Loren D. Estleman - Amos Walker 18 - Nicotine Kiss

by Loren D. Estleman

  I groped at my chest, realized I was in my shirtsleeves, picked up the shovel again, and used it to lever myself up out of the grave. I felt the chill again now, like clammy chain mail against my slick skin, and put on my suit coat before I went into the inside breast pocket and unfolded the church circular I’d taken from Starzek’s supply inside the house trailer. I looked from the face in the picture to the dead face in the ground, with the edges of the tarp framing it like a monk’s hood. That seemed appropriate. I was 90 percent sure they were the same. I knew more than I should have about what happens to a human face when the muscles that operate it stop working.

  It had the petrified look of something that had been in the earth for ages. I’d spoken to the owner only a little more than twenty-four hours ago. Or someone who’d said he was Paul Starzek over the telephone.

  “Police! Drop the shovel and put your hands on top of your head!”

  I jumped, the circular fluttering out of my hand. I hadn’t heard the cruiser coasting to a stop behind Starzek’s pickup or the two deputies approaching on foot on either side of the truck. Both had their pistols thrust toward me in the two-handed clasp, their feet spread and four yards separating them, a firing perimeter. I let the shovel fall with a clank and put my hands where they said.

  ELEVEN

  The command officer was a sheriff’s sergeant named Finlander. He had clay-red hair chopped off straight across his forehead in little-boy bangs, but his face was ancient, pleated longitudinally from brow to jowl like vertical blinds. His eyes were glittering black slits, his nose broad and flat, his mouth a parenthesis turned on its side with the corners curved down and just enough lip to prevent fraying. His uniform shirt was ironed as flat as posterboard. Finns are Huns by ancestry. Give this one a fur hat and a tough little monkey of a steppe pony and he looked as if he could sack Rome on twenty dollars a day.

  The substation was a brick box no larger than a caretaker’s shed in a cemetery and bore evidence of having been used as a community library sometime in the past. The musty perfume of disintegrating paper was still apparent and the remaining shelves held a complete run of red-bound copies of the Michigan Penal Code up to 1974, a four-drawer steel index-card file box filled with juvenile offenders, and a couple of hundred yards of loosely coiled yellow extension cord. That left just room for Sergeant Finlander and me to sit on either side of a gray sheet-metal desk with a scarred composition top and for Walrus Whiskers to stand. The deputy’s name was Yardley, for the record. The spare tire pressing at his belt of torture tools was as hard as the rest of him.

  “You should smile when they take your picture. I’ve seen happier faces in maximum security.” Finlander had my ID folder in his hands. My wallet and its contents, car keys, cigarettes and matchbook, Paul Starzek’s church circular, and my cane decorated the desktop, the cane across the corner nearest the sergeant and farthest from me. Yardley and his partner had found the gun in my car, but it was nowhere in sight. My carry permit lay open-faced among the money and receipts from my wallet.

  “That’s my game face,” I said. “It cracks peepholes and destroys alibis.”

  “Let’s process him, Sarge,” Yardley said. “He had the shovel in his hands, for chrissake.”

  Finlander fixed his slits on me. “Unlawful disposal of a corpse is a misdemeanor punishable by jail time. Then there’s breaking and entering; we’ve got the bolt cutters and the busted lock. I haven’t mentioned suspicion of homicide, but only because we don’t know yet what killed Starzek. Have you visited our fine modern facility?”

  “It’s an empty spot in my collection,” I said. “I think you know I didn’t kill Starzek or bury him. I came prepared to cut off the lock, but someone already took care of that. We’ve been over it.”

  “Go again.”

  I sighed and went again: the job Oral Canon had hired me for, Homeland Security’s interest in the person of Agent Herbert Clemson, my first visit to Paul Starzek’s house, and the second one that had landed me where I was. I’d told him about Grayling because he’d asked about the cane, but left Jeff Starzek out of that part, also both Canons and what Rose had told me about her real relationship with Jeff. I didn’t mention I’d broken into Paul’s house on my first visit. I said I’d found the circular in the pole barn.

  “You’re sure it was Starzek you talked to on the phone?” Finlander had listened as closely as he had all the other times, and let the same length of silence stand while he turned the details over in his mind, or seemed to; he might have been thinking about what Mrs. Finlander was making for supper, if there was a Mrs. Finlander. There wasn’t a personal photo, family or otherwise, anywhere in the little room. It was just as much a monk’s cell as Paul Starzek’s house trailer, without the religious gimcrack.

  “I’m not sure at all,” I said. “I never spoke to him before in my life.”

  “So this is just a job to you. Your past association with his brother doesn’t figure in.”

  “I know Jeff only a little bit better than I knew Paul.”

  “Blood’s blood, but money’s money. If you didn’t kill him—which I’m not considering—I’ll bet you whatever you’re making on this job it was baby brother. There was a shitload of cigarettes in that church before it got moved out. Money to burn, you might say.”

  “You don’t know it was cigarettes. If it was, they were overequipped for the cargo. Cigarette cartons are mostly air. A stack the size of what was taken out of that barn wouldn’t weigh more than a crate of oranges. A station wagon would’ve done the job.”

  “You’re going by floor space, from the clear spot in the dust. Those cartons might have been stacked to the rafters. Unless you know different.” His slits narrowed to seams.

  “I saw it through the window before. I told you that.”

  “I forgot.” He squeaked his chair twice, rocking. “Someone tampered with a back window of the trailer. I don’t guess you noticed that, Mr. Big City Detective.”

  I decided to get mad. It was the only thing I hadn’t tried short of diving out a window. “Your hick-sheriff gag needs work. You don’t have the accent. If you can’t rig it so I broke into the church—and you can’t—and you can’t rig it so I broke into the house—and you can’t—how can you tag me for murder?”

  Squeak. Squeak. “People say liars can’t look you in the eye. I figure they’ve never been lied to by a professional.”

  “I guess that’s still an insult up here. Let’s not fight.” I shifted positions to put out the fire in my thigh. “You’ve only got cigarettes on the brain because of Jeff Starzek’s record and crooks don’t usually change their lay. But experienced smugglers don’t kill each other over a six-month supply of butts. Whatever came out of that church was a lot more compact and a hell of a lot more valuable pound for pound.”

  “Such as what?”

  “Such as that’s your headache. I was hired to find Starzek, not break up Murder, Incorporated.”

  Deputy Yardley smacked his lips and redistributed his weight from one foot to the other. There’s one in every department. It was too bad for him the place didn’t have a basement. That’s where they keep the rubber hoses.

  Finlander stopped rocking. “Who’s paying your freight?”

  “That’s confidential.”

  “Is it a lawyer?”

  I said nothing. Hoping he’d run with it.

  He didn’t. “If you’re not a lawyer, or representing one, you can’t suppress so much as a fart without obstructing justice in a criminal investigation. Not under the law. And you sure don’t look like a priest.”

  “I’ve already told you a lot more than Deputy Yardley’s partner said I have to.”

  “Keppler’s studying for the bar. He’s got a fine clear voice. Put his bracelets back on,” he told Yardley. “You’re in luck, Walker. You get to fill out your jail collection.”

  Walrus Whiskers stepped forward, jingling his manacles. I’d had them on before, but this time I’d feel them every time I sh
ot my cuffs for a month.

  “Do I get a telephone call up here?”

  Finlander raised a hand, stopping Yardley in midcharge. “Lawyer?”

  “Client. I need to clear it before I give up the name.”

  He was less imposing when he stood. He had short legs and they bowed slightly. It wasn’t a comfort. The lower the center of gravity, the harder they are to tip over.

  “Use line two,” he said. “Line one goes directly to headquarters in Port Huron. Let’s step out, Deputy.”

  “We going to just leave him here alone?”

  “That window looks in just as well as out.” The sergeant picked up my cane and looked down at me. “I’d stay in the chair. If you get up, you may need two of these.”

  He left by the only door, carrying the cane like a baton. Yardley jingled out after him. There was a window in the door and he filled it with his big fish-eating face. He would spend his weekends on the ice, bullying the bass out of the water.

  I punched the second button on a black conference telephone the size of a window planter and dialed the Canons’ home number. While it rang I fiddled with some of my effects on the desk, steering clear of the cigarettes and matches; Yardley might have thought I was getting set to torch the place. I stroked one of the small bills I’d broken out of one of Canon’s C-notes. It had a velvety texture you can’t duplicate no matter how much you pay for paper stock. That was where Honest Abe got his smug expression. I hadn’t said anything to Finlander about last night’s comedy with the state trooper, but only because I’d forgotten all about it. In the cold light of a cold day, counterfeiting seemed a long way to reach. Jeff was a small-time smuggler when all was said and done, working just a little less hard than the average stiff for the same blue-collar wages. His brave new cargo was probably stolen pantyhose.

  “Hello?” Rose Canon’s husky voice. No baby crying in the background today.

  “Walker here. Talk to your husband?” I snapped away the five-spot, picked up my keys, and counted them. There was one I’d been carrying so long I forgot what lock it opened. I didn’t want to throw it away in case I came across the lock. That was the investigating business all over.

  “Yes. He knew someone had been smoking in the house the minute he walked in. When he started asking questions, the speech I had ready went right out of my head. I—made a clumsy job of it.”

  She sounded on the edge of hysteria. I talked her off the ledge, or tried to. “Speeches don’t work. The truth sounds better when you shake it straight off the tree. What did he say?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Nothing?” I laid down the keys and unfolded the circular Paul Starzek had had printed to advertise the Church of the Freshwater Sea. I couldn’t keep my hands still.

  “He sat in the same chair you did all the time I talked, staring at the floor and crackling his knuckles. I’ve asked him not to do that; it’s like chewing tinfoil. Then he got up and went out.

  “I thought he was coming right back,” she went on. “He left the door open, something he never does. He says he isn’t paying Michcon to heat the whole neighborhood. When I heard the car start I went to the door to call him back, but he was already gone. That was two hours ago, Mr. Walker. I think he’s left me.”

  “It’s never that clean.” I drew a deep breath. “The ball took a nasty hop, Mrs. Canon. Someone killed Jeff’s brother and buried him next to his church. The police want to talk to Jeff.”

  Air stirred on the other end.

  “Jeff’s no killer,” she said. “He certainly wouldn’t kill his own brother.”

  “We don’t know yet what kind of brother he was.”

  I was barely listening to myself. I’d been smoothing the circular flat on the desk, idly pressing out the creases with my thumbs. Now I picked it up and rubbed one corner between my fingertips.

  “Mr. Walker?”

  She’d been talking, but for me it had been just so much buzzing on the wire. I apologized and asked her to repeat what she’d said.

  “I asked if you were quitting. I need you to find Jeff now more than ever. He’s all I have except little Jeffie.”

  “That’s the job. It doesn’t change until I find him or you fire me. Maybe not even then.”

  “Did you tell the police about me?”

  “Not yet. That’s why I called.”

  “What will they do to you if you don’t?”

  “That doesn’t have to be your problem. I can tie my shoes and I’m pretty good at staying out of jail. I get plenty of practice.”

  “I just don’t think I could face the police. Not until I know if Oral’s coming back.”

  “Chances are he’s out looking for me. I have one of those faces guys want to push in when they feel like pushing in a face. That doesn’t have to be your problem either. I push back.”

  “You won’t hurt him.”

  “I’ll try not to. And thanks for the compliment.”

  I said good-bye, but I didn’t hang up. That would be Deputy Yardley’s cue to enter. After an empty silence, the dial tone kicked in. I nodded a couple of times as if I were listening and fiddled again with the five-dollar bill, rubbing it between my fingers the way I had Paul Starzek’s circular. I put it back where I’d found it and cradled the receiver. Three seconds later the room was full of law, bringing the cold in with it.

  Sergeant Finlander made himself comfortable behind the desk. Snow dusted his shoulders, but he didn’t brush it off. The flakes, finer now, blinked as they melted into his uniform shirt, like fairy lights going out. “What’s the verdict?”

  “I couldn’t reach my client.”

  “Horseshit,” Yardley said. “You were talking to somebody.”

  “I had to leave a message with someone. They’ll call back.”

  Finlander said, “I’ll be sure and put them through to headquarters. You might have noticed we don’t have any holding facilities here. We could lock you in the can, but then we’d have to go over to the White Castle to pee.”

  “I’m not worth that kind of trouble. Yardley saw me pull into Paul Starzek’s place. There wasn’t time for me to kill Starzek and put him in that hole. He was frozen as hard as cinder block.”

  “You could have killed him anytime and stashed him in the church, then come back to clean up.” The sergeant played with a corner of the circular. I watched his hand like a dog. I couldn’t help it.

  I was holding my breath. I let it out. “I may have a lead. There’s someone else I need to discuss it with.”

  “You had your call. You may think murder’s instant overtime up here in Hooterville, but it’s just one more thing on the blotter. We got vacation cabin breakins, domestic shit, a meth lab we’ve had our eye on six weeks. You’ve used up our discretionary time.”

  “You can listen in. Or you can make the call yourself.”

  Yardley said horseshit again and took out his cuffs. He stood straining at the leash.

  Finlander rested his hand on the circular. His face looked like a woodcut. “Who am I calling?”

  I put one finger on a card he’d taken from my wallet and slid it across the desk. It had Herbert Clemson’s name and number on it in raised glittering black letters.

  TWELVE

  Treasury paper.” Clemson stroked both top corners of Paul Starzek’s circular between the balls of his thumb and forefinger. “When you said you had two words for me I was afraid they were ‘Fuck you.’ ”

  “I wouldn’t have brought you up here for that,” I said. “I didn’t think you’d want me to be specific with the local cops listening in.”

  Sergeant Finlander had caught him on his cell, half an hour west of Ann Arbor on his way to the FBI field office in Chicago. He’d been intrigued enough to turn back without pressing for details. I knew then the thing was no coincidence. The case was too important to discuss any way but in person.

  We were sitting away from customer traffic in a White Castle, the one whose bathroom the deputies and command officer used wh
en the one in the substation was occupied. I’d suggested it because I was hungry. Clemson had agreed because the late-afternoon rush hour was in full cry and most of the diners were lined up at the drive-in window and on foot at the counter for takeout; the sit-down crowd wouldn’t start gathering for another couple of hours. We had a table without neighbors by a window overlooking a four-lane highway that never went empty, and whenever an employee wandered by to wipe off a table or sweep under a chair, Clemson stared at him until he went away.

  “Better give me a bill, just to make sure.” The agent let go of one corner to snap his fingers.

  I munched on a greaseburger. “Use one of your own. I paid my taxes already.”

  He clicked his tongue against his teeth and got out a wallet made from the same pigskin as his badge and ID folder. There were at least two more John Doe warrants folded inside it, separated from the bills by a suede partition. He’d used one of them to remove me from county custody. Finlander had taken his signature on a sheaf of forms as thick as National Geographic and let me go without a squawk. Deputy Yardley had chewed off the ends of his walrus moustache and gnashed most of the way through his second set of teeth.

  Clemson selected a crisp ten-spot, rubbed it and the circular simultaneously using both hands. He turned his back to the room, shielding himself while he held first one, then the other, then both side by side up to the light coming through the window. It gleamed red through his curly hair and made a shadow in the deep cleft in his chin. He hadn’t stood any closer to his razor today than yesterday. I’d probably been on stakeout somewhere when that became a fashion statement.

  “Watermark’s genuine, and at a glance I’d say the thread count checks. The Bureau pays someone else to count them.” He put away the bill and the wallet and looked at the circular, as if reading it for the first time. “We get anonymous tips about these shirt-tail churches every day. We try to check them all out. Most of the time, one of them built its porch too close to someone’s property line, or some career atheist is afraid his kid will catch a dose of piety. It was the name Starzek that got us interested in this one. Some of these Christian organizations are blinds to funnel donations to Islamist causes.”