Bloody River Blues: A Location Scout Mystery (19 page)

“I would, though. If he wanted me to take them there, I would.” She said this with great sincerity.

It was then that Pellam noticed the burning candle. It was a funny thing. Red, thick, about three feet high, with charms stuck onto it. It had been burning for a long time; there was a slick puddle of wax in the black saucer the candle rested on, two burning sticks of incense angled out of the shaft. That’s what was stinking up the house. Sandalwood or something. It reminded him of high school—black lights, the Jefferson Airplane, peace symbols that meant peace and tie-dye that was fashionable, not nostalgic.

He looked around the living room. The candle was a hint but it did not prepare him for the collection of paintings, statues, and icons. All religious, mostly crudely done. Pellam wondered if Penny had made them herself. There were pictures of native Africans,
thin black men and women, with intense, euphoric gazes. There were wooden crosses, spattered with dark red paint. Posters of pentagrams and star charts and crystals. A large glass pyramid, inside of which was a shriveled-up brown and flesh-colored object. It looked like a dried apricot. Like many of these objets d’art the pyramid was covered with dust.

“Would you like some coffee?” Ruth asked.

“Oh, sure, coffee?” From Penny.

“No, thanks.”

Ruth said, “No trouble.”

“No, really. I can’t stay long. If you could just show me Donnie’s office.”

Penny pointed the way.

The office was really a bedroom slowly becoming a den. It was small. On the walls were sheets of thin paneling of light-stained wormwood—with tiny black holes like miniature cigarette burns. Donnie had probably done the work himself. Half of the sheets still showed the nailheads. A six-foot piece of unstained crown molding had been mounted where the panel joined the ceiling. A half dozen other pieces of molding sat in the corner. It was going to be a long time before the work got finished, Pellam thought with sadness.

He opened the bottom drawer of Buffett’s desk. He moved aside the box Donnie had told him about and found what he was looking for. He slipped the thick envelope into his pocket.

As he stood he heard a woman’s voice eerily droning: “Ommmm . . .”

Pellam returned to the living room, where sat three people whose only bond seemed to be this tragedy.
Penny was in front of the candle, her voice solid and strong like a car in low gear. Nothing was going to stop it. Tears were in her eyes. She sat Japanese style, on her haunches. She hummed faster and faster.

“Ommmm . . .”

Ruth was sitting back on the couch, tracing the yellow herringbone pattern of the upholstery with a short, unpolished nail. Stan said to her bluntly, “Get me some coffee. And a sandwich. Watch the mayonnaise. You gave me too much last time.”

Penny’s eyes were closed and from her lips came the melancholy drone of her prayer.

Pellam said good-bye to no one. He opened the door and let himself out.

He was going to wait until he got to the Yamaha to take the envelope out of his pocket. But he stopped on the walk and lifted it out. He saw what was irritating his leg. The hammer of the Smith & Wesson pistol had worn through the paper. Pellam covered it with Maddox Police Department Aided Report forms and walked to the motorcycle.

A FLECK OF
dust pedaled through the air of Gennaro’s Bakery. Philip Lombro’s eyes followed it for a long moment then turned back to Ralph Bales.

“You’re not eating your cannoli.”

“It’s good. I like it,” Ralph Bales said. For a stocky man, a man who loved steak and pasta and hamburgers, he had a curious dislike for desserts. He wondered why it was he always ended up sitting in restaurants eating sweets and drinking coffee and tea on deals like this. “I’m a slow eater. My wife—”

“You’re married?” Lombro asked, surprised.

“Was married. She’d be finished with her veal and I’d still have most of it left. It’s healthier to eat slower. You should chew your food, each bite, I mean, fifty times. I don’t do that, but you’re supposed to.”

The bakery was not very authentic, Ralph Bales noted. Not like the ones he grew up near. It was, for one thing, very clean, and the girls wore yellow and brown waitress uniforms, and the miniature pastries in the spotless glass cases were like the rings and necklaces in the Famous Barr jewelry department. He didn’t like it. A bakery should be dark and full of wood and the pastries should be behind dirty, cracked glass. The room should be filled with the smell of yeast and they shouldn’t charge three seventy-five for a damn piece of cannoli.

Lombro was nodding with little interest. “My brother’s wife makes these. They’re better than this one. I think they fill these ahead of time here. You’re not supposed to do that. You were telling me you found the man who was the witness.”

“Yes.”

“What’s his name?”

Ralph Bales had anticipated this question. “Peter James.” There were twenty-seven people named Peter, Pete, or P. James in the St. Louis phone book. Also, it was a name that someone might mix up. Was that James Peters? Jim Peters?

Lombro examined his napkin and replaced it on his lap. “And you’ve talked to him?”

“Okay. We had a long talk,” Ralph Bales said in a low voice. He recited his next line. “He was pretty damn scared when he saw me coming. But he’s agreed to play ball with us.”

“Play ball.”

“That means—”

“That means he wants some money and he won’t identify me.”

“That’s what it means, yeah.”

Lombro sipped his coffee, sitting back, ankle on knee, looking like a Mafia don. “Do you trust him?”

“Well—”

Lombro said, “I mean, if he takes the money will he keep his word?”

Ralph Bales thought for a minute and said, “You’re never sure about these things—” He had not rehearsed this but he liked the lines. “—but I got good vibes from him. He’s not a pro. He’s scared and I think he’ll keep his word.”

“What does he do?”

This was a question that Ralph Bales had not anticipated. He spent a long time shrugging and sipping coffee. “Works some kind of job in St. Louis. I don’t know. Computers or something.”

“And what exactly has he got to sell?”

“He described you. To the letter. He said he looked through the window and got a complete description.”

Lombro touched the silvery hair at his temple as if this news gave him a headache. “Why didn’t he tell the police?”

Another foreseen question. “He was scared, like I said.”

“Did you threaten him?”

Ralph Bales poked at his pastry.

“Did you?” Lombro repeated sternly.

“Okay. I made it clear that we weren’t happy. I told
him we were willing to go to extremes if we had to. I was trying to, you know, negotiate it down. But I told you—I didn’t hurt him.”

“Did it work?”

“What’s that?”

“Negotiating.”

“Not much, no.”

“How much does he want?”

Ralph Bales stopped poking and took a bite of pastry. “Fifty thousand.”

“Uhm.”

Ralph Bales counted to twelve, as his script called for. Then he said earnestly, “I know you don’t want my opinion but there’s a way I’d rather handle it. The
other
way I mentioned.” This was to make the fifty thousand more appealing.

“No more killing. I forbid it.”

Forbid it.
Ralph Bales tried to remember the last time he had heard someone use that word. Not his father. Maybe a priest at school.
Forbid
. It was a word that belonged in an old-time movie.

“Fifty thousand. I’ll have to go to my . . . an associate.”

“Well, that’s what he wants.”

With one square of paper napkin, Philip Lombro wiped the flecks of pastry from his lips and when he was through doing so he took another square and wiped the heel of his shoe. Then he asked another question, one that Ralph Bales had not anticipated, though it was one of those questions that did not really need an answer. “I suppose he wants us to pay him in small bills, doesn’t he?”

“HEY
.”

Donnie Buffett opened his eyes.

John Pellam stood looking at him.

Buffett inhaled slowly. “Hi, chief.”

“You okay?” Pellam’s eyes flickered with concern.

“Yeah. I was . . . There’s this exercise. It’s supposed to calm you down. It doesn’t work too good.”

“Well, some beer’ll calm you down. You want another beer?”

“Yeah, I want another beer.”

In addition to a damp paper bag Pellam was holding a thick white envelope. Buffett looked at it first and the bag second.

Pellam closed the door. Buffett said, “They got a rule against that.”

“Yeah? What’re you, a cop?” He opened two pint Foster’s.

Buffett looked at the blue and red logo. “Oh, yes! That stuff really gives me a buzz. Is that a kangaroo on there?”

“It’s not going to hurt you, is it? I mean, like with medicine you’re taking?”

Buffett drank down three good swallows. “Oooo,” he said slowly. “Jubilation.”

Pellam sat down in the chair. He held the envelope in one hand. Buffett stared at it.

“Donnie . . . Uh, your wife?”

“She say anything about that?” He nodded toward the envelope.

“She didn’t see it.”

Buffett drank more of the ale. He wasn’t looking at Pellam.

“She was kind of chanting when I left.”

The cop studied his beer. “Yeah, she does that some. It’s like a, you know, hobby.”

“We get a lot of that out in California.”

“She’s real sweet. Good kid. And a cook. You want to talk pasta? Penny’s the best. She cooks all kinds. She makes white clam sauce. You know anybody else who’s ever made white clam sauce?”

“I met Stan and Ruth.”

“Yeah. They’re all right.” Buffett looked around the room. “We don’t have a whole lot to talk about. Stan’s a good guy.”

“Seems that way. Your wife okay, Donnie?”

“What do you mean okay?”

“It wasn’t just the chanting. She had this candle burning . . .”

Buffett laughed—though he guessed his eyes did not join in. He said, “She’s kind of superstitious. Like with Reagan, remember? Nancy had an astrologer. A lot of people are into that kind of stuff now. Crystals.” He reached over to the table and lifted up a clear green stone. “Green’s supposed to make you well again. Penny got it for me.” His voice caught and he swallowed. “I’m supposed to wear it. But I figured my Blue Cross goes out the window if they find out I’m getting treated by spirit guides.” He laughed again. The sound turned into a shallow cough. “I’m supposed to keep turning. Otherwise, all this shit settles in my lungs.” His face went dark and still. “I’m working out, too.” He nodded to the jump rope. “I’ll be back in shape in no time.”

“Wheelchair basketball.”

“I’ll whup your ass.”

“I don’t even play basketball,” Pellam said.

Buffett was looking at the envelope. “You found it okay.”

Pellam handed it to him. “It’s pretty beat-up. That’s what Maddox issues you?”

Buffett shook the gun out of the envelope and held it lovingly. He clicked it open and looked at the shells inside. He read the engraved, circular word
Remington
five times. He did not seem to hear Pellam’s question but a moment later he said, “It’s a cold gun.”

“What’s that?” Pellam asked.

“A gun with the registration filed off. Untraceable. Sometimes you go into a drug bust, there’re a lot of cold guns around. So you pick up one and keep it.”

“Like for a backup?”

Buffett spun the cylinder then said, “Well,
I
use them for backup. Lotta cops use them for something else. Like for when there’s some asshole coming at you in an alley and you tell him to stop but he doesn’t.” Buffett stopped speaking as if this were explanation enough.

Pellam shook his head.

Buffett whispered, “You see what I’m saying? You take him out with your service piece then slip a cold gun in his hand. When they have the shooting hearing, you tell them you had to shoot him because he had a piece.” He found he was sweating and wiped his face.

“That happens a lot?”

“Some. They know it goes on. The thing is, if you die with something in your hand the muscles tighten up on it right away. So it’s a hassle to get the guy’s prints on it. The shooting board always suspects but unless it happens to the same cop a lot they’d rather come down on our side.” He looked up. “Thanks for doing this.”

“You really think there’s a chance the killer’ll come back? Try to hit you here?”

“I just feel a whole lot better with a piece.” He nodded at the gun.

“I hear you.” Pellam finished his Foster’s. “Should’ve brought some peanuts.”

Buffett set his ale down. “Stomach must’ve shrunk. Used to be a time when I could drink three of these.”

“You’ll still be able to—”

Buffett’s eyes flashed. “Don’t do that. I hate it.”

“What?”

“Making it sound like everything’s gonna be fine. Everything’s going to be hunky-dory. That’s what my mother used to say. Hunky-dory. And peachy.”

Pellam shrugged. “You’re the one bitching and moaning about your capacity to chug. I’m just telling you it’s—”

“Well,
don’t
tell me, okay?”

“Sure, you want.”

“Yeah, I want.”

There was a long moment of silence. Buffett said finally, “Look, Pellam, I’m sorry. You’re too easygoing. You ought to tell me to fuck off. You ought to slug me.”

“I never hit a man with a gun.”

“I’m tired. I think I need some sleep. I’ll make some calls like I said. Tell the guys to lay off you.”

“Thanks. I gotta go anyway. I got a date.”

“Date?”

“That local girl you met. The blonde.”

“Pretty damn clever, Pellam. You promise ’em parts in the film and then, wham bang, they get a part they weren’t expecting. You Hollywood guys.”

“Not quite. This one hates movies.”

“Hates movies? What’s her name again? Nancy?”

“Nina.”

“One good-looking woman.”

“She’s here,” Pellam said, nodding toward the corridor. “Her mother had an operation or something.” He looked at the Smith & Wesson. “I’ve got a Smittie at home. I do some shooting sometimes.”