Lawrence Block - Everybody Dies

"Maybe the dean will give us a transcript of his record," I said. "You did good work."

"Just part of the service," he said, and lowered his head and sucked up the rest of his mochaccino. "Now what? We gonna hear some old people's music?"

The group on the small stage was a quartet, an alto sax and a rhythm section, and they were as white as I was and almost as white as Danny Boy. They all wore black suit jackets and white dress shirts and faded jeans, and I somehow knew they were European, though I'm not sure how I could tell. Their haircuts, maybe, or something in their faces. They finished the set and the audience, about three-quarters black, was generous with its applause.

They were Polish, Danny Boy told me. "I have this mental picture," he said. "This kid's sitting in his mother's kitchen in Warsaw, listening to this tinny little radio. And it's Bird and Dizzy playing 'Night in Tunisia,' and the kid's foot starts tapping, and right then and there he knows what he wants to do with his life."

"I guess that's how it happens."

"Who knows how it happens? But I have to say they can play." He glanced across the table at TJ. "But I suppose you're more a fan of rap and hip-hop."

"Mostly," TJ said, "Ah likes to go down by de river an' sing dem good ol' Negro spirituals."

Danny Boy's eyes brightened. "Matthew," he said, "this young man will go far. Unless, of course, someone shoots him." He helped himself to a little vodka. "I made some inquiries. The person who caused that unpleasantness in the Chinese restaurant the other night is a disillusioned and bitterly disappointed young man."

"How's that?"

"It seems he got half his money in advance," he said, "upon acceptance of the assignment, with the balance due on completion. As far as he's concerned, he completed the job. He went where he was told to go and did what he was supposed to do. How was he to know there were two gentlemen in the restaurant fitting the same description? There was in fact only one such gentleman to be seen when he entered, and he dealt with the man accordingly."

"And they don't want to pay him the rest of his money?"

"Not only that, but they've had the effrontery to ask for a refund of their initial payment. Not, I shouldn't think, with any realistic expectation of receiving it, but as a sort of counter to his demand for payment in full."

TJ nodded. "Somebody ask you for money, you turn around an' ask him for money. An' maybe he go away."

"That seems the theory," Danny Boy said. "I think they should have paid the man."

"Keep him from runnin' his mouth."

"Exactly. But they didn't and he did."

"What do they owe him?"

"Two thousand dollars," Danny Boy said.

"Two thousand still owing? Out of four?"

"Guess you ain't worth much," TJ said.

"You get what you pay for," Danny Boy said. He took a sheet of paper from his wallet, put on reading glasses and squinted through them. "Chilton Purvis," he read. "My guess is they call him Chili, but maybe not. He's living at 117 Tapscott, third floor rear. I never heard of Tapscott Street myself, but it's supposed to be in Brooklyn."

"It is," I said. "Right around where Crown Heights butts up against Brownsville." His eyebrows rose, and I said I'd worked there years ago. "Not in the same precinct, but close enough. I don't remember a thing about Tapscott Street specifically, and I suppose it's changed since then anyway."

"What hasn't? A lot of Haitians in the area these days, and Guyanese, and folks from Ghana and Senegal."

"All looking to make a better life for themselves," TJ said, "in this land of opportunity for all."

"He's afraid the police are coming for him," Danny Boy said, "or that his employers will show up to seal his lips with a bullet. So he stays in his room all the time. Except when he gets the urge to party and smoke crack and run his mouth."

"Suppose he could pick up the two thou he's got coming just by fingering the man who stiffed him. You think he'd go for that?"

"He'd be a fool not to."

"We already know he a fool," TJ said. "Killin' folks for chump change."

"I'll want to show him a sketch," I said. "But first let me show you, Danny Boy." I opened the envelope, got out one of the copies of Ray's drawing of the slugger. He studied it through his reading glasses, then took them off and held it at arm's length.

"Nasty," he decided, "and not too bright."

"And nobody you know?"

"Unfortunately not, but I wouldn't be surprised if he and I have friends in common. May I keep this, Matthew?"

"I can let you have a couple of extras," I said. I counted out three or four for him, and passed one to TJ, who was edging over for a look.

"Don't know him," he said without hesitation. "Who the other dude?"

"What other dude?" Danny Boy wanted to know.

I produced the second sketch. "Just an exercise," I said, and explained how Ray Galindez had drawn it to clear my mind. But it hadn't worked, I said, in that I'd still been unable to summon up the face of the second mugger.

Danny Boy looked at the second sketch, shook his head, passed it back. TJ said, "I's seen him."

"You have? Where?"

"Round the neighborhood. Can't say where or when, but he got one of those faces sticks in your mind."

"That must be it," I said. "I caught a glimpse of him last week in Grogan's, and I thought he looked familiar, and it's probably because I'd seen him the same as you did. And you're right, he's definitely got one of those faces."

"All those strong features," Danny Boy said, "and you don't expect to find them all on the same face, do you? That nose shouldn't go with that mouth."

I gave TJ a sketch of the slugger and folded one and tucked it in my wallet. As an afterthought I added a copy of the second sketch as well. I put everything else back in the padded mailing envelope.

I looked at my watch, and Danny Boy said, "The band'll be back in a couple of minutes. You want to catch the next set?"

"I was thinking I might go over to Brooklyn."

"To see our friend? You might find him in."

"And if not I could wait for him."

"Keep you company," TJ said. "He ain't in, you can tell me stories to pass the time, an' I can pretend I ain't heard 'em before."

"Past your bedtime," I said.

"You need someone to watch your back, Jack, 'specially when you's the wrong skin tone for the neighborhood. An' if you's to brace this dude Chili, you got to know two's better than one." At the concern in my face, he said, "Hey, I'll be safe. You armed and dangerous, man. You'll protect me."

"Just stay away from parked cars," Danny Boy said, and we both stared at him. "Oh, from when I was a kid," he said. "I told you about my list, right? Well, when I was growing up there were always a few kids every year who got run over by cars, and the cops sent someone around every spring and every fall to tell the schoolkids about traffic safety. You ever pull that detail, Matthew?"

"I was spared."

"There'd be this slide show, and an explanation of how each victim bought it. 'Mary Louise, age seven. Ran from between parked cars.' And half the time or more, that was it, running out from between parked cars. Because the motorist didn't see you coming."

"So?"

"So in my young mind, it was the parked cars that were dangerous. I'd sort of slink past them on the street, like they were crouched and ready to spring. Wasn't until later I realized that the cars that were parked were essentially benign. It was the moving ones that would kill you."

"Parked cars," I said.

"That's it. A fucking menace."

I thought for a moment, then turned to TJ. "If you really want to tag along to Brooklyn," I said, "why don't you do me a favor? Go to the men's room and stow this under your shirt."

He took the padded envelope, weighed it in his hand. "Don't seem fair," he said. "You got your state-of-the-art Kevlar vest, an' I got cardboard. You think this'll stop a bullet?"