Dead Man Talking

by Casey Daniels

  “You can’t just walk away,” I blurted out.

  He laughed. “You’re right. I can’t walk away. Not from this place. But I’ll tell you what, it sure gets lonely in here. I hardly ever get any visitors, you know what I mean?”

  I did. I gulped and nodded. “You want me to come back.”

  “Tomorrow.” Morgan stood. “And you could dress a little nicer, you know?” He glanced at the woman who sat nearby. “Like that lady over there,” he said, and he hung up the phone.

  Maybe it was just as well, because I was just about to tell him to stick it.

  Then again, like I said, I was shameless, and too close to the truth to walk away now.

  I wondered if there was a Frederick’s of Hollywood nearby.

  I may have been desperate, but I am not completely without pride. I skipped Frederick’s of Hollywood and opted for Kmart. Which, of course, is just as embarrassing in its own special way. When I walked into the prison the next day, my outfit lacked style—not to mention class—but if the head-turning looks I got from the guards meant anything, it did its job.

  I had Sammi to thank for teaching me to dress like this.

  Short, short red skirt. White tee with a V-neck that plunged way more than anything should on a woman with a 38C chest. It was sleeveless and had one of those crisscross backs that meant it was impossible for me to wear a bra. But then, that was the whole point. Shoes with skinny heels and chunky soles added another couple inches to my height.

  I had stopped just short of being the girl-on-the-street-corner. But not by much.

  Dale Morgan was not disappointed. When he walked into the visitors’ room, I stayed on my feet long enough for him to look me over. When he picked up the phone on his side of the glass, his smile was oily. “If I ask you to come back tomorrow, what will you wear then? Because I’ll tell you what, honey, I could spend the rest of my time in here just dreaming about what you were going to show up in every day.”

  I might have looked like a bimbo, but I didn’t have to act like one. I dropped into the chair on the other side of the glass from his and glared at him in a way that said there was no negotiating room in what I was about to say. “There will be no tomorrow. You’ve got this one chance and this one chance only to look long and hard

  I was. He didn’t have to tell me. He looked over as much of me as he could see from where he was sitting. “You went out yesterday when you left here and you bought that outfit?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just for me?”

  “I certainly wouldn’t have bought it for myself. Clear reds do not look good on natural redheads, but this was the shortest skirt I could find, so I made the sacrifice. And the shirt is two sizes too small.”

  His eyes went dreamy. “The shirt is perfect!”

  I pinned him with a look. “Talk.”

  Morgan leaned back in his chair. “What do you want to know?”

  I didn’t let him see how relieved I was. “You were in Central State at the time Vera Blaine was killed. I want to know what the other prisoners were saying, how they felt about what happened. Did anybody have any theories . . . you know, about Lamar’s arrest and conviction?”

  “Theories?” He laughed like maybe I was a bimbo after all. “Nobody’s got any theories in a place like this. They only got secrets.”

  “What’s your secret, Mr. Morgan?”

  “Mine?” He grinned. “Word is going to spread through gen pop that you visited me two days in a row, and everybody but everybody’s going to be talking about what a fine-looking woman you are. They’re going to be all over it, wondering how Dale Morgan got a babe as

  “And what was Warden Lamar’s secret?” I asked, and at the same time, I hoped he didn’t know the secret that I hoped only I knew. I wasn’t there to gossip, and it would serve no purpose for anyone to know about Lamar’s affair with Vera.

  He pursed his lips. “I don’t think the warden was a secrets sort of man. He was up-front. Regulated, you know. He had high expectations for all of us. And he kept them, even when we were released and came back, again and again. The warden was noble, and I let him down.”

  “You don’t mean by just ending up back in here. You knew something about Vera Blaine’s murder.”

  He hesitated. “Knowing something he shouldn’t know can get a man killed in a place like this.”

  I had no doubt of it. I didn’t press the point.

  “If Lamar didn’t have any secrets, then who had secrets about him? Reno Bob Oates? Or Bad Dog Raphael?”

  Morgan’s eyes widened. We were the only ones in the visitors’ room that afternoon, but he still took a careful look around before he spoke. “Why those two?”

  “Why not? They both hated Lamar. Either one could have—”

  “They didn’t both have those kinds of connections, if you know what I mean. A man inside, he needs connections on the outside to make something big like that go down.”

  “Something big like a murder and then framing the warden for it?”

  He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.

  I thought about Reno Bob and Bad Dog. “You’re saying Reno Bob didn’t have the chops. He always worked alone. Mack Raphael was the one with the gang connections. You’re saying it had to have been Bad Dog.”

  “Didn’t say that. Wouldn’t.” He looked around again. “A man like Bad Dog has friends in lots of places. I know this for a fact, see. I was his cellmate at Central State.”

  This was something I didn’t know. I tried not to look too interested. “And you may have heard something. Or overheard something. Is that what you’re saying?”

  He shook his head. “I ain’t saying anything of the sort. Like I said, I couldn’t. I value my life too much. Makes me wonder why you aren’t so smart.”

  It was a logical assumption. But then, Morgan didn’t know that Helen Lamar had been her husband’s staunchest supporter all these years, and he certainly didn’t know that Lamar had done her wrong and that she deserved something for her misplaced trust in him. He didn’t know that someone was out to get me. He didn’t know about Sammi, either, and I told him about her and about how we’d started out on the opposite sides of a lot of issues (like taste and fashion, not to mention the law), but how Sammi and I had ended up understanding each other. If we had had more time, we might have been friends.

  “You can see why I’ve got a sort of personal stake in this,” I said when I was done. Maybe it was wishful thinking, but I had the feeling he understood where I was coming from.

  He shifted the phone from his left ear to his right. “I may have overheard something once. A certain cellmate

  “What does that mean?”

  Morgan made a face. “Like I know? I’m just telling you what he said, ‘Bad Dog is sitting on the evidence and laughing his ass off.’ Made no sense to me then, makes no sense to me now. Maybe doesn’t even mean anything.”

  “But maybe it does, and maybe you were feeling guilty for never reporting what you’d heard to the cops. Is that what you were trying to tell Lamar by burying that coin at his grave?”

  “If that was true, you’d be assuming I had a conscience. You think that’s true?”

  “I think Warden Lamar wouldn’t have believed in you if it wasn’t.”

  “Yeah. Well. Whatever.” He looked away.

  I didn’t want to lose him, or the thread of our conversation. I shifted a little in my chair to attract his attention. “So it’s true? Bad Dog Raphael arranged Vera’s murder?”

  “Never said that.” Dale Morgan looked at the clock that hung on the wall behind me. “What I will say is what I said before. Bad Dog, he’s got connections. All kinds of people are on his payroll. You should know that so you can be careful.”

  His comment made me think about something that had been bugging me since the night of the ruined art show and our bachelor auction. “How about reporters?” I asked. “Does Bad Dog have some of them on his payroll?”

  He sucked his teeth. “Could
n’t say. But I wouldn’t be surprised. You thinking about anyone in particular?”

  I was, of course. Mike Kowalski. I wasn’t about to say it. If I was wrong, and if Morgan was somehow allied with Bad Dog, I could be getting Kowalski in a whole bunch of trouble he didn’t deserve. If I was right, and if Morgan was a snitch, I could be signing my own death warrant.

  “I’m just asking, that’s all. I appreciate all your help.”

  “I haven’t helped you.” Morgan sat back, his right arm thrown casually over the back of his chair. “And if you tell anybody I have, I’ll deny it. If you send any cops here to confirm what I’ve said—”

  “I won’t. I swear.” I crossed my heart.

  And that little movement of my finger across my chest got him back to thinking about what he’d been thinking about since I walked in the room. “Forty-five more minutes until visiting hours are over,” he growled. “Since you’re going to be staying around, how about you hitch that skirt of yours a little higher and—”

  I silenced him with a look that was cold enough to shatter the glass between us, and Morgan got the message.

  “So,” he grumbled, “what do you want to talk about?”

  What Dale Morgan and I talked about for the next forty-five minutes isn’t the least bit important. Neither is the fact that as soon as I got back to my hotel, I changed into the real clothes I’d worn to northern Ohio the day before. My purchased-just-for-the-occasion outfit went in the trash, and I hightailed it back to Cleveland as fast as I could.

  I had plenty to do. The last episode of Cemetery Survivor

  A couple weeks ago, I cared. A lot. The Monday after I met with Dale Morgan, I drummed my fingers on the table of the McDonald’s where I was sitting. Yes, it was the one across the street from Bad Dog’s Big Car Nation, and no, I didn’t feel guilty sitting there when there was so much to do back at Monroe Street. I’d left Absalom in charge, and besides, I had to figure out what I was going to do next.

  It was five minutes later, and I was no closer to a solution, when Absalom and Reggie slid into the booth across from me. Delmar and Crazy Jake were there, too. They sat in the next booth over.

  “You were supposed to keep these guys working back at the cemetery,” I told Absalom.

  He grinned and grabbed a handful of my fries. He pointed toward me with one of them. “You’re up to something. Except to keep an eye on Bad Dog, why else would you be hanging out here? You got your voodoo doll?”

  I did, and to prove it, I pulled it out of my pocket and showed it to him, and he nodded, satisfied.

  I wished things were that easy. “Keeping an eye on Bad Dog isn’t getting me anywhere,” I grumbled. The food on my tray was cold. That didn’t stop Absalom from polishing off the fries, or Reggie from grabbing the double cheeseburger. Jake had his own chocolate shake, so Delmar took mine. Since the food was all just a decoy to make me look like I belonged there, and I

  “Like you thought you would?” Reggie chuckled. “You don’t think the guy’s actually going to come right out and admit he killed Sammi when he was trying to kill you, do you?”

  I hadn’t told them why I was there. In fact, I hadn’t told them where I was going when I left the cemetery at lunchtime.

  “She’s not the only one he killed,” I said, sure to keep my voice down. “I think he’s responsible for another murder, too, and for Warden Lamar’s death, since he died of embarrassment his first night in prison.”

  Absalom didn’t look surprised. “So what are we going to do about it?”

  “Well, for one thing, we can figure out the weird thing Bad Dog told somebody in prison. He said he had proof of who committed that murder twenty-five years ago. He said Bad Dog was sitting on the proof and laughing his ass off. What do you suppose that means?”

  Not one of them had an answer.

  I drummed my fingers some more, staring at the car lot while I thought about everything Dale Morgan told me. I watched the office and saw a couple people walk back and forth, including Bad Dog himself. I paid attention to the skillful way the salesman, Bud, ambushed a couple strolling by and dragged them around to the side of the lot to show them a car. I glanced up at the mechanical dog atop that pole.

  And that’s when it hit me.

  “Bad Dog’s sitting on the evidence and laughing his ass off,” I mumbled. Right before I popped out of my seat and headed for the door.

  “Hey! What are you doing? Where are you going?” Absalom and the others scrambled to catch up.

  “Back to Monroe Street,” I told them. “We’ve got work to do.” I would have gone right on sounding upbeat and confident if another thought hadn’t struck.

  I craned my neck and looked up at that smiling, mechanical dog.

  It was a long way to the top of that pole.

  19

  By this time, I knew better than to try and go anywhere without my team. They were going to follow me, anyway, whether I wanted them to or not. I figured it was easier and would cause less commotion if I just told them to meet me at the cemetery at two in the morning. They were dying to know what was up, but I refused to give anything away. We gathered outside the gates of Monroe Street, piled into my car, and we were back at Bad Dog’s Big Car Nation by two fifteen.

  At that time of night, the neighborhood wasn’t exactly hopping, but it wasn’t dead quiet, either. The Mc-Donald’s had just closed, and we parked on a side street where we could watch the workers sweep up, turn out the lights, and drag to their cars. A couple lowriders bounced by, their radios blaring. We waited for them to pass before we got out of the car.

  “You’re not plannin’ on breakin’ and enterin’, are you?” Absalom walked at my side, eyeing the darkened office. There were a couple security lights shining on the used car lot, one near the office door, and another aimed at the double doors that led into a side garage. There was a spotlight high up on the pole to illuminate the mechanical dog. He was doing his job, still waving. The blue neon light in the office window was on, too. Other than that, the place was as dark and as quiet as I’d hoped it would be. “You’re gonna get caught,” Absalom warned. “You’re gonna get in trouble. You are not the kind of woman who will do well in jail, I’ll tell you that. You’re gonna—”

  “Trust me, I’m not even thinking about going inside the office.” I gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder at the same time I craned my neck to see to the top of the pole and the laughing, waving dog. “All I want to do is get a closer look.”

  “At that?” Except for a cat mewling nearby, it was pretty quiet. Which is why I heard Delmar gulp. “It’s awfully high up.”

  By this time we were standing at the bottom of the pole. I glanced up at the metal handholds that started four feet above my head, then down at the sneakers I’d been sensible enough to wear, then around at my team. “If one of you could give me a boost . . .”

  “Up there?”

  Since the question burst out of Absalom and Reggie at the same time, I wasn’t sure which of them to answer. “It’s the only way I’m going to be able to check out my theory. Dale Morgan said that Bad Dog said he had proof that he killed Vera. Well, Morgan didn’t exactly say it. I mean, he didn’t want to come right out and say it. But he sort of said it. He said that Raphael said

  Reggie’s brow creased. The pit bull tattoo frowned. He crossed his arms over his chest. “If you think there’s evidence, then you should tell the cops and have them come look for it.”

  “And they’d listen, right?” Nobody answered, but just in case any one of them was formulating a comeback, I supplied my logic. “Dale Morgan is never going to come out and admit what he told me about Bad Dog. He’s too scared, and I don’t blame him. Apparently, Bad Dog’s got a network that extends into prisons, and if word gets out that Morgan led the cops to this evidence, he’s dead meat. That means the cops won’t hear it from Morgan. And they’re not going to hear about Morgan from me. I’m already responsible for what happened to Sammi. I’m not going to let the sam
e thing happen to Morgan. Even if he is smarmy.”

  The Big Car Nation sign in the office window washed an icy blue color over Absalom’s face. “You can’t climb up there.”

  “You’ll kill yourself,” Delmar chimed in.

  It was, of course, a scenario I’d already considered, and rather than think about it again and chicken out the way I’d been tempted to chicken out ever since I came up with this plan, I closed in on the pole. “Come on, somebody help me out here. I don’t want to have to climb on the roof of a car to reach the bottom rung, but I’ll do it if I need to.”

  With the back of one hand, Absalom pushed me out of the way. “I’ll do it,” he said.

  “You’re too big to reach around the mechanical dog and see what’s inside that car.”

  “Then I’ll do it.” Delmar stepped forward.

  “You don’t need another ding on your record if you get caught. None of you do.” I rubbed my hands together like I couldn’t wait to get started. It was partly for show, partly because I was trying to convince myself that I wasn’t going to fall and end up dead on the hood of the ’98 Accord parked nearby. “All I’m going to do is climb up, take a look inside the car, and see if the mechanical Bad Dog is sitting on anything. Nobody’s going to see me. Nobody’s going to notice a thing. At least not if you all clear out and stop standing around like you’re casing the place. I brought reinforcements.” I pulled the voodoo doll Absalom had given me out of my pocket just to show I meant it. Before my courage faded, I had to move, and I had to move fast. I stepped closer to the pole. “Help me up, will you?”

  They weren’t happy about it, but they gave me the boost I needed, and before I could talk myself out of it, I had one foot on the lowest metal rung and my hands clasped around another rung two feet above my head. I steadied myself. I swore I wasn’t going to look down. I took a deep breath, and I started to climb.

  Really, the pole wasn’t all that high. At least that’s what I told myself. Twenty feet is what, maybe as high as the top of a house? It felt like I was climbing to the moon.