Joseph Wambaugh - Finnegan's week

At twilight, Shelby Pate parked the Harley in the parking lot of Green Earth Hauling and Disposal. He thought Jules Temple hadn’t arrived because his yellow Miata wasn’t in front. But he looked up at the second story and saw a light on in the boss’s office so he rightly assumed that Jules Temple had parked inside the truck yard.

Shelby wondered why the boss would do that, and while Shelby was wondering he removed a paper from his pocket and took a hit of meth. He already had a buzz, but he needed a little boost. Then he was ready.

He slid a buck knife inside his belt and made sure it was accessible. He would’ve preferred a gun, but it was too late to go shopping for one. He wasn’t really worried though, because even if Jules Temple went shithouse when he heard Shelby’s terms, what could he do? The dude needed the manifest. He didn’t know that the manifest was gone-gone with the fucking boots!

Shelby strode through the unlocked front door and climbed the darkened stairs, hearing music coming from a radio in Mary’s office, and when he got to the landing, he looked in.

“I’m in here!” Jules Temple’s voice came from his own office.

Shelby followed the voice and found his boss sitting at his desk, apparently signing payroll checks.

“Maybe you’d like to sign one a them fer me,” Shelby said, without smiling.

“What the hell’s this all about?” Jules demanded. “And what’s this about Durazo not coming back? What happened?”

“Stabbed by some dudes in T.J.,” Shelby said, plopping down in the client chair in front of Jules’s desk. “He’s dead.”

He wore the same clothes that he’d worn to Tijuana the night before, except for a change of T-shirts. His hair still had sand in it. He was as unshaven and scruffy as usual, and he stank to high heaven. Jules curled his lip when he smelled him.

Shelby’s black T-shirt said BLACK SABBATH across the front, in blood-red letters.

“Are you sure he’s dead?” Jules asked.

“When I left him he looked dead. He could come back tonight though.”

“Is that a joke?”

“This is the Day of the Dead,” Shelby said. “Flaco might come home to his momma if she puts a bottle a beer out for him. Flaco loved beer.”

“I may be dense,” Jules said, leaning forward on his elbows, “but I don’t understand you.”

“It don’t matter,” Shelby said.

“So why did you wanna see me?”

“Since you’re here that means you got a general idea,” Shelby said.

“None at all,” Jules said.

“I got something that belongs to you.”

“What’s that?”

“A manifest. One you made out.”

“I make out lots of manifests,” Jules said.

“Not like this one. There’s no manifest like this one.”

“Did you and Durazo steal from North Island?”

“Yeah. A couple thousand pair a shoes.”

“You fucking idiot !” Jules couldn’t help blurting it.

“I ain’t in no mood fer that,” Shelby warned. “I came to do business.”

“You say it’s my manifest? Then give it to me.”

“In time,” Shelby said.

“Do you have it with you?”

“It’s in a safe place,” Shelby said.

“I wouldn’t want anybody else knowing my business,” Jules said. “You live with a woman, don’t you?”

“The bitch threw me out.”

“If anyone else knows about it, I wouldn’t be interested in doing business with you.”

“Nobody knows,” Shelby said, “’cept you and me.”

And that sealed Shelby Pate’s fate. Jules Temple didn’t believe that this freak was savvy enough to arrange for a third party to hold the manifest. Jules believed that the manifest was probably in a bedroom drawer or some obvious place, and that it would be thrown away when Shelby Pate’s property was disposed of. After his death.

Jules certainly believed that he’d have to pay Shelby Pate for the rest of his life and never see the manifest anyway, if he were to succumb to blackmail. So as Jules saw it, he had nothing to lose and everything to gain by proceeding with his plan.

But things were moving too fast . He needed one more drink, and then it’d be dark enough. Then he’d be ready.

“Tell me about Durazo,” Jules said. “Tell me about his death. It’s terrible.”

“He died. There ain’t no use talkin about him. There ain’t no use thinkin about him. I came here to talk business.”

“There’s plenty of time to talk business,” Jules said. “But I’d like to send a check to Durazo’s family in Mexico. I think he had a family in Tijuana, didn’t he?”

“I don’t wanna talk about no fuckin dead people,” Shelby said.

Jules could see those dilated pupils even from across the room. Jules had to placate the monster. He glanced at his watch. It was nearly late enough. Dark enough.

“He was your friend, wasn’t he? You wanna help his family, don’t you?”

“I wanna help me !” Shelby lurched to his feet.

Jules felt a jolt of fear and panic. Those wild eyes! His immense size! “Wait a minute!” Jules said. “Calm down! I just asked for the sake of the man’s family. Okay, okay, we’ll talk business.”

Shelby sat, but leaned forward, as though he might leap across the desk and strangle Jules at any moment.

Jules said, “Do you want a drink?”

“No,” Shelby said.

“Do you mind if I have one?”

“Let’s talk business , dude.”

“Okay, but I need a drink.”

Bobbie was supercharged when Shelby Pate parked his bike in the lot of Green Earth Hauling and Disposal. She drove her car around to the side street looking for Jules’s car. Not knowing what he drove, she could see the rear end of a yellow car in the corner of the truck yard. He was the yellow roadster type, that’s for sure.

She parked, got out, and walked up to the locked truck gate. Why had he put his car inside? Why not park out front where he could enter the building through the main door? She decided that possibly he had to enter through the back door because of a preprogrammed burglar alarm. On the other hand, maybe he didn’t want his car to be spotted by someone driving by. It could be that he didn’t want anyone to know that he’d been at Green Earth Hauling and Disposal on Sunday evening. They might be plotting another theft.

He’d managed to stall long enough to get a glass of Scotch in his hand, but he hadn’t returned to his desk when Shelby Pate said to him, “I’m gonna need some long-term unemployment insurance and you’re gonna give it to me.”

“How much … insurance did you have in mind?”

“I ain’t a greedy dude,” Shelby said. “Say, fifty grand.”

“If I give you fifty grand, you’ll give me back my property?”

“Why not?”

“Would you give me the property first? ”

“ After the check clears.”

“I see,” Jules said, knowing that fifty thousand dollars would only be the first installment.

He glanced at his watch. It was as dark as it would get. He took a sip of Scotch. There was a moon, but it was mistshrouded.

Bobbie, standing outside the gate of the truck yard, was surprised to hear the roadster’s engine turning over. It was very dark now, and the rear of the car was barely visible. Who could be starting up the car?

Jules pressed the button on the remote control inside his belt, and said, “I’d like to be certain that you’ll keep your …” He was interrupted by the sound of the engine in the yard below, easy to hear because Jules had left the window open.

Shelby turned toward the window, and said, “Somebody’s out there.”

“That’s my car!” Jules cried. “I parked it in the yard! Somebody’s stealing my fucking car!”