"What'd he look like?" Carella asked.
"He was a white bird, large in the chest, with. "The man who bought the gun."
"Oh. He was a tall blond guy."
"Blond guy with a blue coat and a red scarf, Anna said. "Tall blond guy. Sure. Matter of fact was in here twice."
This was beginning to get interesting. Georgie hoped it wouldn't get too interesting. "The first time was Friday night around midnight Anna said. "He was meeting a guy named Bernie comes in here all the time. Scar on his right think he's a bookie."
"The blond guy?" Tony asked.
"No, Bernie."
"Did you happen to get his name?" asked Priscilla "I just told you. Bernie." "I mean the blond guy."
"No, I didn't. Matter of fact, the first time I laid eyes on him was Friday night."
"When was the next time he came in?" "Yesterday," Anna said. "Around twelve noon. with Bernie again. They sat right over there," she pointed to a table. "Money changed hands. least yesterday, it did. On Friday, they were talking. He seemed very angry."
"The blond guy?" Priscilla asked.
"No, Bernie."
"He was angry yesterday?"
"No, he was angry Friday. Yesterday, he was all smiles."
"So as I understand this," Georgie said, interpreting for Priscilla, "on Friday night the blond guy and Bernie the bookie just sat over there and talked, and Bernie was pissed off about something, is that correct?"
"Yes," Anna said.
"But money changed hands yesterday and Bernie the bookie was all smiles, Is that also correct?" "Matter of fact, yes," Anna said.
"You know what this indicates to me?" Georgie said.
"What?" Priscilla asked.
"A man paying off a marker."
"That's what it looks like to me, too," Tony said, nodding sagely.
Priscilla nodded, too, and then turned back to Anna. "But you never got the blond guy's name," she said. "Matter of fact, I didn't" Anna said.
"And you don't know Bernie's last name."
"Just his first name."
In which case, let us be on our way, Georgie thought. "But maybe Marvin knows," Anna said. Matter of fact, he did.
Three black guys who looked like they were homeless bums were warming themselves up around a fire in an oil drum on the corner of Ainsley and Eleventh. Ollie felt like arresting them. He was cold and he was tired
after a full eight-hour shift, not to mention here and there around the city afterward trying to get a line on who iced the hooker and her two black Three-thirty in the fuckin morning, he really felt like arresting them.
"You guys," he said, approaching the blazing dram. "You know arson's against the law?"
"Nobody committin no arson here, suh," one of the men said. He was a grizzled old bum looked like a black guy in the prison picture, whatever it was The Scrimshaw Reduction, about this black guy used to drive around this old Jewish southern before he got sent up. The old bum standing with hands stretched out to the fire looked just like that in the picture. The other two looked like black bums you'd see standing around any three-thirty in the morning. Nobody looked They all just kept staring into the flames, reaching toward them.
"So is this your usual corner here?" Ollie asked. "This lovely garden spot here?"
He was being sarcastic. This was an unusual stretch of Ainsley Avenue. Because of the storm and because this was Diamondback, nobody gave a damn about refuse collection anyway overflowing garbage cans stood against tenement walls and marauding rats the size c were boldly shredding stacks of black plastic bags noise of the rats was frightening in itself. crackle of the fire in the oil drum, Ollie could hear their incessant squealing and squeaking scratching. He felt like shooting them.
"Everybody hard of hearing here?" he asked. "This's our regular corner here, yessuh," the one from the Scrimshaw picture said. Ollie didn't know who he hated most, the ones who bowed and scraped or the ones with attitude. There wasn't much attitude around this fire tonight. Just three cold homeless bums afraid to go crawl into their cardboard boxes lest one of their brothers did them in the night.
"You happen to be here Saturday night around this time?" he asked. "Little later, actually?"
None of the men said anything.
"Hey!" Ollie shouted. "Anybody listening to me here?"
"What time would that've been, suh?" the older bum said. Doing his Uncle Tom bit for the benefit of the dumb honkie cop.
"This would've been six o'clock in the morning, suh," Ollie said, mimicking him. "This would've been a taxicab letting out a white blonde in a short skirt and a red fur jacket who was being met by three white guys in blue parkas and a black guy in a black leather jacket. So were you here at that hour, suh, and did you happen to see them?"
"We was here," he said, "and we happen to see em."
Carella and Hawes got to The Juice Bar about five minutes after Priscilla and the boys left. Marvin the bartender and Anna the hat check girl both felt it was deja vu all over again. Just a few minutes ago, three people who might, have been under-covers had been here asking about a tall blond man, and now here were two more very definite detectives flashing badges and
asking about the same tall blond man. Then Carella and Hawes asked exactly what they had told Priscilla and the boys.
So now five people were looking for a guy named Bernie Himmel.
The cops had an edge.
At this hour, The Silver Chief Diner was populated with predators. The morning shifts not begin till eight, and any honest person with a job office cleaners and hospital personnel, employees and cops, night watchmen, bakery cabdrivers, short-order cooks, hotel workers, takers was still busy earning a living. Here in the diner, there were mainly prostitutes and burglars and muggers, dealers and users, occasional noncriminal sprinkling of drunk insomniacs, or writers with blocks. Ollie sorted the wheat from the chaff at once. The minute he got in, every thief in the joint recognized him for what he was, too. None of them even glanced in his
direction He went straight to the counter, took a stool, ordered a cup of coffee from a redheaded girl in a green uniform. Her name tag read SALLY. "You serve Indian food here?" he asked. "No, sir, we sure don't," Sally said. "Native American food?" he asked. "Nor that neither," she said.
"Then how come you call yourself the Silver Chief?."
"It's spose to be like a train," she said.
"Oh yeah?"
"That's what it's spose to be, yes, sir." "What part of the South you from, Sally?" "Tennessee," she said.
"You serve grits here, Sally?" / "No, sir."
"You serve hominy?"
"No, sir."
"How about a nice hot cup of coffee then? And one of those donuts there."
"Yes, sir," she said.
Ollie looked the place over again. Each time his gaze fell upon someone who'd been out victimizing tonight, eyes turned away. Good, he thought Shit your pants. Sally came back with his coffee and donut.
"I'm a police officer," he said, and showed her his shield. "Were you working here on Saturday night around this time, a little bit later?"
"I was," she said.
"I'm looking for a blond girl who was wearing a black mini and a red fur jacket."
He didn't mention that she was dead.
"Fake fur," he said. "Fake blonde, too."
"We get lots of those in here," Sally said, and with a faint tilt of her head indicated that lots of those were in here right this very minute, sitting at tables hither and yon behind Ollie.
"How about Saturday night? Remember a blonde in a red fur jacket?"
"I sure don't," Sally said.
"How about three white guys in blue hooded parkas?"
"Nope."
"Or a black guy in a black leather jacket."
"We get thousands of black guys in black jackets."
"These three white guys would've been in the gutter."
"Where?"
"Outside there," Ollie said, jerking his head and shoulder toward the front windows of the diner. "This weather?" Sally said, and laughed. Ollie laughed, too.