Persuader

sound of a phone in the house. Nothing. I strolled over and checked the rags. Picked up a thing the size of a hand towel. It was dark with grime and dirt and oil. I used it to wipe an imaginary spot off the Cadillac's front fender. Glanced around. Nobody there. I wrapped Doll's PSM and Duffy's Glock and her two spare magazines in the rag. Put the whole bundle under my coat. It might have been possible to get the guns into the house. Maybe. I could have gone in the back door and let the metal detector beep and looked puzzled for a second and then pulled out the big bunch of keys. I could have held them up like they explained everything. A classic piece of misdirection. It might have worked. Maybe. It would depend on their level of suspicion. But whatever, getting the guns out of the house again would have been very difficult. Assuming there were no panic phone calls anytime soon the chances were I would be leaving with Beck or Duke or both in the normal way and there was no guarantee I would have the keys again. So I had a choice. Take a chance, or play it safe? My decision was to play it safe and keep the firepower outside.
    I walked out of the garage courtyard and wandered around toward the back of the house.
    Stopped at the corner of the courtyard wall. Stood still for a second and then turned ninety degrees and followed the wall out toward the rocks like I wanted to take a look at the ocean. It was still calm. There was a long oily swell coming in from the southeast.
    The water looked black and infinitely deep. I gazed at it for a moment and then ducked down and put the wrapped guns in a little dip tight against the wall. There were scrawny weeds growing there. Somebody would have to trip over them to find them.
    I strolled back, hunched into my coat, trying to look like a reflective guy getting a couple of minutes' peace. It was quiet. The shore birds were gone. It was too dark for them.
    They would be safe in their roosts. I turned around and headed for the back door. Went in through the porch and into the kitchen. The metal detector beeped. Duke and the mechanic guy and the cook all turned to look at me. I paused a beat and pulled out the keys. Held them up. They looked away. I walked in and dropped the keys on the table in front of Duke. He left them there.
    The third benefit of Duke's exhaustion unfolded steadily all the way through dinner. He could barely stay awake. He didn't say a word. The kitchen was warm and steamy and we ate the kind of food that would put anybody to sleep. We had thick soup and steak and potatoes. There was a lot of it. The plates were piled high. The cook was working like a production line. There was a spare plate with a whole portion of everything just sitting untouched on a counter. Maybe somebody was in the habit of eating twice.
    I ate fast and kept my ears open for the phone. I figured I could grab the car keys and be outside before the first ring finished. Inside the Cadillac before the second. Halfway down the drive before the third. I could smash through the gate. I could run Paulie over.
    But the phone didn't ring. There was no sound in the house at all, except people chewing.
    There was no coffee. I was on the point of taking that personally. I like coffee. I drank water instead. It came from the faucet over the sink and tasted like chlorine. The maid came in from the family dining room before I finished my second glass. She walked over to where I was sitting, awkward in her unfashionable shoes. She was shy. She looked Irish, like she had just come all the way from Connemara to Boston and couldn't find a job down there.
    "Mr. Beck wants to see you," she said.
    It was only the second time I had heard her speak. She sounded a little Irish, too. Her cardigan was wrapped tight around her.
    "Now?" I asked.
    "I think so," she said.
    He was waiting for me in the square room with the oak dining table where I had played Russian roulette for him.
    "The Toyota was from Hartford, Connecticut," he said. "Angel Doll traced the plate this morning."
    "No front plates in Connecticut," I said, because I had to say something.
    "We know the owners," he said.
    There was silence. I stared straight at him. It took me a fraction of a second just to understand him.
    "How do you know them?" I asked.
    "We have a business relationship."
    "In the rug trade?"
    "The nature of the relationship needn't concern you."
    "Who are they?"
    "That needn't concern you either," he said.
    I said nothing.
    "But