Robert Knightly - Bodies in Winter

‘OK,’ Rakowitz said, leaning out over the table again, his voice dropping in pitch and volume. ‘You ever heard of Paco Luna? They call him Demente.’

Paco ‘Demente’ Luna was Bushwick’s resident drug lord, a man with a reputation so vicious he’d become well-known to law enforcement in the surrounding communities. That a miserable street junkie like Paulie Rakowitz could not deliver Paco Luna was a simple given.

‘Talk’s cheap,’ Jack replied. ‘You need to be a bit more concrete here.’

‘Well, did ya ever wonder how come he’s got no competition? Luna’s Puerto Rican, but there’s lots of Mexicans and Dominicans livin’ in Bushwick. Usually, you go into a mixed neighborhood, you get to choose your product.’

‘And that’s not the way it is?’

‘Fuck no. You don’t deal with Luna’s people, you don’t get high in Bushwick. Now I’m not sayin’ nobody else tried to set up. I’m sayin’ they don’t last long.’

‘Paulie,’ Jack said, ‘you gotta look at the facts here. We got you for a violent felony. You can’t buy your way out by givin’ up some street dealer.’

‘That ain’t the point. It ain’t about Luna.’

‘Then what’s it about?’

‘It’s about how he’s, like…’ When Rakowitz ran his hand across his forehead, it came away slick with sweat. ‘Luna’s protected, OK? He’s got cops watchin’ his back.’ Another pause while his eyes scanned the tiny room as though searching for hidden witnesses. ‘Hey, think about it. Luna’s been runnin’ the show in Bushwick for the last fifteen years. Nobody lasts that long unless they got connections. I mean, it’s like obvious, right?’

Rakowitz kept us going for another fifteen minutes, although it was clear from the beginning — when Jack demanded that he name these cops, when he failed to do so — that we were being treated to a street rumor so common it had risen to the level of myth. The cops, so the story went, were always bent, the man at the top always protected. I’d heard the same tale from Dominicans in Washington Heights and Rastafarians on Eastern Parkway, usually as I was closing a pair of handcuffs around their wrists. Why, they wanted to know, did we snatch the little guys who were only dealing to stay high when the big dogs went their way unmolested?

As I remember it, my usual response was a slap on the head and a demand that the offender ‘Shut the fuck up.’

Still, Rakowitz was impressive. He told his tale forcefully, saving the best for last. ‘OK, you know that Luna has a house on Decatur Street near Central Avenue, right?’

In fact, we didn’t. Decatur and Central intersected in Bushwick, not our jurisdiction.

‘Yeah, fine,’ Jack said. ‘So what?’

‘So, I’m acquainted with a dude who was on a roof gettin’ off when he seen cops go into that building. They marched in like they owned the fuckin’ place.’ Rakowitz gave it a couple of beats before delivering the punch line. ‘And this guy, he says he seen these cops before.’

‘Your acquaintance, he got a name?’

‘Bucky.’

‘Bucky?’

‘Yeah, on account of his teeth.’

‘So, where can we find Bucky?’

‘I don’t know. I ain’t seen him in a while. But everybody knows him. He grew up in the neighborhood.’

‘Where?’

‘I ain’t sure.’

‘How ’bout his real name? You know that?’

When Rakowitz leaned forward, beads of sweat dripped from his hair to splatter on the table top. ‘I don’t,’ he admitted, ‘but I could find him.’

At that point, Jack approached the prisoner, drew him to his feet and quick-marched him into a cage. ‘The only thing you need to find,’ he explained as he turned the key in the door, ‘is a boyfriend. Before you become public property.’

By the time I walked into Sparkle’s at nine-thirty, the joint was jumping. I took a moment to absorb the noise and the commingled odors of beer, tobacco and bodies huddled together after a long day’s work, then crossed to the bar where Mike had a Dewar’s waiting. Home sweet home.

I lifted my glass to Sparkle, as always. For some reason, she was looking especially vivid tonight. Her red, Cupid’s-bow mouth was pursed invitingly and her blue eyes were naughty and knowing.

‘You do something to Sparkle?’ I asked Mike, who was filling a pitcher with Guinness.

‘I had her cleaned yesterday.’

‘You don’t clean her yourself?’

‘Harry, you gotta be kiddin’. The woman I use, her day job’s at the Metropolitan Opera!’

I was still mulling this over when Nydia Santiago called to me. She’d taken over the table usually reserved for Linus Potter, who was standing at the other end of the bar. ‘Harry, c’mere a minute.’

Nydia was sitting with her two main girlfriends, Rose Fulger and Mary Contreras (known universally as Mary Contrary), and an Eight-Three detective named Chris Tucker.

‘What’s up?’ I asked as I sat down beside Nydia.

‘What’s up with your partner?’ she countered. ‘What’s wrong with her?’

‘Why don’t you tell me?’

‘She’s a cop hater,’ Chris Tucker jumped in, his tone distinctly belligerent.

‘Is that what she’s accused of, Chris? Hating cops?’

‘In the Eight-Three, they’re sayin’ she’s an IAB rat. They’re sayin’ she was recruited while she was still in the Academy. You know that’s what the headhunters do. They find the freaks, the ones that shoulda been social workers, and turn ’em into snitches.’

I’d stayed away from Sparkle’s all week, avoiding a choice I knew I’d eventually have to make. Nydia had just invited me to sever all connection with Adele, to close her case and get on with my career. It was Nydia’s way of covering my back and I was certain she expected me to accept the offer.

Some ultimately rational part of me insisted that I seize the opportunity. Adele was going down. I couldn’t save her, but I could save myself. And I wouldn’t have to join the chorus of her accusers. If I simply announced that Adele and I hadn’t spoken during the last week, it would be enough.

As always on crowded Friday nights, despite an ordinance that prohibits the use of tobacco in bars, the atmosphere at Sparkle’s was clouded by cigarette smoke. I watched the smoke drift across the intense beam of light trained on Sparkle’s rhinestone dress, watched it rise and fall in slow waves, now white, now gray, now black. I was hoping that some answer would come floating out of that mist, a once-and-for-all decision that I could live with. Instead, I became more and more angry, with Sarney, with Adele, with the job, and with half-drunk Chris Tucker who just happened to be close enough to bear the consequences.

‘Chris,’ I finally declared, ‘I don’t care what you say about my partner as long as you don’t say it to my face. Ever again. You understand where I’m goin’ with this, right?’

My amiable reputation was so at odds with the look on my face, it took my companions a moment to grasp the essentials. Nydia was the first to react. She put her hand on my arm, but I shook it off. Chris Tucker’s normally pale cheeks were flaming; his blue eyes seemed about to explode. Street cops are taught to confront any challenge to their authority. You back off once, so the lesson goes, you’ll be retreating until the day you put in your papers.

‘That was over the top, Harry,’ Nydia said. ‘That was uncalled for.’

I stood up, my eyes pinned on Tucker’s. When he remained in his chair, I smiled before repeating my position. ‘That goes for you, too, Nydia. I don’t care what bullshit rumors you tell each other, just keep them away from me.’

Though my act was convincing — probably because I meant what I said — I lost my courage at that point. I should have gone on to say that my partner was an honorable cop who’d been around long enough to separate the good guys from the bad guys. If she was pointing fingers, she was pointing them in the right direction. Instead, I carried my empty glass over to Jack Petro, who was standing at the bar.