A Long Line of Dead Men Read online

Page 15

 

  "Well, I can see where a fellow like you would need a trademark," I said. "Something to set you apart from the faceless masses. "

  "If we was on one of them video phones," he said, "you could see me rollin my eyes. "

  "Im sorry to miss that. You want to meet me? I might have some work. "

  "Say where and when. " I named a coffee shop on Twenty-third Street half a block from the Flatiron Building. "Lets shoot for a quarter to twelve," I said, "but I might be a few minutes late. "

  "Not me," he said. "We meetin in a restaurant, Im gonna be there on time. "

  * * *

  "The client," Wally said, "turned out to be a cheap fuck. "

  "Not unheard of. "

  "Christ, no. The world is full of cheap fucks. How it went, I told him what a job you did, how you ought to be down for a bonus. I said we as an agency didnt expect anything over and above our standard fees, which we dont, but that when a guy working per diem comes through like you did he ought to see something extra for his troubles.

  "So he asked me what was reasonable. You know what went through my mind? The old expression, a picture is worth a thousand words. So okay, figure a buck a word, and I said a thousand dollars struck me as a reasonable amount. Which it did. "

  "Thanks, Wally. "

  "Well, it wasnt coming out of my pocket, so I could afford the gesture. And whats a thousand dollars to this fuck anyway, five hours of his lawyers time? If that. So heres his check. Five hundred dollars. "

  "Did he say he thought a thousand was too high?"

  "He didnt say shit. He just went and cut a check for half of the recommended figure. Oh, and heres the letter of commendation, thanks for your efforts on our behalf, et cetera, et cetera. Look it over, see if its all right. "

  I scanned a glowing testimonial on the clients letterhead. "This is great," I said.

  "Hes got a pretty nice prose style, wouldnt you say?"

  "You wrote it?"

  "Dictated it," he said. "How else are you going to get this sort of thing the way you want it? At least the son of a bitch wrote it down word for word. He could have figured words are money and kept half of them for himself. " He shook his head. "You know, I think he was just going to give me half of whatever I said. If I asked for two grand Id have got one, and if Id asked for five hundred Id have got two and a half. I thought about sending this back to him, telling him to pay the whole shot or forget it. Ill still do that if you say so. "

  I shook my head. "The fives fine. Let it go. "

  "Anyway," he said, "it evens out. I got those credit reports for you, fourteen of them, and our company rate as Class B subscribers is thirty-five bucks a pop. Which totals out at four-ninety. "

  "Suppose I give you the check back," I said, "and we call it a wash. "

  He shook his head. "You dont want to do that, kiddo. Keep the check and take the reports and sustain yourself with the knowledge that being a cheap fuck never pays. The reports arent costing you a cent, Matt. I billed them to the client. "

  "How did you manage that?"

  "We did a ton of shit on his behalf, and five hundred dollars worth of credit reports wont seem out of line to anybody. Hey, fuck him, you know? Whats he ask me my advice for if hes gonna take my figure and cut it in fucking half? You see what cheapness does, Matt? Its costing him the same thousand dollars and hes got us hating his guts. "

  "Not me," I said. "I love everybody. "

  I was a couple of minutes early for my lunch with TJ, but he was already seated at a window table, working on a pair of cheeseburgers and a plate of onion rings. I told him about Eldoniah Mims, doing twenty-to-life upstate.

  He said, "Sounds like he be in the right place, Ace. Killin folks for chump change, dude like that got no cause to be walkin around. " I explained that they might have hung one more killing on Mims than he had in fact committed.

  "He carrying any extra weight for it?"

  "No. "

  "So whats it matter?"

  The waitress came over and I ordered the spinach pie and a small Greek salad. When she moved off he said, "You spy the way she was scopin us out? Like she wondering what fool put you and me at the same table. Then she realize we together, so she got to figure out why. Runs all the numbers through her mind, like youre a john and Im a hustler, youre a cop and Im some lowlife youre bout to bust. "

  I was wearing pleated gray slacks and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and the collar unbuttoned. TJ wore a shiny rayon vest striped vertically in black and scarlet, and nothing but brown skin under it. His pants were knee-length baggy black shorts. "Im a cop on the take," I offered, "and youre a millionaire drug trafficker prepared to pay me off. "

  "You talkin," he said. "The Excaliburs parked at the curb, Herb. " He took a drink and wiped milk from his upper lip. "Say this Mims- whats his first name? El something. "

  "Eldoniah. "

  "Eldoniah. That from the Bible?"

  "I dont know. "

  " I swear I dont know how those people come up with those names. " Hes a good mimic, and the line came out in a fairly accurate version of Long Island Lockjaw. In his own voice- or one of his voices, anyway- he said, "You clear Mims for this one killing, he still doin the same twenty he doin now. "

  I told him I wasnt interested in clearing Mims, who was clearly where he belonged. My food came, and while I ate I explained about the club of thirty-one.

  He said, "Somebody be killing them. "

  "It looks that way. "

  "Who you figure doin it, one of them or some other dude?"

  "No way to tell. "

  "Have to be somebody with a reason, an it ought to be more of a reason than killing a cabdriver for his coin bank. " He finished his milk, wiped his mouth again. He said, "I been workin some for Elaine. Mostly mindin the store. "

  "She mentioned it. "

  "Kind of cool to watch people come in and take a look at me. Like they spect Ill grab something and go bookin on out the door, an then they catch on that Im in charge. "

  "There are black people running stores all over the city," I said. "The antique store two doors up the street from Elaine is run by a black woman. "

  "Yeah, an theres black receptionists in the big office buildings, and black folks at department-store information desks, all of em right out where you can see them. Thing is, they dont be lookin like they just got in off the Deuce. They dressed for success, Bess. "

  "Has Elaine said anything?"

  He shook his head. "She cool with it. But what I might do is keep some straight clothes on a hanger in her back room. "

  We talked about that some, and then he said, "I guess I could take a ride uptown, see what the brothers and sisters know about my uncle Eldoniah. Thing is, folks just be talkin different types of trash. Dudes on the street, all hell tell you is how bad he is, like he dusted six cops and robbed the Bank of England. Same dudes in prison, its always for something he didnt do. "

  "I know," I said. "The prisons are all overcrowded, and none of those guys ever did what they went away for. "

  "Ill go up to the Bronx, see if anybody knows anything. All this is four years ago, that what you said?"

  "Its been almost that long since Cloonan was killed. The murder Mims was tried for came later on, and the trial was postponed a couple of times. Hes only been working on his twenty for the past year and a half. "

  "Makes it a little easier," he said. "Least theres a chance somebodyll remember who he was. "

  I got the check. While I was leaving the tip he said, "I was just thinking. These dudes in the club? How its suspicious that half of ems dead after thirty years. Is that right, thirty years?"

  "More like thirty-two. "

  "Thirty-two years," he said. "You couldnt start a club like that on the Deuce. Never mind no thirty-two years. Fore you knew it, you wouldnt have nobody left to have a meeting with. The ones that wasnt dead themselves, they most likely be locked up for killin the other ones. " He took a black
Raiders cap from the back pocket of his shorts, tucked his hair into it, checked his reflection in the mirror. He said, "Group of dudes I knew four, five years ago, half of ems dead. Didnt take thirty-two years, neither. Dyin must be easy, when I think of all the dudes caught on real quick how to do it. "

  "Try to be a slow learner," I said.

  "Oh, I tryin," he said. "I doin the best I can. "

  11

  I treated myself to the afternoon, catching a movie on Twenty-third Street, then walking downtown to the Village. I passed the apartment building that had risen where Cunninghams had once stood, and the brownstone a block away where Carl Uhl had been murdered. I got down to Perry Street in time for the four oclock meeting and stood in the rear with a cup of coffee from the pastry shop around the corner.

  The speaker told what a friend alcohol had been, and how it had turned on him. "Toward the end," he said, "it just didnt work anymore. Nothing worked. Nothing relaxed me, not even seizures. "

  While I waited for a bus on Hudson Street, a florists display caught my eye. I had them wrap a dozen Dutch iris, rode the bus to Fifty-fourth, and walked over to Elaines shop.

  "These are beautiful," she said. "What brought this on?"

  "They were going to be diamonds," I said, "but the client got cheap about the bonus. "

  "What bonus?"

  "For the picture we took at Wallbangers. "

  "Oh, God," she said. "What a crazy evening that was. I wonder how many bars like that there are in the city, with grown men and women sticking themselves to the wall. "

  "I know one on Washington Street," I told her, "where they stick each other to the wall, but they dont use Velcro. "

  "What do they use, Krazy Glue?"

  "Manacles, leg irons. "

  "Oh, I think I know the place you mean. But didnt they have to close?"

  "They reopened again under another name. "

  "Is it boys only these days? Or is it still boys and girls?"

  "Boys and girls. Why?"

  "I dont know," she said. "One isnt obliged to participate, is one?"

  "One doesnt even have to walk in the door. "

  "I mean you can just observe, right?"

  "Why you ask, kemo sabe?"

  "I dont know. Maybe Im interested. "

  "Oh?"

  "Well, look how much fun we had at the Velcro Derby out in Queens. It might be even more of a hoot to watch people get kinky. "

  "Maybe. "

  "It would finally give me a chance to wear that leather outfit that I had no business buying. "

  "Ah, thats why you want to go," I said. "Its not sex at all, its to make a fashion statement. Youre right, though, its the perfect costume for the well-dressed dominatrix. But what would I wear?"

  "Knowing you, probably your gray glen-plaid suit. As a matter of fact youd look really hot in a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt. "