Роберт Паркер - Double Play

“I do what I’m hired for.”

“Me too,” Cash said.

“Can you give me a week, I don’t have to be looking around every corner?”

Cash looked at him silently, nodding his head slowly. Eddie Stanky, on a 3–1 pitch, fouled out to Ray Lamanno. Cash grinned suddenly. There was a wolfish quality to the grin.

“Sure,” Cash said. “Why not?”

Burke called Julius Roach from a pay phone near the clubhouse door.

“Nice to hear your voice again, Burke. What can I do for you.”

“I need to talk with whatever colored guy runs the rackets in Harlem.”

“And you think I would know?” Roach said.

“Yes sir.”

“Would you care to tell me why you want this?”

“No sir.”

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a moment.

Then Roach said, “Call me tomorrow.”

“Thank you.”

Again silence.

“Have you heard at all from my daughter,” Roach said.

“No.”

Silence.

“She all right?” Burke said finally.

“Certainly,” Roach said.

“Give her my best.”

“No,” Roach said. “I don’t think I will.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow,” Burke said.

Burke closed his eyes and stood with the phone still in his hand for a long time after Roach hung up. He pressed his shoulder blades against the wall and rolled the back of his head slowly back and forth on the concrete, until Jackie showed up.

“How long you been with your wife,” Burke said to Jackie as they drove home.

“Met her in 1941,” Jackie said. “We were both at UCLA.”

“You been together since.”

“Yes. Got married ’bout a year and a half ago.”

“Any regrets?” Burke said.

“It’s the greatest thing I ever did,” he said. “Who we talking about here?”

Burke shook his head.

“We talking about you and that girl that likes bad men?”

“What the fuck do you know?” Burke said.

Jackie smiled.

“Hell,” he said. “I been to college.”

Burke snorted. They drove in silence for a time, until Jackie spoke again.

“What if you turned out not to be so bad a guy as you think you are?”

Burke shrugged.

“And she liked you anyway?”

Burke shrugged again.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” he said.

“You brought it up,” Jackie said.

“I just asked about your wife.”

“Sure,” Jackie said. “I guess that’s right.”

Wendell Jackson had an office in the back of a pool room on Seventh Avenue near 131st Street. There were three Negroes playing pool when Burke entered. All three looked at him without comment.

“Looking for Wendell Jackson,” Burke said to them.

They paid no attention to him. Burke walked past them to the back of the pool room and knocked on a closed door beside the Coke machine. It was opened by a well-built light-skinned Negro with a thin mustache. He was wearing an expensive tan double-breasted suit, a white on white shirt, a hand-painted tie and a Borsolino hat. He looked at Burke without speaking, his body blocking the door opening.

“I’d like to talk with Wendell Jackson,” Burke said.

“Un huh.”

The Negro didn’t move.

“Julius Roach sent me,” Burke said.

The Negro looked silently at Burke for a time. Then he closed the door. Burke waited. In maybe a minute, the door opened again. The Negro stepped aside and Burke went in. There was another Negro. He was slender and much darker than the man who’d opened the door. He had receding hair and wore a white shirt with loose sleeves, and high-waisted gray slacks and sandals. The shirt was unbuttoned over his smooth hard chest. He was half lying on a chaise drinking iced tea. He gestured Burke toward a straight-backed chair beside a desk. The light-skinned Negro closed the office door and leaned on the wall beside it with his arms folded over his chest. Burke sat in the straight chair.

“I’m Wendell,” the dark-skinned man said. He stressed the second syllable.

“My name’s Burke.”

“You want some tea, Burke?”

“Sure.”

“Ellis?”

The light-skinned Negro went to a refrigerator in the corner of the room and took out a pitcher and poured some tea into a tall glass. He put the glass on the desk next to Burke and went back to his space beside the door.

“Hope you like it sweet,” Jackson said.

“It’s fine,” Burke said.

“I like it with a little fresh mint,” Jackson said.

“Sure,” Burke said.

“So what does Julius want?” Jackson said.

Burke shook his head.

“It’s what I want.”

Jackson raised his eyebrows and tipped his head a little.

“Honest to God?” Jackson said.

“I asked Julius who ran the rackets up here, and he sent me to you.”

“How you know Julius?”

“Used to be his daughter’s bodyguard,” Burke said.

Jackson smiled and drank some tea.

“So you the gentleman snapped a couple of Frank’s boys.”

“Yes.”

“Had a little problem with young Louis, I think.”

“I did,” Burke said. “Now I don’t.”

“You bodyguarding Julius’s daughter,” Jackson said. “You protecting her from people or people from her.”

“Either way,” Burke said. “Now I’m guarding Jackie Robinson.”

“Goddamn,” Jackson said. “You hear that, Ellis? This is the man guarding Jackie.”

Ellis nodded silently.

“So you be the guy had the blowout with Johnny Paglia over on one two five.”

“Yes,” Burke said.

“Man, you do get about, do you not,” Jackson said.

“You pay attention,” Burke said.

“Happened in my neighborhood,” Jackson said. “You didn’t fool with no sissies.”

“Luck of the draw,” Burke said. “I need you to help me.”

“Why I wanna do that?” Jackson said.

There was the faint hint of an accent in Jackson’s voice. Maybe Caribbean, Burke thought.

“Couple nights ago,” Burke said, “Paglia sent two guys to kill Jackie, in his home, while his wife was there.”

“Paglia’s a pig,” Jackson said. “Got no style.”

“How come he’s able to do business up here?” Burke said.

“Had a piece of it before I moved in,” Jackson said. “Seemed easier to let him keep it than take it away from him.”

“Could you?” Burke said.

“Take it away from him? I think we could. What you think, Ellis?”

“ ’Course we could,” Ellis said.

“So that’s our leverage,” Burke said.

Jackson smiled.

“Our leverage,” he said. “I like your style, white boy.”

“I want you to call Paglia off of Jackie.”

“Why I wanna do that?” Jackson said again.

“You and he are the same color,” Burke said.

“Sho nuff,” Jackson said. “And we all like fish fries and watermelon and picking on the old banjo.”

Burke didn’t say anything.

“You want more tea?” Jackson said.

Burke nodded.

“Ellis?” Jackson said.

Ellis poured more tea.

“You like watermelon, Ellis?” Jackson said.

“I do,” Ellis said with no expression, “and I likes to dance and do the buck and wing.”

Still Burke was silent.

“You can’t handle this yourself, Burke?”

“No. Paglia’s got, what, fifty people? Sooner or later one of them will get by me.”

The room was quiet. Jackson gestured toward Ellis with his empty glass and Ellis poured him more tea. Burke drank his. Jackson drank his. Ellis stood by the door.

“What you think, Ellis?” Jackson said after a while.

“Jackie’s a good player,” Ellis said. “I like to watch him.”

Jackson drank some more tea.