Til Death (87th Precinct) by Ed McBain

Author:Ed McBain [McBain, Ed]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781612181875
Publisher: Thomas & Mercer
Published: 2013-03-12T00:00:00+00:00

The document was divided into three sections separated by perforated folding edges. It was printed on a dull shade of offpink paper. Its outer edges were serrated. Each section measured 4½ inches by 3¾ inches.

Carella took the small official-looking document from Martino and studied the first section.

Carella read each item carefully. Then he turned the permit over to read its reverse side:

The third section of the permit simply granted Martino permission to purchase a pistol and was signed by the same Riverhead magistrate, Arthur K. Weidman.

Carella knew at once that the permit was legitimate. He nonetheless took his sweet time examining it. He turned it over in his big hands as if it were a questionable international document prepared by Russian spies. He studied the signature, and he studied the thumb print, and he made a great show of comparing the serial number on the permit with the number stamped into the metal of Martino’s .22.

Then he handed both gun and permit back to the trombonist.

“Now suppose you tell us why you carry it, Sal?”

“I don’t have to. The permit is enough. I got a gun, and I got a permit for it, and that’s all you have to know. If you don’t mind, I’m supposed to play some dinner music.”

“The dinner music can wait. Answer the question, Sal!” Kling said.

“I don’t have to.”

“We’d better pull him in,” Hawes said.

“Pull me in? What for?” Martino yelled.

“For refusing to co-operate with a duly appointed officer of the peace,” Hawes yelled right off the top of his head.

“Okay, okay, okay,” Martino said in rising crescendo, “Okay.”

“Well?”

“I’m scared.”

“What?”

“I’m scared. I play on jobs, and sometimes I don’t get home till three, four in the morning. I’m scared. I don’t like to walk the streets so late at night carrying money and my horn. I’m scared, okay? So I applied for a pistol permit, and I got it. Because I’m scared, okay? Okay? Does that answer your goddamn question?”

“It answers us,” Carella said, and he looked somewhat shamefacedly at his colleagues. “You’d better get back to the band.”

Martino folded his pistol permit in half and then shoved it back into his wallet, alongside his driver’s license.

“There’s no law against being afraid,” he said.

“If there were,” Carella answered, “we’d all be in jail.”

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