“What about talking to the police? Does your confidentiality extend that far?”
She surprised me again but I had a sudden idea. The lie lined up right behind it. “It might relieve you to give me a dollar.”
She looked confused.
“If you give me a dollar I would be working for you. What we say would be completely protected. If I talked to the police it would be the end of my career.” I told myself that some of what I’d said was true, and that she really wanted to talk. Then I told myself the truth; I really wanted her to talk.
She shifted gears. “Do you work for criminals, Mr. Jacob?”
I looked into her eyes. “I don’t understand.”
She stood and walked toward the door. For an instant I thought she was going to show me out, but she kept walking into the hall. She returned a moment later with a dollar bill in her hand. She handed it to me and sat back down. I stuffed the money into my pocket.
“Sometimes to survive you have to look the other way.” Her eyes stared down at the table top as she struggled with herself. “I’m really more worried about Ernie finding out than the police.” She glanced up at me. “All they could do is put me in jail. Sometimes I think that would be a relief.”
She wanted to talk to someone who wouldn’t beat up on her or Joe. I wasn’t going to do either.
“Mrs. Starring, the police are often correct but, from what I understand, Joe was a recent arrival in Massachusetts. I’d be surprised if he could make contacts quickly enough to be involved in a drug war.”
I was shoveling, but I hoped I was on target. I flashed on Clifford pulling up to Starring’s apartment building, then knew I was right. Unfortunately, Mrs. Starring wasn’t ready to give her blessings to my instinct.
“Mr. Jacob, Joe sold drugs in Perth Amboy.”
I managed to keep the disappointment out of my voice. “How do you know?” I asked gently.
She didn’t meet my eyes, but she began to talk in a hushed, shaky voice. “Amboy has been hit pretty hard for quite a while.” She looked at me, “There’s a story that back in Colonial days they flipped a coin to see whether New York City or Perth Amboy would be used as the major dock.” A small smile stole across her face. “New York won.” The smile vanished into a frown and her eyes went back to the table. “It’s been hard times for a long time around here.”
She was talking about the town and her family.
“Ernie was forced to retire. For a long time I worked, but it drove him crazy. That’s when he started on Joe.”
“Started on?”
“Picked on Joe, unmercifully, Mr. Jacob. Ernie never had much affection in him, but when Joe couldn’t find work, Ernie really let him have it.” She grimaced as a flood of memories crossed her eyes. “It was terrible. He would say anything, even call him a bastard. If Ernie was in the wrong kind of mood or was angry drunk, he’d beat on Joe.”
I thought of the tight row of bungalows that lined the block. “The neighbors never intervened?”
She deflected the question. “We don’t see much of the neighbors, people mind their own business around here.”
I didn’t think she meant it as a jab. “This began after Ernie lost his job?”
“That’s when it got really bad.” She looked at me as if I could help her forgive Ernie. “He couldn’t accept retirement. Ernie was never a perfect husband but without work he was a nothing in his own eyes. He took it all out on Joe.” She shook her head sadly. “It’s hard to understand.”
Not really. I was the Joe in my family. I kept quiet, though, and gave her room to continue.
“I asked Joe to move out many times, but he wouldn’t leave me alone with Ernie.” She stared at her hands in front of her. “If I had made him, all this might not have happened.” Her voice had the hoarse whispered tone of the guilty.
“Why, Mrs. Starring? Why wouldn’t this have happened?”
There were hints of desperation in the way her hands rubbed each other. “You see, Mr. Jacob, Joe couldn’t find a job but the only way he could get Ernie off his back was to bring home money. He said he had a job, but I knew better, and Ernie never bothered to check. Joe knew he wouldn’t.”
“How did you know it was drug money? Did Joe tell you?”
“I just knew.”
I persisted. “But he never told you?”
She looked back up at me with some annoyance. “He didn’t have to tell me.” She watched her hands as though they belonged to someone else and blurted, “I made him swear he would never sell to children or sell hard drugs.”
“And he agreed?”
She bowed her head. “Yes.”
The word hung there like a lighthouse beacon mocking my detective instincts. I wanted to get up and leave the woman alone. But the thought of driving home with nothing more than the salted wounds of a lonely, grieving old lady forced me to continue. I asked if there was any more tea. Mine had grown cold in the cup.
The request and the familiar tasks associated with it seemed to ease her ache. She stood at the stove while the water reheated and fished two new teabags from the box. She gathered our cups and poured the water just as the kettle was ready to sound.
When she returned to the table she asked me for another cigarette. “Ernie complains about money for tobacco, so he never buys the kind I like.” I could hear the frayed edges of the “Ernie is a good man” routine.
After we both had a sip of our tea and smoked a little, I asked, “Why did Joe finally leave?” But before she could answer I stepped on my question with another. “Mrs. Starring, did you ever see any equipment that Joe might have used to, uh, do his work?”
She looked at me dourly. “You are being polite. You mean drug paraphernalia, don’t you?”
I nodded. She looked like she was trying to remember but she just shook her head. “The only thing I can think of is, he once asked me where I bought my scale.”
“What kind of scale?”
“Just a regular baking scale.”
It wasn’t much but it breathed a spark into my seriously sagging hopes. Maybe the boy kept his promise to his mother. If he had, it would be pretty damn unusual to get dead in a drug war over pot.
“Why did Joe leave? What changed his mind?”
“I didn’t know he had rented an apartment up there until the police called. I thought he was going on a short trip.”
“So you didn’t think he’d be gone too long.”
“No I didn’t.” She glanced away.
“But you thought something?”
She nodded. I remained quiet.
“I thought he was going away to do something illegal.”
“More drugs?”
“Yes.”
“You thought he went back on his word. You believed he was selling more than pot.”
Her hands gripped the edge of the table. “No! That’s not it at all. He didn’t want to tell me that he was going to sell marijuana in another state, that’s all. He didn’t leave here to sell hard drugs, Joe wouldn’t go back on his promise. He swore.”
It was all the faith she had, and I wasn’t going to take it from her. Or me. “What did he tell you? What reason did he give for leaving?”
She shook her head rapidly, really wanting me to like her kid. To think differently of him than Ernie had.
“You’re afraid he lied to you. Well, maybe he didn’t, Mrs. Starring. Can you remember what it was that he told you about leaving?”
It was an idea she hadn’t really believed, despite her love. A life like hers lent itself to harsh limits on optimism. “Not really, Mr. Jacob. Joe talked mostly nonsense when he told me he was going.”
“Even the nonsense might help.”
“He said he had a deal that would get both of us away from Ernie. But that he had to go out of state. That’s when I asked him if it had to do with drugs. He just laughed. He said he was done making just enough money to keep us here.” A shadow crossed her face.
“What is it, Mrs. Starr
ing?”
She seemed reluctant, but talking to me helped so she continued, “That’s when he began to talk nonsense.”
“What did he say?” I asked softly.
“He started talking about how Ernie finally gave him something useful.”
“Do you know what he meant? Was it a car?”
She looked completely puzzled. “A car? What car?” She shook her head impatiently. “I don’t know anything about a car. Joe was talking about a fight he and Ernie had. Ernie always had a story about how if he had a kid of his own the kid would be a somebody. He used to scream that at Joe all the time.”
“What was Joe like during Ernie’s tantrums?”
“Tantrums. That’s a good word for it. Joe was always quiet. That’s what made this fight different. Joe was baiting him. Like kidding Ernie about not having a kid of his own, questioning his, uh . . .”
“Virility?”
“Yes. I thought Ernie would kill him. Ernie was so mad he was shaking.” Mrs. Starring was beginning to tremble at the memory. “Finally Ernie started screaming that he did have a child. That it was the same age as Joe and a hell of a lot better than Joe would ever be.”
“What did Joe say? Did he laugh at him?” Somehow I had an image of a bully yelling “I can too, I can too.”
“No, Joe didn’t say anything.”
“Nothing?”
“No.”
“What did Joe look like when Ernie was yelling that?”
She looked bewildered as she recalled, “He looked pleased.”
My head was spinning and my system felt like Fd just mainlined adrenaline. I knew Fd just gotten what I came for, even if I didn’t yet understand it. I forced myself to settle down. “What did you think about what Ernie said?”
“I thought it was hysterical garbage,” she said flatly. “Some foolish way to save face.”
I could see she had already rejected the other possibility and I wasn’t going to rub her face in it. But if I couldn’t bite into the steak, I could cut away at the fat. “Mrs. Starring, did Joe sell drugs by himself or was there someone else he worked with?”
She squared her jaw. “I can’t believe I’ve talked this much. I’m not going to involve anyone else.”
“I’m not asking you to. Look, like I said, the police are probably right about all this. I just want to make sure. I have no intention of doing anyone damage. I only want to talk to them.”
“You are asking me to trust you quite a bit, Mr. Jacob.”
“Yes I am.”
She worked it over in her mind. “Joe had a close friend named Toby Rudnow.” She stopped, troubled by her disclosure. “I don’t know if he was involved or not, but they were close.”
I began to gather up the social debris. Mrs. Starring looked relieved.
“Leave everything, please. It will give me something to do.”
I put my cup back on the table and pushed my luck. “Is there any place I might find this boy?”
“He’s not a boy,” she said with a scowl. Mrs. Starring did not like Rudnow but that still didn’t make it easy. “He spends his time downtown at Warren’s Tavern.”
I stood up to leave. She remained seated, eyes on the table.
“Mrs. Starring, I have just a couple more questions.”
She met my eyes. “Isn’t it enough already?”
“Almost. Did Joe say anything else to you before he left?”
She shook her head. “Just what I’ve told you. That he was going to New England, and was going to get even for the abuse he’d taken from Ernie.” Something new crossed her face.
“What is it, Mrs. Starring?”
“A few days before he left he pulled something out of his pocket. It looked like some official paper, like a birth certificate, and he laughed.” She paused and I could almost see her looking at her Joe. The room was filling up with an unbearably sad emptiness. Mrs. Starring didn’t want to know from birth certificates, but I did.
“Did he say anything about this paper?” I was pushing her further into her depression and felt ashamed of myself. Her face twisted and she spat, “Only that Ernie was too stupid and too drunk to remember he even had it.” She sat there stuck to her seat.
“Had what?”
“The paper. Now this is enough, Mr. Jacob.”
“One last thing. What year was Joe born?”
“1953.” Her hands were twisting and squeezing, “Mr. Jacob, I must get ready for Ernie. Please, would you mind leaving now?” She didn’t rise and I started down the hall. I was about halfway to the door when I heard a loud whisper.
“Mr. Jacob.”
I turned and walked back to the kitchen door. She was still sitting stiffly, tears filling the creases in her face, her hands wringing furiously. “Even though I gave you that dollar I don’t ever want to hear from you.” She bit her lip. “No matter what you discover.”
I started to say something about keeping our conversations private but she shook her head. “No matter what you discover. It’s better that way.”
I nodded, turned, and stumbled the rest of the way out.
The light outside was as gloomy as the bleakness inside, and the clouds were bunched as black and tight as my mood. Rain slapped my windshield, making good the sky’s promise. Wind gusts smacked the side of the car. I thought about heading home, but decided on thoroughness instead. If I found Rudnow it wouldn’t take long to get what I wanted; I was in no mood for play.
I found a street that looked like it went somewhere and followed it straight downtown. Or what passed for downtown. Small rundown hardware, sundries stores, and convenience markets lined both sides of the street. Toward the end of the road a faded green sign marked the municipal parking lot before the wharf. The weather had emptied the streets, but I had doubts whether the sun would have made much difference. From where I parked the car you could see the harbor that lost the bet. The desolation reminded me of the billboard just outside Seattle during the early Seventies: WILL THE LAST ONE TO LEAVE PLEASE TURN OUT THE LIGHTS. Mrs. Starring hadn’t lied; around here the lights had been out a long time.
I saw Warren’s Tavern about a half block back, so I pulled my jacket around me and trotted through the escalating rain and wind to the door. As dark as it was outside it still took a couple of moments for my eyes to adjust, though I could smell the universal stench of every working class bar: alcohol, bad breath, traces of urine, and the clammy sweat of forbidden lust and barely controlled violence. Ammonia and urinal deodorant just added to the mix.
By the smell of it Warren didn’t use much ammonia.
I walked over to the bartender. About a half a dozen men sat around the large oval bar with enough distance between them to make hollering a must. No one seemed inclined to raise his voice. They showed none of the reputed smalltown curiosity when a stranger walked into their midst. No one even bothered to look up.
I leaned over the bar and tried to catch the bartender’s attention. He saw me but didn’t seem too impressed. When he finally arrived I ordered a Miller and gulped at it to dilute the ghost of a forlorn Mrs. Starring alone at her table braced for her husband’s appearance. I put the glass down and signaled again. This time the man looked annoyed as he lumbered over. I thought the neatly folded ten-spot under the glass might lift his mood.
“I’m looking for Toby Rudnow.” I expected some negotiation, but all he did was take the money and nod toward the booths in the back. I saw only one head so I grabbed my bottle and headed that way. I passed the booth, swung around, then slid onto the bench across from a praying mantis wearing a peacoat. His long skinny face was covered with the remains of a lost war with acne. His hands had a slight tremor as he grabbed his drink in surprise.
“What is this? Who are you?” He started to pull his slouched body upright.
“Stay still.” The menace in my voice froze him. “I know who you are and I know you sell dope. I don’t want to know who you sell it to, or who you buy it from. I only want to know what you sell.�
��
A cunning smile crept across his ugly face. “Fuck you. Buy your shit somewhere else.”
I grabbed his hand and twisted it onto the table. “I wasn’t clear, I guess. You are going to tell me what you sell.”
I dug my fingers into the cartilage and twisted a little more. Seeing his tiny close-set eyes still trying to figure an angle, despite the pain, enraged me. I had to bite my own lip to keep from breaking his wrist. I leaned forward and, with my free hand, opened my jacket and showed him my gun.
“We can talk now where I probably won’t shoot you, or we can talk later where I probably will. There’s nothing in the middle, moonface.”
The tears brought on by my grip wiped the defiance off his face. He was back to looking like who he was: an overage grifter who’d probably never been out of Perth Amboy. I let go of his hand. He pulled it and the rest of his body way back into the corner of the booth. Maybe he thought he was out of reach.
“Who are you?” he asked plaintively.
“None of your fucking business. Now, what do you sell?”
“I don’t sell anything. Someone was bullshitting you.”
“Have it your way.” I hooked my leg around his and yanked. Caught by surprise, he slid lower in the booth. His head was only a couple inches higher than the table and I reached over, grabbed his hair, and cracked his chin hard on the solid wood table top. For a moment he was too astonished to respond but I could see him getting ready to yelp so, as much as it disgusted me, I leaned forward and covered his bleeding mouth with my other hand. I stayed like that until he began to choke on his blood. I let go of his hair and put a finger to my lips. He nodded and looked frightened enough for me to believe him. I let go of his mouth and while he gasped for air, I poured beer over my hand and wiped it on his coat.
“Now, asshole, right now. What did you and Starring sell?”
He blanched whiter than he already was when he heard Starring’s name. He stopped breathing heavily and pulled a dirty handkerchief out of his pants, wiping at the blood. I regretted using his coat to wipe my hand. I started to get ready to hit him again when he finally got wise and slumped in his seat.
The Complete Matt Jacob Series Page 25
