Where the ice is thick

Parker sat down beside her, put his sunglasses on, leaned back on the chaise longue with his face in the sun, and said, "I'm going away for a while."

Still looking at the book, she said, "I knew."

"It may just be for a day or two. If I'm not back in two days figure me to be gone for a couple weeks at least."

"Or maybe for ever," she said.

He looked at her, but her eyes were still on the book. He said, "I'm not walking out on you."

"Maybe not on purpose," she said. "I've known men like you before."

She might have been talking about her airline pilot husband, who wound up smeared like raspberry jam across some mountaintop. Parker didn't like the analogy.

"You've never known anybody like me before," he said. "I only walk where the ice is thick."

"You walk on ice," she said. "That's what I mean."

- from The Green Eagle Score, Richard Stark, 1967