The City When It Rains (32 page)

Lazar grasped Corman's hand again and squeezed.

Corman's eyes fled to the window, the dark city beyond it. He could feel small bones breaking in his soul.

“D-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d.”

Corman turned back to the old man. “I'll let you know what I find out about the woman,” he said. Then he lifted himself to his feet. “I have to be going now, Lazar. Lucy's home, so I've got to head back.”

Lazar's body suddenly tensed. His eyes searched the room frantically.

“You want something?” Corman asked.

“D-d-d-d-d-d-d.”

“Water?”

“D-d-d-d-d-d-d.”

Corman tried to follow the movement of Lazar's eyes. They were darting furiously in all directions, as if he were following the movements of an invisible bat.

“Food?” Corman asked. “You cold? Hot?”

The eyes continued to dart around. He seemed to be indicating everything in the room, the pictures on the wall, the television, the window. Then suddenly they stopped dead and fell toward the police band radio at Corman's side.

Corman smiled. “The city,” he said. “You want the city.”

Lazar nodded fiercely. “D-d-d-d-d-d-d-d,” he said loudly.

“You want to hear what's going on.” Corman took the radio from his belt. “SOD okay?” he asked as he wrapped the old man's fingers around it.

“D-d-d-d-d-d-d,” Lazar said happily.

“Okay,” Corman said softly. He switched the radio on, dialed the SOD code, then propped it firmly against the old man's ear. “That ought to keep you busy for a while.”

Lazar nodded vigorously as the first click of the radio sounded in the silent room.

“See you soon,” Corman said as he stepped away from the bed.

He walked to the door, then glanced back. The old man had eased himself into the pillow once again, the slender black receiver perched at his ear. His eyes grew intense, his brow slightly wrinkled in concentration as he listened to the first call. A fire was burning in a Brooklyn warehouse. No one knew if there were still any people trapped inside.

Trang was more or less poised at the entrance to Corman's building, squatting silently, his eyes following the traffic up and down the street. He rose quickly as Corman approached.

“How you doing,” Corman said, as he tried to pass.

Trang stepped in front of him. “Good evening, Mr. Corman,” he said. “As you know, we have a few matters to discuss.”

“I haven't sold anything yet,” Corman told him. “I'm still working on it.”

Trang looked unhappy. “It is very serious now. You many months in arrears.”

“I realize that,” Corman said crisply.

Trang's body seemed to puff out slightly, make itself appear more formidable. “I'm afraid I have taken steps.”

Corman stared at him expressionlessly.

“Filed papers.” Trang looked exasperated. “I'm sure you know what I mean, Mr. Corman. Eviction. You left me no choice. I did it with regret.”

In his mind, Corman saw two small white fangs slide down from Trang's mouth, then rise up again and slip behind the thick pink cloak of his upper lip. He felt his body tighten, make a quick, violent move toward him, then ease back, regain control.

“You'll get your rent,” he said curtly, then turned quickly and headed for the elevator doors.

Lucy groaned sleepily as he kissed her. She looked up briefly from the pillow, her eyes fluttering softly before they closed tight again. “Oh, Papa,” she groaned, a little irritably. “I was sleeping.”

“Go back then,” Corman said softly. “Good night.”

He walked out of her room as the phone rang. It was Edgar.

“Glad to see you're home at night,” he said. His voice seemed slightly strained. “Uh, I'm at home. I mean, in bed,” he added quickly. “You know, with Frances.”

“I understand.”

“But, uh, I wanted to let you know that I've made all the arrangements with Lexie.”

“Okay.”

“Saturday night.”

“Where?”

“She'll meet you at your apartment,” Edgar said. “She's going to be in the city all day, she told me. Probably shopping for some art. They're building a new house, you know.”

“No, I didn't.”

Edgar didn't go into it. “Anyway, she says she can meet you at your apartment.”

“Okay.”

“I tried to talk her out of meeting you there,” Edgar added.

“Why?”

“Come on, David,” Edgar said. “The way it looks. Grist for her mill.”

Corman glanced about the apartment, noting its disarray, and saw it as Lexie would, scattered, unkempt, collapsing at the center.

“She'll come by around eight,” Edgar said.

“I'll be here.”

“Make sure you are,” Edgar warned. “If you weren't, she might take that in a very bad way.”

“I'll be here,” Corman repeated coolly and started to hang up.

“David?” Edgar said quickly, stopping him.

“Yeah?”

“You okay?”

“I'm fine.”

“You don't sound it.”

“I'm busy, Edgar.”

“Developing?”

“Yeah, developing.”

“Well, listen,” Edgar said. “If anything happens. I mean, with money. It would be helpful if you could mention it to Lexie. Strictly in passing, of course.”

“Okay.”

“Technically, it's not her business,” Edgar added. “But we're dealing with a mood here.”

“I understand.”

“Just a passing mention, that's all.”

“If I sell anything,” Corman assured him, “I'll let her know.”

“All right,” Edgar said. “Get some sleep, for God's sake.”

“I will,” Corman told him, then hung up and walked to the window. Outside, the city struck him with such broken beauty that after a while, he pulled his eyes away from it and let them drift downward until they caught on a little feather of dust which clung to the thigh of his trousers. He brushed at it softly, but the faint brownish mark only sank further into the cloth, so he slapped at it harder, then vehemently, with his fist, until suddenly he stopped and began to cry, gently at first, then in wrenching shudders until he finally stepped back from the window, raised his hand to cover his mouth, and waited for it to pass.

When it had, he returned very quietly to Lucy's room. She'd turned over on her back, sleeping deeply, her arms spread wide apart, head arched slightly back, throat exposed, as if waiting to be sacrificed.

CHAPTER
THIRTY-ONE

“I'
M READY,”
Lucy said after she'd finished dressing the next morning.

Corman walked slowly to the door, opened it and ushered her into the corridor.

“Will you pick me up this afternoon?” Lucy asked.

Corman shook his head quickly, his mind concentrating on her with a sudden, biting pain, as if someone had slipped a needle into his brain. “Victor will,” he said, then added impulsively, “I'll miss you tonight.”

She looked at him oddly, then moved down the hall to the elevator.

They rode down silently, Corman clutching his camera bag while he thought of Trang, the eviction, the way it would send Lexie over the edge. He could see her sitting coolly across the table from him, her dark eyes as piercingly accurate as ever. She would know, no matter how much he lied. She would see it in the little feints, shifts, coughs. He was desperate, she would know that. Her true perception had never failed her in regard to his deficiencies.

“Did you and Joanna have a good time last night?” Lucy asked, prying gently, as she always did.

“Yeah.”

“You don't look like it.”

“We had an argument.”

“Did you break up?”

“I think so.”

She tucked her hand in his arm. “Sorry.”

“It happens.

“Not to Mom and Jeffrey,” Lucy said. “They don't ever fight.” Corman shrugged. “They're great people, that's why,” he said facetiously, before he could stop himself.

Lucy jerked at him slightly. “That's not nice.”

Suddenly the sound of her voice, the glancing touch of her hand went through him like a searing charge. He stopped and knelt down to her. “I love you,” he said emphatically. “I will always love you.”

She stared at him, alarmed.

“You must know that,” Corman told her.

Her face tightened. “What's the matter?”

Corman caught the panic in her eyes. “Nothing,” he said quickly, straightening himself, regaining control. “I just wanted you to know that I …”

She watched him fearfully, her eyes glistening. “Stop talking,” she said sternly. “Just stop talking.”

“I didn't mean to …”

“Just stop talking,” Lucy repeated adamantly.

He reached for her hand, but she drew it away.

“I just wanted you to know that I love you,” he said again, this time more calmly, trying to contain himself.

At the school, he gave her a brief hug. “See you,” he said lightly, forcing a smile. In his arms, she was very stiff, a bundle of dry stalks. “I didn't mean to get something started,” he explained. “Really, it's nothing. I just … ”

“Yeah, okay,” Lucy told him. She turned away, then back to him in a quick, smoking whirl. “You're lying,” she said sharply.

He started to lie again, then decided not to. Instead, he simply nodded and watched her eyes burn into him mercilessly before she spun around and disappeared into the moving crowd.

Corman found Lang on the second floor of Midtown North. He was sitting in the locker room munching a cheese Danish, a pair of handcuffs dangling from his one free hand. He looked brutish, and Corman realized that any photograph would only serve to make him look more so, moving the eye along the sloping belly, then up into the pudgy, featureless face, finally drawing it over to the chrome handcuffs, the way Lang's elongated head seemed plastered onto their shiny curving surface.

“What's up?” Lang asked as Corman walked up to him. “You working an EMS beat or something?”

Corman sat down beside him, his eyes moving up the long row of battered metal lockers. Several patrolmen were getting into uniform, struggling with their belts and citation pads, checking out the smudges on their brass buttons.

Lang offered a thin, reptilian smile. “I thought maybe you'd seen that guy I put in Saint Clare's this morning,” he said. “Fucking skell. Tried to hoist an old lady off a roof on Forty-ninth Street.” He shook his head. “I got there just in time. They may give me a medal.” He laughed. “You should have been there. You could have taken my picture.”

Corman reached into his camera bag and took out the notebook.

Lang eyed it suspiciously. “What's that?”

“For notes,” Corman explained. “Just in case.”

“Notes?” Lang said. His face tightened. “What kind of notes?”

“I'm still working on that woman,' Corman said. “And I was wondering if you'd come up with any background on her.”

Lang shrugged. “I asked her father the routine stuff,” he said. “Why'd she do it? Bullshit questions like that.” He took a bite from his Danish and continued talking, his words slightly muffled. “They don't ever know, the parents. It's all a mystery to them. Shit, man, he didn't even know where she was.”

“At the funeral, he was pretty upset,” Corman told him.

“You went to the funeral?”

Corman nodded. “No one there but Rosen.”

Lang washed the Danish down with a gulp of coffee. “Figures,” he said. “With a broad like that.”

“Like what?”

“A loner,” Lang explained. “Nobody in the whole fucking neighborhood knew who she was. All they'd done is, they'd seen her. That was it. As far as shooting the shit with her, passing the time of day? Nothing.”

Corman looked at him curiously. “So you did talk to a few people in the neighborhood?”

“That's right.”

“Why? If it was a routine suicide.”

Lang smiled. “Because of you, shithead.”

“Me?”

“That fucking button,” Lang told him. “We had to cover our asses.” He shrugged. “So, we asked around a little.”

“Did anything turn up?”

Lang shook his head. “Listen, Corman, I don't know why you got such a bug up your ass on this case, but take it from me, it's a complete zero. I'm talking, closed tight. You ask me, that girl dropped out of the whole human race. Put up that sign, you know,
DO NOT DISTURB.

“But why?”

Lang smiled. “My guess is, some fucking guy screwed her up.”

“But who?”

“Coulda been some drifter,” Lang told him. “Maybe some ass-hole she bumped into while she was squeezing tomatoes at the A & P.” He shrugged. “That's the way it is with women. Some scumbag comes along, they can't get over how great he is.”

Corman glanced at his notebook, its cover still closed, the pencil in his other hand motionless beside it. “So you've got absolutely nothing?” he asked.