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Chapter 11

By the tiot off the subway at Broadway and One Hundred Tenth, I was a lot less ier had decided to kill s, there was no particular reason why he would have stolen a car two blocks away froh it ought to add up to so, but I wasn't sure that it did

Of course, if Stacy Prager had a boyfriend, and if he turned out to be the Marlboro , a five-story brownstone which now held four apart her bell, and there was no answer I rang a couple of other bells on the top floor-it's surprising how often people buzz you in that way-but no one was home, and the vestibule lock looked very easy I used a pick on it, and I couldn't have opened it hts of stairs and knocked on the door of 4-C I waited and knocked again, and then I opened both the locks on her door and e roo of Salvation Army furniture I checked the closet and the dresser, and all I learned was that if Stacy had a boyfriend he lived elsewhere There was no signs of ave the place a very casual toss, just trying to get some sense of the person who lived there There were a lot of books,with soazines: New York and Psychology Today and Intellectual Digest There was nothing stronger than aspirin in the ood order, and it in turn gave the iood order I felt a violator standing there in her aparth the clothes in her closet I grew increasingly unco to justify ot out of there and closed up after myself I locked one of the locks; the other had to be locked with a key, and I figured she would simply decide she had failed to lock it on the way out

I could have found a nice framed photo of the Marlboro man That would have been handy, but it just hadn't happened I left the building and went around the corner and had a cup of coffee at a lunch counter Prager and Ethridge and Huysendahl, and one of them had killed Spinner and had tried to killanywhere

Suppose it was Prager Things seeh they didn't really lock in place, they had the right sort of feel to them He was on the hook in the first place because of a hit-and-run case, and so far a car had been used twice Spinner's lettera curb at hiht And he was the one who seee was stalling for tier said he didn't kno he could raise the money

So suppose it was him If so, he had just tried to commit murder, and he hadn't made it work, and he was probably a little shaky about it If it was hie And if it wasn't him, I'd be in a better position to know it if I dropped in on hied a cab

The black girl looked up at me when I entered his office It took her a second or two to place me, and then her dark eyes took on a wary expression

"Matthew Scudder," I said

"For Mr Prager?"

"That's right"

"Is he expecting you, Mr Scudder?"

"I think he'll want to see me, Shari"

She seeot hesitantly to her feet and stepped out from behind the U-shaped desk

"I'll tell him you're here," she said

"You do that"

She slipped through Prager's door, drawing it swiftly shut behind her I sat on the vinyl couch and looked at Mrs Prager's seascape I decided that theover the sides of the boat There was no question about it

The door opened and she returned to the reception roo the door after her "He'll see you in about five ot important business with hiht That man has not been himself lately It just seerows, that's all the uess he's been under a lot of pressure lately"

"He has been under a strain," she said Her eyes challenged er's difficulty It was a charge I could not deny

"Maybe things will clear up soon," I suggested

"I truly hope so"

"I suppose he's a good ood et to finish the sentence, because just then there was the sound of a truck backfiring, except trucks do that at ground level, not on the twenty-second floor She had been standing beside her desk, and she stayed frozen there for a moment, eyes wide, the back of her hand pressed to her et out of my chair and beat her to his door

I yanked it open, and Henry Prager was seated at his desk, and of course it had not been a truck backfiring It had been a gun A sun,22 or25 caliber from the look of it, but when you put the barrel in your un is all you really need

I stood in the doorway, trying to block it, and she was atat my back For a moment I didn't yield, and then it seeht as I to look at him I took a step into the roo to see