“We’re here to see Ms. Lipton, Marcus.”
Marcus’s eyes moved almost imperceptibly, first taking in the credentials, then scanning Frank’s face as though he’d never seen him before.
“Wait.” Marcus’s shearing whisper was like a razor cutting through stiff paper. He swung the door shut. It made the heavy, cushioned sound of a vault closing. The snicking of a deadbolt followed.
Frank glanced out at the empty street, then at Jose. “I thought he was still in Lorton.”
“No,” Jose said. “Maybe a month, two months ago, I heard he was out. Nice uniform.”
“Looks like he got religion.”
“If you can call it that.”
More time passed.
Impatient, Frank rolled his shoulders. “Think he’s coming back?”
“I don’t hear anything.”
Jose had the knocker up when the deadbolt slid back. Another second and the door swung open. Marcus did a short rerun of the statue game, then motioned Frank and Jose in with a twist of his head.
Walking with feline grace, he led them down a narrow hallway and into a glassed garden room filled with potted palms, orchids, and climbing vines.
Sharon Lipton, a large, exotic woman, sat in an even larger wicker chair. Like a throne, the chair back swept out and up, forming an oval frame for her face. Beside her, a similar chair, empty.
“Thank you, Marcus.”
Marcus gave the slightest nod. He waited for a moment, eyeing Frank and Jose in warning, then left.
Lipton watched him leave, then turned to Frank and Jose.
They offered their credentials.
With the back of her hand, she waved them off. “Sit.”
The two men took seats on a small sofa. Lipton looked them over as if they were up for auction.
“You… you’re Josephus Phelps… Titus Phelps’s boy. And you”-she shifted to Frank-“you’re Frank Kearney.”
She continued looking at the two detectives, collecting more thoughts. She pursed her lips. “You the two who set up Johnny Sam.”
Jose shrugged. “Johnny set himself up.”
Lipton ignored him. “You said you wanted to talk to me.” She settled back in the chair and rested her hands on the arms. “So… so talk,” she commanded.
The thought came to Frank: She knows. She knows why we’re here.
Jose did it. Without preamble, he did it. “Ma’am, somebody shot and killed your son, James.”
Lipton’s expression didn’t change.
“It was over on Bayless,” Jose continued, “and Pencil-”
Lipton cut in. “I know.”
Her voice came from a dark cavern of grief and anger. It hung in the still air of the garden room. A heartbeat or two passed; then she brought her head forward a fraction of an inch. The motion carried an impression of searching.
“Where is he?”
“Medical examiner’s.”
“They gonna cut him up… my boy.” The final, flat way she said it, it wasn’t a question, it was an indictment.
“Medical examination could help us find who killed him,” Jose said.
Lipton registered zero expression.
“And his car?” she asked, as though toting up a score to be settled later.
“Impounded, ma’am, for evidence.”
Frank asked, “He lived here?”
“Yes.”
“Could we see his room?”
“Why?”
“There might be something there that could tell us something.”
Lipton shook her head. “Not gonna have my boy’s room tore up.”
“We won’t disturb a thing, ma’am,” Frank said. “We would like to look, though.”
“I don’t let you,” Lipton said sullenly, “you gonna get a warrant.”
“We could,” Frank said.
Lipton fixed Frank with a poisonous stare. Then the venom drained away, and only sadness remained.
“Marcus?”
She hadn’t raised her voice, but Marcus instantly appeared in the doorway. She motioned toward Frank and Jose. “Take these… these gentlemen to James’s. They gonna look around.”
Marcus led the two toward the back of the house, through the kitchen and down a short hallway. In what was apparently an addition to the original house, he opened the door. A cathedral ceiling vaulted over a king-size bed that faced a wall-to-wall cabinet filled with stereo gear and a massive flat-panel TV. On the other side of the room, a recliner chair, a leather sectional sofa, a small wet bar, and another flat-panel TV.
“Turn all that stuff on at one time,” Jose said, “you black out the neighborhood.”
Marcus stationed himself by the door and folded his arms across his chest. The only thing that moved were his eyes as he followed the two detectives working their way around the room, Frank to the right, Jose to the left.
Without a warrant, you didn’t get down to squeezing toothpaste out of the tubes, dismantling furniture, or even emptying the contents of drawers on the floor. But there were trade-offs. In the time you took to get a warrant, somebody could go through the place before you.
A walk-in closet: fourteen suits, a dozen or so shirts on hangers under plastic covers, and, Frank counted, twenty-three pairs of Nikes and sixteen athletic jackets of NBA teams.
Frank couldn’t find a Wizards jacket.
With Michael Jordan, you’d think…
The door beside the closet led into a marble-and-tile full bath complete with steam shower and whirlpool tub.
Another door led to a garage that opened onto the alleyway running along the backs of the row houses. Skeeter could come and go without mama’s knowing.
On the nightstand by the bed, a Uniden radio scanner and a large white telephone with a bank of speed-dial buttons and a row of LEDs.
“Secure phone,” Jose said.
Frank jotted down the number. The nightstand also held several magazines, Ironman, Basketball Digest, Sports Illustrated.
Jose had finished his side of the room and was standing on the other side of the bed. He pointed to the Ironman cover, where an improbably muscled man and woman were showing nearly everything while rollerblading on a Venice, California, beach sidewalk. “Those two probably got muscles in their shit,” he said.
Marcus spoke for the first time. “You two finished?”
Frank and Jose exchanged glances.
“Take us back to Ms. Lipton, please,” Frank said.
Lipton hadn’t moved from her wicker chair.
“You find what you wanted to find?”
“Thank you for your help, Ms. Lipton,” Jose said.
“Didn’t leave anything behind, did you?” she asked, eyelids heavy.
Frank ignored her.
“Do you have any notion who killed my boy?”
“No,” Jose answered softly. “No, ma’am, we don’t.” He let the silence ripen, then asked, “Do you?”
Lipton sat back in her chair. Her face suddenly seemed to wilt. She shook her head. “Would it do me any good to tell you?”
“I don’t know, ma’am,” Jose said very deliberately, in a low voice. “I don’t know if it would do you any good or not.”
“How do you mean that… you don’t know if it would do me any good or not?”
Jose lowered his voice even more. “Nobody can tell you that except yourself.”
Lipton stared at Jose a long time, things going on behind her dark eyes. “How many times my boy hit?”
“We don’t know, Ms. Lipton,” Frank said, “not yet.”
“My boy dead, and that Pencil gonna live…” Lipton mused, trailing off as if she had banked something she had to think about later. She assumed a businesslike tone. “When we get his car?”
“Like I said, Ms. Lipton, it’s at impound. We’ll be going over it for evidence.”
“Evidence?” Lipton’s mouth tightened. “Evidence against who?”
“Just evidence,” Jose said evenly.
“How lo
ng?”
“Beg pardon?”
“How long before we get his car?” Lipton’s exasperation was growing.
Frank watched as Marcus, standing behind her, stirred restlessly, gunner’s eyes locked on the two detectives. Frank became aware of the weight of his own shoulder holster and the drape of his coat over his left armpit.
Him first. Then… then her?
“Can’t say, exactly,” Jose said.
“Can’t?… Or won’t?”
“Can’t, ma’am. I can’t say right now, and you know that. As soon’s we can, that’s all I can say.”
For several heartbeats the four remained motionless, trapped in amber.
Frank broke the silence. “Ms. Lipton. Your son’s killer… you have any idea… any guess?”
Lipton took a deep breath. She held it, then let it out, rocking ever so slightly in rhythm with music only she could hear.
“Idea?” she said in a hard-edged whisper. “I got an eye- dea. I got an idea that you folks did him in.” She paused as though listening to her own thinking coming back to her. “Yes,” she said with finality, “I think I’m looking at the people who did my boy in.”
Frank was unlocking the car when Jose’s cell phone chirped. Jose stood head thrust forward, phone pressed against his ear, massive body locked in place, as if the slightest movement might break a fragile connection. Then, almost imperceptibly, he nodded. His shoulders relaxed. He turned.
“Daddy,” Jose explained. “Wants me to drop by.”
“Want to skip coffee?”
Jose gave Frank an incredulous look. “Not with your turn to buy.”
Adair set the orders of hash browns in front of the two men. Steam rose, fragrant and seductive, heavy with oil and paprika. Frank reached down the counter and snagged a bottle of Tabasco. After dousing his potatoes, he passed the hot sauce to Jose.
Adair watched, then gave out his usual warning. “Stuff’ll rot your gut.”
Jose came back with his usual reply. “Hasn’t yet.”
Adair ran a rag over the already clean counter in front of them. “Word is, Skeeter Hodges got whacked tonight.”
Jose held up the Tabasco bottle. “Empty.”
Adair sighed, reached under the counter, and came up with another bottle. He held it just out of Jose’s reach. “And Pencil Crawfurd caught a few,” he added. He looked at Jose, then Frank.
Frank raised his empty mug for a refill, pointedly saying nothing.
Adair took the hint and gave up on the fishing. Sighing again, he handed Jose the Tabasco and collected both mugs. “Whoever zapped those shits,” he said, returning with the refills, “did us all a favor.”
“Isn’t hunting season for humans yet in the District,” Jose said.
“Too bad,” Adair replied over his shoulder as he walked away, down the length of the counter.
Jose and Frank picked at their hash browns. More out of needing something to do than being hungry. Leaving their plates half full, they drank their coffee without talking. Adair had gone to a booth at the back, where he sat working on the books.
Just the three of them in the place.
Night traffic sounds from outside joined with the gurgling of hot water in the coffee urns.
Jose looked around. “Lonesome is an empty diner at night.” He took another sip of his coffee.
“Skeeter was what… thirty-four, -five?”
“Six. Thirty-six.”
“Old to be living at home.”
Jose considered this, then shook his head. “Advantages… Pretty much come and go as he wanted. Besides, with Mama and Marcus there, he could tomcat around town all he wanted and come home to twenty-four/seven room service and security.”
“That, and a twenty-four/seven alibi,” Frank conceded.
“Sure was into high-tech.”
The flat-panel TVs, the circuit boards, the scanner, and the secure phone.
“Pac-Man generation,” Frank said, still putting a follow-on thought together. “You think about it, Hoser… how much Skeeter’s business depends on communication. He can get stuff at Radio Shack or off the Net… scanners, bugging equipment, scrambler phones… stuff that’s years ahead of anything we’ve got.”
“What’s more,” Jose said, “he doesn’t need a court order to use it. Something else…?”
“Yeah?”
“Notice how eager Mama Lipton was to get his car back? We oughta have R.C. take it apart.” Jose said, adding it to a mental checklist. “ ’Nother thing-Skeeter’s organization.”
“Who’s gonna inherit?”
“Yeah. Takeovers in that line of work get messy.”
“Might tell us who had the motive and the balls to go after him,” Frank said.
Jose scribbled a reminder in his notebook, then sat pensively as though something else was calling for his attention.
“Yeah,” he said finally. “The chair.”
“Chair?”
“Babba Lipton. The chair she was sitting in… with the big round back.”
“Yeah?”
“Remind you of something?”
It wasn’t until Jose asked that a memory flashed to Frank like a falling star. He struggled with it, trying to give it definition, time, place.
“Huey Newton,” Jose hinted.
Instant clarity: The Black Panther poster. Huey Newton. Black leather jacket. Black beret. Shotgun in one hand, spear in the other. Sitting in a thronelike wicker chair. Brooding hate and malevolence.
“When we came in,” Jose continued, “I knew she knew. The way she was waiting for us, sitting in that chair.”
Frank put down his mug. “Yeah. She had a hard time. She’s a tough lady.”
“Yes. No.”
“Yes? No?”
“Yes… she had a hard time. No… tough is raising a good kid. It’s easy to do what she did.”
“What’d she mean by that crap about her looking at Skeeter’s killers?”
Jose shook his head. “Partner, I done finished with my psychoanalysis for the night. We got to get back to detecting.”
Frank drank the last of his coffee. “Might not be too hard.”
“How?”
“Guy who did Skeeter’s out there somewhere”-Frank thumbed over his shoulder-“still on a high… pupils still dilated with excitement… king of the world. Absolutely…”
“Out there feelin’ bulletproof,” Jose said.
“Absolutely bulletproof.”
Jose tried to picture the killer, but Teasdale’s living room came on instead.
Teasdale in his button-up sweater sits in his Barcalounger. TV reflections flicker across the big man’s broad face.
Somewhere off in the distance, he heard Frank. “And he’ll talk,” Frank was saying.
Bedtime. Teasdale fires the remote at the TV. The tube dies.
“He’ll talk…”
Teasdale gets up. He checks the locks. The curtains are closed. But Teasdale pulls them tighter anyway.
“… absolutely have to talk…” Frank batted his empty mug between his hands. Back and forth over the countertop. “… get credit for the score… big man… capping Skeeter Hodges…”
Jose caught his own image in the mirror opposite the counter. “What kind of life is that?” he asked himself quietly.
Frank closed his hands, capturing the sliding mug. “What?”
“Oh,” Jose said, “thinking about… how we have to live.” He stood and reached for his wallet. “How much we owe?” he asked Adair.
Frank shot him a puzzled look. “You forget,” he said, “it’s my turn.”
THREE
T rumpets… church bells… ghostly voices… a Morricone score out of an old Clint Eastwood spaghetti western.
In semidarkness, a crouching figure holds the pistol in a two-handed combat grip, aiming it into even darker shadows. A lightning flash. Skeeter Hodges sits in the Huey Newton wicker chair.
Motionless as a manikin, he sits… waiting.
Blo
od erupts. Skeeter’s head explodes.
In slow motion, the shooter turns.
The bells and the voices surge.
And the figure faces him. And a lone trumpet searches his soul. The pistol finds his eyes. And the bore of the muzzle reaches out and engulfs him, and he stares into the darkness at the end of the world.
The trumpets… the bells… the voices… pound in a hellish apocalyptic crescendo…
Frank opened his eyes as the first jet of the morning from Reagan National screamed overhead, clawing its way north above the Potomac.
He lay twisted in the sheets. Motionless, he stared at the ceiling. His pulse beat furiously in his throat. The jet engines faded and his pulse slowed and the dream fragments drifted away.
He rolled over and shut his eyes, but his legs had cramped during the night, and his lungs felt musty, like a room that’d been shut too long. He sat up and swung his feet to the floor. He yawned, stretched, and looked around the bedroom, eyes coming to rest on the two windows overlooking the courtyard garden at the back of the house. Blue sky framed a sun-dappled oak. Plaster walls and heart-pine floors glowed from sunlight coming down the hallway from the front of the house.
Sixteen years before, when he’d bought the dilapidated row house on Olive Street, all the windows had been painted shut. A contractor had wanted to install thermopaned windows. The more Frank thought about it, the less he’d liked it. Old houses had old windows. So he’d learned how to disassemble the original windows, strip layers of paint, replace pulleys and sash cords, and he’d put everything back together so it worked as it had when the house had been new and Grover Cleveland had been president.
It was warm enough to run in shorts and T-shirt, and ten minutes later, he was striding at an easy pace down M Street. He crossed Key Bridge, ran along Teddy Roosevelt Island, then down the riverside path to Memorial Bridge. Once across the bridge, he circled the Lincoln Memorial, then picked up speed for a hard run up the Potomac and back into Georgetown.
Despite the exertion, the dream kept replaying. Skeeter’s head… the pistol… Skeeter just sitting there… a captive actor in a deadly play… the shot.
He finished the run winded, sweaty, and nagged by a rasping sensation that something somewhere somehow had gone very badly wrong.
A half-hour later, showered, shaved, and standing at the kitchen counter, he sipped coffee and scanned the Post. Skeeter’s killing ranked front page above the fold, complete with photos. Bad-boy rating about eight or nine on a scale of ten, Frank figured, reading between the lines. A follower of the flamboyant Juan Brooks. Inherited the business when Juan got life in max security at Marion, Illinois. Then the obligatory boilerplate editorial equation: Young boys plus inner-city poverty plus guns equals crime.
A Murder of Justice Page 2
