Mean Business on North Ganson Street

by S. Craig Zahler

  “The guys her brother owed were in the Mafia,” said the businessman. “She told me that … that they’d kill him—maybe come after her—slash her face if—”

  “Want anything from the vending machine?” Bettinger asked as he rose from his desk. “I’m partial to cinnamon cakes, but I’ve been told—”

  “Hey! This is serious!”

  “It isn’t. Yell again and our conversation is over.”

  “I’m—I’m sorry.” Robert’s voice was small and distant. “She’s my fiancée.”

  “After I get my cakes, I’ll pull some binders for you to look through. See if you can identify her.”

  “What kind of binders?”

  “Prostitutes.”

  The businessman flung his head at the trash basket, and the frothy contents of his guts splattered the bottom of the receptacle. Convulsions that resembled orgasms wrung out his digestive tract.

  “Thanks for containing that,” remarked Bettinger. “Wanna come back another day?”

  Dripping into the basket, Robert offered no reply.

  “Let me educate you, Mr. Fellburn,” said the detective. “Traci’s probably skipped town by now. She has money that you gave her—willingly—which isn’t the kind of thing that compels a national manhunt. And if we do happen to get her, it’ll go to court, where you’ll have to explain to a judge—maybe a jury—how you were driven around like a fancy golf cart by a black hooker half your age.”

  Robert was appalled by the thought of further embarrassing his ex-wife and children.

  “Traci’s beautiful?”

  Inside the trash basket, the businessman nodded his head.

  “And that’s the glossy—a rich white middle-aged predator and some pretty young black girl. I don’t think seventy-five nuggets and a diamond ring are worth going on stage for that kind of theater.”

  Robert raised his head and wiped his mouth as Bettinger walked across the office.

  “You really thought you were going to marry Traci with an i?”

  The businessman cleared his throat. “We’re very different people … but it could happen. Stuff like that happens all the time.”

  “Not honestly.”

  A ponderous silence filled the room, and the detective opened the door. “We’re done?”

  Robert nodded his pathetic head.

  “Take the bucket.” Bettinger motioned outside. “And don’t be such a goddamn idiot.”

  Ruined, the businessman rose from the couch, walked through the door, and crossed the central pool, a forty-seven-year-old bachelor who had lost his family, his money, and his dignity not because of a beautiful young whore, but because of his own weaknesses—his ingratitude, his lust, and his incredible capacity for self-deception. Robert imagined himself standing before a priest, looking into Traci Johnson’s eyes, exchanging vows, and in an instant, he knew that he was a deluded and ridiculous fool, no different from the chess piece that he had seen on the policeman’s desk—the dog that wore a crown on its head and thought it was a king.

  It was a good thing that the businessman knew how to end his humiliation.

  Resolved, he approached the front desk, slammed the trash basket over the receptionist’s skull, and seized the fellow’s semiautomatic pistol. A warning cry sounded within the receptacle as the officer toppled backward, blinded by puke.

  W. Robert Fellburn swallowed the steel cylinder, thumbed the safety, and squeezed the trigger until his shame covered the ceiling in gray and red clumps.

  III

  A Singular-Choice Question

  Bettinger watched two grimacing members of a cleaning service mount a ladder and apply brushes to the suicide’s final remark. The young officer who had received a vomit crown and matching epaulets had departed early, shaken by his experience while the lobotomized corpse was taken to a place that had steel doors, an astringent smell, and digital thermometers that displayed low temperatures in both Celsius and Fahrenheit scales.

  The detective opened the package that he had moments ago retrieved from the vending machine. Footfalls garnered his attention, and a man cleared his throat.

  “The inspector wants to see you.”

  “I’ll never eat these goddamn cakes.”

  “I think you’ll have some time. The way the inspector said your name, maybe a great big heap of it.”

  Bettinger faced Big Tom, whose nickname referred to his impressive belly rather than his altitude, which was that of a Chinese woman. At that moment, the detective realized how much the senior clerk’s head resembled an onion.

  “The inspector’s upset?” inquired Bettinger, more curious than concerned.

  “Right after he summoned you, there was a thunderclap.” The clerk motioned to a window. “But the skies look pretty clear.”

  Together, the two men retreated up the hall and entered the central pool, where a dozen officers glanced at Bettinger. As he secreted the cinnamon cakes in his jacket, a heaviness pressed down upon his shoulders.

  “Maybe you’ll have time to make pastries from scratch,” remarked Big Tom. “Knead your own dough. Monitor the oven. Harvest sugar cane.”

  “I tried to help the guy.” Bettinger attempted to sound sincere. “Honest.”

  “Don’t be offended if I remove you from my list of emergency contacts.”

  A few more strides brought them to Big Tom’s desk, where the porcine fellow heaved his rump into a plastic chair. Bettinger continued to the door nearby, closed his right fist, and knocked directly below a plaque that read INSPECTOR KERRY LADELL.

  “Bettinger?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Get in here.” The tone of the imperative did not engender positive extrapolations.

  The detective took a breath, twisted the doorknob, and pushed, revealing an office that had more pine and oak than a forest. Sitting behind the desk in a brown leather chair was Inspector Ladell, long and saturnine, his lips pursed beneath his silver mustache and baleful eyes.

  “What the fuck did you say to Robert Fellburn?”

  The words flew at Bettinger like bullets, eliciting glances from the central pool. “Should I close the door?”

  “Answer my fucking question.”

  The detective shut the door.

  “Don’t sit.”

  “It’s that kind of conversation?”

  “Fellburn came in here for help, walked into your office, walked out, killed himself.”

  “Fellburn got squeezed by a black pro half his age. I illuminated the situation and offered some advice.”

  “Was it, ‘Kill yourself’?”

  “I told him to forget the money and move on.”

  “He moved.” Inspector Ladell glanced up at the ceiling.

  Bettinger sat in the chair that had been forbidden to him. “Why’re you coming at me like this? He was an idiot.”

  “You know John Carlyle?”

  The detective’s stomach sank. “The mayor?”

  “Not the second baseman who struck out forty-one times during his brief stint in the majors back in 1932.”

  Bettinger knew that this crummy conversation was about to get a whole lot worse.

  Inspector Ladell popped a mint into his mouth. “Here’s a singular-choice question for you. Guess who was married to Mayor Carlyle’s sister up until a couple of months ago?” The boss sucked his confection. “Choice A. The man who came in here for help, walked into your office, walked out, killed himself.”

  “Fuck.”

  “That’s the right word. ‘Fuck.’” Inspector Ladell nodded. “Maybe if you’d said something nice to him, we wouldn’t be using all this profanity.”

  “What does this mean?”

  “Nothing good.” The boss gave the mint a tour of his mouth. “Most politicians don’t want to be associated with infidelity or suicide or hookers, and this Fellburn casserole’s got all three ingredients.”

  “There’s stink.”

  “When the mayor found out about it, he called the police commissioner di
rectly.” Inspector Ladell clicked the mint against a tooth as if he were cocking a gun. “Please take a moment to imagine the nature of this call.”

  Bettinger’s extrapolation was instantaneous. “Where am I?”

  “Did you see these?” the boss asked as he opened a catalogue and set it upon the edge of his desk. A finger poked a glossy photograph in which a woman who was far too pretty to be a police officer modeled a bulletproof vest. “A good one saves lives,” the fellow remarked, turning pages until he reached a dog-eared photograph of a hunk who held a sleek assault rifle in his well-manicured hands. “And guns that don’t jam are helpful when people are trying to kill you.”

  Inspector Ladell closed the catalogue, leaned over, and dropped it in a garbage pail.

  “Because of you,” he continued, “we lost all of that gear—shit I’ve been lobbying for since the time when black presidents were science fiction. And incredibly enough, that’s not even the worst part. Commissioner Jeffrey is now no longer certain that the mayor will approve our new benefits package.”

  “Christ’s uncle,” remarked Bettinger.

  Inspector Ladell reclined in his leather seat. “The commissioner and I talked. He believes that the mayor would appreciate us getting rid of a certain detective.” The boss crushed the mint with his teeth and swallowed the shards. “Want another singular-choice question?”

  No words came out of Bettinger’s mouth.

  “Is there any chance that you might just disappear somewhere?”

  “As in teleport?”

  Inspector Ladell nodded. “Something like that.”

  “Never learned how.”

  “Anything you can overdose on? Some medication your wife takes?”

  “No. She’s very healthy.”

  “That’s unfortunate.”

  Bettinger needed a solid answer. “Does all this mean I’m fired?”

  “I called around. Said I had a bloodhound that does really good work, a top-notch sleuth that shit on a priceless rug and can’t stay in the house anymore.” Inspector Ladell opened a drawer. “You know anything about Missouri?”

  Chills tingled the nape of the fifty-year-old detective. He hated cold weather and thought that people who chose to live in it were aliens. Reluctantly, Bettinger pushed the conversation forward. “It’s a place, right?”

  “Achieved statehood a while back. Has a city in the northeast part called Victory. Heard of it?”

  “Has anybody?”

  “Part of the rustbelt. Had a future back when Asians were Orientals.” The boss hitched his shoulder, and a manila file slid across his desk, stopped, and overhung the precipice like a diving board. “When you flush a toilet in Missouri, that’s where it goes.”

  Bettinger opened the folder and scanned the cover sheet, which told him that Victory had an alarming number of abductions, murders, and rapes. The city looked like a hunk of third-world flotsam that had somehow drifted into the middle of America.

  “They want you,” stated Inspector Ladell. “They’re reorganizing and need a detective. If you transfer, we’ll pull the suspension.”

  “I’m suspended?”

  “Didn’t I tell you?” A shrug curved Inspector Ladell’s shoulders. “At this stage, I need to hurt you or the department, and I won’t even pretend there’s a dilemma. You’re an asshole. But I’m trying to give you something because you’re talented. Go to Victory. Finish your itinerary. In four years, you can retire, come back here, and throw eggs at the mayor’s house.”

  “Five years.” Bettinger looked at a photo of a ghetto that resembled Nagasaki after the bomb, peopled by the black survivors of a concentration camp.

  “You might be able to swing a transfer at some point, though I doubt it—they’re desperate for badges up there.”

  The detective thought about his wife and children. Rubbing his temples, he looked at his boss, who had tented his long fingers.

  “This is garbage.”

  “It is,” replied Inspector Ladell. “And you earned it.”

  IV

  Smudged

  The detective carried a box that contained clothing and forensics books through the revolving door and into the parking lot. Walking toward his dark green sedan, he noticed a discarded whiskey flask.

  “Bettinger.”

  The detective turned around and saw the anxious and wrinkled face of Silverberg, a man who had saved his life once and whose life he had saved twice.

  “It’s not right,” stated the Jewish fellow. “If a civilian wants to blow his brains out, let him. I approve. So would Darwin.”

  Bettinger shrugged and continued toward his car, accompanied by his peer.

  “Where’re you going?”

  “Home.”

  “Call if you want to get a drink. Or go to the range. Or drink at the range.”

  Bettinger unlocked the passenger door of his sedan and set down the box.

  “You okay?” inquired Silverberg.

  “Fine.” The distracted detective shut the door, rounded the vehicle, and reached the driver’s side.

  “You still have a marker with my name on it.”

  “We’re even.”

  “We aren’t. Anything. Anytime. Anyplace. You can call it in.”

  Bettinger nodded, flung the door, and sat upon the warm upholstery. As he slotted his key, he glanced at Silverberg, who was one of the few friends that he had in the precinct. “Take care.”

  “Anything. Anytime. Anyplace.”

  The detective shut the door, jerked the gear, and departed from the parking lot of the building in which he had worked for the last eighteen years.

  * * *

  Suddenly, Bettinger was home. He could not recall the trip nor any navigational details like stopping or turning, but when he looked through his windshield, he saw that he had somehow arrived.

  The sedan slowly drifted up the driveway toward the beige, four-bedroom house where the detective and his wife had lived since the birth of their first child. Its façade grew until it was all that he could see.

  Both of the kids were still at school, and Bettinger knew that he should speak with his wife before they returned. He killed the engine, and the quietude that followed was like a headache.

  Suddenly, the detective was walking toward his house, holding his keys, but not the box of possessions that he had taken from his office. Three stone steps altered his altitude, and soon he was on the landing, where he slotted metal and snapped bolts. He then entered his air-conditioned living room, discarding the circular shadow that the sun had stuck between his feet.

  “Jules?”

  “It’s me.”

  Soft footfalls sounded in the den, and Bettinger turned around. Approaching him was his wife, Alyssa Bright, a black woman who had a caramel complexion, deep dimples, big eyes, a small nose, and hair that was a dandelion array of medium-length twists. Her ripped jeans were discolored by royal blue paint as were the fingertips on her left hand, her Sierra University T-shirt, and her sharp chin, which she had evidently rubbed while inspecting her art.

  “Is everything okay?” asked the woman, glancing at the clock on the wall.

  “I was suspended for some stupid bullshit, and the only way I can dodge a termination is by relocating to Missouri.”

  Alyssa was stunned.

  A moment later, she padded across the room and took her husband’s hands. “Is this definite?”

  “Yeah. Name of the city is Victory.” Bettinger snorted. “Think of the worst slum you’ve ever been to, shit on it for forty years, and you’ll have an idea.”

  Alyssa pondered the thousand-pound lumps of information that her husband had just heaved onto the living room floor. “I spent some time in Missouri when I was a kid,” she remarked without any fondness.

  The detective looked into his wife’s eyes. “We’ll do whatever you want and think is best for the kids.”

  “Thanks for saying that.” Alyssa squeezed his hands. “Is there a decent city near Victory? Somepl
ace safe where we could live?”

  “Stonesburg. Eighty-two miles away.”

  “A highway connects it to Victory?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Speed limit?”

  “Varies, but mostly sixty-five.”

  “So you’d have a ninety-minute commute each way?”

  “About that.”

  Alyssa rubbed her chin exactly where she had earlier applied the dollop of blue paint. “Let’s go online and look at Stonesburg.”

  “If you want to.”

  “I’m portable. Karen doesn’t like her new school, and Gordon could use some better friends.” The woman motioned to the study. “We need to see what our options are.”

  Certain that he had married the loveliest and most pragmatic woman in existence, Bettinger set a kiss upon his wife’s mouth and slung an arm around her shoulders, which were five inches below his own.

  The couple entered the study.

  Alyssa flicked a switch, and a standing lamp threw light on a desk that had a computer. “You’re a total baby when it comes to the cold,” she said to her husband, “and you’ll have to wear layers. Lots of them. Long johns and undershirts. Gloves and sweaters.” She turned on the central processing unit. “Socks. Earmuffs.”

  “I hate it already.”

  The computer began to whirr, and to Bettinger, it sounded like a blizzard.

  V

  Decapitated Signs

  A thin slice of nighttime remained. It was the hour of newspaper delivery guys, people who worked the late shift, and tacit weirdos. Wearing a blue parka, brown corduroy pants, and gloves, Bettinger backed a yellow hatchback out of a two-car garage in Stonesburg, Missouri. His green sedan had died after six days of cold weather (which seemed like a prophecy), and since most of the family money was tied up in bonds and the Arizona house, the detective had been forced to buy himself a cheap replacement. This lack of available funds had also impacted the quality of their new home, which was small and the color of salmon. Bettinger did not relish the idea of signing a deed of ownership in Missouri, but if the place down south sold, the family would move into a better house, and he would buy a car that did not resemble a condiment.