Loren D. Estleman - Amos Walker 17 - Retro

by Loren D. Estleman

  “How’d the wedding go?”

  It caught him in mid-seizure. “Wedding?”

  “Last time we talked you were getting ready to play parson for two telephone companies. Can I count on one source for all my local and long-distance needs?”

  “Oh. It’s not public yet, but I can tell you the meeting ended most cordially. What has that to do with what we were talking about?”

  “It means you can afford to carry me a few more days. Court costs being what they are, you might as well let me run up the amount you can collect damages on. It’s a screwy case, Mr. Meldrum. It’s the blind men and the elephant. The trunk and the tail don’t match and it’s going to take some time to come up with the body that goes in between.”

  Air stirred on his end. The windows in his corner office would be triple-glazed to seal out traffic noise from the street. “I hope for your sake you’re not stringing this firm along, Walker. For both our sakes. It takes me days to recover after I destroy someone’s career.”

  I picked up my cup and drank. “Feel better?”

  “I do, as a matter of fact.” His tone changed. “Do you really drink tea? I do myself, when I have the time. It forces one to pause.”

  “I was just kidding you, Mr. Meldrum. But if you let me see this thing out I’ll have you over and brew some camomile. I’ll make scones.”

  “That won’t be necessary. Just keep receipts of all your expenses. I have to justify this whole adventure to my partners.” He told me good-bye.

  Over a second cup of coffee I made two calls. I got Barry Stackpole’s pager number again and dialed that. Then I spoke to a contact at the Detroit Institute of Arts and arranged for a check to find out if there was anything in its extensive video archives from Curtis Smallwood’s fight with Manuel Castillo, which was televised by NBC on September 30, 1949. I still had some goodwill with that establishment after recovering a priceless document that had disappeared from its vaults. He informed me, with granite in his voice, that he was in the middle of translating a cuneiform tablet and that it would be a while before he had a chance to consult the fight card at Madison Square Garden. I said I got that excuse all the time and I’d be grateful if he could get back to me on it at the office. Goodwill appeared to be losing value against the Euro. I’d just cradled the receiver when the bell rang. It was Barry. I asked him if he got the reality TV gig.

  “They offered me six weeks with an option for thirteen,” he said. “Even if they didn’t renew they had to use me somewhere, maybe to put the drops in the CBS eye. It came with a car, an apartment in Bel-Air, and a salary that read like the population of Grand Rapids.”

  “Why’d you turn it down?”

  “Who said I turned it down?”

  “You did. You’re too good a writer to abuse the past tense.”

  “I turned it down. They wanted me to wear a trenchcoat.”

  “You don’t have a trenchcoat.”

  “I could always borrow yours.”

  “I don’t have a trenchcoat.”

  “No shit? What do you wear to those foggy assignations on the waterfront?”

  “Kevlar. Why’d you turn it down?”

  “The apartment in Bel-Air. I told them up front I wouldn’t negotiate unless they agreed to shoot in Detroit. I’ve got unions to support. I didn’t get here alone.”

  “Unemployed?”

  “Did you know you can’t smoke in a bar anywhere in that state?”

  “You don’t smoke.”

  “And I’ve been comfortable all these years with that being my idea. What’s on your mind this A.M.?”

  “I just got chewed out by a hieroglyphics expert.”

  “In English or Sanskrit?”

  “It’s not important. I just thought it worth mentioning. I called you about a fighter.”

  “Curtis Smallwood.”

  I took a hit from the cup. “Did you bug my office?”

  He thought I was kidding. “Eavesdropping’s for people with no imagination. Last time we spoke you said Jeremiah Morgenstern was at the Airport Marriott. Imagine my shock when I turned on the radio fifteen minutes later and found out a party named Lance West had just been shot there. The name rang a bell. I entered it in my software and came up with Delwayne Garnet. Delwayne Garnet gave me Smallwood. Turns out getting squiffed runs in the family. I made a bet with myself on how long it’d take you to get around to asking me about The Black Mamba.”

  “You’re a witch, Barry.”

  “Spread that around. If it gets out I’m a good reporter, they’ll burn me at the stake. What do you need, before I start overworking my hard drive?”

  “I’m short on live witnesses.”

  “So were the cops in forty-nine.”

  “I don’t mean eyewitnesses. I mean people who knew some of the principals. If you’ve got the police reports and the press coverage, you’ve got their names. If you can raise any of them without a seance, I’ll be ever so grateful.”

  “You know the terms. In on the kill before anyone else gets the story.”

  “I have a client to report to first,” I said. “Okay after that. This may be Sunday feature stuff, Barry. Cracking Smallwood won’t necessarily crack Garnet.”

  “It ought to. They were both shot with the same gun.”

  I set my cup very carefully in its ring. “I only got that last night. Where did you?”

  “I’m a witch, remember?”

  “You didn’t cast a spell over Captain Hichens.”

  “If Hichens were drowning in Lake St. Clair and I was the only one within earshot, ‘No comment’ would be all I’d get from him.”

  “His partner’s a better catch. He wants to be sheriff.”

  “Face time, kid. It’s what put the P in politics.”

  “Better you than Twenty Twenty. What’s Jerry Morgenstern doing in Detroit?”

  “You mean besides Detroit itself?”

  “Don’t be a tease. I could hear your keyboard rattling as soon as I got off the telephone.”

  “Some things can’t be done on a computer. Snitches don’t thumb their way down the information superhighway. I’m not complaining; there’s nothing like greasing a couple of dirty palms in a couple of blind pigs to remind you you’re not working at a travel agency.”

  I waited out the dramatic pause. While I was waiting I sloshed some coffee around my mouth, strictly for the caffeine, and washed it back into the cup. It had grown cold.

  “Casinos,” he said. “What else? Word is he’s out to deal himself a silent partnership in a second Indian casino going up in Greektown.”

  “It’s been tried,” I said. “If the gaming commission gets a whiff, they’ll run him out of town on a rocket.”

  “Word is he’s got a go-between with connections in Washington.”

  “How good’s the word?”

  “It didn’t come cheap, and I’m a good horse trader. Do what you like with that.” He sounded offended.

  “Any names?”

  “Sure. Website, too: W.W.W. Fuck You Dot Com. What the hell, Amos? You throw me a bone, I bring you back a steak, you ask for a side of beef.”

  “Let’s not fight. I had to ask. It’s good information. Morgenstern said the meeting was set up on this end. That would be the go-between. A gambling concession in Greektown would be big enough to bring him back to Detroit.”

  “We endeavor to give satisfaction.” He sounded mollified.

  “The only thing that would make me happier is if he had anything to do with the case I’m working. He eliminated himself yesterday with one dumb look.”

  The silence on his end was eloquent. “Thanks for the heads-up. I could’ve put the bribe money down on a Corvette.”

  “If I had, you would’ve spent it just the way you did. The story you got is bigger than two murders. When can I call back on the other thing?”

  “Say two o’clock. Seeing as how I’m once again out of work.”

  The telephone rang again while I was wiping shaving crea
m off my face. It was Llewellyn Hale, Canada’s polite answer to Boston Blackie, calling from his hotel room at the Renaissance Center. I asked him how he’d made out at the Grand.

  “I didn’t go. I went to the Henry Ford instead. They have the chair Lincoln was shot in and the limousine Kennedy was shot in. What is this American fascination with death by violence?”

  “You’re too hard to beat at hockey. What can I do for you?”

  “You can put me to work. I don’t feel like driving back home yet, and I’ve seen the sight. I’m bored.”

  I thought. I hate turning down offers of help. If you make a habit of that sort of thing, the time will come when you need it and no one’s offering: cat in the cradle.

  “Pick up a city map,” I said. “One that shows the suburbs too. You’ll probably find one in the hotel gift shop. Take it to your car and drive till you get lost. That won’t take long; the streets around here change names as often as rap stars, and sometimes you have to turn north in order to go south. Then get yourself found. Do that ten or twelve times. After that you shouldn’t need the map.”

  “Is this busy work?” He sounded wary.

  “Maybe. About the only thing I need to double-team is a vehicular tail. That means two in a car, in case the mark finds a parking space and you don’t.”

  “Do tell.”

  “Okay, so you know that. You also need to know your way around. Then it’s more than just busy work.”

  “Any neighborhoods I need to look out for?”

  “There’s a block on Monroe, between Brush and Beaubien.”

  He paused long enough to write it down. “Wrong’un, eh?”

  “Not at all. It’s where you run to get away from all the others.”

  “Are you joking?”

  “Only a little. But it’s the only stretch in the city where you can walk at two in the morning with your gun in its holster. Police headquarters is there, also a casino and family restaurants open late. A mugger might take his chances with the cops, but not with an angry foreigner in an apron with a cleaver in his hand.”

  “I don’t own a firearm.”

  “Hang on. I’ll give you an address where you can get one.”

  “Don’t bother. I’ll buy the map.”

  “I’ll quiz you on it when I need you.” I hung up, grinning.

  Hazing out-of-towners is fun as well as useful. If he was going to be any use to me at all he’d still be in town when I called him back.

  TWENTY-SIX

  On my way into the office I stopped by the City-County Building to claim my revolver. A grandmotherly clerk with eyes screaming to get out stamped the claim slip signed by Captain Hichens, handed me a receipt to sign, and slid the weapon across the counter in a manila envelope. In the car I reloaded the cylinder from the box I kept in the glove compartment and snapped it into its clip in the hatch, next to the unregistered Luger, a speed-loader, and the extra magazine for the automatic. I was back in business.

  A gray Jaguar with New York plates was parked in a loading zone half a block from my building. Shelly sat behind the wheel, presenting an unhappy profile to Nicky, who was carping about something with both hands in motion. I didn’t know if they knew my car by sight, but I rotated the sun visor to cover my face as I drove past in the opposite direction and around the corner. I turned around in the driveway to the lot where I usually parked, went back the way I’d come, and slid into the curb behind the Jag. At the last second I stamped on the pedal and rapped the rear bumper hard.

  Both models were built sturdy. The jolt was just enough to crease sheet metal and rattle a pair of street soldiers. They were still reacting when I jumped out with the .38 in hand. Shelly buzzed down the driver’s window with one hand and fumbled with the portable twelve-pounder under his arm with the other. The lining of his suitcoat tore with a noise like a knife gutting a fish, and he had only about three feet of shining steel free when I jammed the squat barrel of the Chief’s Special into the soft flesh under the corner of his jaw. He froze.

  “There’s a reason they tell you not to shoot elephants from inside a vehicle,” I said. “Next time try something lighter.”

  “Drop it now!” Nicky shouted, close enough to his partner’s ear to make him jump. His Beretta was pointed at me.

  “Oh, put it up.” Shelly sounded done in. “He can’t miss.”

  The younger man’s face ran its full emotional range, ending in a pout. He lowered the pistol to his lap.

  I withdrew the muzzle from Shelly’s neck. He worked out the kinks, twisted the big magnum’s barrel free of his suitcoat lining, and resettled it in its holster. “I hope you got plenty of insurance. Mr. Morgenstern had this car built from the ground up.”

  “Then you shouldn’t leave it on the street. Especially my street.”

  Nicky said, “You should of used that popgun when you had the chance.”

  Shelly was looking at me. “They ran Reservoir Dogs on the hotel TV last night. Nicky took notes.”

  “I stepped on him once. Every time I see you guys I have to raise the ante. What more do I have to do to keep you out of my Zip code?”

  “Not everything’s about you, golden boy,” Shelly said. “We’re waiting on a passenger. You got a customer upstairs.”

  “Morgenstern?”

  “Go on up and see for yourself.”

  A string of cars cruised past. I turned my body to mask the revolver. The older man looked at his partner. “Put it up, I said. People can see in from the windows.”

  “What about him?”

  I grinned and stuck the .38 under my belt. Nicky swallowed the insult, swallowed it hard. He popped open the glove compartment and laid the Beretta inside. He left the lid open.

  Shelly rubbed at the spot where I’d poked him. “I’m getting old. I should be home watching golf.”

  “You’re just overqualified for the job,” I said. “There’s a parking lot around the corner. Cops enforce the ordinances on this street.”

  “Thanks.” He started the motor.

  “The hell with that. If Nicky drills a meter maid in this neighborhood I’ll lose the little off-the-street trade I’ve got left.”

  “Some loss,” he said. “You’re the first pedestrian we’ve seen since we got here.”

  “Yeah. King Tut called. He wants his tomb back.” His partner barked a laugh that sounded just like Morgenstern’s.

  Shelly put the car in gear. “Shut up, Nicky.”

  I smelled her from the landing.

  The scent was fragile, and she hadn’t sprayed it on with a fire hose. Old buildings, like old dogs, have an odor all their own, of moldy plaster and dry rot and tobacco chewed by teeth that had been grinning at coffin linings since the Bank Holiday, and anything fresher than this morning is bound to smell like the British Botanical Gardens. The last time I’d been in contact with this particular perfume, I hadn’t taken much notice because it was laced generously with Scotch. I took my hand off the gun under my belt and let myself into the outer office. The door wasn’t locked.

  Pet was standing with her arms folded loosely, reading the fine print on the original Casablanca poster in its frame, the room’s only decoration apart from the plastic plant in its bed of molded Styrofoam. She was dressed for the street, if the street were Fifth Avenue instead of West Grand, in a frost-green blazer over a black top and a black skirt that ran out of fabric six inches above her knees. They were nice knees, and all of a piece with her legs, sheathed in sheer hose. She had on three-inch heels, frost-green like the blazer, with open toes. She was turned three-quarters away from the door to the hallway. I admired the way her deep red hair grew up from a V at the nape of her neck without a single black root.

  “Did you know this poster is worth a fortune?” she asked without turning. “Jeremiah trades in them. He bought out an entire estate at Sotheby’s last year. A few more thousand and he could have owned the building. You ought to keep it behind lock and key.”

  “Funny, I thought I did.�
�� I closed the door behind me.

  “Your super let me in. I think he has a soft spot for redheads.”

  “He wouldn’t admit it. To hear him tell it, he poisoned Stalin and blew up Sputnik.”

  “I heard of Stalin. I didn’t know he was poisoned. I don’t know who Sputnik was.”

  “Nobody’s that young,” I growled. “Shelly moved the car to a lot around the corner.”

  She faced me. She had amber rings under her eyes behind the powder. “You saw him?”

  “I ran into him downstairs. I only told you because you don’t want to stand on the street looking for your ride.”

  “You think I’d be arrested for soliciting?”

  “In this town we only arrest the johns. We import hookers by the busload just to keep a steady supply. This isn’t the best neighborhood for a woman alone.”

  “Are men out of season?”

  I didn’t have anything for that. I lifted my chin. “You shouldn’t drink so much. On you it shows.”

  She touched her face. “I don’t, usually. I was bored yesterday. Do you give out beauty tips to all the women you meet, or am I a special case?”

  “Are you a case?”

  “I get it. Small talk’s over. Jeremiah sent me to hire you.”

  “He wasted your time.”

  “He said you might say something like that. He said to remind you you weren’t always so picky.”

  “I don’t mind working for gangsters, if it’s legal and they’re not just using me for bait. I don’t even mind working for people I don’t like. Gangsters I don’t like are something else. I need a certain amount of hostility to deal with some of the people I have to in the course of an investigation. When I’ve wasted most of it on the client, it puts me at a serious disadvantage.”

  “If I put it to him that way, you’ll be a lot more than just disadvantaged.”

  “Put it to him any way you like. Tell him it’s outside my specialty.”

  “You don’t even know what it is.”

  “I’ll guess. He wants me to find out if the person he came to Detroit to meet lured him here to set him up for Delwayne Garnet’s murder.”