Gregor got out of the car. He stopped by Juan’s window and said, “Wait here as long as it takes. If you have a problem with a meter reader, circle the block for a while and come back. I may be a long time.”
Juan gave no indication that he’d heard or understood a thing. Gregor let it pass.
Gregor went up the short walk, and then onto the stoop. There was a bell on the left side.
Gregor tried leaning on the doorbell, but nothing happened. He couldn’t hear a sound from inside. The doorbell might be broken, or disconnected. Gregor opened the rickety screen door and pounded on the thicker, more substantial door behind it. When his fist banged against it, he realized the door was metal—and not hollow metal, either.
Gregor pounded hard. Then he stopped and listened. A faint rustling sound came from inside, but it was not the sound of someone coming to open the door.
Gregor waited for a few seconds and pounded again. When he stopped, there was again a faint rustling, but it was faster now. It sounded agitated.
Gregor pounded a third time. Then he said, in as loud a voice as he could muster, “I’m not going away, Mr. Pearce. I’ll stand here on this doorstep for the rest of the day if I have to, and I won’t be quiet. I need you to open this door and talk to me, right this minute.”
This time, there was no rustling sound from the other side of the door. Gregor could imagine Ray Guy Pearce somewhere inside there, holding his breath.
“Mr. Pearce,” Gregor said, “not only can I stand here all day, but I’ve got no compunction about breaking in if I have to. Nothing I need from you is necessary in a trial. Nothing I get from you outside the law will do anything to compromise anyone’s case in any way. Open up.”
There was still no sound behind the door. Gregor waited just long enough to be sure that Ray Guy Pearce wasn’t headed upstairs, and then he began pounding again.
The door opened when Gregor was in mid-pound. It swung inward so fast, Gregor almost stumbled across the threshhold.
The man on the other side of the door was not what Gregor had expected. He was not rabbity and small. He did not have eyes that darted from side to side as if they had a will of their own. Instead, he was large and hulking, as tall as Gregor himself and several times broader, but not with fat. He looked as if he spent several hours every day at the gym.
Ray Guy Pearce looked directly into Gregor Demarkian’s eyes and didn’t blink. “You can’t pull your crap here,” he said. “I’m not one of the civilians who don’t know any better. Produce a search warrant or get out.”
“I’m not going to produce a search warrant,” Gregor said, “because I don’t have one, and I wouldn’t bother to get one, because you and I both know there would be no point. But you are going to let me in, and you are going to talk to me, and you are going to do one more thing. And I think you even know what that is.”
“You’re out of your mind,” Ray Guy Pearce said.
“No,” Gregor said. “I’m just in a position to get you arrested on suspicion of first-degree murder. I can even get you extradited to Connecticut. So first you’re going to let me in, and then you’re going to answer my questions, and then you’re either going to hand over that two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, or you’re going to tell me where I can get it.”
2
The house was not only Ray Guy Pearce’s home. It was the headquarters of Knight Sion Books, the “premier publisher of Truth on the planet.” Gregor saw a sign that said just that as soon as he stepped over the threshold. The sign also had a picture of Saint George and the Dragon on it, with Saint George meant to symbolize either Knight Sion, or Ray Guy Pearce himself.
On second look, Gregor realized that the dragon was a little odd. It had seven heads, like a hydra, and seven eyes.
Ray Guy closed the door behind Gregor’s back and then came around to glower. He did a very effective glower, but Gregor knew better than to take it seriously.
“You have no right to enter a private house,” Ray Guy said. “If you think I’m one of the Sheeple, somebody who does not know my rights under the Constitution of the United States, you’re going to find that you’re very much mistaken.”
Sheeple, Gregor thought.
There were tables and couches and chairs all around them, and all of them were covered with books and papers. It was as if somebody had exploded a library. Gregor went over to the largest of the tables and put his attaché case down. Then he opened the attaché case up and took out the book he’d bought in Greenwich Village.
“Let’s start by discussing this,” he said.