God Save the Mark by Donald E. Westlake

Author:Donald E. Westlake [Westlake, Donald E.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: General, Fiction, Mystery & Detective, Swindlers and swindling, Inheritance and succession, New York (N.Y.), Murder victims' families
ISBN: 9780795304422
Publisher: RosettaBooks
Published: 2002-05-01T00:00:00+00:00

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Chapter 19

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MINETTA LANE is an L-shaped street, one block long, in the heart of Greenwich Village. It is a beautiful street, in a Little Old New York sort of way, and is almost the only area that still looks like Greenwich Village, the rest of it looking mostly like Coney Island. Except West 8th Street, which looks like Far Rockaway.

In any case, I was going to Minetta Lane because that was where Gus Ricovic lived.

Remember Gus Ricovic? According to the Daily News, he had taken Gertie out for a date the night my Uncle Matt was murdered. Who he was beyond that the Daily News had not said, nor was it clear whether or not he had accompanied Gertie into the apartment and become a co-discoverer of the body, nor had there been any mention of him in any of the follow-up stories. But I wanted to know more about him, so when I’d gotten up this morning I’d looked him up in the phone book—everybody is in the phone book—and there he was, living on Minetta Lane.

The address was an old dark-brick apartment building, and the name G. Ricovic was next to the bell-button for apartment 5-C. I rang, and waited, and had about decided nobody was home when all at once the door buzzer sounded. I leaped to the door and got it open just in time.

When I got to the fifth floor the door of apartment 5-C was standing open, showing a large square living room full of bad furniture from the Salvation Army. There was no one in sight.

I stood tentatively in the doorway a second or two, and then tapped on the door.

A voice called, “Come on in!”

I entered, and the voice called, “Shut it, will ya?”

I shut it, and the voice called, “Take a seat.”

I took a seat, and the voice was quiet.

To the right of where I was sitting, an arched doorway led to a long hall, this in semi-darkness. From somewhere down there came the sound of running water, and the brisk scrub-scrub of someone brushing his teeth. This was followed by an interminable period of repulsive gargling sounds, and then a great deal of splashing—as though dolphins were at play nearby and then what sounded like a towel repeatedly being snapped.

At last there was silence. I listened, and nothing seemed to be happening at all.

My mouth had become very dry. What was I doing here? What did I know about questioning people, about investigating murder cases, about unraveling complex schemes? Nothing. Less than nothing, in fact, because what little I did remember from my reading, I didn’t know how to use.

I had come here to ask a man named Gus Ricovic some questions. What questions? And what did I hope to gain from his answers? If I asked him straight out if he was part of the gang that had killed Uncle Matt and kidnapped Gertie and shot at me, he would naturally say no, he wasn’t.

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