Only then did I notice the large figure out cold in a chair to the left.
Alon Davidson.
Even in his slumped position, with his head lolling against his chest, Davidson looked massive. Six foot five or six, very wide across the shoulders and deep across the chest. Tanned, muscular arms like tree trunks that culminated in hands the size of melons. Instinctively, I ran my tongue over my teeth, thinking how many of them I would have lost had I not moved my head just before Davidson's fist had struck.
My gaze shifted from him to Michael. How had Michael, who was much shorter and lighter, managed to overpower this giant? And he seemed to have done so without getting a single scratch in the process.
I said to Michael, "You dragged him in here?"
Michael nodded.
"He was around earlier," said Greta, gesturing toward Davidson. "I saw him peering through the window. He didn't come in."
He wouldn't need to. He could have gotten my description from his wife. Or from someone else who knew me, another customer at the café maybe. So he came around to make sure I was at Greta's, and then he waited outside in the dark. He must've waited for hours, giving his anger time to build to a boil. And when I came out, he pounced.
If it hadn't been for Michael, I would likely have been severely injured. Perhaps even killed. Maybe Davidson would have disfigured my face. Like he'd done to Esther and Willie? I glanced again at the knife on the table.
"Who is he, Adam?" Greta asked.
"Alon Davidson," I said, leaning forward for a better look at him. He had on gray work pants and a yellow shirt with very short sleeves that showed his developed biceps. There were bloodstains on and around the shirt collar. His hair was black and cropped very short. Blood glued the short hairs at his crown. I couldn't see his face with his head drooped forward.
"Can you wake him up?" I asked Michael.
Without a word he stepped forward, reached one hand toward Davidson's face, and made a twisting motion. Davidson jerked in his chair, a sharp cry escaping his mouth. His head came up, eyes popping open. They were set very deep and a very dark brown. Purple bruising circled the left eye, the skin there already starting to swell. Blood caked along his eyebrow. More blood clogged his nostrils, and his large masculine nose was either badly bruised or broken. Two or three days' worth of bristles grassed his cheeks and chin. His brow and jaw and chin matched his physique—all were large and made up of inelegant lines, like a pile of rocks had been sown together atop his barrel of a neck. The result wasn't as ugly as it sounded. If you rinsed off the blood, some might consider it a handsome face, in a brutal sort of way.
Davidson turned his head this way and that until finally his eyes came to rest on my face. A sneer curled his lips, his eyes burned hot, and his body drew tense like a loaded spring. For a second I thought he was going to lunge across the table at me, bloodied as he was. Then Michael laid a hand on his shoulder, surprisingly gentle, and said softly, "I think Adam has some questions for you. You'd better answer them." Then he stepped back to lean against the wall, got out a cigarette, and put it in his mouth.
Davidson didn't answer for a moment. He just stared at Michael with fear on his face. Alongside the fear was wonder, as if he were asking himself, just like I had a minute ago, how this much smaller man had bested him. He turned back to face me.
"You're lucky this guy got me from behind," Davidson said. There was a swagger in his voice, but his body was no longer tense.
"Otherwise?" I prompted, resisting the urge to remind him how he had ambushed me.
"Otherwise I'd have given you a well-deserved beating."
"Deserved? For what?"
"For telling my wife lies. I come home after a long night on my boat, my wife sees me walk in the door, and she starts bawling. Accuses me of having an affair with a friend of hers, Esther Kantor. I ask her who put such lies in her head and she gives me your name. Took me all day to find you."
"Find me to do what?"
"To teach you a lesson you weren't about to forget anytime soon."
"But not for lying about you. Because I wasn't lying, was I, Alon?"
"Yeah, you were. I never had an affair with Esther."
"Now you're the one who's lying, Alon. Esther told a friend of hers about you, about the affair."
His eyes bulged. "What? She's lying. Tell me who this bitch is. Why, I'll—" He bit off the rest of his sentence.
"You'll what? Punch her in the face?"
Davidson shook his head. "I don't hit women."
"This friend isn't the only person who saw you and Esther together. A neighbor saw the two of you kissing."
"More lies."
"By the docks. A few days before the murders. Ring any bells?"
By the way his eyes darted this way and that, I could tell that it did. He shifted in his seat, looked from me to Greta to Michael and back to me.
