The Last Dance by Ed McBain Page A

Accident?”
    â€œYeah.”
    â€œAnd the price was five grand?”
    â€œThe same five he brought into the poker game.”
    â€œWhen did he tell your friend all this?”
    â€œSaturday night. After the game. They went back to his hotel room, had a few drinks, smoked a few joints.”
    â€œWho supplied them?”
    â€œThe drinks?”
    â€œThe drinks, the pot.”
    â€œThe hitter. It was his party. I gotta tell you something, Steve. When a guy makes a big score, and then he quadruples it in a cardgame, he wants to
talk
about it, you dig? He’s
proud
of it. That’s the way these guys’ minds work. They want to tell you how great they are. My friend lost his shirt in that game Saturday night. Well, winners like to shit all over losers. So your hitter took pity on my friend, asked him to share a bottle and a couple of joints with him so he could tell him how fuckin terrific he is, gettin five grand to dust an old fart.”
    â€œBut he didn’t tell him that.”
    â€œThe five grand, yes. The actual dusting, no.”
    â€œThen you’ve got nothing to sell.”
    â€œOh, I’ve got plenty to sell. Remember what you told me on the phone? You asked did I hear anything on this old man got doped with R2 before somebody hung him in the closet. That ain’t the kind of detail a person forgets, Steve. Well, before my friend left the hotel room—I think they had sex, by the way. My friend and the hitter. He’s gay, my friend. Anyway, the hitter handed him a little present. A gift for the loser, you know? A consolation prize. Said it’d help his sex life. Grinning, right? It’ll help your sex life, Harpo, give it a try. That’s my friend’s name, Harpo. So Harpo figured the guy was laying a Viagra cap on him. But instead, it was this.” Danny reached into his coat pocket. He opened his hand. A blister-pack strip of white tablets was on the palm, the word
Roche
echoing over and over again across its face. “Roach,” Danny said. “Same as your hangman used.”
    â€œWho gave you that?”
    â€œHarpo.”
    â€œHarpo what?”
    â€œMarx,” Danny said, and grinned like a barracuda.
    â€œLet me get this straight.”
    â€œSure.”
    â€œPoker game Saturday night …”
    â€œRight. On Lewiston Avenue.”
    â€œGuy who killed Andrew Hale comes into the game with fivegrand, leaves it with twenty. Invites your friend Harpo up for a drink, some pot, a little sex, starts boasting about the hit, lays a strip of roach on him before they part company.”
    â€œYou’ve got it.”
    â€œAnd you say the hitter’s leaving town the day after tomorrow?”
    â€œFrom what I understand.”
    â€œThis isn’t any high-pressured bullshit, is it, Danny?”
    â€œMe? High-pressured?”
    â€œI mean, he really is going back to Houston this Wednesday?”
    â€œIs what Harpo told me.”
    â€œAnd he also told you the guy’s name …”
    â€œHe did.”
    â€œâ€¦ and where he’s staying.”
    â€œThat’s right.”
    â€œOut of the goodness of his heart.”
    â€œHe’s a friend. Also, I’ll probably pass a little something on to him if your lieutenant comes through.”
    â€œI’ll have to get back to you on this,” Carella said.
    â€œSure, take your time,” Danny said. “You got till Wednesday.”
    â€œI’ll let you know,” Carella said, and started to move out of the booth, suddenly remembering how cold it was outside on this eighth day of November. You got to be forty, and suddenly it was cold out there. He was sliding across the leatherette seat, swinging his legs out, starting to rise, Danny doing the same thing on the other side of the table, when the first shot pierced the din of the abnormally crowded room, silencing it in an instant. Even before the second shot sounded, people were diving