Motor City Burning (37 page)

Jimmy got a beer out of the cooler and drank half of it in silence. Then he said, “Since we gettin all confessional tonight, I got somethin I ain't never tole you or nobody else.” Now it was Doyle who waited while Jimmy finished his beer and went back to the cooler. “You want one?”

“I'm good,” Doyle said.

Jimmy sat back down. “I got into the ponies at Hazel Park big-time back in the day. Lost so much money I couldn't make the car payments, the mortgage payments. We was in danger of losin the house.”

“The house in Conant Gardens?”

“No, this was back on Brush, when I was still in a uniform. I was so desperate—I'm almost shamed to admit it—I stole some dope out the evidence room and sold it to a street dealer I knew. I never even tole Flo. Almost got busted too—and it scared me so damn bad I been clean as a whistle ever since. There. I ain't proud of it, but now you know. You ain't the only cop in this town with a secret.”

Doyle finished his beer and his cigar without saying a word. When he flipped his cigar butt into the river—
pssssssst!
—Jimmy said, “So. When you want to snag Bledsoe?”

“The sooner the better, I guess.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Might as well. We should probably run everything by Sarge one more time.”

“Definitely. You want me to come with you to pick him up?”

“Yeah, absolutely.”

“Gimme a rough time.”

“Well, he's working the lunch shift at Oakland Hills tomorrow, so he'll probably show up at home around five and chain himself to his typewriter for the rest of the day. Let's say five-thirty?”

“Sounds good. What's he doin on the typewriter?”

“Writing a book about his time in the civil rights movement.”

“I might like to read that. Too bad he gonna have to finish writin it in prison.”

24

T
HE NEXT DAY
, Doyle and Jimmy ate a long lunch in Greektown with Sgt. Schroeder, going over everything they had on Bledsoe, making sure it was the right time to bring him in. Bring a suspect in too soon and you might get burned; wait too long and he might disappear. When the baklava was gone and the coffee cups were empty, Sgt. Schroeder stood up from the table and said, “Bust him good, gentlemen. Break him in two.”

The detectives checked out a Plymouth and headed for the corner of Pallister and Poe, Jimmy at the wheel. Doyle didn't say a word the whole way but Jimmy knew what was going on in his head. He was walking through how he was going to play it in the yellow room. He was like an athlete before a big game, getting his game face on.

When they pulled up in front of Bledsoe's building, Jimmy shut off the engine but didn't reach for the door handle. He lit a Newport and studied the building next to Bledsoe's, a three-story brick with no roof, no windows, blackened walls.

“That a riot fire?” he said.

“It happened during the riot,” Doyle said, “but it wasn't your typical Molotov cocktail arson.”

“What kind was it?”

“The pre-meditated kind. They just arrested the landlord. He lit—or paid someone to light—a pile of oily rags in the basement. Figured since half the neighborhood was on fire, nobody'd look too close and he'd pick up a nice fat insurance check.”

Jimmy blew a smoke ring out the window. “Jewish lightning.”

“Irish, in this case. Landlord's a guy named Sean Devine. He and my brother played football together at U. of D. Guy's worth a couple mill, lives in Bloomfield Hills, and he pulls a stunt like that. A little girl died in that fire.”

“Man, this fuckin city. . . .”

Just then a sky-blue car blazed out of the driveway between Bledsoe's building and Sean Devine's botched insurance scam. It was a shiny convertible with its top rolled back, a young black dude at the wheel. It went east on Pallister, toward the Lodge.

“That our man?” Jimmy said.

“That's him. Funny, he usually parks out front.”

“I thought you said he wouldn't get home from work till five. It's ten till.”

“Guess he got off early. Let's go.”

Jimmy nodded. “I could use a little OT.”

They followed the Buick north out Woodward. Jimmy was thinking, again, that once the Helen Hull case went down he might go ahead and hang it up, retire. Frank didn't need him anymore. Being out on the water last night was so nice. He could use more of that, more time working in the garden and learning how to cook. And at night there would always be checkers and double-deck pinochle at the Masonic Lodge.

The Buick turned left on Tuxedo and stopped in front of a tidy brick apartment building. Jimmy pulled over half a block away. They watched Willie Bledsoe hop out of the convertible and jog toward the apartment building. He was wearing a gray shirt with a diamond print on it, sharply creased slacks, expensive-looking loafers.

“Brother knows how to dress,” Jimmy said.

“Yes and no,” Frank said. “Some days he dresses like a farmer.”

“How you mean?”

“Sometimes when he goes to the library or sits on his porch, he wears overalls and these big clunky work shoes.”

“Man wears brogans? What's that all about?”

“Beats me.”

“Why don't you ask him?”

“I'm planning to.”

Before Bledsoe reached the building, a girl came out. She was wearing a pink summer dress and matching head band, and she was carrying a white sweater. She gave Bledsoe a big kiss right there on the sidewalk for the whole world to see, then she let him hold the car door open for her. There was a flash of bronze thigh as she slipped onto the front seat.

“Ooooooo-we,” Jimmy said, letting out a low whistle. “She the one from the fish shack?”

“Yep.”

“You didn't say nothin bout that body. Who is she?”

“Name's Octavia Jackson.”

“She a pro?”

“A professional receptionist. She answers the phones at Hitsville, U.S.A.”

“They look pretty chummy. Our man screwin her?”

“Don't think so. They've been out a few times, but they've never spent the night together far as I can tell. A little tonsil hockey's all I've seen.”

“He a homasexual?”

“Doubtful. Believe it or not, Jimmy, some guys like to take their time.”

“And some guys got rocks in they head. I'd be on that like white on Uncle Ben's rice.”

“I'm gonna tell Flo you said that.”

“You do, I'll cut your tongue out. Then I'll shoot you.”

They were laughing when Jimmy dropped the Plymouth into gear and followed the Buick back down Woodward toward downtown. They followed it all the way to Plum Street, to a house with a fucked-up paintjob where a barefoot longhair was standing in the front yard holding a Day-Glo sign that said
Stadium Parking $2
. The hippie could barely stand up, he was so stoned.

Jimmy parked down the block in front of a fire hydrant and cut the engine. “Looks like our lovebirds goin to watch Denny McLain make history with his thirtieth win of the season,” he said. “I read in the
Freep
today that McLain drinks three Pepsis every morning with breakfast.”

“Yeah, I saw that too,” Doyle said.

“A wonder the man's still got any teeth in his head. You wanna snag Bledsoe now?”

“I've got a better idea. You got time to take in a ballgame?”

“Like I said, I could use a little OT.”

“First beer's on me.”

“What're we waitin for?”

“We're waiting for our man to pay the dipshit parking attendant so we can follow him to the ballpark. It's bound to be a sellout. We wouldn't want to lose him in the crowd now, would we?”

“No we would not,” Jimmy said, getting out of the car and lighting another Newport. He could hear noise pouring out of an upper-story window of the hippie house, loud electric guitars, some guy screaming,
“Kick out the jams, motherfuckers!”
Man, the shit white people call music.

They followed Bledsoe and the girl up to the bleachers and sat a dozen rows behind them. Bledsoe slapped hands with two guys sitting on the row in front of him. Jimmy recognized one of them—Clyde Holland, the slickest criminal lawyer in town. Clyde and Jimmy used to run numbers together with Berry Gordy out of a barbecue joint on Hastings called C.T.'s. All three of them wound up going legit, doing all right by themselves. What, Jimmy wondered, were the odds of that?

Denny McLain didn't have his best stuff that night, but Jimmy and Doyle got all the way into the game, almost forgot why they were there. McLain gave up two home runs to Oakland's showboat rookie, Reggie Jackson, and Mayo Smith lifted him for a pinch hitter in the bottom of the ninth with the Tigers trailing, 4-3.

Al Kaline, the pinch hitter, drew a walk. Mickey Stanley singled him to third. The next batter hit a ground ball, and Kaline broke for the plate. A good throw would have nailed him easy, but the ball sailed over the catcher's head to the screen. Kaline scored the tying run and Stanley went to second. Willie Horton drove the next pitch over the left fielder's head, scoring Stanley with the winning run as Denny McLain—a 30-game-winner—sprinted out of the dugout and his teammates hoisted him on their shoulders.

Doyle wanted to make his move right then but Jimmy pointed out Clyde Holland, said if Clyde saw them collaring Bledsoe he'd damn sure come downtown and make sure Bledsoe kept his mouth shut and didn't give up a thing. Doyle's eagerness reminded Jimmy just how much the kid still had to learn. Maybe he should put off retirement a little longer.

So they followed at a distance as Clyde and his buddy walked down the switchbacks with Bledsoe and the girl. The group finally broke up out on Trumbull, and the detectives followed Bledsoe and the girl back to Plum Street. They held hands the whole way. Too bad if tonight was going to be their first time, Jimmy was thinking, as Doyle called out, “Mr. Bledsoe!”

“Gentlemen?” Bledsoe said, turning, not yet realizing the two men were police.

They showed him their shields and half of his cockiness disappeared.

“We'd like to ask you a few questions, Mr. Bledsoe,” Doyle said. “Would you mind coming with us?”

“Right now? But—”

“Right now.”

“Where we going?”

“Downtown.”

“What for, exactly?”

“We'll tell you when we get there,” Jimmy said.

Bledsoe was looking at Doyle, looking him in the eye like they were old buddies who hadn't seen each other in a long time. “What took you so long?” Bledsoe said.

“Sir?”

“What took you so long? All the places you been following me, all the hours you spent camped outside my apartment—and hers—in that old Pontiac of yours. Why didn't you just knock on my door and save everyone a lot of trouble?”

The girl said, “Will someone please tell me what the
hell's
goin on here?”

“Please come with us, Mr. Bledsoe,” Jimmy said, stepping closer.

“My pleasure.” A chubby woman had come out of the hippie house and was standing on the front porch, taking in the scene. Bledsoe called to her, “Hey, Sunshine, can my friend use your phone to call a cab?”

“Sure, Willie.”

Bledsoe took a $20 bill out of his wallet and gave it to the bewildered girl for cab fare. He kissed her and told her he'd see her at her place as soon as he got this cleared up. Then he fell in between the detectives, walking toward the Plymouth with a bounce in his stride that neither of them liked one bit.

The dance in the yellow room began slowly, the way Doyle had planned it. With Jimmy, Sgt. Schroeder and half a dozen detectives watching from the hallway, Doyle offered cigarettes, coffee, soft drinks. Bledsoe didn't want anything. He seemed relaxed. Didn't ask for a telephone or a lawyer, didn't even need to use the bathroom.

Doyle promised he would make this as quick and painless as possible and would do everything in his power to keep his bloodthirsty partner at bay—provided Bledsoe gave him straight answers. Bledsoe nodded. Doyle opened by expressing amazement at how Oakland had managed to piss that ballgame away, and Bledsoe jumped on this, obviously glad to talk about anything but the thing they had brought him here to talk about. Then Doyle asked Bledsoe about his job at Oakland Hills, his Uncle Bob, just letting him know he knew things. Finally Doyle said, “What's with that farmer get-up you wear to the library sometimes?”