Sleepers (41 page)

It took King Benny even less time to find out that unlike his other Mends, Henry Addison didn’t have much money. So he was forced to borrow for his pleasure. This put him in debt to the kind of people who charged interest in return for their loans.

“He’s gonna quit his job in two weeks,” King Benny said.

“Why’s that?”

“He don’t want nobody to know the kind of guy he is,” King Benny said. “Don’t want nobody to see pictures of him they shouldn’t see.”

“He knows this?”

“He will,” King Benny said.

“That it?” I said.

“The boys he buys for parties are expensive,” King
Benny said, taking a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiping the edge of his nose. “Addison makes good money. He don’t make real money.”

“What’s he owe?”

“Eight grand,” King Benny said. “With a heavy vig.”

“To who?”

“Three small-timers downtown,” King Benny said. “They were letting him pay it off for a piece a week. Until this morning.”

“What happened this morning?”

“They were paid off,” King Benny said. “In full.”

“Who paid ’em?”

“Henry Addison’s chits belong to me now,” King Benny said.

“You hate debts,” I said.

“I hate Henry Addison,” King Benny said.

We stopped at the corner of 52nd Street and 12th Avenue. I looked over at King Benny and saw in his dark eyes the dangerous void that he usually hid so carefully. It was an emptiness his enemies had good reason to fear.

It was an emptiness about to be filled with Henry Addison.

His black sedan was across the street, one of his men behind the wheel, the windows up, the engine running. We walked slowly toward the car.

“We going for a ride?” I asked him.

“I am,” he said. “You’re going home. To sleep, in case anybody ever asks.”

“Where are you going?”

“Pick up my money,” King Benny said.

“Take me with you,” I said. “I want to be in on this.”

“Go home,” King Benny said. “We’re in the dirty end of the field now. That’s where I play. And I like to play alone.”

King Benny watched as his driver opened the back door of the sedan. He looked over at me and nodded.

“You’re a good kid,” King Benny said. “You always were. Don’t let this change it.”

T
HE LIVING ROOM
was dark, the only light coming from two bare windows and the glimmer of a floor lamp. All the furniture was new, two black leather couches taking up one end, a white shag pull-out sofa shoved against the opposite wall. In the center of the room was a long butcher-block table surrounded by four black leather chairs on rollers. There was a framed wall poster of Dr. J hanging on one wall and a cardboard cutout of Earl “the Pearl” Monroe leaning against a door that led to the small kitchen. The room smelled of fresh paint and incense.

A tall, reed-thin black man sat in one of the black leather chairs, his feet flat on the floor, his hands folded and resting on the butcher-block table. He was wearing a black turtleneck and black leather slacks. He had a Rolex on his left wrist and a diamond pinky ring on his right hand. He wore black Gucci loafers and no socks.

His mother named him Edward Goldenberg Robinson, after her favorite actor. To continue the Hollywood connection, Eddie Robinson took the street name Little Caesar as he made his way up the ranks of the lucrative drug trade. He was Brooklyn’s number-one mover among black dealers and was rivaled only by the remains of the infamous Nicky Barnes’s crew for power over the entire city. He earned close to $50,000 a day on cocaine, raked in another $25,000 on heroin, and skimmed a ten percent fee off any marijuana that sold on his streets.

Eddie Robinson was thirty-six years old and had already fathered six kids with three different women. His oldest child, a son, was twelve years old and attended a private school in upstate New York, where he lived with
his mother. Little Caesar named his son Rizzo after his youngest brother, who died while in the custody of the Wilkinson Home for Boys.

“You alone?” Eddie Robinson asked King Benny, who was sitting on the other side of the butcher-block table.

“Got a guy downstairs,” King Benny said. “In the car. Your guy shoulda told you before you let me in.”

Eddie Robinson smiled and turned toward the thick-muscled black man in a sweatsuit standing in a corner by the window.

“Bip can’t talk,” Eddie Robinson said.

“Smart move,” King Benny said.

“I’m not looking for partners,” Eddie said, thick mustache highlighting his thin face. “If that’s your reason for the meet.”

“I don’t want a partner,” King Benny said.

“Then what?” Eddie Robinson said.

“I want you to give me some money,” King Benny said.

“How much money?”

“Eight thousand dollars,” King Benny said.

“I’ll play along,” Eddie Robinson said with a smile. “Say I give you the eight grand. How long before you pay it back?”

“I’m not paying it back,” King Benny said, reaching a hand into his jacket pocket and taking out a folded piece of paper. “Somebody else is.”

“This somebody somebody I know?” Eddie Robinson said, taking the paper from King Benny and placing it in his own pocket.

“Your little brother knew him,” King Benny said.

“Rizzo?” Eddie Robinson asked, a sudden deadness to his voice. “How did he know Rizzo?”

“The man was a guard at an upstate home,” King Benny said. “Was there the same time as Rizzo. Before and after he died.”

“Bip,” Eddie Robinson said, not moving his eyes from King Benny. “Count out eight thousand and put it in an envelope.”

King Benny and Eddie Robinson stared at each other in silence, waiting for Bip to walk into the kitchen and come back out with a white envelope. Bip handed the envelope to Eddie Robinson.

“You go back a long time, old man,” Eddie Robinson said as he passed it on to King Benny.

“Old men always do,” King Benny said.

“Ran with the guineas back when the guineas were tough,” Eddie Robinson said.

“Ran when I could run,” King Benny said.

“Maybe you and me can do some business,” Eddie Robinson said. “Close us a deal.”

“We just did,” King Benny said, putting the envelope in the side pocket of his jacket and turning to leave the room.

“I’ll look up our Mend soon,” Eddie Robinson said as King Benny walked away. “And collect the money he owes me.”

“He owes you somethin’ more than money,” King Benny said, standing in the entryway, his face in the shadows. “Something worth more.”

Eddie Robinson stood up from his chair, hands spread out before him. “Ain’t nothin’ worth more than the green.”

“This is,” King Benny said.

“What, old man?” Eddie Robinson said. “What’s this guy owe means more to me than dollars?”

“He owes you Rizzo,” King Benny said. “He’s the man that killed your brother.”

King Benny walked past the light, opened the apartment door, and disappeared.

15

“Y
OU HAVE A
witness for us, counselor?” Judge Weisman asked Michael.

“Yes, your honor,” Michael said.

“Let’s get to it, then,” Judge Weisman said.

“Your honor,” Michael said. “The prosecution would like to call Ralph Ferguson to the stand.”

I took a deep breath and turned to my right, looking at Ferguson as he walked down the center aisle of the courtroom. Twelve years had passed, but I still recognized the sound of his walk and the slight feminine manner in which he moved his shoulders. He had gained some weight and lost some hair and appeared uncomfortable in his baggy blue blazer.

The last time I saw Ralph Ferguson I was tied up in my cell, my mouth taped shut, Sean Nokes holding me down, watching him rape and beat one of my friends. It was a night of terror that Ferguson probably dismissed soon after it happened. It is a night that for me has never ended.

Michael kept his head down as Ferguson walked past, heading for the stand to be sworn in by the bailiff. Michael and Ferguson had not yet met. He had another attorney in his office handle Ferguson’s deposition and the initial Q & A, not wanting to tip his hand before he and O’Connor were to question the former guard in open court.

Ralph Ferguson and Sean Nokes had remained
friends beyond their years at Wilkinson. They spent vacations together hunting deer in upstate woods and long weekends in a rented cabin by a lake fishing for bass. They drank beer and whiskey, talked about old times, and made plans for the future. They hoped one day to go in as partners on a bait and tackle shop in central New Hampshire.

The unhappily married Nokes often visited the happily married Ferguson and his wife, Sally, staying in the spare room in the small tract house they owned in the Long Island town of Freeport. Ferguson had been best man at Nokes’s first wedding, a union that had lasted less than a year. Nokes was godfather to Ferguson’s only child, his four-year-old daughter, Shelley Marie.

On the surface, Ralph Ferguson was a model citizen. Pee-Wee soccer coach. A dedicated employee who never missed a day and helped organize company parties. He even handled the Sunday collections at his church.

A perfect character witness.

Ferguson fidgeted on the stand, too nervous to focus his attention on Michael, gazing instead at the faces of the jury and the spectators.

John and Tommy sat quietly, staring at him with open contempt.

“Doesn’t look so tough up there, does he?” I whispered to Carol. “Nobody does,” she said.

“He looks like anybody,” I said. “No one would ever know he did the things he did.”

“Sit tight, sweetheart,” Carol said, slowly rubbing my arm. “They’re gonna know today. Everybody’s gonna know. Saint Ferguson is about to fall on his ass.”

“Good morning, Mr. Ferguson,” Michael said, buttoning his jacket and standing on the far side of the witness stand. “I’d like to thank you for coming. I realize it’s a long trip for you.”

“I’m sorry I had to do it,” Ferguson said. “I’m sorry it had to be for something like this.”

“I understand,” Michael said, his voice coated with sympathy. “You and the victim, Sean Nokes, were good friends. Is that right?”

“We were
great
friends, yeah,” Ferguson said. “The best. You’d have to look hard to find a better friend.”

“How long did you two know each other?”

“About fourteen years,” Ferguson said.

“How often did you see each other?”

“We got together as much as we could,” Ferguson said. “I’d say about ten, maybe twelve times a year. On weekends, holidays, vacations. Things like that.”

“Would you say you were his best friend?”

“His closest, that’s for sure,” Ferguson said. “We could talk to each other, you know. Talk about things that only good friends talk about.”

“What sort of things?” Michael asked, walking past the defense table, his head down.

“Normal stuff,” Ferguson said, shrugging. “Women sometimes, sports during football season, our jobs all the time. Nothin’ you would call deep. Just talk. Plain talk between friends.”

“What kind of man was Sean Nokes?” Michael asked.

“He was a good man,” Ferguson said. “Too good to be shot dead by a couple of street punks.”

“Objection, your honor,” O’Connor said, standing. “Statement is one of opinion, not fact.”

“He was
asked
his opinion,” Michael said.

“Overruled,” Judge Weisman said. “Please continue.”

“When you say Sean Nokes was a good man, how do you mean that?” Michael asked, moving closer to the witness stand. “Did he give money to charities, adopt stray pets, shelter the homeless? Tell us, please, Mr. Ferguson, how Sean Nokes was a good man.”

“Nothing like that,” Ferguson said, a smile creasing
his nervous exterior. “Sean just cared about you. If you were his friend, there’s nothing he wouldn’t do for you. I really mean that. There was nothing.”

“Did he have any enemies you were aware of?”

“You mean, other than the two who killed him?” Ferguson asked.

“Yes,” Michael said with a smile. “Any enemies other than the two who killed him?”

“No,” Ralph Ferguson said. “Sean Nokes had no enemies.”

“Thank you, Mr. Ferguson,” Michael said, turning his back to the stand. “I have no further questions, your honor.”

“Mr. O’Connor,” Judge Weisman said. “He’s your witness.”

“Can you tell us how you and Sean Nokes first met, Mr. Ferguson?” O’Connor asked, sitting in his chair, elbows on the defense table.

“We worked on a job together upstate,” Ferguson said.

“As what?”

“We were guards at the Wilkinson Home for Boys,” Ferguson said.

“What is that?” O’Connor asked. “A prison?”

“No,” Ferguson said. “It’s a juvenile facility for young boys.”

“Young boys who have broken the law,” O’Connor said. “Is that correct?”

“Yes, that’s correct,” Ferguson said.

“And your function was what?”

“Standard stuff,” Ferguson said. “Keep the boys in line, see they got to their classes on time, keep an eye out for trouble, put them down for the night. Nothing exciting.”

“As guards, were you and Mr. Nokes allowed to use force to, as you say, keep the boys in line?” O’Connor asked, pushing his chair back and standing by the side of his desk.