The Perfect Crime (17 page)

“Sure,” Reader said. “Give him a drink, Eddie. See if there’s any popcorn, too. Got to have popcorn at the movies.”

He reached over and turned on the TV.

“This thing work all right?” A picture, fuzzy at first that began to clear, came on. “Sally Jesse,” he said, smirking. “You watch this crap? This is nice,” he said, not expecting an answer. “I’m glad to see you’ve got a VCR. Saves us the cost of buying one. I’ve got a little tape you’re gonna get a kick out of. In a couple of hours we’re gonna watch it together. I hope Eddie finds some popcorn. Popcorn’s always nice to munch on during the main feature.”

He turned the volume down and watched the picture for a moment. Sally Jesse was talking to two young black men on both sides of an older black woman. She walked over to the black woman and hugged her. The camera showed a close-up of Sally and the tear rolling down her cheek.

Eddie came back in and handed a glass of water to St. Ives who sat up and took it in both hands. “There ain’t no popcorn, Reader,” he said.

Reader said, “Eddie, I guess I been hard on you, haven’t I? Hey, partner, sorry about that.” He could see his partner was approaching the point where his attitude could fuck up the job. “I was kidding about that Indian stuff. Take a joke, Eddie. Cool down. I don’t think you’re so dumb. Would I have taken you on if I thought you were a fuck?”

Eddie visibly relaxed. He gave a tentative smile. “Well, shit, Reader, you been treatin’ me like a broke-dick dog, whaddya expect? How you think I’m gonna feel? We’re supposed t’be partners, this thing.”

Reader walked over and slapped him on the back. “Hey, take it easy. I’ve got job nerves. Couple things been going different than I wanted was all. Like this dead bitch in the closet. Ol’ C.J. here surprised me. It’s under control. We’re fine, Eddie. We’re about to become rich. One more day. Say, why don’t you go out, get some more food. Get yourself a six-pack. Hell, pick up a case, bring it back. We’ll all hoist a few. I bet Mr. St. Ives could use a beer. Couldn’t you, Mr. St. Ives?”

“Here.” He handed Eddie a fifty-dollar bill. “Get some chow, maybe some mudbugs, some cold boiled shrimp, hot sauce. Sounds good, huh? Get back in two hours, Eddie. Tell you what--you got time--go home and pack your shit, get what you need for when we blow this burg. Also,” he reached into his pocket and took out a single key and handed it to Eddie, “this is my apartment key. I want you to stop by and get some stuff we’re going to need. I got two boxes up on the closet shelf. All the shit we need’s there. There’s a garment bag, too. Get that. I need fresh clothes.”

As soon as Eddie left, Reader went over and grabbed St. Ives by the arms and pulled him up to a sitting position on the couch. He sat down beside him and pulled the man’s hands to him.

“I think you maybe forgot a few little details, Mr. St. Ives. We’re going to have us a little chat. I need to know about these passports. Although I got a pretty good idea what they’re for. I just need you to tell me. There’s something else.”

He took the man’s hand and forced the middle finger out and grabbed the nail with the pliers and tore off another nail, ripping it across the quick and ignoring the screams in his ear. He didn’t bother this time to cut down the sides with the scissors. Reader waited until St. Ives came to, his face drenched with sweat and moisture showing all the way through his suit coat. He’d broken the finger, too. That was pretty obvious the way it was twisted and began swelling up right away. He felt the sweat on his own face from the exertion. He looked at the bloody little object and flipped it across the room and set the pliers down on the coffee table. He didn’t have to pick them up this time, the banker tellin him things in a high, reedy voice that told Reader he was telling the truth.

“Now,” he said, pleased at his work. “What kind of story did you run on Castro?”

St. Ives started to open his mouth and say something, when Reader interrupted.

“You got to know I’m way ahead of you, my friend. You can’t even see my smoke I’m so far ahead. You want to be very careful here and tell me the truth. I’ll know when you’re lying.”

There wasn’t a drop of blood in St. Ives’ face. His voice was low and husky when he began talking.

When he finished, Reader said, “That’s a little more like it, Mr. St. Ives. Let’s you and me hop into the bedroom, let me make you all snug. I’ve got a few phone calls to make. You can go keep your girlfriend company. Here.” He stuck the dishcloth he’d been using to mop up the blood in St. Ives’ handcuffed hands. “Keep this tight around those fingers. They feel better already, don’t they?”

On their way to the bedroom, Reader said, “Say, Mr. St. Ives, you’d make a good con. You got lockstep down pat. Most guys fall down the first time they try it. You want to be careful when we get to that rug.”

***

One of the calls turned up some interesting information. Lionel had traced the license plate he’d given him to a rental agency, which went along with what Bobby’d told him. For a fifty-dollar bill, Lionel said he got a copy of the rental agreement from the bozo salesman, which not only gave the guy’s name but where he was staying. As soon as Reader heard the name, he made the connection.

“Thanks, buddy,” he said, replacing the phone.

He sat there for a long time, thinking.

After a while, he picked up the phone again.

“Octavio?” he said. “I want you to tell your boss something. I want you to tell him you got a tip there’s a DEA agent nosing around his business. Tell him you got it from a cop you know. Let him know you tracked the guy down and he’s staying out at the Day’s Inn in Kenner.”

There, he thought, satisfied with what he’d done. The guy’s no longer a problem. Castro would take care of him.

He leaned back and clasped his hands together behind his head.

I needed a challenge,
he thought. This was getting boring, it was going so good.

CHAPTER 24

GRADY TURNED THE CAR and the air on for maybe the tenth time since they’d been there and fired up the last of what had been a full pack of cigarettes when they’d first parked. He didn’t think about it being the last cigarette since there was a full carton on the back seat, minus the pack he’d killed. The stakeout on Eddie’s apartment was going on longer than he’d expected. He glanced over at Whitney to see how she was holding up. So far, she’d exhibited remarkable patience. There weren’t a lot of civilians who would have endured their first stakeout nearly as well as she had.

“You don’t like the heat much, do you?” she said.

“Sorry,” he said, reaching for the control.

“No,” she said, “Leave it on. I probably hate it worse than you do.”

They’d both pretty much told each other their life history in the past couple of hours. When he’d told her about his and Jack’s lifelong dream to open the fishing camp in Vermont, she became animated.

“Grady! Do you know how far Vermont is from where I’m from? We used to do our shopping in Burlington! And Montpelier! Have you ever been to Montpelier? It’s my favorite town in the whole world! Did you know almost every building in town is on the National Register of Historic Buildings?”

It turned out she loved Vermont, almost as much as her own home state of New Hampshire.

“I’ve wanted to move back home ever since I got here,” she confessed. “The only reason I took this job was...” here she gave him a rueful grin, “...it was the only one I could get out of veterinary school and I had some hellacious loans to repay.”

She told him her own far-range plans.

“I’ve been saving every single penny I could. Someday, I’m going back and opening up my own clinic.”

“How’d you get interested in animals?” Grady wanted to know.

“My dad,” she said. “I was his boy. He was a photographer. Mostly wildlife. He had the cover of
Sports Afield
one time. That was funny!”

“How so?” Grady was puzzled.

“Because Dad never shot an animal in his life and that’s a hunting magazine. The picture he shot was grouse being flushed. I bet there’s a million hunters saw that cover and had a wet dream. You know what he did?”

He shook his head.

“He purposely gave the magazine the wrong location.”

“I don’t get it,” Grady said.

“He told the editor the photos were shot in a different place than where they were. It was his way of protecting those birds. He could have ruined his professional reputation if they’d found out.”

“Yeah, I see.” Grady nodded, thoughtfully, smiling at the story. “He sounds like a good guy.”

“Was,” she said. “He died. On a shoot. He was taking pictures of wild turkeys. He died the way he wanted. With his wild animals.”

“I’m sorry,” Grady murmured.

“I am, too,” she said, her eyes misty. “Anyway, that’s where I get my love of animals. From Dad.”

For a moment, she just stared into the distance, and then she shook her hair slightly. She had a thought. A woman’s thought. Shyly, she said, “Maybe...if you get your camp and I get my clinic, we could see each other sometimes. Wouldn’t that be nice!”

Nice wasn’t the word he had in mind at the thought.
Wonderful
, would be a better one. What the heck was happening? He was too old to be acting like some pimple-faced teenager. Not to mention his financial situation wasn’t the best to have a woman like this in his life. Not now, especially, with his brother’s unpaid hospital bills and the cost of the funeral he’d scheduled for three days from then. With all that, it was doubtful he’d be able to afford much more than a room somewhere for the rest of his life.

Just as he was really getting into the really deep-down sorrowful portion of his self-pity, a car turned onto the street they were on.

He grabbed Whitney’s arm and quicklike slid down beneath the seat, whispering urgently for her to do the same. He knew it was Eddie in the brown Cavalier right away, from Veronica’s description of the man which pretty much matched up with Pelkerson’s earlier one.

The Cavalier went past them and turned in to the complex parking lot. As soon as Eddie emerged, Grady said, “Okay. You can get up now.”

When the man came out with two suitcases ten minutes later, Grady knew he’d made the right decision tot at his place instead of trying to find Kincaid. The suitcases were a good sign something was up. Eddie was going on a trip and he’d bet the itinerary would begin right after whatever it was those two were planning went down.

He looked at Whitney, saw the question in her eyes.

“Yep. We’re on him. Like stink on shit. Let’s see where a dog-killer punk like this likes to go.”

He turned the key in the ignition.

He followed Eddie, keeping at least two cars behind him, not that Grady felt he needed to be that careful. The guy seemed to be oblivious to the possibility of someone tailing him. As he made perhaps his sixth turn, Whitney said, “Bucktown.”

Grady glanced at her. “Huh?”

“Bucktown,” she repeated. “That’s where he’s headed.”

Grady didn’t see anything different about where they were. Looked like part of the same neighborhood they’d been driving in. Just ahead, the Cavalier slowed and pulled off and parked by what looked like a restaurant.
Deannie’s
, the sign said.

“Deannie’s has the best seafood in town,” Whitney said. “They do more carry-out than any two places combined. It used to be a wholesale place only, but they had such a demand, they added a restaurant. Thank God the tourists haven’t discovered it yet.”

“We’ll have to go here sometime,” Grady said, half-jokingly, his eye on the door Eddie had gone into.

“When they sterilize the place,” she replied, and it was a couple of seconds before he realized she was referring to Eddie.

Eddie came out ten minutes later, his arms under a huge paper sack, which Whitney said was probably shrimp, maybe mudbugs.

“Mudbugs?” Grady said, and she explained what mudbugs were.

“That’s
bait
!” was his only comment.

It looked like Eddie had enough for ten people.

“Looks like he’s going to party,” Grady said, waiting until he had gone by before he turned around and slowly began catching up.

Eddie’s car headed back into Metairie, but instead of turning on Veteran’s, he kept straight, ending up turning left on another highway.

“This is Jefferson Highway,” Whitney informed. He was trying to make a mental note of all the places they passed, for future reference.

They followed Eddie until he pulled off into a strip center parking lot and went into a liquor store. Grady drove by and pulled off on the edge of the highway a few feet beyond the parking lot. A few minutes later, they watched as Eddie reappeared with a case of beer and a sack on top of it. He stowed that in the car and went back only to emerge with another case.

“Now it sure looks like a party,” Grady said. When Eddie’s car pulled to the edge of the lot and prepared to pull out into the traffic, Grady said, “I hope he doesn’t take a U-turn and head back the other way!” He laughed. “Like all these crazy drivers I see doing that all the time!” He’d been to New York City and California both and he knew now both of those places held an undeserved reputation for wacko drivers. New Orleans merited that title by far. New Orleans drivers were outright lunatics behind the wheel. Pulled right out in front of you on a four-lane and whipped across all four lanes, fuck you if you were in their way. Brakes and a good horn seemed to be the most important things you needed when you went out for a drive. They oughta send the Indy 500 drivers down to the Big Easy to work out for a month and get their high-speed passing skills tuned up, he thought, sarcastica.

“They are nuts down here,” Whitney agreed. “I’m still afraid to drive half the time.”

Eddie’s car passed him, going the same direction, and Grady eased out on his tail. He knew by now that Eddie wasn’t sharp enough to be on the lookout for someone following him, but he wasn’t taking any chances. It seemed as though they went miles and miles, past bars and bakeries and po’ boy restaurants. And after a time, they were driving through the streets of New Orleans. Whitney kept giving him the names of the places they passed, but Grady didn’t get much of any of that until they went past the Super Dome. A few minutes later he was following Eddie’s car over the GNO bridge.

“I hope you’ve got a gun,” Whitney said.

He looked at her, a question in his eyes.

“Algiers,” she said, sardonically, as if that was explanation enough. Remembering his earlier visit, he understood and nodded agreement.

Sure enough, they were going to Algiers. He recognized the bridge and the turnoff when they came off it. Grady was glad his gun was nestled in the small of his back. Coming off the bridge, the place looked like a war zone. He’d been to Stony Island in Chicago once and the Cabrini-Green projects had nothing on this dump.

Grady was so busy watching for derelicts, he missed Eddie’s turn down a side street but Whitney was keeping her eye on him and yelled, “Turn! Turn!” and he barely made the corner, hoping Eddie hadn’t heard the scream of his tires. The Cavalier had disappeared, but Whitney’s sharp eyes caught a glimpse of it just as Grady drove past the first intersecting street. He was already about halfway down the side street. Grady backed up and turned, noting the street name as they flashed by. Thurman. Eddie was a block and a half ahead by that time, pulling the Cavalier over to the curb. He was getting out by the time Grady could pull his own car over, only half a block between them. Grady killed the engine and waited to see what the man would do.

“What now?” Whitney whispered breathlessly, as if Eddie could overhear her.

“Wait,” Grady told her, stoically.

What Eddie did was go up to a house and let himself in. They could see him take the key from his pocket and not from the ring in his other hand.

“It’s not his house,” Whitney said.

Grady looked at her with admiration. “You’d make a good detective,” he said. “I think you’re right.”

Who the hell’s place is it? he wondered. Wait.
Kincaid’s
. That’s it. It must be Kincaid’s. Maybe they were having a meeting. The guy he wanted could be inside right that minute. Briefly, he thought about busting in, shooting the both of them, and then disappearing back up north. He let go of the idea, knowing it was unrealistic. It was nice to imagine, though. Putting a bullet through this guy’s brain would be something that would be hard to top, pleasure-wise. One day.

“I think this is where my guy lives,” he said to Whitney. His voice was grim. “Reader Kincaid.”

While they waited, Grady felt it necessary to apologize for the boredom he was sure she was suffering through. Most civilians didn’t realize that most police work was just that--long periods of just watching people do nothing.

“Boring?” she said, seemingly amazed he’d said such a thing. “I think this is the most exciting thing I’ve done this year. There’s only one thing missing.” Grady looked at her, noted the mischief in her eyes.

“What’s that?”

“When do I get to see some police brutaity?” she said, and both laughed.

“I don’t do that anymore,” he said. “I gave it up for Lent.”

“Oh, you!” she giggled. “Can’t you sin just a little? For this jerk?”

That reminded her of a joke she’d heard and she told it to him. “This guy says, ‘If you ever see me being beat by the cops, please put down your video camera and come help me.’“

Grady chuckled at that one and impulsively, he reached over and kissed her. Just a quick peck, but something even he felt surprised doing and by her eyes, so did she. She slid her hand over and he put his on top and she turned her palm up and they interlocked fingers. They sat like that, not saying anything, for long minutes, just watching the house.

When Eddie reappeared, he went to his car and popped the trunk. Grady watched as he loaded up a couple of big boxes and a garment bag. After he closed the lid, he stood a minute staring at the house and scratching his head as if trying to remember something. He stood there like that for a minute or so then got back in his vehicle.

“He’s not in there,” Grady said aloud, more to himself. “Kincaid,” he said to the question on Whitney’s face.

As soon as Eddie pulled out, Grady drove up to the house and stopped.

“Aren’t you going to follow him? You said Kincaid wasn’t there.” Whitney said. Eddie was disappearing around the corner.

“I’ll catch him,” was his response. “He’s headed back the way he came. Here.” He reached under the seat and grabbed the pad and pencil he kept there and handed them to Whitney. He squinted at the house and then pulled out, in the same direction Eddie had gone.

“Twenty-two, twenty-three,” he dictated. “Thurman.” She scribbled down the address.

They came around the corner just in time to see Eddie take a left a block up and they were back up behind him in less than a minute. Luckily, there wasn’t much traffic.

They followed him back across the bridge and in a few minutes they were on St. Charles Avenue and kept close behind until the street curved right and became Carrollton.

“This is Riverbend,” Whitney said. “Nice neighborhood.”

Eddie was pulling into a strip center a block up on the left.

Grady pulled over to the side of the street and watched. At first, he figured he’d forgotten something for the party since there was a grocery store there, but no, he got out with one of the cases of beer--long-necks by the size of the cases, the old-fashioned big brown ones--and started walking up the street.

Grady pulled into the same shopping center, only at the opposite end of it, and waited until Eddie crossed the street. As soon as he was across, Grady told Whitney to stay put while he got out and followed him. He strolled up to the corner and watched Eddie cross Carrollton and head for the opposite side of the street. He walked up to a house, the second from the corner, going around to the side and letting himself in at a gate.

Wait a minute, Grady told himself. That’s his destination and he’s got a shitload of stuff in the car. Don’t get too hasty. Wait awhile.