Miami Blues (25 page)

"Shut up! How in the hell can I chew your ass if you keep interrupting me?" Brownley frowned, took a cigar out of the humidor on his desk, and began to unwrap it.

Brownley's face was creased with thousands of tiny wrinkles. His face reminded Hoke of a piece of black silk that has been wadded into a tiny ball and then smoothed out again. But the captain's cheeks were grayish with fatigue, and there were a few gray hairs in his mustache as well--gray hairs Hoke hadn't noticed before. How old was Brownley, anyway? Forty-five, forty-six? Certainly no more than forty-seven, but he looked much much older.

Brownley, turning his cigar as he lighted it with a kitchen match, looked at Hoke with unreadable eyes. The whites of his eyes were slightly yellow, and Hoke had never noticed that before either.

"I just got through talking to the chief," Brownley said, "and we made a compromise. I'm going to write you a letter of reprimand, and it'll go into your permanent file."

Hoke cleared his throat. "I deserve it."

"Damned right! The chief, on the other hand, is going to write you a letter of commendation. You might be puzzled by the ambiguity of his letter, but it'll be a commendation. That will also go into your permanent file. So one letter will, in a sense, cancel out the other."

"I don't deserve a letter of commendation."

"I know you don't, but this case'll give the chief something positive to talk about at the University Club next week, and besides, it'll help you out at the hearing. And in a way, maybe you do deserve a commendation from the chief. That was good police work, getting Sanchez to call Ramon Mendez--"

"Who?"

"Ramon Mendez. Sanchez's cop cousin in Hollywood."

"I forgot for a minute. Mendez was one of Frenger's names--"

"I know. But the fact that we had at least one Broward County officer at the scene helped to get us off the hook when we entered Broward's jurisdiction. Because of the seriousness of the crime, we probably would've been okay anyway, but having a Broward officer present helped save a little face. This is politics, Hoke, not police work. I'm sending Officer Mendez a commendation, as well as one for Henderson and Sanchez. And your letter of reprimand will be fairly mild, because the chief just confirmed my majority." Brownley puffed on his cigar. "As of the first of the month, you can call me Major Brownley."

"Congratulations, Willie." Hoke grinned.

"Major Willie." Brownley took a cigar out of the humidor and offered it to Hoke, but Hoke waved it away.

"I'll stick to cigarettes, major. What happens to me now?"

"As you know, there's no standard operating procedure. Usually, when a cop shoots a suspect, we just send him home to wait for the hearing or we give him a desk job while he waits. If the shooting's accidental or if it looks like a grand jury matter, the officer's usually suspended, with or without pay. In your case, as long as you're on sick leave anyway, you just go home and wait for the hearing."

"There're a few things to clear up first. I want to call San Francisco, and--"

"You'll go home and stay there. Don't come into the station until the hearing. You can call Sanchez, and let her clear up any loose ends. Don't talk to the press or to anyone else about the case. You're not going to have any problems at the hearing. Deadly force was justified, and you'll be cleared."

"All right. I'll call Sanchez. She can handle things all right."

"She likes you, too. Of course, when I told you to win her over, I didn't mean for you to prove what a good shot you were, but at least she's not complaining about her supervisor."

"It won't be the same as working with Bill Henderson, but then, Bill can't type eighty-five words a minute, and she can. So I guess it'll even out."

"Get the hell out of here, Hoke. I've still got some calls to make."

Hoke got to his feet. "I'd like to go up to Riviera Beach to spend a few days with my father."

"Okay. Just call in every day. As long's we can reach you by phone."

They shook hands, and Hoke left the office.

When Hoke got to the station parking lot, Henderson and Sanchez were waiting for him. The morning air was moist and hot, and Hoke could feel his pores opening. The humid air felt good after the stale air-conditioning of the station, and Hoke didn't really mind the little rivulets of perspiration that rolled down his sides.

Ellita Sanchez had removed her blue faille suit jacket, and her upper lip was beaded lightly with sweat. Henderson's heavy shoulders slumped with fatigue, and his eyes were bloodshot. Hoke knew that neither one of them wanted a beer as much as they wanted a bed, but he also suspected that they were as reluctant as he was to break up a process they had shared, a certain sense of teamwork.

"How'd you make out, Hoke?" Henderson said.

"I'm still on sick leave, but I'm supposed to stay away from the station until the hearing. Brownley said I could go up to Riviera Beach, though, and stay with my father if! want to, and I think I will."

"You haven't been up to Riviera for a while, have you?"

"'Bout a year ago, when the old man got married again-- remember?"

"Let's go to the Seven-Eleven," Sanchez suggested. "You guys can get a beer, and I'll get a grape Slurpee. My throat's dry, but it doesn't feel like a beer for breakfast."

"Suits me," Henderson said. "We can take my car."

"Let's walk," Hoke said. "It's only a block. We can stretch our legs."

They walked to the 7-Eleven, down the narrow Overtown sidewalk, Hoke beside Sanchez, with Henderson lumbering a few feet ahead of them.

"You ever been to Riviera Beach, Ellita?"

"Never. I've been to Palm Beach, but not to Riviera."

"Palm Beach is right across the inlet from Singer Island, and Singer's a part of the Riviera Beach municipality, with the best beach in Florida. So, if you went as far as the northern end of Palm Beach, you were looking across at Singer. I grew up in Riviera Beach, but I didn't know it was actually called Riviera until I was almost twenty years old. We always called it Rivera. Ri_ver_a--that's what everybody called it. Funny, isn't it?"

"I've noticed that a lot of Miamians call Miami Mi-am-ah. I guess it's what you grow up with."

"In Riviera, that's how we can tell the natives from the tourists. Most of us still say Rivera."

When they got to the 7-Eleven, Sanchez asked the manager to fix her a grape Slurpee. Hoke and Henderson went to the freezer. Henderson got a Bud, and Hoke reached deep into the box to get a cold Coors. Each paid for his own drink, and then they went outside to drink them. A few blocks away, in the nascent morning light, they could see the vultures circling above the county courthouse tower, preparing to fly to the city dump for their breakfast feeding.

"That yellow Nova," Sanchez said, pointing to the dusty car parked by the Dempsey Dumpster, "has been there for three days. I remember seeing it."

"Probably the manager's car," Henderson said. "There's no one else around here."

Sanchez walked down to the car. "It's got Michigan plates."

Henderson cracked open the glass door to the store. The manager had _The Star_ open on the counter and was reading it. He looked up. "You from Michigan?" Henderson said.

"What?"

"Are you from Michigan?"

"Michigan?" The manager shook his head. "Ponce. In Puerto Rico."

"That your car? The yellow Nova?"

The Puerto Rican shook his head. "My wife's got my car. She drives me to work, and picks me up. That car's been parked there for three days."

"You guys better come down here a minute!" Sanchez raised her voice. She threw her waxed cup, still half full, into the dumpster. Hoke and Henderson joined her at the back of the Nova. "D'you smell anything funny?"

Henderson bent over and sniffed at the trunk. He smiled broadly at Hoke. "Take a sniff, Hoke. Be my guest."

Hoke took a deep sniff at the trunk lid, where it joined the body. The odor was unmistakable; it was the familiar odor of urine, feces, death. Hoke raised his head, returning Henderson's knowing metal-studded smile with a wry grin.

"You two stay here," Hoke said. "I'll walk back to the station and send down a squad car--"

"No you won't," Henderson said. "Go home, Hoke! Just get in your car and go home. We'll take care of the body. You're on sick leave and off duty. Remember?"

"He's right, Hoke," Sanchez said. "It'll be at least another hour before we can run a make and get a warrant to open the trunk. Go on home. Please."

"But I'd like to see--"

"Beat it!" Henderson said, pushing Hoke's shoulder.

"All right. But call me tomorrow, Sanchez. There're a few things--"

"I'll call you," Sanchez said. "But right now you'd better get going."

"You call me, too, Bill."

"I will, I will. Good-_bye_, Hoke."

Hoke returned to the police station parking lot and got into his car. As he drove out of the lot he could see Ellita Sanchez leaning back against the trunk of the yellow Nova. Henderson was probably still in the store, using the manager's phone.

Hoke drove down to Biscayne Boulevard and turned north, hugging the right lane so he could make the cut-off at the MacArthur Causeway for Miami Beach. Feeling slightly guilty about leaving Henderson and Sanchez stuck at the 7-Eleven, he pulled down the visor against the morning sun rising above South Beach and headed for the Eldorado Hotel, where Old Man Zuckerman was waiting for him in the lobby with a fresh, neatly folded paper napkin.

The following news item was published in _The Okeechobee Bi-Weekly News_:

VINEGAR PIE WINS

OCALA--Mrs. Frank Mansfield, formerly Ms.

Susan Waggoner, of Okeechobee, won the Tri-

County Bake-Off in Ocala yesterday with her

vinegar pie entry. The recipe for her winning

entry is as follows:

_Pastry for a nine-inch crust_

1 cup seedless raisins, all chopped up

ź cup soft butter

2 cups sugar (granulated)

˝ teaspoon cinnamon

ź teaspoon cloves

˝ teaspoon allspice

4 eggs, large, separated

3 tablespoons 5 percent vinegar

1 pinch of salt

Cream the butter well with sugar. Add spices

and blend well. Beat in yolks with a beater

till smooth and creamy. Stir in chopped raisins

with a wooden spoon. Beat egg whites with a

dash of salt until they are soft, then slide onto

sugar mixture. Cut and fold lightly but well.

Turn into pastry-lined pan. Bake fifteen min-

utes in preheated 425°F. oven. Reduce heat to

300°F. and bake for twenty minutes longer, or

until top is beautifully browned and center of

filling is jellylike. Cool on a rack for two or

three hours before cutting.

When Mrs. Mansfield was handed the prize

by the judges (a $50 US Savings Bond), she

said, "I never met a man yet that didn't like my

pie."

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