Haskins looked up from his coffee. “Hey, hi,” he said.
“Two coffees,” Genero said to the counterman.
“You looking for me,” Haskins asked, “or you just happen in?”
“We’re looking for you.”
“What’s up?”
“How you want those coffees?” the counterman asked.
“Regular,” Willis said.
“One regular, one black,” Genero said.
“Two regulars, one black,” the counterman said.
“One regular, one black,” Genero said.
“He wants a regular,” the counterman insisted, “and you want a regular and a black.”
“What are you, a comedian?” Genero said.
“It’s all on the arm anyway, ain’t it?” the counterman answered.
“Who says?”
“The day a cop pays for a cup of coffee in here, that’s the day they give me a parade up Hall Avenue.”
None of the policemen answered him. They were not, as a matter of fact, in the habit of paying for coffee in local eateries. Neither did they enjoy being reminded of it.
“Bill, we’re looking for a kid about eighteen, nineteen,” Willis said. “Long blond hair, handlebar mustache. See anybody around like that?”
“I seen a hundred of them,” Haskins said. “Are you kidding?”
“This one was wearing a jacket with the fur side inside, the skin side out.”
Haskins shrugged.
“Big sun painted on the back of it,” Willis said.
“Yeah, that rings a bell. I think I seen that jacket around.”
“Remember the kid wearing it?”
“Where the hell did I see that jacket?” Haskins asked aloud.
“He might have been with another kid his age, black beard, black hair.”
“No,” Haskins said, and shook his head. “An orange sun, right? Like an orange sun with rays coming out of it, right?”
“That’s right, orange.”
“Yeah, I seen that jacket,” Haskins said. “Just the other day. Where the hell did I see it?”
“Two coffees, one regular, one black,” the counterman said, and put them down.
“Jerry, you ever see a kid in here wearing a fur jacket with a sun painted on the back of it?” Haskins asked.
“No,” the counterman said flatly, and walked back into the kitchen.
“White fur, right?” Haskins said to Willis. “On the inside, right? Like white fur?”
“That’s right”
“Sure, I seen that goddamn jacket. Just give me a minute, okay?”
“Sure, take your time,” Willis said.
Haskins turned to Genero and conversationally said, “I see you got the gold tin. Who’s your rabbi?”
“I was promoted a long time ago,” Genero said, somewhat offended. “Where the hell have you been?”
“I guess I don’t keep up with what’s happening around the station house,” Haskins said, and grinned.
“You know I was promoted.”
“Yeah, I guess it just slipped my mind,” Haskins said. “How you like the good life, Genero?”
“Beats laying bricks all to hell,” Genero answered.
“What doesn’t?” Haskins said.
“About that jacket...” Willis interrupted.
“Yeah, yeah, just give me a minute, it’ll come to me,” Haskins said, and lifted his coffee cup in both hands, and sipped at it, and said, “That new kid covering out there?”
“He’s doing fine, don’t worry about him.”
“The Monkey Wrench!” Haskins said, snapping his fingers. “That’s where I seen the damn thing. In the window of The Monkey Wrench. Right up the street.”
“Good,” Willis said, and nodded. “Got any idea who runs that shop?”
“Yeah, these two dykes who live over on Eighth. Just around the corner from the store.”
“What’re their names?”
“Flora Schneider and Frieda something, I don’t know what. Flora and Frieda, everybody calls them.”
“What’s the address on Eighth?”
“327 North. The brownstone right around the corner.”
“Thanks,” Willis said.
“Thanks for the coffee,” Genero yelled to the kitchen.
The counterman did not answer.
Detective Arthur Brown was a black man with a very dark complexion, kinky hair, large nostrils, and thick lips. He was impressively good-looking, though unfortunately not cast in the Negro mold acceptable to most white people, including liberals. In short, he did not resemble Harry Belafonte, Sidney Poitier, or Adam Clayton Powell. He resembled only himself, which was quite a lot since he was six feet four inches tall and weighed two hundred and twenty pounds. Arthur Brown was the sort of black man who caused white men to cross the street when he approached, on the theory that this mean-looking son of a bitch (mean-looking only because he was big and black) would undoubtedly mug them or knife them or do something possibly worse, God knew what. Even after Brown identified himself as a police detective, there were many white people who still harbored the suspicion that he was really some kind of desperate criminal impersonating an officer.
It was therefore a pleasant surprise for Brown to come across a witness to the grocery store shootings who did not seem at all intimidated by either his size or his color. The person was a little old lady who carried a bright-blue umbrella on her arm, despite the fact that the day was clear, with that sharp penetrating bite in the air that comes only with October. The umbrella matched the lady’s eyes, which were as clear and as sharp as the day itself. She wore a little flowered hat on her head. If she had been a younger woman, the black coat she was wearing might have been called a maxi. She leaped to her feet as Brown came through the front door of the grocery, and said to him in a brisk resonant voice, “Ah, at last!”
“Ma’am?” Brown said.
“You’re the detective, aren’t you?”
“I am,” Brown admitted.
“My name is Mrs. Farraday, how do you do?”
“Detective Brown,” he said, and nodded, and would have let it go at that, but Mrs. Farraday was holding out her hand. Brown clasped it, shook it, and smiled pleasantly. Mrs. Farraday returned the smile and released his hand.
“They told me to wait in here, said a detective would be along any minute. I’ve been waiting half the morning. It’s past ten-thirty now.”
“Well, Mrs. Farraday, I’ve been talking to people in the neighborhood since a little after eight o’clock. Takes a little while to get around to all of them.”
“Oh, I can well imagine,” she said.
“Patrolman outside says you’ve got some information for me, though. Is that right?”
“That’s right. I saw the two men who held up the store.”
“Where’d you see them?”
“Running around the corner. I was on my way home from church, I always go to six o’clock mass, and I’m generally out by seven, and then I stop at the bakery for buns, my husband likes buns with his breakfast on Sundays, or coffee cake.”
“Um-huh.”
“Never goes to church himself,” she said, “damn heathen.”
“Um-huh.”
“I was coming out of the bakery — this must have been, oh, close to seven-thirty — when I saw the two of them come running around the corner. I thought at first—”
“What were they wearing, Mrs. Farraday?”
“Black coats. And masks. One of them was a girl’s face — the mask, I mean. And the other was a monster mask, I don’t know which monster. They had guns. Both of them. But none of that’s important, Detective Brown.”
“What is important?”
“They took the masks off. As soon as they turned the corner, they took the masks off, and I got a very good look at both of them.”