“What have you learned about the list?”
“About as much as seventy cops and other employees can learn in the time since you called. There are a hundred and ten people who have these names and live or work or both in Manhattan, thirty-one are named John H. Williams, so it’s not as bad as I thought it would be.”
“What do they have in common?” Stone asked.
“You mean, besides being hunted by a lunatic?”
“He may have very good reasons,” Stone said. “Did any of them know a lunatic who might want them dead?”
“There were a scattering of exes—wives and husbands, and just good friends—who are candidates, but nobody who is known to any of the other survivors—so far. In fact, none of the names that anybody on the list came up with are known to any of the others.”
“That would be too easy,” Stone said.
“Of course, we haven’t talked to you, yet.” Dino handed him a sheet of paper with a lot of names typed on it. “These are all the people who are considered candidates for being the lunatic. Do you know any of them?”
Stone read through the list carefully. “Not a one,” he said.
“No name says ‘bingo!’?”
“None.”
“All right, think about your circle of acquaintances: Do you know anyone who might want to kill you? And not just the women.”
Stone got out his iPhone and scrolled through all the names on his contact list. “Nobody,” he said.
“Well, I can think of one person,” Dino said.
“And who might that be?”
“The first Mrs. Barrington,” Dino said.
Stone sighed. Dino never missed an opportunity to bring up Dolce. She was the daughter of a close friend of Stone’s, Eduardo Bianchi, now deceased, who had taken a keen interest in him, and he in her. They had been through a civil marriage ceremony in Venice, but before the scheduled church ceremony could be conducted, sealing the deal, Stone had been called back to the USA to help an old girlfriend who was considered a suspect in the death of her husband.
Dolce, incensed by his absence from Venice and the presence of a previous woman back in his life, had begun an obsessive campaign to get Stone back to the altar, and the whole thing had ended badly. Eduardo, understanding his daughter and fond of Stone, had retrieved the document that they had signed at the civil ceremony and returned it to Stone, who had, very quickly, set fire to it. Dolce now resided in a nunnery in Sicily, attended by the nuns, a number of guards, and at least one psychiatrist. “You know very well that Dolce is not free to attack me.”
“I know that only because I spoke to my ex-wife this afternoon, who called the mother superior and ascertained that her sister is still ‘in residence,’ shall we say.” Dino’s ex-wife, Mary Ann, was Dolce’s sister and, after their father’s death, had been in charge of her treatment and confinement.
“Well, that’s a relief,” Stone said.
“You must admit that, if she had her freedom, she would be just the sort of person we’re looking for.”
“I suppose you’re right. You’d like that, wouldn’t you?”
“Sure I would. Just think of all the man-hours the department would save. As it is, we’re having to interview every person whose name is on the list, and in addition, every ex-wife and ex-husband and ex-lover and all the crazy people whose names they gave us. Also, we’ve had to assign cops to protect them. God help us if we didn’t protect every one of them and then that one turned up dead.”
“Any luck with the adman?”
“No, both his secretary and his ex-wife, who know him better than anyone else, say he’s just not of the nature to attract enemies. His name might as well have been drawn from a hat.”
“Who are the others?”
“They’re all employed in Manhattan by accounting or IT firms, universities, hospitals, etcetera, etcetera—no two of them with the same employer or even in the same field of endeavor. They’re fairly high up in their chosen fields, well-paid and well-thought of. About the only thing they have in common is that they’re all single—either divorced or never married.”
“Are any of the women lesbians or bisexual?”
“Only one, that we know of. She works on Page Six at the Post, dishing dirt. Why do you ask?”
“It occurred to me that the threat could have had affairs with all of them, if he or she were bisexual.”
“Do you know any lesbians or bisexuals?” Dino asked.
“Not well enough for them to hate me,” Stone replied.
“So your theory doesn’t hold water?”
“I guess not.”
They ordered steaks and wine.
“Oh,” Dino said, “two of the people on the list, besides you, have carry licenses—one is a diamond merchant and one is a fancy pawnbroker, with offices in a Fifth Avenue skyscraper.”
“Well, I’m packing, and I hope you told them to.”
“We didn’t have to; they both carry all the time.”
Their steaks came, and they assaulted them.
“I get why the diamond merchant carries,” Stone said, “but why the pawnbroker?”
“He says he has regular customers—for instance, a woman who’s a handicapper at the track in her spare time, and when she loses, she gives him a call. She has a diamond ring worth two hundred grand, and she might borrow fifty on it. When she does, he takes the cash to her personally and collects the ring. The process reverses when she wins big.”
“That’s novel,” Stone said.
“Yeah, he says he knows the ring better than he knows her.”
“I guess we could hope that the perp picks one of those two pistol packers and gets his head blown off,” Stone said.
“That would be nice,” Dino said. “So to speak.”
“Any other theories?”
“Yeah, there’s one on the list who has, over some time, had multiple threats or attempts on his life.”
“Which one?”
“Doesn’t that sound familiar?”
“You’re talking about me?”
“Why do you sound so shocked?”
“I’ve had . . . Well, there have been . . .”
“Yeah,” Dino said. “I think about half of the guys in the Russian mafia carry a card with your photograph on it, just in case they spot you somewhere and get a shot at you.”