She could not now believe he would be torn rudely from her. She could not believe it, she would not believe it. She had told him what she wanted for Christmas. She wanted him. She had said it earnestly, knowing he took it as jest, but she had meant every word of it. And now, her words were being hurled back into her face by a cruel wind. Because now she really wanted him for Christmas, now he was the only thing she really wanted for Christmas. Earlier, she had been secure when she asked for him, knowing she would certainly have him. But now, the security was gone, now there was left only a burning desire for her man to live. She would never again want anything more than Steve Carella.
And so, in the dimness of the room, she prayed, not knowing she was praying, and the words ran through her mind over and over and over again:
Detective-Lieutenant Peter Byrnes went down to the lobby at six fifteen that evening. He had been waiting in the corridor outside Carella's room all day long, hoping he could get to see him again. He had seen Carella only for a brief moment before Carella went unconscious again.
Carella had whispered a word, and the word was "Gonzo."
But Carella could say nothing more about the pusher, and so Byrnes still had only a flimsy description, a description he'd got from the three kids Carella had pinched in the car that day. No one else had heard of Gonzo, so how could Byrnes possibly pick him up? If Carella died…
He had put the thought out of his mind, sitting in the corridor. He called the precinct every half hour. And every half hour, he called home. The precinct had nothing to report. There were no leads to the new death of Dolores Faured. There were no leads to the old deaths of Anнbal and Maria Hernandez. There were no leads to Gonzo.
Things weren't much better at home. Larry was still in the process of shaking his sickness. The doctor had come again, but nothing seemed to displease Byrnes' son more. Byrnes wondered if he would ever be cured, and he wondered if they would ever find the man or men who were committing murder in his precinct. It was two days before Christmas, but Christmas would be a bleak time this year.
At six fifteen, he left the corridor and went down to the lobby. He stopped at the reception desk and asked the girl there if there was a decent eating place in the neighborhood. She suggested a greasy spoon on Lafayette.
He was heading for the revolving doors when a voice called, "Lieutenant?"
Byrnes turned. He didn't recognize the man at first. The man was small and thin, and he carried a box of candy under his arm, and he looked seedy, the way a normally seedy-looking person appears when he's trying to look dressed up. And then the face fell into place, and Byrnes said gruffly, "Hello, Danny. What're you doing here?"
"I came to see Carella," Danny said. He blinked and looked up at Byrnes.
"Yes?" Byrnes said, untouched.
"Yeah," Danny said. "How is he?"
"Bad," Byrnes said. "Look, Danny, you don't mind but I was on my way out to dinner. I'm kind of in a hurry."
"Sure, sure," Danny said.
Byrnes looked at him, and perhaps because it was almost Christmas, he added, "you know how it is. This Gonzo character shooting Carella hasn't…"
"Who? Did you say Gonzo? Is he the one shot St-Detective Carella?"
"That's the way it looks," Byrnes said.
"What are you telling me?" Danny asked. "A punk kid like that? He took Steve Carella?"
"Why?" Byrnes said. He was interested now, but only because Danny had referred to Gonzo as if he knew him. "What do you mean, a punk kid?"
"He can't be more than twenty, not the way I got it."
"What do you know, Danny?"
"Well, like Ste- Well, Carella asked me to scout around on Gonzo, and I didn't come up with nothing. I mean, I scouted around because Ste…"
"For Christ's sake, call him Steve," Byrnes said.
"Well, some cops are touchy about…"
"What have you got to say, Danny, goddamnit!"
"Even Steve don't like me calling him Steve," Danny admitted, and then-seeing the look on Byrnes' face-rapidly went on. "Nobody knew this Gonzo, you dig? So with me, it becomes a mathematical problem. How come these three kids coming to make a buy from this guy know him by Gonzo, and how come nobody on the scene knows him? It figures he ain't from the neighborhood, am I right?"
"Go ahead," Byrnes said, interested.
"Then I ask myself, if he ain't from the neighborhood, how come he inherits the dead Hernandez' junk route? This don't figure. I mean, it looks like he at least knew Hernandez, don't it? And if he knew Hernandez, maybe he knew the sister, too. This is the way I was thinking, Lieutenant, putting together all the things Steve told me."
"So what'd you get?"
