Out of Sight

THIRTEEN

Said to Burdon, "If I get Chirino, will you put me on the task force? I can work it out with my boss if you okay it."

" Her dad said, "You didn't tell him you had the guy?"

"I felt I had to make a deal first."

Her dad said, "My little girl."

They were on the patio with Jack Daniel's over ice, the sun going down.

Her dad had told her often enough it was Walter Huston's favorite time of day in The Virginian and Walter was right. This evening he didn't mention it.

"Burdon naturally was suspicious. He said, "Girl, are you trying to run some kind of game on me?" I said, "All you have to say is yes or no." He said, "You come up with the Cuban you can call your shot." He got there about twenty minutes later. He took one look at Chirino and got his surveillance guys to take him away. He had to ask how I got an escaped con to lie on the floor, but didn't act surprised or make a big deal about it."

"You sandbagged him," her dad said.

"I don't think I'd be civil with you either."

"He had to decide what kind of attitude to have, how to treat me, and he wasn't sure yet. He talked to Adele, asked her a lot of questions.

She was pretty cool about the whole thing. I was surprised."

"If anybody was cool," her dad said, and raised his glass to her.

Karen sipped her drink. Her eyes raised to her dad and she said, "Once you're into it and you're pumped up and you know who the guy is and you know you can't give him one fucking inch… He has the choice, you don't."

"You tell that to Burdon?"

"No, but he said, "Let's go have us a cold beverage and talk some." We went over to the Cardozo for about an hour."

"What's he drink, water?"

"Yeah, Evian, one of those. He warmed up. For the first time since I've known him he came down from heaven and acted like a normal guy. He asked me if I would've shot Chirino if he didn't drop the gun. I said yes and he said he believed it. He wanted to have dinner. He's asked me before, but always made it sound like he was making my day. Wow, I get to go out with Daniel Burdon. I turn him down and he thinks it's a racial thing with me. When I was in college almost every black guy who asked me out was like that. I'd say no thanks, 'cause the guy was an idiot or an asshole or had bad breath, and he'd accuse me of being racist."

"What's Burden's problem?"

"He thinks he's irresistible. He wants to get me in bed, that's all, and I don't see any future in it. Ray Nicolet is the same way, he's getting around to it. All those macho guys… Jesus, give me a break."

Her dad said, "I don't want to know everything, okay?" He sipped his drink looking out at the lawn. After a bit he said, "How come we don't play catch anymore?"

She smiled at him.

"Anytime you want. How's your arm?"

"I don't know, it's been so long."

Twelve years old she had her own glove, a Dave Concepcion model, and they'd throw a hardball at each other out on the lawn.

"You discovered boys and quit playing ball."

"I didn't want to show them up."

"You could've, too, you had an arm. You never threw like a girl."

They were quiet for a while in the last of the day's light. Her dad said, "I don't want to lose you. I think I'm gonna live forever and I need my daughter around. I lost your mother, that's enough." There was a silence again. This time he said, "You're too smart to pack a gun and deal with felons. You're too smart and you're too nice a person."

Karen got up, went over to his chair and kissed him and stayed there, hunched over, her arm around his shoulders. She said, "I didn't go out with Burdon 'cause I wanted to stay home with you. Before that, the plan was to see Adele and come right home and be waiting for you. You know why?"

"Because you love your dad."

"Because I love you and because you have an idea how to find Buddy."

"You gave me the idea. Remember you said what if Buddy's his real name?"

Karen got up.

"And it is?"

"No, but it was something to go on."

Karen turned to sit on the wrought-iron cocktail table, facing him now.

"I called my main source." Her dad paused to sip his drink.

And Karen said, "Gregg, the computer whiz. Just tell me, okay, don't drag it out."

"That's what I'm doing"-acting a little offended-"I'm telling you. I called Gregg, I said, "What can you do with this combination? Your search criteria's the name Buddy, bank robbery or armed robbery, and California between 1970 and 1990." I told him Buddy got out of Lompoc either this year or last year, but we don't know how long he was in."

Karen lit a cigarette. Her dad took it from her, for himself, and she had to light another one.

"You happen to have any grass?"

"I don't do that anymore. Come on, what about Buddy?"

"You start with a nickname it looks impossible, doesn't it?

But if you can add a few facts, and if you're lucky… Gregg used, I don't know, Nexis, Lexis, one of the programs he has, and came up with Orren Edward Bragg, arrested March 22, 1985, and charged with robbing a branch of City Federal on Sepulveda in Los Angeles, three months before. And how did they find him? The way they get most of those guys, on a tip.

LAPD got an anonymous call that turned out to be from the guy's sister, of all people. One of the detectives quotes her as saying, "It was Buddy Bragg who robbed the City Federal bank and some others, too, may Almighty God forgive him." That was the only reference to a Buddy associated with bank robbery, buried way down in the news story, and Gregg had it in about five minutes, printed it out and faxed it. It's inside."

Karen stood up and then sat down again.

"We don't know for sure, though, do we, if it's our Buddy?"

"I called Florence-you met her one time-still one of my best sources. I said, "See if you can run an Orren Bragg for me in Dade, Broward or Palm Beach County." I called her from the club, the same as I did Gregg. I come home, both faxes are waiting. Orren Bragg has accounts with Florida Power and Light and Bell South His phone number's in there too. Buddy resides in Hallandale at the Shalamar Apartments on A1A, he's in 708."

"That's our Buddy," Karen said. She stood up again.

"My sources," her dad said, "will bill you about fifty bucks each. I'll give you the invoices when they come."

Karen stood facing him, nodding and then saying, "Why do you suppose Buddy's own sister ratted him out like that?"

Her dad said, "She felt it was for his own good. Or maybe she never liked him. He was a brat, made her life miserable when they were kids."

"Foley said she was a nun, or used to be."

"I don't know," her dad said, "I always liked nuns. They're so clean.

They never seem to sweat."

She finished her drink and saw her dad watching her.

"You're not thinking of calling, are you? Ask if your friend's there?

Please don't tell me that."

Karen said, "Okay, I won't."

It was an idea, though, she did think about. Call Buddy's number and ask for someone, a name, any name, pretty sure she'd recognize Buddy's voice, or Foley's if he answered, if he was there, and they'd tell her she had the wrong number and hang up. She was tempted, wanting to do it. But if they recognized her voice… She thought of asking her dad to call and decided no, go by the book. So she called Burdon. He was cool, wanting to know how she came about this information, and after she told him he said, "Karen, you're for real, aren't you?

You can come along if you want." He'd stop by the home of a judge friend for a warrant, get a SWAT team together and meet her at the Shalamar Apartments as soon as they could make it.

He said, "Karen"-not calling her «girl» this time" get a key from die manager, if you would, please."

Karen was aware of details she would tell her dad about later this evening.

The smell of sauerkraut in the manager's first-floor apartment His watery wide-open eyes as she assured him the residents wouldn't be disturbed. Telling him this as she imagined their reaction to the SWAT team invading the place.

The senior citizens in the lobby, mostly women, sweaters over their shoulders, bifocals shining, real fear in their eyes at the sight of black uniforms and jackboots, the helmets, the ballistic vests with FBI in yellow, big, on the backs of the vests, the automatic weapons at port arms, the SWAT team coming through the lobby like a troop of Darth Vaders.

She thought, No, these old people wouldn't think of Darth Vader, they'd see Nazi storm troopers coming in to haul them away, because it could have happened to some of them. She had seen old ladies in Miami with faded numbers on their arms.

Karen would tell her dad what she expected and then say she was surprised Burdon didn't make it a full-scale SWAT assault.

Very surprised.

He came with eight guys in jackets and wool shirts hanging out, running shoes, half of them carrying bags that could hold tennis racquets or different kinds of athletic gear. The residents did stop what they were doing, watching television, playing gin; they had to wonder what was going on, curious, but didn't seem alarmed.

Burdon posted two men outside, back and front, and sent two more up to seven to cover both ends of the hall. He said to Karen, "You ready?"

Then had to pause as a woman asked, "Are you delivering the oxygen?"

Burdon, Karen and the remaining four SWAT team agents got on the elevator. On the way up Burdon looked at them one at a time.

"You're primary, you're secondary, you're point man."

He said to the fourth, "You're gonna use a ram?"

He carried it in what looked like a navy seabag.

Karen said, "The manager's door is metal. You know what I mean? They might all be."

Burdon looked at her.

"Yeah, you've been through doors, haven't you?"

"A ram on a metal door," Karen said, "makes an awful lot of noise for what good it does."

She'd tell her dad how you grabbed the handle on top that was like a dorsal fin, and the handle at the back end and swing the ram hard against the door. If it was wood the ram would shatter it. Metal, you might only dent it. But the fourth man also had a shotgun with a «shock-lock» round in it and that would do the job.

They reached the seventh floor and the SWAT agents took off the jackets and wool shirts they'd worn over their ballistic vests, heavy ones with a ceramic plate covering the heart area. Karen handed the key to the agent with the canvas bag. He had his shotgun out now, a Remington with a three-inch strip of metal taped to the muzzle. They approached

The primary and secondary stood to the right of the door, Beretta nines held upright. The point man, who would be the third one in and would cover them, held an MP-5 submachine gun. The one with the shotgun eased the key into the lock and turned it. The door wouldn't budge, a dead bolt holding it shut.

He raised the shotgun and put the strip of metal against the seam, where the lock entered the frame, the muzzle of the shotgun exactly three inches now from the dead bolt, and looked over his shoulder at Burdon and Karen. Burdon nodded.

With the sound of the shotgun blast the primary hit the door going in, secondary and point went in right behind him and Karen, her ears ringing, pulled her Beretta, expecting in a moment to hear gunfire.

Foley said unless you wanted to go skiing or hunting they sure had a piss-poor selection of winter coats here. Buddy said they had some pretty nice jackets. Foley said he didn't even see any wool gloves.

Buddy said well, what did you expect, we're in Florida.

Foley said he expected to see some overcoats, why else did they come all the way up to this mall? Part of it was, he felt like a fool walking through stores in his orange and baby-shit yellow beach outfit, the socks and sandals. Driving back, Buddy said it looked like they'd have to wait till they got up north, say when they crossed the river from Kentucky and came to Cincinnati, Ohio.

And then said, "No, wait a minute. I know the place we should go."

They turned off 95 onto Hallandale Beach Boulevard and in a minute came to the Jewish Recycling Center. Buddy said, "It's like the Salvation Army or St. Vincent de Paul only Jewish. It's got everything we'll need."

OVER 3,000 NEW ITEMS DAILY, the sign said on the way in. They passed through a section of home furnishings, beds, bureaus, everything from TV sets to toasters and waffle irons. Hurried through kids' clothes and a big section of women's things, narrow aisles cramped with clothes and shoppers-Christ, mink coats for only eight hundred bucks-and the constant sound of hangers clicking against metal pipe racks. They came to the men's section, aisles packed with suits, jackets, even tuxedos, and overcoats-some in the exact style Foley was looking for.

The first one he pulled off the rack was dark navy blue, double-breasted. With the sandals and no pants on it looked funny in the mirror, but he knew this was his coat. A slim cut, not at all boxy, like the coat was wearing him.

He put on a navy-blue single-breasted lightweight suit that had a Brooks Brothers label in it and felt good on him, the sleeves a speck short but that was all right; he'd rather have them short than too long. The pants were a perfect fit and not too shiny in the seat. He wondered what the guy did who'd owned the suit. Foley hoped he was successful. He looked at himself in the mirror, at the suit over his cotton beach coat. It looked okay, but he wanted to get a true effect, so he picked out a white dress shirt with short sleeves and a necktie that was mostly dark blue, put them on with the suit and stepped in front of the full-length mirror again to study his new image, expecting to see himself as a businessman, some kind of serious executive.

What he looked like was a guy who'd just been released from prison in a movie made about twenty years ago. Steve McQueen as Doc McCoy. Yeaaah … He liked it. He half turned and cocked his hip in a pose: a photo of Jack Foley taken shortly after his daring prison escape. His mind flicked to a picture of Clyde Barrow, hat cocked down on one eye, and right away saw Karen Sisco coming out of the Chevy trunk in her short skirt, and then on the street in her jeans and pink shoes. He imagined her seeing him in this suit. A semi-dark cocktail lounge. They look at each other…

Buddy came over in an overcoat, a double-breasted gray herringbone, saying, "What do you think?"

Foley nodded, raising his eyebrows.

Buddy said, "I always wanted one like this. I think I need a hat to go with it. I like a hat."

Foley asked how he looked and Buddy took a few moments to say, "Like a stockbroker." After that, Foley tried on a tuxedo to see what it was like. Buddy told him now he looked like a waiter, one that drank and was always getting fired. They were having fun, two grown men playing dress-up.

There were clothes in the apartment, new shoes, food and drink in the refrigerator, orange juice, Diet Pepsi Cola in half gallon plastic bottles, six-packs of beer. Burdon said, "Don't anybody touch that leftover pizza, Buddy's coming back and we gonna be waiting for him.

Here in the apartment and somebody in the lobby with a radio till the people go to bed. Karen, I'd like you to call Hallandale PD, ask if they have a quiet, unassuming evidence tech they can send over to dust around, do the door knobs, glasses in the kitchen, empty bottles, the handle on the toilet.

Say to come in an unmarked car, please.

They'll send us some little girl wants to be a police officer.

Karen, you see anything interests you, or you recognize?"

"The raincoat in the hall closet, Glenn Michaels was wearing it." She paused and said, "Foley asked if he could wear it, so he could take off the shirt he had on, it was filthy."

"The guard's shirt," Burdon said, "the guy Foley assaulted with a two-by-four. So he was here. Or he still is, huh? I prefer to think of it that way, get this done. Karen, you're on my task force. Don't worry, I'll fix it with your boss. Then when this's closed we gonna have a talk, see about getting you transferred over to the Bureau."

Karen didn't say a word, she nodded and made the call to Hallandale PD.

After that she began looking around the apartment again for traces of Foley, something that would tell her he was staying here.

She looked at the shoes again, dark-brown loafers, size 10, so new they hadn't been worn. She believed they were Foley's because they were by the sofa with a pair of white Nikes, same size, also new but showing some signs of wear. The shoes in the bedroom closet, two pairs, well broken in, were no doubt Buddy's. There were magazines in the living room, Sports Illustrated, National Enquirer, and a stack of newspapers-the Miami Herald and Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel-for the entire week, Monday, the day of the prison break, through today, Friday. Karen found Foley's mug shot in the Herald and stared at it, trying to see in this face what she remembered of the guy on Collins Avenue dressed for the beach. If it was Foley he might Ve sat right here to take the Nikes off and strap on the sandals. Going to see Adele, a high-risk move. But so was busting out of prison. He had the nerve… And maybe the beach outfit showed a weird sense of humor: in his own mind a disguise because, ordinarily, he would never in the world dress like a tourist. Karen's feeling was that after a half hour alone with Foley in the dark, she could say he was pretty cool, and cool guys didn't wear orange and ocher beach outfits and socks with sandals…

Burdon said, "We have here Mr. Orren Bragg's phone bill.

Four long-distance calls last month to the same two-one-three area, that's Los Angeles. Who does he know out there, Karen?"

She shook her head.

"Well, we gonna find out. You been in the kitchen?"

"Not yet."

"There's a shoe box in the trash, looks like a receipt in it.

Must be for the new shoes. You can go by the store tomorrow, see if they remember who bought them. I mean if we don't do any good here."

"But you think they're coming back," Karen said.

"Yes, indeed, and we gonna have a surprise party. I want you to take a radio, go down to the lobby and hang out with the folks. You see Foley and this guy Bragg, what do you do?"

"Call and tell you."

"And you let them come up. You understand? You don't try to make the bust yourself."

Burdon slipping back into his official mode.

Karen said, "What if they see me?"

"You don't let that happen," Burdon said.

"I want them upstairs."

Buddy turned south off Hallandale Beach Boulevard onto A1A, three blocks from the Shalamar Apartments.

He said, "It's about, roughly, fifteen hundred miles. You can do it in two days. We leave tonight and drive straight through, we get there two three o'clock Sunday morning. The bars close at two in Detroit and Sunday you can't buy any booze till noon.

Give everybody a chance to go to their place of worship before they tie one on."

Foley said, "What're you trying to say?"

"You want to leave tonight or tomorrow? We leave tomorrow morning, say around seven and drive straight through, we'd get in early Sunday afternoon. The game starts at six, so we'd have plenty of time to find a place and get in some provisions. Unless you want to watch the game at a bar. You know, a sports bar, with a big screen."

"Who do you want?"

"The Steelers, and all the points I can get. Or, we could leave tonight, stop early in the morning someplace in Georgia, sleep a few hours, have a good breakfast… You like grits?"

"I love grits."

"Biscuits and redeye gravy?"

They were turning in at the Shalamar now, following the drive that went down to the building's underground parking area. Foley saying, "I don't care for the gravy. What I like to do is crumble up my bacon in the grits." He said, "It's up to you, whenever you want to get going."

Buddy said, "We don't want to be too leisurely about it, like we got all the time in the world." He nosed the Olds into a space near the elevator.

"What do you think, leave our new duds in the car? We may as well."

An old gent in a golf cap asked Karen if she wanted to play gin-Several ladies, stopping by on their way to the elevator, asked if she was a new resident.

Another, a frail little gray mouse of a woman in her eighties, leaning on a malacca cane, asked if she was visiting her mother.

Karen made the mistake of saying no, her mother had passed away. Then had to gather up the radio and copy of the National Enquirer she'd brought from Buddy's so the woman could sit down close to her on the sofa. She took Karen's hand and began to pat it saying something about God's will, then asking what her mother had died of. Karen said non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, twelve years ago. The mouse woman said oh, gave Karen's hand a few more pats, looked around in a vague sort of way and said it was time for her pills.

Karen watched her creep off toward the elevator, the little mouse woman with her big black cane, and thought again of her mother, who would be only fifty-seven, at home, not hobbling around in a place like this; she would be outside in her straw hat and gloves, trimming, weeding, and you'd be able to see the house from the street. She told friends that and remembered telling Ray Nicolet and thought of the task force again and the SWAT team upstairs waiting and Burdon saying, "You let them come up. You don't try to make the collar yourself."

Karen looked off to the left, past a lamp next to the sofa and a giant schefflera in a planter, to the lobby's street entrance. The elevator was directly in front of her, not much more than thirty feet away.

The little gray mouse woman was still waiting, leaning on her cane.

The elevator door opened and Karen was looking at two men inside, both about the same height, facing this way. One in a dark shirt and trousers, the other…

The other in an orange and ocher beach outfit holding a straw bag.

Now the mouse woman was entering, feeling with her cane, one step at a time.

The one in the dark shirt and trousers reached out to help her aboard.

The one in the orange and ocher outfit continued to look straight ahead at Karen on the sofa looking back at him in the elevator's fluorescent glow lighting him and the other one like two suspects standing in a lineup. He didn't move. Not until the elevator door began to close.

Then raised his hand.

He did-Karen positive now it was Foley-raised his hand to her as the door closed.

The elevator stopped at three. The old woman didn't move and Buddy said to her, "Is this your floor, Mother?"

She looked up at the panel of numbers, the light indicating the floor.

She said, "Yes, it is."

Foley said, "It's ours, too," and turned his head to Buddy looking at him.

"Karen Sisco's in the lobby. I imagine there some fellas upstairs."

They had to wait for the woman to get off, poking the floor with her cane, then eased past her, ran down the hall to the EXIT sign and took the stairs to the garage.

Once they were in the car Buddy said, "I guess we're going tonight, huh?"

Foley liked his tone. He didn't have to tell Buddy to take it easy, not be in so big a hurry to get out they'd bang into cars.

Buddy said, "She'll see the elevator's going up to seven-that ought to give us some time."

They were leaving the building now, turning out into traffic.

"She saw us," Foley said, "so she'll know we got off."

Buddy said, "Well, if they know where I live, I guess they know what I drive. Should we pick up another car? This one's still got California plates on it. Or take 'em off and pick us up a Florida plate. I got a screwdriver in the glove box. They only use one license plate in Florida. I guess other states too. Stop off and lift one before we get on 95. There's a Wal-Mart over on Hallandale Beach Boulevard, has a big lot always full of cars. What do you think?"

"She looked right at me," Foley said.

"She didn't yell or get excited. She didn't move."

They were on A1A in northbound traffic, a two-lane street full of headlights.

"We got one thing going for us," Buddy said, keeping an eye on his rearview mirror, "it's dark out."

"She just sat there," Foley said, "looking right at me."