“You got that Olds ready?” It was the fat manager, standing in the open bay door.
“Just about,” said Stewart, who had balanced and rotated the tires and was now tightening the lugs.
“The blue-hair’s waiting.”
“Said I was near done.”
Stewart looked out the door. The manager was already waddling back to his office. Out by the pumps, Martini was talking to a big guy wearing a suit and hat, the gas line going into his old-man’s Dodge. The big guy had a sleepy set of eyes, and his hair was cut real short. You’d think he was military from the first glance. But Stewart had been around enough to know different. This guy was a cop.
Stewart wasn’t surprised. Dominic Martini knew most of the cops in the neighborhood. It was like a game he played, knowing their names. He’d been hanging around precinct houses, watching them, since he was a kid.
Dumb shit, thought Stewart. It was like he looked up to them. Imagine, looking up to a cop.
Soon after, a squad car drove into the lot with two uniforms, colored and a white guy, in the front seat. The driver, the white guy, pulled up near the plainclothesman’s Dodge.
Stewart said, “What the fuck.”
FRANK VAUGHN LIKED to get out of his car and stretch while the young man at the Esso station gassed up his car. This one had been working here on and off for many years.
On his shirt, the name Dom was stitched onto a patch. There was a long period there when this Dom had been gone. Vaughn guessed he had done an active tour. He had the look of someone the government would snatch. He sure wasn’t college-deferment material, and he was no rich man’s son. Probably a high school dropout to boot. But plenty big enough to be a soldier. When Vaughn used to come here years earlier, the kid was full of piss and vinegar. Knew Vaughn was a cop and was a smart-ass about it, too. Now it looked like all that attitude had drained right out of his eyes.
“Don’t fill it all the way,” said Vaughn, who was admiring a shiny, tricked-out Plymouth Belvedere parked alongside the garage. “Leave some room for the tiger.”
“Huh?”
“Your sign says ‘Put a tiger in your tank.’”
“Oh, yeah,” said Dom, like he didn’t get the joke. More likely, he heard the same crack ten times a day.
A squad car pulled into the lot. Vaughn knew the occupants. Peters, the Ivy Leaguer, and the colored rookie, Derek Strange. The white knight and his black partner, crisp as a newly minted bill, part of the new look of the MPD. To Vaughn, it seemed like more of a publicity stunt than anything practical. Peters was a high-profile uniform who sometimes got his picture in the papers. Put him next to a colored guy, a good-looking one who could speak in full sentences, to make some sort of point. This is the face of your future po-lice officer.
Vaughn felt that the MPD was hiring black cops too quickly, with little regard for their qualifications. In theory, it was a good idea to have coloreds policing colored citizens. But Vaughn was not sure that he or the department was ready for the change. Like everything else rushing by him these past few years, it seemed to be happening too fast.
This young man was all right, though. Hell, he was Alethea’s son, so that wasn’t any kind of surprise.
The Ford stopped on the other side of the pump and idled. Derek Strange was on the passenger side, his arm resting on the lip of the open window.
“Detective Vaughn,” said Strange.
“How you fellas doin’ today?” said Vaughn.
“We’re about off shift.”
“And here I am, just gettin’ on. You need somethin’?”
“Just sayin’ hello. You looked kinda lonely, standing out here.”
“Thanks for your concern.”
The pump jockey turned and had a glance at Strange. Their eyes locked for a moment, and then the jockey looked away.
Strange recognized him. Martini, the teenager from Billy’s neighborhood who he’d hung with a couple of times back when they were boys. A JD-lookin’ kid, on the mean side, had a little brother who was kind, which this one probably mistook for weak. They were all together that day when Strange had been popped at Ida’s for trying to boost a padlock, nine years back.
Strange didn’t acknowledge Martini. He didn’t look like he wanted him to. Looked like he’d fallen some off that high horse of his. Strange let him be. Strange’s father had always told him, Don’t be kickin’ a man when he’s down. Ain’t no good reason for it, he’d said. Wrong as it was, though, Strange had to admit it felt good, wearing his clean uniform, looking at Martini, grease all over his.
“Your mother all right?” said Vaughn.
“She’s fine,” said Strange with a tone of finality. It was plain to Vaughn that Strange was asking him to say no more.
“All right, then,” said Vaughn. “You fellas keep your eyes open out there.”
“Have a good one, Detective,” said Peters, who then put the Ford in gear and drove out of the lot.
Martini replaced the pump handle in its holster. “That’ll be five.”
“Here,” said Vaughn, handing over the bill.
Vaughn walked over to the beautiful red Plymouth parked beside the garage. He studied the car. The owner had named it Bernadette, most likely for his girl. Well, thought Vaughn, young men do stupid things when it comes to young women. Vaughn himself had a tattoo on his shoulder that read “Olga,” the word on a banner flowing across a heart. She had been his girlfriend when he’d had the tattoo done one drunken night in a parlor overseas, twenty-four years earlier. After he gotten it, he’d gone into a whorehouse next door and spent the rest of his leave money on a skinny little girl who called him Fwank, had a shaved snatch, and liked to laugh.
Vaughn walked to the open bay door of the garage. A mechanic, farm-boy big, was lowering an Olds to the cement floor.
“That your Belvedere out here?” said Vaughn.
“Yeah,” said Stewart, not even bothering to look at Vaughn. He was breathing through his mouth as he worked. Vaughn put him in his late twenties. A greaser, not too bright, whose time had already passed him by.
“Nice sled,” said Vaughn.
“Somethin’ wrong?”
“It just caught my eye. I’m a Mopar man myself.”
“Huh,” said Stewart. It was more of a grunt than a response.
Friendly type, thought Vaughn. Okay, then, fuck you, too.
He walked back to his own car, a ’67 Polara with cat-eye taillights. It only held a 318 under the hood, not much horse for the weight. Everything on it was stock, straight off the lot at Laurel Dodge. Nothing like the young man’s Plymouth, a head-turner and a genuine rocket. But the Polara was plenty sporty for a man who was watching fifty coming up in the rearview mirror. It was a pretty car.
Vaughn lit a cigarette as he drove out of the Esso lot and headed for the station. Sunday was a good shift. Not too much happening, usually. Maybe he’d have a free hour. Enough time to visit his girl.
COMING OUT OF the Esso, Strange and Peters responded to a call, a domestic dispute down on Ogelthorpe. Peters told the dispatcher that they’d take it and got them on their way.
“We parked here?” said Strange.
“There ain’t no hurry, rook.”
“You’re drivin’ the limit.”
Peters checked the speedometer. “So I am.”
Peters knew that domestics usually worked themselves out before the police arrived. Cops who had been around for a while weren’t in any hurry to jump into a conflict between a man and a woman, not if they didn’t have to.
“Detective Hound Dog,” said Peters, giving the Ford a little extra gas as he hit the hill on 14th. “He knows your mother?”
“From work,” said Strange.
“I guess Vaughn gets those choppers of his cleaned real regular.”
“I guess he does,” said Strange.
Strange had told Peters early on that his mother worked reception in a dental office. He was instantly ashamed of himself for doing so and wondered
why he had. Now he had to keep up the lie.
“You got plans tonight?” said Peters.
“Gonna catch an early show down at the Tivoli. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.”
“You’ve seen it twice already.”
“Guess I’ll make it three times. Anyway, my girl hasn’t seen it yet.”
“Woman’s gonna be a girlfriend to you, I guess she has to like westerns, too.”
“She likes that good thing, she gonna have to learn.”
“Quit braggin’.”
“No brag, just fact.”
Peters cut right on Ogelthorpe and slowed the cruiser. “They been playing the theme song from that movie all over the radio, you know?”
“Hugo Montenegro?” said Strange. “That’s the bullshit version right there.”
They pulled up along the curb, near the house number that had been radioed in to them. A man and a woman, both dressed in church clothes, were embracing on the front porch. The man kissed the woman on her cheek and then kissed her mouth.
“Now he gonna patch things up,” said Peters.
“He’s working on it,” said Strange.
“Why I wasn’t rushing,” said Peters. “Let’s just sit here for a minute, okay?”
“Give him a chance to tell her he learned.”
BUZZ STEWART WALKED out to the pumps. Dominic Martini had just finished pouring eight gallons into a gold Riviera. He keyed the reset meter as the Buick left the lot.
“What was up with that?” said Stewart.
“Nothin’.”
“Nothin’, hell. Who were the uniforms?”
“Just cops.”
“I mean, do you know ’em?”
“I seen ’em around.”
“Shit, you don’t get it, do you?” Stewart rubbed at his jaw. “You in or no?”
“In,” said Martini.
“Then act like it. You can’t be runnin’ your mouth to the police and be with me, too. Understand?”
“I wasn’t . . . I didn’t say shit.”
“Good. Shorty and me are gonna meet up tonight. You comin’?”
“Said I was in.”
“Be over at my place ’round eight.”
Martini watched Stewart cross the lot and disappear into the dark of the garage.
TEN
ALVIN JONES SAT in his favorite chair, a Kool burning between the fingers of his right hand, a bourbon over ice in his left. He had the sports page open in his lap and was squinting as he labored to read the type. His vision was fine, but the whiskey had got to his eyes.
Paper said the Senators had beat the Pirates, five to three, in an exhibition, which made ten straight wins over National League teams. But he wasn’t interested in who beat who. Jones was looking at the game’s box score so that he could choose the number he was going to play come Monday.
The way Jones had been doing it lately, he’d find his favorite player from the opposing team and make note of his position, then his stats from that particular game. Today he was studying on Willie Stargell. Stargell played first base, that was a 1. He had gone two for four, that was 2 and 4. Put it all together and you got 124. That was the number Jones would play.
But hadn’t he played that number last week? He had, and it had been cold. Shit, he wasn’t gonna make that mistake again. He went to the Nats box and tried the same thing. He didn’t really have any favorites from Washington, though. Del Unser, he was all right but nothing special. Epstein on bag one, okay, sounded like a Jewboy name, so he wasn’t gonna go with him, and then you had Ken McMullen at third. Nah, uh-uh, he didn’t like the way slim looked with that Adam’s apple bobbin’ around in his neck. Casanova, Valentine . . . Frank Howard. Might as well go with farm boy; motherfucker could blow the cover right off the ball while he was sending it into the D.C. Stadium bleachers. But Howard played left. How could you make a number out of left field?
Jones dragged down some menthol and had a sip of his bourbon whiskey. Cheap shit, 86 proof, had the Clark’s label on it, the store’s own brand. He bought the five-year-old stuff instead of the six, unless he was drinking with a woman. Not Lula, a fresh woman. Cheap or no, it did the job and fucked with his head. Said it came from Kentucky, so how bad could it be? He drained the glass, sucked on some ice, and spit the cubes back.
“Lula!” he shouted over a Sam and Dave coming from the component stereo across the room. Unit had everything, even FM. But Jones kept the receiver on AM, where the soul stations were at. He had the dial set on WOOK.
She probably couldn’t hear him, back in her bedroom, fuckin’ with that kid. Between the music playing and that baby boy of hers, she was out of earshot for sure. Sometimes he wondered how he got himself into this situation right here. Thirty-one years old and he still hadn’t learned. He didn’t even like kids, and here he was, listening to one bawling day and night. Recently, he’d left another woman because of her child. Once she’d had it, she’d focused her attention on the boy and begun to ignore him. He couldn’t have that, but now he was stuck in the same kind of setup. At least this bitch here was getting a steady check. That alone was enough to make him stay.
Jones got up and turned the volume down on the box. He’d had Lula buy it, after a little convincing. Took her down to the Dalmo store on 12th and F, asked the salesman to write it up. The salesman chuckled when Jones called it an “Admirable.” How was he supposed to know the brand was Admiral? Way it was printed in the newspaper ad, it looked like Admirable to him.
“Lula!” he shouted.
“What?”
“Bring me a drink!”
That wasn’t all they bought that day. Picked out an RCA Victor twenty-inch diagonal color TV with Wireless Wizard remote control, too. Jones told Lula to fill out the credit forms for both items and sign her name to the whole thing.
Before she did, she took him aside. “Alvin, you know I don’t have that kind of money.”
“All you got to do,” said Jones, “is put down the deposit. You ain’t have to make any more payments, you don’t want to.”
“They just gonna repossess it.”
“If they want it that bad, they will. Meantime, we got sounds and a color TV.”
“What about my credit?”
“You never can fuck up your credit all the way. Always gonna be somebody lookin’ to give you credit.”
“You sure, Alvin?”
“How I buy everything.”
The way he figured it, if he was gonna move into the bitch’s apartment and listen to her baby cry, then he deserved to have nice things.
This place wasn’t bad, not for what Lula paid. Two bedrooms, if you counted that little one in the back, had no closet, where the baby slept. Wasn’t his money paying for it, anyway, so he didn’t care how much it was. He didn’t work, not a sucker’s job, anyway. Neither did Lula, for that matter. Her government checks paid for everything. Which meant he had to hide or be out when the welfare man came around. Inconvenient is what it was, but the price was right, and it was better than being out on the street.
Jones sat back down, took the last drag off his smoke, and crushed it into the ashtray that rested on the cushioned arm of his chair.
He was gonna need some money soon, though. You couldn’t live off a woman all the time. Man had to look like something when was walking down the street. Have a roll in his pocket if he was gonna talk to a woman in a club and offer to buy her a drink. Cash for things like cigarettes, liquor, and gage. He had his eye on an El D he’d seen at this dealer’s lot, too.
So he was gonna have to get up off his ass and do some work. He’d done a bus robbery recently, one late night over on Kenilworth Avenue in Northeast. Stepped onto a D.C. Transit with one of Lula’s stockings over his face, showed the driver his .38, and took him for everything he had. Not much cash and too many tokens, but enough money to last him a few weeks. Those were the kinds of games he ran. One hustle, robbery, break-in, or purse snatch at a time. Once in a while something big to make the ride last. He’d
been studying on some small hotels on the white side of town, over on 16th. All those places had cash on hand, and safes. That’s what this boy of his said, anyway, and this boy knew a lot. Punk motherfuckers worked those front desks, too, so it wasn’t like there was much risk. And there was this corner market near Lula’s crib, settled their debts with the neighborhood regulars the first of every month. He and his cousin Kenneth had been thinkin’ on that place for some time.
He’d made mistakes. Done some jail time for small things, strong-arm robberies and the like. No prison time, though. And he hadn’t been caught for any of the homicides he’d done, grudge-type, passion-type, murder-for-hire shit, which could set you up for half a year. A couple of times he’d killed ’cause his blood had got up.
He thought about that last one. How he’d followed some cat out of a bar who’d said something smart to a woman Jones was with. How he’d taken a blade to this cat’s cheek in the alley behind a low-rise apartment building, one of those reurbanization projects, the fancy name the government gave to ghettos. Jones had cut him, and the man was bleeding through his fingers and had begun to beg: I ain’t mean nothin’, brother, and Please not today, Lord, all that. But Jones had already begun to feel that tick tick tick coursing through his veins, that thing that told him to kill. Jones stuck him right in his chest and twisted the blade before he withdrew it. Must have been the heart he hit, ’cause the blood was bright red and pumping out fast. There was a witness, a young dude, but Jones had fish-eyed the motherfucker as he walked away from the scene. He knew this dude would not come forward. Few in that neighborhood, especially if they were young, would talk to the police. Jones didn’t lose any sleep over it either way. He was thinking, Man shouldn’t have talked to my woman the way he did.
And then he started thinking, Where is that bitch with my drink?