“To what?”
“To whatever it is you’re getting at. Look, for a double sawbuck I’ll put up with a crowd of toothless rednecks yelling up at me for being blind and let a two-hundred-and-fifty-pounder pretend to push me around in the ring, but that’s it. I don’t buy into anything else.”
Some of the runners were slowing and looking their way. Scruggs waved them back into motion.
“Were you watching when Rose came down to check out the ruckus?”
“I was more concerned with this Hatpin Mary throwing a fit at ringside and giving me the evil eye. I don’t need to take a knife in the back for chicken feed. Don’t kid yourself it happens.”
“Why do you think Rose stuck his nose in and tussled with Delaney?”
Scruggs checked an automatic protest of ignorance, a peculiar inner questioning on his face. “You know that creep never shows his puss unless he’s hyping a big card.”
“So? If Delaney did use another gig on Mitchell, could Rose have come down so he could take it off him? Then Delaney could beat his chest while Rose made off with the evidence. Possible?”
Scruggs mulled it over and said, “It’s professional wrestling. What isn’t possible?”
Friday — 6 P.M.
Brookings and Scruggs had both expressed personalized doubts about the value of witnesses drawn from Wednesday’s live audience. Nevertheless, Brewer had taken the names of regulars they knew either worked or lived close to the arena.
Eyewitnesses in general are unreliable, but these were delusionaclass="underline" dishwasher, counter man, ward of the state, or person with no visible means of support, each was fixated on the personalities and predicaments unfolding weekly at what used to be the Majestic Theater. Their intense fascination left no room for doubt about the authenticity of the IWL saga. Brewer was surprised that Delaney and Scruggs hadn’t ended up in the morgue along with Chuck after experiencing the spittle-spraying diatribes he evoked from a couple observers. It reminded him of a story about frenzied soap-opera fans so deeply imbued with their suspension of disbelief that, happening upon an actress in public who portrayed a home-wrecking vixen on the tube, they had cursed and physically attacked her.
The worshipers of pseudo-mayhem presented him with a shared article of faith. Like Bud, all were convinced that Chuck Mitchell’s death was a result of Delaney’s brutal attack. They also believed that the reigning champ, “The Prince,” would exact a terrible vengeance against the killer on the twenty-third. Forever and ever, amen.
He found Kenny Stiglitz, the trainer, tucked into the corner of a dark booth in Webbie’s Tavern. He was a middle-aged guy with the build and demeanor of a discarded soldier. Brewer identified himself, and immediately tears began to run down the man’s stubbly face. His throat was so constricted he could barely speak. It was the first semblance of remorse Brewer had seen since first talking to Bud.
He told Stiglitz he was an old friend of Mitchell’s, hoping the connection would break down the kayfabe barrier, but it just made Stiglitz more gloomy.
“I wouldn’t blame Buddy if he came and broke my neck for this. I never shoulda walked away, even if the kid said he was all right.”
“The cut, Kenny. Can you tell me about that?”
“Whattaya mean? He went too deep on hisself.”
“Could you see there was more than one cut?”
“Was there? You think I could see that with all the blood? Christ!”
He put his face down on his clenched fists.
“Maybe if I’d been sober I woulda realized...”
That was about all Brewer could get out of him.
He grabbed some Chinese on his way back to the squad room. It was too late to make the Mitchell wake, but if he hacked away at his paperwork tonight, he could drive up for the burial tomorrow with a clear conscience.
He stopped the chopsticks halfway to his mouth, realizing loyalty and commitment to Bud were sinking now beneath the surface of forms, folders, and food containers littering his desk.
Mercifully, the phone rang. It was Wendt.
“What a good civil servant you are. What’s the wife got to say about all this?”
“No wife. No pets.”
“That ain’t the way I remember it.”
“That’s the way it is now.”
“You may be on to something. Anyway, you still churning the Mitchell thing?”
“Yeah, and you were right about it going nowhere.”
“What, you don’t like that Delaney guy no more?”
“I do, but nothing’s shaking loose. How’re you doing with that dead lady?”
“We’re sweating the husband, the smarmy bastard. Anyway, I’m not going to get blindsided on this Mitchell thing, am I?”
“I would’ve liked Bud with us while we watched that tape.”
“You can’t change reality, Brewer. Look, tell your guy he might be able to sue in civil court, but it falls short of criminal. So long.”
After some thought, Brewer picked up the phone again.
“Don’t hang up, Martin. Just listen. I’ve pretty much got it down, and I have you and a couple other sources tell me that you’re truly busted up about Mitchell once you find out how bad it is. I believe it. I think Rose asked you to put him down — just why, I don’t know — but I don’t believe you had your heart in it. Trouble is, no one tended to the cut the way they should have, and Chuck was too banged up to realize how bad off he was.
“When I look at you, I see a conscience at work. I think you need to say what really happened. Get out from under this weird storybook crap that Rose has you guys jammed up in.”
Silence...
“Look, Martin, I saw the tape of the match. So did Homicide. Wouldn’t it be better if you came forward before they decide to come after you? Wouldn’t that be better for the missus?”
A long pause, then a heavy-handed click.
Friday — 9:15 P.M.
Adele had grown up in this town. Some of her old acquaintances plus the wrestling coach and a few kids from Chuck’s high-school days had come by earlier in the evening. Bud thanked everyone quietly and listened keenly to stories about Chuck and Adele. He tried not to come off as the brooding presence that had broken up the household, but he was pretty sure he failed at that too.
The funeral parlor grew quiet and filled with empty shadows. He sat alone with fifteen minutes to go and stared at a restored profile that had nothing to do with the boy who had been alive.
He heard something and turned. For a moment, he thought someone’s kid had wandered away from another wake and was peeking in at him. But when the short figure rolled into motion, he recognized the stunted body and got up.
Burgess “Big Tiny” Blair possessed a rugged, elongated face on a normalsized head, but its disproportion to the rest of his body was striking. His dark suit was from the husky-boys department at J.C. Penney’s and hung kind of loose.
He came straight to Bud and held up his small but powerful hand. “Sorry ’bout the boy, Bud. Lemme take a look at him.” Big Tiny’s voice had grown raspy, and Bud didn’t like the chalky pallor of his skin.
They went to the coffin and Blair stood on tiptoe on the kneeler. On impulse, Bud lifted him from behind and held him up for a better look, realizing just how much bulk Tiny had lost.
“Okay, Bud, put me down. We gotta talk. I was on the card.”
“I know. I was watchin’. You done good — considerin’.”
“It’s what happened after we gotta talk about.”
There was a tavern directly across the street. A couple of regulars on barstools gave them long, impassive looks as they came in and then went back to their private reveries. Some Irish mourners were reminiscing loudly in the back, so the pair took a booth up front. Bud sent the waitress for boilermakers.