Night and Day (25 page)

“Debbie?”

“My wife,” he said. “You know her.” He pointed down to the end of the counter.
“Usually sits there every weekday morning.”

“Bowl of oatmeal and a glass of water?”

“That’s my girl.”

The woman with the foul mouth. “Geez, Han, I never knew she was your wife. She
come in before she goes to work?”

“Work?” Hanritty laughed. “Debbie’s work is walking around the neighborhood, sticking
her nose in everything she can. Then when I get home at night, she tells me all about it. I
don’t even listen anymore. Can’t keep the people and their problems straight. It’s like a soap
opera.”

“How come she doesn’t help out here?”

He laughed again. “With her mouth? I got enough trouble keeping asses on those seats.
Put Debbie behind the counter, I might as well just close the place. Hell, Charlie, you must
have heard the filth that comes out of her mouth.”

“Never noticed,” I said, perhaps a little too quickly.

Hanritty scowled at me, then laughed. “Debbie’s a great gal, but she sure likes to swear.
You want me to call her, find out where Eddie Gee hangs out?”

“Sure.”

Hanritty walked to the phone next to the cash register and dialed. “Hey, it’s me,” he said into
the phone.

He listened for about a minute, rolling his eyes at me. “No, I didn’t notice anything, but I
usually come up Expedition,” he finally said.

Another minute of listening and eye rolling. “Yeah, honey, I’ll be careful. Listen, I got a
question for you. You know where Eddie Gabriel does his business?”

I couldn’t quite make out what she was saying, but whatever it was, she was shouting it.
Hanritty held the phone away from his ear, smiling. When she seemed to lose a little steam,
he put the phone back to his face and said, “Honey, honey! Take a breath. You’ll give
yourself a heart attack.”

He listened for a moment, then said, “Yeah, I know Gabriel’s a fucking douchebag.
What? No, I don’t want to see Gabriel. I’m asking for a friend. A customer. You know him.
Charlie Welles. He’s in here almost every morning.” He laughed and looked at me. “That’s
right, the prick with the cheap suit in booth four.”

I didn’t know what he found so funny. My suits aren’t that cheap.

“Look, Debbie, if you don’t know, just say so. You can’t be expected to know
everything.”

Hanritty nodded. “Yeah, yeah, I know the place. You sure?” He held the phone away
from his face again. I could hear her yelling.

“Honey, honey!” he shouted, putting the phone back to his ear. “That’s all I needed to
know. I’ll see you around seven, seven-thirty tonight. I love you, sweetie.”

He hung up the phone, laughing. “Little reverse psychology works every time with
Debbie. I say she doesn’t know something, she tells me,” he said. “Eddie Gee has an office
in an old tire warehouse on First, just south of Market. He’s usually there in the morning
before ten or so. You know it?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I know where it is.” First and Market was about three blocks from the
docks, and two blocks from St. Joseph’s Street, where Holstein said he’d dropped the files off
to Gabriel. Looked like Ray was shading the truth right up to the end.

“Appreciate the help, Han,” I said. “So how about those eggs.”

Even if I hadn’t known exactly which warehouse Eddie Gee was operating out of, it was
easy enough to spot. There was a long, black, pre-war Cadillac at the curb, two guys leaning
against it. And Johnny Three-Legs sat on the top of the concrete stoop, his back to the office
door, watching the street.

He was staring at the Jeep, smiling, as I rolled to a stop in front of the long-abandoned
warehouse. His smile vanished when he saw me climb out.

The two guys leaning on the Cadillac were also watching, and as I got out of the Jeep, one
of them peeled himself off the side of the car and ambled toward me. He was the bigger of the
two, broad across the shoulders and chest, surprisingly petite from the gut down. His buddy,
still watching from the car, was petite from head to toe. I figured the little guy for the driver,
and Mr. Broadshoulders for the bodyguard.

“Can I help you?” he asked, stopping directly between me and the steps where Johnny sat
watching.

I shook my head. “Nope.”

That didn’t seem to be the answer he was expecting, so he just stood there, staring at me.
I stared back.

“Look, buddy, this is a private street.”

“Really,” I said. “I must have missed the sign. Anyway, I’m here to see Eddie, so if
you’ll get out of my way . . .”

He didn’t move. “Do you have an appointment?”

“Sorry. I didn’t have Eddie’s phone number, so I couldn’t call ahead.”

“Maybe you should just leave your name,” he said. “If Eddie has an opening, somebody
will get back to you.”

I pulled out the ID and flipped it open. “You can get my name and particulars from this.”
I said. “Take your time. I know some of the words are kind of big.”

He stared at the ID for nearly a minute. Then he looked up at me and smiled. “Have a
nice day, officer,” he said. Before I could reply, he turned and went back to the Cadillac.

Chapter Twenty-two

I crossed the sidewalk to the steps. Johnny was still watching from the stoop.

As I got close, he stood and said, “Get in your fancy car and get the hell out of here.”

“Can’t,” I said, stopping at the bottom of the steps. “Got business with your boss.”

Johnny’s hand went into his pocket.

“Think real hard, Johnny,” I said softly. “Your hand comes out holding a knife, I’m
going to take it from you and shove it so far up your ass you’ll be eating whole tomatoes and
slicing them on the way to your asshole.”

Johnny stood his ground at the top of the stoop, hand still in his pocket. “I’m warning
you,” he said. “I know how to use this.”

“That’s what they say,” I said, looking up at him. “And I know how to use this.” I pulled
the pistol from my belt and held it up. “Want to play quick draw?”

“You don’t scare me, Welles.”

“I don’t want to shoot you, Johnny,” I said, shaking my head. “Just go in and tell Eddie
he’s got a visitor.”

“The boss is busy. He ain’t seeing visitors this morning.” He seemed to think for a
moment, then said, “Come back this afternoon.”

I sighed. “Let me make it easy for you to understand. You keep standing there, I shoot
you, I step over your corpse and go see Eddie. Or you go tell Eddie that I want to see him, and
you keep breathing. It’s that simple.”

I raised the pistol and centered it on his face. “Make your choice, and make it fast.”

If he pulled the knife, the timing would be real tight. I wasn’t worried about Johnny or
the driver leaning on the car behind me. Johnny would have to come down the steps to get to
me with a knife, and the driver wouldn’t be carrying. But Mr. Broadshoulders was another
story.

He’d be a licensed bodyguard or private investigator, and he’d have a legal carry permit.
If I shot Johnny, he’d figure Eddie was next. Fancy ID or not, he’d try to drop me before I
could get to the boss.

Johnny hesitated, and I saw him start to bring his hand out of his pocket. My finger
tightened on the trigger. A little more pressure and I’d blow his face off.

His hand came out empty. “Wait,” he spat. He turned and went into the building.

While I waited, I turned and checked out the two guys leaning on the Cadillac. Mr.
Broadshoulders was watching me, his hand rubbing his chest, a few inches from the opening
in his suit jacket. The other guy was tapping his foot, not exactly looking at me, but not
exactly looking at anything else either.

Market Street had been once been a bustling center for goods coming in and out of the
city. But the freighters eventually stopped docking at the port, and the area began to die. The
war had put the final nail in the coffin, but the neighborhood was used up long before the
vampires arrived. After the war, after the camps, it stayed a maze of empty streets and
abandoned buildings.

The door opened and Johnny stuck his head out. “Come up,” he said.

I quickly climbed the steps and stopped at the top. Johnny stood in the doorway, his right
hand hidden behind the half-open door.

“Why don’t you take a couple of steps back, Johnny, and turn around.”

He frowned. “What?

“Please,” I said, raising the pistol.

His lip curled and he stepped back. As I pushed the door open, he was just taking his
hand out of his pocket. “Turn around,” I said.

He hesitated a moment, then slowly turned, watching me over his shoulder as he did..

I checked out the room. It had been a receiving office, and maybe a secretary had sat
there when they were still storing tires in the main part of the warehouse. A pair of desks up
front flanked the threadbare carpet that led like a path to the door in the back of the room.
There were empty beer bottles on both desks.

Behind the desk on the right was a long, dirty-green couch. There was a blanket and
pillow on the couch, and the floor was littered with food wrappers. The room had the faint
stench of body odor.

Somebody was living in the office, and my money was on Johnny Three-Legs. Eddie
wasn’t exactly high-class, but he wasn’t the type of guy to sleep on the couch.

As we reached the second door, Johnny turned and said, “I gotta take your piece before
you see the boss. Nobody goes in carrying.”

“Is that a joke?”

“We got rules, asshole.”

“So do I,” I said. “And giving my gun to a halfwit is against every one of them.”

The door behind Johnny opened and Eddie Gabriel filled the opening. “Johnny!”, he
bellowed.

“Yeah, boss,” he replied, never taking his eyes off me.

“Let the man in.”

“He’s got a piece, boss,” Johnny said. “You said . . .”

“I know what I said,” Gabriel interrupted. “Now get out of his way and let him in.”

“But boss . . .”

Gabriel shook his head, gave me a wink, and leaned forward, putting his hand on
Johnny’s shoulder. With a roar, he shoved Johnny to the side. The kid’s legs hit the edge of
the couch and he tumbled onto it.

“Come on in,” Gabriel said. He turned and shuffled away. I followed.

His feet were wrapped in tan elastic bandages, and he wore a pair of open-heel leather
slippers. Eddie Gabriel’s bad feet were legendary, even before I met him. He claimed it was
something to do with his circulation. A lot of people figured it was the four hundred
plus pounds he was carrying.

Above the ankles, Gabriel was just big and round. Big, round hairless head, carefully
shaved every day, including the eyebrows. Big round body, covered by a loose, smock-like
pale yellow shirt and loose khaki pants.

Of course, I knew what the real problem was with Gabriel’s feet. I knew all about him.

Eddie Gabriel. Twenty-five years ago, he was Edouard Gabrielle, a fat French-Canadian
con-man from Quebec City who decided to ply his trade south of the border. He was
moderately successful, according to the police reports I’d seen, a smart guy who could read
people as easily as the big letters on an eye chart. Then somebody told him that Gabrielle was
a woman’s name. So he shortened it to Gabriel and started calling himself Frenchy on the
street. To his marks, he was still Edouard. The rich old ladies loved him.

Unfortunately, one day Frenchy Gabriel played an old gal who had a son named Paulie.
Momma didn’t mention to Gabriel that her son, Paulie Celestino, was a very important made
guy in a mob run by Frankie Lavino. When Gabriel made his play and took Momma
Celestino to the cleaners, Paulie complained to the boss and Frankie the Wino sent some guys
to give Frenchy Gabriel a taste of his displeasure.

Because Lavino’s guys had a sense of humor, they decided it would be good for a laugh if the fat
man couldn’t carry his own weight anymore, so they took a sledgehammer to Gabriel’s feet.

It took a couple of years, but Gabriel’s feet finally healed enough that he could walk
again. But they were never right, and kept him in the kind of pain that makes a man naturally
surly. Frenchy Gabriel died, and Eddie Gabriel, a tough hood with a bad attitude, was born.

Gabriel squeezed behind a large desk in the back of the room and dropped down in the
chair. The chair sagged and creaked loudly. “Sit, sit!” he shouted, waving at the armchair
against the left wall.

As I sat down, Johnny Three-Legs inched into the room and perched on the edge of a
smaller desk near the door. He didn’t look at me. He didn’t look at Gabriel. He just sat there,
staring straight ahead.

Gabriel leaned forward, grinning. “He’s like a faithful mutt,” he whispered. “Kick him
all you want, then give him a smile and he’s licking your palm.”

“How are the feet, Eddie?” I asked.

“Oh, geez, they’re bad,” he said, leaning back in the chair. He carefully lifted each leg,
setting it on the desk. “Went to see another doc last week, he tells me to start wearing some
support stockings or some fuckin’ thing and be more active, you know, to improve the
circulation. More active, he tells me, like I can walk twenty feet without screaming from the
agony my feet are giving me. Then he tells me if I don’t get the swelling down, they might
have to amputate.” He nodded. “That’s right, cut ‘em the fuck off.”