‘Yes, sir, when the good Lord takes me, he’ll know that. It’s all I was put on this earth for, ‘cos God knows I ain’t been good for much of anything but rearing kids. Losing my little Tommy hurt me bad. When they die young, they stay young.’
‘How’s all his brothers doing?’
She took a wheezy breath. ‘I got one working for a real estate outfit, suit an’ all, another in a bakery, another in prison, and I got one... He was going bad, but he straightened out real good. He had a job uptown.’
‘Doing what?’
‘Odd jobs. For an art gallery — hanging paintings, sweeping up, cleaning. It was permanent, but the pay wasn’t good, so he’s looking elsewhere right now.’
‘Was it the Nathan gallery?’
‘Yes, sir, but a lot of bad things happened. There was a fire and she — the lady that owned it — was killed in it, so he was out of a job. Since then he’s been looking hard.’
‘That’d be Eric?’
‘Yes, Eric, my oldest. I know he was in trouble a few times, but I swear to you, he’s a good boy now.’
‘He live at home with you?’
‘Sometimes. He got his old room, but he comes and goes. He sees I don’t go short, though. Why you come here? On account of my Eric?’ She leaned forward. ‘What you want here in my house?’
‘I’m not sure — just an answer to a few things. Did you ever meet with a guy, maybe asking questions about the gallery?’
‘No, sir.’
‘You sure about that? Only I have some notes he made and, according to them, he paid a visit to you. It’d be a while back now.’
‘No, sir, I had no one visit me.’
‘How about someone calling to see Eric?’
‘No, sir, no one has been here, I’d swear to that on the Holy Bible.’
‘Is Eric around now? Could I see him?’
‘No, he’s out right now.’
Rooney was sweating — the cluttered room was stifling hot, even though only the screen door was closed. There was no breeze from the yard, and no air-conditioning.
‘Does Eric drive?’
‘Sure he drives. He needed a clean licence for his work at the gallery, and Mrs Nathan, she provided a van for him to deliver an’ collect. He was workin’ there quite a while.’
‘Did you ever go to the gallery?’
‘Who me? No, sir, I don’t get to go no place, not with my condition.’
‘Did you ever meet Mrs Nathan?’
‘No, Lord have mercy on her, I never did. I’m praying my boy gets work soon — see, with her gone, who’s gonna give him a reference? An’ he worked a long time for that gallery.’
Rooney turned to the bank of family photographs, dominated by the large one of the dead Tommy.
‘Which is Eric?’
She smiled and pointed. ‘The sharp-lookin’ one. He always was a fancy dresser.’
Rooney stared at the picture of Eric, gold chains round his neck, leaning against a wall and smiling to reveal a gold-capped tooth. Rooney had seen a few other photographs of Eric — in police files. ‘So he’s been straight since he got out?’
The big woman pursed her lips, then took a folded cloth from her pocket and dabbed her face and neck. She was sweating profusely. ‘That is all behind him, mister. He swore on his brother’s grave he would get out of that bad crowd he was mixin’ with. It wasn’t easy, believe me. You get into one o’ those gangs round here and they don’t let you out.’
‘No drugs any more?’ Rooney asked quietly.
‘No, sir. Like I said, he swore on his brother’s grave, day he came out of the pen. He went straight to the graveside and he got down on his knees, in front of me and his brothers and sisters, and he said he would stay clean. That was more’n seven years ago.’
‘You sure now, Mrs Lee Judd? I mean he’s unemployed right now, and, like you said, he comes and goes, so how can you be sure?’
She banged the side of her chair. ‘One brother, one son dead is enough. He wouldn’t do that to me.’
‘Does he blame himself for Tommy?’
She dabbed her neck, then looked at him directly. ‘There was one person to blame. We knew it, and you cops knew it too, but she never come to justice. She never come to court, she got away with murder, an’ no, no, my boy don’t blame himself. It was that bitch cop.’
‘You recall her name?’ Rooney asked.
‘No, sir, I do not.’
‘Does Eric know who she was?’
‘I can’t answer for what Eric knows.’
‘So he blames her too, does he?’
She clenched the arms of her chair. ‘You tellin’ me he ain’t got the right to blame her? She fired into that boy, kept on shooting. He was nothin’ to do with what was going on, he was just an innocent boy, and she shot him down like a dog.’
‘But he was there, wasn’t he? Looked like he was being used by Eric as a runner.’
‘Eric says it was a lie to get that woman off.’
‘But there were traces of cocaine found.’
‘No, sir, don’t you tell me lies. They’d have had that poor child shooting up to serve their purposes, but he was innocent, and Eric swore on the Bible he was not using him. An’ if you come here today to try an’ rake up dirt for some reason, then you get out of my house, you hearin’ me?’
Rooney stood up. Mrs Lee Judd was panting with anger, and he patted her shoulder. ‘Now, don’t you go gettin’ all upset.’
‘Why you come here? What do you want?’
Rooney hesitated, then looked at the big framed photograph of Tommy Lee Judd. ‘Just making enquiries, Mrs Lee Judd, an’ if you tell me Eric’s a reformed character, then...’
She dragged herself up to stand in front of him, shoving her face forward. ‘Like I said to you, Eric stood over that grave, an’ I won’t hear no bad things about him — he’s a good son.’
Well, I sincerely hope so, and more than that I hope he’s not runnin’ with the gangs again, because if he is I’ll be right on his neck an’ fast. I think your boy is looking for trouble, big trouble, so you warn him to stay in line. Warn him to back off — and quit making nuisance phone calls.’
Rooney got up. He had wanted to unnerve the woman, even though he wasn’t sure that it had been Eric Lee Judd calling Lorraine. It was just that old second sense, plus the fact that Eric might have seen her visit the gallery.
‘I’ll see myself out. Just tell that boy of yours I was round, okay?’
She wouldn’t let him go by himself, but shuffled after him, down the dark, dingy hallway. She wasn’t going to let him wander around her house like those snooping cops were inclined to do — she wanted this fat man out, and the door bolted behind him.
Rooney heard the bolts being slammed across the front door, then the chain, and he knew she was watching him through the broken stained-glass window. He went straight to his car, and drove out of her drive.
He parked about a hundred yards away down the street and made sure all his doors were locked. He wondered how long it would be before Mrs Lee Judd contacted her son and told him about the visit — his old cop’s nose knew she’d be trying, because one look around that cramped, dilapidated house had revealed a new TV set and video, fridge-freezer and washing-machine. They stuck out like a sore thumb beside the rest of the furniture, and were obvious signs of ready cash, signs of a kid handing over fistfuls of dollars to his mama.
Rooney sighed, and lit a cigarette: Lorraine had got off lightly from the Lee Judd episode. She was never called to court, as by the time of Eric Lee Judd’s trial she was long out of the force, hell-bent on drinking herself to death. There had been a major cover-up — he knew that better than anyone, as he’d been responsible for most of it — but the boy was not the innocent his mother had tried to make out. They had found traces of cocaine on his hands and inside his jacket pockets, that black jacket with the yellow stripe down the back that little Tommy had coveted because it had belonged to his brother Eric. They had also taken statements from two other kids they’d picked up, who had said that Tommy was running for his big brother, who was dealing to some of the clubs, mostly cocaine and ecstasy. Six months after the trial, Eric Lee Judd had been arrested in another bust, and this time he had served three years.