Then he saw the missing boards. The ground said it was the way others had gotten past the fence. He squeezed through. The space between the fence and a bungalow wall had a little light from a neighbor’s rear window. Voices … the sound of a TV.
At the corner of the bungalow, he kneeled and looked around with his face near the ground where he was less likely to be seen. He could see part of the car and children flashed across his line of vision. A curtain puffed from a broken window. From inside came the sound of James Brown, “… black and I’m proud … Unnh!”
“Glad for you, bro’ James,” Troy whispered. He could hear the excited voices of the playing children. “You’re it! You’re it!” one of them called. A game of hide-and-seek. What if one of them hid back here? If he was spotted, a prowling white man, Moon Man would think it was police and would never come here again. Troy was certain one of the bungalows was the stash pad—but which one?
Troy moved across the passage between the bungalows and went to the corner. A narrow space ran between its wall and an old wire fence half-covered with ivy. Troy moved along the wall. Trash was knee-high, sinking down as he stepped on it. He scraped the wall. The old paint would mark his clothes. Fuck it. He came to a barred window. It was dark. Ahead was another window with light coming through a drawn curtain and a windowshade. He ducked under the first window and moved to the next. He could not see inside, but he heard snatches of conversation, “motherfucker … niggah … and sixteen keys …” This was the stash pad, no doubt of it.
Time to leave. He squeezed back along the wall. He was less careful and his foot kicked a bottle and bounced it off the wall.
The house went silent.
Troy cursed silently and moved faster, trampling a cardboard box. Instead of going to the hole in the fence, he climbed it in the corner. It weaved and tottered without collapsing. He jumped down and made his way toward the street. A voice called, “You fuckin’ kids stay outta here!” Troy laughed without sound, and kept going as the nearby dog barked in the background.
As he started the car, he began to bounce and rhythmically pop his fingers. “Awright awready. We gonna nail this nigger. Whee, baby, they gonna be mad. Well, they can scratch their ass and get glad.” And he laughed at the anticipation.
9
Diesel studied himself in the mirror. He was wearing the uniform of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, complete with sergeant’s stripes. It was a big uniform, but Diesel’s two hundred and fifty pounds bulged at the waist of the trim-cut shirt. He turned to Troy. “Whaddya think, brother?”
“You don’t belong in Gentlemen’s Quarterly, but they won’t see anything but cop, believe me.”
Diesel nodded. He felt weird in a police uniform, but if Troy thought it was cool, that was good enough for him.
Mad Dog came out of the bathroom. He, too, wore a deputy’s uniform. “What about me?” he asked as he fastened the clip-on neck tie.
“Looks great,” Troy affirmed.
“Yeah. I’m gonna enjoy arrestin’ a nigger,” Mad Dog said, punctuating the statement with a laugh.
Spread on the bed were handcuffs, surgical gloves, two cellular telephones, and the hand-held spotlight with the red cover fastened over it. A regular flasher for the car roof was what Troy wanted, but Alex was unable to get one right away, and such a bright light might summon one of the police helicopters that perpetually cruised over L.A.’s South Central ghetto. The pulsing blue light would be visible for miles from the sky.
Troy picked up one of the cellular phones. “Okay, I’m outta here. You guys move in about half an hour.”
“Cool,” Mad Dog said.
When Troy was gone, Diesel turned on “Monday Night Football,” trying to relax. The first half was almost over and Dallas was on a drive. He became engrossed and paid no attention as Mad Dog brought a glass of water from the bathroom; then produced a dirty handkerchief wrapped around a disposable syringe and needle and a bent spoon with a burned bottom. He was unfolding the bindle of cocaine when Diesel looked over. Diesel stood up to look over Mad Dog’s shoulder and make sure. “What the fuck are you doin’?” he asked.
“What the fuck does it look like? I’m slammin’ some coke.”
“Jesus Christ! What the fuck! Coke’ll make you crazy, man. That’s the last shit you wanna take on a caper.”
“Hey, man, you do it your way, I’ll do it my way. This shit makes me king of everything.”
“You just think it does.”
“That’s good enough. Whatever it does, it’s my motherfuckin’ business, y’know what I mean, man?”
Diesel stifled the urge to backhand Mad Dog across the room. He knew he would have to kill the man if he did that—or else Mad Dog would kill him the moment his back was turned. “Do whatever you want, man—but don’t fuck this caper up.”
“I’ll pull my end. You worry about yours.”
Diesel nodded. He would have to talk to Troy about this maniac. Mad Dog returned to readying his fix.
Diesel looked back at the TV. Dallas had scored a touchdown that he had missed. It was halftime. He kept staring at the TV without seeing it. If he turned and looked at Mad Dog, he might lose his temper.
They didn’t speak when they went out to the rented white Chevy. It looked like a police car. The license plate, taped over the real license plate, had been stolen from the long-term parking lot at LAX. Even with windbreakers over the police uniforms, they looked too much like cops to tail Moon Man. He would surely spot them before they were ready to move. Following him was Troy’s job. They would wait watching a drive-in movie far down Vermont, ten minutes from where they expected to pull Moon Man to the curb. When Troy called on the cellular phone, they would move out and close in. He would tell them where to go. They already knew what to do when they got there.
Troy knew several locations where Moon Man might be. Because it was early evening when he set forth, he first cruised past the split-level ranch style in Baldwin Hills, one of the nicest black neighborhoods in all of America. The lights were on and the wife’s Mark VII was in the driveway—but no Cadillac. The next stop was a pool-hall on Crenshaw where Moon Man sometimes went. As the Mustang went through the rear parking lot, a pair of young black men followed him with burning eyes. Whitey was unwelcome in this neighborhood. Troy grinned and waved as if he knew them; then watched in the mirror as they looked at each other and asked who he was.
Up Crenshaw, east on Florence, into the land of the California drive-by. The ubiquitous automobile made it feasible to carry an assault rifle out of sight on the floorboards. Any gathering of young men in enemy turf was fair game.
At Western Avenue, Troy turned south. Moon Man had once visited a storefront church with a red neon cross on the roof. He decided to check it because it was on the way to the cocaine house.
A block from the neon cross was a corner liquor store with a brightly lighted parking lot. He glanced over as he went by. The Cadillac was there, shining in the light, and Moon Man’s bodyguard was approaching it with a bag cradled in his arm.
Was Moon Man in the car? He had to think so. He kept going, but he slowed considerably and kept his eyes on the rearview mirror. Headlights appeared, turned onto Western going the other way. He had to make a U-turn. Fuck the double line.
He hit the brakes and made the turn, grateful that Western was a wide street. At first he couldn’t tell which taillights belonged to the Cadillac. He punched the gas and swerved between cars. A driver honked a protest that he ignored. Usually he was a cautious driver because he committed no small crimes—and why risk being pulled over for a traffic violation? Tonight he punched the gas and five liters of Ford V8 threw him back into the seat and hurtled the car forward.
He closed enough to pick out the quarry as its turn lights began to pulse and its brake lights flashed. Another five seconds and he would have missed it. He reached for the cellular phone. Time to get the “deputies” moving. He would guide them to a meeting point. It looked like i
t was going to work. Shit and Jesus and hurray for the white boys.
In the Cadillac, Moon Man had no sense of impending danger whatsoever. The car was clean except for the “nine” his driver carried—and he was paid to take the case if he was busted with it. It was only a misdemeanor in any case. Moon Man’s worries were not about cops or ripoffs; they were about his jive-ass wife wantin’ a divorce and money, too much goddamn money for anything she ever did to earn it. Bitch didn’t do nothin’ but lay around the scatter eatin’ fuckin’ sweets and givin’ him a hard time: “Where ya goin’, when’re ya gonna be back?” She suspected he was messin’ with that fly bitch Tylene … Oh, man, she was fine. His dick got hard as Chinese arithmetic as soon as he thought about her. She was a dumb bitch, but she sho’ had nice trim …“Hmmm, mmm, mmmm,” he muttered in wordless appreciation. Actually, a dude like him, with his game tight as he could be, he should change bitches as soon as they got a little worn.
Ahead the traffic light turned from green to yellow. The Caddy slowed to stop. Moon Man rode up front with the driver. He reached over to turn on the radio. What issued first was gangsta rap. He made a face and began to scan for something more mellow.
The car flooded with red light. Oh, shit! Heat!
He leaned forward and looked. A deputy sheriff was waving a flashlight at them. “Pull over,” the deputy said, waving the flashlight to indicate.
The driver looked to Moon Man. It was a Caddy with a Northstar engine. It would fly. Should he hit the gas when the light turned green?
“It ain’t nuthin’,” Moon Man said. “Just some redneck pigs wantin’ to roust a nigger in a hog. We’re clean, right?”
“Oh, yeah … just the piece.”
“Pull over. Keep your hands in sight. They be scared, but they be dangerous. Never give ’em a chance to waste a nigger. They got huntin’ licenses for us.” Moon Man had absolute belief in the truth of his words. It fit the facts he saw through the prism of his experiences.
The driver pulled across the intersection and angled to the curb on the other side. The white Chevy pulled in behind and turned off the red spotlight. Moon Man used the mirror to watch the deputies get out. One of them reminded him of a TV version of the fat-assed Irish cop. The other was smaller. They came up along each side of the Cadillac. Moon Man’s heart raced, but he was confident it was a routine roust. White cops always wanted to know why a nigger was pushing a Cad, or a Jag, or any other expensive set of wheels. If it was a real bust, if they knew who he was, there would be DEA agents swarming over them.
The driver lowered the window. Diesel arrived, leaned down so he could look them over.
“What’s the problem, boss?” Moon Man asked; he could play the game as well as any other chump. Niggers got themselves in trouble by huffin’ and puffin’ whenever the police pulled them over for a traffic ticket.
Diesel ignored the question. “Sir, do you have your driver’s license?” he asked the driver.
The driver nodded and reached up to take the California operator’s license from where it was clipped to the sun visor. He kept it there for precisely this situation.
Diesel looked the license over and handed it back. He looked at Moon Man. “You, sir, do you have identification?”
“Me. I don’t need ID. Man, that’s what the Supreme Court said last year. Said you didn’t have to carry ID.”
“Sir!” Diesel cut him off. “Can I see some ID?”
“I mean … what’re you … Oh, shit,” he finished in exasperation, angrily reaching for his wallet in his hip pocket. His hands were shaking as he fumbled through the wallet and took out the driver’s license.
Mad Dog was on the sidewalk, watching the cars zoom back and forth. A few blacks were gathering to watch, like filings to a magnet. Across the street and down the block, the Mustang was in shadows as Troy watched the scene. It was going great. All that could go wrong was for a police car to happen by. The whole world would blow up if that happened.
Diesel handed the driver’s license to Mad Dog. “Check this through R and I,” Diesel said. He’d been through it enough times in life to make it seem realistic.
Mad Dog took the card and went back to the white Chevy. As he stood by the open driver’s door and feigned making a call, he was looking over the top of the car at the half score of African-Americans on the sidewalk. Most of them were young males, teenage to early twenties. A few were young females. All watched with silent hostility at the two white cops rousting the brothers in the nice ride. Mad Dog felt fear. Blacks always aroused more fear than whites or Mexicans—not fear that they could exploit, rather fear that made him dangerous as a cobra with flared hood. He eyed the spectators. Somebody called out, “Let the brother go!” But someone else said something else. Mad Dog didn’t hear the words, but they must have had ghetto wit, for the crowd broke into laughter at whatever was said.
Mad Dog walked back to the car. It had all been planned. He motioned Diesel away from the car, as if to consult. “You see Troy across the street?” Diesel asked. “Yeah. Let’s take him,” Mad Dog said. “I’ll cover the driver.”
Diesel walked to the front passenger door and opened it. “Would you get out of the car, sir?”
“What? What for?”
“Would you step out, please?” His voice was harder.
Mad Dog was at the driver’s window, standing so he was looking down over the driver’s shoulder. In his hand, down by his leg, was a razor-sharp skin diver’s knife. If the big man blinked wrong, Mad Dog would drive the knife into his neck.
Moon Man, anger and fear mixed into a tangle inside him, got out of the car. He knew he was going to jail, although he had no idea why.
“Face the car and put your hands behind your neck,” Diesel said.
Moon Man did so, and felt a sinking sensation as a hand bent his arm down behind his back and fastened a hand-cuff; then the other hand. “Hey, man, can you tell me what this is?”
“The computer says you got outstanding traffic warrants.”
“Ahh, man, that’s bullshit, man.”
“That’s what the computer says.”
Moon Man called to his driver. “Call my old lady and get down to the slam with some scratch and get my ass out.”
The driver, all three hundred pounds, still sat with hands on the steering wheel. The illegal nine-millimeter under his arm felt big as a football. He nodded at the instruction, glad that he had not been pulled out and searched.
Diesel took Moon Man’s arm at the elbow, as police had done to him a score or more times, and guided the drug kingpin to the Chevy, where Mad Dog waited with the rear door open.
“Hey, ol’ rich nigger!” called one of the spectators, “you shoulda done paid them tickets.” The others laughed.
Diesel guided Moon Man’s head down enough to clear the roof. Diesel was glad the crowd was led by a comedian rather than an agitator.
Moon Man was in the car. Diesel slammed the door. Mad Dog was already behind the wheel. Diesel got in and nodded.
The white Chevy started moving. Diesel and Mad Dog forgot their mutual antipathy, at least for now. Act one was over. They had the sucker in hand. Now to break him down and rip him off.
Looking out the back window, Moon Man frowned. “Hey, man, where we goin’? This ain’ no way to the substation.”
“Shaddup,” Mad Dog said.
“What the fuck, man. I can ask where I’m goin’, can’t I?”
“No.”
“Damn!”
“Shaddup.”
Moon Man, leaning to the side as required by the handcuffs behind his back, began nodding his head in a gesture of anger. What kinda shit was this?
The Chevy followed the Mustang. Troy made sure he kept them close. Once he had to pass through a traffic light where they were stopped for the red. He waited on the other side. A black-and-white went by the other way. Would they notice the Sheriff’s Department uniforms?
The light changed. The white Chevy and the black-and-wh
ite passed each other. The Chevy went by Troy. He was watching the other car. It kept going. A little luck was always good. Troy took off and passed the white car.
When the cars began turning onto side streets, Moon Man sensed that this was more than a roust for traffic warrants. Not for a second did he doubt that they were deputy sheriffs. His imagination ran toward police hit squads. The idea of a hardcore white robbery crew never crossed his mind. He might have wondered about two niggers in uniforms, but not a pair of honkies.
Troy parked in a factory lot. It had a dozen cars in enough spaces for fifty. It was near enough to the Harbor Freeway so that the traffic’s hum drowned out sound. The few nearby buildings were small shops and factories. Troy got out of the Mustang and walked back to the Chevy. He opened the back door. “Move over,” he said to Moon Man, raising the pistol and extending his arm so the muzzle was a few inches from Moon Man’s eyeball.
Moon Man moved. He jumped to the side and ducked his head. “Hey, man!” It was shrill.
In the front seat, Mad Dog laughed. “Hey, man,” he mocked in a shrill voice. “All the bitch came out in this nigger.”
“Hey, man, what’s goin’ on, man?”
“Shaddup. I’ll tell you in a minute,” Troy said, slamming the door. “Roll on,” he said to Mad Dog. Diesel looked back over the seat. His grinning teeth shone in the streetlight they passed beneath.
As Mad Dog headed for the court bungalows, Troy played on the fear he heard. “Look here, man, you can live through this.”
“You ain’t even gotta snitch on nobody,” Mad Dog said.
“We’re goin’ to get that stash of yours. We’re gonna take you to the door, and you’re gonna tell the dude you got inside to open up. If he opens up, cool. If not, I’m gonna blow your backbone outta your belly. Y’know what I mean, man?”
“Hey, man, I dunno—”
Before he could finish the denial, Troy backhanded him across the nose with the muzzle of the pistol. The crunch of broken nose bone was audible, as was Moon Man’s gasp of pain. A broken nose hurts. “Ohh, man. Damn!” He held his head down. The blood ran down and dripped from his chin.
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