by Rick Polad
“Nice to see you, Spencer. You’re early.”
“I am. Gonna settle at the end of the bar and watch the crowd.”
“Fine. Are you meeting the lady?”
I laughed. “I wish. No, just Ben. Please point him in my direction when he gets here.”
“Sure thing.”
The bar was crowded and noisy, but there were three stools at the end farthest from the dining area. Jack placed a Guinness in front of me as I was hanging my jacket over the back of the stool.
“My thanks to you and your brewmaster, Jack.”
“I’ll pass that along, Spencer. How’s the crime game?”
“Never a lack for business.”
“Yup, two jobs with good job security… murder and alcohol.”
I raised my glass.
The TV over the back of the bar was running the nightly news. I was watching with half my attention. The other half was thinking about how to approach the parlor gang on Monday. I knew they weren’t going to be happy about the chat, but it was worth a try. Then the half that was paying attention to the news made the Monday meeting even more problematic. The channel seven news anchor was talking about all of Joey’s prior arrests and lack of convictions and ran a taped statement by his lead lawyer about how they were still trying to get him released on bond.
I knew that would make Joey a happy man. I was pretty sure he wasn’t concerned about being convicted. When it came to arrogance Joey had more than his share. But being locked up in a cell was killing him. I couldn’t bring myself to feel sorry for him. But his being in a cell made my job easier—Joey wouldn’t be sticking his nose into the investigation. And I was pretty sure he wouldn’t be happy about my talking to his men. If he got out and was there on Monday, my talks probably wouldn’t even happen.
Before the story was over, the couple three stools over left, leaving a wide space between me and two guys talking about the Blackhawks. I caught Jack’s eye and raised an empty glass. He gave a tiny nod, finished wiping the bar, and pulled another.
I was nursing that smooth bit of Ireland—Dad had called it the nectar of the gods—and watching the weather report, when someone sat down next to me. But it wasn’t just any someone… it was someone with short black hair whose feet didn’t touch the bar rail. Except this time she was looking considerably more memorable. Maybe it was the makeup, or the multi-colored scarf, or the gentle smell of baby powder. I didn’t know if bulls really were attracted to the color red, but if they were they would have approved of her lipstick. I wondered several things, including why she showed up here and why she sat next to me when there were five empty stools. Perhaps it was my magnetic personality and good looks. Perhaps not.
I kept my eyes on the news and heard her order white wine. When Jack brought it he gave me a quick look that included a nasty little gleam in his eye.
She picked up the glass and said, “I hope you don’t mind my taking this seat.”
“Nothing to mind. But there are several open. I’m wondering why you picked that one.”
She smiled an enticing smile and said, “I don’t like drinking alone. It’s always nice to have someone to talk with.”
I took a drink and didn’t respond.
She kept trying. “I haven’t seen you here before. Do you come here much?”
Before I could respond, the news anchor came out of a commercial with more about Joey with his photo in the bottom right corner of the screen.
I swirled my beer, nodded to the TV, and decided to stir the pot. “Interesting story. Do you think he did it?”
She laughed and leaned toward me. “Oh, I wouldn’t know about such things. I don’t have much faith in the justice system. People have been getting away with murder since the beginning of time. Why should this time be any different?”
“He’ll get a trial, and they have an eyewitness. Seems like a good case.”
“And I imagine he’s got the best lawyers money can buy. And maybe a few judges too.”
“You’re pretty cynical.”
I finished my beer and Jack raised his eyebrows. I told him I’d wait for dinner.
“Just realistic. By the way, my name’s Jamie.”
“Nice to meet you, Jamie,” I said flatly. I tried not to look at her, but I couldn’t help staring at her eyes. They matched the color of her hair—as black as ebony.
The newsman did the talking for the next few minutes. Sometime in those minutes Jamie managed to change her position so that her leg was touching mine. I didn’t admonish her leg. It reminded me of Sarah Dingle in sixth grade. When she had sat next to me on the bus she dropped a book on the floor. I gallantly picked it up. Somehow, by the time I handed it to her, she had moved closer to me, and her leg was touching mine. I didn’t mind, but at the time I didn’t really know why I didn’t mind. I didn’t mind now either, but now I knew why. People often touched in a crowded bar. But there were still four seats left on the other side of her.
She finished her wine and asked, “Do you have a name?”
“Yup.”
Before she could respond, Ben walked up.
“Hey, Spencer. Am I intruding?”
“No, we were just chatting about names.” I introduced him to ‘Jamie.’
“Always interested in those of the female gender,” Ben responded with his usual charm. “I hate to intrude, but Nathan has our table ready.”
Jamie laid a five on the counter, swung around on her stool and said, “Looks like I’m the one who’s intruding. You two have a nice dinner.” She turned to me, swung her purse over her shoulder, and said, “Maybe we’ll see each other again, Spencer.”
I silently swore at Ben. “Maybe we will.”
“Well, bye.”
I watched her walk away in the mirror. She didn’t look back.
As we walked to the dining room, Ben asked, “Where was the Spencer charm? You treated her like you wanted her to leave.”
“You get the table. I’ll find you.”
I waited for a group to clear the foyer, walked back to the bar, and waited for Jack to turn around.
“Hey, Spencer, nice lady.”
“If you mean she gave you a nice tip, then I agree. Have you seen her in here before?” Even a customer who had only been in once would be remembered by Jack.
He shook his head. “First time during my shift.”
“That’s what I thought. Thanks, Jack.”
“Sure thing, Spencer.” He turned to a waitress.
I found Ben at a table at the back of the restaurant section. Two glasses of Guinness were already on the table.
“So what the hell was that about? ‘Maybe we will?’ What happened to ‘I look forward to it’?”
“Well, two things, and both are females.”
He took a long drink and said, “Both? I get Rosie, but it doesn’t hurt to be nice. Who’s the other female?”
“Loretta Hands.” I sipped my beer.
Ben let out a startled “Loretta Hands” as Jane arrived at our table.
“Hi, gents. Nice to see you both.”
“Hello, dear Jane,” said Ben. “You look as lovely as a spring morning.”
She curtsied and asked if we wanted menus. We both declined and ordered steaks, medium rare.
“Back to Loretta,” said Ben. “You lost me. What did that have to do with Loretta Hands?”
I took a long drink, took a deep breath, and said, “I’m not quite sure. I can answer that better after you get some background on her.”
Nathan seated two couples at the tables next to us. The place was filling up.
“Well, I already have some background on her. And I think some is all we’re going to get.”
“Seems the night for being cryptic. What do you have?”
He took a deep breath followed by a long drink.
“Loretta Hands. Born in Chicago in 1956. Address on Diversey. Rents. The rental agreement was signed three years ago. No prior address. She has a driver’s license but does not ow
n a car. She has a gun permit that dates to 1977.”
“Okay. What else?”
He stared some more. “That’s it.”
I was about to take a drink but stopped and set my glass down. “What do you mean, that’s it?”
He shrugged. “That’s it, as in there’s nothing else. This is the most average American there is… except for one thing.”
I looked around the room. There wasn’t an empty table and the noise level was high. People enjoying the end of the week. All of a sudden I wasn’t.
“Yes… one thing,” I said. “Why does an average American girl get a gun permit the first chance she gets?”
Jane arrived with our steaks as Ben continued. “Why, indeed. But I bet we could come up with several reasons.”
The steaks were sizzling on the metal plate, and the baked potato and sautéed green beans rounded out a perfect meal. Luckily, the rise in my curiosity level hadn’t affected my appetite. Jane was back two minutes later with more beer.
“Anything else I can get you gentlemen?”
“Only some lucidity, my dear Jane,” said Ben.
Her smile disappeared. “Some what?”
“Not to worry. You have provided for our every need.”
She squinted at him. “You’d think I’d be used to you two by this time.”
Ben raised his glass. “Hopefully the romance will never become as predictable as your fine service.”
“I’m sure that will be the case, especially if I can figure out what you’re talking about.”
Ben laughed and raised his glass again as she picked up the tray.
“You’ve got to stop playing with her, Ben.”
“Not playing in the least, Spencer. I’d follow her to the ends of the earth.”
“Right. And that might be romantic if she hadn’t already forgotten about you.”
He shrugged as we cut into the steaks. They were done perfectly, as usual.
As he chewed, Ben asked, “How does this mystery woman fit into the Joey picture? I’d like to meet her.”
“The mystery gets more mysterious. You already have.”
His eyebrows raised as he chewed.
“That was her at the bar.”
“You introduced her as Jamie.”
“I did. That was the name she gave me.”
As we finished the meal and another beer, I explained how she fit into the picture.
“Do you think she’s anything more than a person who lives across the street?”
“Too early to think, Ben.”
“Hard not to think so. If she isn’t, there’s sure something else she’s hiding. And she’s very good at it. She sure isn’t your average girl across the street.”
“Agreed.”
“Do you have someone on her?”
“I’m out of people, so no.”
“How about me?”
I finished my Guinness. “If you’re willing. But as far as I can tell she has no job and no set schedule. She spends a lot of time in the parlor.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Jane brought the check, and I paid.
***
I turned up my collar as I walked back to the car. The sky was clear and the air was cold. I pulled into the garage and stopped in the backyard to look at the sky. Jupiter and Mars were within one degree of each other in the western sky. No moon and cold, crisp air made for perfect viewing. I thought of taking out the telescope, but the cold trumped the viewing. And I still wasn’t ready to dig up memories.
Chapter 10
Lieutenant Stanley Powolski had been on the force two years longer than my dad when Dad became chief. He had been a sergeant for as long as anyone knew and had turned down every chance at promotion. He had no desire to be anything but a sergeant. He had finally accepted a promotion to lieutenant but only for the raise. Francine, his wife of thirty-seven years, had developed cancer, and the extra money came in handy.
I had called him Uncle Stosh ever since I started talking. When I started high school I dropped the uncle, but he would always be family. And with Mom and Dad gone, he and Aunt Rose were the only family I had left. He had taught me how to play gin when I was three. We played for Lifesavers. He also got me started on beer. That was a few years after the gin. The only beer in his fridge was Schlitz, “the beer that made Milwaukee famous.”
I had given up trying to explain to him that the beer in his fridge wasn’t the same as the beer he had grown up with. In the late forties Schlitz was the best-selling beer in the country, much to the dismay of Anheuser-Busch, which started new campaigns in the fifties. The lead went back and forth until Busch took over for good in 1957. Schlitz’s owners fought back by cutting costs. They made small changes that they thought wouldn’t be noticed by their customers. They replaced malted barley with corn syrup and used cheaper hops, ignoring the warnings of their brewers about what would happen if they fooled with the quality of the beer. For a while their market share grew faster than any other beer. They also shortened the aging time and had to add a silica gel to prevent a haze from forming as the beer chilled, because there wasn’t enough time for the protein to settle out.
In 1976 the FDA started to talk about listing ingredients on bottles and cans. They certainly couldn’t list silica gel, so they added a new anti-haze agent. That caused an unexpected problem—it reacted in the bottle with the foam stabilizer forming a layer that looked like mucus. The owners tried to tell consumers that it wasn’t harmful, but Schlitz was done.
I later expanded my beer selection, but at Stosh’s house it was Schlitz. The owners had at least one loyal drinker.
I got to his bungalow a little before noon and found him in his recliner, reading.
“Hey, kid. I hope you’re hungry. I’ve got plenty of meat.”
“I could eat a horse, but I’d prefer pastrami on rye. What are you reading?” I knew the subject, just not the book. Two shelves of Stosh’s bookcase were filled with Chicago crime history. There wasn’t much he didn’t know.
“New book by Brinkman. He takes another look into old unsolved crimes. Supposed to have new information, but I’m not holding my breath.”
“Why do you read all that crime history?”
“Takes my mind off the new crime history.” He shook his head. “Eight shootings since six last night—five dead. We’re ahead of last year.”
It wasn’t a new problem. Dad had dealt with it for years.
“One good thing about the mafia—they just shot their own. These bastards throw bullets around like confetti. One of the dead is a little girl who was sitting in the back of a car going to a birthday party.”
“I know it’s frustrating, Stosh. Is there an answer?”
He shrugged. “We just keep arresting them if we can find them. The people in the neighborhoods won’t talk because they’re scared and don’t trust us. Did you see the blurb in the Trib this morning?”
“You mean by the superintendent?”
“Yup.” He picked up the paper and leafed through it to a page with a picture of a pair of handcuffs and read the quote. “Our policemen don’t come from Mars. They come from the community and then tend to represent the views of the neighborhoods from which they sprang.” He shook his head. “We shouldn’t have to explain that we’re the good guys.”
“Things aren’t going to change. Is sprang a word?”
He just glared at me. I was used to it. “And God forbid we look the wrong way at one of these gang bastards. An ACLU lawyer will be knocking on my door.”
“Why not just lock someone up for life if they commit a crime with a gun?”
“Easier said than done, Spencer. The solution is to get the kids off the streets with jobs and stronger families and keep them out of the gangs. They need more options.”
We relocated to the kitchen and laid out the sandwich fixings. Pastrami, roast beef, and ham from the deli down the street and a choice of bread and rolls. I had a taste for pastrami, but by the end of the af
ternoon I’d have one of each. He took two bottles of Schlitz out of the fridge. We took our sandwiches and beer into the front room and ate on trays. We’d play cards and watch whatever sport was on and find some place for dinner. But tonight I was abandoning him for Rosie—she was off at five. She had a new partner and had been spending more time than I thought necessary breaking him in. She had broken a couple of standing dates to help Gabriel get situated. Gabriel?
As he was pulling in his tray, Stosh asked, “So, you think your boy will be out soon?”
“Don’t know. But I wouldn’t mind not having to drive to County to listen to his whining. But I was hoping to talk to the boys at the parlor Monday. Joey being there would not be good. I had enough trouble with Marty.”
“You think you’d get anything out of them anyway?”
I finished my first bite and washed it down, trying not to think about the mucus. “Only by mistake. As you know, you never know what someone will say if you ask enough questions.”
“Sometimes they don’t even know they said something important.”
“And sometimes neither do we.”
He talked while he ate. “You doing anything else besides talking with the boys?”
“They’re all being watched. So far we’ve got Danny Primo, the driver, running into Jack Eigen at a liquor store.”
“Anything to that, you think?”
I shrugged and picked up the second half of my sandwich. “Probably not, but I’m not fond of coincidences.”
“But they do happen.”
“Sure. The world works at random. They do happen. But each one needs to be ruled out.”
“Okay, probably not a coincidence, but probably nothing to do with Joey.”
“Probably not. The big problem with following these guys is they don’t spend all their time in church and volunteering at the Salvation Army. Everything they do looks suspicious because everything they do is suspicious.”
He turned on the TV. We were in between seasons. Football was done, and baseball was a few months away. And golf didn’t come on until three. The only thing on was bowling, but sport was sport. I cleaned up, got us each another bottle, and he set up the card table. By three he owed me six-fifty. Even at a penny a point it mounted up.