanity," Sean said.

"What?"

"All that business about your being suicidal. I assume that's another exaggeration. Pittman didn't respond. "You mean it's true?" Sean asked in surprise. Pittman stared at his Coke can. "Your son died," Sean said, "and you fell apart."

"That's right."

"My sister died when I was twenty-five. She was a year younger than me. Car accident," Sean said. "And?"

"I nearly drank myself to death. God, I loved her." "Then you understand," Pittman said.

"Yes. But it's a little different now, isn't it?" "How do you mean?"

"When you're tired and hungry and scared."

"I feel like I'm being selfish. My son was wonderful. And here I'm thinking about myself."

"I don't presume to tell you how to grieve. But I will tell you this-you can't go wrong if you do what your son would have wanted you to do. And right now, he'd have been telling you to look out for your ass."

The shower was primitive, just a nozzle over a plastic stall with a drain in the concrete floor. There wasn't any soap shampoo, or a towel. Pittman was pleased that he'd had the foresight to put a toilet kit in his gym bag. He found two steel chairs that he put near the shower's entrance, draping his sport coat over one, his slacks over the other. There wasn't any door to the shower, and after he came out to dry off with his dirty shirt, he discovered that, as he had hoped, the steatn from the shower had taken some of the wrinkles out of his jacket and pants. He put on fresh underwear and socks, decided to save his remaining clean clothes by putting on black cotton sweat suit, and returned to Sean among the crates.

Sean had opened a cabinet, revealing a television, and was watching CNN. "They sure like you."

Yeah, pretty soon I'll have my own series."

'Well," Sean said, opening another beer. "From the newspaper and now this, I have a pretty good idea of their side. What's yours?" He put his feet on the coffee table. For the second time that day, Pittman explained.

Sean listened intently, on occasion asked a question, and tapped his fingers together when Pittman finished. "Congratulations.