I called it twenty grand, and started putting the boxes together again.
36
The earliest flight I could get back to Denver was the 6:47. I checked in an hour early and fought the ticket people at the Portland airport. There was a luggage limit and I was over it: even by paying excess freight charges, I couldn’t get more than five boxes on board without special permission. I battled my way up the bureaucratic chain, telling them I was a Denver detective working undercover on a case involving a major book theft ring. I didn’t have any identification, I said, because undercover cops never carry any, but my story could be verified by Detective Hennessey at DPD. Of course, before they could reach Hennessey, my plane would be gone, I said with the proper degree of helplessness. The man in charge at five-thirty in the morning was a suspicious bird: damned if he didn’t call Denver.
“They do verify that a Detective Hennessey is employed with the Denver police,” he said to the ticket people. He looked at me severely. “What did you say your name was?”
“Cameron.”
He looked at my ticket. “It says Janeway here.”
I rolled my eyes. “I’m traveling undercover,” I said with just the right edge of strained patience.
“Is there a Detective Cameron on the Denver police force?” he asked the telephone. He nodded and hung up. “Let him through,” he said to the ticket people.
God bless United Air Lines.
I slept all the way home.
At Stapleton, the chores of the day arranged themselves in my mind. The first order of business was to secure the books.
I drove to a storage locker I knew, rented a small unit, stacked the boxes two high on pallets off the floor, locked the unit, and went home.
I took a shower, shaved, and ate breakfast. A pot of coffee, double strength, brought me almost back to life, and I sat at the phone and lined up the day’s work.
Hennessey. The Ballards. Rita McKinley.
I wanted to know what the cops had found when they had gone into Rita’s place yesterday. I wanted to see the artist’s sketch, if they had made one, from the description Neff had supplied. Hennessey was the best avenue to that information. But then I looked at the calendar and saw that my entire afternoon was blocked out: today I was scheduled to give my deposition on the Jackie Newton lawsuit. “Son of a bitch,” I said. I said a few other things, fought back a temptation to throw my coffee cup through the wall, then settled down and called my lawyer.
Robert Moses wasn’t handling my case gratis, but he might as well’ve been. A long time ago, when I was in uniform, I saved his child from a pervert—strictly my good luck, and the little girl’s, that I was four blocks away when the stupid ass snatched the kid in broad daylight. A neighbor had seen it all, had called the cops, and a vehicle description was on the radio in less than two minutes. The dispatcher was still reading it when the car came speeding past the little greasy spoon where I sometimes stopped for coffee. I nailed the guy, and though I was only doing my job, Mose had been in my debt ever since. So he thought, and those are the only kinds of debts that matter. You couldn’t put the man off: he owed me a big one, and when Jackie Newton went after my hide, Mose offered his legal services free. We argued over money and finally resolved it this way: he would give me his best shot and I would pay him what I could, when I could pay it. I wondered how he liked making janitor’s wages.
“Where the hell’ve you been?” he said. “I’ve been trying to get you ever since I saw the paper this morning.”
“Been up in Oregon communing with nature. What’s the story this afternoon?”
“I dunno, what do you want it to be? I can get it put off, given what happened in your store yesterday. What the hell was that all about?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out. I could sure use the time this afternoon. How long is this likely to take?”
“They’re gonna try to sweat you. Levin’s a mean little prick; if he thinks you’re in a hurry, you’d better pack your supper and bring your toothbrush. That’s all this is, you know: he’s just trying to run up your legal fees.”
“Little does he know,” I said.
“This is just the opening salvo, my friend. My guess is they’ll try to bring you in again in a few weeks. Levin’ll conveniently forget to ask a fairly crucial question, and he’ll ask the court for a new deposition. Then there’ll be a flood of interrogatories and if we’re lucky we might get to trial sometime in 1994. My advice is this. Give ‘em a stiff upper lip. Don’t let the bastards rattle you. Be there today, right on time if you can. Let him take all night if he wants to. I’ll be with you, pal.”
“I know you will.”
“Our turn comes next week. I can’t wait to get that Crowell dame up here. I’m gonna nip this baby right in the bud. See, she’s never been deposed before, she don’t know what it’s all about. If she thinks Jackie Newton frightens her, I’m gonna scare what’s left of her into an early grave.”
I gave a dry little laugh. “That poor kid.”
“Save your sympathy. That poor kid is gonna put you under, if I let her. Which, given the handsome fee you’re paying me, I don’t intend to do.”
“I can’t help feeling sorry for her. None of this is her fault.”
“It’s all her fault. Don’t even think of asking me to go easy on her.”
“No,” I said. “Do what you have to.”
“I always do, Clifford. Now, what do you want to do about this afternoon?”
“You’ve probably rearranged your whole life for this.”
“I have made a few minor adjustments, yes. But don’t let that worry you; I can always take off and go fishing with my kids.”
“No, let’s do it. I’d sure like to be out of there by three o’clock if I can. It’d be nice to have some of the day left.”
“Don’t count on it,” Mose said.
I called the mortuary and made arrangements for Miss Pride. I called the cemetery and arranged for a burial plot.
I called Hennessey downtown.
“Where the hell have you been?” It was starting to sound like a catchphrase, something people automatically said when they heard my voice.
We decided to meet for lunch in a place not far from City Halclass="underline" from there I could walk over to Levin’s office and be there in plenty of time. It was already eleven-fifteen, so I went right over. All I wanted was a beer and a raw egg: Hennessey ate half a horse, with french fries. “Jesus, Neal, you’ll be lucky if you live another year,” I said, and knocked wood. I hoped he’d live forever, the sweet old son of a bitch. Hennessey had his stern look on. “Let’s get down to cases, buddy,” he said, and though I somehow guessed that he didn’t mean it, I managed to give him my rapt attention.
“I been trying to get you for twelve hours,” he said.
“I went for a walk in the mountains.”
“What’d ya do there?”
“Walk. Think. Look at butterflies.”
“It snowed in the mountains last night. There ain’t no butterflies.”
“The pretty kind, Neal, that ski and walk on two legs.”
There was a long silence. Hennessey had been my partner forever, it seemed: he had deliberately taken a more or less subordinate role because we did our best work that way. But he knew me inside out: he knew when I began to bend the rules because he had seen me do it often enough. He said, “Y’know, my bullshit detector’s going crazy here. The needle’s knocking the roof off.”
I ignored that. “What did you get from McKinley?”
He ignored that. “Cliff, what the hell are you up to?”
I said, “Actually, that elephant sandwich you’re eating doesn’t look half bad. Maybe I’ll have one.”
“C’mon, Cliff, stop screwing around. Look, I’ll ask you point-blank: are you messing around in this case? If you are, Cameron’s got a big package of trouble all wrapped and ready to dump right on your ass.”