"Westlake, Donald E as Stark, Richard - Parker 09 - The Split (The Seventh) 1.1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Westlake Donald E)

Parker opened the door and the girl came in carrying a cookie tray with a teapot on it, three cups, a sugar bowl, a little round dish bearing a lemon, and a sharp knife. She put everything down on the table beside the bed. She'd found an apron, pink and white, to supplement the sweatshirt, but it only covered her in front, and when she bent to set the tray down on the table she aimed at Parker again that part that had won Dan Kifka.

Kifka said to her, 'Janey honey, Parker and I got to talk awhile, private. Boy talk.' Seeing him talking cute to the girl was like watching Smokey the Bear.

The girl turned and looked at Parker. It was obvious she'd decided she didn't like him and never would. She said, 'Dan needs his rest.'

Parker told her, 'He'll get more rest with me than you.'

'Just for a few minutes, honey,' Kifka said. He could have crumpled her, one-handed, like an empty cigarette package, but instead he put on apologetic look on his face and asked pretty.

Parker waited because that was all he could do, but he didn't like it.

Still, it didn't take as long as he'd expected. The girl pouted a little, and hesitated, and twitched her exposed tail, and made a few more remarks about the state of Kifka's health, and insisted on pouring the tea, but then she gave in and left the room, and closed the door behind her.

Kifka pointed at the closed door. 'That's the medicine, boy,' he said. 'That little girl can keep me as warm as toast.'

'The cash,' Parker said.

'I know, I know. I'm trying not to think about it.'

'That's bright.'

'Okay, Parker, don't get feisty. Somebody stole the dough. Look at me, what can I do?'

'You know where a couple of the others are holed up.'

Kifka nodded. 'Sure I do. Arnie and Little Bob. You want me to contact them?'

'No. I want their addresses. I want to go see if they're still there.'

'You think it's one of them? Neither of those guys would pull anything like that, Parker; I've known them both for years.'

Parker said, 'Who, then? Clinger?'

'New. Who, Clinger? He ain't the type.'

'How about Shelly? Or Rudd?'

Kifka shook his head to both of them. 'You know those guys as well as I do,' he said.

'Somebody took the cash,' Parker reminded him. 'There's only seven of us. It wasn't me and it isn't you. So that leaves five.'

Kifka frowned hard, rumpling his face up like a beagle. 'I just can't see it,' he said. 'It couldn't be some outsider?'

'Sure. Coincidence. I don't mind coincidence, it won't be the first time. A flat worker just happened to pick that apartment while I was out. He didn't know Ellie was there, and she saw him and he figured she could identify him, so he took the sword down off the wall and killed her. Then he found the cash by accident and took off. Except burglars don't like to kill if they can avoid it; they'd rather run. And why should he blow the whistle to the cops after I go back in the apartment?'

Kifka nodded reluctantly. 'Yeah, it don't sound probable,' he admitted.

'Maybe it was a stranger after all,' Parker told him. 'I'll believe it after I've checked and found out for sure it wasn't any one of us.'