He went to the girl's dresser now, and opened the top drawer, looking for he didn't know what, anything thai would tell him something about either her or whoever had been with her on the night she died. There were cops who went by the book, canva.s.sed the neighborhood first, asked Leroy and Luis, Carmen and Clarisse did they see anybody going in or out of the apartment, but up here in Zimbabwe West, n.o.body ever saw nothing if you were a cop. Anyway, he preferred getting to know the vie first, and then getting to know whoever knew her. Besides, Ollie liked dead people much better than he did most living ones. Dead people didn't 95.Ed McBain give you any trouble. You went into a dead person's apartment, you didn't have to worry about farting or belching. Also, if the vie was a girl, you could handle her panties or panty hose-like he was doing now- without anybody thinking you were some kind of pervert. Ollie sniffed the crotch of a pair of red panties, which was actually good police work because it would tell him was the girl a clean person or somebody who just dropped panties she had worn right back in the drawer without rinsing them out. They smelled fresh and clean.

Being in her apartment, sniffing her panties, going through the rest of her underwear, and her sweaters and her blouses and her high-heeled shoes in the closet, and her coats and dresses, one of them a blue Monica Lewinsky dress, going through all her personal belongings, trying to find something, wondering what kind of person could have stabbed the girl it looked like half a dozen times and then left a f.u.c.kin bread knife sticking out of her chest, opening her handbag and rummaging through the personal girl things in it, he felt both privileged and inviolate, like an invisible burglar.

Carl Blaney was weighing a liver when Ollie got downtown at four o'clock that Wednesday afternoon. It was still raining, though not as hard as it had been earlier. The morgue and the rain outside both had the same stainless steel hue. He watched as Blaney transferred the liver from the scale to a stainless steel pan. Personally, Ollie found body parts disgusting.

"Is that hers?" he asked.

"Whose?" Blaney said.

"The vic's."

"That's all we've got here is vies."

96."Althea Cleary. The little colored girl got stabbed." "Oh, that one."

"What do you do here, you just go from one liver to another?"

"Yep, that's all we do here," Blaney said dryly. "So what've you got for me?" Ollie asked.

There was nothing Meyer liked better than to irritate Fat Ollie Weeks. The man was calling to talk to Carella, but Carella was down the hall. Meyer could not resist the temptation.

"Do you plan to sue this guy?" he asked.

"What guy is that?" Ollie asked.

He had never sued anybody in his entire life. He figured the lawyers of the world were rich enough.

"This guy who wrote this book with a lot of police stuff in it."

"What guy?" Ollie asked again.

"This Irishman who wrote a book. You're famous now, Ollie."

"The f.u.c.k is that supposed to mean?" Ollie said.

"On the other hand, it does say in the front of the book that the names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author's imagination, or are used fict.i.tiously."

"Wonderful," Ollie said. "Tell Steve I called, okay? I got to see him about something."

"'Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons is entirely coincidental,'" Meyer quoted. "Is what it says. So I guess it is just a coincidence."

"What is just a coincidence?" Ollie asked.

"His name being so similar to yours and all," Meyer explained.

"Whose name?"

"This guy."

97.Ed McBain "What guy?" Ollie asked for the third f.u.c.kin time.

"This guy in this police novel written by this Irish journalist."

"Okay, I'll bite," Ollie said.

"Fat Ollie Watts," Meyer said, drawing the name out grandly. "Not that anyone ever calls you Fat Ollie," he added at once.

"They better not" Ollie said. "What do you mean, Fat Ollie Watts?"

"Is the name of a character in this book."

"A character! Fat Ollie Watts?'

"Yeah. But he's just a minor character."

"A minor character?"

"Yeah, some kind of cheap thief."

"Some kind of cheap thief!"

"Yeah."

"Called Fat Ollie Watts!"

"Yeah. Pretty close, don't you think?"

"Close? It's right on the f.u.c.kin nosel"

"Well, no. Watts isn't Weeks."

"It ain't, huh?"

"It's even spelled differently."

"Oh, is that right?"

"I wouldn't worry about it."

"On your block, Fat Ollie Watts ain't Fat Ollie Weeks, huh? Then what is it?"

"It's Watts."

"Who the f.u.c.k is this guy?"

"Fat Ollie Watts," Meyer said. "I just told you."

"Not him The guy who wrote the f.u.c.kin book Don't he even know I exist?"

"Gee, I guess not."

"He's writing a book about cops and he never heard of me? A real person! He never heard of Oliver Wendell Weeks!"

"Oh, come on, Ollie, relax. This is just another 98.Thomas Harris ripoff serial-killer novel. I wouldn't worry about it."

"Does this f.u.c.kin guy live on Mars, he never heard of me?"

"He lives in Ireland, I told you."

"Where in Ireland? In some booth in a pub? In some stone hut by the side of the road? In some f.u.c.kin smelly bogl"

"Gee, I'm sorry I even mentioned it."

"What's this guy's name?"

"I told you. Fat Ollie . . ."

"Not him," Ollie said. "The writer. The f.u.c.kin writerl"

"I'll tell you the truth," Meyer said, grinning, "I've already forgotten it."

And hung up.

The two men met in a bar at five that afternoon. Both were officially off duty. Carella ordered a beer. Ollie ordered a Harvey Wallbanger.

"So what's this about?" Carella asked.

"I told you on the phone."

"Some girl got stabbed . . ."

"Black girl named Althea Cleary. Eight times, according to the ME. Knife was still in her chest. Weapon of convenience. Matches the set in her kitchen. Thing that made me think of you was Blaney telling me . . ."

"Which Blaney?"

"I don't know. How many Blaneys are there?"

"Two. I think."

"Well, this was one of them," Ollie said. "He told me the girl had maybe been doped. With guess what?"

Carella looked at him.

"Yeah," Ollie said.

"Rohypnol?"

99.Ed McBain "Rohypnol. Hey, bartender!" he yelled. "Excuse me, but did you put any vodka in this f.u.c.kin drink?"

"I put vodka in it," the bartender said.

"Cause what I can do, I can take it down the police lab, we'll run some toxicological tests on it, see if there's any alcohol in it at all."

"Everything's in it supposed to be in it," the bartender said. "That's a good strong drink you got there."

"Then whyn't you make me another one just like it, on the house this time, it's so f.u.c.kin good."

"Why on the house?" the bartender asked.

"Cause your toilet's leakin and your bathroom window's painted shut," Ollie said. "Those are both violations."

Which they weren't.

"You're sure she was doped?" Carella said.

"According to Blaney."

"And he's sure it was roofers?"

"Positive."

"What you're suggesting is a link to my case."

"By George, I think you've got it."

"You're saying because they were both doped . . ."

"Yep."

". . . and later murdered, there's a link."

"Which don't seem like too extravagant a surmise."

"I think it's a very far reach, Ollie."

"Here's your Wallbanger," the bartender said, and banged it down on the bar.

Ollie shoved his chair away from the table and walked over to pick it up. Watching him, Carella thought he moved surprisingly fast for a fat man. Ollie lifted the gla.s.s, sipped at it, smacked his lips, said, "Excellent, my good fellow, truly superior," and came back to the table. "It ain't a far reach at all," he told Carella.

"No? You're saying the same person who hanged my guy may have stabbed your girl."

IOO.

"I'm saying there's a pattern here. In police work, we call it an M.O."

"Gee, thanks."

"Happy to inform," Ollie said, and raised his gla.s.s in a silent toast, and drank. "There ain't no vodka in this one, either," he said and looked into the gla.s.s.