George Pelecanos - Down By the River Where the Dead Men Go

“You know, Nick, we were really close on nailing Samuels, too. I’d say we were one day off. We were working our informants pretty good on the drug angle, man, and we were close. Once we knew he owned both warehouses, after that it was a cinch. But someone just got one step ahead of us. Goddamn, was Johnson pissed off about that. We did find the twenty-two that did Jeter and Lewis, and the man who used it. Guy out of South Baltimore, just like you said. But we’d still like to clean the rest of this thing up. ’Course, all’s we got to do now is find the gun that belongs to those casings.”

“There you go, Boyle. Find the gun and you’ll have the whole thing wrapped up.”

“The gun. The gun was a nine-millimeter, like that Browning you carry.” Boyle’s jittery eyes settled on mine. “You still carry that Browning, Nick?”

“No. I lost it. The thing is, I was just looking for it the other day, to clean it-”

“Yeah. You probably dropped it in the river or some shit like that, by mistake. Slipped right out of your hands. Funny, you know. If the city could get it together and put up the money to dredge the Anacostia, you wanna know how many cases we could put to bed?”

“Too bad they can’t get it together.”

“Yeah. Too bad.” Boyle closed his eyes and emptied his drink. “Well, I better get home. My kids and all that.”

“I’ll lock up behind you,” I said.

Boyle held on to the bar and got off his stool. I walked with him to the door. When we got there, he put his back against it and wrapped a meaty hand around my arm. He started to speak but had trouble putting the words together, closed his mouth in a frown.

“You’re drunk, Boyle. You want me to call a cab?”

“Uh-uh.”

“Go home to your kids.”

“My kids. Yeah, I got my kids.”

“Go on home.”

“You know somethin’?” Boyle said. “I feel sorry for you, Nick. I really do. You know… you remember a few years ago, there was this short-eyed motherfucker that was rapin’ those little girls in Northeast? Description on hicri for m was he was some variety of spic, a Rican maybe, with a bandanna, the whole brown rig. The shit was on the news every night, man-you gotta remember.”

“Yeah, I do. They never caught the guy. So what?”

“ I caught him,” Boyle said. “Me and this other cop. We got him in an alley, and he confessed.”

“Congratulations. Another good collar for you.”

“You didn’t read about him being caught ’cause we never took him in. I put a bullet in his head that night, Nick. The other cop, he put one in him, too.”

“Go home,” I said, pulling my arm away. “That’s liquor talk. Save that shit for your buddies at the FOP.”

“It’s just…” Boyle said. “It’s just that I know what’s in your head right now. The thing is, I got my kids to go home to. I can go home, I can hold them, and for a little while, anyway, it makes everything all right. I got that, Nick. What do you got?”

I didn’t answer. Instead, I opened the door.

“Don’t you want to know?” Boyle said.

“Okay,” I said. “Why hasn’t Johnson pulled me in?”

“Johnson?” Boyle said, a sad smile forming on his face. “Johnson’s been there, too, that’s why. Johnson was with me when we did that short-eyes. Johnson was the other cop.”

Boyle stepped through the open door. I closed it and turned the lock.

I walked back behind the stick and refilled my shot glass. The whiskey was silk; I drank it and smoked a cigarette in the quiet of the bar. The phone rang. I picked it up, the call a misdial. I stared at the receiver in my hand. When I heard the dial tone, I phoned Lyla’s apartment. A man’s voice greeted me on the other end.

“Is Lyla McCubbin in, please?” I said.

The man put his hand over the phone but did not cover it all the way. He said, “Hey, Lyla, this guy wants to know if he can speak to a Lyla McCubbin. Sounds like a salesman or something. Want me to just get rid of him?”

I heard Lyla laugh, recognized the laughter as forced. I hung the receiver in its cradle before she could reply.

I had another beer, and another after that. By then, it had gotten pretty late. I thought of my cat, out in the weather, hungry and pacing on the stoop. I dimmed the lights and put on a coat, then locked the place and set the alarm. I went out to the street.

Orange and yellow leaves lifted and tumbled down 8th. I turned my collar up against the wind, walked with my head down, my eyes on the sidewalk.

I passed the riot gate of the shoe store and neared the alley. From the alley, I heard a voice.

“Stevonus.”

I turned around.

“LaDuke,” I said.

He stood in the mouth of the alley, his face covered in shadow. But the black pant legs and heavy black oxfords were exposed by the light of the streetlamp above; I knew it was him.

I walked to the alley and stood a couple of feet back. The smell coming off him was minty, strongly medicinal.

“Got a cigarette, Nick?”

“You’re smoking now, huh?”

“Sure,” he said, a slight lisp to his voice. “Why not?”

I reached into my coat and shook one out of the deck. He took it and asked me for a light. I struck a match, cupped the flame. He put his hand around mine and pulled it toward him, leaning forward at the same time. I saw his face then as it moved into the light. He watched me carefully as the flame touched the tobacco.

“Kinda scary, eh, Nick?”

I took in some breath and tried to smile. “It’s not so bad.”

“Nobody’s ever gonna call me ‘Pretty Boy’ again, I guess.”

He was right. No one was going to mistake him for pretty. Whoever had done the work on him had botched the job. His lips were pulled back on one side and stretched open in a ghastly kind of half smile, the gums ruby red and exposed there and glistening with saliva, the saliva dripping over the side of his mouth. Skin had been grafted sloppily along his jawline, unmatched and puckered at the edges, and bluish around the grafted hole in his neck.

“No, Jack,” I said. “It’s not pretty. But you’re alive.”

LaDuke took a folded handkerchief from his pocket, the handkerchief damp and gray. He dabbed it on his gums, then shoved it back in his pocket. He dragged on his cigarette.

“How’d you get out of the warehouse that night?” I said.

“When I went down into that mess with my gun, we traded shots. But the fire spread real fast, and then those men knew they weren’t going to make it. They ran for the door on the first floor. I guess Sweet had taken the key. Anyway, I kinda woke up, decided that I wanted to live. I booked back up the stairs and ran down that hall. Hell, I was right behind you.”

“And then?”

“Shit, man, I don’t know. I was going into shock in a big way. The only thing I thought to do was go to my father. So I drove out to Frederick County. I kept my foot to the floor all the way, and I made it. I don’t know how I made it, but I did.”

“Your father,” I said, not really wanting to know.

“Yeah. He did the best he could. Used that horse stitch of his on my face, did some kind of poor man’s graft. Wired my jaw together. The main thing was, he stopped the infection, after a couple of d a e couays. I don’t remember much of it.” LaDuke avoided my eyes. “Yeah, my father, he fixed me up.”

I felt a chill and pulled the lapels of my coat together to the neck. LaDuke retrieved his handkerchief and blotted the spit from his chin.

“Why’d you come to me tonight?” I said.

“Your cop friend visited my father today. Thought I might warn you.”

“Warn me about what?”

LaDuke said, “You took out Samuels, right?”

“Yes.”