Quick & Dirty

32

Stone called 911 and reported the incident, then he ran outside, got into a cab, and headed uptown.

It was a good twenty minutes before Stone arrived at the scene. A patrol car and an ambulance had one side of 125th Street blocked, and a small crowd lingered, hoping for a look at the body, which was a lump under a sheet. A supervising sergeant had arrived and was standing next to the lump, taking notes from a conversation with one of his officers.

Stone waited for them to finish, then approached the officer and showed him his retirement badge. “Sarge, do you mind if I have a look at the body? It’s about another case.”

The sergeant looked at him narrowly. “Are you Barrington?”

“Yep.”

“Yeah, I remember you from the One Niner. What case?”

“Art theft. The kid stole a valuable picture, then sold it, and I have to find out who to.”

“Awright,” the cop said, turning his back on the corpse. “Be quick about it.”

Stone pulled back the sheet and saw that the angelic good looks of the sixteen-year-old had fled him. He was scrawny and unshaven and his hands and fingernails were filthy; his head rested in a pool of drying blood. Stone pushed up his sleeves and found fresh track marks. He checked his pockets and found a wad of bills, something over fifty dollars, and a business card from a bar, with a phone number written on the back of it. He palmed the card and returned the cash to the pockets. “Thanks, Sarge,” he said. “Did he go out a window or off the roof?”

“The roof. We got a couple of witnesses to that.”

“Anybody see who threw him off?”

“Of course not. You get what you needed?”

“Not much to get,” Stone replied.

“That’s life, pal.”

Stone departed the scene and walked down 125th Street. He had a look at the card: Sam Spain’s Bar, maybe a block down the street. His cell phone buzzed.

“Yes?”

“It’s Dino. I’m at a wake. What do you need?”

“I needed to locate a junkie, but I got there too late.”

“A particular junkie?”

“The son of Morgan’s maid. He stole something, and I was trying to get it back, but he’s already sold it.”

“Any idea where?”

“Not really, but there was a business card from a bar in his pocket. I thought I’d check it out.”

“What bar?”

“Sam Spain’s on 125th Street.”

“Don’t you go in there alone,” Dino said. “I mean it. On any given day there are half a dozen people in there with a reason to knife you.”

“You want to join me?”

“I’m tied up here for another hour, then I’ve got to spend the rest of the day catching up on what I didn’t get done during the funeral. Meet me at Clarke’s at seven, and we’ll figure it out.”

“Okay.”

“But, Stone, don’t go into that bar alone!”

“Got it. See you at seven.” He hung up.

By now, Stone was across the street from Sam Spain’s. It looked very ordinary: big neon sign, a Schaefer Beer sign in the window, also neon, also saying OPEN. Schaefer Beer, an old-time New York brewery dating back to the nineteenth century, had gone out of business, what, twenty, thirty years ago? A man approached the place on the bar’s side of the street, a familiar face. But who? Stone couldn’t remember.

His phone rang again.

“Yes?”

“It’s Art Masi. Something up? Talk fast, I’m at a wake.”

“I’ve got a lead on the picture. Margaretta Fernandez, Filipino lady, Mrs. Tillman’s maid, received the FedEx box, took the picture home with her, and hung it on her living room wall, from where her son, a junkie, stole it and sold it.”

“Have you caught up with him?”

“No, but somebody did about half an hour ago, tossed him off a roof on 125th Street.”

“Swell.”

“The cop let me go through his pockets, and I found a card from Sam Spain’s Bar, just down 125th. I’m standing across the street from it now.”

“I wouldn’t go into that bar alone if I were you,” Art said.

“You’re an art cop,” Stone replied. “What do you know from dangerous bars?”

“Sam Spain is a fence. I know from fences. If you go in there you’ll come out with a knife between your ribs.”

“I’ve heard that.”

“I’m tied up for another couple of hours,” Masi said. “When can we meet?”

“P. J. Clarke’s at seven. The commissioner will be there, too.”

“Okay, I’ll hang on while you find a cab.”

“Art, I’m fine.”

“Are you carrying?”

“No.”

“I’ll hang on while you find a cab.”

“Oh, all right.” It took only a couple of minutes to flag down a cab. “Okay, Art, I’m in a cab.”

“See you at seven,” Masi said, and hung up.

Stone gave the driver the address.

“You had me worried for a minute,” the driver said. “You looked like you were thinking about going across the street into Sam Spain’s.”

“I was thinking about it.”

“You don’t want to go in that place without an armed escort, pal,” the driver said.

“Gee, everybody’s looking out for my welfare today,” Stone said.

“You look like you could use some looking out for. You go into Sam’s dressed like that, and it’s like wearing a sign on your back that says, ‘Please knife me and take my wallet.’” He turned down Fifth Avenue.

“Dressed like what?”

“Ain’t that a cashmere jacket?”

“Oh, yeah, I guess so. I get your point. How did Sam Spain’s get such a lousy reputation?”

“They worked at it. I went to high school with Sam’s daughter, who would fuck anything that moved, but if Sam found out about it, the fucker got dead in a hurry, and nobody would go near the fuckee. I felt sorry for her.”

“Is Sam mobbed up?”

“Not in the way of the traditional Italian mob,” the driver said. “Sam’s a Filipino and an expert with blades.”

“I appreciate both your concern and the information,” Stone said as the cab drew up at his corner.

“You really were gonna go in there, weren’t you?” the driver said, accepting a fat tip.

“I was thinking about it,” Stone said. He slammed the door, and suddenly he remembered who the familiar face was; he hadn’t made him without his uniform. He was Ralph Weede, the doorman from 740 Park, Margaretta’s boyfriend.