What It Was

by George Pelecanos

  A female clerk with dilated pupils handed Strange the bagged-up tapes, the package no bigger than a sandwich.

  The young man said, “Would you like me to take that out to your car for you, sir?”

  “I think I can handle it,” said Strange.

  The young man smiled. “Just doin my j-o-b.”

  Smartass, thought Strange. And heading out the door, he thought: Is it just me, or is everyone in this motherfucker high?

  VAUGHN HAD a brief conversation with Dewight Mitchell, a D.C. Transit bus mechanic who troubleshot at the depot up by 14th and Decatur. Mitchell was about Vaughn’s age, solidly built, with short gray hair and veins thick as worms on the backs of his workingman hands. Once Mitchell had shown him his Electra, a convertible, Vaughn knew for certain he was speaking to the wrong man. He had known, in fact, since he’d met Henrietta, Mitchell’s wife.

  They talked cars, mainly. Vaughn said he was a Mopar man but felt that Dodge had erred with the design change they’d made after the golden years of ’66 and ’67. Mitchell liked GMs for their elegant lines but conceded their mechanical inferiority. Said he could break down any kind of engine, so the nuts-and-bolts shortcomings didn’t bother him much, long as he was driving a nice-looking car.

  They shook hands and Vaughn went on his way.

  In Vaughn’s mind, he was straight with black people. He got along fine with them, mostly, if they were polite and close to his age. It was some of the young ones, with their attitude, who rubbed him the wrong way. As if to underscore the point, a dark guy with a blowout crossed the road up by Colorado Avenue, taking his sweet old time as Vaughn approached in his Monaco. Vaughn had to stop and wait for the young man to pass, and got an eyefuck for his courtesy. It was that special look that said, I dare you to hit me, white man.

  Maybe I should pull over and kick your ass, thought Vaughn. But these days, at the urging of Olga, he was trying to get with the program and move to a higher spiritual place, join hands with all the people of colors and step forward into the light.

  Vaughn showed the spade his choppers and drove on.

  FIRST THING Clarence Bowman did after reporting for work at D.C. General early that morning was to check in on Roland “Long Nose” Williams. Looking through the open door of his room, he saw an orderly changing the sheets on Roland’s empty bed. Confirming that Williams had been released, Bowman called in to the home office and said he was experiencing stomach problems that rendered him unable to work. Excused from his duties for the day, he returned to his apartment off H Street, got out of his security guard uniform, and changed into triple-pleat black slacks, a gray poly shirt, black side-weaves, and a summer-weight sport jacket, also black. Bowman phoned Coco Watkins and told her that Williams was back on the street.

  “I’ll make sure Red gets the message,” said Coco. “You on your thing?”

  “I could use some female assistance,” said Bowman. “Phone call shit.”

  “My girls are kinda shook from a bust went down last night. You know they be delicate sometimes.” Bowman heard Coco inhale deeply on a cigarette as she thought it over. “There’s an all-purpose girl, goes by Gina Marie. She should be down at the diner on U. She goes there to start her day.”

  “I know Gina.”

  “Many men do,” said Coco. “That girl will do anything for a dime.”

  Bowman ended the call. He went to his small kitchen and dropped the door on the oven of his freestanding electric range. In its cool cavity were two guns: an S&W .38 and a Colt .22. Bowman checked the loads on both and slipped them into a small gym bag. He found the keys to his Mercury Cougar and with bag in hand left out of his crib.

  COCO WATKINS looked out the big window of her office-bedroom to the wide expanse of 14th Street. Down the block, near the corner of R, she saw an unmarked stripped-down white sedan carrying a side-spot, and a hand, cigaretted and draped loosely on the lip of the open driver’s-side window, belonging to the cop behind its wheel. MPD had put a plainclothes officer outside her place in the event that her man would pay her a visit. She had expected that. But she had missed another street detail.

  Focusing on the unmarked, Coco did not take notice of a black Continental parked on the opposite side of 14th, or the two white men who were its occupants. Had she studied the Lincoln, she would have noted that the car was not a typical police vehicle, and that the men inside it didn’t look like law.

  It was not like Coco to be sloppy, but she was stressed. She had spent the night in lockup, had been forced to lie down on a hard cot, and had gotten no more sleep than a cat on coffee. Then she had returned in the morning to find her place burgled and tossed. Couple of the doors of the girls’ rooms had been broke off their hinges, and the pretty ring Red had given her was gone. She didn’t know how she was going to tell him. Top it off, she was worried about him. She’d already heard that he’d robbed Two-Tone Ward earlier that day, and given Ward a beatdown in the bargain. That would come back on Red for sure.

  Coco dressed in tight-fitting bells, low heels, and a nice silk blouse, put on some costume jewelry, and made herself up in the light of her vanity mirror. She went out into the hall and talked to Shay and a couple of the other girls who were relaxing in their rooms. Said she’d be around and would return but didn’t know when. Told Shay she’d check in with her later. Reminded them that it was a work night, and to prepare themselves to get back on the stroll.

  Coco used the fire escape to go down to the alley, where a boy was watching her red-over-white Fury. She gave him a five-dollar bill and fired the Plymouth up.

  STRANGE WENT to a pay phone outside the Boukas Florist, high on Connecticut, and dialed the number Lydell Blue had provided for the house on Tennyson. The lady of the house, Hallie Young, answered. Strange gave her his name but not his occupation.

  “I understand you’re using a Miss Maybelline Walker as a math tutor,” said Strange. “She’s been recommended to me for my daughter.”

  “Yes, we hired Maybelline to help our son.”

  “She gave me your name as a reference.” Strange figured this untruth would get back to Maybelline, but he would deal with that conflict when it arose.

  “We’re pleased with her, so far. She’s only just made her second visit today.”

  “How did you come to know of her services, originally? If you don’t mind my asking.”

  “She was referred to us by a couple we know from the neighborhood. The Rosens. Seth and Dayna live over on Thirty-First Place. Dayna used her longer than we have.”

  “Would you happen to have their phone number?”

  “Hold on, Mr. Strange.”

  Strange held, and got what he was after. He hung up the phone, lifted the receiver back out of its cradle, and made his next call.

  THE SECOND name on Vaughn’s list took him to the neighborhood of Brightwood, off Georgia Avenue. He was looking for a Costas Lambros, who was the registered owner of a ’68 gold Electra.

  Lambros lived on Tuckerman Street in a small neat house of brick and shingle. A large healthy fig tree was set against the south wall of the colonial. From his years on patrol, Vaughn knew that one could identify the past and present Greek-owned homes in any community by the fig trees growing in their yards.

  Vaughn inspected the Buick that was parked out front. It was a base-model Electra, stripped down and stock from the factory, with a white roof. It was a nice vehicle, but it was not a deuce.

  An old man came out of the house, his pants cinched sloppily above his waist with a mangled leather belt. His wife, her gray hair tied up in a bun, wearing a housedress, orthopedic shoes, and calf-length stockings, followed. Both of them walked with difficulty. As he approached, the old man’s lips were moving, but there were no sounds emanating from his mouth.

  Costas and Voula Lambros wanted to know why Vaughn was standing by their car. They had to be mindful of strangers. The neighborhood had changed for the worse, what with “the mavri” moving in. Costas had owned a fruit-and-vegetable stand
in the Eastern Market for many years, and his wife, Voula, had worked beside him. Their kids had families of their own and were living in the suburbs. Nixon had to do something soon about the welfare and all the crime.

  Vaughn thanked them and apologized for taking their time. Driving away he thought, Please don’t let that happen to me.

  CLARENCE BOWMAN parked his Cougar on 11th, walked around the corner, and entered the diner that remained one of the few spots of thriving commerce and life on U Street since the riots.

  Bowman saw Gina Marie at the counter, seated on one of its red-cushioned stools. To the left of her was another streetwalker who went by Martina. Martina was picking at a basket of fries drowning in ketchup. All the counter seats were taken, as were most of the two- and four-tops spread about the front of the house. The diner’s storied jukebox was playing “Talking Loud and Saying Nothing,” James Brown’s new one, Parts I and II, and hard-at-work employees and patrons alike were moving their heads to its surging, infectious groove. Bowman stood over the shoulder of a man who was sitting to the right of Gina Marie and waited. The man felt Bowman’s presence, turned his head and gave him a look, then a double look, and got up off his stool, basket of lunch in hand. Bowman had a seat.

  “Girl,” said Bowman.

  “Clarence.”

  From the baggage underneath her eyes, it looked like Gina Marie had just got up out of bed. She was a hard-faced woman to begin with, half used up at twenty-five. She wore a curly brown wig and false eyelashes, and a short red dress that showed off her heavily muscled legs. Reminded Bowman of that running back, Don Nottingham, played for Baltimore, the low-to-the-ground man they called “the Human Bowling Ball.” Gina Marie was built like him, with a triangle. Some men liked that body type, but Bowman went for tall. Gina Marie was drinking a large sweet tea from a paper cup and smoking the life out of a cigarette.

  Bowman lit one of his own. “What’s goin on?”

  “Guess you heard about Red.”

  “He dead?”

  Gina Marie shook her head. “It’s all over the telegraph. Him and Fonzo Jefferson robbed Sylvester Ward earlier today. They gave him an ass-whippin, too.” Gina Marie dragged on her smoke and French-inhaled. “You know Two-Tone got police and politicians in his pocket. This ain’t gonna be good for Red. Your boy must be losing his got-damn mind.”

  Bowman studied the burning menthol between his fingers.

  “That homicide detective,” said Gina Marie, “the one they call Hound Dog? He been askin around, too.”

  “You mean Vaughn.”

  Gina Marie made a head motion to her left. “He talked to Martina. Don’t worry, Martina ain’t give nothin up.”

  Bowman glared at Martina Lewis, a punchboard dressed and made up as a woman. Martina held Bowman’s gaze for a moment, then looked away.

  “Martina’s cool,” said Gina Marie, not liking Bowman’s cold stare.

  “There’s somethin you can do for me,” said Bowman.

  “Say it.”

  Bowman reached into his shirt pocket, produced a slip of paper, and handed it to Gina Marie. On it was the phone number and address of assistant prosecutor Richard Cochnar. Bowman had copied it straight out of the book. The prosecutor had not even been on the job long enough, or made enough enemies, to realize that his contact information should be unlisted. He was that green.

  “Cock-nar,” said Gina Marie, struggling as she tried to read off the paper.

  “It’s Cotch-ner,” said Bowman. “Ain’t no k in that name.”

  “What you want me to do?”

  “Go to that pay phone over there and call his place. Make your voice like a salesgirl or somethin. Ask to speak to the man of the house. I already know he won’t be there.”

  “So why am I calling, then?”

  “Listen to me. Whoever you talkin to gonna tell you that Cochnar’s at work. So you ask what time he gonna be in.” Bowman dropped a dime and a nickel onto the counter. The dime spun and then rolled down flat. “Can you do that?”

  Gina Marie picked up the change. She jumped down off the stool and strutted, quick and cocky, to the phone. Even in her heels, she wasn’t more than five-foot-nothing.

  While she made the call, Bowman looked at Martina Lewis. “Hey,” he said, and chuckled low.

  Gina Marie returned, smiling proudly, and hopped back up to her seat. “He gonna be home around seven.”

  Martina Lewis got up abruptly, walked by them, and headed out the door.

  “Martina a man,” said Gina Marie, apropos of nothing.

  “Clarence Carter can see that shit,” said Bowman, and he, too, rose up off his stool. He crushed out his cigarette, removed a ten from his wallet, and slid it in front of Gina Marie.

  “Thanks, sugar,” she said.

  Bowman, not one to waste words, was already gone.

  DAYNA ROSEN had declined to give Strange any information over the phone. He told her that he happened to be in the neighborhood and politely asked if he could stop by her place and speak with her face-to-face. After a short silence on her end of the line, she agreed. But when she got a look at him, a strong young black man walking up her sidewalk, she took him around the side of her house, one of the many center-hall brick colonials of Barnaby Woods, and had him sit on its screened back porch. She was being cautious because of his color, something she’d never admit to him or herself. But he knew.

  Dayna Rosen was a dark-haired, brown-eyed woman in her late twenties, wearing bell-bottom jeans, a leather vest, rope sandals, and a Hanoi Jane shag straight out of Klute. She and Strange sat on the back porch in comfortable chairs, part of an outdoor furniture set that looked like it had cost good money. She had served him iced tea. African masks hung on the porch’s posts, and a Coltrane poster had been framed and mounted on the paneled outside wall. The Rosens were making a statement, and Strange took it in.

  Dayna gave him a shorthand summation of their lives. Her husband, Seth, was an attorney for a labor union and he was at work. Their son, Zach, was in first grade at Lafayette Elementary. He was having a little trouble keeping up in math. They thought they’d “nip it in the bud” early and get him a tutor. Dayna had seen a flyer posted on the bulletin board at the Chevy Chase Library and she’d called the number given for Maybelline Walker, who was offering her expertise and services.

  “How’d that work out?” said Strange.

  “Fine,” said Dayna. “What she did was helpful.”

  “First grade is kinda young to have a tutor isn’t it?”

  “Zach needed assistance.” She looked him over. “How old is your daughter?”

  “She’s ten,” said Strange recklessly. He hadn’t thought the age thing through.

  Dayna’s eyes flickered. She glanced at his hands, which carried no wedding ring. “You and your wife must have had her at a very early age.”

  “I plucked my bride straight out the cradle,” said Strange with a clumsy smile. “So, Maybelline Walker. You used her for how long?”

  “A month, I guess. Maybe four sessions.”

  “Only a month?”

  “Something…” She stopped, moved her eyes away from his, and finished her thought. “Something happened.”

  “Was there some kind of problem with her work?”

  Distracted and out of sorts, Dayna got up out of her chair and used her palms to smooth out the wrinkles in her jeans. She picked up her glass, which she had barely drunk from, and said, too hurriedly, “I’m going to get some more tea. Would you like a refill?”

  “I’m good,” said Strange.

  She was gone for a while. When she returned, she stood by the table and made no move to sit. Her jawline had hardened and there was steel in her voice. “You should go. I called the police.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “I don’t believe you have a daughter, for one, or that you’re married. You’re not telling me the truth.”

  Strange nodded. “Sometimes, in my line of work, it’s just easier to lie.
”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m doing a background check on Maybelline Walker for a client,” said Strange, telling another lie. “I’m an investigator on the private side.”

  “Let me see some identification.”

  Strange pulled his ticket from his wallet and handed it to her. “You didn’t call the police, did you?”

  “No, but I should have.” She dropped the license in front of him on the glass table. “Please go.”

  “Want me to use the servants’ exit?”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I’m sayin, Maybelline did better than I did. Least she got through the front door.”

  Strange pictured Dayna on some college campus, not too long ago, an enthusiastic participant in the revolution. And now, living this good life in Chevy Chase, D.C., seeing that this capitalism thing was not all that bad, but still trying to hold on to her ideals. That white guilt thing had to be heavy on her shoulders.

  Strange’s implied accusation cut but didn’t soften Dayna. Color came to her face.

  “Bullshit,” she said. “Don’t lay that crap on me.”

  “I apologize for coming here on false pretenses,” said Strange.

  Dayna, exasperated, sat back down in her chair. “What do you want, really? What’s this about?”

  Strange leaned forward. “You said something happened.”

  VAUGHN DROVE over the Anacostia River, went north on Minnesota Avenue, and turned right on one of the single-syllable streets running alphabetically across the grid of central Northeast. The block ended in a circle, with a stand of thin woods split by a ribbon of creek. Boxy brick apartment buildings, housing residents on government assistance, were visible on the other side of the woods.

  Vaughn parked his Monaco in front of one of several wood-framed, dilapidated single-family homes, took his hat off the seat beside him, and placed it on his head. He walked up a buckled, weeded sidewalk to the house whose address he had written in his notebook. A woman was on the porch in a folding chair, a sweated can of Schlitz in her hand. He could see, even in her seated position, that she was tall and long of leg. Her hair hung straight. She wore a shift with open buttons up top, and her bust was full and sat high and natural. Her feet were bare. A country girl gone hard in the city.