By the time Culver returned, much later, in another cab, it was all over. Liam O’Gara was in police custody and warrants had been issued for the arrest of William Hazelhurst and Barnett Lovell. The banker lapsed into a rare moment of generosity, praising Lyman for his expertise and paying him twice the agreed fee. Because it was Steen who tackled the man responsible for Culver’s beating, he was given a sizeable reward. A protection ring had been smashed, and the streets of the neighborhood were safe once more.
“I can’t thank you enough, Mr. Lyman,” said Culver, pumping his hand. “I’d recommend you to anybody.”
“Thank you, sir,” said the detective. “Matt and I are always ready to take on any assignment. Just remember that prevention is better than the cure.”
The banker frowned. “I don’t follow.”
“You should’ve come to me when you received that first warning letter. Then we could’ve taken steps to ensure that you were never given that beating. It’s always much more satisfying to nip a crime in the bud. That way,” said Lyman, pointedly, “the only person who gets hurt is the villain.”
Copyright © 2010 by Edward Marston
Powder Goes Hunting
by Michael Z. Lewin
“This satisfying, intelligent private eye novel unfolds with expert timing,” Publishers Weekly said of Michael Z. Lewin’s first novel in the Albert Samson series, Ask the Right Question, which first saw print forty years ago. Now it’s back in print in paperback, available at backinprint.com and online bookshops. Another popular Lewin character, Indianapolis cop Lieutenant Leroy Powder, takes the lead in this new story, which compels our attention in the quiet way we’ve come to expect Powder tales to do.
Lieutenant Leroy Powder slowed his car as the house numbers got close to 1228. Although off-duty and dressed in civilian clothes, in truth he considered himself to be at least as on duty as when he was running roll call, no matter what his paymasters might say. He was hunting criminals. Tracking them. Getting evidence. Working out how to catch them.
It wasn’t something he did much these days. Mostly he, and the officers who worked under him, just responded to evening events on Indianapolis’s North Area swing shift. Sure, sometimes there were things to be deduced or discovered, steps to be taken, conclusions to be drawn. But most of the time it was less heady. Securing crime scenes, finding witnesses, reassuring disturbed members of the public.
Such things were important. Of course they were. And there were also better and worse ways to do them. Here, however, Powder was being positive in his policing. He was being proactive. It was like being a detective again, but without reopening that whole can of worms.
The neighborhood Powder was cruising was not luxurious, but its eighties ranch houses had well-established yards. Maybe the houses were closer together than new-builds of the type these days, but the residents were also closer to the center of town than they would be in houses built now. The development’s modest but comfortable properties were an easy commute to North Area. And at the same time, they were near to good roads that led into the countryside. They were a good fit for the kind of criminal Powder was stalking.
And, indeed, two of his criminals lived here. One at 1228 and the other only a few houses away and just around a corner.
Powder had five criminals on his list. Well, technically they were suspects, but nobody with half a brain could think of them as anything but self-advantaging, selfish liars and defrauders of the public purse. Criminals.
When Powder spotted 1228, he pulled up across the road. He took an envelope and a clipboard from his passenger seat. He put on a Colts cap and a pair of sunglasses. Then he got out and went to the door and rang the bell.
It was answered by a woman in a bright red-and-white gingham pinafore. How many wives — even those without their own jobs — wore that sort of thing these days? It was sort of nice to see: rather reassuring and traditional. Powder hadn’t often talked about personal things with Barry Haller, but even so he had the impression that Haller was a traditionalist where women were concerned. That they should be homemakers and child-raisers, cake-bakers and churchgoers, present-buyers and clothes-finders. PTA members and neighborhood morals-vigilantes? Lordy, it bored Powder just to think about it. He wondered if it bored Mrs. Haller too. Maybe she took regular drags on the cooking sherry.
Still, she opened the door to the stranger halfway, rather than peeping through a crack. That meant she was confident in her own house. And maybe trained in martial as well as marital arts? Or was it that she held a pistol behind the door in the hand Powder couldn’t see?
“Hi, ma’am,” he said. “I have a letter for Barry Haller that he needs to sign for.” Powder held up the clipboard. The envelope was resting on it.
The woman tilted her head. She frowned, but just for a moment. “I’ll sign for it,” she said. “I’m Mrs. Haller.”
“Oh, I do wish you could, ma’am. Unfortunately it needs to be signed for by Mr. Haller himself.”
“Well, he’s not here right now.”
“Is he expected back soon?” Powder looked at his watch.
“I’m not real sure.”
“I could wait. I mean, out there, o’ course.” Powder gestured to his car. “Or I could come back later on.”
“It may be a long time.”
Powder’s faced wrinkled in sympathy. “He hasn’t split the sheet with you or nuthin’ like that, has he, ma’am?”
“Oh no. Good heavens. He’s just out, with some friends.”
“This time of day? Well, nice for some.”
“Confidentially,” Mrs. Haller said, “I’m not really supposed to say where he’s gone.”
“Ah,” Powder said with a smile. “It’s a secret. Out gettin’ you a fancy anniversary present? Or is it your birthday?”
“No, no.”
Her statement was meant to be a finish to the conversation but Powder just stood and waited.
In a way, it was sad that doing nothing more than maintaining eye contact could intimidate the woman. But there it was. When she saw that Powder wasn’t going to leave, she shrugged and said, “Between you and me, it’s the first day of deer season.”
“Ah.”
“He managed a day off from work to go to Hancock County with some of his buddies.”
“I got it now, ma’am,” Powder said, truthful in more ways than one, because he’d been recording the conversation on a small recorder taped to the underside of his clipboard. “Well, tell you what. Why don’t I just go back to base and find out if you can sign for the letter yourself after all. I’ll explain the situation to my boss. I expect she’ll understand.”
The boss Powder was referring to wasn’t really his “boss” but she did understand.
Although Carol Lee Fleetwood worked in the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department’s headquarters downtown, she was now a civilian. A paralyzing bullet near her spine ended her short but distinguished field career, even in this age of ramps and access. Still, in Holland they hire blind police officers because they’re better at telling recorded voices apart, and as soon as Fleetwood had regained consciousness she declared her determination to continue police work. She might not be blind, but she was smart. There had to be a place for smart in IPD, as it was then. IMPD now. Somewhere.
“Somewhere” eventually turned out to be in Human Resources, formerly known as Personnel. And once she found her slot there she rose to become, effectively, the top dog — some said bitch — in IMPD HR. Politically sensitive — and vulnerable — officers of high rank might establish the department’s general personnel policies but it was Fleetwood who made the policies work — if they could work. She wasn’t quite able to make silk purses out of any old policy-sow’s ear, but she had a track record for making purses of cotton or even satin from the basest policy materials. Nowadays it seemed that HR could hardly do without her.