The Professional - By Robert B. Parker Page 0,49

now, as best I could determine, looking at nothing I could identify. Tony picked up his hat, put it on, stood, and buttoned up his coat.

“You owe me,” he said.

“But who keeps track,” I said.

“Me,” Tony said.

He nodded at Ty-Bop, who went out of the office first. Tony followed. They didn’t close the door behind them. But that was okay. It created sort of a welcoming image. I was a friendly guy. Might be good for business.

Chapter58

VINNIE MORRIS WAS a middle-sized ordinary-looking guy who could shoot the tail off a buffalo nickel from fifty yards. We weren’t exactly friends, but I’d known him since he walked behind Joe Broz, and while he wasn’t all that much fun, he was good at what he did. He kept his word. And he didn’t say much.

We were in my car, parked at a hydrant on Beacon Street beside the Public Garden, across the street from where Beth lived with Gary Eisenhower.

“Her name’s Beth Jackson,” I said. “We’ll sit here and watch. If she comes out and gets in a car, we’ll tail her. If she comes out and starts walking, you’ll tail her.”

“’Cause she knows you,” Vinnie said.

“Yes.”

Vinnie nodded.

“And that’s it?” he said. “You want me to follow this broad around, tell you what I see?”

“Yep.”

“I don’t have to clip her?”

“No,” I said.

“I don’t like to clip no broad, I don’t have to,” Vinnie said.

“You won’t have to,” I said.

He looked at her picture.

“Nice head,” he said.

“Yep.”

“How long we gonna do this?” Vinnie said.

“Don’t know.”

“She takes a car and I just ride around with you,” Vinnie said.

“Correct,” I said.

“Okay,” he said.

“You care why we’re tailing her?” I said.

“Nope.”

One of Vinnie’s great charms was that he had no interest in any information he didn’t need. We sat with Beth for several days. Mostly she walked. So mostly I stayed in the car and Vinnie hoofed it.

“She goes to Newbury Street,” Vinnie said. “Meets different broads. They shop. They have lunch. Today it was in the café at Louis.”

“Must be an adventure for you,” I said.

“Yeah. I thought Louis was a men’s store.”

“All genders,” I said.

“You buy stuff there?”

“Don’t have my size,” I said.

“Got my size,” Vinnie said.

“See anything you like?” I said.

“Most of it looks kinda funny,” Vinnie said.

“That’s called stylish,” I said.

“Not by me,” Vinnie said.

“She spot you?”

Vinnie stared at me.

“Nobody spots me, I don’t want to be spotted,” Vinnie said.

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” I said.

We did that for most of a week, with Vinnie doing all the legwork and me twaddling in the car. On a white, dripping, above-freezing Friday in late February, I called it quits.

“You stick with her till I call you off,” I said to Vinnie. “Or you can’t stand it anymore. You don’t need me. She’s obviously a walking girl.”

“I won’t get sick of it,” Vinnie said. “I like looking at her ass.”

“Motivation is good,” I said.

Vinnie got out of the car, and I drove home.

Chapter59

GARY EISENHOWER came to see me. I was in my office with my feet up, listening to some Anita O’Day songs on my office computer and thinking lightly.

“Who’s the broad singing,” Gary said when he came in.

“Anita O’Day,” I said.

“I need to talk,” he said.

I turned Anita off and swiveled my full attention to him.

“Go,” I said.

He sat in one of my client chairs.

“I . . .”

He shifted a little and crossed one leg over the other.

“I . . . I feel really bad,” he said. “About Estelle.”

I nodded.

“And I . . . I . . . I got no one else to talk to about it,” he said.

“Happy to be the one,” I said.

“I mean, I been with Estelle for, like, ten years,” Gary said.

“Long time,” I said.

“I . . . I cared about her.”

“Through all the philandering” I said.

“Sure, I told you. She liked it, too. We were in that together.”

I nodded.

“For crissake, who would want to kill Estelle,” Gary said.

I shook my head. I wanted to go where he wanted to. I suspected he was circling it. He shifted in his chair and crossed his legs in the other direction. He tapped out a little drumbeat on his thighs for a moment.

“The thing is,” he said. “The thing that kills me is . . . did I do something to cause this?”

I looked interested.

“I mean,” he said, “did I, like . . . did I bring her into contact with someone who would kill her?”

I waited. He didn’t say anything else. I waited some more. He interlocked