Blood on the Street (A Smith and Wetzon Mystery, #4)

“Hey! Did you ever work for Shearson?”
    Bingo! She remembered. “No, but you do know me. I’m Wetzon. A headhunter. We met a long time ago, before the Crash.”
    “Hey, yeah, I sort of remember you. The Four Seasons, right?” He drove with his right arm on the back of the seat, turning to talk to her now and then when he came to a stop.
    “Right. I moved you to Marley Straus. Are you moonlighting?”
    He was an aggressive driver, tooling up Sixth Avenue, weaving around trucks and cabs, then east on Twenty-third Street to Third. “Naa,” he said. “I left the business about a year after the Crash, or rather, it left me. My clients were wiped out and scared shitless to come back in.”
    “I’m sorry.”
    He drove up Third Avenue to Forty-second Street and waited for the light to change. “Don’t be. I do okay with the cab, and I don’t have to listen to complaints from my clients on one side that I wasted their assets, and my manager on the other, pushing me to do more business, get my clients out of cash and T-bills. It was a no-win situation. Listen, the Street invited the small investor into the shower years ago, dropped the soap, and has been—excuse me—fucking him ever since.” He made a left and pulled up in front of Grand Central Station, magnificent and glowing in the sunlight. Weekend travelers were streaming in and out. Carlino turned to her. “But that isn’t to say I wouldn’t go back in when things get better. I’m just waiting for the right time.”
    She gave him ten dollars and told him to keep the change. A four-dollar tip. Was she crazy? No, just guilty. She walked into Grand Central and over to Zaro’s, where she bought half a dozen sticky buns to take up to Smith. If she hadn’t moved Carlino out of Shearson when she did, she wondered, would he still be in the business?
    She said so to Smith an hour and a half later in Westport as she strapped herself into the passenger seat of the Jag.
    “We didn’t twist his arm to move.” Smith backed the Jag up and turned around. “He’s responsible for himself. And he wasn’t about to turn down that nice upfront check.”
    “Yeah, I guess—”
    “Guess, nothing. How was the train?”
    “Uneventful. But last night, now that was interesting. Tell me first, how is Mark?”
    Smith’s face softened. “They were so cute. You should have seen them. They left at seven this morning carrying so much equipment they could hardly get on the bus. He’s gotten so tall. And grown up. His friend is such a nice, clean-cut boy. His mother is married to George Herzinger.”
    “Gee, Smith, not the newspaper tycoon?” Wetzon fluttered her eyelids, teasing.
    But Smith nodded seriously. “Uh-huh. Such good connections for my boy.”
    And for his mother, Wetzon thought, but she didn’t comment. Instead, she told Smith about the visit from Peiser and Ferrante. “They found the gun.”
    Smith’s mood turned dark. “That Rona is a bigger fool than I gave her credit, to have kept the gun—” She made a sharp turn.
    “Smith, for godsakes, Rona isn’t that stupid. I’ll bet someone planted it. And there were no prints on it at all.” She looked out the window. The terrain did not look familiar. “Where are we going?”
    “Humpf. She’s doing everything to see that we don’t get paid.”
    “You’re acting as if she’s doing it on purpose to spite us. I think she’d rather be cleared and go back to work. It has nothing to do with our getting paid or not. But I haven’t told you the rest about the gun.” They were passing a reservoir, a beautiful preserve of trees and undergrowth.
    “What haven’t you told me?”
    “The gun was registered in the name of Wilson Boyd.”
    “Well! Good!”
    “Good?”
    “Yes.” They were passing through a quaint little village called Weston, if you could believe the signs on the few stores. “Ah, the village of my ancestors,” Wetzon quipped.
    “What? Oh, I see, one of your little jokes.” She looked over at Wetzon. “I’m glad you’re wearing black.”
    “Clue me in, please, Smith. Where are we going?”
    “We, my dear Wetzon, are about to make a condolence call.”

48.
    T HE COUNTRY ROAD was winding and hilly, the trees rich with fall foliage. Forced to drive at a crawling pace because they followed a nursery truck packed with young spruce trees, Smith leaned on her horn. “Move it,” she yelled with all the appropriate gestures.
    The object of her fury paid no attention, and Wetzon