by Ed McBain
“Never.”
“What about his partner?”
“Who’s his partner?”
“Ray Castaneda.”
“I don’t know him,” Blanca said. “Is he related to Pepe Castaneda?”
“Maybe. Tell me about Pepe.”
Blanca shrugged. “A punk,” she said.
“How old is he?”
“Thirty? Something like that.”
“What’s he do?”
“Who knows? Maybe numbers, I’m not sure. He used to be a junkie years ago, he’s one of the few guys I know who kicked it. He was with this street gang, they called themselves The Spanish Nobles or some shit like that, this was when he was still a kid, you know. I was only five or six myself, you know, but he was a very big man in the neighborhood, rumbling all the time with this wop gang from the other side of the park, I forget the name of the gang, it was a very big one. Then, you know, everybody started doing dope, the guys all lost interest in gangbusting. Pepe was a very big junkie, but he kicked it. I think he went down to Lexington, I’m not sure. Or maybe he just got busted and sent away and kicked it cold turkey, I’m not sure. But he’s off it now, I know that.” She shrugged. “He’s still a punk, though.”
“Have you seen him lately?”
“Yeah, he’s around all the time. You always see him on the stoop someplace. Always with a bunch of kids around him, you know, listening to his crap. Big man. The reformed whore,” Blanca said, and snorted.
“Have you seen him today?”
“No. I just come down a little while ago. I had a trick with me all night.”
“Where can I find him, would you know?”
“Pepe or the trick?” Blanca asked, and smiled.
“Pepe,” Delgado said, and did not smile back.
“There’s a pool hall on Ainsley,” Blanca said. “He hangs around there a lot.”
“Let’s get back to Huerta for a minute, okay?”
“Why?” Blanca asked, and turned to look at a bus that was rumbling up the avenue.
“Because we got away from him too fast,” Delgado said.
“I hardly know him,” Blanca said. She was still watching the bus. Its blue-gray exhaust fumes seemed to fascinate her.
“You mind looking at me?” Delgado said.
She turned back toward him sharply. “I told you I’m not a stoolie,” Blanca said. “I don’t want to answer no questions about Joe Huerta.”
“Why not? What’s he into?”
“No comment.”
“Dope?”
“No comment.”
“Yes or no, Blanca? We know where you live, we can have the Vice Squad banging on your door every ten minutes. Tell me about Huerta.”
“Okay, he’s dealing, okay?”
“I thought he had a real estate business.”
“Sure. He’s got an acre of land in Mexico, and he grows pot on it.”
“Is he pushing the hard stuff, too?”
“No. Only grass.”
“Does his partner know this?”
“I don’t know what his partner knows or don’t know. I’m not his partner. Go ask his partner.”
“Maybe I will,” Delgado said. “After I talk to his partner’s brother.”
“You going to look for Pepe now?”
“Yes.”
“Tell him he still owes me five bucks.”
“What for?”
“What do you think for?” Blanca asked.
Genero was waiting on the sidewalk when Willis came out of the phone booth.
“What’d they say?” he asked.
“Nothing yet. They’ve got a lot of stuff ahead of what we sent them.”
“So how we supposed to know if it’s grass or oregano?” Genero said.
“I guess we wait. They told me to call back in a half hour or so.”
“Those guys at the lab give me a pain in the ass,” Genero said.
“Yeah, well, what’re you gonna do?” Willis said. “We all have our crosses to bear.” The truth was that Genero gave him a pain in the ass. They had arranged for pickup and delivery to the lab of the plastic bag full of oregano/marijuana and had asked for a speedy report on it. But the lab was swamped with such requests every day of the week, the average investigating officer never being terribly certain about a suspect drug until it was checked out downtown. Willis had been willing to wait for the report; Genero had insisted that he call the lab and find out what was happening. Now, at twenty minutes to 4:00, they knew what was happening: nothing. So now Genero was beginning to sulk, and Willis was beginning to wish he would go home and explain to his mother how tough it was to be a working detective in this city.
They were in an area of The Quarter that was not as chic as the section farther south, lacking its distinctive Left Bank flair, but boasting of the same high rentals nonetheless, this presumably because of its proximity to all the shops and theaters and coffeehouses. 3541 Carrier Avenue was a brownstone in a row of identical brownstones worn shoddy by the passage of time. They found a nameplate for Robert Hamling in one of the mailboxes in the entrance hallway downstairs. Willis rang the bell for Apartment 22. An answering buzz on the inner door sounded almost immediately. Genero opened the door and both men moved into a dim ground-floor landing. A flight of steps was directly ahead of them. The building smelled of Lysol. They went up to the second floor, searched for Apartment 22, listened outside the door, heard nothing, and knocked.
“Bobby?” a girl’s voice said.
“Police officers,” Willis said.
“What do you want?” the girl asked.
“Open the door,” Genero said.
There was silence inside the apartment. They kept listening. They knew that Robert Hamling wasn’t in there with the girl, because the first word out of her mouth had been “Bobby?” But nobody knows better than cops that the female is the deadlier of the species, and so they waited apprehensively for her to unlock the door, their coats open, their guns within ready drawing distance. When the door finally opened, they were looking at a teenage girl wearing dungarees and a tie-dyed T-shirt. Her face was round, her eyes were blue, her brown hair was long and matted.
“Yes, what do you want?” she said. She seemed very frightened and very nervous. She kept one hand on the doorknob. The other fluttered at the throat of the T-shirt.
“We’re looking for Robert Hamling,” Willis said. “Does he live here?”
“Yes?” she said, tentatively.
“Is he home?”
“No.”
“When do you expect him?”
“I don’t know.”
“What’s your name, miss?” Genero asked.
“Sonia.”
“Sonia what?”
“Sonia Sobolev.”
“How old are you, Sonia?”
“Seventeen.”
“Do you live here?”
“No.”
“Where do you live?”
“In Riverhead.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Waiting for Bobby. He’s a friend of mine.”
“When did he go out?”
“I don’t know.”
“How’d you get in here?”
“I have a key.”
“Mind if we come in and wait with you?”
“I don’t care,” she said, and shrugged. “If you want to come in, come in.” She stood aside. She was still very frightened. As they entered, she looked past them into the hallway, as if anxious for Hamling to appear and wishing it would be damn soon. Willis caught this, though Genero did not. She closed the door behind them, and together they went into a room furnished with several battered easy chairs, a foam rubber sofa, and a low, slatted coffee table. “Well, sit down,” she said.
The detectives sat on the sofa. Sonia took one of the chairs opposite them.
“How well do you know Robert Hamling?” Willis asked.
“Pretty well.”
“When did you see him last?”
“Oh…” she said, and shrugged, and seemed to be thinking it over.
“Yes?”
“Well, what difference does it make?”
“It might make a difference.”
“Last week sometime, I guess.”
“When last week?”
“Well, why don’t you ask Bobby when he gets here?”
“We will,” Genero said. “Meantime, we’re asking you. When did you see him last?”
“I don’t remember,” Sonia said.
“Do you know anybody named Lewis Scott?” Willis asked.
“No.”
“Ever hear of a clothing store called The Monkey Wrench?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Ever buy any clothes there?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Ever buy a black silk blouse there?” Genero asked.
“I don’t remember.”
“Show her the blouse, Dick,” Willis said.
Genero produced the manila envelope again. He took the blouse from it and handed it to the girl. “This yours?” he asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Yes or no?” Genero said.
“It could be, I can’t tell for sure. I have a lot of clothes.”
“Do you have a lot of black silk blouses bought at a store called The Monkey Wrench?”
“Well, no, but a person could get confused about her clothes. I mean, it’s a black silk blouse, it could be any black silk blouse. How do I know it’s mine?”
“What size blouse do you take?”
“Thirty-four.”
“This is a thirty-four,” Willis said.
“That still doesn’t make it mine, does it?” Sonia asked.
“Were you here in Isola last night?” Willis asked.
“Well, yes.”
“Where?”
“Oh, banking around.”
“Where?”
“Here and there.”
“Here and there where?”
“You don’t have to answer him, Sonia,” a voice from the doorway said, and both detectives turned simultaneously. The boy standing there was about eighteen, with long blond hair and a handlebar mustache. He had on blue jeans and a blue corduroy shirt, over which he wore an open coat with white fur showing on the inside.
“Mr. Hamling, I presume,” Willis said.
“That’s me,” Hamling said. He turned to close the entrance door. A bright-orange, radiating sun was painted on the back of the coat.
“We’ve been looking for you,” Willis said.
“So now you found me,” Hamling said. “This is about Lew, isn’t it?”
“You tell us,” Genero said.
“Sure, it’s about Lew,” Hamling said. “I figured you’d get to me sooner or later.”
“What about him?”
“He jumped out the window last night.”
“Were you there when he jumped?”
“We were both there,” Hamling said, and glanced at the girl. The girl nodded.
“Want to tell us what happened?”
“He was on a bum trip,” Hamling said. “He thought he could fly. I tried to hold him down, but he ran for the window and jumped out. End of story.”
“Why didn’t you report this to the police?”
“What for? I’ve got long hair.”
Willis sighed. “Well,” he said, “we’re here now, so why don’t you just tell us everything that happened, and we’ll file the damn report and close out the case.”
Genero looked at him. Willis was taking out his pad. “Want to tell me what time you went over there?”
“It must’ve been about four-thirty or so. Look,” Hamling said, “am I gonna get in any trouble on this?”
“Why should you? If Scott jumped out the window, that’s suicide, plain and simple.”
“Yeah, well he did.”
“Okay, so help us close it out, will you? This is a headache for us, too,” Willis said, and again Genero looked at him. “What happened when you got there?”
“Why do I have to be in it, that’s all I want to know?” Hamling said.
“Well, you were in it, weren’t you?”
“Yeah, but…”
“So what are we supposed to do? Make believe you weren’t there? Come on, give us a break. Nobody’s trying to get you in trouble. You know how many acid freaks jump out the window every day of the week?”
“I just don’t want it to get in the papers or anything,” Hamling said. “That’s why I didn’t call you in the first place.”
“We realize that,” Willis said. “We’ll do everything we can to protect you. Just give us the information we need to get a report typed up, that’s all.”
“Well, okay,” Hamling said reluctantly.
“So what happened? Did all three of you go up there together, or what?” Willis said.
“No, I ran into him on the street,” Hamling said. “I was alone at the time. I called Sonia up later, and she came over.”
Willis was writing on the pad. Genero was still watching him. Genero had the strangest feeling that something was going on, but he didn’t know quite what. He also had the feeling that he was about to learn something. He was both confused and somewhat exhilarated. He kept his mouth shut and simply watched and listened. “All right,” Willis said, “you ran into this friend of yours and—”
“No, no, he wasn’t a friend of mine,” Hamling said.
“You didn’t know him?”
“No, I just ran into him in this coffee joint, and we began talking, you know? So he asked me if I wanted to come up to his place and hear some records, you know, and…Listen, can I get in trouble if I really level with you guys?”
“I’d appreciate it if you would,” Willis said.
“Well, he said he had some good stuff and maybe we could have a smoke. That’s all I thought it was at the time. Just a smoke, you see. I mean, if I’d known the guy had acid in his apartment—”
“You didn’t know that at the time?”
“No, hell no. I usually try to stay away from these plastic hippies, anyway, they’re usually a lot of trouble.”
“How do you mean, trouble?”
“Oh, you know, they’re trying to show off all the time, trying to be something they really aren’t. Weekend hippies, plastic hippies, same damn thing. None of them are really making the scene, they’re only pretending to make it.”
“How about you?”
“I consider myself genuine,” Hamling said with dignity.
“How about Sonia?”
“Well, she’s sort of a weekend hippie,” Hamling said, “but she’s also a very groovy chick, so I put up with her.” He smiled broadly. Sonia did not smile back. She was still frightened. Her hands were clasped in her lap, and she kept shifting her eyes from Willis to Hamling as though knowing that a dangerous game was being played, and wanting desperately to be elsewhere. Genero sensed this, and also sensed in his inexperienced, newly promoted way that the girl was Willis’s real prey and that it would only be a matter of time before he sprang for her jugular. The girl knew this, too. Hamling seemed to be the only person in the room who did not know it. Supremely confident of himself, he plunged on.
“Anyway, we went up there and smoked a few joints and drank some wine, and it was then I suggested I give Sonia a ring and have her come over, join in the celebration.”
“What were you celebrating?” Willis asked.
Hamling hesitated. He thought the question over for several moments, and then grinned and said, “Life. Living. Being alive.”
“Okay,” Willis said.
Genero was still watching very closely, learning as he went along. He knew, for example, that Hamling had just told a lie. Whatever they’d been celebrating, it had not been life or living or being alive. He could not have told how he knew Hamling had lied, but he knew it. And Willis knew it. And the girl knew it. And Genero knew that before long Willis would come back to the reason for the celebration, in an attem
pt to expose Hamling’s lie. Genero felt great. He felt as though he were watching a copsand-robbers movie on television. He didn’t want it to end, ever. It never once occurred to him, as he watched and listened to Willis, that he himself was a detective. All he knew was that he was having a great time. He almost asked the girl how she was enjoying herself. He wished he had a bag of popcorn.
“So I went down to the street,” Hamling said. “He didn’t have a phone in the apartment. I went to a pay phone to call Sonia. She-“
“Where was Sonia?”
“Here. I was supposed to meet her here at seven o’clock, and this was now maybe close to eight. She has a key, so I knew she’d let herself in.”
“Was she here?”
“Oh, yeah. So I asked her to meet me uptown. She said she wasn’t too familiar with that part of the city, so I told her what train to take, and I met her at the subway stop.”
“What time was that?”
“She must’ve got there about eight-thirty. Wouldn’t you say it was eight-thirty, Sonia?”
The girl nodded.
“Did you go back to the apartment then?”
“Yes,” Hamling said. “That was the first mistake.”
“Why?”
“He was naked when he opened the door. I thought at first… Hell, I didn’t know what to think. Then I realized he was high. And then I realized he was on an acid trip. A bummer. I tried to find out what he’d dropped, there’s all kinds of stuff, you know, good and bad. Like there’s a whole lot of difference between white owsley and green flats; you get shit with strychnine and arsenic mixed into it, man, that’s bad news. But he wasn’t making any sense at all, didn’t know what he’d dropped, didn’t know where he was, kept running around the room bare-assed and screaming and yelling he could fly. Scared Sonia half out of her mind, right, honey?”
The girl nodded.
“When did he jump out the window?” Willis asked.
“I don’t know, we must’ve been there maybe twenty minutes. I was trying to talk him down, you know, telling him to cool it, calm it, like that, when all of a sudden he jumps up and makes a break for the window. I tried to grab him, but I was too late. The window was closed, you dig? He went through it head first, man oh man. I looked down in the yard, and there he was laying there like…” Hamling shook his head.
“So what’d you do?”
“I grabbed Sonia, and we split. I didn’t want to get mixed up in it. You got long hair, you’re dead.”
