(2004) Citizen Vince (14 page)

Dupree grips the smooth handle of his suitcase and is walking toward the front of the airport when he feels a strong hand clasp his shoulder.

“Hey, slow down, motherfucker. You Officer Dookie?”

Dupree smells booze. He turns to see a big, thick, bald plainclothes in skintight slacks and dress shirt, jacket with shoulder holster, hooded eyelids, and cuffs on his belt. Dupree offers his hand. “I’m Alan Dupree.”

The cop ignores the hand and takes Dupree’s suitcase. “Fuckin’ bosses, eh? Send you ’cross the fuckin’ country ’cause some mope gets on a fuckin’ plane. I tell you, Dookie—fuckin’ bosses. Lazy cunts. Is what they are.” An afterthought: “I’m Donnie Charles. Everyone mostly call me Detective Charlie. Or Det-Charlie. But usually just fuckin’ Charlie.” Every word bursts out of this detective’s mouth except
fuckin’,
which Charles stretches out like a gospel refrain, like a whale surfacing. He takes huge strides through the airport, swinging the suitcase. Dupree throws in a running step every few minutes to keep up. “Me, I’m mindin’ my own business, my fuckin’ lieutenant calls and says he’s got some fuckin’ needle dick from Seattle needs driving around on some kind-a-homicide whatnot and I think, What the fuck, I need the OT.”

Detective Charles rushes through the luggage area and outside, to an unmarked parked at the curb. Covering the backseat of the car is a mound of about twenty shoeboxes. One of the boxes is open to reveal a new pair of Adidas running shoes. A young Hispanic man is leaning on the hood of the car and he straightens up when he sees Charles, who unlocks the car, opens the back door, and hands a pair of shoes to the young man, who nods as he backs away. Then Charles pops the trunk and unceremoniously dumps Dupree’s suitcase in. “Fuckin’ monkeys. Gotta grease ’em to watch your fuckin’ car. You got that in Seattle? Puerto fuckin’ Ricans will steal the fuckin’ aerial. You got a lot of them PRs in Seattle, Dookie? What are you, about a size ten? Take some shoes.”

And they’re driving.

Dupree feels the need to swim against the current of Det-Charlie’s rant, and to give the illusion that he knows what he’s doing. He pulls out the file to brief his liaison, the way he imagines this is done. “We appreciate your help on this.” He opens a file. “Our guy’s name is Vince Camden. We first contacted him at the scene of a homicide about thirty-six hours ago. He said he didn’t know the victim, but later we found his name in the dead guy’s Rolodex.”

“Uh-huh,” Charles says, his head pecking through traffic.

“He came in on his own for questioning and admitted knowing the victim, but he had an alibi, so we let him go.”

“Yeah. Uh-huh.” Both hurrying and not listening.

“After the initial interview I drove him home and told him not to leave town. Then we found some stolen credit card numbers with his name on them in the victim’s belongings, so I went back to ask him a few more questions and saw that he’d run. The house was trashed. Suitcase gone. We got a warrant, searched his house, and found traces of marijuana and more credit-card numbers.”

“Uh-huh.”

“So I went to the restaurant where this Camden said he was going earlier, and the owner remembered him, said he made some
phone calls and took some notes about something. So I went through the garbage—”

For the first time Charles turns, a half smile on his face. “You went through the fuckin’ garbage?”

“Yeah,” Dupree says tentatively. He holds up a plastic baggie with a crumpled piece of notebook paper inside it. He reads: “‘Partner. Bay Ridge. Married. Jerry. Tina McGrath. Long Island.’”

Charles laughs. “Well, that solves it.”

But Dupree likes telling the story, even if it’s only to himself. “So today I called the airlines and checked their flights to New York and
bang!
Pan Am had this Vince Camden flying from Spokane to Chicago and Chicago into LaGuardia this morning. I’d just missed him. So we booked a flight and called to see if you fellas could help us. And…here I am.”

Charles seems to have tuned him out. “What’s the guy’s name?”

“Vince Camden—”

“Camden? Like New Jersey?”

“We think it’s an alias.”

Detective Charles looks pissed. “Well, what the fuck? Is it his name or ain’t it his name? Don’t fuck around with me here, Seattle, I’m in no fuckin’ mood.”

Dupree doesn’t know what to say.

Charles hits him in the chest. It hurts. “Aw, I’m just fuckin’ with you, man. Don’t take nothin’ I say serious. That’s the thing. You ask any motherfucker, they’ll tell you the same thing: don’t take nothing ol’ Det-Charlie says serious. Unless he gets
this
look on his face.” He scrunches up his mouth and nose, looks like a bulldog. Dupree recognizes the glassy eyes: He’s stoned. The guy is stoned. “Memorize this face, Dookie. You ever see this face, you crawl under the nearest fuckin’ table.”

Charles whips his Crown Vic through traffic, in and out, eating up space between cars. “Get out my fuckin’ way!” Flies up on drivers’ tails and slaps at his siren. “Get off my fuckin’ road!”
When he crosses into oncoming traffic to pass a bus, Dupree grabs the dashboard. The car veers back into its lane and Charles flips the siren. “Where these people goin’ that’s so fuckin’ important? Any of you fuckers chasing a murderer? No? Then get off
my fuckin’ street!
”

Dupree opens his mouth to remind Charles that as of right now Vince Camden—or whatever his name is—is simply a material witness, but he thinks better of it.

“We gotta reach out to my PBA rep,” Charles says, “and then we’ll scratch one of my regulars, see if he knows your guy. You like Italian?”

“Actually, there’s this girl I thought we could start with.” Dupree reaches in his file for the letter that he found in Vince Camden’s house. For some reason the name and address were cut off the envelope and the top of the letter, but the woman who sent the letter signed it Tina. It was the reason Phelps agreed to send him: the letter and the sheet of crumpled paper he found in the garbage. “See. A letter from Tina and this name on the paper. Tina McGrath. We think it’s the same Tina.”

Charles ignores him.

“There was a Jerry and Tina McGrath in Information. And guess where they live?”

Nothing.

“Long Island. I have her address right here. And see. On the paper I found in the garbage: ‘Long Island.’ See?”

“You want a girl, Dookie? Why didn’t you just say so? You come to the big city, you think old Det-Charlie ain’t gonna take care of you in that manner? We don’t gotta go to Long Island. Fuck that negative shit, Seattle! Think positive.”

Dupree opens his mouth to correct Charles, who reaches next to his seat, pulls out a pint of Jack Daniel’s and takes a long pull, holds it out for Dupree, then waves it at a car in front of him: “Get off my fuckin’ road!”

TWO HOURS TO
kill before he meets Benny. Vince takes the train back to Manhattan. Goes to midtown and walks Fifth Avenue, a river of bobbing heads. It’s disconcerting, all those eyes, those faces. He keeps imagining that he sees Ray Sticks in the crowds and between buildings. How long before Ray realizes Vince isn’t in Spokane anymore and tracks him back here? He stares at the marquee of a movie theater. One of the three movies is
Altered States,
a novel he started reading a couple of months ago when he was first trying to impress Kelly. It was about a young scientist who puts himself through experiments in a sensory-deprivation tank. Vince remembers the exact point he quit the book, not even thirty pages in, when one of the characters said, “We’re born screaming in doubt, we die screaming in doubt, and human life consists of continually convincing ourselves we’re alive.” But he wouldn’t mind seeing how the story ends, so he ducks into the theater.

But the movie is slow and dark and he can’t concentrate. He leaves when his popcorn is gone. Walks for a while and then cabs to a little restaurant called Caffe Grigio on Desbrosses Street. Standing next to Benny is a guy in black shirt and white jacket, hands crossed in front of his crotch like a soccer player protecting the goal. The guy is shades of gray—slate eyebrows rising over sunglasses, white hair receding at the temples. His black shirt is parted to reveal a gold chain nestled between the folds of his neck and a bouquet of silver chest hair.

Benny stands between Vince and the other man like a boxing referee. Even with the blond Afro, he’s a half foot shorter than either of them. “Hey,” he says to Vince. “This is the client I was telling you about. Pete, this is—” Vince can see his old friend reminding himself to use the new name, the way they agreed. “This is Vince Camden.”

They shake hands warily and walk into the place, past the cash register and straight to a booth at a window, all set up for them with three place settings and three waters. Pete pulls the chintz curtains and sits nervously tracing his finger on the paper place mat. The place mat says
Beautiful Italy!
Pete traces the shape of Italy on the mat without looking down.

Benny sits on Pete’s side. “Okay,” he says, “I’ve filled Pete in on your story. He’s agreed to help you out as a favor to me.”

“I appreciate that,” Vince says.

“But you’re never to mention that you spoke to him or that I represent him. If you ask a question and he declines to answer, that’s it. Understood?”

Vince nods.

“You are not to repeat any of this information to anyone, not even to me. Pete could get in trouble helping a guy like you.”

Vince is surprised at the sting of that.

“So today never happened,” Benny continues. “Understood?”

“Sure,” Vince says.

“Okay, then,” Benny says. “I’m going to sit at the bar because I really shouldn’t hear any of this. Wave me over when you’re done.”

They watch Benny go to the bar and take off his overcoat. The waitress comes over and Pete orders a beer and the veal cannelloni. Vince says he only wants a whiskey sour. When the waitress brings them each a drink and an antipasto plate, Pete takes his sunglasses off to reveal two tired eyes, also gray. He takes a piece of provolone, salami, and an olive. “Benny tells me you’re into some shit with Ray Sticks?” His voice is rough and slow, as if he’s talking through water.

Vince nods. “I think so. Big stocky guy with black hair and a couple of caterpillar eyebrows. Calls everyone chief—”

Before he can say any more, The Client nods and takes a drink of his beer. “Yeah, that’s Ray Sticks. I play cards with that animal.”

“So how do I find out who sent him after me?”

“Only one guy could’ve sent him after you.”

“Who?”

Pete picks another olive off the antipasto plate. “Sticks works for this guy Johnny Boy, boss of a Gambino crew out in Queens. Runs everything out of Ozone Park—hijacking, a little shy business, gambling. His brother runs smack. Johnny is like an old-time Cosa guy. A traditionalist. Always talks about returning to the glory of the old days. Shit like that. Real slick. He’s squarin’ up all the business that fell between the cracks. That’s probably where they found you. Between the cracks.”

“Do you think he’d let me buy off my debt?”

“Doubtful.” Pete frowns, and tilts his head. “John ain’t averse to money. But you don’t know with that guy. He’s high-strung. Watches too many movies. Last March his kid got run over by a car, and he’s been buggy ever since. Real unpredictable.”

“So how do I find him?”

“Johnny Boy’s crew works out of this place, the Bergin Fish and Hunt Club. But I’d stay away from there. Guy like you ain’t likely to get a break in a place like that.” For the first time he meets Vince’s eyes. “No offense.”

Vince ignores it. “Where, then?”

“Try to catch him relaxed. He likes to gamble. Gets drunk and throws away ten, twenty dimes a weekend on card games. You play?”

“Yeah. A little.”

Pete rips off a piece of the place mat and grabs a pen from a passing waiter. “There’s a high-stakes game in an apartment over on Mott Street tonight. I’ll vouch for you, get you in the door. You pay my buy-in. Then I’ll lose quick and get my ass out of there before you say anything.” Pete writes the address on the place mat. “There’s always two or three games. I can’t guarantee you’ll be at Johnny Boy’s table, but you flash enough money, look like a mark, maybe even win…you might get a shot.”

Vince thanks him and the guy shrugs. He looks up to Benny at the bar, and then turns back to Vince. “Look, Benny says you’re a good guy, so I’m gonna tell you this one time: Be careful of this guy John. He ain’t right. Ever since his kid got killed—” He doesn’t finish the thought.

“How old was his kid?”

Pete is picking at the antipasto plate. “Twelve.”

“Jesus. And the guy who hit his kid? What happened to him?”

Pete picks an olive from the antipasto plate. Stares at it, shows Vince, then drops it into his water glass. They watch it sink to the bottom of the East River.

THEY FLY THROUGH
a tunnel, Detective Charles working the siren, gas pedal, and whiskey bottle in concert. On the other side of the tunnel Dupree sees a sign for the New Jersey Turnpike. He turns back to Charles. “Hey, are we in New Jersey?”

“We ain’t in fuckin’ Seattle.”

Dupree looks down at the file in his hand. “Look, I think we should go talk to this girl, Tina McGrath, before it gets too late—”

“Settle the fuck down, Seattle. I got some business first.”

“But—”

“Look, I could’ve had my fuckin’ Friday night off, chased some tail, but when my lieu tells me you poor fucks from Mayberry need some help, I jump! You think it’s easy to get an NYPD detective to volunteer to haul your ass around on a Friday night? You might show some consideration for my work ’stead of busting my balls.”

“I’m sorry,” Dupree says.

They exit the turnpike, drive through close, ratty houses, and after a few minutes, come to a small business area. Charles parks in front of a brick storefront with a dry cleaner in the front and a sign on the side above a screen door that reads N
ITTI’S
.

Charles hops out of the car. “Come on, Seattle. We’ll have a bite with my union rep, and then we’ll go find your girl.”