Thirteen Million Dollar Pop

33

Lenny Brennan Barnes. That was the guy putting the squeeze on his boss.

Little pimp motherfucker. That’s what Potempa had called him.

Behr ran him and discovered the resume of an undergraduate hood scratching his way toward a master’s. There was a drunk and disorderly, a grand larceny for a car theft that he’d pled to, possessing stolen goods, possessing drug paraphernalia, and pandering. All it told him was that Barnes was a dirtbag, as advertised. Behr was tempted to go to his house and have a real personal conversation about all things Potempa, but he couldn’t risk pushing and causing the guy to go public with the video of the girl. It wasn’t his move to make.

Behr had gotten to the office early, and he left just as early, making his way out while the place was still humming with activity, the Payroll Place file on his plate hardly an afterthought, his concentration fragmented, and Potempa nearly in tears. The conversation had only gone on another minute or two. There was no point in asking whether he’d been to the police, but Behr had done so anyway. A defeated shake of the head was Potempa’s answer, and there was nothing else to say.

Instead of sticking around, Behr went to Donohue’s, where he hung on the bar through dead early afternoon quiet and into the fore-end of the minor happy hour wave. He got a hold of the bartender Arch Currey, the gatekeeper of Pal Murphy’s time, and requested an audience.

Pal owned the place and sat like a cardinal in a back booth, holding court. Nearly every piece of business information, both legitimate and illegitimate, of any consequence in Indy flowed through that booth. Pal would certainly know if any high-profile hit had been ordered in town. Whether he would tell Behr anything about it was the only question. Pal wasn’t in the taproom when he arrived, and most of the barstools around Behr were full by the time the familiar visage of white hair, chrome glasses with tinted lenses, white dress shirt and smooth leather blazer took the seat in the booth that had magically remained empty despite there not being a reserved sign resting on the table.

They’d always been on terms. Nothing Pal had ever helped Behr with had come back to hurt him. For his part, Behr had shared some things that had been useful to Pal over the years. Other than that, Behr was a good customer, a regular, at Donahue’s. Which made it all the more strange that Behr got no traction whatsoever tonight. Three hours and three nursed beers didn’t yield him an audience. Pal was there, five yards away, occasionally talking to his waitresses, shaking hands with other patrons, conferring head-to-head with some old-timers, and getting his coffee refilled by Arch Currey every once in a while. Behr tried to keep his cool, but at the two-hour mark he broke protocol.

“Arch,” he said, when the bartender moved by, “he’s aware that I’m-”

“He’s aware,” was all Arch said.

Behr was trying to gauge whether it was a case of Pal having an inkling of what he was there for-because he would certainly have heard it was Behr in that parking garage-and had no information to share, or if some more direct insult was being communicated. Things were pretty chilly when it came to acquaintances willing to help him. He wondered if it was coincidence or like forest animals going to their burrows before a storm. Maybe Pal knew something, but it was too big for him to get involved. That thought made Behr uncomfortable. Then he got a new idea. He needed someone who knew things but didn’t know any better. There was a different Murphy besides Pal-a McMurphy anyway-who might be able to help.

“Some other time,” Behr said to Arch, and tossed a quick two-finger wave Pal’s way as he headed for the door.