Ed McBain - Long Time No See

“Soil,” Carella said.

“What?”

“It’s soil, not dirt.”

“Yeah — in an evidence bag and sent it over to the lab. This was before I went to Irwin’s wedding, I want you to know. You had me very busy yesterday.”

“Did you check out the back yard?”

“I went down there before I left the building. I didn’t see any signs of digging.”

“How’d the window box look?”

“What do you mean?”

“Was it dumped on the floor like the rest of the stuff in the apartment?”

“The dirt, you mean?”

“Yeah, the soil.”

“No, it was in the box.”

“Well, if the killer went throwing everything all over the place, why was he so neat with the window box?”

“Then maybe it wasn’t the killer,” Meyer said, and shrugged, and then winced. “My head hurts when I shrug,” he said. “I shouldn’t drink. I really shouldn’t drink. I can hold my liquor, I don’t get drunk, but I always have a terrible hangover the next day.”

“What do you drink?” Carella asked.

“Scotch. Why? What does it matter what I drink?”

“Some drinks give you worse hangovers than other drinks. Gin gives you terrible hangovers. So does bourbon. Cognac is the worst.”

“I drink Scotch and I have a hangover,” Meyer said. “That’s because I’m Jewish.”

“What’s that got to do with it?”

“Indians and Jews get terrible hangovers from drinking Scotch,” Meyer said. “Jewish college girls get headaches from eating Chinese food, did you know that? It’s from the the monosodium glutamate in it. It’s called the Jewish College Girl Syndrome.”

“How do you happen to know that amazing fact?” Carella asked.

“I looked it up.”

“Where?”

“In the library. Under Jewish College Girls.”

“I’ve never in my life looked under a Jewish College girl,” Carella said.

“The reason I looked it up, I was working on this case,” Meyer said, “where an Indian...

“Yeah, yeah,” Carella said.

“God’s truth. An Indian was lacing a Jewish college girl’s Chinese food with Scotch, and she was getting terrible headaches all the time. I finally arrested the Indian.”

“Did the headaches go away?”

“No, but the Indian did. For six years.”

“What did the girl do about the headaches?”

“She went to see a headache doctor. He told her she was wearing underwear a size too small.”

“How did he know?”

“He looked it up.”

“Under what?”

“Under wear ,” Meyer said, and both men burst out laughing.

They were still laughing when they showed their shields to the patrolman stationed outside the front steps of the 85th Precinct. The patrolman looked at the shields and then looked at the two men. He suspected they were imposters, but he let them go inside, anyway; hell with it, let the desk sergeant’s mother worry. The building that housed the 85th looked very much like the one that housed the 87th — twin green globes flanking the entrance doors, wide steps leading up to those doors, muster room beyond, brass rail just before the muster desk, sergeant sitting behind the high wooden desk like a magistrate in a British court. They showed him their shields and said they wanted to talk to someone in the Detective Division.

“Anyone in particular?” the sergeant asked.

“Anyone who might be familiar with street-gang activity in the precinct.”

“That’d be Jonesy, I guess,” the sergeant said, and plugged a line into his switchboard. He waited, and then said, “Mike, is Jonesy up there? Put him on, will you?” He waited again. “Jonesy,” he said, “I’ve got a pair of detectives down here, want to talk to somebody about street gangs. Can you help them?” He listened, and then said, “Where you guys from?”

“The Eight-Seven,” Meyer said.

“The Eight-Seven,” the sergeant repeated into the phone. “Okay, fine,” he said, and pulled out the plug. “Go right upstairs,” he said, “He’s waiting for you. How’s Dave Murchison? He’s your desk sergeant there, ain’t he?”

“Yes, he is,” Carella said.

“Give him my regards. Tell him John Sweeney, from when we used to walk a beat together in Calm’s Point.” “We’ll do that,” Meyer said.

“Ask him about the ham and eggs,” Sweeney said, and laughed.

The detectives of the 85th had somehow managed to wheedle from petty cash, or someplace, the money for a printed sign. It read DETECTIVE DIVISION in bold black letters. Just below the words was a pointing carnival-barker hand that looked like what someone’s great-grandmother might have seen. It gave the otherwise decrepit muster room a look of antiquity and shoddy dignity. Up the iron-runged steps they went, just as if they were home. Turn the comer, walk down the hall, there was the bull pen. No slatted rail divider here. Instead, a bank of low filing cabinets that formed a sort of wall across the corridor. Just inside the battered metal barrier was a desk. A huge black man in shirt sleeves was standing behind the desk, a clearly anticipatory look on his face.

“I’m Jonesy,” he said. “Come in, have a seat.”

A plastic nameplate on his desk read Det. Richard Jones. The desk top was strewn with familiar D.D. report forms, departmental flyers and notices, hot car sheets, stop-sheets, all-state bulletins, B-sheets, mug shots, fingerprint cards — the usual clutter you’d find on the desk of any detective in the city. There were four men besides Jonesy in the squadroom. Two of them sat typing at their desks. One was leaning against the grilled detention cage, talking to a young black girl inside it. Another was at the water cooler, bending over to look at the spigot.

“Steve Carella,” Carella said, and took a chair alongside Jonesy’s desk. “This is my partner, Meyer Meyer.”

“What can I do for you?” Jonesy asked.

At the water cooler, the detective straightened up and said to no one in particular, “What the fuck’s wrong with this thing?” No one answered him. “I can’t get any water out of it,” he said.

“We’re looking for a line on a street gang named the Hawks.”

“Right,” Jonesy said.

“You know them?”

“They’re inactive. Used to be a bopping gang, oh, ten, fifteen years ago. Half of them got drafted, busted or killed, the others went the drug route. Haven’t heard a peep from them in years.”

“How many members were there?”

“Maybe two dozen in the nucleus group, another fifty or so scattered throughout Diamondback. These gangs like to think of themselves as armies, you know what I mean? In fact, some of them are — four, five hundred members all over the city. Once the shit is on, it’s important how many guys they can put on the street. We had a fight three weeks ago, I swear to Christ this one gang put a thousand guys in the park. Gang called the Voyagers, I love those grand-sounding names, don’t you? Had it out with a Hispanic gang in Grover Park. The Eight-Nine put us onto it because the other gang is in their precinct. Gang named the Caballeros. What a bunch of bullshit,” Jonesy said.

“About the Hawks,” Carella said. “Would you be familiar with someone named Lloyd?”

“Lloyd what?”

“That’s all we’ve got. He would have been president of the gang twelve years ago.”

“My partner’d know more about that than me. He’s the one started this detail. We were getting so much gang activity in this precinct, we had to create a special detail, would you believe it? Two men who should be taking care of people getting robbed or mugged, got to waste our time instead riding herd on a bunch of street hoodlums. Let’s take a look at the cards, see what we got on this Lloyd. I’m not sure they go back that far, but let’s see.”