High Country Nocturne

by Jon Talton

  “I don’t have to talk to you.” He sneered and leaned forward from the waist when he spoke. “You’re not a deputy anymore. I can call you Asshole, asshole.”

  I said, “Sure, Jerry.”

  “So without that badge, you’re only some asshole trespassing on private property, asshole.”

  He stepped around Belma and let loose a large gob of spit. I turned in time to keep it out of my eyes but it went low and landed on my tie.

  Lindsey gave me that tie.

  Jerry laughed harder.

  I laughed, too. We both had a grand old time.

  Then he leaned over the counter to speak or spit again and I broke my promise to Sharon.

  I suddenly grabbed him by both shoulders and pulled his face hard into the top of display counter.

  He let out a pained squeak as an elaborate spider web of broken glass grew around his head.

  He was a little guy, so it was easy.

  So was shoving him backwards into the wall, where he collapsed on the floor followed by a cascade of dozens of packs of Camels, Pall Malls, and Newports dislodged from their homes.

  It was as if he were at the bottom of a slot machine and had won the jackpot, only doing so might require reconstructive surgery to his cheekbones and jaw.

  He fell back moaning, and I produced the Colt Python, traversing the barrel to my left.

  “Stay on that stool, fat man.”

  He stayed on the stool.

  My eyes caught a slight movement right. I brought the barrel to Belma.

  “I don’t like it that I can’t see your hands,” I said.

  The burrito was sitting beside the tip bowl.

  Jerry moaned, “Leave it alone, Ahu. Don’t do nothin’, Belma…”

  She slowly placed chubby little hands on the cash register while Jerry pulled himself up. He looked better than I expected, a puffy nose constituting most of the damage.

  “Stand up and back away.”

  She did.

  I stepped behind the counter and retrieved a sawed-off, double-barreled shotgun from a space below the register. From the tip of the barrel to the end of the stock, it was about fourteen inches long.

  Jerry tried to explain. “We’ve had robberies…”

  This was sweet deterrence. Shoot straight through the cheap facing of the counter while some dirtball was demanding money.

  “It’s okay, it’s okay!” Jerry had his hands out, palms facing me. Now he was the peacemaker.

  I holstered the Python. Breaking open the sawed-off, I saw two twelve-gauge shells in the chambers. Those would have torn me in half. Why was my breathing so even?

  With my other hand, I produced my badge case and held it out low.

  Lindsey’s blood was on the star, the identification card, and the leather. The badge case had been in the pocket of my blazer, which I had used as a trauma dressing.

  Let them see what they’ve done.

  “Your information was wrong, Jerry, and you assaulted a deputy sheriff.”

  “I didn’t know. How would I know?” He was talking fast, using his hands to make a calm-down gesture. The clown on the stool had not moved a millimeter and stared at me with flat eyes. I snapped the twelve-gauge back in place, cocked the hammers, and let it rest in the direction of his bulk.

  “Honest mistake, Mapstone. Let’s talk. Come in back, to my office. I’ll get you a towel to clean up.”

  “Maybe I’ll take you downtown. Couple of years in prison, in general population, would do your asshole good, Asshole.”

  “Oh, c’mon, Mapstone. I was only jokin’.”

  “You know your rights, correct?”

  “Sure, but…”

  “Read your damn rights!”

  “I have the right to remain silent…please!”

  “Keep going.”

  He rubbed his bashed face. “Anything I say can and will be used against me.”

  I stared at him. The Miranda Warning was one of Phoenix’s gifts to the world. After the Supreme Court let him off because his constitutional rights had been violated, Ernesto Miranda would sell signed Miranda Warning cards for five bucks. Until he wound up on the wrong end of a knife fight in the Deuce.

  “I have the right to an attorney and if I can’t afford an attorney, one will be provided for me. I understand each of these rights as I have explained them to me.”

  I nodded approval and he looked sad. Belma, likely standing for the longest stretch in years, added a long fart to the proceedings.

  For a few minutes, I let him think about being arrested as not a single customer came in. For all the silence, the place had a jumpy oppressiveness, like even the packs of smokes wanted to bolt for the parking lot, and I was not the cause.

  Then I let him take me to the back office.

  Three-Finger Jerry was a former Phoenix cop and a Jack Mormon; in other words he had backslid out of the church. He earned his nickname when he blew two digits off in a firearms accident. With his own police shotgun.

  After he was bounced from the force, he set up El TobacCorner and seemed to fade away unless you had business with him.

  The one exception came a couple of years ago, when his estranged wife called 911 to say he was having sex with a rubber pool raft in the common area of his apartment complex. She filmed the act on her cell phone and it went viral on the Internet, battlefield of angry spouses and spies.

  Jerry got probation for indecent exposure and for a while was another dubious celebrity in the Arizona freak show.

  He was also the only person I could easily find on a Sunday night who was a bona fide member of the supply chain involving stolen goods.

  In other words, Three Finger Jerry was a fence.

  Chapter Sixteen

  I followed him into the hall, twenty feet past cigarette cartons stacked against the walls. Jerry was a short guy with a blond crew cut, wearing a gray T-shirt that was too big for his spindly arms. He did a “Walk Like An Egyptian” dance and laughed. I didn’t.

  The hall opened into a larger storage area with pallets of more cigarette cartons and Tide detergent. At the back were two metal doors. One, which he opened, had a black plastic OFFICE sign. The other was unmarked and secured by a heavy padlock.

  The music switched over to “Rockin’ Robin,” the Bobby Day version. I hadn’t heard it or thought about it in years. I was thankful that it was shut out when he closed us inside the little room, bid me have a seat, and settled behind a cheap, small desk.

  The walls were unpainted Masonite and covered with old Hustler centerfolds in all their gynecological meticulousness.

  “Thanks for smashing in my face,” he said

  “You brought it on.”

  He looked at me earnestly. “I mean it. Had to spit on you, see? Nothing personal but I had to put on a show. You didn’t disappoint.”

  A drawer opened and his hand reached in. I started bringing up the sawed-off but he came out with only a dry face cloth. I used it to wipe off the ruined necktie.

  I asked him why we needed to put on a show. His eyes avoided me and he pulled on the T-shirt, his loopy arm muscles standing out. Sweat stains were darkening the garment.

  “How’s your buddy, Sheriff Peralta? I hear he became a private eye.”

  The question surprised me considering Peralta’s newfound notoriety, but I made my face express boredom.

  “He’s doing well. How’s the fence business?”

  He studied me with sad gray eyes. I was one of the few people who knew he had been one of Peralta’s CIs or confidential informants.

  He lightly rubbed his mashed face. When he took his hands away, his drawn appearance was evident. Since the last time I had seen him, he had probably lost twenty pounds he couldn’t afford.

  “Business is shitty. That’s how it is.”

 
“Is that what made you pick up the muscle out front?”

  He stared into his lap. “He picked me up. He’s MS 13, so you’d better watch your ass. Goddamned Salvadorans. I’m into ’em deep. Look, I’ve got to close pretty soon, so what’s on your mind?”

  He pulled out a Marlboro and lit it with trembling hands, offering me the pack, but I waved it away and said nothing.

  He smoked with his bad hand. The shooting accident had shorn off most of the index and middle fingers. So he smoked by holding the cigarette between his thumb and fourth finger. The effect was half Sinatra and half circus geek.

  After a few moments, he shrugged. “This business used to be simple. Junkies and burglars bring in electronics, I pay ’em shit, send the stuff to Mexico where it’s repackaged and resold.”

  He smoked and stood. His small body seemed incapable of idleness, but what had that gotten him? When I kept staring, he sat back down and continued.

  “Here’s what made it work. Stuff goes to a pawnshop and it’s liable to attract the cops. A legit pawnbroker has to log it in the computer system. Here, I got a smoke shop in Maryvale. Who’s gonna think? Simple business model. I connect buyers and sellers. How am I different from an investment banker or a hedge-fund guy? We’re a coarse, shitty land run by criminals. I go with the flow.”

  While he philosophized, I gently uncocked the little shotgun’s hammers, broke it open, tossed the shells on the floor, and set the empty firearm beside his desk.

  “So what changed?” I asked.

  “The fucking Internet, for one thing. E-sellers, they call them—craigslist, eBay. Scoop up a lot of the really good stuff, so I’m dependent on the dude who’s too stupid or too poor or too jonesing and impatient to go online.”

  He had given this much thought.

  “Plus, there’s too much crap today,” he said. “Thieves don’t know the PC era is over, see? Don’t even try to bring in a PC nowdays, much less with Windows XP. Macs, iPads, iPhones, and Androids—those I can use.”

  He pouted.

  “And?” I said.

  “The fuckin’ Salvadorans.”

  “You have to go through them now?”

  “Shit, they don’t care about stolen iPads. Stolen guns, they like those if they’re the right kind. No, they use my humble, locally owned retail establishment the way they want.”

  He wiggled his arm to see a silver watch.

  I put my hands behind my head, exactly the way Peralta used to do when he was either relaxing or trying to irritate me. It had the latter effect on Jerry.

  “What do you want from me, Mapstone? Use your fucking imagination. Money and drug drops. Stuff I don’t want to know about, okay? If there’s heroin coming through here to be broken up and distributed, it’s not my problem. The less I know, the less chance they’ll feed me to their pit bulls.” He paused. “Cigarette smuggling is the biggie. That I have to know about.”

  “What about the tax inspectors?”

  “Haven’t seen one in years,” he said. “State cutbacks. Anyway, some of the inventory is legit. Go look, you’ll see tax stamps. The rest goes into the black market. I don’t get diddly as a cut even though I’m the one taking the chances here.”

  “How’d they take over?”

  “I needed a loan fast, okay? Goddamned Indian casinos, all around the city now. It’s their revenge on the white man. Anyway, I was fifty thousand short and a guy told me about a guy. You know how it goes. Next thing I know, Ahu is my babysitter.” He used his good hand to wipe away sweat. “Are we done?”

  I thought about that. Ahu’s tattoos didn’t look like MS 13, one of the most dangerous criminal organizations in the hemisphere. He didn’t fit the profile ethnically, either. Jerry, as a former cop, should know that. But somebody was leaning on him and Phoenix had no lack of gangs.

  Even if Ahu didn’t belong to Mara Salvatrucha, this was cause for concern. CIs always went to the highest bidder. Peralta had taught me that. Now somebody was able to put in a higher price for Jerry than keeping him out of jail on condition that he provide information and not murder anyone, Peralta’s old deal.

  I thought about the Tide. It was tough on stains, a cash cow for Procter & Gamble, and in recent years had become a street currency used to buy drugs. Addicts shoplift the 150-ounce bottles and at the most risk a shoplifting charge, way better than a felony count for burglarizing, say, a television. Organized groups called retail boosters have gotten into the racket, and not only with detergent. Fences buy the items at a discount and resell them, even to major retailers.

  Jerry’s simple business model was keeping up with the times.

  I said, “We’re not done. You have some place you need to be?”

  “I need to close, Mapstone. Really.”

  “Your sign says you’re open until eleven.”

  His new partners probably had a shipment on the way. I affected nonchalance.

  He blew a plume of blue smoke over my head, stood up, turned around, and studied one of the pinups. He sighed and faced me. “God, this town was way simpler when the Italians ran things, you know?”

  I nodded sympathetically.

  “Tell me about diamonds.”

  He looked at me like I was insane. “Diamonds? What?”

  “You heard me, Jerry. Tell me about diamonds and I’ll let you close or whatever you need to do.”

  He plopped into the chair. “Diamonds. They’re hard. They’re forever. They’re a girl’s best friend. Color, cut, clarity, and carat. Who cares? Some lowlife brings in a stolen engagement ring and I’ll give him a hundred bucks. And that’s if it’s a good ring. The resale market stinks.”

  My swollen eye and cheek throbbed in realization.

  I smiled on the inside.

  He doesn’t know about Peralta and the robbery.

  This was a good thing, or so I calculated. If he knew, he might have somehow used it against me. For the first time, I was thankful for a society of ignoramuses that didn’t read newspapers or even watch television news.

  He stubbed out the Marlboro. “I don’t deal in ’em.”

  “How would a person fence valuable diamonds, in unique settings? Hypothetically speaking.”

  “Way over my pay grade,” he said. “Diamonds make people crazy. The 2003 Antwerp heist? A hundred million. They got caught. Absolutely insane plan. But it didn’t keep them from trying. You get into that kind of shit, you better pick out your dirt furniture.”

  I raised my eyebrows.

  “Dirt furniture,” he repeated. “Goes well six feet under.”

  When I spread out comfortably in the chair, he talked again.

  “Here’s what I’ve read, okay? Uncut diamonds are the easiest to resell. They’re tough to trace. The buyer could cut them, change their characteristics, and make it hard to track them. Nothing worth more is as small and easy to move. No mineral is worth more per gram. Now, cut diamonds are a different breed of cat. If they’re expensive enough, they might be laser-inscribed, with a number or name. De Beers does that. I’m no expert, but that’s what I’ve heard, see.”

  For somebody who claimed little knowledge of diamonds, he knew quite a bit.

  I said, “So they’re not fence-able?”

  “I’m not saying that.” His pride kicked in. “The smart thief would wait. Let the cops move onto other stuff. Then find the right wholesaler. You know, with the right set of ethics. They’ll still get a fraction of what the diamonds are worth. The wholesaler will resell ’em to retail jewelers who don’t want to ask too many questions.”

  He picked out another smoke with the remarkable dexterity of that shot-off hand and lit up.

  He continued, “Wholesalers make the money. But understand, they’re after diamonds worth millions, not the engagement ring your girlfriend gave back, see? That’s what I’ve read, at least. Honest to God, I don
’t deal in diamonds. If I did, I wouldn’t be in this fuckin’ mess.”

  “So who would know about these wholesalers?”

  He watched me closely. “You’ll leave if I give you a lead?”

  I nodded.

  He reached for a notepad with his good hand and scrawled an address. He tore off the page and slid it across to me.

  “I handled a delicate matter once,” he said. “Let’s leave it at that. I delivered a package to this office.”

  “Who works here?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t want to know and my client wasn’t going to tell me. My instructions were to walk into the outer office at a certain time and put the package on the secretary’s desk and leave. I didn’t see a secretary or anybody. Don’t think that wasn’t intentional. After I got back in the hall, I heard the door being locked behind me. Look, I’m taking a chance even giving you this much.”

  As he checked his watch for the tenth time, I unfolded the computer-generated color sketch of Strawberry Death.

  “Ever seen this woman?”

  “I thought you said you were going?”

  I tapped on the sketch.

  He actually took a moment to study it. “Nope, but I’d like to. She’s cute. Not exactly the kind of clientele we get in here, you know? She lose a diamond?”

  “Something like that.”

  I thanked him. And although I already knew his answer, I told him we could help, get him into witness protection in exchange for his cooperation.

  He waved me away with his three-fingered hand, the Marlboro held firmly.

  “Go. Go.”

  Halfway down the corridor, I turned back to him.

  “Where would a person go in this town to hire a hit on somebody?”

  He rolled his eyes. “Anywhere. Depends on whether you want it done right, and don’t want to get caught in a sting by law enforcement.”

  “Can you be specific?”

  “No.” He lowered his voice beneath the sounds of Chuck Berry. “If I had that answer, I might take out my baby sitter. Hey…”

  As “Johnny B. Goode” ran on, he gripped my shoulder. “Be careful with that name I gave you. Word is he’s close to the cartels.”