When the Thrill Is Gone (25 page)

This high-toned language silenced the biracial aide.

“And me,” I said, “I’m from another plane completely. I live in a shithole where the gasses rise up to block the sun. Down where I am there’s serious global warming. Up here it’s cool and breezy, so much so that you might think you’re removed from the shit. You might make a mistake and think that you were born up here and not down in the muck where I live. But I’m here to tell you that I am the man that will drag your ass back down to where it came from.”

It was a muscular monologue, enough so that Phil became circumspect, both physically and verbally.

His stillness and silence were a balm to my rising anger.

“Now let’s try this again,” I said. “Leonid McGill here to speak to Cyril Tyler.”

“He’s not here,” Phil said, his face and voice devoid of animation.

“Where is he?”

“I don’t know.”

“You wouldn’t lie to me now, would you, Phil?”

He had no reply to my question.

I believed the young assistant but still had the urge to grab him and hold him over the side of the building just to hear him yelp and beg. This desire caused me, not for the first time, to wonder at my own motivations of late.

Quashing these violent feelings, I said, in a very mild tone, “Tell him that I have accomplished the task for which I was hired and that I have his answer.”

AFTER THAT I followed the rabbit warren down to the street, an insane reinterpretation of Alice in pursuit of the ever-elusive hare.

42

BACK ON THE STREET, a few blocks from Cyril Tyler’s building, I experienced the momentary prickling of impotence across my forehead. It’s the sensation that a true athlete-boxer feels when there’s a punch coming that he hasn’t seen, a real hammer blow that will end the bout forthwith.

I turned to my left—just to see if there was someone standing there, watching me. There wasn’t, and so I took out my cell phone and a note I had scribbled down and shoved in the breast pocket of my blue suit. I entered the number and pressed send.

“Fawn David,” she said, answering the phone after only one ring.

Her voice was certain and crisp, businesslike. I was thrown off, mostly because I was used to preparing my lies while the phone rang in my ear.

“Hello, Ms. David,” I said out of reflex. “My name is McGill and I’m looking for Bill Williams.”

“Excuse me?” It was her turn to feel lost in the exchange. “Did you say Bill Williams?”

“Yes.”

“Do you, do you mean William Williams?”

“Yes.”

“Oh my God. I haven’t heard from Mr. Williams in almost fifteen years. Maybe more. How did you even know to call here?”

“I’m a private detective,” I said, feeling a bit vulnerable with the honesty. “I was hired by a man named Vartan, Harris Vartan, to locate this Mr. Williams. Vartan had the number of a woman who had known Bill and who was in possession of some of his books. There was a real estate ad that he’d circled pressed into the pages of
Kapital
, by Karl Marx. This number was in that ad.”

“Yes,” Fawn David said, “yes. Mr. Williams lived in the room out back for seven years. Wow. I haven’t even thought about him in such a long time. He was a very nice man—exceptional.”

“In what way?” I asked, standing on the sidewalk of what passes for a side street on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.

“He was . . . such a nice man. Very interested in what people had to say, and very well read. It was really because of him that I started my business.”

“What business is that, Ms. David?”

“Middleman Enterprises. I research all kinds of products and, for a percentage or a fee, depending on price, I help people acquire special items for business, personal use, or just a present.”

“So if I wanted a special breed of dog . . .”

“I’d research the breed and give you a list of prices, breeders, and anything else you might need.”

“And how did Mr. Williams get you on this path?”

“He told me that I could do what I wanted to, exactly what I wanted. He said that I didn’t have to settle for less.”

I suspected that there was something important missing from the information she gave, but that was more about her than the absent, probably dead, Mr. Williams.

“I’d love to come by and see where it was that he lived,” I said. “I doubt if I’ll find him, but I’d like to try my best.”

“That would be wonderful,” Fawn David said. “You can drop by any time. I’m always home. When you work for yourself the day never seems to be over.”

“I know what you mean. I’m working a couple of more active cases at the moment. I don’t know when I can come exactly but I’ll call you in a day or two to see when is best for you.”

“Anytime, Mr. McGill, anytime at all.”

I was a little surprised about the welcome the young woman expressed. At the time I supposed that it was because she lived in Hoboken; maybe people were more hospitable there.

“HEY, LT,” BUG Said, also answering on the first ring.

“You sound tired.”

“I’m always tired. Iran works me until I’m almost dead. And he puts me on the scale every morning. If I weigh just a pound more he doubles the exercises. So I can’t even eat. I’m hungry all the time, man.”

“You asked for it, right?”

“Fuck you.”

“Hey,” I said, grinning at no one. “You see? It’s working. Iran’s got your testosterone up high enough that you wanna curse a light-heavy like me.”

“I transferred the cash,” he said. “It’s in a special account that Twill started just today.”

“Twill?”

“He started the account, but he doesn’t know it.”

“Oh. Okay. That’s great. Thanks a lot, Tiny. You’re a real talent.”

I ALWAYS CARRIED throw-away phones that Bug kept me supplied with. This one had a tortoiseshell body and a Utah area code. I used it to compose the following text to my son’s phone:
I got your money, boy. If you want some of it back you’ll meet me @ the Harvell Club on 9th Ave and 14th St @ 3:45 this Friday. Beat Murdoch.

I smiled to myself, thinking of the mental anguish I would be causing my delinquent and nearly perfect son. I had met killers and thieves, drug dealers and pimps, billionaires and extortionists, zealots of all kinds, and still Twill remained unique. He was a bright spot on the face of the sun, a shadow in the depths of space.

My real phone made the sound of a loon at sunset.

“Hey, Luke,” I said.

“You bettah get ovah here, LT. Your boy’s got trouble.”

“Right away, brother.”

43

THE FOUR-STORY VICTORIAN house was painted white with blue-and-green trim and had a slanting roof of layered tar paper coated with dark-red sand. The windows sparkled and the shades and curtains were all purchased at the same time, making the uniformity picture-perfect. Down the concrete pathway that led to the entrance a little boy was pulling a blue wagon that contained an even littler girl, while two young brown women watched them and chatted from the porch.

The boy was making the sounds of a great engine.

The girl alternately giggled and screamed.

The women were speaking in Spanish.

They were all happy and at home.

Less than a year ago the nineteenth-century home-turnedapartment-building had been a self-contained slum. The paint was peeled away and most of the windows had been broken. Crackheads and other druggies crawled into the empty rooms to nurse their highs or service their johns. Once a week the deadly handsome, black-as-tar Johnny Nightly would come up from the illegal pool hall basement and chase away the riffraff.

Then one evening I was visiting with Johnny’s boss, Luke Nye. For some reason, probably the bourbon, I told Luke about the recurring dream I had of escaping from a burning skyscraper by busting out a window and jumping from the highest floor.

“What that feel like?” the man who most resembled a moray eel asked.

“You’d think it would be quiet and peaceful,” I said, feeling a shudder, “like a baseball sailing out of the park. But it was loud, like a battlefield soldiered by screamin’ monkeys fightin’ through a hurricane.”

That very night Luke dreamed that some junkie had set fire to his building, causing the whole structure to cave in on his exclusive club. He sent Johnny out to hire a team of
illegal
laborers and they refurbished the building in four months’ time. Now working families live over the pool hall and Johnny comes up to collect rent and to make sure there are no fire hazards.

I walked up the steps past the women.

“Good afternoon,” I said politely.

“Hola,”
one of them replied, while the other gave me a smile laced with concern.

I’m a scary-looking guy, especially if you know what to look for. From the width of my shoulders to the scars on my knuckles, anyone who lived in a part of town where people worked with their bodies knew that I dealt in trouble.

So, not allowing the women’s unease to upset me, I passed on to the front door and pressed the button for 4A.

“Yeah,” a voice rasped.

“It’s me, Luke.”

“Come on up, LT.”

The door buzzed and I pushed my way in.

I TOOK THE stairs three at a time because when you’re not a professional athlete you have to pick up your workouts where you can.

The first three floors of the building were single units designed for larger families, but the top level was divided into studio apartments that Luke’s friends and guests occupied from time to time; 4A was the unit that Theodore “Tally” Chambers was given.

The door was ajar so I didn’t knock.

It was a sunny room painted mostly white. There were four occupants. Tall and slender Johnny Nightly, whose glistening blackness was a thing of art; Luke, who was of medium height with brown skin that seemed to be seen through a blue-green filter; an old woman the color of a pecan shell; and Tally, who must have lost a dozen pounds since I’d seen him last, only a few days before. The boy’s skin looked like it had a layer of yellow webbing laid over it.

The men were standing around the bed where Tally lay. The woman was seated beside that bed, applying a compress to the ailing youth’s forehead.

“Luke,” I said.

The serpentine face regarded me and nodded to Johnny.

“LT,” Johnny said. “This here is Juanita Horn. She’s—”

“How are you, Juanita?” I asked to show that the introduction was unnecessary.

“Mr. McGill,” she said, not turning away from her charge.

Juanita Horn had been a nurse in Trinidad. She had been young and quite beautiful. Her man, Bell, was a rough-and-tumble sort of guy who had trouble with the law and so came to New York. Juanita followed and they partied until Bell was stabbed in the back by a woman who didn’t want him going back home to Juanita.

Nurse Horn attended to him as she had all of his friends when they had wounds, bruises, and breaks. Bell died from his injury and Juanita stayed on, the visiting nurse to those who couldn’t afford the exposure of an emergency room. She was as good as most general practitioners, and better because she knew when the wounds and maladies were beyond her abilities.

“The kid uses needles,” Nightly said in a subdued tone. “Got hep and who knows what else? Fever’s bad. We were going to take him to the doctor but Juanita said that he won’t die right away, and he’s been saying things that you might want to know.”

I bobbed my head to show that I understood and moved next to Sister Juanita. She understood the gesture and stood so that I could hunker down next the boy.

“Tally,” I said as if calling into anther room.

When he opened his eyes I recoiled at the bright yellow beaming from them.

“She sent me to meet with him,” Tally said, almost out of his mind with fever. “Sent me to tell them that Chrystal needs money, lotsa money if they want her to let up on her share of the inheritance, if they didn’t want her to go to the cops.”

“Chrystal said that?” I asked.

“What?” Tally was looking in my direction, but it was a toss-up whether he saw me or not. “What you say?”

“Chrystal said to ask for the money?”

“No, man. Chrystal loves that murderin’ fool. Chrystal’s crazy. Don’t even know what’s good for her.”

“Shawna?” I asked.

“I’m sick,” Tally said, looking into my eyes with sudden awareness. “Am I dyin’?”

“Did Shawna ask you to ask for money for Chrystal?”

When the boy exhaled it sounded like a last breath. It stank, too. The disease was deep in his blood and lungs, skin and eyes. He passed out and Juanita shouldered me aside. She poured alcohol on a white towel and dabbed it on his face.

“He’s a sick puppy,” Luke Nye said. “I’m scared just to look at him.”

“Rich man killed his sister, and if he’s saying what I think, he might be next on the list.”

“If somebody wants to kill him,” Johnny said, “he better hurry up before the kid does it himself.”

“Did he mention any names?” I asked Luke.

“No, just said a guy killed his sister. Said it was in the paper. I thought you might wanna know.”