Packet made another notation. Jeff thought it was time the officer called in the license number and had Records run a trace on the Jaguar’s plates.
As soon as Jeff finished school and could pass the exams, he was going to be a cop. Not a patrol cop, but a genuine crime investigator. He was good at figuring things out. Two years earlier he had tracked down the Pattersons’ cat when it disappeared for three days, found it a few doors down, accidentally locked in a neighbor’s house when they left on vacation.
Catching Murley frowning at him, Jeff dropped to his knees and rubbed vigorously at the Chevy’s polished wheel cover. He couldn’t see quite as well now, but he could hear the oystershell ground cover crunching under the officer’s hard-soled shoes as he circled the Jaguar, scribbling on his tablet.
“It’s got a flat,” the cop said, apparently spying the right front wheel.
“Yep.” Murley’s tone said it didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. “These fancy foreign jobs get flats just like the homegrown variety when somebody slashes the tire wall.”
Jeff watched the reflection in the Chevy’s chrome as the officer folded his long body to examine the three inch gouge. He made another note on his pad and stood up.
“You have a look inside the car before you called us? Try to find out who it belongs to?”
“Didn’t touch nothing,” Murley said. “Told the kid not to touch nothing, either. Don’t belong to me, don’t want no part of it.”
But Jeff watched Murley’s eyes roaming over the sleek sports car, taking in the wire wheels and twin pipes, probably thinking that half the cars on the lot, lumped up and sold as a package, wouldn’t bring in as much as this gem was worth.
Gem or not, Jeff didn’t like Jaguars.
His sister’s big-shot boyfriend — Sangriff — thought Jags were boss. Top down, showing off his third-degree tan like some kind of South American sun god, he’d pick up Jeff’s sister and take her tooling around until all hours, to places Mom would have shrieked to hear about had it not been the golden boy courting her daughter. Make enough trips south of the border, anybody’d look golden and glossy, Jeff tried to tell Sis. But all she could see were the fancy presents Sangriff brought back, big-shot international trader that he was. What exactly was Sangriff trading, Jeff had wondered. Nobody made that much money in a legit business.
He stood up to polish the Chevy’s side mirror and watched Packet stride toward his blue and white squad car, parked near all the clunkers with oil or transmission leaks on the grass where drips wouldn’t show. Leaning across the front seat, the cop scooped up the radio’s hand mike and relayed the Jaguar’s license number. Faint static issued as somebody replied.
Jeff listened hard, wishing he could think of a reason to amble closer, but Murley would fine him an extra hour of unpaid overtime if he caught Jeff slacking. The fat old man had moved to the front bumper of the Jaguar, giving the car a wily eye that meant he was scheming something, probably trying to figure a way to turn a dollar from his unlikely stroke of luck before Providence teed up for another swing.
Murley didn’t miss a trick when it came to wheeling and dealing. But Jeff had to give the man his due, he wasn’t as greedy as other dealers along used car row. Murley never sold a car without a seventy-two-hour warranty, never repossessed one until a payment was three days late. And Jeff was grateful for having a weekend job that didn’t cut too deep into his school work. Mom wouldn’t have let him keep it otherwise.
Reaching inside the Chevy, Jeff started the engine, as if he hadn’t already warmed up all the cars so they’d start fast and run smooth. Then he lifted the hood and pretended to tinker. Actually, the idle did sound a little rocky, like maybe the carb was mixing too rich. Jeff adjusted it, then switched off the engine and began to detail the already detailed interior.
“You know an Arnold Tanninger?” The officer’s hard-soled shoes crunched across the shell.
Jeff slid nearer the window, skimming an Armor All rag over the dash pad.
“Don’t recall knowing anyone by that name,” Murley said. “Unless maybe a customer from some time back. Paid cash, maybe. Nobody I’m holding paper on now.”
“Tanninger’s a parolee, petty theft, suspected of small-time drug dealing. Last known address is less than a mile from here.”
“Petty theft?” Murley’s tone was incredulous. “And this car belongs to him?”
“The plates belong to a car registered to Tanninger. An Olds-mobile Cutlass.”
“You mean the car and the plates don’t match.” Murley’s eyebrows dipped together like two caterpillars at a square dance.
Footsteps crunched closer, and Jeff peeked out to see the officer standing a few feet away, looking at the Jaguar’s door, thumbs tucked under his belt, lips thinned to an exasperated slash in his lean face. He wants to look inside, Jeff thought, examine the car for clues, bumper to bumper. That’s what I’d do. But first he’ll run the chassis number. That will take longer than the plates, and he’ll have to open the Jaguar to find it.
“Got a slim jim inside, you want to jimmy that lock,” Murley said.
The officer darted him a stern look.
“Hell,” Murley hedged, “customers always locking keys inside their car, wanting us to get ’em out.” He shrugged his thick shoulders.
The officer turned his frown back on the car door.
“So,” Murley said, “you think this guy Tanninger stole the Jag, put his own plates on it, then dumped it here with a slashed tire?”
“We’ve got somebody checking on Tanninger,” the officer said.
Jeff could have told them where to find Arnold Tanninger — pumping gas at the Exxon four blocks down. When he wasn’t pumping gas, he was peddling crack. Tanninger had caught up with Jeff one day leaving the schoolyard after a hassle with the phys. ed. coach.
“Hey, kiddo,” Tanninger’s smelly arm snaking around Jeff’s shoulders. “That was a bum deal you got back there.”
Jeff tried to shrug him off, but the arm stuck like nettles.
“Kinda stuff gets you down,” Tanninger said. “Coach got on my case, too. Kicked me out, so I set myself up in business. Who needs school when you can make more bread on the street than any of those suits in their high-rise cages? Whatcha say we hang out, get mellow, talk some business?”
“Get lost,” Jeff had told him, adrenaline still rushing from the hassle over his American history grades. No pass, no play. He was doing fine in his other subjects, but what use was memorizing dates of old wars and treaties and such?
Tanninger pulled out a knife, a nasty thing with a short curved blade. “Why you laying down that kinda shit, kiddo, hen I’m trying to be nice to you?”
Jeff was scared. It had been stupid to pop off to Tanninger. Now he was in deep trouble.
By that time they were passing the Patterson house, where Jeff had become a hero after finding the cat. He had also helped Mr. Patterson plant Spanish daggers under all the windows to ward off burglars when he worked late and had to leave his family at home alone. The concrete sidewalk lay close to the Pattersons’ house, Spanish daggers grown up man-size after two years, sharp pointy leaves stretching in all directions.
One eye on the ugly knife, Jeff pretended to trip on a deep crack. He feinted a fall and jabbed his elbow into Tanninger’s side, shoving him into the daggers and turning fast, a well-placed kick finishing the job. He hadn’t hung around to find out how Tanninger freed himself, but he heard later that Mrs. Patterson called 911 with an attempted burglary. The wicked knife bearing Tanninger’s prints hadn’t won any favors with the cops.