The Night Crew

forever.
    Now he lay there, little of him visible other than his hair and oddly pale eyelids, breathing through a plastic mask, his breath so shallow, his life bumping along on the monitors overhead, like a slow day on a stock-market ticker.

thirteen

    They left Glass and Creek—Glass said she’d try to get Creek moved again, in case the white-haired man was a real threat—and went back into the night, heading for the Philadelphia Grill.
    ‘‘The guy was probably a doper,’’ Harper said, ‘‘ ’cause he moved so fast. Like a guy who’s holding. He didn’t stop to look us over, he didn’t stop to see if we were coming after him—he just took off. And the way he went out, he must’ve already been in the hospital, because he knew about the parking ramp exit and how to get there in a hurry.’’
    ‘‘That worries me; he was scouting the place,’’ Anna said. ‘‘What surprises me is, he was old. Or older.’’
    ‘‘Maybe not—could’ve been blond, could’ve been the light on his hair.’’
    ‘‘No. He was older. Fifties, anyway. The way he moved, I’m thinking . . .’’ She closed her eyes, letting the scene run through her mind. ‘‘He saw us, he turned, he sort of groped for the door, he pulled it open, almost hit himself with it. He was a little creaky. Maybe even a little heavy. He wasn’t a kid, though. He just moved like an older guy.’’
    ‘‘That doesn’t fit the profile of any psycho I ever heard of,’’ Harper said thoughtfully. ‘‘Maybe the guy in Chicago— Gacey. He was sorta porky, and a little older than most of them. I think.’’
    ‘‘He’s not what I expected,’’ Anna said. ‘‘The prowler was fast, and the guy who shot Creek, he was fast. Really fast. He had to be a young guy.’’
    ‘‘So we’ve got two people giving us a hard time?’’ He looked at her with thin amusement. ‘‘And we can’t find either one of them?’’ The Philadelphia Grill was a baked-meatloaf-andpowderedpotatoes place on Westwood, jammed into the lower corner of a colored-concrete building; it had a wraparound glass window, but the window was blocked with blinds pulled nearly shut.
    Inside, the clientele seemed to hover over their coffee, arms circling the cups, as though somebody might try to take the coffee away from them; and they tended to look up whenever the door opened. The blinds, which blocked the view in, were open just enough that, from the inside, they could see out.
    ‘‘There he is,’’ Anna muttered.
    Tarpatkin looked like her idea of a crazy killer: his pitchblack hair, six inches long, streamed away from his narrow face, as though an electric current were running through it. He had thin black eyebrows over a long, bony nose; his lips were narrow, tight, and too pink, the only color in his face. He was dressed all in black, and was reading a tabloid-sized real-estate newspaper. He had one hand on a cup of tea, showing a tea-bag string and tag under his hand. He was wearing a heavy gold wedding band, but on his middle finger. An empty cup sat across the table from him. ‘‘What if he’s the guy?’’
    ‘‘Do you know him? Ever met him?’’ Harper asked.
    ‘‘No. I’d remember the face.’’
    ‘‘Then he’s not the guy, because you know the killer, at least a little bit,’’ Harper said. ‘‘Slide into the booth across from him; I’ll get a chair.’’
    Tarpatkin watched them coming, eyes just over the top of the paper. His expression didn’t change when Anna slid into the booth: ‘‘Hi,’’ she said, smiling. Harper hooked a chair from an empty table across from the booth, turned it backward and sat down, just blocking Tarpatkin’s route out of the booth.
    ‘‘Mr. Tarpatkin—name’s Harper, and my friend here is Anna.’’
    ‘‘Hello, Anna,’’ Tarpatkin said. ‘‘Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?’’
    ‘‘No, no, it’s a gun,’’ Anna said pleasantly.
    ‘‘We’d show it to you, but in here’’—Harper looked around—‘‘somebody might get excited and we’d all start shooting.’’
    ‘‘What do you want?’’ Tarpatkin asked.
    ‘‘Just need to talk,’’ Harper said.
    ‘‘That’s all you guys ever want,’’ Tarpatkin said. ‘‘Talk. Then your ass winds up in jail.’’
    ‘‘What?’’ Anna’s eyebrows went up and she glanced uncertainly at Harper.
    Tarpatkin caught it, and clouded up: ‘‘If you assholes ain’t cops, you can get the fuck