Pigeon Blood

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN: What I Need Is a Drink

  Blair remembered waking up from time to time, but they must’ve had him on something sweet, because he kept drifting off without warning. He knew he was in a hospital because the sheets were clean, and the smell of antiseptic was strong. Besides, Horace had told him so one of the times when he was awake enough to understand him. In the back of his mind, Blair worried about not having the money to pay the hospital or the doctors, but most of the time he was too doped up to care.

  Whenever Blair tried to roll over, his ribs hurt like hell; he figured Corinne must’ve busted them up pretty good. There was also a pain in his left shoulder, and it was bandaged up along with his ribs. His head was bandaged, too, but he could remember times when it had felt a lot worse after consuming a bottle or two of gin. The IV needles were very restricting, so thank God he only had to have them in for the first day or so. At mealtime he ate heartily, but he was starting to miss alcohol like crazy. It was only a matter of time before he got sicker because of it.

  Horace was a real sweetheart. He stayed by Blair’s side as often as he could, and the head nurse who worked the graveyard shift was nice enough to bend the rules and let him sleep in the chair by the bed. She understood that Horace didn’t have a place to go home to, and it mattered to her. Someone who cared. Now that was a rare animal to find anywhere.

  Johnny DeMario and his wife dropped by a few times to see how Blair was faring. Johnny was easy to recognize, since the strong smell of tomatoes always preceded him. Blair could even remember seeing Detective Connery’s concerned face peering at him once, but Blair was too sedated to hold an intelligent conversation with the man. As much as Connery wanted to close his cases, he didn’t push Blair and that was a very decent thing for him to do.

  On the third day of his stay, Blair opened his eyes and stared up at the ceiling. Sweating profusely even though the room was air conditioned, Blair’s mouth and throat felt cottony dry and tight. Without thinking, he said, “Horace, would you get me some water?”

  Blair got the water he’d asked for, but he was happy to see that Vanessa was the one holding the cup. Smiling at her, he accepted the straw and drank the cup empty.

  “Would you like some more?” she asked.

  “No. Thanks.” He stared at her. “It’s so good to see you. I’m glad you stopped by.” He raised his hands for emphasis. “You should’ve awakened me.”

  “But you were sleeping so peacefully.”

  “How long have you been here?” he asked.

  “Three hours.”

  “Three hours…?” He looked around. “Where’s Horace?”

  “He left to smoke a cigarette.”

  Blair nodded. “You know what happened to me, right?”

  “Yes,” she said, “Horace told me. You’ve got three broken ribs, a muscle tear in your left shoulder, and a cut on your head. Seven stitches.”

  “That Corinne’s a tough woman. I never did ask what she hit me with.”

  “A fireplace poker,” Horace said, coming into the room, “and about twenty years of hostility. Ain’t no fury like a woman that’s done been scorned.” He smiled. “How ya doin’, buddy?”

  “I’m good, except that my hands are shaking and my stomach is churning. I need a drink.”

  Vanessa sat down on the edge of the bed. “The doctors asked me to talk to you about that, Blair,” she said. “They wanted me to ask you to check yourself into a rehab clinic.”

  “No offense, but they recruited Horace to work me over on the idea, too. It didn’t work for him, either. I don’t need rehabilitation, Vanessa. What I need is a drink, preferably gin.”

  “You need professional help, Blair.”

  “Is Horace putting you up to this?”

  “Bein’ drunk almost got you kilt,” Horace said. “That woman wouldn’ta been able to do half what she done to you if you’da been in your right mind.”

  “Look who’s talking! The whiskey king! Go to hell, Horace. And while you’re there, pick me up a six-pack.”

  “We tryin’ to help you out.”

  “If the advice comes without a keg of beer or a snifter of brandy, I’m not interested in it.”

  The raised voices attracted the attention of an orderly, and he peeked inside the room on his way past.

  “Listen to me, Blair,” Vanessa said, leaning over him. “I know you’re hurting right now. And you know as well as we do that you need help.”

  “The only help I need is in finding an empty bar stool and a Visa card that isn’t maxed out yet. Believe me when I tell you, a drink is the only thing that will get rid of the cramps and the headaches. Pure thoughts and polite conversation isn’t going to do it.”

  “What you need is a trained staff who knows how to handle people who are addicted to chemical substances,” Vanessa said. “You can’t stop drinking on your own.”

  “Maybe I don’t want to.”

  “I think you do. People care about you. We all do.” She hesitated, glancing over at Horace. “I care about you.”

  “Oh, really? If you really cared, you’d get me an eighty-proof bottle of anything!”

  “Do you know why you’re in one of the finest hospitals in this city? You’re here because Calvin Maxwell is paying for everything.”

  “He should pay! His crazy ass wife was the one who put me in here!”

  Blair tried to get up, reaching out and knocking things over as he did. The pain in his left shoulder prevented him from getting very far. Pounding on the bed in an effort to lower the side so that he could get away from Vanessa, he drew the attention of a nurse standing close by. She sent three orderlies into the room with restraints. Blair tried to kick the guy who was trying to tie up his legs, but the fellow was crafty and managed to get the job done anyway. He’d probably had lots of practice with other bozos like Blair.

  Even after he was tied, Blair was convinced that he could pull free. Tugging so hard against the straps, it felt as if the blood vessels in his wrists and ankles were tearing. When all else failed, he started thrashing around and yelling as loud as he could. He used up so much energy to accomplish absolutely nothing that he urinated on himself. Embarrassed to the point of almost wanting to die, he turned away from Vanessa and refused to look at her again.

  “Get her out of here! I mean it, Horace!”

  Vanessa did leave on her own, and afterward Blair wept for what seemed like forever.

  Soiling himself like a baby in front of a woman who meant a lot to him had been an all-time low in his life. Talk about ultimate awakenings. The doctor on duty came in and sedated him, but when he woke up the next day, he begged the first person he saw for some help.

  While talking to a hospital counselor about the detox programs available in the area, Blair spotted Detective Connery standing in the doorway. When Connery heard what was going on, he nodded his head with approval.

  “I’m happy to hear that you’re going on the wagon, Blair,” he said, coming in as the counselor left and then taking a seat beside the bed.

  “Don’t get too close. I bite.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  “Have you been talking to Horace again?”

  “Yes, I have. But do you know what? That guy only tells me what he wants me to hear. No more, no less. He’s a very loyal friend to you, Blair.”

  “I know it.” When Connery didn’t say anything else right away, Blair felt compelled to add, “So, what’s up?”

  “Are you still going to testify against Latrice?”

  “Of course.” Blair shook his head. “I can’t believe the son of a bitch is still alive.”

  “And now there’s Jeremy Driscall suspected in Vinnie Moorland’s murder. Calvin Maxwell has agreed to testify against him.”

  “And I’ll testify against him, too. This is one witness who’ll be there on judgment day. You can count on it.”

  “Good,” Connery said. “Corinne Maxwell was the one who assaulted you.”

  “Yeah, and I’ll be
there to see that she gets hers, too. Believe me.”

  “Mrs. Maxwell has hired a couple of high-powered attorneys, Blair. She might beat the rap.”

  “Well, I’ll do everything I can to see to it that she doesn’t.”

  Connery scratched the back of his neck, frowning a little. “It might not be up to you and me.”

  “Man, you see a lot of them get away, don’t you?”

  “Even one is one too many,” he said. “What do you know about Mercedes Whent’s death?”

  Blair shook his head. “That’s one I can’t help you with. I’m sorry.”

  “Any hunches?”

  “Yes. Either Driscall or Corinne Maxwell killed her. My guess is, Mercedes wanted a bigger piece of the action.”

  “What action?”

  Blair gave Connery his best stumped look. “Damned if I know,” he said.

  “Miss Whent had been the one who saw you fleeing from the Maxwell-Massey murder scene. She practically swore that you were involved in some way.”

  “It figures,” Blair said. “She never did like me. I guess she hated me because I was a reminder of how low a person can go. Looking at me was like looking into a mirror, I guess.”

  “A man named Gonzales killed Detective Mikel Smith.”

  It was hard for Blair to care one way or the other about Smith. “That’ll save the taxpayers a bundle trying to keep Smith fed in prison,” he said.

  “I’ll pretend I didn’t hear you say that,” Connery said. “Officer Follen is being investigated.”

  “Well, he should be. He’s on the take as sure as I’m lying here.”

  Connery didn’t say anything more about that.

  “Did you ever figure out how Kevin’s rock pick got back in his apartment?”

  “Detective Smith put it there, I’m sure of it. Based on what I’ve been hearing from Latrice, I think Smith made the improper assumption that Latrice had taken Kevin’s pick from the apartment after he’d ransacked it. Truth is, Cynthia had been carrying it to protect herself.”

  “One thing confuses me,” Blair said. “How did they manage to get in and out of the apartment without breaking in?”

  “They had a key.”

  “Where’d they get it?”

  “Latrice took it from Cynthia’s key chain after he’d killed her. She had a duplicate key to her brother’s apartment. The authorities, with the exception of Detective Smith, didn’t even know that Cynthia and Kevin knew one another. We all thought Kevin just happened by at the wrong time.”

  “So did I.”

  “Latrice had killed Kevin over two hours after he’d killed Cynthia.”

  The news surprised Blair. “No kidding. From my recollection, it felt as if one had been murdered right after the other.”

  “I can’t tell you what you did during those two hours in the alley, Blair, but it’s a fact that there was a considerable time lapse between the first murder and the second.”

  “Man, oh man,” Blair said, shaking his head. “That’s so weird. I must’ve been huddling there for two hours!”

  “I figure the sound of Kevin’s being murdered brought you back to your senses again.”

  “Man!” Blair declared, shaking his head once more. “Even after everything that had happened to me that night, I still can’t believe it!”

  “All the more reason for you to give up drinking for good.”

  “You’ve got that right.”

  “One thing puzzles me, Blair.”

  “What’s that?”

  “How did you get your hands on the bugging and recording devices you used?”

  “Well, when I entered Kevin’s apartment, I found some rubies and sapphires in the bottom of his fish tank. I sold them to a jeweler for about a thousand bucks. I used Kevin’s money to buy the stuff I needed to bust the woman who set him up.” He shrugged. “I figured that was the least I could do for the boy. Kevin’s family can have the equipment. I don’t want it.”

  “I thought you told me you didn’t find anything in Kevin’s apartment.”

  Blair smiled as if it were no big deal. “Finding that stuff just slipped my mind.”

  “Is that right?”

  “Yes. Excuse me, Detective, but staying alive was occupying most of my thoughts at the time. I was convinced that Cynthia and I were both going to end up on slabs downtown with matching toe tags.”

  “What jeweler did you sell them to?”

  “Bailey’s on Kentworth Avenue.”

  “I’ll want to see stubs and receipts of the transaction.”

  “You’ve got it.”

  “Jeremy Driscall and Quentin Latrice have been going on and on about some mysterious, multimillion dollar ruby crystals which haven’t surfaced yet. Calvin Maxwell mentioned them, too. Latrice and Driscall claim that you have the rubies and that you took them from Kevin’s apartment.”

  “Those fools have been hallucinating more than I have. They’re in trouble and they want to take me down right along with them. They did it once before, so why not?”

  “Even you had told me that you felt gems might have been involved.”

  “Well, I still feel that way, only I haven’t seen any. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.”

  A nurse excused herself as she came into the room and put a padded envelope down on Blair’s table. Detective Connery leaned over and read the return address.

  “It’s from Calvin Maxwell,” he said. “I wonder what’s inside?”

  “Yeah. Me, too.” There was no way Blair was opening that package until Connery was long gone. Connery understood that, too.

  “Are you absolutely certain that you didn’t find anything in Kevin’s apartment that you might like to tell me about?”

  Blair stared at Connery for a long moment, trying to decide whether to be straight with him or not. After all, the corundum wasn’t Kevin’s, and the rubies didn’t belong to Calvin, Cynthia, Latrice, or Driscall, either. They had been Vinnie Moorland’s, but he died five years ago. No one else had ever seen the crystals besides those who were either dead or in trouble with the law, with Horace and Blair being the only exceptions. So what was the point of mentioning them now?

  “I didn’t find anything else,” Blair told him.

  Detective Connery nodded and wrote that down in his notebook. Obviously he didn’t believe Blair for a second, but how could the man argue about something which the rest of the world didn’t even know existed?

  “Whatever you say,” Connery said. He stood up and then stretched out his hand. Blair didn’t hesitate to shake it. “As far as I’m concerned, these cases are closed.” Connery turned and headed for the door.

  “Detective?” Blair said, and so Connery paused. “What’s your first name?”

  He smiled. “Reinhold, although I prefer Rein. You know, like a misting rain.”

  “Hey, I won’t call you detective if you won’t call me doctor.”

  “Sounds good to me. You take care now.”

  “You, too.”

  Blair looked after him thoughtfully until Horace came back into the room. It was then he remembered the package Cal Maxwell had sent over. “Close the door, will you Horace?” He did.

  Picking up the envelope, Blair ripped it open. Out dropped an oval cabochon star ruby with a note. “Mother Mary, Jesus, and Joseph,” Horace said, covering as many religious divinities as he could list in a single breath.

  Blair held up the one-inch stone and observed the effect of the inclusions in the gem, the delicate, minute needles of titanium oxide miraculously reflecting the ceiling light in a vibrant, six-point design. Hexagonal patterns could easily be seen in the crystalline structure, typical of natural star corundum. The semi-transparent ruby was of good color and the asteric effect was imperfect; the star was slightly wavy, a little blurry, and incomplete in a couple of the rays emanating from the center of the stone. But for a bauble only worth about thirty-five grand, it looked pretty damned good.

  “Dear Blair,” the note said. ??
?This is Vinnie Moorland’s star. It and the other pieces cost me a son, a daughter, and now, I’m told, a wife. I don’t want it. It belongs with one of Vinnie’s friends, someone who loves and values the earth and its riches just as much as he did.”

  And it was signed, “Cal.”