Damnation Street

6.

Two hours later; the Hall of Justice. Homicide, fourth floor.

Bishop sat in an interview room about the size of an outhouse. The soundproofing on the walls, once white, had gone a depressing gray. There was a wooden table. Three wooden chairs, one on one side, two on the other. Bishop sat in the one, slouched, rebellious, his arm thrown over the back.

He waited. A long time. It had been an evening full of thrills. He waited in the little room until every thrill had died. The fog of dejection settled over him again.

Then Inspector Ketchum walked in, scowling and furious.

Ketchum was a small, sinewy black man. He was wearing green slacks and a blue shirt, a red tie pulled loose at the collar. His gold inspector's star was on the front of his belt. His. 40-caliber Beretta was holstered on his hip. He was carrying a thick black binder. It had some numbers on the side of it and a name. It was the name of the girl on TV, the blond girl in handcuffs. Bishop's girl.

Bishop gave the inspector a bored look. Ketchum was bristling with anger, but so what? Ketchum was always bristling with anger. The son of a bitch hated everyone, except maybe Weiss. Weiss had been Ketchum's partner in his cop days, so maybe Ketchum liked Weiss. But that didn't help Bishop any. The way things were set up, that only made Ketchum hate Bishop all the more.

Ketchum dropped the black binder- whap! -on the wooden desk. He propped his foot up on one of the chairs, rested his arm on his raised knee. He gazed down at Bishop balefully, like a vulture waiting for lunch to die.

"I hope you think I'm good-looking, Bishop, 'cause I'm about to fuck you hard," he said. He had a low, rasping growl of a voice. His scowl was apparently permanent.

Bishop shifted in his chair. He whiffled. He sneered. Just because his life was swirling down the crapper didn't mean he was going to take shit from this chucklehead. "Give it a rest, Ketchum," he said. "This is San Francisco. You can't even bust people here for breaking the law-what do you think you're gonna do to me?"

Ketchum lay a finger on the black binder, the girl's casebook. "Accessory to murder. Receiving stolen goods."

"Oh bullshit."

"Interfering with the police. Oh, and how about DUI and speeding? How about operating a fucking motorcycle without a fucking helmet?"

Bishop gestured with the hand behind his chair. "Without a helmet. Jesus. I guess I'm a pretty bad guy, all right."

"You're not even a bad guy, Bishop. You don't rate high enough to be a bad guy. You're just a waste of space with skin on. Too much dick and not enough brains and no fucking heart at all."

"Oh for Christ's sake, Ketchum, what do you want from me?"

"Well, now, I'm glad you asked me that question. I was just getting to that." The inspector took his foot off the chair. He stood straight, one hand resting on his gun butt. "I want you out of here."

"Hey, I'd like to help you, but all those mean men with guns out there won't let me leave."

"I mean out of my life. Out of Weiss's life. That's what I want. I want you out of Weiss's life."

Bishop shrugged. "I'm gone already. I haven't been back to the Agency since you hauled the girl in."

"Oh, but you will be back, Bishop. You'll strut around and drink and raise hell awhile, but you'll crawl back there sooner or later. Know why? You got nowhere else to go, that's why. No one else would have you. And Weiss knows that. And he'll take you back. 'Cause he thinks he can save your soul somehow. Now what's your opinion on that, Bishop? You figure Weiss can save your soul?"

"Let me think," said Bishop. "What's the right answer? Oh yeah: blow me."

Ketchum snorted. "Doesn't matter. 'Cause it ain't happening. 'Cause you're getting out of Weiss's life. And when I say out of Weiss's life, I mean out of San Francisco altogether. And when I say out of San Francisco, what I mean is: get the fuck out of California and stay out. I want you to live fast and die young in any one or all of the other scenic forty-nine states in this great and good land of ours. And I want you to understand with the full power of your maladjusted mind that if you ever come back here, you are going to find an Inspector Ketchum-shaped misery at the center of your existence as unchanging as the infinite but in your case misguided love of almighty God."

"I'm sorry, Ketchum, did I forget to mention you can blow me?"

Ketchum's scowl didn't falter, but an unpleasant light came into his eyes. It occurred to Bishop that this probably was not a very good sign.

"I don't think you've been listening," the inspector said.

Bishop kept up the hard-guy routine, never mind his sinking feeling. "I'm listening," he said. "But you got nothing here. Accessory to murder! Come on, man, you can't hold me on shit like that."

The light in Ketchum's eyes grew brighter. "Boy, I can hold you on any damned shit I please. For forty-eight hours. Counting from the start of business tomorrow. Except-oops-tomorrow's Saturday, there is no business. So it's counting from the next day except-oops-that day's Sunday, so now we're counting from the day after that. Which means, let's see, I can throw you in CJ for forty-eight hours counting from the day after the day after tomorrow-assuming your papers don't get lost or you don't get transferred somewhere we can't find you, which might slow things down considerably. And this is just the start of what this city's gonna be like for you from here on in, just the start. Now get the fuck on your feet, you miserable piece of shit."