“But of course you didn't?” I almost felt sorry for the kid, he was so badge-happy it was comical.
“No, I didn't. Truth is when we were dismissed I went back there—about an hour ago—and Lande was still in his shop. As I told you, he's nervous, talks a blue streak. Well, he made a slip. In his chatter he said, 'I got the money back.' I distinctly heard him say that although he denied it when I questioned him. He made a joke of it, asked where in the devil would he get fifty grand. As it happens, when I was returning to the station house I made a few casual inquiries in the neighborhood, at a bar and at a restaurant—Lande has been selling meat there for the last seven or eight years, does his own butchering, but has a small panel delivery truck and employs a driver. Everybody agrees he was lucky to clear five thousand dollars a year and...”
“Lawrence, you told him you were an auxiliary cop, didn't you?”
The kid nodded. “He noticed my shoulder patch when I returned, practically ordered me out of the store. I explained that...”
“You use your stick on him?”
Lawrence looked astonished. “Hit him? Certainly not.”
“Then he can't make any complaints, so what's troubling you? And even if you got bounced off this volunteer force, so what?”
“I don't have a 'so what' attitude. I plan to make the force my career and therefore ...”
“You talk like a bad cops-and-robbers movie, like a jerk.”
The kid went white and stood up. “Marty, you were a great cop, a top detective. I bring you a case, a crime, and all you can say is ...”
“Sit down, Lawrence,” I said, trying to make my voice soft. I slipped him a grin. “It's a hot night and we haven't seen each other for a lot of years. All right, maybe this is important to you, but as for me—one thing I learned while I was a kid—never work for free.” He sort of slumped in his chair and I added, “Seems to me you're making a fuss over nothing—the butcher isn't making any charges. And he could even jam you up—when you went back there you weren't on duty, had no police powers—not even as a peace officer, whatever that is.”
“I know that,” Lawrence said. “But if you could only have seen how hysterical he was at first—I believe he was robbed of fifty thousand dollars and that for some reason the money was returned to him.”
“Aren't you getting a little... uh... hysterical, kid? You said yourself he doesn't do a business to have that kind of cash around, and if he was robbed, why would it be returned to him? And in a few hours' time, too? It doesn't make sense. Far as you're concerned, forget it.”
The kid stared at me for a second, his eyes thoughtful. “Marty, I'm certain there was a robbery.”
“So what? You're not involved.”
“Not involved? It happened on my beat, and if for no other reason I'm involved because as a citizen it's my duty to report any crime I ...”
“You really believe this slop you're handing me?”
“I certainly do!”
“You better forget trying to become a cop, then. Kid, I'm going to give you some advice I'm sure you won't pay no attention to, but just in case you do become a cop, or even this part-time stuff you're doing, I don't want to see you make a fool of yourself. There's hardly...”
“I fail to understand your attitude toward the law, Marty!”
“Relax, and listen to me. There's hardly a day goes by in which the average citizen doesn't break some law—maybe letting his dog off a leash or spitting on the sidewalk. Also, there's hundreds of laws, maybe thousands, that don't make sense and shouldn't be on the books. For example, a girl can be hustling ever since she's thirteen, selling it a dozen times a day, yet until she's eighteen every one of her customers is guilty of statutory rape. Isn't that something, raping a whore!”
“A prostitute has rights, the protection of the law. The very fact that she may be under age proves...”
“Damn it, Lawrence, stop talking like a schoolboy reciting his lessons,” I said. “You dream of being a cop, then remember this—a cop only enforces the laws he has to, otherwise he'd go nuts—looks the other way whenever he can. Maybe this...”
“That's not my idea of law enforcement. At all times the...”
“Shut up! Maybe your butcher was robbed, maybe he wasn't. He says he wasn't. Maybe he also exceeded the speed limit driving to his shop today. Lawrence, what I'm trying to say is, don't be an eager beaver. Here you're only a volunteer cop for a couple hours a week, and you're already in an uproar over something that's none of your business. And don't hand me that honest-citizen crap. Lande's story is so wacky it can be true. He's robbed of fifty grand he says he hasn't, then an hour later the punks return the dough all tied in pink ribbons—probably said they were bad boys. Forget it.”
“I can't, there's too many weird angles. If only for curiosity's sake, I'm going to keep looking into this.”
“The cemeteries are full of curious people.”
“Marty, you've slowed down.”
“Maybe. And maybe if you were a stranger I'd knock you through the wall, badge, club, and all. Maybe that's what Lande should have done. Lawrence, I can't tell you what to do, but don't make a horse's rear out of yourself, especially if you might get on the force someday.”
“Marty, I'm not a kid looking for a thrill. I think there's something wrong here. I have a feeling, a hunch—and Lande's cockeyed story.”
I shrugged, dug for another mint. I was all out of the damn things. “Told you—you wouldn't take my advice. Do what you want, only try not to make a fool of yourself.”
He got to his feet. “Anyway, it's good to see you. I'll drop in to see you again, if you don't mind.”
I stood up and squeezed his shoulder. He didn't have much meat on him. “Where do you get that if-you-don't-mind slop? Drop in any time. Maybe we'll have supper together when my gut is hitting on all cylinders. You see Dot much?”
“Of course. I'm living at home.”
“Tell her I asked for her. Ain't you kind of old for still living at home? What's the name of your girl and are you sleeping with her?”
“That's none of your business, but we have been intimate. Name is Helen Samuels.”
“Sounds like a Jew.”
“She is. Why are you so bigoted, Marty?”
“You really going to marry a Jew-girl?”
“Why not?”
I shrugged. “I'm hardly the one to give advice on marriage. Also I'm not bigoted. I've known some pretty good nigger cops and Jew-boys. And Bill Ash is a Roman. I don't know, as a cop you got to start off by hating a lot of people, most people. Makes it easier to hate 'em if you hate their skin, their religion.”
He sort of laughed at me, punched my arm. It was odd, all of him was a kid except his eyes and his voice. He said, “You're like a rock, Marty, unchangeable. Remember when you gave me boxing lessons? I was a fair bantamweight in the army.”
We walked toward the door. “If I'd known you were going to be such a busybody, I would have given you lessons in kneeing and kicking.”
I walked the kid out to the lobby and said good-by. It was a few minutes past midnight on the clock behind the desk when I grabbed a morning paper, told Dewey, “Maybe I can get some shut-eye now.”
Dewey was a retired postal clerk, a moonface with watery eyes, and the veins on his fat nose like a complicated map—from the barrels of wine he'd guzzled during his sixty-eight years.
He said, “Too hot for sleep. The boy badge have his hand out?”