The Heckler

“You got all this from that burnt matchbook?” Carella asked, and Grossman began laughing. The dawn broke slowly. Carella, holding the phone close to his violated ear, began to grin. “You bastard,” he said. “I believed you for a minute there. Whatdid you get from the matchbook?”

“The name of a hotel,” Grossman said.

“Here? This city?”

“Yep.”

“Shoot.”

“The Hotel Albion. It’s on Jefferson and South Third.”

“Thank you, Sam.”

“Don’t thank me yet. You can probably pick up these matches in any cigar store in the city.”

“Or maybe not, Sam. Maybe they’re private hotel stock. The Albion, the Albion. That’s not one of those big chain jobs like Hilton runs, is it?”

“No. It’s a small quiet place right on Jefferson.”

“That’s what I thought. So maybe thisis a break. In any case, I’ll check it out. Thanks again, Sam.”

“Right. How’s Teddy?”

“Fine.”

“And the twins?”

“Growing.”

“Good. I’ll be talking to you,” Grossman said, and he hung up.

Carella looked at the hotel name he’d jotted onto the pad on his desk. He nodded, pulled the phone to him, and dialed the number of his home in Riverhead.

“Hello?” a sprightly voice answered.

“Fanny, this is Steve,” he said. “Is Teddy still there, or did I miss her?”

“She’s upstairs taking a bath. What is it, Steve? I was just feeding the twins.”

“Fanny, I’m supposed to meet Teddy at three o’clock outside Bannerman’s and I thought I’d be able to make it, but it doesn’t look that way now. Would you just tell her I’ll meet her for dinner at six at the Green Door? Have you got that? Six o’clock at—”

“I heard it the first time. Your son is screaming his head off at me, would you mind if I—Oh, holy mother of God!”

“What’s the matter?”

“He’s just thrown his spoon at April and hit her right in the eye with it! I don’t know why I stay on in this madhouse. It seems to me—”

“Aw, you love us, you old bag,” Carella said.

“An old bag is what I’ll be before the year is out. Me who used to provoke street whistles not two months ago.”

“Will you give her my message, dearie?” Carella asked, imitating her thick Irish brogue.

“Yes, I’ll give her your message, dearie. And will you take a message from me, dearie?”

“What is it, dearie?”

“In the future, don’t be calling at twelve noon because that is the time your darling little twins are being fed. And I’ve got my hands full enough withtwo Carellas not to have a third come bothering me. Is that clear, sir?”

“Yes, dearie.”

“All right, I’ll give your wife the message. Poor darling, she’s been rushing about like a mad fool so that she’d meet you on time, and now you call with—”

“Goodbye, dearie,” Carella said. “Go take the spoon out of April’s eye.”

He hung up, smiling, wondering how he and Teddy had ever managed to run a household without Fanny. Of course, he told himself, before Fanny there hadn’t been the twins, either. In fact, had the twins not been born, Fanny would not have been hired as a two-weeks, postnatal nurse. And then when they’d moved into the new house, the monster which was on the market for back taxes, and Fanny’s two weeks were up—well, it was difficult to say exactly what had prompted her to stay on at practically no salary, unless it was the fact that she had come to think of the Carellas as her own. Whatever her motive, and Carella never thought too much about motive except when he was working on a case, he was damned grateful for her existence. He sometimes had qualms that his children would grow up speaking with an Irish brogue since, by necessity, it was her speech they imitated and not the nonexistent speech of their mother. And only last week, he was nearly shocked out of his skin when young Mark said, “Dammit, dearie, I don’t want to go to bed yet.” But all in all, things were working out fine.

Carella stood up, opened the top drawer of his desk, took his gun and holster from it, and clipped it to the right side of his belt. He took his jacket from where it was draped over the back of his chair, put it on, and then tore the top page from the pad and stuck the sheet into his pocket.

“I probably won’t be back for the rest of the day,” he told Parker.

“Where you going?” Parker asked. “A movie?”

“No, a burlesque,” Carella said. “I dig naked broads.”

“Ha!” Parker said.