Mr. Murder

"Different. The world has changed or the way I look at it."
        "Me too."
        "Something's been… lost."
        And we'll never find it again, he thought.
        The Ritz-Carlton was a remarkable hotel, exquisitely tasteful, with generous applications of marble, limestone, granite, quality art, and antiques throughout its public areas. The enormous flower arrangements, on display wherever one turned, were the most artfully fashioned that Oslett had ever seen. Attired in subdued uniforms, courteous, omnipresent, the staff seemed to outnumber the guests.
        All in all, it reminded Oslett of home, the Connecticut estate on which he had been raised, although the family mansion was larger than the Ritz-Carlton, was furnished with antiques only of museum quality, had a staff-to-family ratio of six to one, and featured a landing pad large enough to accommodate the military helicopters in which the President of the United States and his retinue sometimes traveled.
        The two-bedroom suite with spacious living room, in which Drew Oslett and Clocker were quartered, offered every amenity from a fully stocked bar to marble shower stalls so spacious that it would have been possible for a visiting ballet dancer to practice entrechats during his morning ablutions. The towels were not by Pratesi, as were those he had used all his life, but they were good Egyptian cotton, soft and absorbent.
        By 7,50 Tuesday morning, Oslett had dressed in a white cotton shirt with whalebone buttons by Theophilus Shirtmakers of London, a navy-blue cashmere blazer crafted with sublime attention to detail by his personal tailor in Rome, gray wool slacks, black oxfords (an eccentric touch) handmade by an Italian cobbler living in Paris, and a club tie in stripes of navy, maroon, and gold. The color of his silk pocket handkerchief precisely matched the gold in his tie.
        Thus attired, his mood elevated by his sartorial perfection, he went looking for Clocker. He didn't desire the big man's company, of course, he just preferred, for his own peace of mind, to know what Clocker was up to at all times. And he nurtured the hope that one blessed day he would discover Karl Clocker dead, felled by a massive cardiac infarction, cerebral hemorrhage, or an alien death ray like those about which the big man was always reading.
        Clocker was in a patio chair on the balcony off the living room, ignoring a breathtaking view of the Pacific, his nose stuck in the last chapter of Shape-Changing Gynecologists of the Dark Galaxy, or whatever the hell it was called. He was wearing the same hat with the duck feather, tweed sportcoat, and Hush Puppies, although he had on new purple socks, fresh slacks, and a clean white shirt. He'd changed into a different harlequin-pattern sweater-vest, as well, this one in blue, pink, yellow, and gray. Though he was not sporting a tie, so much black hair bristled from the open neck of his shirt that, at a glance, he appeared to be wearing a cravat.
        After failing to respond to Oslett's first "good morning," Clocker replied to the repetition of those words with the improbable split finger greeting that characters gave each other on Star Trek, his attention still riveted to the paperback. If Oslett had possessed a chainsaw or cleaver, he would have severed Clocker's hand at the wrist and tossed it into the ocean. He wondered if room service would send up a suitably sharp instrument from the chef's collection of kitchen cutlery The day was warmish, already seventy. Blue skies and balmy breezes were a welcome change from the chill of the previous night.
        Promptly at eight o'clock-barely in time to prevent Oslett from being driven mad by the lulling cries of sea gulls, the tranquilizing rumble of the incoming combers, and the faint laughter of the early surfers paddling their boards out to sea-the Network representative arrived to brief them on developments. He was a far different item from the hulking advance man who'd driven them from the airport to the Ritz-Carlton several hours earlier. Savile Row suit. Club tie.
        Good Baily wingtips. One look at him was all Oslett needed to be certain that he owned no article of clothing on which was printed a photo of Madonna with her breasts bared.
        He said his name was Peter Waxhill, and he was probably telling the truth. He was high enough in the organization to know Oslett's and Clocker's real names-although he had booked