'What's it called?'
'Sir?'
'The supply house.'
'Yes, sir. I'm sorry, I'm a bit hard of hearing.'
'So am I,' the Deaf Man said.
'Then you know what it's like.'
More or less, the Deaf Man thought.
It's Conan Uniforms, sir, the second floor at 312 Baxter. They have a full line of chauffeur, butler, maid, doorman, janitorial, security, and medical uniforms. Was Regal recommended them, in fact. They have all Regal's specifications. Nice people to deal with, too. Are you thinking of becoming a chauffeur, sir?' he asked, smiling at the absurdity of such a notion even as the words left his lips.
'Not just yet, no,' the Deaf Man said, smiling with him, the oaf. 'Are you from London, David?'
Yes, sir. The part what's called Cheapside, do you know it, sir?'
'I do indeed.'
Yes, sir,' David said. 'Sir, we're about there now, would you care for the main entrance or the stage door?'
'The main entrance, please.'
Yes, sir.'
David made his turn at the corner, and pulled up in front of the concert hall.
'I shouldn't be long,' the Deaf Man said.
'I may have to move, sir, if the police come by. But I'll just circle the block till I see you.'
'Fine, David, thank you,' he said, and stepped out of the car.
In the glass-covered display frame to the right of the main entrance doors, there was a poster for this weekend's 'Three at Three' series. It showed a black and white photograph of Konstantinos Sallas holding his violin by the neck, and grinning at the camera. Pasted across the lower half of the photo was a narrow banner that read SAT 6/12 AND SUN 6/13.
The Deaf Man nodded and walked into the lobby. *
BERRIGAN SQUARE WAS near the westernmost end of the Stem, where a largely Jewish citizenry merged seamlessly with an increasingly Hispanic population that changed in a flash to what the real estate agents referred to in code as 'a colorful neighborhood.' Poison Park, as it was familiarly known to police and drug abusers alike, was a triangular-shaped patch of scrawny grass surrounding a bronze statue of Maxwell Wilkerson, Civil War general and later biographer of Abraham Lincoln.
Wilkerson was a witty man with a cheery smile (even in uniform) and graying hair (even in bronze) whose bravery and scholarship had enlightened an entire age. Standing at the apex of the triangle, surrounded by benches peeling dark green paint, sword upraised to the pigeons that soared overhead intent on defecation, and the traffic that zoomed on each of his flanks, east and west, he boldly dominated the small park and indeed the large thoroughfare itself. The shabby assortment of drug addicts and dealers assembled in the park didn't give a shit who Maxwell Wilkerson was or had been. Intent on scoring, each in his own way, they milled about the small triangle in the middle of the avenue, transparently exchanging folded bills for packets of white powder.
The cops in this city — and in most American cities — had long ago decided that the prisons were too full of petty drug abusers and had given up on making small busts. Being an addict was not a crime, but having in one's possession certain circumscribed amounts of controlled substances was. Even so, the law enforcement agencies concentrated instead on destroying the crops in South America and arresting the upper-level chieftains of the posses engaged in the traffic. They probably figured they were doing as good a job in the War on Drugs as the government was doing in its War on Terror even though they
didn't have eighty-seven billion dollars at their disposal.
Fat Ollie Weeks figured it all had to do with money.
Not too long ago, he had busted a vast conspiracy linking counterfeit money to illegal drugs to terrorism. So you didn't have to tell him, thanks, that what was going on in Poison Park, or on the desert sands of Iraq, was all about money. Didn't have to tell that to his good buddy Steve Carella, either, who - Ollie had to admit -had helped a little in busting the big 'Money, Money, Money Case,' as he still fondly thought of it.
With the possible exception of Carella — and, well, Patricia Gomez now, he supposed - Ollie didn't like many people, and he didn't trust anybody at all.
He knew that any of the junkies here in Poison Park would sell his mother to an Arabian rug merchant if he thought the transaction would pay for his next fix. He knew that any of the dealers passing out drugs here would happily kill any of his competitors or indeed Ollie himself if he felt his lucrative livelihood was being threatened. None of these people cared about bringing democracy to Iraq because they knew that nobody gave a damn about sharing the pie with them right here in America.
None of these people had benefited from a tax cut because none of them paid taxes. The junkies didn't vote because they didn't give a shit about anything but heroin or cocaine or meth or you name it. The dealers didn't vote because either they weren't citizens or they felt that whoever was President or Vice President didn't affect their lives in the slightest; in fact, if you asked them, they probably couldn't tell you who was now holding those elected positions.
Right here in America, the people here in Poison Park were as much slaves to using narcotics or selling narcotics as the black man had been a slave to King Cotton.
Right here in America.
So who cared what happened in Iraq?
Not Ollie, that was for sure.
Sitting on one of the benches as General Wilkerson's shadow slowly encroached on the tips of his brown shoes, Ollie merely hoped he was passing as either a junkie or a dealer because he had no intention of getting shot on this fine June afternoon.
True enough, he had never met a junkie of his size in his life. But he was dressed as seedily as every other addict in the park (the dealers fancied expensive leather, of course) and he had not shaved or bathed in preparation for the stakeout, and he tried to appear needy if not desperate. The addicts figured him for a new kid on the block; here in Dopeland, there was always a new kid on the block. The dealers approached him more warily; sometimes the new kid was carrying tin.
Ollie couldn't tell whether the man who sat down next to him on the bench was (a) an addict (b) a dealer or (c) an undercover like himself. This was the One-Oh-One Precinct; he knew some of the cops up here, but not all of them. In character (he felt) he scoped the man suspiciously. Neither said anything for several moments. Traffic whizzed by on either side of them, east and west. Another sort of traffic moved briskly in the park everywhere around them. Business as usual on this sunny June day.
At last, the man sitting beside him said, 'You a cop?'
'Sure,' Ollie said. 'Ain't we all?'
The man laughed.
Five of him would have made one Ollie, he was that thin. Wearing jeans that hadn't been washed in months, it looked like, and a thin cotton sweater, its sleeves pulled down to the wrists to hide his track marks, Ollie
guessed. Must've been twenty-five, thirty, hard to tell with some of these needle freaks. Hollow cheeks, darting blue eyes. The needy look Ollie was trying to emulate. Trying so hard he almost forgot he was here looking for a murderess. Murderer. Whatever, these days.
'You selling?' the man asked.
'No,' Ollie said.
'So what're you looking to buy?'
Was he a dealer? He sure as hell didn't look like one.
Actually, I'm a little short of bread just now,' Ollie said.
Ain't we all,' the man said, and laughed again. 'How about if you wasn't short?'
'I do a little Harry, is all. I just dip and dab.'
'Don't we all,' the man said again, but this time he didn't laugh. 'I'm Jonesy,' he said, but did not extend his hand.
Andy,' Ollie said.
A name he had used many times before. Andy. Sounded like a large man's name. Andy Fulton was the whole handle he often used on undercover. Big large name. 'Reason I'm here