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done, a policeman's lot is not an 'appy one, 'appy one.") She saw two drug
scores and a cruising hooker, then a familiar face. She walked over and leaned
against the wall next to the pickpocket and sometime informant.
"Hey, Battles," she murmured. "How's doing?"
"Inspector Martinelli. Looking good. I'm clean."
"I'm sure you are, Bartles, and how about we stay that way? Such a pretty
day, let's not spoil it for the folks from Nebraska, huh?"
"I'm not working, I told you. I'm just waiting for the wife."
" 'His capacity for innocent enjoyment is just as great as any honest
man's,'" she sang, out of tune, startling a passing young couple from Visalia.
"What're you going on about?"
"Just something I heard on the tube the other night. Bar-ties, I think when
your wife's finished her shopping you should take her home. I'm in a good mood
and if you spoil it, I might break one of your fingers getting the cuffs on
you."
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"I'm not working today," he insisted.
"Good. Neither am I. Have you seen a tall old man with a beard doing some
kind of a clown act?"
"First she threatens me, then she asks me a favor."
"No threat, and it's not a favor. Just asking a civil question.
"You wouldn't know a oh Christ, it's my wife. Get lost, will you?"
"Have you seen him?"
'Two blocks down, across the street. Now go!" he hissed.
Kate moved off, but not before she had seen the light of suspicion come on in
the face of a thin woman in shorts and spike heels. She whistled softly to
herself and turned into one of the nearby clothing shops, where she chose a
hot pink nylon baseball cap that was embroidered with a truncated Golden Gate
Bridge and the words SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA, buying it and a package of
chewing gum. She paused at the tiny mirror beside a display of abalone
earrings to put her hair up under the hat, then unpeeled the gum and took out
a piece, which she never chewed by choice, but it rendered her infinitely more
harmless than all the makeup in a theater. Chewing and humming and slouching
behind her shades, she went to see the act of Brother Erasmus.
?
THIRTEEN
?
A certain precipitancy was the very poise of his soul.
It really was a stunningly beautiful morning, Kate thought with pleasure, the
kind of day that tempts people from New York and Boise to move to California.
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It is easy to brave the earthquakes and the unemployment and the killing
mortgages when a person can eat lunch outside wearing only a cotton shirt,
knowing that much of the country is up to its backside in snow. Strolling
along in the carnival atmosphere, kites dipping out over the water, the air
smelling of fish and aftershave, the waters of the Golden Gate sparkling, with
the bridge, Mount Tamalpais, and the island fortress of Alcatraz looking on
benevolently, Kate could forget for a few minutes that she was here on
business. She paused to examine the odd wares of the shop that sold live
oysters complete with pearls, stopped again to watch a young black kid
standing on a box playing robot while his buddy made sure everyone had the hat
held under their noses, and then she bought an ice cream cone for camouflage,
of course. By then she had spotted Erasmus. She went up casually, hiding
behind hat and cone and the large crowd he had attracted.
He was dressed as Rosalyn Hall had described him, in khaki trousers, a
too-small blue-and-white-striped T-shirt, and running shoes that were just a
bit too long. He also had a Raiders cap perched on the back of his head and an
exaggeratedly garish gold watch on his wrist. His face, as Rosalyn had said,
was very lightly shaded. From the side where Kate stood, his face above the
beard seemed slightly more dusky than usual, but when he turned around, she
saw that the left side of his face was pale, almost chalky. Subtle, and
disconcerting.
The most striking thing, however, was not Erasmus himself but his wooden
staff: Propped upright against a newspaper vending machine, it wore on its
carved head a miniature Raiders cap and a pair of child's sunglasses, and
beneath its chin a scrap of the blue-and-white T-shirt fabric covered the worn
piece of ribbon. Kate had not really noticed how like Erasmus the carving was,
probably because the wood was so dark that the details faded, but it was all [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]