Silent Prey

wide.
    “Motherfucker . . .” Oliveo said, backing away, sputtering. “You’re that dude.”
    Bekker turned away, started across the street, half running, mind twisting, searching for help, for an answer, for anything.
    Behind him, Oliveo had turned toward the cop cars across the square. “Hey,” he screamed. He looked from the cops to Bekker, then at the cops again, then dashed toward them, yelling, waving his arms. “Hey, hey, that’s him, that’s him . . . .”
    Bekker ran. He could run in the gym shoes, but there were a lot of cops, and if they came quickly enough, and if they asked about a woman running . . .
    A bum stood at the mouth of an alley, picking through a garbage can. He wore a crumbled hat and a stained army coat, ankle length.
    A half-brick sat on the sidewalk, a remnant of concrete lapped over it like frosting on a piece of carrot cake.
    It was a narrow street, the closest people a block away, not looking.
    Bekker snatched the brick off the street, still running. The bum looked up, straightened, leaned away, astonished when Bekker hit him squarely in the chest. The bum pitched over the garbage can and went down into the alley, on his back. “Hey,” he groaned.
    Bekker hit him between the eyes with the brick, then hit him again. Hovered over him, growling like a pit bull, feeling his blood rising . . .
    A siren, and another.
    He stripped the hat and trench coat from the bum, pulled the trench coat over the purse, stripped off the wig, pulled the hat down low on his head. The bum blew abubble of blood. Still alive. Bekker lurched back to the mouth of the alley, trying on the new persona, the mask of beggary . . . .
    Behind him, a gargling sound. He half turned; the bum was looking at him, one good eye peering brightly out of a ruined face. The bum was dying. Bekker recognized the gargle. Something cold, distant and academic spoke into his mind: cerebral hemorrhage, massive parietal fracture. And that eye, looking at him. The bum would die, and then he’d be back, watching . . . . Bekker looked both ways, then hurried back to the bum. Pocketknife out, quick jabs; eyes gone. The bum moaned, but he was going anyway.
    The brick was by the bum’s head, and Bekker picked it up and jammed it in his pocket. Good weapon. A gun was too noisy. But he groped for the gun inside the bag and transferred it to the pocket.
    Into the street. Six blocks. He saw a cop car go by, screech to a stop at the intersection, the cops looking both ways out the windows, then go on. The coat stunk: dried urine. The smell clogged his throat, and he imagined fleas crawling onto him. More sirens, cops flooding the neighborhood. Bekker hurried . . .
    Turned onto Greene, tottering, a drunk, his shabby coat dragging on the pavement. A woman coming. Closer, same side. Bekker changed to the other side of the street. His vision wavered, changed tenses: Approaching Lacey building. Sirens in the distance, but fading. Woman goes to Lacey building door . . .
    What  . . .
    The panic gripped him for a moment. Confused. What did she want? Blank-faced buildings looking down. Gumball drops. Red one, loading anger. They would do this to him, a man of talent. The woman was half turned toward him, head cocked.
    A distant voice, in the back of his head: Bridget. Bridget Land. Come to visit . . .
    He straightened, walked back across the street, away from her, and she put a key in the front-door lock and turned it, pushing the door open. Bridget Land, he’d forgotten about her . . . . She must not know.
    She pushed the door open, her shoulders rounded, aged, straining with the effort, then stepped up and inside. Bekker, caught by anger and opportunity, began moving. There was no space or time, it seemed, and he hit the door, smashed inside, and hit her.
    He was fast, angel-dust fast, quicker than a linebacker, smacking her with the brick full in the face. She went down with a strange, harsh croak, like a wing-shot raven.
    Bekker, indiscreet, beyond caring, slammed the door, grabbed her by the hair and dragged her to the stairs, and down.
    He forgot the bum’s clothes, and paid no attention to the woman, yipping like a chihuahua with a bone in its throat. He dragged her to the room, strapped her down. Her legs started to work now, twitching. He wired the silencer into her mouth, working like a dervish, hovering . . . .

CHAPTER
27
    Buonocare, the banker, ran the photo tape through two more