“I’ll run ’em for you,” Boldt repeated a little more sternly, both excitement and concern competing inside him, along with the secrecy the moment required of him. “I’ll handle it.” LaMoia said something else, but Boldt didn’t hear. He was thinking about his snitch, Raymond, and why the hell the man might repeatedly have been calling a chump like Anderson a few days before the man’s murder.
CHAPTER 16
The Air Strip’s facade glowed Pepto-Bismol pink with a metal awning that proclaimed in chipped lettering LIVE GIRLS-ALL NUDE. Boldt had never seen a sign advertising dead ones. He stepped inside, faced with a potbellied doorman wearing a tuxedo T-shirt, black leather Army boots, dark shades and a hoop earring. The doorman said to Boldt, “Five-buck cover. Two-drink minimum.”
Boldt’s first reaction was to offer his gold badge, but he owed it to Raymond to keep his identity as a cop hidden. He paid the five. Tina Turner blared from the enormous speakers about wanting his love. The doorman said, “Enjoy yourself.” Boldt stepped in, overwhelmed by the smoke and smell of salty flesh.
There were fifteen or twenty men scattered among twice that many tables. Most wore business suits or sport coats, their ties loosened. The air held a low cloud of cigarette and cigar smoke. Salesmen, Boldt figured. Regulars, a couple nights a week, a couple nights a month. In the dark shadows to Boldt’s right a pair of young women moved like painted horses on a carousel as they lap-danced for two sets of legs and two pair of hands that gripped the arms of the chairs like a strong wind was blowing. To Boldt’s left a girl in her late teens stood with her hands on her hips, her young breasts bare, her crotch barely within a sequined G-string, rocking her pelvis in time to the pounding music, throwing her brown hair forward like a curtain of water. She hooked her thumbs into the G-string, intent to remove it, and Boldt looked straight ahead to the bored bartender and his gaggle of barflies.
Coming into Raymond’s bar was a blatant violation of their agreement. The man-a darkly handsome Latino-sat at a stool at the far end, leaning against the wall. He wore mirrored sunglasses that fit his face like swimming goggles, trained onto Boldt as he closed the distance and perched on an aluminum stool next to the man. Boldt ordered a ginger ale, winning a snort from the bartender and a comment that the first two cost five bucks no matter what you ordered, and you had to order two. Boldt changed his order to a 7-UP.
“This is not cool, man,” Raymond said in as much of a hush as he could manage over the music. “Very uncool.”
“You think she’s eighteen?” Boldt asked of the woman writhing against a vertical bar on stage.
“No clue, man. Nice jugs and trim. That’s all the man cares about. You don’t see no driver’s license on her, do you?” Raymond enjoyed his own jokes. “What? You gonna pull her over for speeding up your ticker, man?” He lit a cigarette. “A guy your age, she probably gives you a woodie. Don’t do nothing for me.”
“How about we take it outside?” Boldt asked.
“Dude!” Raymond called out to the bartender, who glanced over, “We gonna party for a minute behind the curtains.”
“Don’t bother the girls, damn you.”
Raymond led Boldt through a pair of velvet curtains, through a door, and into a brightly lit area where three bare-breasted women were in the process of applying too much makeup. Two shared a joint. The other chewed gum. They walked past the women, Boldt careful not to brush up against a bare back. All three seemed fascinated with Boldt’s attempts not to look.
“Heat?” one of the youngest asked, eyeing Boldt.
Raymond said, “Get real. Like I’m gonna bring heat on you! This here is my man. We gonna hang back in the coatrack for a minute or two.”
The coatrack was a wardrobe area: sequins, boas, spike heels, hats of every description and a variety of props including rubber snakes, dildoes, a saddle and stuffed animals. That smell of cigarettes and sour skin was concentrated here, like opening a leftover container kept too long in the refrigerator. Raymond found them both inverted milk crates and they sat down.
“This sucks, man.”
“Had to happen. You didn’t answer my page.”
“One page. I was busy.”
“So am I. It couldn’t wait.”
They entered a staring contest. Boldt won.
“This is bullshit.”
“We’ve got a guy who slipped in his tub and ate his teeth.”
“Probably didn’t use one of those rubber mats, you know?” Raymond looked to be in his mid-twenties. He was thirty-nine. In another era he would have been called a dandy. He dressed sharp and greased back his hair into a ducktail so that his chocolate-brown eyes appeared to come right out of his face like a pair of dark olives. His teeth were too white to be real, and his smile approached an icy glee that warned of a stiletto or a piece hidden somewhere on his person. His pants were so tight that Boldt took them as explanation of the man’s unusually constricted voice.
“You and I are supposed to have a warm rapport, Raymond.” Ray-moan. “A nice fuzzy relationship free of surprises for either of us.” Boldt allowed the comment to hang in the thick air. “Now I’ve got to wonder if I can still trust you, because if I can’t, your name comes out of my book, and the cash stops coming your way. We get off the bus at the next corner. Know what I mean?”
“Wait one damn minute,” Raymond protested. “What the hell you talking about?”
“The dead guy in the bathtub went by the name of Andy Anderson.” Boldt watched for a response and won it.
“Never heard of him.” Raymond knew to stay clear of a dead body.
“You called him three times in the past ten days and you never heard of him? I’m the one that never heard about him, and I’m not happy about that. Now he’s in the fridge downtown wearing nothing but a string around his big toe, and my Homicide friends come and tell me you two were chummy right before he slipped.”
“Hey, man, this the first I heard about him going down, swear to God.”
“Way they’re thinking-my friends in Homicide-maybe someone put a bar of soap under his feet, kind of helped things along. You know?”
“Don’t look at me, man.”
“I’m not looking, Raymond, but I am listening. I’m the guy keeping Homicide off your case for the time being.”
“I’m sure.”
“It’s me or them. Your choice. Personally, I’d like to keep you as a source-we work well-but if you surface because of this, then our relationship’s over.”
It was warm in the small room, and Raymond’s face shined with perspiration. He wouldn’t like losing the occasional payoff. Whatever else Raymond did for money he managed to keep his name off the pink sheets, which made him all right with Boldt. “He’s a pussy chaser,” Raymond said, laconically. “A guy gets into some pussy he shouldn’t and Anderson’s the one rigging the motel room for Panavision and Dolby. Know what I mean? A little private screening for the wife. He’s been in here a couple times asking questions. The girls here … some do more than dance. He pays well. We had a little business from time to time. No big deal.”
“That’s not answering my question.”
The man grimaced. Sources did not like discussing their deals. Boldt understood this. He said, “Make an exception, Raymond. The man is dead.”
“Yeah. But something got him that way,” he said cautiously. “That shit gets contagious and I be a fucked-up dude.”
“Work with me.” Boldt zeroed in on the man’s eyes and locked up good and tight. He was stoned or high on something. Boldt repeated, “Work with me.”
“Anderson says the Fremont neighborhood gonna get hit. Some heavy lifting, you know? It’s too big an area to watch by himself-alone, he says-and that any news about such an activity would be appreciated. So I put out the word. You understand. And the only shit I hear about is some white dude about to get fried for using the wrong house for surveillance. Two to five o’clock in the morning some chemists are cooking meth in the basement of this vacant house, see? Three o’clock in the afternoon along comes this white boy who looks like he’s snuffing termites. But no he ain’t. He goes inside for a little hide-and-peek. Up on the second story. The chemists put it out on the street wanting to know if this is heat or just some stupid jackass. Not good business to whack heat. Which is how come my man hears about it, and how come I hear about it after him.”