"Can we stick to the gun?" Freeman was leaning forward now, interested.
Terrell shrugged. "Hey, you want it, you can have it. Here, check it out."
He handed it to Freeman, who gave it the once over, then passed it to Hardy. "What do you think?"
"It's a toy gun in a dumpster."
Freeman mulled it a few more seconds. "Anything else in this dumpster you bagged that isn't connected to anything, Wally? You want to waste more of our time." Freeman was picking at the bags, lifting them, dropping them. "We got trash, we got toy guns…" He shook his head. "Christ. How 'bout we get to see the clip?"
Afterward, Hardy went up to homicide and finagled Glitsky into a stop at Lou the Greek's. Freeman had gone to wherever it was he went on Friday nights – Jennifer was calendared for Monday morning and Hardy thought he was probably up to some behind-the-scenes shenanigans with somebody.
Now Hardy was trying to convince Abe that Hawaii was where the Glitskys ought to go for vacation, Glitsky saying that Hardy must be out of touch with what policemen made nowadays if he thought Abe, Flo and their three children could spend fourteen days at a Kampgrounds of America site, much less soaking up rays on Maui. He concluded by saying he thought they'd probably go to Santa Cruz for the weekend, maybe the Russian River, spend the rest of the vacation painting the apartment. "If we can afford the paint."
"Things a little tight?"
Glitsky chewed the ice from his tea. "Things were a little tight before my voluntary five percent pay cut."
"You got that?"
"Everybody who makes over fifty grand. And now, after a mere nineteen years on the force, when I have finally graduated to that lofty height, they whack me for getting there."
Abe swirled his glass in its condensation on the table, stared at the window. "Just the other day I was saying to Flo – 'Hey, hon, why don't I volunteer to work two hours free every week next year?' She thought it was a great idea since we don't need any money to live anyway." He drank some tea. "You know what I did? I went in to Frank" – this was Frank Batiste, Glitsky's lieutenant – "and asked him for a $2,001 pay cut, save the city some money."
"And what'd Frank say?"
"He said he wouldn't – it wouldn't look cooperative. I tell him I'm making $52,000 – take away the five percent, I'm down to $49,400. My two grand and a buck idea puts me at $49,999. All things considered, I'd rather have the extra $500."
"I would have done it."
Glitsky shook his head. "No, you wouldn't. You know why? Because the difference is fifty bucks a month, which after taxes is maybe thirty-five – call it two burgers a week. And for that you get a rep for being difficult. After nineteen years! And guess what happens to difficult guys? Here's a hint, eighty-five didn't get to take their voluntary cut – they got pinked."
"Eighty-five?" The number was higher than Hardy would have thought. How could the city lay off cops? This was almost five percent of the force. "Eighty-five?"
"Sure. What do we need cops for?"
"Or health workers." Hardy mentioned the picket lines at the Mission Hills Clinic.
"But guess what? The mayor's still got his driver. You wouldn't want the mayor driving his own car around, would you? What would people say? How would it look?"
Hardy drank some beer. "Well, at least he's got his priorities straight. If it were me, I'd definitely do the same thing – lay off the police and keep my driver."
"I'm going to look into setting up my own security business," Glitsky said. His eye caught something behind Hardy. "And here comes my first recruit."
Terrell slid in beside him, across from Hardy. "First recruit for what?"
"Glitsky Home Security. Armed response in minutes."
Terrell took a pull from one of the bottles of Bud he'd brought over. "We get to shoot people, no Miranda? Catch 'em and put 'em down?"
"Yep. And get paid for it."
Terrell was bobbing his head. "I like it. I'm in." He had another swig, focused on Hardy. "Your partner might be famous, but whew!"
"That's why he's famous – he's that way." He looked at Glitsky. "Freeman."
"What way?" Glitsky asked.
"What way?" Hardy repeated mildly to Terrell. "You can speak freely to Inspector Glitsky."
"I got an idea bagged that might or might not be evidence and the guy goes ballistic on me. I tell him he can use it or not. Hey, I had a theory that might have worked – so? It didn't, big deal."
Lou's was getting crowded, louder. Hardy elbowed his way to the bar and bought another round. When he returned, Terrell was in the middle of something that sounded familiar.
"… the Crane thing was at least worth looking into, but it turned out to be nothing, too."
"What did?" Hardy slid in, passed the round – two more bottles for Terrell, another iced tea for Glitsky.
"I was just telling Glitsky about that other thing, the guy in LA you called from the Witt house."
"Crane. The guy who was murdered."
"Yeah, Crane. Just talking about how theories sometimes pay off, sometimes not."
"Most times not." No argument, just stating a fact, Abe was already chewing the ice in his fresh drink.
It drove Hardy crazy, but he preferred not to change the subject if Terrell had discovered a link with Simpson Crane and was going to talk about it. But he couldn't resist the urge to get in a dig. "Why'd you follow that up? You've already got yourself a suspect."
Terrell didn't take any offense. Instead, he smiled disarmingly. "Hey, I love my work. You called it – it was one of those coincidences. You check it out, what do you lose? You can't tie up a murder too tight, am I right or not?"
On this everyone was in accord. Hardy sipped his beer, taking his time, not wanting to betray any particular interest. "So what'd you find?"
"Pretty much what you told me. No connection to Witt."
"Well, there must have been some – the number was stuck on his desk."
"I mean, sure, yeah, that. But I'm talking the actual hit, they know who did it, or think they do."
"So who?"
"Some local muscle down in LA." Terrell was into his story, a bottle of beer in each hand, from which he drank alternately and steadily. "This guy Crane was the premier union buster of the nineties – cleared like a half a mil a year making sure all the little people kept getting fucked. They try to organize, he gets 'em fired, figures out a way to make it stick. Time to renegotiate, he's got everybody scared they're going to lose their jobs, so they cave. They say the President wanted him for Secretary of Labor but couldn't pay him enough."
"He work for San Francisco?" Glitsky asked, joking. "I think they must be using somebody like him."
Terrell shook his head. "Well, nobody's using him, that's for sure."
"What happened?"
"Well, he already killed a couple of unions – meat packers, janitors, like that – small time stuff, and then he thought he'd take on the machinists."
"And somebody important didn't like it."
"That's the theory." Terrell held up his empty beer bottles. "Are these things twelve ounces?" He started to get up. "Anyway, they did it right – hired some pro, no paper trail, no indictment. My round this time."
He was on his way to the bar.
"No more for me," Glitsky called after him. He was still chewing his ice. "You're a sly dog. He's following your leads and doesn't even know it."
Hardy kept a straight face. "You heard him – he loves his work." He brought his beer up. "It is interesting, though, don't you think? Two murders and two hit men?"
Glitsky was shaking his head. "I count three murders and one hit man – Larry Witt, their kid, this guy Crane."