Hit Man

“And your relationships with women,” Breen went on, “have a strong Oedipal component. Your mother was a vague and unfocused woman, incompletely present in her own life, incapable of co

“Once!”

“-are a natural consequence of this confusion. Your mother herself is dead now, isn’t that so?”

“Yes.”

“And your father is not to be found, and almost certainly deceased. What’s called for, Peter, is an act specifically designed to reverse this entire pattern on a symbolic level.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“It’s a subtle point,” Breen admitted. He crossed his legs, propped an elbow on a knee, extended his thumb and rested his bony chin on it. Keller thought, not for the first time, that Breen must have been a stork in a prior life. “If there were a male figure in your life,” Breen went on, “preferably at least a few years your senior, someone playing a faintly paternal role vis-à-vis yourself, someone to whom you turn for advice and direction.”

Keller thought of the man in White Plains.

“Instead of killing this man,” Breen said, “symbolically, I need hardly say-I am speaking symbolically throughout-but instead of killing him as you have done with father figures in the past, it seems to me that you might do something to nourish this man.”

Cook a meal for the man in White Plains? Buy him a hamburger? Toss him a salad?

“Perhaps you could think of a way to use your particular talents to this man’s benefit instead of his detriment,” Breen went on. He drew a handkerchief from his breast pocket and mopped his forehead. “Perhaps there is a woman in his life-your mother, symbolically-and perhaps she is a source of great pain to your father. So, instead of making love to her and slaying him, like Oedipus, you might reverse the usual course of things by, uh, showing love to him and, uh, slaying her.”

“Oh,” Keller said.

“Symbolically, that is to say.”

“Symbolically,” Keller said.

A week later Breen handed him a photograph. “This is called the Thematic Apperception Test,” Breen said. “You look at the photograph and make up a story about it.”

“What kind of story?”

“Any kind at all,” Breen said. “This is an exercise in imagination. You look at the subject of the photograph and imagine what sort of woman she is and what she is doing.”

The photo was in color, and showed a rather elegant brunette dressed in tailored clothing. She had a dog on a leash. The dog was medium size, with a chunky body and an alert expression in its eyes. It was that color which dog people call blue, and which everyone else calls gray.

“It’s a woman and a dog,” Keller said.

“Very good.”

Keller took a breath. “The dog can talk,” he said, “but he won’t do it in front of other people. The woman made a fool of herself once when she tried to show him off. Now she knows better. When they’re alone he talks a blue streak, and the son of a bitch has an opinion on everything. He tells her everything from the real cause of the Thirty Years’ War to the best recipe for lasagna.”

“He’s quite a dog,” Breen said.

“Yes, and now the woman doesn’t want other people to know he can talk, because she’s afraid they might take him away from her. In this picture they’re in the park. It looks like Central Park.”

“Or perhaps Washington Square.”

“It could be Washington Square,” Keller agreed. “The woman is crazy about the dog. The dog’s not so sure about the woman.”

“And what do you think about the woman?”

“She’s attractive,” Keller said.

“On the surface,” Breen said. “Underneath it’s another story, believe me. Where do you suppose she lives?”

Keller gave it some thought. “ Cleveland,” he said.

“ Cleveland? Why Cleveland, for God’s sake?”

“Everybody’s got to be someplace.”

“If I were taking this test,” Breen said, “I’d probably imagine the woman living at the foot of Fifth Avenue, at Washington Square. I’d have her living at number one Fifth Avenue, perhaps because I’m familiar with that particular building. You see, I once lived there.”

“Oh?”

“In a spacious apartment on a high floor. And once a month,” he continued, “I write out an enormous check and mail it to that address, which used to be mine. So it’s only natural that I would have this particular building in mind, especially when I look at this particular photograph.” His eyes met Keller’s. “You have a question, don’t you? Go ahead and ask it.”

“What breed is the dog?”

“The dog?”

“I just wondered,” Keller said.

“As it happens,” Breen said, “it’s an Australian cattle dog. Looks like a mongrel, doesn’t it? Believe me, it doesn’t talk. But why don’t you hang on to that photograph?”

“All right.”

“You’re making really fine progress in therapy,” Breen said. “I want to acknowledge you for the work you’re doing. And I just know you’ll do the right thing.”

A few days later Keller was sitting on a park bench in Washington Square. He folded his newspaper and walked over to a dark-haired woman wearing a blazer and a beret. “Excuse me,” he said, “but isn’t that an Australian cattle dog?”

“That’s right,” she said.

“It’s a handsome animal,” he said. “You don’t see many of them.”

“Most people think he’s a mutt. It’s such an esoteric breed. Do you own one yourself?”

“I did. My ex-wife got custody.”

“How sad for you.”

“Sadder still for the dog. His name was Soldier.Is Soldier, unless she’s gone and changed it.”

“This fellow’s name is Nelson. That’s his call name. Of course the name on his papers is a real mouthful.”

“Do you show him?”

“He’s seen it all,” she said. “You can’t show him a thing.”

“I went down to the Village last week,” Keller said, “and the damnedest thing happened. I met a woman in the park.”

“Is that the damnedest thing?”

“Well, it’s unusual for me. I meet women at bars and parties, or someone introduces us. But we met and talked, and then I happened to run into her the following morning. I bought her a cappuccino.”

“You just happened to run into her on two successive days.”

“Yes.”

“In the Village.”

“It’s where I live.”

Breen frowned. “You shouldn’t be seen with her, should you?”

“Why not?”

“Don’t you think it’s dangerous?”

“All it’s cost me so far,” Keller said, “is the price of a cappuccino.”

“I thought we had an understanding.”

“An understanding?”

“You don’t live in the Village,” Breen said. “I know where you live. Don’t look so surprised. The first time you left here I watched you from the window. You behaved as though you were trying to avoid being followed. So I bided my time, and when you stopped taking precautions, that’s when I followed you. It wasn’t that difficult.”

“Why follow me?”

“To find out who you were. Your name is Keller, you live at 865 First Avenue. I already knewwhat you were. Anybody might have known just from listening to your dreams. And paying in cash, and all of these sudden business trips. I still don’t know who employs you, the crime bosses or the government, but then what difference does it make? Have you been to bed with my wife?”

“Your ex-wife.”

“Answer the question.”

“Yes, I have.”

“Christ. And were you able to perform?”

“Yes.”

“Why the smile?”

“I was just thinking,” Keller said, “that it was quite a performance.”

Breen was silent for a long moment, his eyes fixed on a spot above and to the right of Keller’s shoulder. Then he said, “This is profoundly disappointing. I had hoped you would find the strength to transcend the Oedipal myth, not merely reenact it. You’ve had fun, haven’t you? What a naughty little boy you’ve been! What a triumph you’ve scored over your symbolic father! You’ve taken his woman to bed. No doubt you have visions of getting her pregnant, so that she can give you what she so cruelly denied him. Eh?”