Fred Limberg - First Murder

“I can’t tell you.” Ray looked down at the tabletop. “Not yet anyway.”

“Then get out. Both of you. Get out of my house right now!” Lakisha was pointing toward the front door. “I tell you everything I know and do everything I can to help you find Dee’s killer and you won’t tell me who this motherfucker is? He might be stalking us, Rayford. He might be planning to kill every one of us.” She was trembling in fear or anger or both. Ray stood, his head still down. Tony thought he looked sad.

“I’m sorry,” Ray said softly. “We’ll go. I wish I could tell you more but I can’t. There are a hundred reasons. C’mon Tony.” Ray started walking toward the hall. Tony gave Lakisha a look that he hoped said he was sorry, too.

Ray took the driver’s seat this time. Tony sat quietly on the other side waiting for him to start the car. The afternoon was gone and the drizzle was trying to turn into rain. Water ran in random rivulets down the windshield that was starting to fog from the two men’s breathing.

“We can’t tell her yet,” Ray finally said.

“I know.”

“But do you know why?” Ray turned to Tony, eyebrows arched, inquisitive. Tony wondered if it was one of Ray’s teaching moments.

“I can think of a dozen reasons, maybe more.”

“But the big one…what do you think the most important reason is?” Tony shook his head. All the things that he could think of seemed valid. He looked back at Ray and noticed a sliver of light from the front door and a shadow approaching the car in the drizzle. “It’s because she knows something else and if she has a name or where we came up with the guy it will taint her memory. There’s something else there.”

Both of them jumped at a sharp rapping at the driver’s side window. Ray rolled it down. Lakisha stuck her head inside the car.

“I can’t eat all that pasta by myself. Get back inside. If you can’t tell me-fine.” She turned and strode toward the front door, yelling over her shoulder, “and hurry it up.”

“You heard the lady.” Ray said as he opened his door.

Swenson and Hong were both surly when Tony pounded on their door just after 9:00 on Sunday morning. No, Stuckey wasn’t there. No, they hadn’t seen him all weekend, not since Friday morning. Most importantly, no, he hadn’t moved any of his stuff out.

When Hong asked why Tony was so intent on finding Sean and asked if he was a suspect or something Tony answered, “No.”

There was no answer when they banged on Angie Arkwright’s door. Tony told Ray it wouldn’t surprise him if she was still wasted and didn’t even hear the knocking. Ray wondered if they were both in the apartment and were refusing to answer the door. Tony noticed movement down the hall out of the corner of his eye.

The frizzy gray haired woman Angie had flipped off the night he’d interviewed her was peering around her door jamb. When he started walking toward her she pulled back and shut the door.

“Ma’am,” Tony said, knocking gently on the door. “Police, ma’am. Could I speak to you a moment?” He rapped again.

“Whadda’ you want?” A raspy old-woman’s voice struggled through the door, leaving ten thousand cigarettes in its wake.

Tony held his gold badge up to the peep hole. “A couple of questions is all. Open the door, please.” Ray joined him, a quizzical look on his face.

“I don’t know nothin’. Leave me be.” Tony could tell she was leaning against the door. She sounded a little afraid.

“Please just open the door so we don’t have to yell. Your neighbors might not like it, cops yelling at your door.” Tony felt the door shudder and saw the knob turn slowly. She only opened it an inch.

“Whadda’ you want?” she asked again in a hissed whisper.

“Do you know the woman in 33? The Arkwright woman?” Tony still had his badge out and up.

“Know who she is. Don’t know her. She a mean ‘un.”

“Mean?”

“Always cussin’ me an’ stickin’ me her finger. I ain’t nosy. I jes’ like to know who’s comin’ an’ goin’.” She was squinting through the barely open door. All Tony could see was a slice of wild gray hair and a watery blue eye deep-set in a thin hard wrinkled face.

“You ever see this guy around?” He held up a picture of Sean Stuckey. The door creaked open another couple of inches.

“I seen him. Hair’s longer now an’ he’s got whiskers.”

“This is an older picture.” It was one of the altered shots, Stuckey’s California look. The old woman had noticed the difference.

Tony got an idea just then and smiled thinly. “When was the last time you saw him?”

“Couple a’ days ago.” She nodded toward Angie’s door down the hall. “He ain’t there now. Some other fella’s in there, though.” The old woman dropped her voice to a whisper. “She sellin’ it, I think.”

“What’s your name, ma’am? I’m Tony. This is my partner, Ray.” Bankston nodded. He was pleased. He had an idea where Tony was going with this woman.

“That boy in some trouble?”

“We just want to talk to him. He’s a little hard to find sometimes.” Tony shrugged, tried a wider smile.

“Uh-huh. John Law knockin’ on the do’ Sunday mornin’ and he ain’t in trouble?”

“We want to talk to him is all.”

“Uh-huh.” The old woman started coughing.

Tony fished a fold of bills out of his pocket and peeled off a twenty. Then he took one of his new cards out of another pocket.

“I could use your help. Now if you see this guy, any time, day or night, you call this number on the bottom.” She reached for the bill. Tony held it back and gave her the card first. “See the number on the bottom?”

“Not without my damn glasses.” She held it close to her tired watery eyes, squinting again. “Where it say cell?” Tony nodded and passed the twenty over.

“That’s the number. You see this guy you call me. If it works out, I’ll have another twenty for you. Deal?”

“Anytime?”

“That’s right.”

“Okay Ray.” She smiled a toothless smile and slammed the door.

“I thought I was Ray.” Bankston was chuckling as they pulled out of the dingy parking lot.

“Well, we look so much alike. I can see where people get us mixed up.” Tony laughed too. “So what now, boss?”

“I think we should rest today. I don’t want to get into it with the Hewes’ woman if her husband’s around, and we can’t find Stuckey. That was a slick move with the old woman.”

“There’s always a peeper. Even on patrol, whenever I’d pull up to a house, a crime scene or a domestic, whatever, I’d look around for the peeper.”

“If she calls let me know. I’ve got a few questions for Mr. Stuckey, too.”

Ray was driving, heading toward the east side of St. Paul to drop Tony at home. They rode in silence, each of them content with their own private thoughts.

Ray was getting comfortable with his young partner and appreciated that he didn’t talk just to make noise-that he waited until he had worked through a question before he asked for help. He liked that he didn’t leap to conclusions, too. So often the new ones, the youngsters, would be so eager to make their mark they tried to make the evidence fit some preconceived notion instead of letting it guide them.

Tony was simply enjoying the silence, watching familiar scenery slide past, letting go of the dozens of questions in his mind. He needed rest, he knew that. He also knew if he didn’t blank out the details of the murder for a while that things would begin to get confused. Maybe he’d go to the gym and work out. That helped sometimes, cleared some cobwebs. Maybe he’d call Sue Ellen later, see how life in the safe house was. He laughed to himself when he got the idea that what he should really do is check out a couple of the old Latin Kings haunts, find Garcia, and shoot him.