It was raining. Frankfurter’s face was swollen so Gleason did most of the talking.
Levy Solomon sat as calmly as a plaster Buddha in the only comfortable chair in the living room of his condo in the Century City complex in Beverly Hills. Gleason and Frankfurter were on the sofa, which was too soft to support their weight. Solomon smiled because he knew the sofa was too soft.
Frankfurter spread his hands in a gesture of openness so patently false that even Gleason winced, not with pain, but with embarrassment. Rain in L.A. Just their luck. Nothing was going right on this whole rotten assignment.
“We’ll make it fast,” Frankfurter said. There was a nasty snarl to his voice. He was tired, tired of the job, tired of chasing that fucking broad and then pulling back to clean up behind her. He’d fix Rita Macklin. Someday, somewhere, on his own time. He’d fix that little tit good.
“You’re Solomon, worked in Poland, retired. You stashed Teresa Kolaki and Rita Macklin here for a few days. Now, where’s the tapes?”
Levy Solomon blinked, smiled, and said, “Where’s the beef?”
“Jesus Christ, you think this is a fucking joke?” Gleason said.
“You have oral surgery?” Solomon asked.
“Yeah.”
“I feel for you, I really do. It’s the worst.”
“The guy caused it has it worse. Your buddy.”
“Who’s my buddy?”
“Devereaux.”
“Never heard of him.”
“Cut the shit. We got a plane to catch at midnight back to Chicago.”
“You live in Chicago?”
“No.”
“I had a brother lived there once, ran a haberdashery. On the South Side. I—”
“Cut it, will you? We’re all pros.”
“Is that right?” asked Levy Solomon.
“Look. What I like to do and what I’m gonna do is two different things. Personally, what I’d like to do is dangle you by your ankles out the window and maybe forget myself and let go.”
“Is that right?” Levy Solomon stared at Frankfurter.
“What I’m gonna do is tell you to call your special number.”
“My special number?”
“What is this guy, an echo chamber?”
“What number is that?”
Gleason spoke the number. It was right. Levy Solomon sighed, staring from face to face. “What’s it about?”
“Devereaux is blown away by KGB. In Zurich. We want the tapes that Little Miss Reporter made with Teresa Kolaki.”
“You can search the place. You got a search warrant?”
“You’re tiring me out, you know that? Fuck search warrants. I can give you dozens. What I want is no more shit. I want you to call up that special number, which I know that you know, and I want you to talk to your main man and he’s going to tell you to do just what I told you to do.”
Levy Solomon shrugged. It was amusing, playing with these two. Even if they were a bit slow. He stood up. “I’ll call in the other room.”
He went to the kitchen, dialed the number of the house in Arlington that patched through to the special number.
Hanley said, “Hello.”
“All right, it’s me,” Solomon said.
“Go ahead. Give it to them.”
“Is he really dead?”
“Yes.”
“All right.”
That was all. He replaced the receiver. Too bad. He had known Devereaux in Berlin—a little business ten or twelve years before. Devereaux had been a cold fish, all right, but he knew his stuff. He had let Levy Solomon direct the operation; he had held up his end with the East Germans. Too bad.
He walked into the living room again. “Locker at the airport.”
“We figured that.”
“Should be five tapes. Nothing was transcribed. No time. A few documents. Teresa gave Devereaux some stuff.”
“I don’t know about that,” Frankfurter said. “He can keep it now.” He laughed.
“Give it to the fishes,” Gleason said. “Dirty prick.”
“Devereaux was a good man,” Levy Solomon said as though he should say something like that. He didn’t like these guys.
“He was a prick,” Gleason snarled.
Levy studied him. “He hurt your mouth, huh?”
“Fuck you, too.”
“Son, it’s amazing the riffraff they let in NSA these days.”
“We didn’t tell you we were in—”
“You didn’t have to,” said Solomon. “You smelled up the room the minute you walked in.” He took a keychain from his pocket and walked to the wall switch and opened it with a screwdriver on the chain.
“Simple stuff,” said Frankfurter.
Levy Solomon turned, gave a vague smile again. “Okay, Einstein, find it yourself.”
Frankfurter pulled off the plate, turned it over, found nothing. He looked in the electrical box and found nothing.
Solomon stared at the pair of them. “I ought to make you sweat your flight some more but I can’t stand to have the apartment fumigated with the stink from you guys.”
Frankfurter said nothing.
Solomon took the plate and pried it apart. It was really two parts, sealed so tight that it appeared one. The key fit in a shallow hollow between the two plates. He gave it to them and turned his back to replace the wall plate. He spoke very softly.
“When I turn around I don’t want to see you guys here. Or you’ll both be picking teeth out of your palates.”
He screwed in the wall plate, humming to himself.
When he turned, they were gone.