George Pelecanos - Hard Revolution

“Detective Vaughn,” said Strange.

“How you fellas doin’ today?” said Vaughn.

“We’re about off shift.”

“And here I am, just gettin’ on. You need somethin’?”

“Just sayin’ hello. You looked kinda lonely, standing out here.”

“Thanks for your concern.”

The pump jockey turned and had a glance at Strange. Their eyes locked for a moment, and then the jockey looked away.

Strange recognized him. Martini, the teenager from Billy’s neighborhood who he’d hung with a couple of times back when they were boys. A JD-lookin’ kid, on the mean side, had a little brother who was kind, which this one probably mistook for weak. They were all together that day when Strange had been popped at Ida’s for trying to boost a padlock, nine years back.

Strange didn’t acknowledge Martini. He didn’t look like he wanted him to. Looked like he’d fallen some off that high horse of his. Strange let him be. Strange’s father had always told him, Don’t be kickin’ a man when he’s down. Ain’t no good reason for it, he’d said. Wrong as it was, though, Strange had to admit it felt good, wearing his clean uniform, looking at Martini, grease all over his.

“Your mother all right?” said Vaughn.

“She’s fine,” said Strange with a tone of finality. It was plain to Vaughn that Strange was asking him to say no more.

“All right, then,” said Vaughn. “You fellas keep your eyes open out there.”

“Have a good one, Detective,” said Peters, who then put the Ford in gear and drove out of the lot.

Martini replaced the pump handle in its holster. “That’ll be five.”

“Here,” said Vaughn, handing over the bill.

Vaughn walked over to the beautiful red Plymouth parked beside the garage. He studied the car. The owner had named it Bernadette, most likely for his girl. Well, thought Vaughn, young men do stupid things when it comes to young women. Vaughn himself had a tattoo on his shoulder that read “Olga,” the word on a banner flowing across a heart. She had been his girlfriend when he’d had the tattoo done one drunken night in a parlor overseas, twenty-four years earlier. After he gotten it, he’d gone into a whorehouse next door and spent the rest of his leave money on a skinny little girl who called him Fwank, had a shaved snatch, and liked to laugh.

Vaughn walked to the open bay door of the garage. A mechanic, farm-boy big, was lowering an Olds to the cement floor.

“That your Belvedere out here?” said Vaughn.

“Yeah,” said Stewart, not even bothering to look at Vaughn. He was breathing through his mouth as he worked. Vaughn put him in his late twenties. A greaser, not too bright, whose time had already passed him by.

“Nice sled,” said Vaughn.

“Somethin’ wrong?”

“It just caught my eye. I’m a Mopar man myself.”

“Huh,” said Stewart. It was more of a grunt than a response.

Friendly type, thought Vaughn. Okay, then, fuck you, too.

He walked back to his own car, a ’67 Polara with cat-eye taillights. It only held a 318 under the hood, not much horse for the weight. Everything on it was stock, straight off the lot at Laurel Dodge. Nothing like the young man’s Plymouth, a head-turner and a genuine rocket. But the Polara was plenty sporty for a man who was watching fifty coming up in the rearview mirror. It was a pretty car.

Vaughn lit a cigarette as he drove out of the Esso lot and headed for the station. Sunday was a good shift. Not too much happening, usually. Maybe he’d have a free hour. Enough time to visit his girl.

COMING OUT OF the Esso, Strange and Peters responded to a call, a domestic dispute down on Ogelthorpe. Peters told the dispatcher that they’d take it and got them on their way.

“We parked here?” said Strange.

“There ain’t no hurry, rook.”

“You’re drivin’ the limit.”

Peters checked the speedometer. “So I am.”

Peters knew that domestics usually worked themselves out before the police arrived. Cops who had been around for a while weren’t in any hurry to jump into a conflict between a man and a woman, not if they didn’t have to.

“Detective Hound Dog,” said Peters, giving the Ford a little extra gas as he hit the hill on 14th. “He knows your mother?”

“From work,” said Strange.

“I guess Vaughn gets those choppers of his cleaned real regular.”

“I guess he does,” said Strange.

Strange had told Peters early on that his mother worked reception in a dental office. He was instantly ashamed of himself for doing so and wondered why he had. Now he had to keep up the lie.

“You got plans tonight?” said Peters.

“Gonna catch an early show down at the Tivoli. The Good, the Bad and the Ugly. ”

“You’ve seen it twice already.”

“Guess I’ll make it three times. Anyway, my girl hasn’t seen it yet.”

“Woman’s gonna be a girlfriend to you, I guess she has to like westerns, too.”

“She likes that good thing, she gonna have to learn.”

“Quit braggin’.”

“No brag, just fact.”

Peters cut right on Ogelthorpe and slowed the cruiser. “They been playing the theme song from that movie all over the radio, you know?”

“Hugo Montenegro?” said Strange. “That’s the bullshit version right there.”

They pulled up along the curb, near the house number that had been radioed in to them. A man and a woman, both dressed in church clothes, were embracing on the front porch. The man kissed the woman on her cheek and then kissed her mouth.

“Now he gonna patch things up,” said Peters.

“He’s working on it,” said Strange.

“Why I wasn’t rushing,” said Peters. “Let’s just sit here for a minute, okay?”

“Give him a chance to tell her he learned.”

BUZZ STEWART WALKED out to the pumps. Dominic Martini had just finished pouring eight gallons into a gold Riviera. He keyed the reset meter as the Buick left the lot.

“What was up with that?” said Stewart.

“Nothin’.”

“Nothin’, hell. Who were the uniforms?”

“Just cops.”

“I mean, do you know ’em?”

“I seen ’em around.”

“Shit, you don’t get it, do you?” Stewart rubbed at his jaw. “You in or no?”

“In,” said Martini.

“Then act like it. You can’t be runnin’ your mouth to the police and be with me, too. Understand?”

“I wasn’t… I didn’t say shit.”

“Good. Shorty and me are gonna meet up tonight. You comin’?”

“Said I was in.”

“Be over at my place ’round eight.”

Martini watched Stewart cross the lot and disappear into the dark of the garage.

ALVIN JONES SAT in his favorite chair, a Kool burning between the fingers of his right hand, a bourbon over ice in his left. He had the sports page open in his lap and was squinting as he labored to read the type. His vision was fine, but the whiskey had got to his eyes.

Paper said the Senators had beat the Pirates, five to three, in an exhibition, which made ten straight wins over National League teams. But he wasn’t interested in who beat who. Jones was looking at the game’s box score so that he could choose the number he was going to play come Monday.

The way Jones had been doing it lately, he’d find his favorite player from the opposing team and make note of his position, then his stats from that particular game. Today he was studying on Willie Stargell. Stargell played first base, that was a 1. He had gone two for four, that was 2 and 4. Put it all together and you got 124. That was the number Jones would play.

But hadn’t he played that number last week? He had, and it had been cold. Shit, he wasn’t gonna make that mistake again. He went to the Nats box and tried the same thing. He didn’t really have any favorites from Washington, though. Del Unser, he was all right but nothing special. Epstein on bag one, okay, sounded like a Jewboy name, so he wasn’t gonna go with him, and then you had Ken McMullen at third. Nah, uh-uh, he didn’t like the way slim looked with that Adam’s apple bobbin’ around in his neck. Casanova, Valentine… Frank Howard. Might as well go with farm boy; motherfucker could blow the cover right off the ball while he was sending it into the D.C. Stadium bleachers. But Howard played left. How could you make a number out of left field?