City Primeval

  Cruz, Cruz, Cruz . . . no Raymond Cruz, which he didn't expect to find anyway, but there was an M. Cruz the kind of initial-only listing women thought would prevent dirty phone calls and Clement bet twenty cents, dialing the number, that M. Cruz was Raymond Cruz's former wife.

  MCMU called Raymond Cruz. Sandy Stanton was back, crossing the street toward 1300 Lafayette with a bag of groceries. Alone. A 1st Precinct squad car got him over there, up the circular drive to the entrance, in less than four minutes. Sandy was in the lobby, pulling Del Weems' credit-card bills out of the mailbox, when Raymond walked in.

  Well, hi there. Sandy gave him a nice smile.

  Raymond smiled too, appreciating her, close to believing she was glad to see him.

  What brings you around, may I ask? Del isn't back yet, if you're looking for him.

  Raymond said, No, I'm looking for you, Sandy. And she said, oh, losing some of her sparkle. They went up to 2504. Raymond walked over to the skyline view while Sandy ran to the bathroom. She was in there a long time. It was quiet. Raymond listened, wondering if she was flushing something down the toilet. She came out wearing her satin running shorts, a white T-shirt with a portrait on it, barefoot, saying she had to get out of those tight designer jeans. Saying she wished uncomfortable outfits weren't so fashionable, but what were you supposed to do? You had to keep up. Like with cowboy boots now. Back home she'd worked at a riding stable at Spring Mills State Park and wore cowboy boots all the time, never dreaming they'd be the fashion one day and you'd even wear 'em to shopping centers . . . Sandy talking fast to keep Raymond from talking and maybe he'd forget why he came. It did give him time to identify the portrait on her T-shirt and read the words SAVE BERT PARKS.

  She hesitated too long and he said, Where's Clement?

  Well, so much for the world of fashion, Sandy said. I don't know where he is.

  You drop him off someplace?

  You think I'm dumb or something? I'm not gonna tell you a thing. If I didn't have a kind heart, I wouldn't even be talking to you . . . You want a drink?

  Raymond was ready to say no, but paused and said sure and went with her into the kitchen that was like a narrow passageway between the front hall and the dining-L. She asked him if Scotch was all right. He said fine and watched her get out the ice and pour the Chivas. Sandy opened a can of Vernor's 1-Cal ginger ale for herself. She said, Ouuuuuu, it sure tickles your nose, but I like it. You can't buy it most other places but here.

  Raymond said, You have any grass?

  Boy Sandy said. You never know anymore who's into what.

  You have trouble getting it?

  What do you want, my source?

  No, a guy in the prosecutor's office I know has a pretty good source. I was thinking maybe I could help you out, I mean if Mr. Sweety isn't coming through.

  Man oh man, Sandy said. I think I better go sit down. You're scary, you know it?

  Looks like Mr. Sweety's in some trouble.

  Jesus, who isn't?

  Have to be careful who you associate with.

  That is the truth, Sandy said. I think I might be running around with the wrong crowd. Let's go in the other room; I feel cornered in here.

  I just wanted to ask you something, Raymond said. See, we're gonna be talking to Mr. Sweety. He was supposed to be working the night the judge was killed. Maybe he was. But we do know you have something going with him Sandy said, Have something going?

  You went to his house yesterday

  To get some dope. You already said you know he's a source I use. You just said so.

  Yeah, but why would Clement send you over there?

  He didn't. He didn't even know I went. Sandy paused. Wait a sec, you're confusing me. I did go over there yesterday to score some grass. Period. It's got nothing to do with anything else.

  Clement let you use the car?

  It isn't his car, it's Del Weems'.

  I know, but I wondered why he'd let you go there.

  He didn't know I went. I already told you that.

  Twice, Raymond thought. He believed her because he wanted to, because it was reasonable. He didn't like to come onto facts that appeared unreasonable and have to change his course.

  He liked it that she was upset and he kept going now. I mean considering everything, Raymond said. Here we've got a car that was identified at a murder scene, Del's Buick . . .

  Sandy rolled her eyes little girl standing there in her satin running shorts, nipples poking out at Bert Parks on her T-shirt. Skinny little thing he felt sorry for her too.

  What's the matter? Raymond asked.

  Oh, nothing . . . Jesus.

  We don't have Clement in the car yet, but we know Clement did both the judge and the girl, Adele Simpson.

  Now it's starting to snow, Sandy said, and we're hardly into October.

  Ask him, Raymond said. But here's the thing. Would Clement like to know you were over there in the car, the Buick, seeing a man who used to work with him and could be a suspect in Guy's murder? You understand what I'm saying?

  Do I understand? Are you kidding?

  So it isn't so much Clement doesn't know you went over there, Raymond said. You don't want him to know.

  If you say so.

  Why don't you want him to know, Sandy?

  He don't like it when I smoke too much grass.

  Like when you get nervous or upset?

  Yeah, usually.

  Well, the way things're going, Sandy, Raymond said, I think you better hit on a couple pounds of good Colombian.

  Chapter 15

  CLEMENT HAD NEVER ICE-SKATED, but he could see the Palmer Park lagoon would be a good place. It wasn't a big open rink, like most. It was a pond, several acres in size, with wooded islands in it to skate around. A good place to dump the Ruger when he was finished with it. He parked by the refreshment pavilion and cut through the woods along Merrill Plaisance Drive to where he had hidden the rifle in some bushes a few minutes before.

  It was almost six o'clock; getting dark in a hurry. He picked up the rifle and moved up to the edge of the trees where he could look directly across Merrill Plaisance, across the narrow island separating the drive from the residential street and the front of the four-story, L-shaped apartment building that was 913 Covington, the home of Lt. Raymond chicken-fat Cruz with the sad mustache and the quiet way about him, which could be politeness or just empty-headed dumbness.

  Clement had said to the woman's voice on the phone, the cop's former wife, What's Ray's address again? I lost it . . . And the apartment number? . . . Oh, that's right on the first floor, huh? Then had got the id of the building manager off her mailbox and called her saying this was Sgt. Hunter: they were planning a surprise party for Lt. Cruz; the guys were gonna drop in and then, when he wasn't looking, reach out the window and haul in this present as a surprise, a stereo outfit, and he wanted to know which window to put it outside of. The landlady said in this neighborhood they better put a policeman with it or they would be the ones surprised when they reached out to get it.

  There were three windows: one with an air-conditioning unit, one with a plant, one with raised venetian blinds, close to the sidewalk on Covington.

  Ten past six.

  The landlady had said he was usually home by six-thirty the latest, unless he didn't come home. Her apartment was next to his and if she was in the kitchen she'd hear his door slam and then sometimes she'd hear him playing music . . . Didn't he already have a victrola? . . . A little cheap one, Clement told her, which was probably the truth.

  Look for a medium-blue four-door Plymouth. Clement had heard cops didn't use their own cars on the job because no one would insure them.

  Twenty after. There was a last trace of red in the sky. The front of the building was without definition now, a few lights showing in apartments. Clement practice-sighted on Raymond Cruz's dark windows. Range, about fifty yards. But a tough shot with the cars going by in front of him, on the park drive.

  Maybe this Raymond Cruz di
d use his own car. Or lieutenants got a different color than that shitty medium blue. Clement didn't worry about odds or luck. Something happened or it didn't. The man would come home or he wouldn't. If not tonight, tomorrow. Clement didn't plan on waiting around forever; but a little patience was good and more often than not got rewarded.

  That's why Clement wasn't too surprised or especially elated when he saw the light go on in Raymond Cruz's apartment. Sooner or later it was supposed to. Clement put the Ruger against a tree and lined up his sights on the figure moving inside the apartment, Clement waiting for a lull in the traffic . . .

  Raymond had come into the apartment building from the alley, walked through to the foyer and got his mail: Newsweek, a visa bill, a bank statement, a thick window-envelope from Oral Roberts, Tulsa, Oklahoma, addressed to Mr. M. Cruz, and a folded piece of notepaper.

  In his apartment Raymond dropped the mail on the coffeetable, went into the kitchen with Newsweek and got a can of Strohs out of the refrigerator. He drank from the can as he glanced through the magazine on the counter, learning that beer was now discovered to cause cancer along with everything else. In the living room again he sat down at the end of the couch by the floor lamp he'd bought at Goodwill Industries. He picked up the mail from the coffeetable, threw back the bill from visa and the bank statement, laid the Oral Roberts envelope on his lap and opened the piece of notepaper that was folded three times. The typewritten message said:

  SURPRISE CHICKEN FAT!!!

  Raymond would replay the scene, what happened next, and at first believe the guy was right outside because the timing was that good . . . sitting there looking at the typed words, wondering . . .

  And the front window and the lamp exploded, the glass shattering and he was in darkness, instinctively rolling off the couch, catching a knee on the coffeetable, trying to yank the snub-nosed .38 out of his waistband that was tight on his hip, crawling toward the window now, the flat sound of reports reaching him, erupting through fragments of glass, thudding into the wall, six, seven shots he got his legs under him, turned and ran for the door . . . down the hall, out the front entrance. Cars were going by on the park drive, headlights on, making faint humming sounds. He crossed Covington to the island, kept going, heard a car horn and brakes squeal and he was into the trees, in darkness, with no sense of purpose or direction now, no sounds except for the cars going past on the park drive.

  In the apartment again he picked up the phone, began to punch buttons. He stopped, replaced the receiver. If Sandy was home with the Buick, what was Clement driving? Could it have been someone else? No. He sat in semidarkness, a light showing in the open doorway to the hall.

  Raymond picked up the phone again and punched a number.

  Mary Alice, I just want to ask you a question, okay? . . . No, I don't have time to get into that. Somebody called and you gave him my address. Did the guy have kind of a southern accent? . . . I know you didn't know who it was. Mary Alice, that's why you're not supposed to give out . . . No, you just tell them you don't know. Last night, did a lady call? . . .

  Jesus Christ, Raymond said. He put the phone, in both of his hands, in his lap and could hear her talking. He saw streetlight reflections in the jagged pieces of windowpane. Raising the phone again he heard her pause and said, quickly, Mary Alice? Nice talking to you.

  He called Squad Seven. Maureen answered and he asked her to look in his book and give him Carolyn Wilder's phone number. Maureen came back and said, Six-four-five . . .

  And Raymond said, No, that's her office. Give me her home number. And the address. He got out his pen and wrote on the back of the Oral Roberts envelope as Maureen dictated. Maureen said, Why would she have an office in Birmingham if she lives on the east side?

  Raymond said, You want me to I'll ask her. But I got a few other questions first.

  He dialed Carolyn Wilder's home number. Following the first ring her voice came on. Yes?

  You were waiting for me to call, Raymond said.

  Who is this?

  He told her and said, I'd like to talk to the Oklahoma Wildman, but I don't know where he is.

  He isn't here.

  It stopped Raymond. I didn't expect him to be.

  There was a pause. He was here, Carolyn Wilder said. He left a few minutes ago.

  Raymond said, Carolyn, don't move. You just stepped in a deep pile of something.

  Chapter 16

  CAROLYN WILDER'S HOME on Van Dyke Place, off Jefferson, had been built in 1912 along the formal lines of a Paris townhouse. During the 1920s and 'y30s it had changed from residence to speakeasy to restaurant and was serving a limited but selective menu for the most part to Grosse Pointe residents who knew about the place and were willing to reserve one of ten tables a week in advance when Carolyn Wilder bought it as an investment, hired a decorator and, in the midst of restoring a past splendor, decided to move in and make it her home.

  Standing in the front hall, facing the rose-carpeted stairway that turned twice on its way to the second-floor hall, Raymond said, It looks familiar.

  The young black woman didn't say anything. She stood with arms folded in an off-white housedress, letting him look around, the lamplight from side fixtures reflecting on mirrored walls and giving a yellow cast to the massive chandelier that hung above them.

  You look familiar too, Raymond said. You're not Angela Davis.

  No, I'm not.

  You're . . . Marcie Coleman. About two years ago?

  Two years in January.

  And Mrs. Wilder defended you.

  That's right.

  We offered you, I believe, manslaughter and you turned it down. Stood trial for first degree.

  That's right.

  I'll tell you something. I'm glad you got off.

  Thank you.

  How long ago was Clement Mansell here?

  There was a pause, silence. Ms. Wilder's waiting for you upstairs.

  I was just telling Marcie, Raymond said, your house seems familiar, the downstairs part. Though not this room with its look of a century later, plexiglass tables, strange shapes and colors on the wall, small areas softly illuminated by track lighting. You do these?

  Some of them.

  The room was like a dim gallery. He was sure that most of the paintings, not just some, were hers. What's this one?

  Whatever you want it to be.

  Were you mad when you painted it?

  Carolyn Wilder stared at him with a look that was curious but guarded.

  Why?

  I don't know. I get the feeling you were upset.

  I think I was when I started.

  She sat in a bamboo chair with deep cushions of some dark silky material, a wall of books next to her, Carolyn half in, half out of a dimmed beam of light. She had not asked him to sit down; she had not offered him a drink, though a cordial glass of clear liquid sat on the glass table close to her chair and a tea-table bar of whiskeys and liqueurs stood only a few feet from Raymond.

  Marcie married again?

  She's thinking about it.

  I bet the guy's giving it some serious thought too. She live here?

  Downstairs. She has rooms. Most of it's closed off though.

  He turned from the abstract painting over the fireplace to look at her: legs crossed in a brown caftan some kind of loose cover her feet hidden by a hassock that matched the chair.

  Are you somebody else when you're home?

  I'm not sure I know what you mean.

  You go out much?

  When I want to.

  I have a hard question coming up.

  Why don't you ask it?

  Are you working at being a mystery woman?

  Is that the question?

  No. He paused.

  He was aware that he had no trouble talking to her, saying whatever came to mind without wondering what her reaction would be or even caring. He felt a small hook of irritation, standing before the woman in shadow, but the irritation was all right because he could control
it. He didn't want to rush the reason he was here. He would hit her with it in time; but first he wanted to jab a little. She intrigued him. Or she challenged him. One or the other, or both.

  He said, Do you still paint?

  Not really. Once in a while.

  You switch from fine art to law . . . On impulse?

  I suppose, Carolyn said. But it wasn't that difficult.

  You were divorced first is that where the impulse comes in? The way the divorce was handled?

  She continued to stare at him, but with something more in her eyes, creeping in now, something more than ordinary interest. She said, You don't seem old enough to be a lieutenant; unless you have an M. B. A . and you're somewhere in administration. But you're homicide.

  I'm older than you are, Raymond said. He walked toward her chair, moved the hassock with his foot and sat down on it, somewhat half-turned from her but with their legs almost touching. She seemed to draw back against the cushion as he made the move, but he wasn't sure. He could see her face clearly now, her eyes staring, expectant.

  I'm almost a year older. You want to know what my sign is? She didn't answer. He picked up the cordial glass and raised it to his face. What is it?

  Aquavit. Help yourself . . . but it's not very cold.

  He took a sip, put the glass down. You watched this lawyer handle your divorce, thinking, I can do better than that . . . Huh?

  He agreed to their settlement offer, Carolyn said, practically everything, let my husband have the house, a place in Harbor Springs, charged ten thousand and billed me for half.

  Raymond said, And treated you like a little kid who wouldn't understand anything even if he explained it.

  Her eyes held. You know the feeling?

  I know lawyers, Raymond said. I'm in court about twice a week.

  He was so condescending he was oily. I couldn't get through to him.

  You could've fired him.

  I was different then. But at least it turned me around. I actually made up my mind to get a law degree listen to this and specialize in divorce and represent poor, defenseless, cast-off wives.