“No fiendish devices, no infernal machines,” Baldy said. He sat down and picked up his glass. “As far as the window is concerned, I don’t think it can be opened from the outside. My guess is that it wasn’t completely latched. There’s a catch on each side, just above the ventilator. If only one of them was unlatched, it would give a man a chance to edge up one side and slip a knife blade through to disengage the other catch. They’re both latched now. And we’ve been over every square inch of that room.”
“If nothing was disturbed, why was the window opened?” I asked.
“My guess,” Kim said, “is that they were in there when Betty arrived and didn’t have a chance to finish what they had started.”
Betty gasped again. “When I heard that noise, I thought it was the wind blowing the curtains. You mean—”
Baldy patted her shoulder. “They’re gone now, lambie. Don’t keel over. You’re a big girl now.”
The color came back into her round cheeks and she smiled shyly at Baldy.
Kim walked over and up the steps to the door. He examined the sliding bolt and chain of ornamental brass, tugged at the chain.
“Strong enough,” he said.
“How do we work this?” I asked.
Kim sauntered down into the room, his hands in his pockets. “How about this? We’ll shove off now and wait in the hall until you kids get the chain across the door. Either Baldy or I will be back early in the morning. In the meantime, don’t open the door for any reason at all. Don’t leave this room unless the building starts to burn down. Understand?”
Betty and I nodded in unison. He pulled a fiat automatic out of the side pocket of his suit coat and handed it to me, the muzzle pointing at the ceiling. He sat down beside me.
“This little thing here—” he began.
“—is the safety catch,” I said. “And the clip holds eight and the gun is a basic Browning patent.”
Kim gave me a look of complete disgust. “Showoff!” he said.
Betty and I walked them to the door. Baldy muttered something to Betty and she went out into the hall with him, closing the door behind them.
“Pause for refreshment,” Kim said, leaning back against the wrought iron railing, his face moody. I looked at him with narrowed eyes. I began to tap my foot.
“At least you should make me say no,” I said.
At that moment the door swung open and Betty came in, a canary-well-swallowed look on her face. Kim left without a word. I slammed the door and locked it.
“He’s nice,” Betty said dreamily.
“At least he’s cooperative,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, go to bed!”
“Why, Hank honey! You don’t mean that after brushing off half the loose dough in New York, you’d get swooney over a two-bit lawyer?”
“Go to bed!”
She giggled and I walked off and slammed my bedroom door. After I had climbed in and after the lights were out, she tapped on my door.
“Come on in,” I said. “I’m not asleep yet.”
She was in her powder blue robe. I saw the hall light shine on it just before she closed my door. The bed creaked as she sat on the edge of it.
“Are you mad because I kidded you?” she asked.
“For heavens sake, Betty! Of course not! I was just mad at Kim. I thought when you went into the hall with Baldy, he’d try to kiss me. I was all braced to give him a polite no thank you. I must be slipping. His nice brown eyes don’t glaze any more when he looks at me. He looks at me like a scientist inspecting a bug.”
“Maybe he’s worried about you.”
“I hope that’s it. Or else my best friends better start telling me.”
We sat without speaking for a time. Though I ached with weariness and the reaction from shock, I wasn’t sleepy. I guessed that Betty felt the same way. I heard the far-off blare of a tug in the harbor, the soft sound of tires when a car went by. Around us were millions of people. A certain percentage would die during the night or the next day.
There’s nothing like wondering if you’re going to die to help you do a little evaluation of your place in society. I thought of myself in some bright little kitchen in some bright little house. Maybe if Mother and Dad hadn’t died I’d be in one of those bright kitchens. Maybe I’d have a kid. The husband would be a cop, maybe. A tall guy. A nice guy. I could almost see him. For some dopey reason, he wore Kim’s face.
Suddenly I was homesick for the old neighborhood, the old way of life. Running up the stairs two at a time after school. The cooking smell in the hallway of the flat. The noise of kids at play out in the summer dusk.
I wanted to cry.
To keep myself from crying, I started to talk about the people who had been in that neighborhood. I talked about the old times.
Betty and I had done a little reminiscing in the past. Not much. We’d never had time to do much.
“Remember,” I said softly, “the time that Hubey Goekner was trying to figure out what was going on in that pianobox in back of the grill and fell off the roof on top of it.”
“Um hmm,” she said.
