Silent Prey

"Cops," she said, barely looking up when they came in.

"How are you?" Lucas asked. "Doing any good?"

"What d'ya want?"

"We need to talk to Ma

Sloan had moved to the door between the waiting area and the workroom. "He's here," he said to Lucas.

They went back together. Johnson saw them, picked up a rag, wiped his hands. He was at least seven feet tall, Lucas thought. "Ma

"What's he done?" Johnson's voice was deep and roiled, like oil drums rolling off a truck.

"Nothing, far as we know. But he was bunked down at the jail next to Michael Bekker, the nut case."

"Yeah, Rayon told me," the tall man said.

"You know where we can reach him?"

"No, I don't know where he's living, but I could probably find him, tonight, if I walked around the neighborhood for a while. He usually goes down to He

"Bekker's chopping people up," Sloan said. "I mean chopping them up. I don't know if Burrell's got trouble with the cops, but if there's any way he could help us…"

"What?".

Sloan shrugged, picked up a can of WD-40, turned it in his hand, and shrugged. "We might be able to take a little pressure off, if he has another run-in with the cops. Or if your friend out there, if she…"

Johnson looked them over for a minute, then said, "You got a phone number?"

"Yeah," Sloan said. He fished a card out of his pocket. "Call me there."

"Like tonight," Lucas said. "This guy Bekker…"

"Yeah, I know," Johnson said. He slipped Sloan's card in his shirt pocket. "I'll call you, one way or another."

The drive to Stillwater cut another hour out of the day; the interview took ten minutes. Payton looked like an ex-college lineman, square, ru

They left him talking to himself, muttering curses at the floor.

"How're you go

Lucas glanced back at the penitentiary. It looked like an old Catholic high school, he decided, inside and out, until you heard the steel doors open and shut. Then you knew it couldn't be anything but the joint…

Johnson called Sloan's number a little after six o'clock. Burrell would talk and he'd meet Lucas at Pe

"Um, I got some shit to do at home," Sloan said.

"Hey, take off," Lucas said. "And thanks."

They shook hands, and Sloan said, "Don't take no wooden women."

Pe

Farther toward the back, four men and two women stood around a coin-op pool table. Layers of cigarette smoke floated around them like the ghosts of autumn leaves. Lucas walked past the bar to the back, past the pool table, past a beat-up pay phone hung in an alcove next to a cigarette machine. He looked in the men's john, came back, walked around the crowd at the pool table. The men wore jeans and vests, with big wallets chained to their belts, and looked at him sideways as he went through. Johnson wasn't there. Neither was anyone who might be Burrell.

"What can I do you for?" the bartender asked, drying his hands on a mustard-stained towel.

"Bottle of Leinie's," Lucas said.

The bartender fished it out of a cooler and dropped it wet on the bar: "Two bucks." And then, tipping his head toward the back, "Looking for someone?"

"Yeah." Lucas paid and sat on a stool. The back-bar mirror ended before it got that far down, and Lucas stared into the fake walnut paneling opposite his stool, hitting on the beer, trying to straighten his schedule out.

If he didn't find Burrell quick, he'd have to stay over a day. Then he'd miss the early flight to Atlanta. Instead of getting into Charleston in the morning, he wouldn't make it until the afternoon and probably wouldn't get out until the next day. Then he'd have to think of an excuse for the New York people.

The hooker rapped on the bar with her knuckles, nodded at the daiquiri, got a new one. She wore a pale-green party dress, almost the color of the drink. She caught his eyes again, let her gaze linger this time. Lucas didn't remember her. He'd known most of the regulars when he was working, but he'd been off the streets for months now. A week is forever, on the streets. A whole new class of thirteen-year-old girls would be giving doorway blow jobs to suburban insurance agents who would later be described in court documents as good fathers…

Lucas was halfway through the beer when Johnson walked in, out of breath, as though he'd been ru

"Jesus, Davenport," he said. "Missed the bus." He looked down the bar at the hooker as Lucas swiveled on the stool.

"Where is he?" Lucas said.

Johnson's face lit up. "What'd you mean, where is he? He's right there."

Lucas looked past the hooker to the back of the bar; all the pool players were white.

"Where?"

Johnson started to laugh, lifted a leg and slapped a thigh. "You sittin' next to him, man."

The hooker looked at Lucas and said, in a voice an octave too low, "Hi, there."

Lucas looked at the hooker for a second, rereading the features, and closed his eyes. Transvestite. In a half-second, it all fell into place. Goddamn Bekker. This was how he got close to the women and the tourist males. As a woman. With the right makeup, at night, with his small, narrow-shouldered body. That was how he got out of the New School…

God damn it.

"Did you tell Bekker how to… do this?" Lucas asked, gesturing at the dress. "The dress, the makeup."

"We talked about it," Thomas said. "But he was a sick motherfucker and I didn't like talking to him."

"But when you talked about it… was he real interested, or did you just talk?"

Thomas tipped his head back, looked up at the ceiling, remembering. "Well… he tried it. A couple of things." He hopped off the bar stool and walked away from Lucas and Johnson, moving his hips, turned and posed. "It ain't that easy to get just the right walk. If you forget halfway through the block, it ruins your whole image."

The bartender, watching, said, "Are you guys gay?"

"Cop," said Lucas. "This is official."

"Forget I asked…"

"I won't forget, honey," Thomas said, licking his lower lip.

"You fuckin'…"

"Shut up," Lucas snapped, poking a finger at the bartender. He looked back at Thomas. "But did he do it? The walk?"

"Couple times, a few times, I guess. You know, we did talk about it, when I think back. Not so much about how good it feels, but how to do it. You know, gettin' the prosthetic bras and like that. He'd make a good-lookin' girl, too, 'cept for the scars."

"You think so?" Lucas asked. "Is that a professional opinion?"

"Don't dick me around, man," Thomas said, flaring.

"I'm not. That's a real question. Would he make a good woman?"

Thomas stared at him for a minute, decided the question was real: "Yeah, he would. He'd be real good at it. 'Cept for the scars."

Lucas hopped off the bar stool, said thanks, and nodded to Johnson: "We owe you. You need something, talk to Sloan."