“I’ll walk it around for a few days,” LaPointe says. “See what Bouvier’s report gives us. You don’t mind if I take it on, do you?” The question is only pro forma. LaPointe feels that all crime on his patch belongs to him by right, but he is careful of the feelings of the other senior men.
“Be my guest,” Gaspard says with a wave of his arm that indicates he is happy to be rid of the mess. “And if I ever get the clap, you can have that, too.”
“I’ll route the paper work through you, so we don’t upset the Masters.”
Gaspard nods. That is the way LaPointe usually works. It avoids direct run-ins with the administration. There is nothing official about LaPointe’s assignment to the Main. In fact, there is no organizational rubric that covers him. The administration slices crime horizontally into categories: theft, bunco, vice, homicide. LaPointe’s responsibility is a vertical one: all the crime on the Main. This assignment was never planned, never officially recognized, it just developed as a matter of chance and tradition; and there are those in authority who chafe at this rupture of the organizational chain. They consider it ridiculous that a full lieutenant spends his time crawling around the streets like a short timer. But they console themselves with the realization that LaPointe is an anachronism, a vestige of older, less efficient methods. He will be retiring before long; then they can repair the administrative breach.
LaPointe turns to the uniformed policeman. “You found the body?”
Caught off guard, and wanting to respond alertly, the Chiac cop gulps, “Yes, sir.”
There is a brief silence. Then LaPointe lifts his palms and opens his eyes wide as if to say, “Well?”
The young officer glances across at Guttmann as he tugs out his notebook. The leather folder has a little loop to hold a pen. It’s the kind of thing a parent or girlfriend might have given him when he graduated from the academy. He clears his throat. “We were cruising. My partner was driving slowly because I was checking license plates against the watch list of stolen cars—”
“What did you have for breakfast?” Gaspard asks.
“Pardon me, sir?” The Chiac officer’s ears redden.
“Get on with it, for Christ’s sake.”
“Yes, sir. We passed the alley at… ah… well, let’s see. I wrote the note about ten minutes later, so that would put us at the alley at two-forty or two-forty-five. I saw a movement down the alley, but we had passed it by the time I told my partner to stop. He backed up and I got a glance of a man hopping down the alley. I jumped out and started to chase him, then I came across the body.”
“You gave pursuit?” LaPointe asks.
“Well… yes, sir. That is, after I discovered that the guy on the ground was dead, I ran to the end of the alley after the other one. But he had disappeared. The street was empty.”
“Description?”
“Not much, sir. Just caught a glimpse as he hopped away. Tallish. Thin. Well, not fat. Hard to tell. He had on a big shabby overcoat, sort of like…” The officer quickly looks away from LaPointe’s shapeless overcoat. “…you know. Just an old overcoat.”
LaPointe seems to be concentrating on a rivulet of condensed water running down the steamy window beside him. “Il a clopiné?” he asks without looking at the officer. “That’s twice you said the man ‘hopped’ off. Why do you choose that word?”
The young man shrugs. “I don’t know, sir. That’s what he seemed to do… sort of hobble off. But quick, you know?”
“And he was dressed shabbily?”
“I had that impression, sir. But it was dark, you know.”
LaPointe looks down at the tabletop as he taps his lips with his knuckle. Then he sniffs and sighs. “Tell me about his hat.”
“His hat?” The young officer’s eyebrows rise. “I don’t remember any…” His expression seems to spread. “Yes! His hat! A big floppy hat. Dark color. I don’t know how that could have slipped my mind. It was kind of like a cowboy hat, but the brim was floppy, you know?”
For the first time since they entered the Roi des Frites, Guttmann speaks up in his precise European French, the kind Canadians call “Parisian,” but which is really modeled on the French of Tours. “You know who the man is, don’t you, Lieutenant? The one who ran off?”
“Yes.”
Gaspard yawns and rubs his legs. “Well, there it is! You see, kid? You’re learning from me how to solve cases. Just talk people into committing their crimes on the Main, and turn them over to LaPointe. Nothing to it. It’s all in the wrist.” He speaks to LaPointe. “So it’s routine after all. The guy was stabbed for his money, and you know who…”
But LaPointe is shaking his head. It’s not that simple. “No. The man this officer saw running away is a street bomme. I know him. I don’t think he would kill.”
“How do you know that, sir?” Guttmann’s young face is intense and intelligent. “What I mean is… anyone can kill, given the right circumstances. People who would never steal might kill.”
With weary slowness, LaPointe turns his patient fatigued eyes on the Anglo.
“Ah…” Gaspard says, “did I mention that my Joan here had been to college?”
“No, you didn’t.”
“Oh, yeah! He’s been through it all. Books, grades, long words, theories, raise your hand to go to the bathroom—one finger for pee-pee, two for ca-ca.” Gaspard turns to Guttmann, who takes a long-suffering breath. “One thing I’ve always wondered, kid,” Gaspard pursues. “Maybe you can tell me from all your education. How come a man grins when he’s shitting a particularly hard turd? I mean, it isn’t all that much fun, really.”
Guttmann ignores Gaspard; he looks directly at LaPointe. “But what I said is true, isn’t it? People who would never steal might kill, under the right circumstances?”
The kid’s eyes are frank and vulnerable and they shine with suppressed embarrassment and anger. After a second, LaPointe answers, “Yes. That’s true.”
Gaspard grunts as he stands and stretches his settled spine. “Okay, it’s your package, LaPointe. Me, I’m going home. I’ll collect the reports in the morning and send them over to you.” Then Gaspard gets an idea. “Hey! Want to do me a favor? How about taking my Joan here for a few days? Give him a chance to see how you do your dirty work. What do you say?”
The Chiac officer’s mouth opens. These goddamned Roundheads get all the luck.
LaPointe frowns. They never assign Joans to him, just as they never give him committee work. They know better.
“Come on,” Gaspard persists. “He can sort of be liaison between my shop and yours. Take him off my back for a few days. He cramps my style. How can I pick up a quick piece of ass with him hanging around all the time, taking notes?”
LaPointe shrugs. “All right. For a couple of days.”
“Great,” Gaspard says. As he buttons his overcoat up to the neck, he looks out the window. “Look at this goddamned weather, will you! It’s already socking in again. By dawn the clouds will be back. Have you ever seen the snow hold off so long? And every night it gets cold as a witch’s tit.”
LaPointe’s mind is elsewhere. He corrects Gaspard thoughtlessly. “écu. Cold as a witch’s écu.”
“You’re sure it’s not tit?”
“écu.”
Gaspard looks down at Guttmann. “You see, kid? You’re going to learn a lot with LaPointe. Okay, men, I’m off. Keep crime off the streets and in the home, where it belongs.”
The Chiac officer follows Gaspard out into the windy night. They get into the patrol car and drive off, leaving the street totally empty.
“Thanks, Lieutenant,” Guttmann says. “I hope you don’t feel railroaded into taking me on.”
But LaPointe has already crooked his finger at Dirtyshirt Red, who shuffles over to the table. “Sit down, Red.” LaPointe shifts to English because it’s Red’s only language, the language of success. “Have you seen the Vet tonight?”