An hour later Abby hung up and reported, “Well, you’ll be happy to know that I finally found a company using blue tags,”-at which point Dart hung up in the middle of a call. “You shouldn’t have done that,” she said. “They use blue tags, but their numbers aren’t close to this five-digit one that we have.”
His moment of elation past, Dart sank down in his chair and rubbed his eyes. “Did they say anything about blue tags?”
“He gave me the name of the company that wholesales the tags,” she replied, and Dart realized that this was where he should have started all along. “Nutmeg Supplies out of Bridgeport. But it’s Saturday, and they won’t reopen until Monday. So if we can wait-”
“We can’t,” he reminded.
“No. I didn’t think so.”
“But we may not have to,” Dart said, recalling that Bud Gorman often worked weekends.
Gorman was an avid NASCAR fan, and liked to travel to NASCAR races all over the country. He managed this without chewing up too much vacation time by working six-day weeks and then trading in this extra time for a Friday or Saturday of his choice, buying himself three-day weekends whenever a race required an extra travel day. Dart reached him and was put on hold.
Gorman returned to the phone angrily. “You never return my calls.”
“I’ve hardly been home.”
“I have the Roxin information for you-who they are; what they’re about.”
“I have more urgent, local needs.”
“Dr. Arielle Martinson,” Gorman said, ignoring him. “Three venture capital firms and an industrialist from Sweden own seventy-three percent. Martinson’s been at the helm since the inception. She came out of the University of Michigan, where she chaired the genetics research program, which saw a hell of a lot of federal funding and where this industrialist, Cederberg, first met her. A real slow start to earnings, as with most biotechs-six years until it made a nickel. Has done very well with an arthritis treatment-”
“Artharest,” Dart interjected, forcibly interrupting the man. “Another time, Bud. Thanks. I’ve got an-”
“What you might be interested to know,” the man continued, undaunted, “is that Martinson-who pulls in eight hundred a year, plus stock options, incidentally-has nearly an entire year of her life missing. I mean, I’ve got basically nothing on her. I show some medical expenses, some attorney expenses, and that’s about it. ‘That’s all, folks.’ My guess is, she went off to what amounts to the funny farm in Switzerland. But it wasn’t no vacation-I don’t show that kind of spending pattern at all.”
Dart recalled the thick scar behind her ear and her nervous habit-her compulsion-of attempting to keep it hidden.
“My guess is, if I could get into her insurance records …,” Gorman said wishfully. Dart made a note to call Ginny and see what she could do. He felt himself sweating. Gorman had agitated him.
Dart charged in before Gorman could start again. “I need the name-and the phone number for that matter, if you’ve got it-for the owner of something called Nutmeg Supplies in Bridgeport.”
“Wait a second,” Gorman said, disgruntled. “Let me write this down.”
Dart repeated his request, and gave his extension in the conference room.
“Gimme a couple minutes.”
When the phone rang and Dart answered it, Gorman read off the information without saying hello. He ended with “No charge” and hung up.
Dart reached the owner of Nutmeg Supplies at home and heard football in the background on television. The television made him think of home, and that made him think of Mac, and even with the neighbor kid walking and feeding the dog during the days, he felt awful having to lock the dog up so much on night shift. The owner of Nutmeg Supplies, a man named Corwin, grew angry with Dart at first, believing the call was a phone solicitation. “I’m with the Hartford police,” Dart repeated for a third time.
“I thought it was a gimmick,” the man said apologetically. “That you was selling home security or one of them steering wheel locks or something.”
“I’m not selling anything,” Dart said.
“I understand that.” He apologized again.
Dart stressed the urgency of his case, building up Corwin’s importance and underscoring that the information was vital to an active homicide investigation. The man rallied to the call, an unusual but welcome response. “I’ll need to go down to the office. Blue tags, you said? Only blues?”
“Blue; Five digits, starting with nine-eight.”
“If we sold them,” Corwin said confidently, “I’ll know who to.” He paused. “You did say murder, right?”
“That’s right.”
“That’s what I thought you said.”
Forty-five minutes later, Corwin called back. “I got two retail and one commercial with blue tags. The ninety-eight thousand series went to Abe’s over on Seymour.”
“Seymour?” Dart shouted into the phone without meaning to.
“Yeah, Seymour Street. Abe’s Commercial Laundry.”
Dart checked the open yellow pages for an address. “Abe’s is not listed in the Yellow Pages,” he complained.
“They’re commercial, not retail. They do institutional work-nursing homes, that sort of thing. I doubt they would advertise.”
“No retail?” Dart asked.
“Some, probably. There’s a storefront of sorts, as I recall-mind you, I haven’t done a delivery in ten years. It’s not a big part of their business-retail. That’s a bad part of town.”
“Yes, it is.”
“Even ten years ago.”
“Yes.”
“Commercial work, mostly. They’re a good customer for us. Big volume.”
Dart thanked the man and was already turning through the white pages, his finger running down columns. A manicured nail entered his vision-Abby had found the listing. Corwin clarified, “You said a murder investigation, right?”
“Yes I did.”
“And I helped?”
“Very much.”
“That’s okay … I like that…. Hey, Detective?” he said, holding an impatient Dart on the phone. “Nail the bastard.”
Dart thanked him again and hung up. He told Abby, “He said to nail the bastard.”
“What did you say?” she asked.
“I thanked him.”
She was over checking the map, pinned to the wall. “It’s Seymour Street, just south of Park Street.” “We can’t go in there alone, Joe,” she chided. “Not without a cruiser. Not without backup.”
He didn’t want to get into this with her. Haite would resist giving him any help, would never grant him backup. What made this worse, much worse, for Dart was that just the sound of the words Seymour Street was familiar to him, but he couldn’t remember why, could not place the voice speaking those words, Corwin’s voice too fresh, too present, in his mind.
But then that voice came to him. After seven years of hearing a voice daily it did not stay blurred for long. Walter Zeller had been raised in his parents’ house on Seymour Street, back when Park Street had been a good neighborhood, not a demilitarized zone. He had spoken of that house, that time, often, affectionately, nostalgically, referring to it simply as Seymour Street.
Dart could not remember what had happened to the house. Zeller had inherited it upon his mother’s death four years ago. That much he remembered well, because Zeller had paid some inheritance tax rather than sell the place, despite its almost worthless value. He wasn’t sure what had become of the place after that.
Perhaps, Dart thought, Wallace Sparco lives there now.
CHAPTER 38
This was it-Dart knew before he set foot out the door.
He stole four hours sleep at home after walking Mac around the block and fixing himself a tuna sandwich. By five-thirty it was dark outside, and it occurred to him that the earlier the better because the worst gang violence came after ten at night, by the time the drugs and the alcohol and the restless anger had taken hold. He dressed in black jeans and a navy blue sweatshirt so that he could walk with hood up and buy himself some disguise.