Mission Flats

40

One hour later, in an unmarked cruiser, John Kelly and I sat staring at a small apartment building — surveilling it, in Kurth’s word. At some point, according to the garbage evidence, Braxton had stayed here. Now our assignment was to ascertain whether he came or left in the hours before the police stormed the building. A few miles away, Caroline was at Mission Flats District Court getting the warrant. The moment she got it, under the paranoid rules of engagement that governed in Mission Flats, we would rush to carry out the search before anyone in the Area A-3 stationhouse could warn Braxton we were coming. In the meantime there was nothing to do but wait, surveil, and hope the fluttery feeling in my stomach did not worm its way south to my bowels.

‘You nervous, Ben Truman?’

‘Yup.’

‘Good. If you’re not nervous, you’re stupid.’

‘You nervous?’

‘I’m too old to be nervous.’

Across the street was number 111 St Albans Road in Mission Flats, a mold-green clapboard structure with two entrances, each apparently leading to several apartments. The building sat atop a mortar-and-pudding-stone foundation, which leaned precariously to the left so that one imagined the building sliding right off it like a fried egg slipping off a plate.

We sat there awhile. And then awhile longer.

Kelly produced an apple from his coat pocket and began munching. He gazed out the windshield, blithely unconcerned with 111 St Albans Road or, apparently, anything else. It was hard to focus with all that apple-crunching. I pulled my gun and fussed with it. I checked the clip, pressed it back into place, racked the slide once. One round up. Better safe than sorry. I sighted along the spine of the gun to a mailbox.

‘Put the gun away,’ Kelly said to the windshield. He popped the apple in his teeth to free his hands, then he took the pistol, removed the clip and the chambered round, and handed it back unloaded. ‘The gun’s fine. Leave it alone.’ He returned to munching and gazing out the windshield. ‘You’ll do fine, Ben Truman.’

‘How long do you think she’ll be?’ I meant Caroline. ‘How long does it take to get a warrant?’

‘It takes what it takes.’

I nodded. ‘You ever shot anyone, Mr Kelly?’

‘Sure.’

‘How many?’

‘I don’t know. A lot.’

‘A lot?’

‘In Korea. We didn’t keep count.’

‘I mean when you were a cop.’

‘Only one.’

‘Did you kill him?’

‘God, no. Shot him in the ass.’

‘I’ve never shot anyone, you know.’

‘I figured.’

‘I can’t even shoot a deer. You ever seen a deer get shot?’

‘No.’

‘Well I did, once. It’s bloody. I figured the thing would maybe stagger around and grab his chest and fall over. You know, “Good night, sweet prince” and that’s it. Forget it. I shot this big buck and we came up and he was lying there, still alive. He kept kicking his feet, trying to get up. His eyes kept blinking. He was scared, you could tell. I was supposed to shoot him again. I couldn’t do it. One of my buddies had to finish him off.’

‘It’s not like shooting a deer, Ben.’

‘I don’t even like to fish-’

‘Ben!’

I slid the clip back into the Beretta and Velcro’d the gun into the holster on my belt.

After a time I said, ‘I talked with Gittens today. He fessed up, told me Raul was his snitch, just like Vega said. I keep thinking: Maybe it doesn’t matter. So ten years ago Gittens passed along a tip — so what? And then I think: Danziger never knew Gittens was involved.’

Kelly gave me a blank look.

‘Remember you said good cops do bad things for good reasons, and bad cops do bad things for bad reasons? Well, arresting Braxton is a bad thing.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘It just doesn’t feel right.’

He stared out the windshield. ‘Look, Gittens is a good cop. Let’s wait and see what happens. For now, just make sure you get home tonight in one piece. That’s all you should be worried about.’ He opened his door to drop the apple core on the curb. He tried to drop this comment out the door too: ‘Caroline will kill me if anything happens to you.’

‘What? What does that mean?’

He gave me a look. ‘Ben Truman, you may be too dense to make it as a detective.’

‘What? Tell me!’

‘It means she’s thirty-seven years old, she has a son at home. A lot of guys don’t want that. It’s not easy for her. Where’s she going to meet a man?’

‘You know, Mr Kelly, don’t take this the wrong way, but maybe she doesn’t want to meet a man.’

‘You think she’s gay?’

‘No. It’s just, maybe she doesn’t want to get married. Maybe she likes her life the way it is.’

‘Jesus, you think she’s gay’

‘Trust me, she is not gay’ Then: ‘I mean, I don’t catch a gay vibe off her. I have a pretty good sense of these things.’

‘So you’re just not interested in her.’

‘I’m just saying, I think she wants to be out on her own right now. She’s like a man that way’

‘“She’s like a man”?’

‘With the independence, not… the other thing.’

‘I look at her and she’s beautiful. Don’t you think she’s beautiful?’

‘Oh she’s-’ I puffed my cheeks and exhaled heavily, the way a mechanic does when you ask him how much it will cost to rebuild the engine in your Saab. ‘She’s very, very attractive, yes,’ I said carefully.

‘I just don’t want to see her wind up alone, that’s all.’

‘Well, you don’t have to worry about Caroline. I think she can take care of herself.’

‘Everybody tries to look that way, Ben Truman, but nobody can really take care of themself. Not even Caroline.’

‘Maybe.’ I shrugged, uneasy with the topic. ‘Anyway, if she knew you were talking like this, she’d kill you. Besides, I don’t think she’s especially interested in me.’

He shook his head, disappointed in me. ‘Ben, I bet you could tell me what color Martha Washington’s eyes were, but if there was a real live woman in front of you, you wouldn’t know which end was the front and which was the back.’

‘Martha Washington’s eyes were green.’

‘You’re joking.’

‘No. It’s in the correspondence.’

He grunted and shook his head some more.

We returned to surveilling number 111 St Albans Road. And waiting.

And waiting.

An hour later, the ninjas arrived.