by Randy Alcorn
“Harry Belle,” Gray said quickly “Lives in Vancouver. He’s kind of a PI, but…he does other stuff too. He followed you, put the heroin in your coffee—not enough to kill you—remember, I told him not to kill you. He told me he put the heroin in your overcoat the next morning in the parking garage elevator.”
“Seven. Who’s the big black guy who looks like me, the one at the bar and at the hotel with Gracie?”
“Don’t know his name,” Gray said. “I swear it. Only saw him once. He’s an associate of Harry’s. I’m telling you, Harry set that whole thing up. I didn’t know the details. I was out of the loop.”
“Eight. Who’d you hire to kill Gracie?”
“Nobody!” Gray sweat profusely, staring at Norcoast’s motionless legs poking out from behind the desk. “All I did was tell Shadow to make sure Gracie didn’t talk, that’s all. I didn’t mean for him to kill her. Never said anything like that. It just got out of hand, that’s all. It wasn’t my fault.”
“Nine. One more chance to tell the truth about the hit on Leesa Fletcher.”
“I didn’t have anything to do with that. Nothing! I really didn’t,” Gray said. “Please! You’ve got to believe me.”
“Ten.” Clarence paused a moment, then pulled the trigger. The hammer dropped.
Gray stared, eyes bulging.
Nothing happened.
“All right, gentlemen,” Clarence said. “Thanks for your cooperation. I think we can leave now.”
Gray stood speechless for five seconds. “But…what? You can’t just…What about the councilman?”
“What about me?” Norcoast asked in a tone of disgust, getting to his feet.
Just then Ollie Chandler barged in the door. “What’s going on here, Clarence?” Ollie looked around the room. He saw the Glock 17 lying on the desk, and then his eyes landed on the HK53.
“I looked everywhere for that rifle,” Ollie said, red spreading up his neck from the collar. “I reported it stolen this morning. I’m in the doghouse at the department. You’ve got some explaining to do, mister.”
“Sorry, Ollie. I asked Clancy to call you when our drama was nearly over, but I couldn’t risk telling you earlier.” Clarence reached into his coat pocket, from which a little black wire ran to his tie. He took out a micro tape recorder, popped out the tape, and handed it to Ollie. “You’ll want to listen to this. It’s all here. After his confession about Leesa, Norcoast agreed to cooperate with us to get a confession out of Gray.”
Gray glared at Norcoast. Norcoast stared back at Gray and imitated his voice: “I’m innocent. I never did anything. It was all Norcoast. I’ll testify against him.”
“I thought you were dead,” Gray said.
“So you figured you’d just smear my reputation?”
“You managed to do that yourself, Councilman.” Mr. Fletcher looked at him with disdain.
“Wait, Reg,” Gray said. “They forced you to set me up and they forced us to confess to things we didn’t do. That’s how it was, and that’s completely illegal. It’ll never hold up.”
“Actually, when I found out how you betrayed me, betrayed this office, used your position to frame an innocent man and to murder a girl…I decided to go ahead and play along. They didn’t force me.”
“I demand to see my lawyer,” Gray said, looking around the room, hoping to find a sympathetic eye. He didn’t.
“You must have some beautiful sisters, Gray,” Ollie said. “Looks to me like you used up all the ugly in the family. Go call your lawyer—nobody’s stopping you. Just don’t leave the building.” Gray straightened his shoulders, as if to affirm his indignation at being mistreated.
Norcoast looked again at the pictures on the wall. He was standing with his arm around Leesa, and they were looking into each other’s eyes like an adoring couple. Was this a nightmare? Who’d taken that picture? He knew he’d been more discreet than that. He’d never posed with her. Or had he? Pictures don’t lie. Do they?
Clarence met Ollie in his office at four that afternoon.
“I listened to the tape,” Ollie said. “I can’t believe you convinced those upstanding citizens to be in on this charade. They were really taking a risk.”
“I called them all last night and we got together. I lobbied them,” Clarence said.” When I told them about Norcoast and Gray, they all wanted to see them go down. Like me, they didn’t have much confidence the truth would come out in the legal process. When I explained my idea about loading the HK with blanks and using the unloaded Glock, they bought it.
“Pastor Clancy and Jake were the hard sells. They must have asked me ten times if I was absolutely positive they were just blanks. I don’t think the other guys would have felt bad if there was a live round or two in there. We all met together again this morning and went over the plan. Some of them had to do some acting—Jake and Cairo especially. Now, Harley, he wasn’t acting.” Clarence laughed and shook his head.
“Anyway Ollie, you can see why I couldn’t let you in on it. You would have told me not to and you’d have been in big trouble just knowing about it. I wanted to take the risk myself. If something went wrong, it was just me stealing the HK.”
“Which isn’t going to go over very well at the precinct,” Ollie said. “I still can’t believe you got Norcoast to play along.”
“Plan A was based on hoping Gray would crack just being confronted by all the men, but he was too cool. That’s why we had to go to Plan B—taking out the HK and firing the blanks. My gut told me the councilman would agree to nail Gray once he understood he’d framed me and pulled off a murder or two out of his office. I’ve gotten to know Norcoast pretty well the last couple of months. I knew he’d feel betrayed by Gray and that he’d want to distance himself from him. Speaking of acting, Norcoast did all right himself. And with no rehearsal.”
“Where’d you get the blanks for the HK?”
“Sergeant McCamman put me on to that. A military surplus store. He said the army uses them for training with M-16s. Two bucks per twenty rounds of .223 blanks. Needless to say, the sergeant knew nothing about me borrowing the HK53 from your trunk.”
“Blanks don’t fire as loud,” Ollie said, “but I guess that close indoors, most people wouldn’t notice.”
“Gray was the only one who had to believe it, and to him I’m sure it sounded like dynamite.”
“How’d you manage to fire more than one blank?” Ollie asked. “There’s nothing to cycle the action, so usually blank rounds won’t eject. You have to remove them manually.”
“You knew that, huh? I sure didn’t,” Clarence said. “I found out when I tried it yesterday. I wanted the full effect of an automatic, so I called McCamman and he told me HK makes a blank adapter for their weapons. It does something to the gasses or the pressure so the action cycles perfectly, just like the real thing.” Clarence pointed to the HK. “Notice anything different?”
Ollie picked up the gun and looked at the silver-colored fixture.
“Wait a minute. There’s no hole in the end.”
“That’s the adapter. I called a dozen places in town, and one guy actually had an HK blank adapter,” Clarence said. “I never pointed it directly at Gray for more than a moment, for fear he’d notice there was no place for a bullet to come out. Once I showed Jake and Cairo there was no hole in the muzzle, no chance for an accident, they calmed down. And Jake checked my Glock twice this morning just to make sure it was empty.”
Ollie shook his head. “I tell you, Abernathy you scare me. So what’s the deal with the photos on Norcoast’s wall? Where’d they come from?”
“Those were Carp’s work, you know, my photographer friend? Mr. Fletcher gave me this playful looking pose of Leesa from her senior pictures. I told Carp what I wanted, and early this morning she scanned it in along with a picture of Norcoast and manipulated the image into this seamless picture of them as a couple. Remember, she did that work for me earlier, taking that photo of Norcoast and me and putting in the message from L
eesa on his tie. For an added touch, this time I had her put the African symbol of justice on his forehead. Just wanted to disorient him, throw him off guard, make it look like we could prove more than we could. Like something you’d do.”
“Now the DA’s going to have to figure out which confessions are admissible and which aren’t,” Ollie said. “But since it was a bunch of civilians that set it up, most of them family of victims, at least it might get some sympathy, and it doesn’t make the cops look bad. They can’t get us for entrapment. It doesn’t make my evidence inadmissible. I’ll tell you, though, Clarence, for a minute there you had me scared. I was afraid maybe you went off the deep end, turned vigilante on me.”
“The thought occurred to me. But I kept thinking about Geneva and the kids and my dad. And Mama and Dani and Felicia. No way I could do that to them. It’s like I felt them all praying for me to do the right thing.”
“Weird,” Ollie said.
“Maybe not,” Clarence said.
“One thing I still don’t get,” Ollie said. “Between Norcoast, Gray, and Shadow, we know who killed Leesa and Gracie and who set you up. And we know Spider and his buddy were hired by Harper to do the hit on Leesa that killed Dani and Felicia. But we still don’t know who was behind the main event. If Norcoast or Gray didn’t set up the murder with Harper, who did?”
Clarence went out from the garage to look at the roses, his blue jeans stiff from the cold. The denim rubbed hard against his frigid legs. He rolled out some twine to tie up the roses a bit closer, to protect them from the winter ice.
He looked at the shriveled-up buds, marveling that they still had life in them. He imagined what they’d look like in the spring, beautiful and colorful again. Maybe in the spring he’d plant more roses. Maybe some petunias and marigolds and primroses. With Dani gone, this place needed more color.
“Hang on,” he said to the barren roses. “Your time will come. You can make it through the winter.” Just then Jake and Janet pulled into the driveway.
“What are you two lovebirds up to?” Clarence called.
“Some last minute wedding details,” Jake said. “And we’ve been looking at houses. At first we’ll be in Janet and Carly’s place, you know, but we’re thinking we’d like to start over in a new place. Since we’ll be young marrieds and all—Janet and I and a nineteen-year-old and a one-and-a-half-year-old, I mean.” He put his arm around Janet, who smiled broadly. Geneva came out the front door, and the women threw their arms around each other, though it had been only two days since they’d seen each other.
Clarence pointed to a house across the street and two doors down with a For Sale sign out front. “Won’t find a better deal in Portland than that place. Just needs some fixin’ up.”
“Looks like a pretty decent structure,” Jake said.
“I’d help you work on it,” Clarence said. “We could be neighbors.” Geneva and Janet caught each other’s eyes.
“I thought you were movin’ into that place out in the country,” Jake said.
“Changed our minds. For now, we’re staying here.” Clarence pointed again at the house for sale. “How about we take a look at it right now?”
“Why not?” Jake said.
As they crossed the street, Clarence wondered if his dreams of a beautiful place in the country would ever materialize. Maybe they’d just be postponed. Or maybe they’d be fulfilled in another world.
Clarence handed Ollie a year-old Trib article. Ollie looked at the headline: “Gang Summit to Curtail Violence.” The article spoke of gang leaders meeting with the Portland City Council on how to reduce street crime. A photo of attending gang leaders included both Gangster Cool and Shadow. Clarence had highlighted one line in yellow: “Councilman Norcoast and three members of his staff attended the gang summit.”
Clarence gave Ollie another article, a feature story on Reggie Norcoast and his staff. There was a picture of Norcoast, Carson Gray, Sheila, and Jean.
“Where’d you get these?” Ollie asked.
“From Raymond Taylor’s bedroom wall,” Clarence said. “I saw them there when I talked with his mother. I went over last night and asked her for them. I could understand the photo with GC and the article on the gang summit. But Norcoast’s staff picture didn’t make sense. Now it does. He knew them, and he did more than pass out campaign literature.”
“This photo’s good timing,” Ollie said. “Want to join me on a fishing expedition?” Clarence sat by Ollie’s phone as the detective pressed on the speaker and dialed a Sacramento number.
“Harper,” the tired voice said.
“This is your old buddy, Detective Chandler. What would you say if I told you now we’ve really nailed the person who sent you the fax? Of course, it wasn’t Norcoast or Gray. But what if I told you our lady insists you misconstrued her message, that you came up with some far-fetched scheme to kill somebody when she intended no such thing.”
Clarence looked at Ollie in surprise. What was he saying?
“She said that?” Harper asked. “No way. That’s not how it was and she knows it. She was trying to blackmail me.”
“Blackmail you? How?” Ollie asked. Harper hung up.
“She?” Clarence asked Ollie. “Who is ‘she’?”
“I don’t know,” Ollie said. “But remember how Harper seemed to know immediately I was bluffing when I hinted I’d talked with the guy who sent him the fax? That’s bugged me ever since. When Gray and Norcoast both denied it at gunpoint after confessing everything else, it dawned on me how I tipped off Harper. I said ‘guy.’ If Harper had been contacted by a woman, he’d know I was bluffing. So I just bluffed him again, but this time I was holding the right cards. It was a woman, all right.”
“But,” Clarence said, “besides two part-time secretaries, Sheila and Jean are the only women who work in that office, right?” Ollie nodded. “Well, I can guarantee it’s not Sheila. Miss Bubbly Perkiness isn’t the type. Jean, on the other hand, has ice water running in her veins. I could see her being involved.”
“People aren’t always what they appear,” Ollie said, now lost in thought.
“What are you going to do?”
“Well, I might start by meeting with Sheila. I could hand her the fax, ask her what she’d say if Matthew Harper claimed she called him, set up the hit, and sent the fax. See how she responds. What’s the worst thing she could do? Reach in her purse and spray me with mace?”
“Trust me, Ollie,” Clarence said. “Read my lips. Forget about Sheila. Go after Jean.”
Clarence and Ty sat on the couch.
“Listen, Ty, I went down to the Teen Challenge center, and they walked me through their program. They really know their stuff. They can help you with this drug problem, and they can disciple you too, really get you into God’s Word. I’d like you to come with me, at least check it out and see what you think.”
Ty nodded. In the last three weeks, and especially the last two days, his relationship with the gang had come crashing down on him. Shadow’s arrest and his uncle’s role in it had put Ty on the outs with the 60s. He felt betrayed by GC’s role in his mother’s and sister’s deaths. And he was tired of pretending he liked what the crack was doing to him. Gangs and drugs were starting to seem like nothing more than broken promises.
Clarence and Tyrone talked for a while about many things, when suddenly Ty started to cry Clarence put his arm around him. “What’s wrong, Ty? Things are finally looking up now. It’s going to be okay.”
Ty wouldn’t talk for a while. He tried to leave the room, but his uncle insisted he stay with him. Finally Ty choked out, “If it wasn’t for me, Mama and Felicia wouldn’t have died.” The tears flowed now, mystifying Clarence.
“That’s nonsense, Ty,” Clarence said. “What are you talking about?”
“The street sign. Jackson. I’m the one that tagged it. Made it look like Jack.” He stared at Clarence, desperation in his eyes. “It’s my fault they died.”
Clarence held him tight. “
No, Ty. It wasn’t your fault. It was other people who set it up. It was other people who did it. It wasn’t you.” Ty melted in his arms, a rag doll. Clarence sensed he had more to tell and determined to stay with him until he did.
Finally Ty said, “I shot somebody.”
“Who? When?”
“Awhile back. GC gave me a sawed-off. Shot a Blood in a gang war. Name’s Donnie. Had him in a math class at Tubman. He…gave me his cookies.” Ty sobbed.
“Did he…die?”
“No. But he hasn’t been back to school. Heard he’s had lots of problems.” Ty’s voice cracked. “Got his stomach stapled up and stuff.”
“Okay,” Clarence said. “We’ll go to the police and you’ll tell them what happened. Then we’ll go to Donnie and his family. You can ask their forgiveness. We’ll offer to help them any way we can. I’ll be there with you the whole way, son. All right?”
Ty looked scared, but he nodded, clearly at the end of himself. Clarence could see the weight of guilt on his shoulders. It was a guilt he understood.
After a quiet few minutes Clarence said to Ty, “God can forgive us no matter what we’ve done, because Jesus paid the price for us. And if God can forgive us, we can forgive ourselves.” Clarence paused, then sucked in air. “I’m going to tell you something I’ve never told anybody, Ty, not even Geneva and your grandpa.” The boy looked up. “When I was your age, your mama and I lived in the projects in Chicago. One day I was with my buddies Rock and Shorty. We were just hangin’. Then we saw this white boy ridin’ in on his bike…”
Thirty minutes later, Ty got up from the couch, went to his closet, reached deep into a box of old comics, and retrieved a 9 mm handgun. He looked at it, weighed it in his hand, and took it to the living room to give to his uncle.
“Ray? Ollie Chandler. Listen, we’ve got some stuff on Norcoast, pretty serious stuff, but there’s some major holes that have to be filled in. I don’t think I can get a court order for you to talk to me unless I’ve got some idea what you may know.”