“Fascinating,” he says.
We approach the booth.
I see an older guy with white bristle-brush hair and wraparound sunglasses bossing two acne-riddled kids rigging up a sheet of cardboard behind one of the gurgling oil vats so the grease won’t splatter into the tub of powdered sugar.
They’re attaching the cardboard to the back of the fryer with duct tape.
I glance at Ceepak.
He sees it too.
“Don’t jump to conclusions, Danny,” he whispers.
The boss turns around and looks like he has Pepsi Balls for lunch every day. He’s wearing an American flag golf shirt that shows off his sagging laundry-sack abs. I’m pretty positive Skeletor wasn’t feeding him free steroid samples.
Mr. America smirks when he sees us.
“Ha! Give me the fool gear!” he says with a belly laugh. The two young kids working the fry baskets turn around to see what’s so funny.
“Dude!” says one, whose American flag polo shirt is splattered with what looks like baby poop shot out of a blender without a lid. “Put down the corn cob!” He jabs a basket full of sizzling Oreos at me. It splashes a few droplets of hot grease on his co-worker’s canvas All-Stars.
“Shit!” says the co-worker, hopscotching in place. Scalding hot oil seeps through canvas every time.
“What do you need, boys?” asks the boss. “A pair of fresh Balls?”
He chuckles again.
Ceepak doesn’t chuckle back. In fact, he is in glare mode.
“I meant Pepsi Balls,” says the fry guy. He jerks a thumb to the sign offering “Two Giant Balls” for two bucks.
“Are you the proprietor of this establishment?” asks Ceepak.
“Yeah.”
“I’m Officer Ceepak. This is my partner, Officer Boyle.”
“I know who you two are.” Mr. America isn’t smiling any more. “I seen you on TV.” He holds up two fingers. “Twice. The Skee-Ball thing, and the thing with the brothers on the bikes.”
“Then, I take it, you remember the slender man we were pursuing as well?”
“Skeletor. Yeah. Sure. I remember him. Catchy name. Skel-e-tor!”
“Do you remember him working here?” asks Ceepak.
“Who?”
“Skel-e-tor,” I say, because Ceepak wouldn’t mock the guy as much as I do.
“What the fuck you talking about?”
“Perhaps we should step around to the rear of your booth,” suggests Ceepak. “Away from public view.”
“What? So you two can jackboot me into saying something I don’t want to say?”
“Pardon?”
The guy in the booth knuckles both fists on the counter so he can lean forward and get in Ceepak’s face.
“This is America,” he says. “I have my rights.”
“Indeed you do, sir. And it is our sworn duty to protect your rights. It is also our duty to apprehend those who would break the law.”
“What? Selling dope to jigaboos and mud people? You ask me, maybe these so-called drug dealers are doing America a favor. Thinning out the herd of jackals and illegal immigrants infesting the ghettos. Reclaiming this country for the people who founded it.”
“Seriously?” I say. “Allowing Skeletor to sell smack and steroids out of the back of your stall here is going to help fix America?”
“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and.…” He whips off his sunglasses dramatically so he can glower at us. “Tyrants! Thomas Jefferson said it first, not me. Now get outta here, boys. You’re scaring away my customers.”
“We will leave. As soon as you tell us about Skeletor.”
“What about him?”
“When will he back?”
“Who said he was ever here?”
“We have our informants.”
“Of course you do. Who? Some junkie from up in Newark you pay to tell you what you want to hear?”
“When will Skeletor be back?” Ceepak asks again.
“He was never here.”
“Sir.…”
“I only know him from TV.” He gets this manure-eating grin on his face and jams his hands into the front pockets of his jeans so he can rock back on his heels and gloat at us a little. “You two shouldn’t mess with a hornets’ nest, or we’ll swarm out to sting you.”
“We?” says Ceepak.
“Go away. I’m busy here. Got Ho-Ho’s to fry.”
“So you admit that you are a member of The Creed?”
“I don’t admit shit.”
“You don’t have to.”
“What?”
“Earlier, when you were leaning on your fists, I noticed the eights tattooed above your knuckles, two on each hand.”
“That’s when I graduated high school. ’88. 1988.”
“If true, your school spirit is commendable. However, I suspect you are lying to us about this, as well as your knowledge of Skeletor’s whereabouts.”
“Prove it.”
“We will. And when we do, trust me, sir, you will answer our questions or you will be incarcerated. Danny? Let’s go. We’ve learned what we needed to know. Be advised, sir, your booth will be under constant police surveillance.”
“What? What for?”
“Drug trafficking. Kindly inform Skeletor that, when he returns, he will be arrested.”
“Hah! He’s not coming back here. He’s not stupid.”
No, but some of his friends sure are. The guy just basically told us that, yes, Skeletor has been selling drugs out of his candy stand.
Of course, he’s also right.
We won’t catch Skeletor hiding behind the Pepsi Balls. The guy has slipped out of our grip more times than an oily Snickers bar.
We really only have one shot.
Playing the America’s Most Wanted card. Putting his bony face and Mandy’s Mustang on TV.
20
Monday, we go to church.
For Paul Braciole’s funeral.
We’re working crowd control and traffic outside Our Lady of the Seas Catholic Church, which more or less resembles a brick school building with a steeple and stained-glass windows. Don’t worry. Judging from the television satellite trucks lined up around the block, you’ll be able to watch highlights on all the major entertainment news shows, not to mention this week’s “Funeral for a Friend/To Catch a Killer” edition of Fun House.
We’re on a bit of a break. The TV anchor types are all in their satellite vans, waiting for the funeral to end so they can mob folks streaming out of the church, including several celebrities who dropped by to remember Paulie, a “young man of enormous talent who was taken from us too, too soon,” according to the church-lawn eulogy delivered by Marty Mandrake for the gaggle of reporters jabbing microphones in his face before the services started.
Prickly Pear Productions has hired about a dozen beefy guys in EVENT STAFF windbreakers to keep the crowd of mourning fans behind a hastily erected barricade of interlocking fences running up the sides of the church steps. Since it’s a somber occasion, all the looky-loos are behaving. Holding candles and sobbing. Making memorials out of stuffed animals, flowers, and, yes, tubs of bodybuilding protein powder.
We’re in our police cruiser, parked right at the curb in front of the entrance steps. Even our radio is quiet. Perhaps Dorian Rence is observing a moment of silence in Paulie’s honor.
Ceepak’s cell rings. The personal phone. He always wears two so he doesn’t “blur the line between my private life and my professional responsibilities.”
“Hello?” he says. If it was the business line, he’d say “This is Ceepak. Go.”
I do that slight head-tilt thing that I always think will make it easier for me to eavesdrop.
“I’ll have to call you back,” he says.
Whoever’s on the other side says something that sounds like a mosquito singing: “Bizz bizz-bizz bizz.”
So much for my head-leaning eavesdropping technique.
“Oh,” says Ceepak. “You saw it?”
The mosquito, I think, says “yes” or some other one-syllable buzz.
“Have my television appearances made you reconsider your job offer?”