George Pelecanos - Drama City

Don’t do that, little princess. Don’t call me over. You and your mother don’t need me in your life.

He didn’t look at his grandmother’s house at all. He just went on his way.

Back in his apartment, Lorenzo changed into loose-fitting jeans, a sleeveless T, and a short-sleeved button-down shirt. He tied a pair of Nike 20s tight on his feet. In the living room, he moved the hope chest and inspected the contents of the area beneath the cutout he had made in the floor.

Nigel called from one of his cells. He was out in the car, on Otis, waiting. Jasmine whimpered and came to Lorenzo as he hung up the phone.

“I’m comin’ back,” said Lorenzo. “You just go and lie down in your bed.”

The dog walked into the bedroom. Lorenzo went to meet Nigel.

Calvin Duke lived on 35th Street, off Ames, between Minnesota Avenue and the Anacostia Freeway, in his grandmother’s house in Northeast. His backyard, like most of the yards on the one hundred block of 35th Street, was deep and wide, and ended at an alley. Past the alley were the railroad tracks, and past the railroad tracks were the Anacostia Freeway, the green of Anacostia Park, and the brackish water of the Anacostia River. It felt like country here. Many of the residents on 35th maintained bountiful gardens of vegetables and flowers in their backyards. In Calvin Duke’s were several cars.

Nigel Johnson and Lorenzo Brown cruised down 35th in Nigel’s Lexus, going along slowly so as not to miss Duke’s residence. Lorenzo spotted the house, and Nigel swung his sedan into a space along the curb. They walked together to the front door.

An old woman answered their knock. Her skeletal frame was no more than a hanger for her housedress. Sparse white hair topped a scalp dotted with raised moles. Her eyes were sunken in their sockets. She had removed her teeth. To Lorenzo, she had the look of one of those shrunken heads he’d hung on his doorknob when he was a kid.

“Yes?” she said.

“Is Calvin in?” said Nigel.

“You some kind of police?”

“No, ma’am. We’re lookin’ to talk to him about a car.”

“My grandson’s out back, burnin’ a steak.”

“We’ll just go around there, then, that’s okay with you.”

The old woman shrugged. “Mind that dog.”

They walked down to Ames and then cut into the alley. Crepe myrtle and hibiscus were in bloom and plentiful among the vegetable gardens in the backyards. The smell of their blossoms hung sweet and heavy in the humid early-evening air.

Approaching the back of the old woman’s residence, they saw the large figure of a man standing over a brick-walled barbecue pit built up on a concrete slab. He held a green bottle in one meaty hand and a grilling fork in the other. Smoke came up off the grill. A black rottweiler stood by the man’s side, looking up at its master, then at the grill, and again at its master.

A large portion of the fenced yard was paved, and on the pavement sat three cars: a late-model Mercedes coupe, a new Cadillac XLR convertible, and a two-tone ’63 Impala tricked with mags, new pipes, and air shocks. What wasn’t paved was untended and dotted with excrement.

Nigel and Lorenzo stood at the fence. The rot barked lazily but did not leave its master’s side.

“I help you two with somethin’?” said the man, raising his deep voice.

“You can if you’re Calvin Duke,” said Nigel. “We wanna talk about a rental.”

“Who sent y’all?”

“Fella I spoke to down at the supper club,” said Nigel. “Said you were the man.”

“I guess you in the right place, then.” Duke, around forty, big and round, light of skin, and moley like his grandmother, smiled. “You done found the Dukey Stick.”

“Mind if we come in?”

“Come through the gate.”

“What about that animal?” said Nigel to Lorenzo.

“That dog ain’t gonna hurt no one.”

They went through the gated portion of the fence, passing a freestanding garage that had been converted into some sort of office for the fat man. They walked by the cars, waxed and detailed, and stepped up onto the concrete slab. A T-bone steak sizzled on the grill over glowing coals. The bricks at the top of the pit were not mortared to those below them and sat crookedly. A couple of empty Heineken bottles were set atop the bricks.

Lorenzo whistled softly. The rot came to him at once, and Lorenzo rubbed its scalp. The dog’s ears were scarred and carried open pink sores. Its eyelids curled inward.

“Champ supposed to be a watchdog,” said Duke good-naturedly. “But he don’t watch nothin’ but what’s on this grill.”

“You got a fly problem with this dog’s ears,” said Lorenzo.

“That so.”

“You clean up the feces in the yard, that’ll discourage some of it. But you got to treat this animal’s ears now. It needs treatment for its eye condition too.”

“Oh, so now I’m gonna clean up the feces in my own yard.” Duke looked Lorenzo over with amusement. “You wanna clean shit, you clean the shit out your own yard, hoss. ’Stead of comin’ into my yard and telling me to clean mines.”

“Dog needs treatment,” said Lorenzo.

“What’re you, some kind of dog police, sumshit like that?” Duke laughed expansively to let them know they were all friends.

Lorenzo stared at Duke.

Duke looked away and drank off some of his Heineken. He put the fork down on the grill and patted his fat thigh. “C’mere, boy.”

The rot moved back toward his master but did not get too close. Duke reached down to pet him, and the dog backed up a step, then bent his head down timidly and allowed Duke’s touch.

“Anyway,” said Duke. “What can I do for you boys?”

“We’re interested in one of your cars,” said Nigel. “Silver BMW, the Three-thirty model.”

“It’s out.”

“I can see that.”

“How about that pretty Impala over there? Imagine drivin’ that pretty-ass motherfucker down the street. Females be gettin’ wet behind it.”

“We lookin’ to talk to whoever rentin’ the BMW.”

“Why?”

“That ain’t your concern.”

“It is if it’s about my car. And don’t try to act like you police.”

“Be better for you if we were,” said Nigel.

“Now you gonna tweak on me, big man?”

“I haven’t yet.”

“Comin’ in here, on my property, makin’ demands.”

“I’m gonna ask you nice, but only one more time. We gonna need the name and address of the man who’s rentin’ the Three-thirty. You give us that, we gonna be on our way.”

“I can’t help you,” said Duke, the boldness withering in his voice.

“The BMW,” said Nigel.

“Look, I got rules. I might be part of this underground economy out here, but still, I got the same rules any other business got. I can’t be givin’ up the confidentiality of my clients.”

“Fuck all this,” said Lorenzo. He reached over and picked the fork up off the grill by its wooden handle.

“Hey,” said Duke.

Lorenzo walked around Duke and backed him up so that his wide bottom hit the barbecue pit. Some bricks came loose off the top. Both bottles fell to the concrete and one of them shattered. Lorenzo pushed the fork toward Duke’s face, and Duke closed his eyes and turned his head. Lorenzo touched the tines of the fork to Duke’s neck, denting it, and Duke screamed. His voice was no longer rich and deep. Lorenzo stepped back. Smoke came off Duke’s neck.

“You burned me,” said Duke, as if Lorenzo had only hurt his feelings. He rubbed at the marks, like those of a snakebite, that were already showing there. Champ stood where he was and watched.

“The name and address,” said Nigel.