Page 11 (1/2)

I was toweling dry when the phone rang I didn't want to pick it up I knehat I was going to hear

"That was just a warning, Scudder"

"Bullshit You were trying You're just not good enough"

"When we try, we don'tup I picked it up a few seconds later and told Isaiah no calls before nine, at which tiot into bed to see whether I could sleep

I slept better than I'd expected I woke up only twice during the night, and both times it was the same dream, and it would have bored a Freudian psychiatrist to tears It was a very literal dream, no symbols to it at all Pure reenact's to the moment the car closed on me, except that in the dreao all the way, and just as I kneas going to put me between the rock and the hard place, I woke up, with uess it's a protectivelike that Your unconscious s you can't handle and plays with them while you sleep until soood those dreams did, but when I awoke for the third and last tiet s It seeood about So to provoke all along And soht about the phone call It had not been the Marlboro man I was reasonably certain of that The voice I'd heard was older, probably around e, and it had had the flavor of New York streets in its tones

So there looked to be at least two of the else to know, another fact to file and forget Had there been more than one person in the car? I tried to reli down on ht at my eyes And by the ti car, it was already a good distance pastthe plate nu heads

I went downstairs for breakfast, but couldn't ht a pack of cigarettes out of the machine and smoked three of them with my coffee They were the first I'd had in alotten a better hit if I'd punched theht into a vein They made me dizzy but in a nice way After I'd finished the three, I left the pack on the table and went outside

I went down to Centre Street and found my way to the Auto Squad room A pink-cheeked kid who looked to be fresh out of John Jay asked if he could help me There were half a dozen cops in the roonize any of them I asked if Ray Landauer was around

"Retired a few o," he said To one of the others he called, "Hey, Jerry, when did Ray retire anyway?"

"Musta been October"

He turned to me "Ray retired in October," he said "Can I help you?"

"It was personal," I said

"I can find his address if you want to give me a minute"

I told him it wasn't important It surprised h to retire But he was older than me, come to think of it, and I had had fifteen years on the force and had been off it for e iven me a peek at the hot-car sheet But I would have had to tell hih a lot of bullshit that wouldn't be necessary with so toward the subway When an erabbed it I told the driver I wanted the Sixth Precinct

He didn't knohere it was A few years ago, if you wanted to drive a cab you had to be able to name the nearest hospital or police station or firehouse from any point in the city I don't knohen they dropped the test, but now all you have to do is be alive

I told hiot there without too much trouble I found Eddie Koehler in his office He was reading so hiuy like this accoets his naovernor?"

I thought of Huysendahl "Everybody wants to be governor"

"That's the fucking truth Why do you figure that is?"

"You're asking the wrong person, Eddie I can't figure out why anybody wants to be anything"

His cool eyes appraised me "Shit, you alanted to be a cop"

"Since I was a kid I never wanted to be anything else, as far back as I can ree I wonder why Soht up, the cop on the corner, everybody respecting hiuys"

"I don't know They always shot Cagney in the last reel"

"Yeah, but the fucker had it coney but you wanted hiet aith it Sit down, Matt I don't see you much lately You want some coffee?"

I shook ar from his ashtray and put a match to it I took two tens and a five from my wallet and put them on his desk

"I just earned a hat?"

"You will in a et wind of it"

"You don't have anything to worry about, do you?"

"Who knows? You get ato worry about" He folded the bills and put theot out the slip of paper I'd written on before going to bed "I've got part of a license number," I said

"Don't you know anybody at Twenty-sixth Street?"

That here the Motor Vehicle people had their offices I said, "I do, but it's a Jersey plate I' the car was stolen and that you can turn it up on the GTA sheet The three letters are either LKJ or LJK I only got a piece of the three numbers There's a nine and a four, possibly a nine and two fours, but I don't even know the order"

"That should be plenty, if it's on the sheet All this towing, sometimes people don't report thefts They just assuo down to the pound if they don't happen to have the fifty bucks, and then it turns out it was stolen Or by then the thief du for a tow, but not froet the sheet"

He left his cigar in the ashtray, and it was out again by the tiot back "Grand Theft Auto," he said "Give ot a make and model on it?"

"Nineteen forty-nine Kaiser-Frazer"

"Huh?"

"Late-ot They all look about the sa on the ht Oh, hello, LJK nine one four"

"That sounds like it"

"Seventy-two Ireen"

"I didn't count the doors, but that's got to be it"