What It Was

by George Pelecanos

  “You’ll be paid.”

  “I’m gonna have to be well paid.”

  “Ain’t no thing. Me and Fonzo are flush, and we about to get richer.”

  “I know you’re good.” Bowman abruptly got up, smoothed the front of his triple-pleated slacks, and put out his hand. “Two Seventy-Four.”

  “Two Seven Four,” said Jones, giving his old friend a thumb-grip shake, moving their hands from side to side.

  Bowman nodded at Jefferson and left the house.

  “Your boy look like Rafer Johnson,” said Jefferson.

  “Clarence’s face cut the same way,” said Jones.

  Jefferson got up and put an album on the platter of his compact system. It was the new Kool and the Gang, Music Is the Message. He dropped the needle on the song called “Soul Vibrations.” As it came forward he said, “This jam is bad right here.”

  Jones made no comment. He didn’t care much for music or books. He liked movies when he had the time, the ones had black men in charge, but mostly his focus was on work. He aimed to leave behind a name that would be remembered. That would be something. Maybe the only thing. The one way you could win. ’Cause everyone was bound for a bed of maggots in the end.

  “I could use another blonde,” said Jones.

  Jefferson called out to his woman, and soon Monique appeared in the room. She was taller than Jefferson. The tops of her globes came bold out of her shirt, and she had straightened hair that was left uncombed. Monique had a mean-mustang look to her that Jones liked. He wondered what it would take to make an untamed country girl like her smile.

  “Get us two more High Lifes, Nique,” said Jefferson.

  Monique flattened a palm on her hip. “Your legs broke?”

  Jefferson smiled a row of gold. “Shake a tail feather, baby.”

  Monique turned on one heel and went to the fridge to get their beer.

  “Lotta woman right there,” said Jones.

  “That girl can buck.”

  After she returned with their beverages and left the room again, they discussed their plans. There was much to do.

  STRANGE PULLED his Monte Carlo over to the curb on 14th a block north of the house where Coco Watkins plied her trade. It was now well past two in the morning. Last call had come and gone. The licensed bars had closed their doors, and though there were many after-hours establishments down here, bottle clubs, floating card games, and such, most were in side street row homes, not on the main avenue. There were folks here and there, some standing on corners, a couple of them staggering and plain wasted. Others walked toward their homes, minding their own. But the general landscape was quiet. Even the punchboards had called it a night.

  Strange walked down the sidewalk unarmed. He had a retractable baton in the trunk of his car and sometimes he carried a Buck knife. But he was about to commit a B-1, and to have a weapon attached to it meant mandatory time. His aim was to get in, find what he was looking for, and get out. No violence, no complications.

  As he approached the door beside the market, he quickly scanned the area and saw no one who appeared to be law. He was unconcerned with witnesses. His plan was to enter the house as if he owned it. He put his hand inside his sleeve, turned the knob on the open door, stepped inside, and closed the door behind him.

  He stood silently in a kind of small foyer and listened. He heard nothing but the ticks and creaks an old house made in the middle of the night. He reached into the back pocket of his jeans and produced a pair of latex gloves that he’d taken from a box Carmen had brought home from the hospital. He fitted the gloves on his hands.

  “Hey!” said Strange, and heard only the echo of his own voice.

  He went up the stairs, his gloved right hand riding the banister up to the second-floor landing. He knew where he was going because Vaughn had detailed the layout. But first he needed to ensure an alternate exit. Instead of heading straight to Coco’s office, he went in the opposite direction, down a hall, past a row of small rooms that ended with a dirty window leading out to a fire escape going down to the alley.

  Strange unlatched the window. As he did it, he heard a noise from the first floor. A knock on the door, and then the door swinging open. Two men, talking loudly and unconcerned about the racket they were making. Then their footsteps, heavy on the stairs.

  FANELLA AND Gregorio ascended the staircase. Gregorio had a .38 holstered inside his jacket. Beneath Fanella’s white raincoat was an Ithaca pump-action twelve-gauge that had been cut down and fitted in a sling. Gregorio pulled his revolver as his feet hit the landing and waited for Fanella’s instructions. Fanella looked toward the front of the building, saw an open door that led to a large room. He moved his chin in that direction, and Gino Gregorio pointed the gun there. It was understood that he would shoot if he felt the need.

  Fanella opened his raincoat and drew the shotgun. He proceeded to walk down the hall methodically, looking carefully into each open room, kicking in the doors of those that were closed. It was soon obvious to him that these rooms were empty. Still, they approached the main room gun-ready. Only when they stepped inside and saw that it was unoccupied did they lower their weapons.

  They had seen the light in the window from the street. Fanella found it odd that there was no one here. He was confounded, and he was somewhat disappointed. He looked around at the red furniture, the red velvet drapes, the brass bed.

  “Least we come to the right place, Gino.”

  “It’s a whorehouse, Lou.”

  “You think?”

  Fanella slipped the shotgun into the sling, then walked to a bar cart and picked up a bottle of Crown Royal. He poured some into a tumbler, drank half of it down, made a sour face, and dropped the glass to the floor.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “Some boofer poured rotgut into a Royal bottle.”

  They tossed the room but found no heroin. Before they exited, Gregorio watched Fanella reach into a box and drop something in his pocket.

  “Who’s that for?” said Gregorio.

  Fanella said, “My wife.”

  WHEN STRANGE was certain they had left, he reentered the house. He’d watched them, sitting as far back as possible on the fire escape, through the dirty window. He’d made out their race, size, hair color, guns, and the white raincoat the larger man wore.

  Strange went down the hall to the large office, where a light had been left on. Carefully, he moved the curtain slightly aside on one of the big windows fronting 14th and looked down at the street. A large dark-haired man and a lean one with blondish hair were getting into a late-’60s black Lincoln. From this vantage point, the origin and numbers on the plates were unreadable. The car started with deep ignition and pulled away from the curb.

  Strange had a quick look around. The men had turned the place over indelicately and searched the room thoroughly. A big wooden box, the kind used to hold silverware, sat on the floor beside the bed.

  It was the box described by Vaughn. It had been opened and remained open still. There were only a few trinkets left inside. Necklaces of colored glass, a tiara with broken rhinestones, and a cameo brooch that looked to be made of plastic. All kinds of cheap, imitation jewelry.

  Strange moved his hand through the goods. He found no ring.

  FRANK VAUGHN pushed his plate aside, picked up his deck of L&Ms, and shook out a smoke. He lit the cigarette with his Zippo, placed the lighter atop the pack, and pulled an ashtray within reach. Before him was a notepad and pen.

  “I’ll have some more java, Nick.”

  “Sure thing, Marine.” Nick Michael, owner and operator of the Vermont Avenue diner, took Vaughn’s empty and moved to the big urns, where he drew a cup of fresh coffee. He returned to the counter with the full cup and placed it in Vaughn’s saucer. To the young black man with the thick mustache and broad shoulders, seated beside Vaughn, Nick said, “How ’bout you, young fella, want me to warm that up?”

  “I’m good,” said Strange. He had already devoured his eggs, scrappl
e, and onions fried in hash browns, and sopped up the yolk with toast. Nick removed both of their plates and walked toward a bus pan down by the register.

  “You get in that building all right?” said Vaughn.

  “Thanks to you.”

  “Wish I’d stuck around.”

  “I was lookin through a dirty window, mostly, so I didn’t have the best view.”

  “And you saw…”

  “Two white men. One dark and on the big side, one thin and fair skinned. The big guy carried a shotgun. The other one had some kind of pistol.”

  “What about their vehicle?”

  “Black late-sixties Lincoln with suicides.”

  Vaughn wrote that down on his pad. “Sounds like a match. Two white men visited Roland Williams and tortured him in D.C. General yesterday. A nurse gave us a rough description that’s close to yours.”

  “Tortured him for what?”

  “Williams says he doesn’t recollect. I’m guessing they were after information on the whereabouts of Red Jones. If I’m right, Williams gave up the location of Coco Watkins’s whorehouse. That’s what they were doing there—looking for Red.”

  “Who are they?”

  “Button men from up north,” said Vaughn. “Italians. Williams copped heroin on consignment from a guy up in Harlem who was connected to the Organization. So Roland Williams, in effect, owed money to the Mob. Jones took off Roland’s stash. Now the Italians are looking for Jones to settle the debt.”

  “You know this?”

  “Williams told me just enough to put it together. It makes sense.”

  “Red Jones is leaving behind a trail of fire.”

  “He’s bold,” said Vaughn. “Him and his partner, little dude named Alfonzo Jefferson, compelled a Lorton escapee, Dallas Butler, to come into the station last night and make a false confession to the murder of Bobby Odum.”

  “Compelled him how?”

  “They beat the shit out of him and threatened to murder his mother. Butler’s on the way back to jail, and happy to catch the ride. I did get one bit of information before I shipped him off.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Jefferson drives a sixty-eight Electra, gold exterior, hardtop with fender skirts.”

  “Deuce-and-a-quarter?”

  “Uh-huh. Case you see it on the street…”

  “I know. Proceed with caution.”

  “I’m guessing Jones is cribbed up with Jefferson somewhere,” said Vaughn. “Coco’s trick pad is way too hot.”

  Strange borrowed a pen from Vaughn and wrote down the description of Jefferson’s car on a napkin. He folded the napkin and slipped it in the pocket of his slacks.

  “You happen to find Red,” said Vaughn, “I wouldn’t try to talk to him about any missing jewelry.”

  “Someone’s gotta end this cat sooner or later.”

  “It’s coming,” said Vaughn. “Jones has a big set of nuts and he gives a good fuck about exactly nothin. But he’s gonna bite it. Guys like him think they’re taller than they are. They step on the wrong toes, and then it’s assassination time. Darkness.”

  “Maybe you’ll find him first.”

  “I hope I do,” said Vaughn. He hit his cigarette and studied it as he exhaled smoke. “I think I’m startin to love this guy.”

  “What’s next?”

  “I ran Alfonzo Jefferson through the system. He’s got priors but he’s no longer under supervision. Father deceased, no siblings on record. If his mother’s alive, there’s no record of her whereabouts. Prob’ly has a different last name than he does.”

  “Find the Electra, you find Jefferson.”

  “Right. There’s a few Buicks in the city that match the description, but none under his name. I’ll go out on the registration list and see if someone’s carrying the paper for him. Talk to my informants, like that. You?”

  “I’m thinking about taking a closer look at my client.”

  “Maybelline Walker? I don’t blame you.”

  “I’m curious, is all.”

  “That broad’s got a bag of cats under her dress. I met her, remember?”

  “It’s not like that,” said Strange.

  “Yeah, I know. You like her.” Vaughn’s grin was canine. “Deep down inside.”

  “Sayin, I’m spoken for. Got a date tonight with my girl, matter of fact. We’re going to a show at Carter Barron.”

  “I took Olga there to see Henry Mancini and Harry Belafonte a few years ago. Mancini played ‘Moon River,’ and I acted like I cared.”

  Nick laid down the check between them, and Strange reached for his wallet. “I got this one.”

  “Stay in touch, Derek.”

  “I will.”

  Vaughn crushed out his L&M. Strange palmed a couple of dollars over the counter to the grill woman and settled up with Nick.

  RED JONES and Alfonzo Jefferson sat in the gold Electra, parked nose east on Oglethorpe Street, in a neighborhood called Hampshire Knolls in Northeast. Their clothing was brightly colored, their heels were high, and the collars of their shirts were laid out wide across their chests. Jones had his .45 on the seat, resting against his leg. Jefferson’s police-issue .38 was fit snugly between his legs.

  Small homes, attached to one another in pairs, lined the block. The houses, built in 1950 and sold under the GI Bill, had originally gone for $12,000, with a mere $500 down payment the ticket in. Nearly all of those veterans and their young families were gone now, having moved out to suburban Maryland in search of better schools, safer streets, and whiter neighborhoods.

  Mid-street, under the shade of a government oak, a boy buffed the milky film off a current-year Cadillac that he had washed and waxed. An older man sat in a folding chair in the same patch of shade, having a cigar while he watched the boy work.

  “He up in that semidetached on the right,” said Jefferson. “Ward visits the same woman, same day, every week about this time. Has that boy shine up his Caddy while he hits that thing.”

  “Kinda early for that, isn’t it?”

  “Man likes his morning glory.”

  “You do your homework, Fonzo.”

  “I try to.”

  “How long we got to sit here?”

  “Boy’s near finished. That means Ward about to come out.”

  Jones dragged on a cigarette, then let his smoking-hand rest on the lip of the open passenger-side window. “They say he buys a new short every year.”

  “Man’s got to do somethin with all that cash.”

  “He spends plenty, but not all of it,” said Jefferson, studying the Eldorado as if looking at it in a dream. “That’s a sweet-ass car.”

  Sylvester Ward’s latest had been purchased with cash. It was a triple-green coupe with an opera window, rear skirts, spoke wheels, and wide whitewalls. His vehicles were bought at Capitol Cadillac on 22nd Street in Northwest. He liked to say that he traded them in “when the ashtrays get full.” If it was an exaggeration, it was not much of one.

  Ward, a rotund man in his early forties, came out of the duplex. He walked with confidence and had the easy gait of a man who carried his weight naturally. He wore a forest-green suit with white stitching on the lapels, a textured white shirt, white shoes, and a white belt. The outfit was a deliberate complement to his car. Ward was dark, mostly, with small patches of beige on his cheeks and forehead, and spots of beige and white all over the backs of his hands. He had been afflicted with a skin condition since childhood.

  “I see why they call him Two-Tone,” said Jones.

  “Look more like three to me,” said Jefferson.

  “Let’s take him.”

  They gathered their guns, slipped them under the tails of their shirts, got out of the Electra, and commenced to cross the street. Jones paused to crush his cigarette under one of his Flagg Brothers, then deep-dipped forward.

  Ward took note of the low-rent strangers as he descended the concrete steps of the row home. He showed no fear if he felt it, and when he hit the sidewalk he co
ntinued on toward his Cadillac. There they all met, standing around the car in that tight atmosphere that said some kind of conflict was about to go down. The boy dropped the chamois cloth he held in his hand and took one step back. The older man gripped the arms of the folding chair and stared straight ahead.

  “What you two want?” said Ward tiredly.

  Jones lifted his shirttail and showed Ward the butt of his .45. The boy’s eyes widened and he felt his heart beat pleasantly in his chest. Nothing this exciting had ever happened to him and nothing would again. When he was a crushed and disappointed middle-aged man he would often bore his friends with the story of Red Jones, tall and proud, tight bells, tall stacks, big old Afro, who came up on him and his uncle, showed his heater, and took off numbers kingpin Sylvester Ward.

  “You comin with us,” said Jones. “Right now.”

  “Don’t you know who I am?” said Ward, his voice a husky match to his size.

  “Matter of fact, we do.” Jefferson gave him a gold-toothed smile. “We ain’t about to take no poor motherfucker off the street.”

  “Let’s go,” said Jones.

  Ward gestured to the vehicle with incredulity. “What about my ride?”

  “Leave it,” said Jefferson. “The boy can watch it.”

  “Pay him for his time before you go,” said Jones. He gave the boy a short nod.

  Ward peeled off some bills from a roll of cash he drew from his pants pocket before walking with Jones and Jefferson to the Electra. Jones got into the backseat with Ward, drew his gun, and held it loosely in his lap.

  Jefferson settled in behind the wheel of his car and turned the ignition. Looking in the rearview mirror at Ward, he said, “You stay over in Shepherd Park, right?”

  “Holly Street,” said Ward, just above a mumble.

  Jefferson pulled away from the curb. “That’s a nice El D, Two-Tone. What you got in that, a six?”

  “Shit,” said Ward. “That’s a five-hundred-cubic-inch big-block V-eight.”

  “What do they call that color, ice-green, somethin?”

  “Willow- green. It’s new for this year.”

  “Pretty,” said Jefferson.