"Annabelle picked up his syringe first?"
"Yes, I think so."
"Is it possible he picked up the wrong syringe?"
"Huh?"
"Is it possible he used your syringe?"
"No. I know the feel of mine. No, it's impossible. I shot up with my own syringe."
"What about when you left?"
"I don't know what you're saying, Dad."
"Could you have left your syringe there and taken Annabelle's by accident?"
"I don't see how. Right after we shot up, Annabelle… now wait a minute, you're getting me mixed up."
"What happened exactly?"
"Well, we fixed ourselves, and I guess we put the syringes down. Yes, yes. Then Annabelle saw he was about to nod, so he got up and took his syringe and put it in his jacket pocket."
"Were you watching him closely?"
"No. I only remember he was blowing his nose—addicts always got colds, you know—and then he remembered the spike, and he went over to get it and put it in his pocket. So that was when I went over for mine, too."
"And you were high at the time?"
"Yeah."
"Then you could have taken the wrong spike? The one Annabelle had been handling? Leaving your own spike behind?"
"I guess so, but…"
"Where's your syringe now?"
"On me."
"Look at it."
Larry reached into his pocket. He turned the syringe over in his hands studying it. "It looks like mine," he said.
"Is it?"
"It's hard to tell. Why? I don't get it."
"There are some things you should know, Larry. First Hernandez did not hang himself. He died of an overdose of heroin."
"What? What?"
"Second, there was one and only one syringe found in the room with him."
"Well, that figures. He…"
"The man who called me is after something. I don't know what yet. He said he'd call me again after I talked with you. He said you and Hernandez argued that afternoon. He says he has a witness who will swear to it. He says you were alone with Hernandez all that night. He says…"
"Me? Hell, I didn't argue with Annabelle. He laid a fix on me free, didn't he? Does that sound like we argued? How does this guy know all about this, anyway? Jesus, Dad…"
"Larry…"
"Who is this guy?"
"I don't know. He didn't give his name."
"Well… well, let him get his witness! I didn't argue with Annabelle. We were friendly as hell. What's he trying to say, anyway? Is he trying to say I gave Annabelle that overdose? Is that what? Let him get his goddamn witness, go ahead, let him."
"He doesn't need a witness, son."
"No? I suppose a judge is just going to…"
"The man who called me said we'd find your finger prints on the syringe in that basement room."
Chapter Nine
At three o'clock that morning, Maria Hernandez was ready to call it a day. She had thirty-five dollars in her purse, and she was tired, and it was cold, and if she fixed herself now and then went straight to sleep, she'd be set for the night. There was nothing like a nice warm fix before hitting the sack. For Maria, a shot of heroin was something that attacked her entire body. It made her tingle everywhere, even in what the Vice Squad and she herself referred to as her "privates."
The euphemistic use of the word by members of the Vice Squad was prescribed by law, since that law demanded that no arrest for prostitution could be made by a detective posing as a prospective client until the alleged prostitute's "privates" had been exposed. Whether or not Maria had picked up the term from her Vice Squad associates, or whether it was a modestly maiden expression she herself had invented was a question for debate. She did have a good many Vice Squad associates—with some of whom she had going business arrangements, and with others of whom she had got into trouble. The trouble had been either of a legal-sexual nature or a socio-sexual nature. The Vice Squad because of its unique pincerlike position was thought of by many prostitutes as the Vise Squad. Again, this was a euphemism.
There were many euphemisms in Maria's business. She could discuss sex the way most other women discuss the latest fashion trends, except that Maria's discussion would have been far more coldly dispassionate. But she could discuss sex and generally did in no uncertain terms with other women in her trade. She discussed sex differently with men.
A man seeking her body was, when she discussed him with the other prostitutes, a "John." But in the polite society of a brew shared between male and female in a polite neighborhood bistro, Maria invariably referred to a client as a "friend."
When Maria said, "I have some very important friends," she did not mean she could have a speeding ticket fixed. She simply meant that many of the men who, euphemistically, slept with her were perhaps both wealthy and respected.
Nor would Maria ever stoop to describing in a vulgar manner the services she performed. Maria never "slept" with a man. Maria, euphemistically, "stayed with a friend."
Whatever she did, and for whomever, she did it with a strangely detached attitude. There were, she realized, a good many more respectable ways of earning money. But Maria needed about forty dollars a day to feed her habit, and girls of Maria's age—unless they were movie stars—simply didn't earn that kind of money. It seemed provident to her that she had come fully equipped with a readily marketable commodity. And, following the age-old hand-in-glove practicality of supply and demand, she dutifully set about supplying whenever there was a demand.
There was a demand for Maria.
The suburban housewives, knitting and sewing, secure in the golden circle of their own wedding bands, would have been surprised to learn just how much of a demand there was for Maria. They might, in all truth, have been shocked.
For Maria had a good many friends who enjoyed the innocent, high-school-girl look about her. Being with Maria was like being a boy again, and even suburban housewives know that every man is just a little boy grown up. Maria's friends ranged from wealthy executives to file clerks, and her places of assignation ran the gamut from plush-lined private offices to blankets thrown on a factory floor. When she operated within the confines of the 87th Precinct, she generally enjoyed the rental of a room supplied at the rate of $3 per friend. The rooms were rented by various and sundry people, but usually by old women who derived their sole sources of income from such rentals. Maria did not enjoy working uptown. Her prices, because of the clientele, had to be lower there, and that meant entertaining more friends in order to accrue the boodle necessary for her daily drug requirement.
To say that Maria despised the sex act would be untrue. To say that she enjoyed it would be equally untrue. She neither enjoyed it nor despised it. She tolerated it. It was part of her job, and since there were many white-collar workers in the city who neither despised nor enjoyed but simply tolerated their jobs, her attitude was understandable. Her tolerance was helped by the peculiar ability of narcotics to quell the normal sex appetite. So, armed with the double-barreled shotgun of understimulation through narcotics and indifference through prostitution, Maria stalked her game and quite miraculously led the game to consider her a hot-blooded huntress.
Her stalking, by three o'clock in the morning, left her a little weary. She had thirty-five dollars in her purse, and an eighth of heroin in her hotel room, and hell, it was time to call it a day. But thirty-five dollars was not forty dollars, and forty dollars was what Maria needed for her next day's supply, and so her relief at the day's work being over was partially clouded by a reluctance to quit when that additional five dollars was still lacking.