Right as Rain

by George Pelecanos

  STRANGE went to work daily and kept to his general routine. He followed the news reports closely but did not discuss them, except with Ron and Janine, and only then in passing. He phoned Quinn and spoke to him twice, and on both occasions he found him to be uncommunicative, remote, and possibly in the grip of depression. He visited Leona and Sondra Wilson briefly and was pleased with what he found.

  It was a tentative time for Strange, and though he picked up a couple of easy jobs, mostly he waited. By the end of the next week, he welcomed the phone call that he knew with certainty would come. The call came on Saturday morning, when he was returning from a long walk with Greco, as he stepped into the foyer of his Buchanan Street row house.

  “Hello,” said Strange, picking up the phone.

  “Lydell here. You ready to talk, Derek?”

  “Name the place,” said Strange.

  OREGON Avenue, south of Military Road, led into a section of Rock Creek Park that contained a nature center, horse stables, and miles of hilly trails. A huge parking lot sat to the right of the entrance, where people met to train and run their dogs on the adjacent field. The parking lot was a popular rendezvous spot for adulterous couples as well.

  Strange and Lydell Blue sat in Strange’s Caprice, parked beside Blue’s Park Avenue in the lot and facing the field. Blue’s hair had thinned and it was all gray, as was his thick mustache, which he had worn for thirty years on his wide, strong—featured face. His belly sagged over the waistband of his slacks. He held a sixteen—ounce paper cup of coffee in his hand, steam rising from a hole he had torn in its lid.

  Over a dozen large—breed dogs ran and played in the field, all of their owners white, well—off, and dressed in casual, expensive clothes. At the far end of the lot, near the tree line, a middle—aged man and a younger woman necked in the front seat of a late—model Pontiac.

  “You shoulda brought Greco,” said Blue, looking through the windshield at an Irish wolfhound and a white Samoyed sitting side by side on a rise, a woman in a Banana Republic jacket telling them to hold from fifteen feet away.

  “Greco’s not a dog lover,” said Strange. “Right about now, he’d be barin’ his teeth at those two.”

  “Wouldn’t want to bust on all these folks’ perfect day.”

  Strange looked over at Blue. “Tell me what you got, Lydell.”

  “You gonna be up front with me if I do?”

  “How long we been knowin’ each other, man?”

  “Okay, then. Okay.” Blue ran his thumb along his mustache. “The cops who found Eugene Franklin found a suicide note at the scene. More like a confession, really.”

  “You see the note?”

  “Got a copy of it from a friend over in Homicide. Written with an ink pen on a plain white sheet of paper. Handwriting was clean and precise, like he was under no kind of duress when he wrote it. Signature on it matched the signature of Franklin we had on file.”

  “What’d the note say?”

  “Franklin admitted that he and Adonis Delgado were on the payroll of that drug lord, Cherokee Coleman. He detailed his role in the Chris Wilson shooting. How Wilson had gotten onto him and Delgado, and how Coleman had ordered a hit on Wilson. They used Ricky Kane, who was a drug dealer to the restaurant trade, not the clean—cut suburban boy the papers had made him out to be, to get Wilson out there in street clothes and make him look wrong. Franklin was supposed to shoot Wilson. But his partner, Quinn, who Franklin claimed was clean, shot Wilson first.”

  Strange digested what Blue had told him. “The newspeople been talkin’ about these rumors, that Franklin is somehow connected to the Out—County thing. If he was hooked up with Delgado —”

  “Franklin put it all in the note. Him and Delgado were sent by Coleman out to that property to make a drug transaction, and also to kill the two wholesalers, Earl and Ray Boone. Somethin’ about makin’ it right for Coleman over two Colombians the Boones had murdered out there. That part checks out; two men were found in a tunnel on the property, their death date much earlier than the date of death on the Boones. They’ve ID’d the corpses as two Colombian brothers, Nestor and Lizardo Rodriguez, who were recently reported missing down around Richmond.”

  “What about the Boones and Delgado? Who killed them?”

  “Franklin claimed that he did. Claimed he had a crisis of conscience and had to end the whole thing the only way he saw fit. He and Delgado fought over it in the house, they went at it, and he killed Delgado. Then Franklin went down to the barn and shot the father and son. He left the drugs and the money sitting in the barn and drove back to D.C. Ate his own gun the next day.”

  “There was a girl found in that tunnel, too.”

  “Edna Loomis. Died of natural causes. That is, if you call a woman having a stroke at thirty years old 'natural.’ Methamphet—amine will do that to you, you ingest enough.”

  “Hell of a story,” said Strange.

  “Yeah. Trouble is, it doesn’t check out.”

  “What’s wrong with it?”

  “Plenty of things. Start with the crime scene, out at the barn and the house. Okay, so Franklin says he had a change of heart, and he and Delgado got down to it. Why was Delgado naked, then? And Delgado was stabbed. Why wouldn’t Franklin just go ahead and shoot him like he did the others?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “They found a boot print tracking out of Delgado’s blood, too. Size twelve, I believe it was. Franklin wore a ten.”

  “What else?” said Strange.

  “The Boones were killed by the same type of gun, a Glock Seventeen. But it was two different Glock Seventeens that killed ’em. The markings on the slug found in the body of the son and another bullet found in the wood of the bar were inconsistent with the markings of those found in the father and those found around the father. The trajectory angles were inconsistent, too. There were two shooters that night, Derek. Had to be.”

  “No fingerprints, nothin’ like that?”

  “No prints other than those of the deceased, Franklin, and another, unidentified woman.”

  “A woman, huh?”

  “They found vaginal fluid and pubic hairs in the same bedroom where they found Delgado.”

  “The Loomis girl?”

  “Didn’t match. But if there was some kind of phantom woman there, it explains why Delgado died in his birthday suit.”

  “Sounds like y’all got a genuine head—scratcher.”

  “Uh—huh.”

  Blue turned his head and stared at Strange.

  “Why’d you call me here, Lydell?”

  “Well, Derek, I’ll tell you. I got an anonymous package in the mail, no return address, mailing label out of a printer just like any of a thousand printers in this city. Had Chris Wilson’s investigation detailed in a notebook, and photographs of Franklin and Delgado headin’ into Coleman’s compound.” Blue took a sip of coffee. “That was you sent me that, right?”

  “It was,” said Strange.

  “Didn’t take a genius to figure it. You had called me and asked me to run the numbers of Delgado’s cruiser, remember?”

  “I do.”

  “So tell me how you came to get all that information.”

  Strange shrugged. “I was hired by Leona Wilson to try and clear her son’s reputation. Among other things, she wanted his name etched onto that police memorial they got downtown. I started by interviewing Quinn, and then Franklin, and the natural progression was to follow Ricky Kane and see what he was all about.”

  “Okay. What’d you find?”

  “Same thing Wilson did. Kane led me to Coleman, and that was when I noticed the same Crown Vic cruiser patroling the perimeter of the operation on two separate days. I called you and got Delgado’s name. I found Wilson’s notebook and the photographs and mailed them off to you. See, I saw that this thing was bigger than me, Lydell. I thought if y’all could connect the dots, Wilson’s story would naturally get told. I didn’t give a goddamn about no conspiracy thing, man, I was only tryi
ng to do what Leona Wilson had hired me to do.”

  “A couple of cops came forward, said they saw you and Quinn talking to Franklin down at Erika’s.”

  “That’s right.”

  “They’re gonna bring you in for questioning, man. They’re gonna bring Quinn in, too.”

  “You tell them I mailed you the information?”

  Blue drank the rest of the coffee in one long gulp. He dropped the empty cup at his feet.

  “They don’t even know I got it,” said Blue. “The notebook and photographs, they’re in the trunk of my Buick, man. Gonna give it all back to you before you leave.”

  “You can’t use it?”

  “How could I explain the fact that it was sent to me in the first place?”

  “You couldn’t, I guess.”

  “Either I’d have to lie or I’d have to implicate you. And those are two things I’m not gonna do. Anyway, the department doesn’t need the notebook or the photographs to make the case. Kane’s been picked up. What I hear, he’s already rolled over, and he’s confirmed the background information that was in Franklin’s note. They’re gonna get him to turn Cherokee Coleman in exchange for some kind of country club jolt. Whether it sticks to Coleman or not, we’ll see. Nothin’ has so far.”

  “Kane say how he got Wilson out in the street that night?”

  “Kane said he heard that Wilson had a sister was hooked on junk. He told Wilson he’d found her and to meet him on D.”

  Kane heard that Wilson had a sister… . Lyin’ motherfucker, thought Strange, tryin’ to make himself look good.

  “You knew about the sister?” said Blue.

  “She lives with her mother,” said Strange, with a casual nod. “Everything that family’s been through, I’d hate to see that junkie sister rumor get thrown out to the press.”

  “We know what that family’s been through. How Kane got Wilson out to the street that night is immaterial. Far as anybody’s ever gonna know, the sister’s clean.”

  “And Chris? What about him?”

  “Yeah, Chris Wilson. It’s delicate, how the department’s gonna handle that. For obvious reasons, they don’t want too much play on this bad—cop thing, and they don’t want the public to think that what Wilson did — being some kind of rogue enforcer out there — is something they condone, exactly. In the end, I don’t know how this will be spun for the general public. But I do know what they’re saying about Wilson down at headquarters. He’s gonna get some kind of posthumous, low—key commendation from Chief Ramsey.”

  “Good,” said Strange. “That’s real good.”

  “You stirred the pot, Derek.”

  “I guess I did.”

  “Funny about that other cop. Quinn, I mean.”

  “Yeah. He’s not gonna come out of this smellin’ any better than he did to begin with.”

  “You think he should?” said Blue.

  “He made a mistake,” said Strange. “I’ve gotten to know Quinn a little, and I can tell you, he’s still payin’ for what he did. I think he’s always gonna pay.”

  “Ending a fine young man’s life the way he did, that’s not just a mistake. And you can’t tell me that if Chris Wilson had been white —”

  “I know it, Lydell. You don’t have to tell me, ’cause I know.”

  Strange cracked his window. The afternoon sun had warmed the interior of the car.

  “All the good people in this city,” said Blue. “And all you ever hear about is the bad in D.C. Now you’re gonna hear about bad cops, too, when most of ’em are good. And most of the people I come across every day, they come from good families. I’m talkin’ about the people in the church, people who go to work every day to take care of their own, good teachers, good, hard workers … and here we are, all these years we been out here, fuckin’ with the bad ones. Why’d we choose this, Derek?”

  “I don’t know. I guess it chose us.”

  “If we’d only known, when we were young men.” Blue chuckled, looking over at his friend. “Lord, I been knowin’ you now for nearly fifty years. I even remember the way you used to run when you were a little boy, with your fists balled up near your chest, back in grade school. And I can remember the way you looked in your uniform, as a young man, back in sixty—eight.”

  “Sixty—eight,” said Strange. “That was some kind of year, Lydell, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes it was.”

  A look passed between Strange and Blue.

  “Thank you, Lydell.”

  “You know how we do.”

  Strange shook Blue’s hand. “So the department’s gonna be callin’ me in.”

  “Any day,” said Blue. “The way you just explained it —”

  “What, somethin’ about it you didn’t like?”

  “It was just a little rough, is all. I’d work on it a little, I was you.”

  STRANGE returned to his row house and phoned Terry Quinn. He relayed the conversation he’d had with Lydell Blue.

  “I hated to lie to my friend,” said Strange. “But I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “I guess Eugene destroyed the original confession,” said Quinn.

  “Looks like he did. The one the police found was written on plain white paper. I’m fixin’ to destroy some things, too. Gonna lose the clothing I wore that night, my boots, my knife … you need to do the same. Get rid of your day pack and that Glock.”

  “It’s already done.”

  “I don’t like the way you sound, Terry,” said Strange. “Don’t do anything stupid, hear?”

  “Don’t worry,” said Quinn. “I’m not as brave as Eugene.”

  The phone clicked dead in Strange’s ear.

  Chapter 34

  ON a Sunday morning in early April, when the cherry blossoms along the tidal basin were full and brilliant, and magnolias and dogwoods had erupted pink and white on lawns across the city, Strange, Janine, and Lionel met at church.

  Strange had not been to services for some time. He decided to go this day, the weekend after Easter, to pray for his mother, and though he did pray in the privacy of his home from time to time, he thought it might be wise to be in the Lord’s home for this, considering his mother’s dire condition. He knew that attending church for personal favors was wrong and, on some level he didn’t fully understand, hypocritical, but he went just the same.

  The pews inside the New Bethel Church of God in Christ, on Georgia and Piney Branch Road, were nearly full. Strange paid some attention to the sermon, prayed intently for his mother while Janine rested her hand atop his, and enjoyed the gospel singing from the choir, his favorite part of the service.

  Outside, as the congregation exited, Strange recognized many. In the faces of some of the children he saw their parents, whom he’d known since they were kids themselves. And he saw several former clients, whom he greeted and who greeted him with firm handshakes and claps on the arm. Though he had often given these people less—than—happy news, he was glad he’d never padded his hours with them or done a second—rate job. They knew who he was and what he was about, and he was proud that they knew.

  “We goin’ to that Greek joint for breakfast?” said Lionel.

  “Billy’s closed today,” said Strange. “It’s his Easter Sunday.”

  “I was gonna make a nice turkey,” said Janine. “Will you come over for dinner?”

  “Was thinkin’ I’d take Greco for a long walk down in Rock Creek,” said Strange. “But yeah, I’d love to come over for dinner, long as it’s early. Need to spend the evening with my mom.”

  “We’ll have it early, then,” said Janine. “See you around five?”

  “Lookin’ forward to it, Janine.”

  He kissed her there, in a cluster of azalea bushes planted beside the church.

  “Look at y’all,” said Lionel. “In front of God, too.”

  Strange walked to his Caddy, parked on Tuckerman. Along the curb, on the other side of the street, sat a gray Plymouth K—car. Leona Wilson had opened the passenger
door for her daughter, Sondra, who was ducking her head to get inside. Strange caught a quick look at Sondra, still thin and shapeless in her dress, her hair salon done and shoulder length, her eyes bright and a bit unfocused. Not there, but getting there, Strange could see.

  As Strange crossed the street to greet Leona Wilson, Terry Quinn’s face flashed in his mind. He hadn’t seen Quinn or spoken to him for quite some time.

  Leona Wilson walked around the K—car to the driver’s—side door, stopping as she saw Strange approach. For a moment she didn’t seem to recognize him, dressed as he was, but then she smiled at the broad—shouldered, handsome man in the pinstriped suit. She reached out with a white—gloved hand and cocked her head.

  “Mrs. Wilson,” said Strange.

  “Mr. Strange.”

  STRANGE sat behind the wheel of his Cadillac Brougham, parked on Bonifant Street in Silver Spring. Greco was snoring, lying on his red pillow on the backseat. Strange and the dog both had a bellyful of Janine’s cooking inside them, and Greco had taken the opportunity to nap.

  Across the street, Terry Quinn locked the front door of the bookstore, checked it, and turned to go up the sidewalk.

  Strange leaned his head out the window. “Hey, Terry!”

  Quinn found the source of the voice and smiled. He crossed the street and walked toward the car. Strange thought that Quinn had lost weight but realized that it was the hair that had given him that mistaken impression; Quinn had cut it short.

  “Get in for a minute, man,” said Strange.

  Quinn went around the Caddy and dropped into the passenger seat. Greco woke, sat up, and smelled the back of Quinn’s neck as Quinn and Strange shook hands.

  “Derek.”

  “Terry.”

  “What brings you out this way?”