James Burke - Black Cherry Blues

"Then one guy spills ice and vodka all over the table and tells the kid to mop it up and bring him another deck of cards. The kid says, "Hey, I've been studying Italian at school this year. What does Eatta my shitta mean?"

"The old man hears it and slaps his kid's face in front of everybody. Then he starts swallowing and sweating and apologizing to the dagos while they stare at him from behind those black shades. Finally one of them stands up, hooks his finger in the old man's mouth, and throws him down in an iron chair. He says, "He don't have manners 'cause you didn't teach him none. So you shut up your face and don't be talking to impress nobody. You clean this up, you bring everybody what they want, you sit over there and you don't go nowhere till we say."

"They made him sit out there in the sun like an organ-grinder's monkey for four hours. Till the kid finally begged them to let the old man go back inside.

"It's good to say Ciao, ciao, bambino to the grease balls The next time the United States drops an A-bomb on anyone, I think it should be Palermo."

"Where's Dodds?"

"You really want to know?"

"I want to know if he's going to be back after me."

"First you tell me why you didn't drop the dime on me." There was a half grin on his face as he raised the beer bottle to his mouth.

"No games, Clete."

"Because a guy out on bond for murder doesn't like to introduce cops to his blood-spattered kitchen. Because maybe he knows they might just take the easy route and haul his butt down to the bag. Sounds like your faith might be waning, Streak."

"Is that guy going to be back?"

"That's one you don't have to worry about."

"Where is he?" I asked.

"Get serious. You don't need to know any more, Streak. Except the fact that our man didn't like heights."

"What?"

"Did you ever meet a psychopath yet that wasn't scared of something? It's what makes them cruel. Charlie didn't like high places. At least not the one I showed him."

I looked out silently at the river. A Frisbee sailed by overhead.

"Too grim for you?" Clete said.

"Did he kill Darlene?"

"No, I'm convinced that's one he didn't do."

"Dio, then?"

"He didn't know. Put it in the bank, too."

I stood up and began brushing the grass off my pants.

"You're going to turn to stone on me, huh?" he said.

"It's a school night. Alafair has to get home."

"Why is it you always make me feel like anthrax, Streak?"

"You're right about one thing today. I didn't call the heat because I didn't want to be part of another criminal investigation. Particularly when I was left with the problem of explaining how somebody's blood got smeared all over my walls and stove and floor. Right now I'm going to believe that Charlie Dodds is on a flight to new opportunities in Mexico City. Beyond that, I wouldn't count on anything, Clete."

"I'm going to get the guy that did her. You want to sit around and bite your nails, that's cool with me."

I walked off toward a group of children with whom Alafair was playing tag. Then Clete called after me, in a voice that made people turn and stare, "I love you anyway, motherfucker."

I needed some help. I had accomplished virtually nothing on my own; I had been locked up for punching out Sally Dio, had persuaded nobody of my theories, and instead had managed to convince a couple of local cops that I was a gun-wielding paranoid. That night I called Dan Nygurski at his home in Great Falls. A baby-sitter answered and said that he was at a movie with his wife, that she would take down my name and number. He returned my call just after ten, when I was drifting off to sleep with a damp towel folded across the lump on my forehead. I took the phone into the kitchen and closed the hallway door so as not to wake Alafair or Dixie Lee, who was sleeping on the living room couch.

I told him about Charlie Dodds in my house. About the slapjack across the head, the handcuffs, the Instamatic camera, the survival knife that he had started to shove into my heart. Then I told him about Clete, the working over that Dodds had taken, the rolled rug, and the trip in the jeep probably up a log road in either the Bitterroot Valley or the Blackfoot Canyon.

"You realize what you're telling me?" Nygurski said.

"I don't give a damn about Dodds. That's not why I called."

"You didn't tell the cops any of this?"

"I'm telling you. Do with it what you want. I'll bet nobody ever finds Dodds, though. Clete's done this kind of thing before and gotten away with it."

"You should have called the cops."

"Bullshit. I'd be trying to arrange bond right now."

"I'll have to report this to them."

"Go ahead. I think their interest level on a scale of one to ten will be minus eight. Look, Nygurski, there's somebody else after me or my daughter. He was hanging around her school this morning. Maybe it's Mapes, maybe it's another one of Dio's people. I need some help."

"I think it takes a hell of a lot of nerve to ask a federal agent for help after you run around two states with a baseball bat."

"We both want the same thing Sally Dee doing some serious time."

"No, you've got it wrong. I want to do my job. You want to write your own rules on a day-to-day basis."

"Then you give me a solution. You pledge the safety of my daughter, you assure me that I won't be headed for Angola Farm in about three weeks, and I won't be a problem to you."

"What kind of help do you want?"

"Can you find out if Dio might have another hit man in town?"

"If he does, we don't know about it. Maybe he put out the contract and let Dodds hire a backup guy. I tell you, though, if this new guy is working with Dodds, he's not going to try for any 'before and after' stuff, not after Dodds blew it. He'll go for a clean hit, one that you'll never see coming. I don't want to be graphic, but you know how they usually do it one behind the head, one in the ear, and three under the chin."

"Run Mapes for me."

"What do you expect to find?"

"I don't know. My lawyer says he was in trouble only once, for beating up a kid with a golf club when he was seventeen. But I've seen this guy in action, and I can't believe he hasn't bumped into the furniture more than once."

"Where's he from?"

"He beat up the kid in Marshall, Texas."

"I'll see what I can do."

"There's one other thing. Dixie Lee moved out of Dio's place. He says he's through with him. You might talk to him."

"About what?"

"That's your province. How about grand jury testimony? It took guts to walk out on Dio, particularly when he owes him fifteen thou."

"When did you decide to start sharing Pugh's secrets?"

"He's probably going to need federal protection sometime. He might be a drunk, but his head sops up information and people's conversations like a blotter."

"Where is he?"

"He's staying with me."

"What did you do for kicks as a kid? Swallow thumbtacks?"

"The guy's up against the wall," I said.

"No, I take that crack back. You're a slick operator, Robicheaux. Pugh becomes a federal witness, Pugh lives at your house, your house and the people in it go under our umbrella. Right?"

"Not really."

"I hope not. Because we choose the accommodations."

"Clever people don't end up in the mess I'm in, Nygurski."

"I think maybe there's solid truth in that statement. I'll get back to you. In the meantime you watch your butt."

"When can I hear from you about Mapes?"

"I'm going the extra mile for you. Ease up on the batter, okay? Have a little trust. If you ever get out of this, get your badge back. I think everybody would rather have you inside the tent pissing out the flap rather than the other way around. I'm sure of it."

Dixie Lee was up early the next morning and had breakfast with me and Alafair at the kitchen table. He was one of those drunks whose eyes clear and whose skin becomes pink and unlined with only a twenty-four-hour respite from alcohol. This morning his face was shaved and bright, and he wore a pair of pleated, white summer shorts and a white sport shirt with green parrots on it. I walked Alafair to school, then made him go to an AA meeting with me down the street and put his name in with the job-placement service. His mood was not as cheerful on the way back home as it had been earlier.