Chapa looked up at the four of them and shook his head.
“It's not a pog.” He smiled smugly. “It's a slammer, a member of the pog family.”
Jack looked down at the small round piece of metal, then back at Chapa with a gaze that was equal parts awe, bemusement, and pity.
“That's it,” Jack's voice was calm and steady. “Officer Gordon, get him out of here and keep him away from normal people until we take his statement, sometime around Labor Day.”
“Pogs were made of cardboard, this one's metal, and heavier, that's what makes it a slammer,” Chapa was talking fast, trying to get the words out before Gordon could grab his shoulders again and drag him away.
Jack snatched the bag back, returned it to her pocket. “Your turn. What, exactly, is a pog?”
Chapa folded his arms across his chest and looked like he was getting ready to hold court.
“They originally came from fruit juice in Hawaii. The treated cardboard milk cap beneath the screw-on bottle top of passion fruit-orange-guava juice. They had different designs, kids began to collect them and trade them by playing a game. You'd pile up a stack of your opponent's pogs face down, then hit them with a heavier piece called a slammer. The ones that turned face up you got to keep.”
Herb grunted. “Never heard of it.”
“Really big, back in the early 90s. Companies made millions of them. They were a fad for a while, some of the rarer ones sold for big bucks, like baseball cards. The one that popped out of Preston features a Bob Kane drawing. Classic Batman, before they turned his cowl from blue to black.”
“And you know this because…?”
“I'm a reporter,” Chapa said through a smirk. “That means I'm as close to being omniscient as any human being can possibly get.”
“If you're omnipotent you know that if you print any sort of speculation before we release an official statement I'll come down on you so hard your ears will bleed.”
Chapa smiled. “You can't repress the truth, Lieutenant. The people have a right to know.”
“They also have a right to be safe from murderers, which are a lot harder to catch if crime scene information leaks out. Now go take his statement, Gordon, and if he gets away from you again you're going to wish you didn't come to work today and instead stayed home and licked all the hair off of a monkey.”
Chapa laughed, then said, “Don't knock what you haven't tried, Lieutenant,” forcing Jack to suppress a smile of her own.
Gordon nodded, grabbed Chapa more firmly than possibly necessary, and pulled him off the scene.
“Want to get a smoothie?” Herb asked. “I've got a sudden urge for passion fruit-orange-guava juice.”
Jack didn't answer. She watched Chapa leave. While shooing away reporters was second nature to her, this one wasn't as annoying as most, and it seemed like he might have had more to offer. It didn't matter really. Gordon would do a decent interview, and if there was a follow-up needed Jack could always do it herself. Besides, real murders weren't like TV or books where the crime was solved an hour after it happened. It often took days, weeks, months, before an arrest was made.
Still, watching Chapa walk away left her with a nagging doubt that perhaps she should have pressed the man further.
Excerpt from PLANTER'S PUNCH by J.A. Konrath and Tom Schreck
Duffy
My face hurt like a toothache.
The boxer I'd just fought—a fat guy from Gary, Indiana who was supposedly slow and easy to hit—could punch. I hit him a lot, easily, but he countered well, and every time he did it felt like getting banged with a fabric-covered cinder block. Enough of those and it makes your head ring. Not a pleasant dull throb, but a crackling pain going through from your forehead to your jaw.
Incidentally, I won the fight—six rounds to two in an eight rounder that left me a thousand dollars richer. Now, my true reward; a trip to AJ's for a beer. I fought at the Armory, a two minute car ride to the bar, and got the shock of my life when I came through the front door.
The place had a crowd.
That never happened. Usually, the crowd, and I use that term loosely, consisted of the Fearsome Foursome, Kelley the cop, me and maybe, on a good night, a couple of cab drivers. Tonight other people had invaded my refuge.
Luckily, the Foursome had their usual seats at the bar and saved me one. Kelley, one away from that, was also in. Maybe not so luckily, the Foursome had already started.
“They wrapped her tits in ace bandages, you know.” TC said.
“She sprain 'em?” Jerry Number One said.
Fuck, they were arguing about the Wizard of Oz again. TC loved to talk about how Judy Garland had her breasts wrapped to look younger in her famous role.
“Jed Clampett got sick making that flick,” Rocco said. It silenced the room for a second while the others stared. I took my seat, put a hand up to my face. No swelling, yet.
“The glue on the lion outfit gave him the hives,” Rocco said with confidence.
“Bulger.” Jerry Number Two.
“It is not Bulger, it's the truth,” Rocco said.
AJ, the owner and only bartender, slid a bottle of Schlitz in front of me. I took a long pull and held the rest of it to my forehead.
“Let me get a Beam, too.” I said. AJ lifted his eyebrows but said nothing and put a sidecar of the brown elixir next to the Schlitz.
“Buddy Epson got allergic to the silver paint. Ray Bulger played the lion,” I said. “You fuckin' guys had this discussion a month ago.”
The Fearsome Foursome—Jerries One and Two, Rocco and TC—all stared at me.
“Sorry, fellas,” I said, realizing I'd snapped at them. “My head hurts.”
The unusual silence from the crew called my attention to the crowd in the bar for the first time. There were three strangers on stools on the end by the TV. They didn't look like the usual cab drivers who drifted in. Foreign, maybe eastern block, each in a suit worth more than my payday. They seemed familiar, and it dawned on me they were at the fight. I saw them in the dressing room hanging out with Wilkerson, the fight promoter. They also had front row seats.
I figured they probably followed me here for a drink, but then realized they were here before me. Unusual. Behind them, another group chatted quietly while sipping their drinks. A fat balding guy ate an AJ's cheeseburger, getting mustard, ketchup and grease on his face. He didn't bother with a napkin and instead dragged his sleeve in an upward motion across his mouth.
He talked to a forty-something woman in a very sharp suit—way too sharp for AJ's. No spring chicken, but hot enough in that self-confident, cougarish way.
I reached for the whiskey, letting it burn down my throat.
“Be cool, Duffy. Any second now, they're going to approach you, make the offer.”
I cocked an eyebrow at Kelley. “What the hell are you talking about? Did I just walk into a bad spy novel?”
“Lower your voice, dumb ass. I said stay cool.”
I was going to give Kelley more shit but his eyes made me think better. I took another pull on the Schlitz and played along.
“You wearing the wire?” I asked.
I guess I was going to give Kelley shit after all. But he surprised me by saying, “No. You are. Joint effort with the Chicago cops. Stick this in your pocket.”
He passed something into my hand. I glanced down. Looked like a pen drive.
Kelley wasn't the practical joker type. He wouldn't crack a smile on his birthday in a room full of clowns. Maybe my fat opponent had jarred something loose in my head, because I truly had no idea what was going on.
“Pocket,” Kelley said. “Here they come. Tell them yes.”
I felt movement to my right. The three well-dressed foreign-types were standing over me.
“Matching Rolexes,” Jerry Two said. The Fearsome Foursome were appraising the new arrivals. “Daytonas. Platinum bands.”