Night Film(45)

See you later.

I pulled out onto Ninth Avenue, stopping at the red light. Nora was still walking down the block but slowed to glance over her shoulder again. She must have seen me, because she immediately skipped up the front steps of the nearest cruddy building.

Jesus Christ. Sartre really wasn’t kidding when he said Hell is other people.

The light turned green. I floored it to get in the right-hand lane but was immediately cut off by an articulated bus. As usual, the driver was driving like he thought he was in a goddamn Smart car, not a block-long centipede on wheels. I braked, waiting for him to pass, turned right onto Fifty-first Street, again onto Tenth and then Fifty-second.

I pulled over behind a truck and spotted Nora immediately.

She was sitting back along the ledge of the front steps of the apartment building she’d seemingly disappeared into, checking her cell. After a minute, she stood, peered around the columns to take a furtive look at the spot where I’d just dropped her off. Seeing I was now gone, she skipped down the steps, heading back to the corner.

I edged into the street. Reaching the deli, she strode past the rows of fresh flowers—saying something to the old guy sitting there—and entered.

I pulled over again to wait. A minute later, she emerged carrying those two giant Duane Reade shopping bags she’d had back at the Pom Pom Diner as well as—oddly enough—a large, white wire cylindrical birdcage.

She crossed the street with this luggage, heading south down Ninth.

I waited for the light to turn green and made a right, watching her jostle down the sidewalk in front of me. I slowed, so as not to pass her—a taxi behind me laying on the horn—and saw her stop at the door of a tiny, narrow storefront. PAY-O-MATIC, read the sign. She pressed a button to enter, waiting, and vanished inside.

I accelerated, making a fast right onto Fifty-first Street, parking in front of a fire hydrant. I locked the car and headed back to Ninth.

The glass fa?ade of PAY-O-MATIC was covered in signs: WESTERN UNION, CHECKS CASHED, 24-HOUR FINANCIAL SERVICES. The shop was tiny, with brown carpeting and a couple of folding chairs, boxes piled on the floor. Along the back wall there was a teller window with bulletproof glass.

I rang the buzzer. After about a minute, the back door opened and a large bald man stuck his head out.

He was wearing a black short-sleeved shirt and had a face like a piece of pastrami. He pressed a switch on the wall and the entrance clicked open.

As I stepped inside, he moved into the teller window, wiping his hands on the front of his shirt, which I now saw had branches of red bamboo sewn all over it. As a rule, I didn’t trust men who wore embroidery.

“I’m looking for a young woman with shopping bags and a birdcage.”

He made a bogusly confused face. “Who?”

“Nora Halliday. Nineteen. Blond.”

“It’s just me here.” He had a thick New York accent.

“Then I must be Timothy Leary tripping on serious acid, because I just saw her walk in.”

“You mean Jessica?”

“Exactly.”

He stared at me, worried. “You a cop?”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t want trouble.”

“Neither do I. Where is she?”

“The back room.”

“What’s she doing there?”

He shrugged. “She gives me forty bucks. I let her crash here.”

“Forty bucks? That’s it?”

“Hey,” he said defensively. “I’ve got a family.”

“Where’s the back room?”

Without waiting for his answer, I stepped to the only door and opened it.

It led down a cluttered, dark hallway.

“I don’t want trouble.” He was right next to me, his heavy cologne nearly knocking me over. “I did it as a favor.”

“To whom?”

“Her. She showed up here six weeks ago, crying. I helped her out.”

I stepped past him into the hall. Muffled rap music throbbed on a floor above, giving the building a thudding heartbeat.

“Bernstein!” I shouted.

There was no answer.

“It’s Woodward. I need to talk to you.”

At the end of the hall were two closed wooden doors. I moved toward them, around a janitor bucket filled with dirty water, passing a kitchenette, a half-eaten sandwich sitting on top of a folding table.

“I know you’re in here somewhere,” I called out.

The first door was slightly ajar. I pushed it open with my foot. It was a bathroom, a crumpled issue of a skin magazine and a ribbon of toilet paper stuck to the floor.

I moved past it, knocking on the second door. When there was no answer, I tried the handle. It was locked.

“Nora.”

“Leave me alone,” she said quietly. It sounded as if she were mere inches away, behind a piece of cardboard.

“How about opening the door so we can talk?”

“I’d like you to leave, please.”

“But I want to offer you a job.”

She didn’t answer.

“I’m looking for a research assistant. Room and board included. You’d have to share the bedroom every few weekends with my daughter and her stuffed animal collection. But otherwise, it’s yours.” I glanced over my shoulder. The big guy from out front was eavesdropping, his fat frame plugging the hallway.