The Professional

Chapter 63

ONE OF SPENSER’S RULES for criminal investigation is that most things have two ends. I’d gotten nothing much from Beth’s end, so I decided to try the other end, and went out to JP to visit Boo.

Zel was cooking sausage and peppers when I got there, and I sat at the kitchen table and drank a beer he gave me while he cooked.

“Boo ain’t here,” Zel said.

“Where is he?” I said.

“Out,” Zel said.

“What’s he doing while he’s out?” I said.

“Got me,” Zel said.

He moved the peppers and sausage around with a spatula.

“Low heat,” Zel said. “Cook it slow. That’s the secret.”

“He go out much alone?”

Zel looked at me.

“Boo’s forty-two years old,” he said. “Course he goes out alone.”

I nodded.

“You and he doing any business with Beth Jackson?” I said.

“Beth? Chet’s wife? No, thank you,” Zel said.

“Trouble?” I said.

“With a capital T,” Zel said. “And that rhymes with B, and that stands for bitch.”

“You don’t like Beth,” I said.

“Good call,” Zel said.

“I’m a trained detective,” I said.

“No,” Zel said. “I don’t like her.”

“Because?”

“Because I kind of liked Chet.”

“And she cheated on him,” I said.

“She didn’t give him no respect,” Zel said.

I nodded.

“Boo like her?” I said.

Zel looked at me sharply.

“Why?”

“He had a confrontation with her Monday,” I said. “Outside her house.”

“Shit!” Zel said.

He poured some sherry wine over the sausage and peppers and watched it boil up briefly and then start to cook away. He lowered the heat to simmer, then turned from the stove and went to the refrigerator and got a bottle of beer for himself and another one for me. He put mine on the table in front of me and went and leaned on the counter near the stove. He drank some of his beer and looked at me.

“Boo ain’t right,” he said. “We both know that.”

I nodded.

“But like I said, he’s forty-two years old. I try to look out for him, but… I can’t treat him like a little kid.”

“He’d know it?” I said.

“It would be disrespectful,” Zel said.

I nodded.

“But…”

Zel drank some more beer and checked his cooking.

“But Boo can’t do time,” Zel said. “He’s okay if I’m with him, but if I ain’t, he can’t stand close places.”

“Claustrophobic?” I said.

“Yeah, that’s what he is, claustrophobic. ’Less I’m with him, he can’t ride an elevator. Can’t go in the subway if it’s crowded. Has to leave the window open in his room a crack, no matter how cold it is.”

“But he’s all right if he’s with you?”

“Yeah.”

“Why are you worried about him doing time?” I said.

Zel checked his cooking again and shut off the heat under his pan.

“You ain’t here to sell him magazine subscriptions,” Zel said.

“You know why he would be having an argument with Beth Jackson?” I said.

Zel got another beer from the refrigerator. He held one toward me. I shook my head.

“Another thing,” Zel said, “about Boo. He gotta be a tough guy. It’s all he ever had, being a tough guy.”

“And he’s not so good at that,” I said.

“Not against somebody like you,” Zel said. “But for Boo, it almost don’t matter if he wins. He gotta fight, you know? He wins, or he shows he can take it. Either way, he gotta be a tough guy.”

Zel drank some beer.

“All he got,” Zel said. “He does time, he’ll be scared, and he can’t stand to be scared, so he’ll be a tough guy and he’ll get hurt bad. Don’t matter how tough you are. Inside, they can break you.”

“You’ve been inside,” I said.

“Uh-huh.”

“And Boo,” I said.

“What’s made him so… odd,” Zel said. “I mean, he started out with a lot of problems, and he was always kinda slow. But time in made all of it much worse.”

“You know what he’s doing with Beth Jackson?” I said.

“No.”

“You know who killed Chet Jackson and Estelle Gallagher?”

“No.”

“You think Boo was involved?” I said.

“Boo’s mostly a slugger,” Zel said.

“He had a gun when I was here last,” I said.

Zel nodded.

“So you think he was involved?” I said.

“No.”

“If he was, I’m gonna find it out,” I said.

“He wasn’t,” Zel said. “I’d know.”

“I think he was,” I said.

Zel nodded.

“He can’t do no time,” Zel said.