[Lady Justice 08] - Lady Justice and the Watchers

by Robert Thornhill

  “Most people don’t just come in for the injection. They bring their prescriptions and pick up their toothpaste and deodorant while they’re here.”

  He shook his head. “It’s one of those ‘damned if you do and damned if you don’t’ scenarios.”

  I thought about all my drug related conversations with Dr. Pearson.

  “I’m guessing that you’ve seen quite a change in the pharmacy business over the years.”

  “You bet I have,” he replied. “When I first started my practice, prescriptions were written for very specific things, much like the few times that you’ve come to see me.

  “As I recall, when you were suffering from your kidney stone, you were more than happy to pop the antibiotics and pain relievers that Doc Johnson prescribed for you and I believe that your dentist wouldn’t do your root canal until you had a round of antibiotics.”

  “Right on both counts,” I replied.

  “What I see coming in the door today are what I call ‘convenience prescriptions’.

  “Mrs. Jones can’t sleep so her doctor gives her Lunesta or Ambien. Little Johnny is wound tighter than mommy can handle so the kid is pumped full of Ritalin. The old man can’t get it up anymore so Viagra or Cialis are now part of his weekly regimen. The wife can’t cope with all the stress in her life so she keeps a bottle of Valium in her purse.”

  I saw a wry smile creep across his face, “I have a customer that had so many pill bottles in her purse that she got her birth control pills mixed up with her Valium. She’s got fourteen kids now, but doesn’t really give a damn.”

  That’s why I like this guy.

  “Seriously, though,” he said, “people are taking so many drugs with so many side effects that now they’re coming in here with prescriptions to treat the side effects of the drugs they started with. It’s a vicious circle.”

  “If it’s that bad and you’re helping perpetuate the problem, how can you sleep at night?”

  He held up a bottle and gave me a wink, “Oh, I just take two of these right before bedtime and wash them down with two fingers of Jack and I sleep like a baby.”

  “It seems like new drugs are coming on the market almost weekly,” I said.

  “That’s because things that used to be just part of our daily lives are now being classified as diseases,” he replied, “and as soon as there is a new disease, the drug companies are ‘johnny-on-the-spot’ with the latest cure.

  “Sometimes I wonder which comes first, the chicken or the egg. I’ve often wondered if the drug guys invent a new pill and then the docs find a disease that it will cure.”

  I saw him grin again.

  “In fact, I just received a list of new drugs that will soon be on the market.”

  He picked up a piece of paper.

  “Damitol:

  Take two and the rest of the world can go to hell for eight hours.

  St. Momma’s Wort:

  Plant extract that treats mom’s depression by rendering preschoolers unconscious for up to two days.

  Peptobimbo:

  Liquid silicone drink for single women. Two full cups swallowed before an evening out, increases breast size, decreases intelligence and prevents conception.

  Dumberol:

  When taken with Peptobimbo it can cause dangerously low IQ, resulting in enjoyment of country music, moon pies and pickup trucks.”

  I was just about to make a wise crack when Homer and Henrietta Krug walked in the door.

  They’re a sweet old couple in their eighties that live just down the street from my apartment building.

  I often see them visiting with Dad and Bernice and when I saw Henrietta painfully waddle in the door walking bowlegged, I wondered if Dad had given Homer more of his Viagra stash.

  Wally smiled at the old couple, “Sorry, we’re not open yet. We had a robbery last night and things are a bit of a mess.”

  “That’s okay,” Henrietta said, “we’re not here to buy anything. We just needed to check something out.”

  “Sure,” Wally replied, “How can I help you?”

  “Well, when I was in here the other day, I bought one of those new-fangled stick deodorant things. I took it home and read the directions on the label. It said to ‘remove cap and push up bottom’. So I did it and now I can barely walk.”

  Homer chimed in, “But whenever she farts, the room smells really nice!”

  I’m not sure how Wally handled that one, because at that very minute, Detective Derek Blaylock walked in the door followed by the CSI team.

  “Walt, Ox, what have we got here?”

  After we filled him in with what we knew, Blaylock just stood there deep in thought, rubbing his chin.

  “This is the third pharmacy heist in the last month and we’ve had zippo on the perps until a few days ago.

  “One of the drug task force’s informants told us about a dealer operating down on the Plaza.

  “The guy is pushing the Yuppie stuff, Oxy, Ecstasy, Weed. The stuff in this heist fits that profile.

  “Walt, I think maybe we could use you again.”

  “For what?”

  “To do a drug buy for us.”

  “You think I look like a Yuppie?”

  “No, exactly the opposite. That’s why you would be perfect.”

  “I’m not following.”

  “The street hustler on the Plaza is going to be carrying the stuff the young studs want.

  “You’re going to show up wanting some of the little blue pills that the old guys covet. He’s not going to have any on him, but you’ll offer him enough to make the trip back to his stash worthwhile. We’ll tail him to his pad and bust him there.”

  “What the hell,” I thought. “Playing an impotent old man wasn’t a whole lot worse than impersonating a transvestite, a cadaver or a candy-striper.”

  On the way home that evening, I thought long and hard about how to tell Maggie that I was going undercover again.

  She had been less than thrilled when I broke the news about going to a suspected terrorist’s meeting, and now I was about to tell her that I would be rubbing elbows with a drug dealer.

  I was almost thankful when I walked in the door and saw Willie sitting on the couch.

  I was hoping that Maggie might scale back her rhetoric with witnesses present.

  “Willie, what’s up?”

  “Jes’ got back from de Three Trails. Old man Feeney stopped up de crapper again. You gonna have to buy me one of dem hazzz-mat suits if I gotta keep plungin’ his poop.”

  “I’m sure Mary was thrilled.”

  “She did threaten to shove a cork up his behind. Well, guess I better get downstairs an’ start fixin’ my supper. I think I might be able to eat now.”

  “Hang on a minute,” I said. “I’ve got something that I want to run by you and Maggie.”

  I told them about the break-in at Watkins Drugs and my upcoming assignment.

  The moment that I said ‘undercover’, Maggie’s expression changed.

  “So how many nights are you going to be away from me this time?”

  “That’s the good part,” I said, trying to put a positive spin on the situation. “It’s just a one night deal and then it’s over.”

  Willie had listened quietly and I was hoping he would be supportive, but his comment only fueled the fire.

  “You betta watch yo’ ass, Mr. Walt. Dem drug guys can be real mean. Even Louie de Lip steers clear of the corners where de’re workin’.”

  I saw the look of concern on Maggie’s face. “Gee, thanks, Willie,” I thought.

  “I’ll be perfectly safe. I’ll be wearing a wire and guys from the drug task force will be all around me.”

  I could see that Maggie wasn’t convinced, and after Willie’s comment, I wasn’t so sure that I was either!

  I was at the station at six o’clock to be prepped and briefed on my assignment.

  The first order of business was to get me wired up.

  The tech guys really like work
ing with me because, for a dude, I’m relatively hairless.

  I only have three chest hairs, which makes it easy for them to plaster the mike to my body with their adhesive tape.

  I was definitely a late bloomer when it came to body hair. I can remember other guys in my class proudly sporting peach fuzz on their lips years before I spotted my first hair. If I remember correctly, I didn’t start shaving regularly until I was twenty-five.

  I spent a lot of my youth with my grandpa and I remember him telling me that if I wanted to grow a moustache I should put chicken manure on my lip --- to fertilize it, of course.

  I never knew if he was telling the truth because Grandma always scolded him and made him take it back.

  Some guys might have been upset by their lack of body hair, but not me.

  Tarzan was one of my heroes and his chest was as hairless as a new baby’s butt.

  I figured if it was good enough for Tarzan, it was good enough for me.

  After I was wired, the guy from the drug task force laid out the plan.

  “The dealer usually sets up on the Plaza on 47th Street, right by the big boar hog statue. You know where that is?”

  I did. The boar’s nose had been rubbed slick and shiny by thousands of fingers over the years. It was said to be good luck to rub his nose, make a wish and throw a coin into the fountain.

  “We don’t know the guy’s name, but our informant says to approach him by saying, ‘Mickey said it would be a great evening to be on the Plaza’.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding! That sounds like something from an old Mickey Spillane novel.”

  “He’ll ask you what you want and you’ll tell him Viagra and you’ll haggle over the price and he’ll say he’s got to go get it. That’s all you have to do --- except for one other thing --- you have to stick this GPS transponder on him somewhere and then you’re through.”

  He handed me a little dot about the size of an M&M with adhesive on one side.

  “We’ll be listening through your wire. As soon as he takes off, we’ll track him to his stash and take him down. Pretty simple, huh?”

  “Sure, what could possibly go wrong?”

  I hopped out of the unmarked van a couple of blocks away from the boar statue and walked to the appointed corner.

  It was just seven o’clock and still light. I wondered if drug dealers were like cockroaches and only came out after dark.

  I looked up and down the street, but no one I saw looked like a crook. Couples were strolling the sidewalks hand-in-hand, ladies with shopping bags were hurrying from store to store and an old black guy set up a chair by the curb, put his hat on the sidewalk and started playing old blues tunes on a beat-up saxophone.

  People would stop, listen for a few minutes, toss some coins into the hat and continue on their way.

  I was mesmerized by his soulful playing and left my bench to get a closer look.

  I had just taken a few steps when I heard, “GET OUT OF THE WAY, OLD MAN!”

  I looked up just in time to see a kid on a skateboard closing on me fast.

  I jumped one way and thankfully, he swerved the other.

  I felt the ‘swoosh’ as he missed me by inches.

  He didn’t even bother to look back, but he did take the time to give me the finger as he sped away.

  A pimple-faced kid wiping out the old impotent guy almost derailed our little drug bust.

  At eight o’clock I saw a guy saunter up to the statue and give the boar’s nose a rub, but instead of moving on as others had done, he took a seat on the side of the fountain.

  When he hadn’t budged in ten minutes, I figured he must be our guy.

  I casually sauntered up and took a seat beside him.

  I gave him a glance and a smile, “Mickey said it would be a great evening to be on the Plaza.”

  He gave me a look of disgust. “What the hell are you talking about, old man? I’m waiting for my wife who is thirty minutes late, so I’m already pissed, so get away from me!”

  “Uhhh, sure, sorry. Didn’t mean to bother you.”

  I figured the guys listening in the van a block away were cracking up.

  I had just taken my seat on the bench when a guy slid in beside me.

  “Mickey was right. It is a great evening to be on the Plaza.”

  It scared the crap out of me. “Oh, I guess you heard.”

  “What can I do for you?”

  “My friend told me that if I needed some pharmaceuticals, you were the man to see.”

  “You don’t exactly look like the type wanting some Ecstacy or GHB.”

  “To tell you the truth, I don’t even know what that stuff is.”

  “So what are you looking for --- oh wait --- let me guess -- the little blue pill.”

  “It’s kind of embarrassing --- but yes, that’s what I want.”

  “Just go see your doctor. I don’t have time to mess around with that stuff.”

  “I’ve been to my doctor and he won’t give me a prescription --- says I have a bad ticker.”

  “So you’ve got heart trouble and you still want to rev up the engine?”

  “Hell yes! What’s the point in living if you can’t enjoy the good stuff?”

  “So you’re willing to die in the saddle, so to speak.”

  “Hey, we all gotta go sometime and I can’t think of a better place to be.”

  “It’s gonna cost you.”

  “How much?”

  “Twenty-five each.”

  “Holy crap! They’re only ten bucks at the drug store!”

  “Yes, but you can’t get them there, now can you? If you want to play ‘hide-the-salami’ with the old lady, you gotta pay the price.”

  I thought for a minute.

  “Okay, I’ll take eight of them. Two hundred bucks, right?”

  “That’s about it. Just wait right here. I don’t carry that stuff around with me. I’ll be back in fifteen minutes and you’d better be here.”

  I grabbed his hand and clapped him on the back sticking the GPS tracker to his shirt.

  “Not to worry. Momma’s at home hot to trot and I’m ready to batter dip the old corn dog.”

  I was feeling pretty good about myself as I watched him disappear around the corner.

  If everything went according to plan, the guy would be in cuffs in about twenty minutes.

  It hadn’t escaped my notice that the Cheesecake Factory was just a block down the street.

  I figured that after that performance I deserved a special treat --- key lime cheesecake, my very favorite.

  I strolled to the store, was seated right away and ordered a big slice with whipped cream.

  My mouth was salivating in anticipation when a fellow slid into the booth beside me.

  I felt something round and very hard pressed against my ribs.

  “Don’t make a scene, cop, unless you want to die right here along with a half-dozen others.”

  “Who are you? What do you want?”

  “Don’t play games with me. You’re not the only guy wearing a wire,” he said, pointing to an ear bud.

  “I heard your buddies arresting my partner and now you’re going to pay.

  “Just get up slowly. We’re leaving this dump together. I’ll be right behind you. Don’t try anything stupid or a lot of innocent people will be hurt.”

  I slid out of the booth and as we headed for the door, we passed the server who was bringing my key lime cheesecake.

  I was scared and pissed at the same time.

  I had really been looking forward to that cheesecake.

  When we reached the street, I asked, “Where to?”

  I was hoping the guys in the van might still be listening to my wire.

  He didn’t respond verbally. He just shoved me in the direction of the covered parking garage.

  We climbed to the second level of the garage and stopped in front of a black Lincoln.

  He grabbed my shoulder, flipped me around and tore open my shirt.


  “First thing we’re gonna do is get rid of this!” he said ripping the wire from my chest.

  It hurt like hell and I was horrified to see two of my three chest hairs plastered to the gooey side of the adhesive tape.

  He threw the mike on the pavement and ground it with his heel.

  “Now we’re going for a ride,” he said, popping the trunk. “Get in!”

  I knew that once I was in that trunk I was a goner so I just decided to try to take the guy right here and get it over with.

  He had already messed up my dessert and destroyed two thirds of my chest hairs, so I figured that if I could get in a couple of blows, it would be worth it.

  Just then a car came screaming around the corner of the parking garage.

  The lights were on high beam and it was heading right toward us.

  I heard a voice scream, “WALT! JUMP!”

  The guy turned toward the oncoming car and fired a volley of shots, disintegrating the windshield.

  I saw right away that the car wasn’t slowing, so I dived head-first into the open trunk and heard the impact as the front bumper connected with the gunman.

  The tires squealed as the car came to a halt.

  I peeked out of the trunk just in time to see two heads pop up --- Willie and my dad!

  I hopped out of the trunk and checked on the gunman, but he was out cold.

  Dad grabbed me by the arm, “Son, are you all right?”

  “Uhhh, yeah, I think so,” I said feeling my body parts. “What are you guys doing here?”

  “Willie told me about your little adventure tonight and we figured that we might as well tag along -- you know--- just to make sure everything went as planned.”

  “Obviously it didn’t. Where did you learn to drive like that?”

  “It seems that you’ve forgotten that I was an over-the-road trucker for forty years. I may be old, but I still have skills.”

  I turned to Willie, “Well, my friend, I guess I owe you another one. How many does this make?”