Grant McCrea - Dead Money

Hey, I said, I know you’ve got your rules. But I was hoping you could tell me what you can.

He gave me a knowing smile.

Hey, Rick, he said, you’re not tight with Internal Affairs, are you?

Not on this one, I laughed. Next time maybe.

Okay, just wanted to make sure. Anyway, I don’t mind telling you what I know, because what I know isn’t much. I hear it’s pretty cut and dried, Rick.

That may be so, I said. But I’ve got my job to do. The kid says he didn’t do it.

Well, there’s a shock.

I know, I know, I smiled. But I got to tell you, there’s something very believable about him. He’s an angry kid. But I don’t see any guile in him.

You don’t need guile to hit a guy upside the head with a blunt instrument.

All right. I know. I’m not going to convince you of anything.

You always were a wimp.

Just tell me what you can.

He gave it some thought. He ran his hands over his cleanly shaven head.

Okay, here’s what I know. The guys have a fight. Sounded pretty damn vicious. A lot of thumping and banging and yelling. Then it all goes quiet. We got a time on that. One thirty-five a.m. Almost exactly an hour later, some homeless guy in an alley about three blocks away picks up a big cardboard box. Going to use it for a house or something. And under the box is the body of this kid. His face is half caved in. Blunt trauma. Kid’s dead as a doorknob. They haven’t found the weapon yet.

Nose broken.

Whole fucking face broken, Rick.

Any witnesses?

Not that I know about. Old lady in the building on the other side of the alley thinks she heard something. But she’s vague about it. So far, nobody saw nothing.

So how’d they find Jules?

Somebody in his building called in a complaint about the noise. When they were fighting. Nobody’d got around to showing up by the time the body was found. But after that, somebody made the connection.

So it’s all circumstantial. Not enough to arrest him on.

They usually are, my friend, Butch laughed. But yeah. Sort of. Brought him in, but couldn’t hold him. Took them hours to get a warrant to search the kid’s place. Got the wrong judge.

Albertson?

You got it. What’s the probable cause, he says. Shit.

Well, there are two sides to that argument.

I guess, he smiled. They’re doing tests now. The usual forensic stuff. Talk to me in a couple of days. The picture might be different.

Could have been random. A mugging.

Sure. Always possible. But it didn’t look like it. Too vicious. Looked like something personal.

I asked whether they had tracked down Larry Silver’s relatives, friends. Looked for folks with grudges.

Sure, he said. The family’s in Kansas somewhere. Hadn’t heard from him in two years. Nice old folks. Had Larry late in life. Couldn’t understand what went wrong. His brother is twenty years older. Has a good job down at the feedlot. Comes to dinner every Sunday. Something just clicked in Larry one day, when he was fifteen or so. Gone wild, they said. Like a barnyard dog. Nothing you could do but stay away from him. And then he left town. Didn’t tell anyone. Didn’t leave a note. Never wrote. Never called. They’d just sort of written him off. Hoped one day he’d come to his senses. Give them a call. Send a postcard.

Friends?

The usual losers you get with a guy like that. Small-time dealers. Runaways like him. He’d lived in Riverside Park for a while. Stretched some plastic between two trees. Begged for quarters. Til some local punks rousted him out of there. Got lucky. Ran into somebody who got him a job. Flipping burgers somewhere. Didn’t last long. Just long enough for him to get a little place in Williamsburg, pay a couple months’ rent. Nobody really liked him much. He was a moody guy. Chip on his shoulder. But nobody really hated him either. They just tolerated him.

Not much to go on.

Not much.

I don’t have the resources to reinvent the wheel, I said. Do me a favor, if you can, Butch. Just get the details on a couple of kids most likely to have information about him. Who knew him best. Who might know something. I might find something your guys missed.

Always possible, Rick. I’ll see what I can do.

From most people, that would be a no. From Butch, it was a yes.

All right, I said. Hey, I really appreciate this, Butch.

Rick, I owe you. You know that.

Actually, I didn’t know that. But I was happy to let him think so.

I remembered Dorita. Damn. I’d completely forgotten we’d arranged to meet the night before.

I called her up. Begged for forgiveness.

If you’d remembered, she laughed, I’d have fallen off my chair.

We arranged to meet at the Monkey Bar. For the first time I noticed the pun. Monkey bars. Hah.

Despite the name, it was more upscale than the Wolf’s Lair. More Dorita’s style. Plush sofas. Indirect lighting. Colored drinks.

I spied Dorita in the corner. She’d snagged our favorite spot. A small banquette, largely blocked from view. It made it hard to hail a waitress, but it helped the conversation. You felt you were alone.

I ordered a Scotch, Dorita a cosmopolitan. Her drink was pale red and pretty. A cherry in it. She crossed her legs. They were pale and pretty too.

I was thinking, I said.

You were thinking. I was.

Dangerous.

I was thinking that I really ought to give up this racket.

Here we go again.

No. I mean it. I really do.

But you can’t afford to.

There’s the problem.

Don’t you owe the IRS a half a million?

Well, yes. Rehab’s expensive. Fifteen times in rehab is fifteen times more expensive. And not tax-deductible.

Then stop dreaming.

There’s always bankruptcy.

Talk to Mort, darling. They never let you go. A tax debt never goes away. Bankruptcy or no bankruptcy.

I’ve heard that.

It’s true. Talk to Mort.

But that would only matter if I had a job, some assets.

Oh. I see. Hit the road? Beg for quarters? You’re too old for that, Rick. And anyway, you’re not that romantic anymore.

You’d be surprised.

Yes. I would.

Anyway, the idea is, I could play poker for a living.

Rick, your brilliance is exceeded only by your naivete.

I guess you’re right.

The Gang of Eight had a meeting.

My fellow probationists?

Right.

I wasn’t invited.

I’m not surprised, Ricky. You’re such a goddamn recluse.

True, true. And I wouldn’t be in this mess if I weren’t. Believe me, darling, I try.

I know you do. You should call up Martin. Tell him to include you. It’s like a support group. They’re all helping each other. Getting together to drum up new business.

I’ll think about it, I said, in a tone intended to close the topic.

So, she said, picking up the cue, tell me about your visit with Jules.

Interesting kid. I kind of like him. Feisty. Doesn’t take any shit. A kid his age, you’d think he’d be terrified. But he isn’t. He’s quite cool about it.

That could be interpreted two ways. At least.

Yes. You’re right. And I’m not sure I believe his story.

Okay. But did he do it?

I don’t know. And I’m not sure I want to know. I’m not sure he told me the whole truth, and nothing but. In fact, I’m quite sure he didn’t. And he may well have done it. But he’s not evil. If he did it, I’m guessing, there were circumstances.

She asked me for the details.

There aren’t a whole lot of details yet, I said. What I know isn’t too helpful. The kid’s story doesn’t buy him much. It’s not a whole lot more substantial than ‘I didn’t do it.’ But they don’t have any physical evidence to tie him to it. Still less an eyewitness. But there’s all this other stuff going on. Between Jules and Dad. Weird stuff. I can’t shake the feeling that they’re all playing some kind of game. At my expense.