Her apartment felt particularly small. It had a way of expanding or contracting, depending on how the day went. Today it struck her as ludicrous, these little rooms in which she, an expensively educated thirty-eight-year-old woman, found herself living. Remember: its a prize. In todays market, a dinky one-bedroom on Fifth Street cost a grand and a half, minimum. Be grateful for your rent-controlled life. Embrace the fact that you live above the poverty line.
She went to pour herself a vodka, decided against it. Better stay stone-cold sober, in case the kid should call. She made herself a cup of tea instead, took her Whitman down from the shelf, and curled up on the love seat with it.
I celebrate myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
Whitman, Walt. She hadnt thought about him, really, since college. Yes, she was an avid reader, but she wasnt the kind of person who sat home at night and read poetry for pleasure. She knew the basics: Americas great visionary poet, alive sometime in the 1800s, produced in his long life this one enormous book, which he kept revising and expanding the way another man might endlessly remodel and add onto his house. Big, white Santa Claus beard, floppy hat. Liked boys.
He liked boys, didnt he? Was that true? She paged through the book.
Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,
Twenty-eight young men, and all so friendly,
Twenty-eight years of womanly life, and all so lonesome.
Right. What else?
The beards of the young men glistened with wet, it ran from their long hair,
Little streams passed all over their bodies.
An unseen hand also passed over their bodies,
It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs.
Would the kid have read that? Maybe, maybe not. Hed quoted from the opening stanza, nothing more. A smart kid picked up all kinds of things.
Still, there was something sexual about this. A boy embraces an older man and blows them both up.
Were all the same person. We all want the same things.
She kept hearing his voice in her head. Giving a kidlike performance, she thought. A child who was doing his best to act like a child.
Yet she didnt feel the murder in him. The kid was, of course, crazy by definition. But still, she prided herself on a certain ability to suss out the truly dangerous. She couldnt name the specifics, though there were plenty of well-documented signs. This was something else. A flavor, a whiff. A buzz that was the best term she had for it. As if she could hear the tiny sound being made by a bad connection, the particular bit of faulty wiring that made murder more than just a fantasy.
It was complicated by the fact that every now and then, some of them were right. The tobacco companies had discovered a secret ingredient to make cigarettes more addictive. The North Koreans/iad been kidnapping Japanese tourists to educate their spies about the particulars of Japanese customs. Those noises coming from the apartment next door were in fact being made by a full-grown tiger.
She heard a noise in the hallway, right outside her door. A scraping. Something. Like a heel dragging across the tile. It was probably Arthur next door, pausing for an emphysemic breath before stumbling on, but she knew the sounds Arthur made; she knew
all the ordinary sounds the tenants produced in the hallways. This one wasnt familiar.
She raised her head from the book. She listened.
There it was again. A furtive, scrabbling sound. If this were the country, it might have been an opossum, scratching at the shingles.
The country teeth out there in the dark?
She got up, went and stood by the door. Nothing now. Still, she was shaky. A little shaky. Given the times. She didnt have a gun, being deterrence. Had never wanted one. Now she wondered.
She said Hello? and was embarrassed by the girlish fear in her voice. Fuck that. Fuck them if they wanted her meek. She opened the door.
No one. Just the ordinary drear of the corridor, its brackish aquarium light, its tiles the color of decayed teeth. She stepped out and took a proper look. Empty. The sound had probably been coming from the street or through the wall from the other next-door apartment (where the druggy, dreamy young couple in residence were always engaged in some mysterious project that involved endless little tappings and draggings). There was no one and nothing.
It took her another moment to see what was on the wall opposite her door. In white chalk, in perfect if slightly labored grade-school cursive, someone had written, TO DIE IS DIFFERENT FROM WHAT ANY ONE SUPPOSES, AND LUCKIER.
Neither Pete nor the FBI boys could offer much. They questioned the neighbors, of course, and of course nobody knew anything, had seen anyone untoward, or etcetera. As every tenant knew, it was semi-challenging but not impossible to get into the labyrinth of alleys and dumping grounds behind the building and slip in through the broken back door. The buildings denizens had recently observed the fifth anniversary of their ongoing attempts to get the landlord to fix it.
Pete stood in Cats living room, sweating majestically, sipping the espresso shed made for him.
Hows the coffee? she asked.
Strong.
Only way I know how to make it.
Im frankly at a loss about how this asshole figured out where you live.
There are about a dozen ways.
Right.
This was one of the surprises there were no elaborate systems for keeping cops anonymous. That was movie stuff. Matter of fact, the systems that did exist, for the higher-level grunts, didnt work all that well. Just about anybody with true determination and a computer could track down a cop or an FBI agent or an auditor with the IRS, knock on the door one night, and deliver a lethal message. Only the biggest bosses had protection.
Pete said, You want one of the guys to stay with you tonight? Or would you rather go to a hotel?
I can spend the night at Simons.
If theyve got your address here, they may know about him, too.
Simons building is probably safer than FBI headquarters. Some exiled king lives in one of the penthouses, plus a few very kidnappable CEOs.
Have you called him?
I was just about to. He should be done with his client by now.
Call him. I want to get you settled somewhere.
She dialed Simon on her cell. She told him the story.
My God, he said.
I am, in fact, a little rattled, she told him.
Come right over.
I will.
Pete took her. They left the FBI boys lifting the ten thousand fingerprints from every inch of the premises. Who knew? Maybe theyd come up with something.
Pete walked her into the lobby of Simons building on Franklin. He whistled softly over the maple paneling, the silent explosion of pink lilies on the concierges desk.
Fat, he said under his breath.
She announced herself to Joseph, the supremely capable Korean doorman.
Night, she said to Pete. Must be nice, he said.
Ill see you in the morning, she answered curtly. She was in no mood right now.
Right. See you in the morning.
Simon was waiting for her upstairs. He held her. She was surprised to realize that she might start weeping, not so much from exhaustion or nerves but from the sheer joy of having someone to go to.
Unbelievable, he whispered. Unbelievable, she said.
She sat on his sofa, declined his offer of a drink. She loved his apartment, felt appropriately guilty for loving it, but loved it all the same. Four big rooms on the twenty-second floor, twelve-foot ceilings. The people walking the streets below, trying to find the least bruised bananas at the corner market, hoping not to get hit by cabs they had no idea what hovered over them, these oases of granite and ebony, these sanctuaries. The scorched plains rose to alpine peaks, where the wizards lived. Up here it was temple lights and a sequestered, snowy hush.
Simon was a collector. Nineteenth-century maps, Chinese pottery, vintage toys, and music boxes. Cat kept meaning to ask him. Why those particular objects, out of all the things in the world? She hadnt asked. She preferred the mystery. Simon bought and sold futures. He saw some particular significance in maps, pots, and playthings. She liked it that way. She spent enough time searching for explanations at work.
Simon sat beside her. What happens now? he said. She saw the spark in his eyes. He was turned on.
Theyre checking out my building. I dont expect them to find anything.
How can they not find anything?
There are thousands of fingerprints in a building like mine. And Well. Its time you knew. Were not really all that good at this. We work very, very hard. But a lot of the time we just end up arresting the wrong person, and that person goes to jail, and everybody feels safer.
Simon paused, nodding. He seemed unsurprised, or had decided to act unsurprised. He said, The pay-phone thing is funny, isnt it? Why not a cell?
Cell phones have owners. This is brilliant, in its way. Low-tech is the best way to go. You pump a few coins in, say your piece, and run. We cant watch every pay phone in the five boroughs. These little fuckers are smart.
Do you think youll catch him? Simon asked. We have to. We cant screw up something this big.
And your role is?
To go back to work in the morning and wait for another call.
Thats it?
For now, yes.
He was disappointed, naturally. He wanted her careening around in an unmarked car. He wanted her cracking the case, saving the day. It was not sexy or interesting, her waiting by the phone. It was just say it too maternal.
She said, I was reading Whitman. At the same time some maniac was writing a line from Whitman on the wall outside my door.
Ive never read Whitman, he said.
Of course you havent. Youre Cedar Rapids. Youre Cornell and a Harvard MBA. Your people dont do poetry. They dont need to.
Stop.
She said, Chapman was carrying a copy of Catcher in the Rye when he shot John Lennon.
Why do you think the kid would choose Whitman?
Im trying to figure that out.
Why did Chapman choose Salinger?
Well, Id say it was to feed his own narcissistic sense of himself as a sensitive loner. He identified with Holden Caulfield. Holden was right, and the rest of the world was wrong. Other people might think it was a bad idea to kill John Lennon, but Chapman thought he knew better.