Alex Cross 5 - Pop Goes the Weasel

CHAPTER Thirty-Four

Maybe we were close to something. Two Metro cruisers and two unmarked sedans pulled up to the fenced-in entrance of tiny Downing playground in Shaw. Rakeem Powell and Sampson went with me to visit with Joe 'Back Door' Booker, a well-known neighborhood menace.

I knew Back Door by sight and spotted him right away. He was short, no more than five-seven, goateed, and so good with a basketball that he sometimes played in work boots, just to show off. He had on dusty orange construction boots today. Also a faded black nylon jacket and black nylon pants that accordioned at the ankles.

A full-court basketball game was in progress, a fast, high-level game, somewhere between college and pro in terms of athletic ability. The court couldn't have been more basic - black macadam, faded white lines, metal backboards and rims with chain nets.

Players from two or three other teams sat around waiting their turn to play winners. Nylon shorts and pants and the Nike swoosh were everywhere. The court was surrounded by four walls of heavy wire fencing and was known as the 'cage'. Everybody looked up as we arrived, Booker included.

'We got next!' Sampson called out.

The players on and off the court exchanged looks and a couple of them grinned at Sampson's one-liner. They knew who we were. The steady thump, thump, thump on the game ball hadn't stopped.

Back Door was on the court. It wasn't unusual for his team to hold winners for an entire afternoon. He had been in and out of reformatories and prisons since he was fourteen, but he could play ball. He was taunting another player who was on the court in gray suit pants, high-tops, a bare chest, 'You suck,' said Back Door. Take those church pants off. I play you in baseball, tennis, bowling, any game - you suck. Stop suckin'.'

Rakeem Powell blew the silver referee's whistle he always carries. Rakeem works as a soccer ref in his spare time. The whistle is unorthodox, but it gets attention in noisy places. The game stopped.

The three of us walked up to Booker, who was standing near the foul circle at one basket. Sampson and I towered over him. But so did most of the players. It didn't matter, he was still the best ballplayer out there. He could probably beat Sampson and me if we played him two on one.

'Awhh, leave the brother alone. He didn't do nothin,' one of the other, taller men complained in a deep voice. He had prison-style tattoos all over his back and arms. 'He was here playin' ball, man.'

'Door been here all day,' said somebody else. 'Door been here for days. Hasn't lost a game in days!'

Several of the young men laughed at the playground humor. Sampson turned to the biggest man on the court. 'Shut the hell up. Stop dribbling that rock, too. Two young sisters been murdered. That's why we're here. This is no game with us.'

The dribbler shut up and picked up the game ball. The yard became strangely quiet. We could hear a jump rope striking the sidewalk in a fast rhythm. Three little girls playing just outside the cage were saying, 'Little Miss Pinky dressed in blue, died last night at half past two.' It was a jump-rope rhyme, sadly true around here.

I put my arm around Booker's shoulder and walked him away from his friends.

Sampson continued to do the talking. 'Booker, this is going to be so fast and easy you and your friends will be laughing your asses off about it before we're back in our cars.'

'Yeah, uh-huh,' said Joseph Booker, trying to be cool in the extreme heat of Sampson's and my glare.

'I'm serious as a heart attack, little man. You saw something that can help us with the murder of Tori Glover and Marion Cardinal. Simple as that. You talk and we walk right back out of here.'

Booker glared up at Sampson as if he were staring down the sun. 'I didn't see shit. Like Luki say, I been here for days. I never lose to these sorry chumps.'

I held up my hand, palm out, inches from his squashed moonpie face.

'I'm on a stopwatch here, Booker, so please don't interrupt my flow. I promise you, two minutes and we're out of here. Now here's what's in it for you. One, we go away and you gentlemen finish your game. Two, Detectives Powell and Sampson will owe you one. Three, a hundred dollars now for your time and trouble. The clock is ticking,' I said. 'Tick, tick, tick. Easy money.'

He finally nodded and held out his hand.

'I seen those two girls get picked up. Around two, three in the mornin' on E Street. I didn't see no driver, nobody's face or nothin'. Too dark, man. But he was driving a cab. Look like purple-and-blue gypsy. Some-thin' like that. Girls get into the back of the cab, drive off.'

'Is that it?' I asked him. 'I don't want to have to come back here later. Break up your game again.'

Booker considered what I'd said, then spoke again. 'Cab driver a white man. Seen his arm stickin' out the side window. Ain't no white boys drivin' the night shift in Shaw, least none I seen.'

I nodded, waited a bit, then I smiled at the other players, 'Gentlemen, as you were. Play ball.' Thump, thump, thump. Swish. Booker could really play ball