Fast Shuffle, page 17
“You won’t give Scocci a pass, one of your own,” Sears said, “but for this guy Dickinson you put your dick on the chopping block.”
“Harry and I used to make mud pies together,” Rossiter said.
“You going to eat that?” Sears asked.
“Every night after supper, played Horse in my driveway.”
“Back when Horse was a game not a drug.”
“Joined the Scouts together.”
“You know how many calories that is?” Sears asked and forked a piece of shortcake and whipped cream.
“‘The Cub Scout follows Akela,’” Rossiter said. “‘The Cub Scout helps the pack go.…’”
“Goodie-goodies, the two of you,” Sears said.
“‘The pack helps the Cub Scout grow,’” Rossiter said.
“‘The Cub Scout gives goodwill,’” they said in unison.
“My brother’s troupe,” Sears said, “the Cub Scout gave good head.”
“I’ll bet you were one hell of a Brownie,” Rossiter said. “Harry, me … we went to the Jamboree together.”
“What did you get patches for?” Sears asked.
“Merit badges?” Rossiter said. “Indian lore, safety, insect study…”
“I played the clarinet,” Sears said.
“For the Brownies?” Rossiter asked.
“Fuck the Brownies,” Sears said. “Who had time for the Brownies?”
“What’d you play?” Rossiter asked.
“‘When I’m Sixty-Four’?” Sears said.
“Clarinet’s not a big rock instrument,” Rossiter said.
“Sly and the Family Stone, ‘Dance to the Music,’” Sears said.
“On the clarinet?” Rossiter asked.
“‘Tsiganeshti,’” Sears said. “‘Ba dem Zeiden’s Tish.’”
Rossiter narrowed his eyes: a question.
“‘At Grandfather’s Table,’” Sears said. “Klezmer. Yiddish. Whatever.”
“You’re Jewish?’ Rossiter asked.
“Methodist,” Sears said. “My grandparents were. Me? My God’s vanilla. Not much taste. But pure.”
“So why Ba dem yackety-yak?” Rossiter asked.
“My clarinet teacher was a big Jew,” Sears said.
“Big as me?” Rossiter asked.
“Big in the neighborhood,” Sears said. “Important. Symphony orchestra. Dances. Ninth grade, we still had sock hops in the church basement.”
“The Big Jew would play a church basement?” Rossiter asked.
“Every other kid’s playing ‘Peter and the Wolf,’” Sears said. “Bad um dum, dum dad um … The Cat!”
“I wanted to be the Wolf,” Rossiter said.
“You played French horn?” Sears asked.
“I played the radio,” Rossiter said, “the record player.”
“I had a recording,” Sears said. “Narrated by Arthur Godfrey.”
“Every year, the school did ‘Peter and the Wolf,’” Rossiter said. “They never had a French horn.”
“Who was that guy?” Sears asked. “The singer Arthur Godfrey fired?”
“So they let some lucky kid play it on a kazoo,” Rossiter said.
“Thirty years after,” Sears said, “my mom and dad still talked about it.”
“Never got the chance to play it,” Rossiter said. “Not even on the kazoo.”
“Talked about it more than the Kennedy assassination,” Sears said.
“Then,” Rossiter said, “I graduated from junior high.”
“Julius LaRosa,” Sears said. “That was the singer’s name.”
“And that was it,” Rossiter said. “Never got to play the kazoo.”
“I think he—Arthur Godfrey—was such a big deal because he had this integrated singing group,” Sears said.
“No more ‘Peter and the Wolf,’” Rossiter said.
“My father thought that was cool,” Sears said. “Nineteen sixties—it still got my mother’s goat.”
“Arthur who?” Rossiter asked.
A cop in a two-for-one gray three-button JoS A. Bank suit and an off-white shirt with a red tie sat down next to Sears, who shifted away from him. Hugging the wall.
“Wearing your TV shirt, McChesney,” Rossiter said. “You working some eleven-o’clock-newsbreak-stay-in-tune-for-the-sports-and-weather case?”
McChesney was rail thin, sallow, his skin the shiny brown of the polyurethaned table.
“How’s IAB?” Sears said, staring into the middle distance.
“Don’t start, Sears,” McChesney said.
“Hey, Connie,” Sears said, “I’m not the one who re-upped in Internal Affairs. Twice.”
“Last time I saw you,” Rossiter said, “when you were still on the street going after bad guys, I remember you nailed Public Enemy Number One.”
“A dangerous—what?” Sears grinned. “Longmeadow drunk?”
“He was trying to buy drugs right off the West Springdale Bridge,” McChesney said.
“That’s worth a commendation,” Sears said to Rossiter.
“You think this makes me pop a chubby,” McChesney said, “busting the balls of a good cop.”
“You got that right,” Sears said. “My partner, here, is a good cop.”
“You talk to the CO?” Rossiter asked.
“I wanted to reach out to you first,” McChesney said. “You being Harry’s friend and all.” McChesney half-turned toward Sears, who still did not look at him. “This guy—Dickinson—when he commits one of his cute felonies, your partner—the good cop over here—ever give him a pass?”
“You ever bend the rules?” Sears asked her partner.
“I’m an Eagle Scout,” Rossiter said.
“We can do this in my office?” McChesney still addressed Sears. “On video. If you want.”
“Let me know when,” Sears said. “I’ll wear my Clinique.”
McChesney got up.
“You change your mind,” he said, “give me a jingle.”
Two steps away from them, McChesney hesitated.
He licked his thin lips, made a tk-tk sound with his tongue.
“You going to ask me for a date,” Sears said, “come right out—say it.”
“Me?” McChesney said. “Why would I want to step in that swamp.”
Sears waited.
Under the table, Rossiter shifted his feet. The table heaved.
To Rossiter, McChesney said, “Your pal’s getting a rough break.”
Rossiter stared him down.
“I’m just saying,” McChesney said.
McChesney left.
Outside, Rossiter and Sears headed to their car.
“I’m drunk,” Sears said.
She fished in her left pants pocket.
“I got my keys,” Rossiter said. “Leave your car.”
“My paycheck,” Sears said. “I keep forgetting to go to the bank.”
“Use the ATM like the rest of us,” Rossiter said.
“Put my check in a machine?” Sears said. “You trust them? You know what, Rossiter, this shift, night shift, it don’t matter, we’re freaking vampires…”
As she opened the passenger door of Rossiter’s car, she said, “Your pal Harry’s got a gun, right?”
“He’s in the hospital,” Rossiter said. “Anyway, the gun’s a prop. Harry hates it when he spills his coffee. He’s not going to leave a mess.”
CHAPTER 95
Friday found Harry lying, fully dressed, in bed in the dark. His hat beside him.
“Harry,” Friday whispered.
Harry sat up.
Friday slipped into the room and closed the door behind her.
“How’d you get in here?” Harry asked.
“I was taught by the best,” Friday said.
She kissed Harry.
“You were right,” she said.
“Right?” Harry asked.
“Marian,” Friday said. “Cotton’s safe. The gun. We got to get you out of here.”
“Why?” Harry asked.
Harry was listless.
“Did they already give you a shot or something?” Friday asked.
“Pills,” Harry said.
Friday searched Harry’s face.
“You okay?” she asked.
“It’s been a long day,” Harry said.
Harry started to lie back down. Friday stopped him.
“Harry,” she said, “it’s like The Big Sleep. When they gave Marlowe the drug.”
Harry shrugged.
“You’ve got to fight it,” Friday said.
Friday took Harry’s arm, got him out of bed and to the door.
“Your hat!” she said.
Friday turned back to the bed and Harry’s hat.
Harry said, “Yeah…”
“You’re leaving without your hat,” Friday said.
Harry shrugged.
“You never go anywhere without your hat,” Friday said.
Harry shrugged.
“The pill works,” Friday said.
“I guess,” Harry said.
Friday grabbed the hat and put it on Harry’s head.
CHAPTER 96
Harry and Friday hurried down the clinic hall.
“You saw Cotton’s gun,” Harry said.
“We go back,” Friday said, “get it, and—”
“We call the police,” Harry said, “let them handle it.”
Friday shot Harry a disappointed look.
“Before you took the pill,” Friday said, “you wouldn’t have said that.”
“Look, Linda—” Harry said.
“Linda?” Friday said. “You call me Linda?”
A night watchman came around the corner ahead of them.
“So, Mr. Dickinson…,” Friday said, going into a role.
“It’s not going to work,” Harry muttered.
Friday tried harder.
“You were explaining the difference between alligators and crocodiles,” she said.
The night watchman stopped and studied them.
“Now,” Friday said, “which one has the narrow snout?”
As they passed the night watchman, Friday smiled at him.
“Ma’am,” the night watchman said, “where’re you taking that patient?”
Friday hurried Harry along.
“Insomniac,” Friday explained. “Late-night panic attack. We’re walking it off.”
The night watchman started after them.
“Can I see your staff ID?” the night watchman asked.
Friday ran, half-dragging the reluctant Harry after her.
Outside, Harry and Friday headed across the lawn toward the parking lot. Behind them, in the clinic, lights went on. An alarm bell started ringing.
As she ran, Friday said, “You called me Linda!”
Harry said, “It’s your name.”
They reached the Tercel. Friday started the motor even before Harry had his door closed.
“What have they done to you?” she asked.
“Not half what they’ll do if they catch us,” Harry said. “Let’s go!”
Friday put the car in gear and, scattering gravel, peeled out of the clinic grounds.
PART FIFTEEN
People were funny. They got a big thrill out of hunting a live man who was free in the streets.
—Ben Hecht
1001 Afternoons in Chicago
CHAPTER 97
“Friday called,” Rossiter’s wife, Maggie said, the moment Rossiter came through the mudroom door.
“Telling you I’m a hard-hearted bastard,” Rossiter said. “Where’s Chloe?”
“You think I need her to tell me that?” Maggie said, throwing over her shoulder the red-checked dish towel she’d been holding. “Doing homework.”
“How long ago did Friday call?”
“Two, three hours. Maybe less.”
“Old news,” Rossiter said. “I’m bushed.”
“Bed, huh,” Maggie said. “I get fifteen minutes to say how’re ya doing. Lucky me.”
Rossiter followed Maggie into the kitchen, where she grabbed a flyswatter and started stalking flies.
“Why don’t you get some fly strips?” Rossiter said. “Hang them around the house?”
“They get into my hair,” Maggie said, whacking a fly in midair.
“Hang them higher,” Rossiter said.
“They’ll get into your hair,” she said.
Rossiter rubbed his palm over the bristle on his head.
He opened the refrigerator, peered into the abundance of leftover food—Saran-Wrapped plates of cold meat and pale green vegetables, red-topped Rubbermaid plastic containers filled with week-old hummus, raw carrot sticks and raw celery sticks, whole cooked tomatoes in light sauce, homemade apple sauce—and grabbed a bottle of beer between his second and third fingers.
“Harry’s got Friday going,” Rossiter said, twisting off the bottle cap. “She’s getting as nuts as he is.”
“Why she doesn’t leave his bony ass for your old pal.”
“Plante? He’s no pal.”
“She should get married. Start a family.”
Maggie whacked a fly on the wall.
“My helping Harry out time to time,” Rossiter said. “The CO contacted Nightwatch, the city-wide commander. IAB’s sniffing around.”
“You going to lose your pension?” Maggie stopped stalking flies. Held the flyswatter upright like the Statue of Liberty’s torch.
“I can’t help Harry anymore,” Rossiter said.
Maggie killed a fly on the window over the sink.
“IAB,” she said. “Shit!”
She scooped up the dead fly with a Kleenex. It left a smear, which Rossiter wiped away with a thumb.
“What do we have for dessert?” Rossiter asked.
“You haven’t had dinner yet,” Maggie said, putting the flyswatter on the kitchen table.
Daintily, Rossiter picked up the flyswatter and tossed it into the sink. He spritzed the table with Fantastic and wiped where the flyswatter had been.
Maggie put a piece of homemade shortcake—with a biscuit, not angel food cake—in front of Rossiter.
Rossiter nodded.
“Six strawberries,” he said. “You think it gives me a glow, helping to bust my best friend?”
“I think you’d bust me and the kid if you had the chance,” Maggie said, slapping a fly on the kitchen table with her hand. Right next to her husband’s shortcake. “I think you’re the fucking Angel of the fucking vengeful God.”
CHAPTER 98
The moon was high in the sky when the old-fashioned telephone on the stand at the top of the stairs rang.
A red light on its base blinked.
The telephone rang again.
Phil—in Vishnu-blue striped pajamas, glasses pushed up on his forehead, a forefinger keeping his place in the book he was reading: a World War I spy novel—hurried out of the first room off the upstairs hall.
“Why the hell don’t they call my cell,” Phil grumbled.
A dead ladybug lay on the stand. Phil crushed the bug between his forefinger and thumb. It made a satisfying crack.
Once more, the phone rang.
Phil looked at it and thought, Now that Harry’s gone, we can get rid of this antique.
The top-of-the-stair telephone jack had been installed half a century ago.
The telephone rang a fourth time.
“Who?” Phil asked into the phone. “What?”
Phil ran a hand through his hair, which stood up like a cockatoo’s crest. He made a few mm-hmm’s, tugged at the tip of his nose, and asked, “Where do you think he’s going?”
Carol hurried out of her bedroom, tying the belt of her quilted bathrobe, holding the current New Yorker at her side.
“What’s happening?” she asked.
“Harry’s escaped,” Phil told her, hanging up the phone.
Carol tried to hide a smile.
“They think he’s on his way here,” Phil said. “We better lock the doors.”
“You really think he’s dangerous?” Carol asked. “Give me a break.”
“He’s not dangerous,” he said, “but he shouldn’t be here.”
“Why not?” Carol asked. “It’s his home.”
CHAPTER 99
Friday took corners at sixty miles an hour, skidding, throwing Harry against the passenger door.
Harry slumped in his seat.
“We’re going … where?” Harry asked.
Friday turned left onto McKinley Avenue, skirting the park, the shortcut to Longmeadow.
“Turn the car around,” Harry said.
Friday ignored him.
“I’m not going to Cotton’s,” Harry said.
“I tried Rossiter,” Friday said. “He didn’t pick up.”
“Turn the fucking car around,” Harry said.
Friday looked at Harry, her mouth open, her eyes stinging.
“Harry…?” Friday said.
“Turn the car around,” Harry repeated.
“You sound like Phil,” Friday said.
He looked away from her, out the passenger-side window.
“Cotton kills this guy Pillette,” Harry said. “I get locked in the loony bin. And you don’t like the way I sound. Am I missing something here?”
“Yes,” Friday said. Softly. “I think you are.”
CHAPTER 100
Rossiter was crouched down in the back aisle of the convenience mart, a huge humped figure, trying to decide between Cape Cod Chips and Sierra Chips—why didn’t Maggie tell him which kind she wanted when she sent him out on the errand—when he heard a young voice (he, at first, thought it might be a girl) tell the clerk, “Empty your cash register.”
Rossiter eased his gun out as he peered through three other aisles, past cans of soup, pet food, boxes of pasta, at the kid in the gray hoodie holding an ancient Saturday Night Special.
“Sure,” the clerk said. “Sure thing.”
Still crouched, silently, Rossiter crab-walked his way toward the end of the aisle. Like many big men, he was light on his feet.
On the TV above the counter, Bruce Willis jumped from a helicopter onto the top of a speeding truck.
Distracted by the movie, the kid said, “Jesus.”
The clerk, also distracted by the movie, said, “I seen it when it was in the movies.”
