Stardust by Robert B. Parker Page B

from six at night to six in the morning. Hotel security will watch your room. They’ll be connected to the prowlies by radio.”
    â€œProwlies?” Jill said. She was glancing toward the bar. The waitress started toward her with another glass of wine, and I could see the tension ease as Jill spotted her.
    â€œPolice car,” I said.
    The waitress put the wine down. Jill picked it up, took a genteel sip.
    â€œYou want to go out nights, or whatever, you arrange it with Hawk.”
    â€œAnd will he go out with me?”
    â€œThat’s for you and him to work out.”
    â€œWill you?” Jill leaned toward Hawk as she spoke. The throat of her simple white blouse was open and as she leaned forward there was a clear line of cleavage.
    â€œSure,” he said.
    â€œAnd I, meanwhile, will chase down whoever has been annoying you and urge them to stop,” I said.
    â€œCan you find him?”
    â€œSure,” I said.
    â€œHow?”
    â€œYou start looking,” I said. “And you ask people things, and then that leads you to somebody else and you ask them and they tell you something that hooks you into somebody, and so on.”
    â€œBut where on earth will you start?”
    She had a little trouble with the separation between earth and will.
    â€œI already have,” I said. “I started with your friend Rojack.”
    She frowned. She took a drink. She frowned again.
    â€œI told you I don’t know him.”
    â€œKnow his name though,” I said.
    â€œ ’Course I know his name.”
    â€œHe says you and he were an item.”
    â€œHe’s a creep,” Jill said.
    â€œIs there anything you’d like to add to that appraisal?”
    Hawk sat quietly. Now and then he took a small taste of his scotch. He watched Jill’s behavior happily, as if he’d paid a modest admission fee and felt he’d gotten a bargain.
    â€œI don’t want to talk about him,” Jill said.
    â€œYou think he did it?” I said.
    Jill shook her head angrily.
    â€œI’ll find it out anyway,” I said. “Wouldn’t it make sense to tell me what you know, and get it over with quicker?”
    â€œI’m hungry,” Jill said.
    I slid the bowl of smokehouse almonds toward her. She took a handful and ate them silently, then drank some more wine. She had turned away from me as she did so and was eyeing Hawk.
    â€œYou married?” she said.
    Hawk shook his head.
    â€œGot anybody?” Jill said.
    â€œLots,” Hawk said.
    â€œI mean anybody special,” Jill said.
    â€œThey all special,” Hawk said.
    â€œYou like white girls?”
    Hawk looked at me again.
    â€œTell me ’bout that pay again?” he said.
    â€œGood. It’s good as hell,” I said. “And you get a free watermelon, too.”
    Hawk nodded. Jill bored in on him.
    â€œDo you?”
    â€œNot stupid,” Hawk said. “Mostly I prefer not stupid.”
    â€œDid Spenser tell you what I’ve been looking for ever since I got to Boston?” She put an h in Boston.
    â€œA noble black savage,” Hawk said.
    Jill shook her head. She was implacable. She probably didn’t listen to what I said or Hawk said or the byplay between us.
    â€œI want something about this long,” she said and made her two-foot measuring gesture again.
    Hawk examined the distance between her hands seriously, then nodded thoughtfully.
    â€œCould send over my little brother,” he said.

15
    H AWK was still nursing his first Laphroig, I was two-thirds through my first Sam Adams, and Jill was just beginning her fifth white wine.
    â€œBefore you doze off,” I said, “can we talk about Wilfred Pomeroy?”
    Jill had no reaction for a moment, then she looked very carefully up from under her lowered gaze and said to me, “Who?”
    â€œWilfred Pomeroy. Rojack says he was harassing you and had to be chased away.”
    â€œI