by Roy Chaney
When Hagen reached him Vogel lay facedown behind the car, half in the roadway and half on the strip of grass at the edge of the road, his right hand under him, clutching his chest. In the glow from the taillights of the Mercedes Hagen saw the blood running out from under Vogel and down the incline of the road toward the tall grass.
Hagen was reaching for the pistol under his jacket when another shot cracked the rear window of the Mercedes like an eggshell . . .
A crash—loud enough to be heard over the pounding music.
A fight had broken out near the bar. Two young men had knocked over a small table covered with empty glasses as they swung their fists at each other in wide drunken arcs. Two bouncers rushed up, pulled the two men apart, hustled them toward the front door.
Hagen felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Hello, Bodo.”
Harry Needles stood over him, a highball glass and a long thin cigar in one hand, a smile on his round and well-tanned face.
“How are you, Harry.”
“I heard about Ronnie. I’m real sorry.”
“Thanks, Harry.” Hagen stood up. “Is there someplace we can talk?”
“You mean without shouting?”
“Something like that.”
“I think I can manage that.”
Hagen followed Harry Needles to the back of the club, then through a door and up a long narrow staircase to the second floor.
“How long has it been, Bodo?”
“Ten years.”
“You’re starting to look like your old man. You know that?”
“It’s come up once or twice.”
Harry Needles’s office was a large rectangular room with a desk positioned at one end and a long couch upholstered in black leather at the other end. Three of the walls were covered in dark wood-grain paneling. The fourth wall of the office was composed entirely of sheets of one-way glass, through which Hagen could see the entire club laid out one floor below. A glass-topped table surrounded by eight chairs sat in front of the one-way glass and a large and well-stocked bar trolley stood near the desk. The room was surprisingly quiet, the music downstairs audible only as a muffled bass beat. Hagen was grateful for the calm.
Harry Needles stepped up to the bar trolley. “What are you drinking these days?”
Hagen asked for a bourbon and soda. Needles poured it, then freshened his own drink while Hagen stood at the window, studying the view.
Needles brought the drinks over, set them on the table.
“When did you get into town?” Harry Needles said.
“Yesterday. The funeral was yesterday.”
Harry Needles shook his head. “It’s hard to believe, Bodo. I’m not sure I do believe it. I just saw Ronnie last week. He’d just gotten into town and he came by. Next thing I hear he’s dead. I hope they find whoever did it, hang that bastard good. I’d like to be there when they do.”
“McGrath is working the case.”
Harry Needles nodded, a circumspect look on his face. “McGrath is a good cop.”
“I ran into him at the funeral.”
“I didn’t hear about it or I would’ve been there.”
“Wasn’t much to it.”
Harry Needles nodded. He seemed to want to say something more about Ronnie and his death and the funeral but he couldn’t find the words. He shifted gears, motioned toward the table. “Have a seat, Bodo. Best seat in the house.” Needles puffed on his cigar, raised his chin, blew a stream of smoke up toward the ceiling. “What do you think of my place?”
“The restaurant didn’t work out?”
“Steak and eggs, tits and ass—it’s a living, either way.”
Before sitting down Hagen and Needles turned their chairs sideways to the table so they could keep an eye on the nightclub below, as though the flashing lights and milling crowd and dancers and pounding music were all boiling and building up to a dangerous explosion that neither of them wanted to miss. Harry Needles’s hair had gone gray but he looked fit and trim and successful. Harry Needles had always looked successful. It was in the well-preserved tan and the straight white teeth and the pleasant, knowing smile. It was in the crisply pressed white shirt he wore and the sharply creased black slacks and tasseled two-tone loafers. It was in the way he carried himself, with an air of entitlement. Harry Needles hadn’t always lived well but he knew how to look like he lived well. To some people—like Harry Needles—it was the same thing.
“Tell me about Ronnie,” Hagen said. “What was he up to last week?”
Needles sat back. “Nothing much to tell. He showed up here a week ago Sunday. Said he’d just gotten into town. I was surprised to see him—I thought Karl Hagen’s boys had left this town for good. I brought him up here and we had a few drinks and talked. It was good to see him. Ronnie had his problems like anybody, but he was a good kid, Bodo.”
Hagen took a drink. The bourbon went down warm and solid. “What did he say?”
“Not too much. Just bullshitting. He was happy to be out of the Legion and back home. Didn’t seem to have any plans other than drinking and screwing. Nothing wrong with that.”
“Where was he staying?”
“I don’t think he said.” Needles gave Hagen a sharp look. Hagen recalled Jack Gubbs’s remark—“Do you always make noises like a cop?” But Hagen wanted answers. He needed answers. And the only way to get answers was to ask questions.
“You see him again, after Sunday?”
“I didn’t see him at all. He came by on Tuesday but I wasn’t here. Then on Friday I heard on the news about what happened. What was he doing out at Hoover, Bodo? If he was in trouble, I wish he’d told me. I would’ve helped him out. He knew that. You know that.”
“I know, Harry.”
“I wish he’d told me.”
“Did Ronnie mention a fellow named Gubbs?”
“Jack Gubbs?” Harry Needles looked surprised to hear that name.
“You know Gubbs?”
“Sure.”
“What’s he all about?”
“Who have you been talking to?”
“Marty Ray.”
“Marty Ray showed up at the funeral?”
“No, I went to see him today. What about Gubbs?”
Needles flicked cigar ash into a glass ashtray. “Gubbs works for Marty Ray. Worked for him for years. I never liked Gubbs. He’s a loose cannon. Then again, Marty Ray’s a loose cannon so maybe that’s why they get along. What’s Ronnie got to do with Gubbs?”
Hagen explained that apparently Ronnie knew Gubbs when Ronnie worked for the Ray brothers, and that Ronnie might have stayed at Gubbs’s apartment last week. Hagen didn’t mention that he’d talked to Gubbs the day before. He kept his visit to the Sniff out of the conversation as well. Perhaps it was only habit—over the last ten years Hagen had grown used to playing his cards close to the vest.
Harry Needles knew nothing about Ronnie’s association with Jack Gubbs. “I know Gubbs because I used to have business with the Rays. The Rays loaned me some of the capital to buy this place. For a while there a lot of money changed hands. Above the table, under the table—business is business. At first I dealt with Jimmy, but after Jimmy died Marty used Gubbs as a go-between. Until a few months ago Marty still owned a percentage of this place. But I paid him off. This place is mine now, top to bottoms.”
Harry Needles smiled at his pun, crushed his cigar out in the ashtray. Then, “Let me tell you, Bodo, I didn’t like being in debt to Marty. I don’t like the man. Don’t know too many people who do. He’s always been strange but since his brother died he’s gotten very strange. But you know how he is. How did you like working for him?”
“Jimmy had the brains. Marty was along for the ride. So tell me, Harry—who whacked Jimmy Ray?”
Harry Needles snorted. “I never asked. You can get yourself into trouble asking questions like that. Who whacked Jimmy Ray—a lot of people would still like to know. Like McGrath. He was on that case. Gave him some torment, I’m sure. I
hope he does better . . .” Harry Needles’s voice trailed off as he gave Hagen an awkward glance.
Harry nearly choked on his drink when Hagen asked him about the rumor that Ronnie might have been implicated in the Jimmy Ray murder.
“Marty didn’t tell you that.”
“Sure he did.”
“Then he needs his medication adjusted.” Harry Needles started to say more, took another drink instead. After a pause he continued. “Marty talks trash. You know that. He’s a clown. But he can be a dangerous clown. So be careful. Don’t fuck with him too much. Jimmy’s not around to keep him on a leash like in the old days. And your old man isn’t around to bail you out of trouble.”
“He never bailed me out.”
“That’s not what I remember.”
Hagen changed the subject. “Marty also told me Ronnie was hanging around with one of your dancers.”
“Marty did a lot of talking.”
“You know the girl?”
“Of course. Theresa—Theresa Sanchez. Ronnie met her when he was downstairs at the bar the night I saw him. Then he came by again on Tuesday to see her and I guess they went out. She isn’t a dancer anymore. She’s one of my bar managers. Smart woman. Goes to college. She’s down there right now.”
“I’d like to talk to her, Harry.”
“She’ll be off work in about a half hour. You can talk to her up here if you want.”
Harry Needles pulled the small cigar tin out of his shirt pocket, flipped it open. Offered Hagen a cigar, then took one for himself. Harry lit Hagen’s cigar and then his own. “Ronnie did a little work for me too, when I opened this place. Did he ever mention that? I had a hard time finding good people at first, so he’d come by some nights and look after things, work the front door. Help me keep an eye on the bouncers, make sure they weren’t ripping me off every time I turned my back.”
“Was that before he went to work for the Rays?”
“Same time. He did a little work for them, a little for me. Like I said, the brothers put up some of the money to open this place, so it was all in the family. I liked having Ronnie around. He was having a tough time of it right then—a little too much drinking, a little too much dope. Kind of a lost soul. I tried to keep him busy just to give him something to do so he’d stay out of trouble. I thought he might stick around and come work for me full time, but then he joined the Legion. I was kind of disappointed when he told me.”
As they smoked the cigars the conversation shifted to small talk. Hagen was surprised to learn that Harry lived down in Laughlin, Nevada. Hagen could remember when Laughlin was nothing but a wide patch on a long hot desert road. Harry Needles asked Hagen what he was doing these days in Germany. Hagen gave Harry the same story he’d given McGrath—he was a security consultant for a German industrial firm. The only people Hagen had ever told about his work for the CIA were his father, Ronnie and the Sniff. He was sure that his father and the Sniff had kept it under their hats, as he’d asked them to. He wasn’t so sure about Ronnie. Not that it mattered much now.
The telephone on the desk rang. Harry Needles got up to answer it. A small pair of binoculars with Zeiss lenses sat in the center of the table and Hagen picked them up and peered through them, studying the scene below. The Japanese tourists Hagen had seen earlier were gone. They had been replaced by three young men in football jerseys who looked almost shamefaced as they stared at a young Latina dancer who lay on the stage, rolling forward and back, her ankles locked behind her neck and her chin resting between her large round breasts.
Harry Needles’s phone conversation was brief and monosyllabic. When he hung up the phone he said to Hagen, “Small world.”
“How so?”
“Jack Gubbs is downstairs. And he wants to talk to you.”
8.
“HELLO, JACK,” Needles said, when Gubbs stepped into the office. “Wish I could say it’s a pleasure.”
“Sorry to drop in on you like this, Harry,” Gubbs said. He paused in the doorway, his hand on the doorknob. His bleary red eyes moved between Harry Needles and Hagen, back and forth, as though he wondered which of the two men he might have to physically defend himself against in the next few seconds. He nodded toward Hagen, said to Harry Needles, “I just wanted to talk to your man here for a minute.”
“Talk away,” Hagen said.
“Maybe we can talk alone.”
Needles looked at Hagen. Hagen shrugged. Harry Needles walked to the door, keeping his eyes on Gubbs as Gubbs moved aside to let him pass. Harry Needles said he had a few things to do downstairs. “Back in a flash,” he said before closing the office door behind him.
Gubbs noticed the bar trolley, said, “Well, thank you, Harry, don’t mind if I do,” as he walked over to it. He poured three fingers of vodka into a highball glass, drank some of it down, paused to study the contents of the glass in the light, then poured the rest of it down his throat. He set the glass down hard on the trolley, seemed to smile to himself at a job well done.
“Harry Needles is a fine fellow,” Gubbs said.
“He doesn’t like you much.”
“He doesn’t have to anymore.”
“Did he like you before?”
Gubbs turned to face Hagen, shrugging his shoulders to adjust the hang of the loose-fitting yellow sport coat he wore over a maroon polo shirt. His pasty face looked like a clay sculpture that someone had pummeled with their fists. “When Marty owned him he liked me just fine. Too bad that Marty sold out. I liked the old days. Harry used to introduce me to the girls.” Gubbs shook his head at the memory. He didn’t seem to quite believe it himself. “Lot of nice girls in this place.”
“How did you know I was here?”
“You’re not so hard to find.” Gubbs came over to the table, pulled out a chair and sat down. “I talked to Marty. He said you were headed in this direction. Looking for the dancer who was with Ronnie. So I decided to drop by. Gives me a chance to see my girls again.”
Hagen didn’t believe it. It was more reasonable to conclude that Marty Ray knew where he was because it was Marty Ray who was having him followed.
“So what do you want to tell me?”
“First things first. If I tell you what I know, you’re going to get off my back. Understand? Forget you ever met me. I don’t know what happened to Ronnie. But whatever it was, it has nothing to do with me. Is that clear?”
Hagen almost laughed. This wasn’t the Gubbs he’d talked to yesterday. Someone had pumped Gubbs full of courage and sent him over here like a windup toy. It could only have been Marty Ray. What kind of line was Gubbs going to try to feed him?
“The police are going to find out about you sooner or later,” Hagen said. “All I can promise you is that I won’t pick up the phone five minutes after you leave here and tell them about you.”
“It’s not the police I’m worried about.”
“Then who is it?”
Gubbs pulled out a pack of cigarettes, lit one with a gold Zippo lighter. Took a long drag, then scratched his forehead with the thumb of his cigarette hand, puzzling something together. “Ronnie was your brother. You want to find out who killed him. I can understand that. I’m fine with that. Ronnie was a friend of mine. Maybe you don’t believe that but he was. But you’re stirring up a pot full of shit and if you keep throwing my name around, then maybe someone’s going to get the idea that I know something I shouldn’t know. And then maybe what happened to your brother happens to me too. All I’m saying is, go on about your business, do what you have to, but leave me out of it. I don’t feel like catching a bullet because some asshole keeps dropping my name in all the wrong places. People get shot in this town every day, for all kinds of reasons. I don’t want to be one of those people.”
“If you’re not worried about the police, why haven’t you talked to them?”
“Maybe I have.”
“Have you or haven’t you?”
“If I told you I had, would you believe it?”
“Probab
ly not.”
“There you are. I’d be wasting my breath. And I like my breath, Hagen. I’d like to keep breathing it. Maybe it’s not worth much but it’s all I’ve got.”
“What did you come here to tell me?”
Gubbs took another long drag, exhaled cigarette smoke through his nose. “You asked me yesterday if Ronnie was looking for a fence.”
“That’s right.”
“Well, he was.”
“That’s not news, Gubbs.”
“Let me finish. He asked me if I knew a fence and I told him about a guy I know. Not someone I know—someone I’ve heard of. Working for Marty, I hear things sometimes. You know how it is. So I asked around and got the guy’s phone number. I gave it to Ronnie. I didn’t hear anything more about it. I didn’t know whether Ronnie called him or not and I didn’t care. None of my business. Today I called the guy myself. I told him what happened to Ronnie and I told him about you. The guy said he talked to Ronnie last week. He was supposed to talk to him again on Saturday but Ronnie didn’t show up. He hadn’t heard that Ronnie was dead. I asked him if it was okay if I told you about him. He said he didn’t care. He sounded kind of interested in talking to you.”
Gubbs puffed on his cigarette. The fingers of his free hand tapped the surface of the table, stopped, started again. Gubbs was a nervous man. Was he always nervous or was he just a poor liar? Hagen was inclined to believe that he was always nervous. But that didn’t mean that Gubbs wasn’t lying right now.
“What’s the guy’s name?” Hagen said.
“His first name is Winston. I don’t know his last name. Everybody calls him Winnie the Poof.”
“What kind of name is that?”
“It’s what people call him, that’s all. I guess he’s some kind of flamer. What do I care? Live and let live. Right, Hagen? Live and let live.”
“Did he say why he wanted to talk to me?”
“He’s looking for whatever it was that Ronnie wanted to sell him, he didn’t tell me what. He wonders if maybe you know where the thing is. Yesterday you asked me about a wooden hand. That’s the thing, right?”
