Streets of Fire

THIRTY-TWO

Ben had already tromped down the stairs and pulled himself in behind the wheel before he realized that he had no place to go. It was almost two hours before King was scheduled to speak, and he had been assigned no duties in the meantime except to continue looking, in whatever way he could, for the man who’d killed Doreen Ballinger.

Everyone else was very busy, as Ben could easily see as he glanced about. The firemen were mustering on the steps again, surrounded by scores of uniformed policemen and Alabama Highway Patrol. They stood in ranks, or gathered together in small knots, but always separate from each other, the firemen looking oddly sad and disengaged, while they warily watched the police swagger up and down the stairs, their thumbs notched in their thick black gunbelts. For a moment Ben remembered how often he’d seen Breedlove do exactly that, his shoulders hunched, his long shadow cutting jaggedly at the steps as he moved toward the glass door. Now he tried to imagine what Breedlove must have thought as he laughed with the Langleys, or joked with his partner, or slammed Coggins against the wall of the detective bullpen with such pretended fury that even Daniels had been fooled by it, and had finally moved in to stop him. But it had all been an act, and it seemed to Ben that to create an atmosphere in which such acting could be called for, in which decency had to wear a grim disguise, was itself a grave and desperate wrong. He wished that he’d known about Breedlove before it was too late, because he realized now that he would have behaved differently toward him, perhaps touched his arm from time to time, or offered him a subtly pointed look, anything that might have let him know that even within the ranks of his fellow detectives, he was not entirely alone.

Ben looked at his watch and tried to imagine some way to kill the next two hours. For an instant he saw Doreen’s face in his mind, then Esther’s, then Ramona’s as she swung beneath the tree, watching Doreen saunter toward her from the other side of the field. After that it was a stream — Kelly Ryan swaying in summer heat, then Bluto’s body swelling with decay, and after him, Breedlove, his arms stretched out like broken wings, his shattered head drooping toward his chest. It was as if some dark angel had descended upon the city, randomly swinging its sword, slicing whoever stood within its path.

He glanced back up toward City Hall. The Chief had just stepped out of the building, casting his short, stubby shadow across the stairs. The men on the steps stiffened immediately, and they were still standing at attention when Ben hit the ignition and fled down the avenue and away.

‘You got anything for me?’ Ben asked as he walked up to Patterson’s desk.

‘The girl’s in the ground, Ben,’ Patterson said resignedly, ‘and it’s going to be just like it would have been with any other little girl from Bearmatch.’ He shrugged. ‘I knew it would. I said so from the beginning.’

‘I mean on Breedlove,’ Ben told him.

Patterson straightened up from the paperwork on his desk. ‘You working that case, too?’

‘Just a little,’ Ben said. ‘Sort of unofficial.’

‘Unofficial? I never heard of that.’

‘I don’t know who they’ll finally turn it over to,’ Ben told him. ‘But for now I’m just checking up on it. You know, on the side.’

Patterson stared at him suspiciously. ‘Which means what, exactly?’

Ben did not answer.

Patterson smiled slyly. ‘They don’t have anybody else they can trust, do they?’

Ben remained silent.

Patterson shook his head. ‘Is it really that bad?’

Ben shook his head. ‘It’s complicated, Leon,’ he said.

‘Like everything else lately.’

‘I guess so.’

Patterson stood up. ‘Well, what do you want to know?’

‘I’d like to take a look at the body.’

‘Okay,’ Patterson said. He led Ben back into the freezer room, opened the vault and pulled back the cover. Breedlove’s body lay naked on the stainless steel carriage.

‘He was shot in the mouth,’ Patterson said. ‘Then they cut him up and tied him to the tree. He was dead when they did that.’

‘Has he been officially identified?’

‘By his wife,’ Patterson said.

‘His wife? She came down here?’

‘Yeah.’

‘When?’

‘About an hour ago,’ Patterson said. ‘And she was real upset. And not just about her husband. Other stuff.’

‘Like what?’

‘Well, when the body came in, the wedding ring was missing,’ Leon said. ‘She made a big stink about that. I even made sure that he’d worn a ring.’ He lifted Breedlove’s left hand and held it up to the light. ‘He’d had a ring all right,’ he said as he pointed to the faintly pale circle around Breedlove’s finger. ‘But I never saw it.’

‘Where do you think it is?’

‘Could have fallen off during all that was happening to him,’ Patterson said. He returned the hand to the carriage. ‘Who knows?’

‘I’ll call the sheriff up there,’ Ben said. ‘Maybe they found it in the field or in his car or something.’

‘Were you up there?’ Patterson asked as he pushed the carriage back into the wall.

‘Yeah.’

‘Pretty soggy, I guess.’

Ben looked at him. ‘Soggy?’

‘Well, from the look of Breedlove’s shoes.’

‘It was a grassy field,’ Ben said. ‘It wasn’t soggy.’

Patterson’s eyes took on a sudden intensity. ‘Well, Breedlove’s shoes were covered with some kind of thick, pasty clay. White clay.’

‘Then he picked it up somewhere else,’ Ben said. ‘Did you run any tests on it?’

Patterson shook his head. ‘No.’

‘Find out what it is,’ Ben said quickly, ‘and let me know as soon as you can.’

Susan Breedlove answered the door almost immediately. She was a small, but slightly overweight woman, with reddish hair and pale complexion. Her son stood at her side, staring silently into Ben’s eyes.

‘I’m sorry to bother you, Mrs Breedlove,’ Ben said as he took off his hat.

‘Who are you?’

Ben took out his identification. ‘Ben Wellman,’ he said.

Mrs Breedlove stared at him suspiciously. ‘Did you know Charlie?’

‘Yes.’

‘I never seen you with him.’

‘We weren’t exactly friends,’ Ben said. ‘Not like Daniels.’

The woman’s eyes continued to watch Ben apprehensively. ‘Well, thank you for coming,’ she said at last. Then she stepped back and began to close the door.

Ben caught it in his hand. ‘I’d like to talk to you for a minute.’

‘What about?’

‘I understand that Charlie’s wedding ring was missing.’

Mrs Breedlove’s body grew taut. ‘Somebody stole it.’

‘It might have fallen off.’

She scowled bitterly. ‘They stole it. The people that killed him.’ She shook her head resentfully. ‘There’s no way that ring fell off. It was too tight for that. Somebody pulled it off Charlie, that’s what happened.’

‘He had twenty dollars in his wallet,’ Ben said, ‘nobody took that.’

For a moment Mrs Breedlove considered Ben’s remark. ‘I don’t know how to explain it,’ she said finally. ‘I just know that it didn’t fall off my Charlie’s finger. Somebody pulled it off.’ She glanced down at her son, then ran her short fingers through his light-brown hair. ‘Go on out in the back, Billy,’ she said.

The child backed away reluctantly, his eyes still on Ben.

Mrs Breedlove waited until he had disappeared into the back of the house. ‘Are you looking into all this?’ she asked, once the screen door had sounded and she knew the boy had made it to the backyard.

‘Yes.’

‘How come it ain’t Harry?’

‘They figure he’s too close to it, I guess,’ Ben told her.

She looked at him quizzically. ‘Wouldn’t that be a good thing, though?’

‘It might be,’ Ben said.

She opened the door slightly. ‘Well, come on in, anyway,’ she said with a small shrug.

Ben followed her into the small living room. There was a short square television in the corner and a brown, hooked rug on the plain wooden floor.

‘The ring, it looked just like this,’ Mrs Breedlove said as she placed her hand flat beneath a table lamp. ‘It had one of them little blue stones, just like this.’ She smiled to herself, her voice softening as she spoke. ‘Sapphire they call it. Pretty. It stays that same blue forever. At least that’s what the man at the jewelry store said.’

Ben stared at the ring. ‘Did it have anything written on it?’

‘“For Charlie. Love Susan,”’ Mrs Breedlove said. She shrugged. ‘That’s all.’ Her eyes swept the empty house. ‘I don’t have no family,’ she said as she lowered herself into a small, plastic-covered chair. ‘Charlie didn’t have none either. That’s why it’s like this, empty. Nobody to come and comfort us like family people do.’ She shook her head. ‘Course, there’s been a few dropped by. Harry come over, that was one. And the Chief come. And Mr Starnes. Some of the neighbors come over for a few minutes this morning. But that ain’t the same. Besides them, it’s just been me and Billy setting around the house.’

Ben took a seat on a small green sofa. ‘I’m real sorry about Charlie,’ he said. He waited a moment, watching her face, trying to determine what to ask next. ‘May I ask you, ma’am, if you knew what Charlie was doing?’

‘What do you mean, “doing”?’

‘What he was investigating.’

‘No, he didn’t never talk about it.’

‘And last night,’ Ben continued gently. ‘You were away.’

‘Charlie told us to leave for the night,’ Mrs Breedlove said.

‘Why did he want you to do that?’

‘Said it was the colored people,’ Mrs Breedlove told him. ‘Said it was because of all the trouble.’

‘That’s all he said?’

‘He didn’t give no other reason,’ Mrs Breedlove said. ‘He just came home, said he had to take us to the bus station early, picked up our old garden shovel and took us to the station.’

‘He picked up a shovel?’

‘That’s right.’

‘Did he say why?’

‘No. He just put it in the backseat of the car and off we went.’

‘To the bus station?’

‘Uh huh.’

‘And he said he was taking you early because he had someplace he needed to go.’

‘Someplace to go, right, and that he had to get on over to wherever it was.’

‘Did he mention where he was going?’

‘No,’ Mrs Breedlove said. ‘But he never mentioned things like that. He always kept me in the dark about what he was up to. Charlie was like that. Maybe I knew him a little, but I don’t think nobody else did.’

‘What time did he leave that afternoon?’

‘He took us to the bus station at around six, I reckon,’ Mrs Breedlove said. ‘He told me to call him from Hunts-ville when I got there.’

‘To call him at home?’

‘Yes.’

‘Which meant that he expected to be back at around eight?’

Mrs Breedlove nodded. ‘It’s about two hours to Huntsville.’

‘When did you call him?’

‘A little after eight,’ Mrs Breedlove said. ‘But nobody answered. I kept calling every thirty minutes till it was almost morning. By then I was getting real worried. So that’s when I called the police back here in Birmingham.’

‘Who’d you speak to?’

‘Captain Starnes,’ Mrs Breedlove said. ‘He sounded funny.’

‘In what way?’

‘Just jumpy-like.’

‘What did he say?’

‘To come on back home to Birmingham,’ Mrs Breedlove said. She shrugged. ‘I guess he already knew about Charlie by then.’

Ben looked at her sincerely. ‘I’m sorry about all these questions,’ he said.

Mrs Breedlove watched him intently for another moment, then her eyes drifted toward the back of the house. Through a long narrow hallway, the boy could be seen running back and forth, firing a cap pistol. Mrs Breedlove smiled slightly. ‘It’s funny how things work. I never had a daddy, now Billy won’t have one neither.’ She looked at Ben. ‘Did you have a daddy?’

‘Yes, ma’am.’

Mrs Breedlove’s eyes glistened. ‘Was he nice?’

‘Yes, he was.’

She looked away, swallowed hard, then turned back to him. ‘I sure would like that ring, Mr Wellman,’ she said almost pleadingly. ‘You reckon you might be able to find it for me?’

Ben could feel something harden within him, grow almost murderous in its furious resolve. ‘Mrs Breedlove,’ he said, ‘I can tell you this: nobody will try any harder.’