Now and then - By Robert B. Parker Page 0,35

Chollo said. “Guys his size don’t often need to.”

“’Cept they run into somebody that do,” Hawk said. “You think he’s a shooter?”

“Don’t know,” I said. “If I had to guess, I’d guess no. He sounds like a dope, except when he starts mouthing what Alderson taught him. Then he sounds like a parrot.”

“How ’bout if Alderson tell him to?” Hawk said.

“He might,” I said. “He thinks Alderson’s divine.”

“So are we,” Hawk said. “And there be four of us.”

Susan’s office door opened and a fiftyish woman in an anklelength black coat hurried out, not looking at anything. She went out the front door and down the steps and turned left toward Mass Ave without altering her gaze. Hanging around Susan so long, I’d learned that no eye contact was sort of de rigueur when departing from your shrink’s offi ce. Chollo watched her go.

“You looking at that woman’s ass?” I said.

“As I mature,” Chollo said, “my age limits loosen. We are very romantic, south of the border.”

“Age got nothing to do with it,” Hawk said. “Only two kinds of music: good and bad.”

“That would be Duke Ellington,” I said.

Hawk nodded.

“It would be,” Hawk said.

“I’m a Desi Arnaz man, myself,” Chollo said.

“ ‘Babalu’?” I said.

“Exactly,” Chollo said. “How you going to top ‘Babalu’?

Duke whatssis ever do ‘Babalu’?”

“God, I hope not,” Hawk said.

“You putting down the music of my people?” Chollo said.

“Whenever I can,” Hawk said.

As they talked neither one ever lost focus on Susan’s doorway.

“You need to open your mind, my African friend. Bobby Horse, now he likes Kiowa music.”

“What the hell is Kiowa music,” Hawk said.

“You know. They got those pipes they play.”

“You like it?”

“I never heard it. But Bobby Horse, he say it’s great.”

“Bobby Horse think he grew up in a damn teepee,” Hawk said.

“Sí,” Chollo said. “And ride bareback on a pinto pony when he is still a baby. It is how he got his name.”

“Only horse he ever saw he bet on,” Hawk said.

“Bobby Horse is maybe a little romantic about being a Native American,” Chollo said. “But he fi ghts good.”

“Yeah,” Hawk said. “He do.”

Susan came out of her office and walked across the hall. She was wearing a black sweater today, over a white shirt. Her pants were banker’s gray and fit her very well. Her black boots had high heels. When she came into the room it seemed almost to reorganize about her. I felt what I always felt when she appeared, the oh-boy click in the center of my self.

“Perry Alderson just called and asked for an appointment,” she said.

38.

We all thought about that for a while. At least

Susan and I did. Vinnie continued to sleep. Hawk and Chollo were impassive, waiting for Susan and me. My first reaction was no! My second reaction was to find Alderson and break his back. My third reaction was the one I allowed out.

“What are you going to do?” I said to Susan.

She smiled.

“Right reaction,” she said.

“What other reaction could I have?” I said.

“Oh heavens,” Susan said. “I’ve known you too long and too intimately . . .”

“Please,” I said. “Not in front of my friends.”

She smiled again.

“The other reactions would have been about you,” she said.

“Not always a bad thing,” I said. “Sometimes you and I are pretty inextricable.”

“Yes, we are,” she said. “I told him I’d see him.”

“Alone?” I said.

“You know what I think about group sessions,” Susan said.

“When?” I said.

“Tuesday morning, at nine-fi fty.”

“We got the weekend to rig the offi ce,” I said.

“Rig?” Susan said.

“Listening device, surveillance camera.”

“No,” she said. “I cannot spy on a patient.”

“Even one who means you ill?” I said.

“We don’t know that yet,” she said.

From the couch, with his eyes still closed, Vinnie said, “I can put in an alarm button. I used to do electrical work.”

“Under the desk,” I said. “Where she can hit it with her knee?”

Susan nodded.

“That would be acceptable,” she said. “And I’ll have the gun you gave me. And you’ll all be here.”

“Why are you seeing him?” I said.

“It’s what I do,” Susan said. “He’s there. He’s of interest. I am interested.”

“Doesn’t this present some ethical problems for you?” I said.

“Many,” she said. “I plan to explain it to him.”

“About you and me?”

“Yes.”

“He knows that now,” I said. “Why do you think he’s coming to see you?”

“That would be one of the things I’d hope to discover,” she said. “I certainly won’t discover anything by turning him away.”

“No,” I said.

“At least while he’s here, we know where he is,” she said.

“Will you rat him