They sat at a table at the back of the place. There was a steady stream of traffic to the rest rooms. Wade and Bent figured people were going in there to snort a few lines, but they were after a killer here, they didn't give a damn about arresting any penny-ante noses. That was the trouble when a city started sliding south. You couldn't bother about the little things anymore. When people were getting killed, you couldn't go chasing kids spraying graffiti on walls. You couldn't ticket a truck driver for blowing his horn. You couldn't bust people who were jumping subway turnstiles. When you had murder and rape and armed robbery to worry about, the rest was merely civilization.
"Tell us all about Sonny and Dick," Wade said.
"I don't know them," Dolly said. "Can I get something to eat? I came in here to get something to eat."
"Sure. What would you like, Dolly?"
"Ice cream," she said. "Chocolate, please."
They ordered a dish of chocolate ice cream for her. At the last minute, she decided she wanted sprinkles on it. The waiter carried the dish of ice cream to the counter and put sprinkles on it. When he came back to the table, she picked up a spoon and began eating at once.
"Yum," she said.
"Sonny and Dick," Bent said. "Two men, both black."
"I like black men," she said, and winked at them and licked her lips.
"So we've been told."
"Yum," she said, and spooned up more ice cream.
"Where are they now?" Wade asked.
"Don't know them," she said.
"Sonny what?" Bent said.
"Nope. Sorry," she said. Eating. Licking her lips. Licking the spoon.
"Dick what?" Wade asked.
"Don't know him, either."
"Remember Thursday night?"
"Nope."
"Remember where you were Thursday night?"
"Sorry, nope. Where was I?"
"Around ten o'clock, a little later?"
"Sorry."
"Remember Sloane Street?"
"Nope."
"3341 Sloane?"
"This is very good," she said. "You should try some. Want a taste?" she asked Bent and held out the spoon to him.
"Third floor," Wade said. "You and Sonny and Dick, cooking dope over a candle in a red holder."
"I don't do dope," she said. "I'm clean."
"Remember the shooting?"
"I don't remember anything like that. Could I have some more ice cream?"
They ordered another dish of chocolate ice cream with sprinkles on it.
"You really should try some of this," she told them, "it's yummy."
"One of your pals was packing a nine-millimeter auto," Wade said.
"Gee, what's that?" she said.
"It's a big pistol with a twenty-bullet clip in it. He fired down the stairs at us, remember?"
"I don't even know where Sloane Street is," Dolly said, and shrugged.
"Dolly, listen carefully," Wade said. "Put down your spoon and listen."
"I can listen while I'm eating," she said.
"Put down the spoon, honey."
"I told you, I can …"
"Or I'll break your fucking arm," he said.
She put down the spoon.
"One of your pals killed somebody," he said.
She said nothing. Just kept watching him, a sullen, angry look on her face because he wouldn't let her eat her ice cream.
"Did you know that one of your pals killed somebody?"
"No, I didn't know that."
"We think it was Sonny, but it could have been Dick. Either way . . ."
"I don't know these people, so it don't mean a fuck to me," she said.
"He killed a cop's father," Wade said.
Dolly blinked.
He leaned in closer to her, giving her a good look at the knife scar that stretched tight and pink over his left eye. You dig black men, honey? Okay, how you feel about this one with his bad-ass scar?
"A cop's father," he repeated, coming down hard on the word.
She may have been stoned senseless not ten minutes ago, and maybe she was still flying, it was hard to tell. But now there was a faint flicker in those pale dead eyes. She was allowing the words to register, allowing the key words to penetrate, they were talking about a cop's father getting killed.
"You know what that means?" Bent asked. "Somebody killing a cop's father?"
"I don't know anybody named Sonny."
"It means every cop in this city's gonna be trackin' the man till they catch him. An' then he be lucky he makes it alive to jail."
"Don't matter shit to me," she said, "I don't know anybody named Sonny."
"That's good," Wade said, "because if you do know him . . ."
"I told you I don't."
"… and it turns out you were protecting him …"
"Nor Diz neither."
"Diz?" Wade asked at once. "Is that his name? Diz?"
Dolly still didn't realize she'd tripped herself.
"Diz what" Bent asked.
"If I don't know him, how would I know Diz what?"
"But you do know him, don't you, Dolly?"
"No, I…"
"You know both of them, don't you?"
And now they came at her from either side, hurling words at her, not waiting for answers, battering her with words, Wade on her right and Bent on her left, Dolly sitting between them with her spoon on the table and her chocolate ice cream melting fast.
"Sonny and Diz."
"Two black killers from DC."
"What're their last names, Dolly?"
"Tell us their last names."
"Sonny what?"
"Diz what?"
"They killed a cop's father!"
"You want to go down with them?"
"You want to keep on protecting two strangers?"
"Two killers?"
"You want every cop in this city on your ass?"
