Dead Money Run

by J. Frank James

  Chapter 35

  “Are we working on the same plan, or are we on to something else?” Hilary asked.

  “I don’t know yet. I’m still trying to figure out our conversation with Roseman. Things just don’t feel right.”

  “Don’t start going paranoid on me?”

  “You may be right,” I said. “I can’t help feeling someone is ghosting our every move.”

  “So what are your concerns?”

  “In a lot of these situations, a person can worry too much. Lose his edge without knowing it. In no time you begin to worry about things that aren’t there. It’s like jumping into a deep pool. Better to close your eyes and jump rather than worry about hitting the water. I figure Roseman for trouble. I don’t think he knows anything. He is kicking over rocks looking for anything he can find. He’s trying to play both ends against the middle and we are in the middle.”

  “Maybe that’s not such a bad thing,” said Hilary. “You wanted Sonny Cap to find us, right?”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “Well if Roseman is trying to work himself into the deal, he could be the route we are looking for. He knows one thing for sure, we are his ticket to some money,” said Hilary.

  “What’s that?” I was concentrating on Carl trying his best to follow us.

  “He knows we are in town and I’d bet my new watch, Angel or Sonny would pay a few bucks for that information alone.”

  “Think he’s selling us out?”

  “As you sometimes like to say, ‘Does a bear shit in the woods.’

  “Lou, if it’s like you say that this Roseman doesn’t know anything, then he’s trying to get some information to sell. So let’s give him some. Let him walk into a dark corner with the Outfit. See what happens.”

  “That’s the way I have it figured, Princess.”

  “Princess? You really think I’m a Princess?”

  “Well, maybe Goldilocks.”

  “And what are you doing in this fairytale? By the way, Goldilocks was a blonde.”

  “I think I’m the boy with his finger in the dike,” I said.

  One thing about Hilary, she had an analytical mind. I liked that in a partner and, so far, was a good partner. I was in a better position to gain from a relationship with Carl than Roseman was. The way I saw it, I couldn’t lose. No matter what, using Carl was a good way to stir the pot. The more confusing things became, the better it was for our side. We had to find Crusher and get rid of Roseman, short of killing him. For the better part of thirty minutes I worked things over and was not paying a lot of attention to where Hillary was driving.

  “You know where you’re going?”

  “Stone Mountain.”

  “What’s in Stone Mountain besides a big rock?” I asked.

  “Well, they have a train that goes all around the mountain with stops along the way. I need something to clear my mind of bad people. Haven’t you ever been to Stone Mountain and seen the big carvings of Robert E. Lee, Andrew Jackson and Jefferson Davis. They even have a sky ride to the top of the mountain.”

  “Maybe next time,” I said.

  She was right, of course. Thinking like a criminal is not easy. It can be like carrying a fifty pound pack around on your back.

  “Hilary, I have an idea.” She turned to me when I talked to her. I liked the eye contact. “What do you think about doing some undercover work?”

  “You mean like, Dick Tracy?”

  “No, I was thinking more along the line of Gypsy Rose Lee.”

  “She a cop?”

  “No, a stripper.”

  Chapter 36

  “I’m not taking my clothes off for anyone but you at the moment, Bubba.”

  “I wasn’t thinking about that. I was thinking hostess at the Starlight Club.”

  “It’s still a no.”

  “It was just a thought,” I said.

  “Need to think of something else.”

  “How are we doing for gas?” I said.

  Hilary turned her head to look through the steering wheel at the gas gauge. “Got quarter of a tank.”

  “There’s a Shell Station on the right. Pull in there. I have to make a phone call.”

  “Why don’t you use your cellphone?” said Hilary.

  “Because I don’t want to waste the minutes on a local call and I don’t want my number flashing up on the call screen.”

  “Who you calling?” she said.

  “A lawyer I know who might have a lead on Crusher. The question is, will he give it to us?”

  “That has seemed to stop you in the past,” said Hilary.

  As she drove the car into the station’s gas area, Hilary stopped near one of the outside gas islands. Someone on the other side was putting gas in a pickup truck. It was one of those big wheeled jobs, high off the ground, so that when you got in, you had to jump up to get in the cab. I told Hilary to top it off and that I would pay inside. I walked into the station and handed the clerk behind the glass a hundred dollar bill and told him that we wanted a fill-up on island number one. I then walked over to a payphone hanging next to the restrooms.

  The place was a one-stop-does-all kind of place. The only thing that I did not like about it was that I couldn’t see Hilary and the car while talking on the telephone, but what could go wrong?

  I removed the phonebook and searched the white page listings in Atlanta for the name, Al Baker, attorney.

  Crusher told me once while in prison that his attorney was a guy named Al Baker. He also said that he was dumber than dirt and was one of the reasons he was in prison.

  Taking out a quarter, I dropped it in the slot and dialed the number. When the phone connected the call I got an intercept that said the number had been changed to a six seven eight calling exchange and then it gave me the new number. I dialed that number and the voice on the other end answered, “Law Offices of Alwin C. Baker. How may I help you?”

  “Yes ma’am,” I said. “My name is Ben Took and I would like to hire Mr. Baker on a matter, but I don’t seem to have his new address.” She spoke fast and I wrote his address on the inside of my hand as she talked. He was located in a place called Ellijay. She gave me directions.

  “Where are you now?” she said.

  “Atlanta.”

  “Get on I-75 and head North until you get to a sign that reads I-575. Take that all the way until you get to the Ellijay exit. You can’t miss it. There is a big apple farm on the corner where you turn. Turn right off the exit and when you get to Main Street take a left. We’ll be on your right.” I thanked her and hung up. I thought about taking a leak, but decided I needed to check on Hilary.

  I walked over to the front door and looked toward island number one. The bozo that had been filling his gas tank when I got out of the car now had a buddy and they were standing next to Hilary talking to her. Hilary was not talking back. She did not have a happy look on her face. Pushing out the door, I walked in their direction. As I did, I removed the sap that I had taken off one of the cowboys in South Carolina and wrapped my hand around the leather handle.

  I could hear one of the men saying, “Hey, how about me and Justin here buying you a beer?”

  “My husband’s in the store and he will be out in a minute. If I were you I wouldn’t be standing here when he comes out. In fact, here he is now.”

  When Hilary looked toward me, the one closest to me, turned and tapped his buddy on the shoulder, who turned around and started to say something. Before he got it out of his mouth, I hit him with the sap, knocking him up against the truck. The other guy started to back away saying, “I told Junior this was a bad idea.” He had his hands up in a benediction position.

  “Pick up your buddy and if I see you around here again, we are going to have a lot more to talk about.”

  “Yeah, sure. I need to get Junior in the truck.”

  “Put him in the bed in back,” I said. “I’m starting to lose patience.”

  I waited while he loaded Junior into the truck bed and
drove away. After they left, I told Hilary to get in the car. I didn’t even bother to get my change for the hundred. I was sure that we had appeared on the security cameras. It was a big station.

  “Now what do we do?” said Hilary. “They have our license number on their security cameras.”

  “It won’t do them any good. The plate is a Florida plate and the address on the license is the same as that of the Jacksonville Museum. We’re still good to go,” I said.

  Chapter 37

  Hilary’s hands were shaking as she tried to grip the steering wheel of our car. I offered to drive, but she kept on yelling. I just let her yell as she drove out of the station. After ten minutes or so she calmed down and I told her to take the next right and head north as I put Baker’s address in our GPS. The rest was easy.

  “What were you thinking? I could have handled that. You just had to back me up. They were just a couple of hicks. I can handle hicks. Now they have our pictures. We’ll be all over the news.”

  I looked out the passenger’s side window and said, “I doubt it. The clerk inside was happy and could have cared less. He made an extra forty bucks on the deal and the two with the elevated testosterone levels, will live. Who are they going to arrest-the curator at the Jacksonville Museum? I don’t think so. Besides, they were messing with my wife.”

  With that we were done talking. Hilary blinked when I said ‘wife’, smiled and patting my hand.

  “I didn’t think of it like that, but I might just start if you’re asking?”

  “Well, start thinking, “I said.

  It took forever to get to Ellijay. The voice in the GPS was lost.

  “What’s this lawyer supposed to do for us?”

  “Tell us how to find Crusher.”

  Ellijay was not a large town, but it had something I hadn’t seen in a long time, a Piggly Wiggly Food Store.

  “Look at that,” I said. “There’s a Piggly Wiggly.”

  “What’s a Piggly Wiggly?”

  “Food heaven,” I said.

  “Sounds like something you get out of a can with a lot of dirt in it.”

  “Well, we will have to stop in there before we leave and check it out.”

  “I can’t wait,” said Hilary.

  Baker’s office was an old house with a porch across the front and a sign that read, Alwin K. Baker, Attorney.

  “I guess he doesn’t believe in paint?” said Hilary.

  “We’re not buying the place,” I said.

  There was a small parking area with two cars in it. One was a Cadillac ragtop that looked like it had seen better days. The other was a late model Miata convertible. The Caddy was sitting low on its frame on the driver’s side. A ragtop, it had several patches of Duct Tape reflecting the economic status of its owner.

  “What do you wa’na bet the Caddy belongs to Baker,” I said.

  “I try not to bet on sure things,” said Hilary. “How do you want me to play this?”

  “Just tell him, if he asks, that we are friends and that you volunteered to drive me up from Jacksonville. No need to lie. Someone has us scoped out now anyway.”

  Walking up to the front porch of the house, it looked like it needed more than just paint. In the backyard of the house there was one of those metal clotheslines on a pole that would turn in the wind. It had some interesting apparel hanging from it.

  Entering the house, there was a young woman sitting behind desk working on a key board. Looking up, she said, “May I help you?”

  “I’m Mister Took. I called earlier.”

  “Oh yes. I remember talking to you.”

  There was a name plate on the desk that read Alysia Baker. She had to be either a daughter or granddaughter. If she turned out to be Baker’s wife I wanted to start eating what he was eating.

  “Mister Baker is in a conference, but I will tell him you are here. May I tell him what it is about?”

  I said, “Sure,” and handed her a hundred dollar bill. At first she was a bit confused.

  “Tell him it’s a retainer,” I said.

  Hilary kicked me as she left the room, but didn’t say anything.

  When the girl returned she said that Mister Baker’s meeting had just finished and that he could see us now. She ushered us into a room the size of a small walk-in closet with a table and four chairs in it. I sat in the chair closest to the chair with arms. It was larger than the other three chairs. Hilary took a seat across from the throne chair. After about fifteen minutes, Baker entered the room.

  About five foot three, I estimated Baker’s weight at close to three hundred pounds, give or take an ounce. He wore a gray suit the size of a circus tent that had seen better days. He was sporting jowls that a hog would have envied.

  “Mister Took, allow me to introduce myself. I’m Al Baker. I understand that you have a legal matter to discuss with me.” Baker’s little pig eyes flashed at Hilary as if the matter was not for her ears. He was probably thinking divorce.

  “Yes, I do, but it is more about one of your former clients than anything to do with me directly,” I said.

  Big Al didn’t skip a beat. He folded his hands as if he was about to lead us in prayer and said, “Well, Mister Took, I can hardly discuss a client’s case with you or anyone who may be outside the scope of the case.”

  “Yes, I understand the need for confidentiality,” I said, “But, Mister Baker, I am simply trying to locate a friend of mine that you may have represented once.”

  “I see,” said Baker in his best steely-eyed look. It was probably the same look he gave old ladies on one of his juries.

  After further thought, probably not.

  Baker looked like he spent more time in a buffet line than a courtroom. “Do you have this person’s name to share with me?”

  “All I know is his stage name,” I said. “He’s was a professional wrestler and went by the name of Crusher.”

  Baker looked like he was going to swallow his tongue. After a few moments of trying to get his wits about him, Baker said, “How do you know, Crusher?”

  “We met in prison. I was in a cell next to him at the Atlanta Pen.”

  “Then your name is not, Ben Took, is it?” said Baker.

  “Not really,” I said. “But what’s in a name?”

  “Might have made it easier, that’s all.”

  “Easier for whom, Baker? You or me?”

  “Me,” he said.

  Reaching into my front jacket pocket, I removed an envelope that I had planned on giving Baker once I felt it would do some good. When I did, Baker flinched. I’m sure he was thinking I had a pistol, but I just slid the envelope over to him and waited.

  “There is a thousand dollars in that envelope, Baker. You may want to count it. This and the hundred I already gave you, makes eleven hundred for an address I’m probably going to get anyway.”

  I watched Baker finger the envelope like a kid with a new fire truck. First he turned it one way and then another. Finally he said, “What do you want?”

  “Crusher’s address will work just fine,” I said.

  Looking first at me and then at Hilary, Baker got up, taking the envelope with him, and left the room. After a few minutes he returned with a sheet of paper, handed it to me without saying a word, turned and left the room. I figured that was our cue to leave. When we stepped out into the waiting room, the girl Friday was gone. Probably went to the bank to cash her payroll check.

  Looking at the address on the paper, Crusher lived in another small town down the road from Ellijay called Jasper. Driving out of Ellijay I gave the Pig, as people affectionately called a Piggly Wiggly store, a long goodbye, but with the promise to come back.

  “You look like you lost your best friend,” said Hilary.

  “I would have loved some of the Pig’s ice cream.”

  “Maybe next time, Topper,” said Hilary. “What do you think of Mister Baker?”

  “He’s broke. Needs to find something else to do,” I said.

  ”How did
Crusher make out?”

  “With Baker as his lawyer, he didn’t. Baker was why he was in prison. He was granted an appeal after the wrestling association found an ACLU lawyer who filed an appeal and won Crusher’s release.”

  “See there. Maybe, Mister Baker, is not as bad a lawyer as he looked.”

  “Baker didn’t have anything to do with it. The basis for the appeal was ineffectual representation at his trial and the fact that it had been determined that Crusher had acted in self-defense. All of which the idiot whose office we just left knew before the trial, but didn’t use.”

  Chapter 38

  As we drove back down the road to find Crusher’s house, Hilary filled me in more about herself.

  “So what were you doing waiting for me at the bus station?” I said.

  “I had been hired by the group who paid out the insurance claim filed by the Casino on Cumberland Island. I am supposed to get a lead on the money you took.”

  “Well, you found me. Why didn’t you just cash me in and be done with it?”

  “I’m not sure really. I guess I started to like you and the rest sort of took care of itself. I really don’t like to think about it. My license is probably going to be suspended by the time this is all over and we’ll just cozy up in a nice cell somewhere together.”

  “What’s the name of the insurance company?”

  “Consolidated Assurance Payroll Corporation or CAPCO.”

  “And what is Consolidated Assurance Payroll Corporation?” I said.

  “They strictly insure casino payroll accounts for Indian-backed casinos. It seems that even the Indians have trouble holding onto their money. Also, the money you took was unmarked. They never mark casino money. But, you probably knew that already.”

  “So, they are out the money?”

  Nodding her head as she drove, “Yes, hence all the more reason to find you and get the money back.”

  “So why hire you and not let the cops sort it out?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure really. The only thing I can figure is the cops don’t care, which seems a bit odd.”