“What? You’re going to give me advice now? Jesus. Like I need advice from a guy like you.”
“You’re right. Go on, Vivian. Just go.”
Vivian got out of the car, slammed the door shut. “You know what it is? You’re old, that’s all. Tired and old.”
“I know,” said Karras, but she was already halfway across the street.
He watched her walk inside the front gate. The mother said something to her sharply in Chinese, and Vivian ridiculed her loudly as she walked by. Karras could only guess what the mother had said; walking through the garden toward the house in her paisley halter top and tight jeans, her lips painted red, Vivian looked somewhat like a fifteen-dollar whore.
As she walked on, the young man on the porch made a comment, and Vivian knocked the racing form from out of his hands. He smiled, then stopped smiling as he looked across the street at Karras, straight into his eyes. Karras had no doubt that the young man would cut him, and take pleasure in it, if he ever saw him come around again in his sporty little car. Karras put the Ghia in first and pulled away from the curb.
On the way back into town, Karras stopped at a rec center on University Boulevard and watched a pickup game being played between five young men. Karras asked if they needed a sixth man and was invited into the game. None of his shots fell, and he was used on D. By the end of the game his teammates had stopped passing him the ball. He walked back to his car with a slight limp, listening to the laughter of the players still on the court. He had turned his ankle, and his left eye throbbed where he had caught a hard ’bow from an eighteen-year-old kid.
TWENTY-ONE
Jimmy Castle heard the honk of the Firebird. He buttoned the imitation pearl snaps on his favorite shirt and slipped his feet into his wedge-heeled shoes, leaving his room and taking the stairs up to the foyer of the house.
Standing in the foyer, he could see his mother in her bedroom, doing her traction, sitting up straight in the chair with her headgear on and facing the door.
“You leavin’?” she said, without moving her head.
“Yeah, Ma.”
Dewey honked the horn again. Jimmy suddenly remembered where he had stashed his smokes the night before when his father had surprised him by coming downstairs. Jimmy had quickly tossed the cigs between the flour bin and the rice bin in the kitchen before his dad could see.
“You gonna be late?”
“No, Ma.”
Jimmy went into the kitchen, opened the cabinet over the wall oven, stood on his toes, and felt around for his softpack. He pulled the cigarettes out quickly, sending a wooden bin out to the floor with a dull crash.
“What the heck was that, Jimmy?”
“Nothin’! It’s all right!”
Some rice had spilled from the bin. Jimmy began to scoop it back in with his hand when he heard the horn again. Dewey had really landed on it this time. Jimmy left some grains of rice on the linoleum floor and slid the bin back in the cabinet. He slipped the pack of smokes behind his sock and headed toward the front door.
“Have fun, honey,” yelled his mother.
“I will.”
Jimmy looked back once more into the kitchen before opening the door. He saw the white rice on the rust-colored linoleum floor. He hesitated, thinking that he should go back and finish cleaning it up. His mom might come downstairs, slip on it, and reinjure her back. But he didn’t want to piss Dewey off.
He left the house and jogged down the walkway to where the Green Ghost sat idling in the street.
They stopped at Country Boy on Georgia Avenue in Wheaton and picked up a couple cold six-packs of Schlitz. Jimmy used his older brother’s draft card for ID, a formality for the old guy at the register, who had been selling beer to underage kids for years. Out in the Firebird, they tore the rings off three cans and got on their way. As soon as they hit the Beltway, Jerry fired up a joint. They smoked half of it down on the way to 95.
“You got the tickets, Jerry?” said Jimmy.
“Huh?” said Jerry. It was hard to hear Jimmy from the backseat; Dewey had BTO 2 cranked up pretty loud.
“The tickets, man.”
“The tickets?” Jerry faked a freak-out look, and Dewey laughed. Jimmy could tell that Jerry was just jacking him off. They had bought the tickets to the Rick Derringer concert at the Baltimore Civic Center a month back, and even though Jerry was kind of a burnout, he would never have left the tickets at home.
Jerry was lighting a match under the fat number again to give it another good seal. The windows were closed, making the smoke thick inside the car. It was hot, and sweat dripped down Jimmy’s back beneath his long-sleeved shirt. Jimmy leaned forward, put his head between the buckets.
“Who’s openin’ for Derringer, man?” said Jimmy.
“The ticket says ‘a Special Guest,’ ” said Jerry. “I bet it’s fuckin’ Edgar, man.”
“That would be bad,” said Jimmy, though he always got weird vibes now when he heard Edgar Winter. He had puked really bad one time listening to ‘Frankenstein’ after he and Jerry had smoked a bunch of green on top of a bottle of Strawberry Hill.
“You think Rick Derringer’s a queer?” said Dewey.
“Huh?” said Jerry.
“Check out the cover of All-American Boy. The guy’s wearin’ makeup and shit.”
Traffic on 95 was fairly heavy. Dewey accelerated, used the right lane to pass a green Pinto. He shot back across the middle lane and into the left, flooring the Firebird as he tilted his head back to drink the last of his beer.
“Dude,” said Jerry, smiling, his head moving back and forth to the BTO.
“Hey, slow down, man,” said Jimmy.
“Fuck you, Toothpick,” said Dewey. He tossed the empty Schlitz can over his shoulder to the backseat, reached into the paper bag beside him for another.
Jerry Baluzy relit the joint. He hit it hard and passed it over to Dewey. Dewey took a hit, held on to the weed while a thought came into his head. He hunched down low and got comfortable in his seat.
“King Suckerman was bad,” said Dewey. He had been thinking about the movie all morning and had put the depressing aspect of it out of his mind. “You know, it would be rough as shit to be a pimp.”
“Yeah,” agreed Jerry. “And if I was gonna be one, I’d be King Suckerman. ’Cause King Suckerman had all the bitches. The black bitches and the white bitches. Even had him a Chinese ho, too.”
“Gimme some of that, Dewey,” said Jimmy. He had noticed that the joint was getting pretty small.
Dewey turned his head, smiled at Jerry, held up the roach. His eyes were pink and dilated, and hair had fallen about his face.
“What, you want this, Toothpick? This thing’s about the size of your dick.”
Looking at Jerry, Dewey let his hand slip off the wheel. The Green Ghost went off the road with the gas pedal pinned to the floor. The Firebird crossed the grassy center island and landed in the path of an oncoming tractor-trailer.
Dewey Schmidt screamed like a girl while Jerry Baluzy coughed a spray of blood against the windshield, his heart exploding in his chest. Just before the eighteen-wheeler hit, Jimmy Castle pictured his mother, and rice scattered on a kitchen floor.
TWENTY-TWO
Rasheed Adamson’s viewing was held on Saturday night at the Jarvis Funeral Home on U Street. Dimitri Karras put a blue blazer on over a white shirt and yellow slacks. His only tie was a wide flower-patterned job in fluorescent colors. He skipped the tie and wore the long collar points of his shirt outside the blazer’s lapels.
Upon entering, Karras stood in the back of the room, nodding to anyone who made eye contact with him but otherwise keeping to himself. Marcus Clay, Elaine Taylor, and Cheek walked in and went straight to a middle-aged woman wearing black who had been the center of attention since Karras had arrived. Marcus gave her a kiss, hugged her, and held her hand. Karras supposed that this was Rasheed’s mother.
When Marcus and his party had moved away, Karras finally went forward and
gave his sympathies to Rasheed’s mother. She thanked him politely, though she seemed confused at his presence. He excused himself and stood by Rasheed’s closed casket, taking in the scent of the surrounding bouquets of orchids and other flowers. Karras said a short prayer, did his stavro, and kissed the casket.
He walked over to Marcus, who stood to the side talking to Rasheed’s brother, Al. Karras shook Marcus’s hand, then Al Adamson’s.
“Good of you to come, man,” said Adamson.
“My sympathies,” said Karras.
Adamson nodded. He wore a black suit with a black shirt and solid gray tie, a pearl-tipped tack holding the tie in place, and black alligator-skin shoes, shined to a high gloss. Adamson had a full beard and a shaved head. His shoulder muscles bunched to a thick neck. Karras could see the cut of Adamson’s arms and chest beneath the tailored suit.
“You get your mom out the city?” said Clay.
Karras nodded. A look passed between Adamson and Clay.
“Dimitri?” said Clay.
“Yeah?”
“You don’t mind, Al and me, we got a few things we need to discuss.”
“Okay.”
“Talk to you tomorrow, hear?”
Karras went to where Elaine stood, kissed her on the cheek. He left the funeral home and walked across U Street to his car.
“Saturday night,” said Eddie Marchetti. “Nothing on.”
“What’s that?” said Clarence Tate.
Tate stared out the window into the darkness. He could hear the faint thump of bass from the disco down the street.
“I was just sayin’ that Saturday is the worst night of the week for TV.” Marchetti looked sadly at the Sony across the room. On the screen, a toothy white guy in a blue uniform was smiling at something another toothy white guy had said. “Emergency. Christ.”
Tate walked across the room and turned off the set. He had a seat in front of Marchetti’s desk.
“Eddie, we need to talk.”
“About what?”
“About figuring out what to do about Wilton Cooper. About cutting our losses here. About getting rid of that inventory back there and closing up shop. I think it’s time to discuss it, don’t you?”
“Take care of it, Clarenze. That’s what I’m overpaying you for, right?” Marchetti smiled weakly.
Clarence Tate shook his head. It wouldn’t help to say anything else. Tate would have to figure everything out his own self. Eddie was just plain hopeless.
Marchetti stared at the Sony’s gray tube. “I wish it were Sunday, Clarenze. Kojak night.”
“Damn, Eddie—”
“What, you don’t like Kojak?”
“I like him all right.”
“Kojak knows how to dress.”
“Man’s got some bad vines,” admitted Tate. “I’ll give you that.”
“You got a favorite Kojak, Clarenze?”
“Not really.”
“I got a favorite.” Marchetti leaned forward.
Tate sighed. “Go ahead, Eddie.”
“Okay. There’s this Mafia guy, and he has a son, a real loser. For one reason or another the son puts a hit out on Kojak, kills someone else along the way. Now this Mafia guy, he and Kojak, they go way back, but because of the kid the don’s lost Kojak’s respect. The Mafia don, he tries to talk Kojak out of going after the kid. He makes the mistake of calling Kojak Theo—trying to hit a nerve, for old time’s sake and all that. The camera moves in on Savalas, who corrects the guy by saying, ‘It’s Lieutenant Kojak.’ Like, you don’t know me all that well anymore to be callin’ me Theo. Really powerful shit. Anyway, in the end Kojak guns the kid down in the street. Some lady comes by and says, ‘Who was that guy?’ meaning the kid. And Kojak says, ‘He was nobody, lady. Nobody at all.’ I’m tellin’ you, Clarenze, every time I see that one show, I get the chills.”
Marchetti’s eyes went somewhere else. He rubbed his jowls.
“You know, Clarenze, I never wanted no one to get hurt.”
“I know it, Eddie.”
“I only wanted to come down here and make a name for myself so I could go back up to Jersey with my head up. I was afraid that if I didn’t do something to show my family, I’d end up a nobody myself, y’know what I mean?”
Tate nodded, waited for Marchetti to go on. But Marchetti didn’t say anything else, and Tate stood out of his chair.
“Hey, where you goin’?”
“Home, to relieve my parents. Gonna put my little Denice to bed.”
“Clarenze—”
“Huh-uh, Eddie. I need to be there for her before she goes to sleep.”
Tate was halfway across town, driving east in his Monte Carlo, when a plan began to form in his head.
TWENTY-THREE
In all of Marcus Clay’s twenty-seven years, he had never seen so many Maryland and Virginia license plates on a Sunday morning in the District. As he drove his Riviera across town to church, it seemed that every suburban family and carload of college kids was headed into D.C. The Metrobuses were full, too, and people of all ages and colors were walking down the streets, carrying coolers and blankets folded under their arms. The big celebration had begun.
At the All Souls Baptist Church, the pews were all occupied, but as soon as the service ended the parishioners headed out quickly, eager to change into shorts and T-shirts and get their spots on the Mall or settle into the choicest picnic areas of Rock Creek.
Outside the church, Clay saw George Dozier head down the polished concrete steps to his ride, a brown Mercury Marquis, parked out front on the street.
“Hey, George!” called Clay.
Dozier stopped, turned around. “Marcus.”
Clay went down to where Dozier stood, his keys in his hand. “George, man, I been looking for you.”
“Here I am. But I’m kind of in a hurry. My mom put me in charge of the barbecue today.”
“Shoot, George, everyone’s in a hurry today. I need to talk to you, man, about Rasheed’s case. You told me—”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Look, George, I tell you what. We’re just a couple of blocks from U Street, right? How about I buy you lunch at Ben’s?”
Dozier thought it over. “I can’t spare more than fifteen, twenty minutes, Marcus. Don’t want to get Moms upset.”
“I won’t keep you, man. Let’s go.”
Clay knew that Dozier couldn’t resist a free lunch at Ben’s Chili Bowl. What kind of real Washingtonian could?
“So—pass me that hot sauce, George—the other night, you said you were working some undercover thing.”
“Yeah, that’s right.” George Dozier looked down the counter at Ben’s, packed with folks in church clothes and others who were casually dressed. “Been working on something right here in Shaw the last six months or so.”
Clay used a knife and fork to cut a portion out of his chili burger. Dozier had a couple of chili dogs on a plate in front of him. He picked one up and took a healthy bite.
“Mmm,” said Dozier.
“What kind of thing you got goin’ on?”
Dozier wiped his mouth. “Been runnin’ this citywide scam down on these thieves. Got a storefront operation set up on Twelfth, between U and V. Call it G and G Trucking Service. A bunch of us cops in plainclothes sit behind a long counter, take the walk-in trade. You wouldn’t believe it, man: Once the word got out on the street, everyone in this town who had stolen goods to sell started coming in to see us. They think we got a high-end fence operation going on. We tell ’em we work for some Jew, but the Jew, he’s out of town. All kinds come in: office burglars, home burglars, pickpockets sellin’ credit cards, stickup boys, junkies, you name it. Lot of ’em selling guns. Chief Cullinane says half of them’s recidivists—”
“Recidivists?”
“Repeat offenders, back on the street.”
“How you know that?”
“We got their names, numbers, addresses, all that. Been runnin’ this operation for the last six months. Nex
t week we’re gonna shut it down, go to their homes or where they’re stayin’, arrest them then.”
“Now wait a minute, George. How’d you get this cast of characters to give up their names and addresses to a bunch of plainclothes cops?”
Dozier was finishing up his first dog. He swallowed, then gave Clay a wide grin. Clay could picture the same exact smile on little George Dozier’s face back when the two of them were alley-running kids.
“Here’s the beauty of it, Marcus. We held a raffle.”
“A raffle?”
“Yeah. You believe that shit? Raffled off an El Dorado, man, and don’t you know that damn near every man walked in that joint filled out a card. Called it the GYA raffle.”
“What’s GYA stand for?”
“Got Ya Again. You remember back in February, when those white cops grew their hair kinda long, impersonated Mafia dons, ran a similar operation down? It was all over the papers and the TV, called it the Sting?”
“Sure, I remember.”
“Well, this here’s the same kind of thing. So we decided to use those initials: GYA, for Got Ya Again.”
“Funny so many would fall for it the second time around.”
“That’s what a lot of the brass in the department said, that it wouldn’t work. And there was that unspoken thing, since it was all brothers runnin’ this operation, that we wouldn’t have the brains or the wherewithal to pull it off. But we are pulling it off. Got over a million dollars in goods already recovered, Marcus.”
“Congratulations, George.”
“Yeah, I’m proud. Gonna be a boost for my career, and for a lot of other good brothers, too.”
Clay ate his burger and waited for Dozier to finish his second chili dog. Dozier used the rest of the bun to mop the fallen beans and sauce off the plate.
“George?”
“Yeah.”
“You hear anything on Rasheed?”
Dozier nodded shortly, looked down at his clean plate. “Heard plenty, Marcus.”
“You got friends in Homicide?”