by Ace Atkins
“I should be the one to ask.”
Vinnie nodded. He offered his fist. I bumped it and he tagged me in.
I got out and walked back down the street to the church. I had seen pictures, mostly mug shots, of Ray Russo. I knew his general build, the shape of his face. I couldn’t be sure he wouldn’t run when he saw me. But I’d worn a new pair of Asics and was confident he wouldn’t get far.
As I passed the tables, families speaking in Spanish and English, I admired the food laid out. Barbecue, tamales, fried chicken, and beans. Hot homemade tortillas and some kind of dish that looked like fried fish heads. I saw the same man who had been painting the mural of Christ on the side of the church.
He was dressed in a blue Memphis Grizzlies shirt that hung to his knees. The front read Grit & Grind. When he saw me, he nodded. He simply pointed to the front of the church. I nodded back and mounted the steps. The front doors were wide open, the sanctuary dimly lit. The pews looked to be old and mismatched, the carpet a thread-worn red. At the altar, I saw a man kneeling before a large cross.
We were alone.
There was the sound of laughter and music outside.
When I walked up on him, the man turned. He was gaunt and gray-bearded, dressed in black jeans and a black dress shirt. He looked more like a hippie than a Mob guy. But there was no mistaking Famous Ray.
“Not here,” he said. “I knew you were coming. Take me where you want. I’m tired of running.”
53
I DIDN’T COME to kill you.”
Famous Ray got off his knees and turned back to me. His eyes had dark circles under them. He looked to have lost fifty pounds since the time of his last mug shot. He wore a large gold cross around his neck. Lean, wiry, and somewhat haggard, he had the appearance of a portrait from long ago.
“Who are you?”
“My name’s Spenser,” I said. “I’m a private investigator.”
As he looked at me, his dark eyes darted from me to the back of the church, and then to the side doors.
“What do you want?”
“The Gentleman in Black.”
He nodded and swallowed, running a lean hand over his face.
“Did Jimmy send you?”
“I work for the Winthrop Museum.”
“You got some kind of ID?” he said.
He hadn’t lost his East Boston accent. I opened my wallet and showed him the credentials given to me by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
“You’re the guy who killed Frank Doerr?”
“I guess that will be my epitaph,” I said.
He let out a breath and sat down on the steps to the altar, the carpet even more worn and threadbare here. A PA system had been set up under the large cross, lots of wires and speakers showing. Famous Ray looked tired, resting his elbows on his knees.
“Sorry you came all this way,” he said. “I don’t have it.”
“You’re going to have to give me more than that.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll drop Jimmy Morelli a postcard,” I said. “He is looking for you.”
“How’d you find me?”
“Does it matter?”
A side door opened and the short Hispanic painter walked into the sanctuary carrying a shotgun. He kept the gun aimed at me but his eyes up at Pastor Doménikos.
Russo/Doménikos shook his head and said something rapid in Spanish. The man’s eyes were on me but didn’t move. He looked like a little fireplug, sure-footed and rooted to the ground. It didn’t look like he was going anywhere. Again, Ray spoke to him in Spanish. This time the tone was harsh. The short man lowered his shotgun and headed back out the side door.
“That’s Miguel,” he said. “He’s a good friend.”
“Looks like you have a nice life here.”
“Better than I ever hoped to deserve,” he said. “The Feds gave me a few options of where I could go. I’d never been to Memphis. I always liked Elvis.”
“And the church façade?”
“It’s real,” he said. “I don’t have to work. I don’t have to do anything. I didn’t want to do this. I had to do this.”
“Some might say it’s a calling.”
“It’s hard to understand,” he said. “It was hard for me to understand. But I knew things were different.”
He smiled as he spoke, a calm expression on his face. He’d shaved his beard thin across his jawline, narrowly connecting with his mustache along his chin. His dark eyes took me in, seeming very much at home inside the tiny brick church.
“I don’t want to cause you any trouble,” I said. “I was hired to find the painting.”
“It’s long gone.”
“Where?”
“Can I ask how you knew I had it?”
“Friend of the family.”
“Jimmy Morelli,” he said. “He still wants his cut.”
“As do a few others in Boston.”
“Jackie DeMarco?”
I shrugged. He smoothed down the thin mustache with the back of his hand.
“Do you believe in fate, Mr. Spenser?”
“I attended the final game of the 2004 World Series,” I said. “Yes, I do.”
“Divine intervention?” Ray said. “That God has a purpose for us all?”
“Pastor Doménikos,” I said. “That discussion would take much more time than you and I have.”
He smiled. He liked me referring to him by his new name. I could smell the corn and meat cooking on the grill outside. Tejano music began to play.
“I’m glad you were able to start over,” I said. “You and I both know you’ve done some rotten things in your life. Not many people have that kind of opportunity.”
He nodded.
“I have a friend who’s been searching for these paintings for almost twenty years,” I said. “He’s very ill. I promised I’d find them for him.”
“Not for the money.”
“Nope.”
“I may be a man of God,” he said. “But I am still suspicious.”
“Did you sell them?” I said. “You and Devon Murphy?”
He shook his head. “We tried,” he said. “The Goya was in really bad shape. The guys in DeMarco’s crew weren’t careful and made a rough time of it. But The Gentleman was pristine. Nearly perfect. You should have seen it.”
“I have,” I said.
“Where?”
I told him about my trip with Alan Garner. He said he didn’t know Garner but didn’t disagree that what I saw was authentic.
“It changes you,” he said. “Some people don’t get it. Jimmy used to call it bad luck. It wasn’t bad luck for me. It helped me put things in perspective, thinking about all those eyes on it over the years. You realize everything you do in life isn’t worth squat. My place in the world. That stuff I done? None of it would matter in fifty years, let alone four hundred.”
“Did you leave it with Murphy?”
“This is my new life, Spenser,” he said. “I don’t want to walk backward.”
“If you’ve thrown away your old life,” I said, “what does it matter anymore? It may not matter to you. But it matters a hell of a lot to the museum and to my friend.”
“How sick is he?”
“As sick as you get.”
“Cancer?”
I nodded.
“My mother died of cancer,” he said. “It’s not pretty to watch. Your body turns on you.”
“I won’t tell the cops we talked.”
Russo/Doménikos smiled and stood from the steps. He smiled at me some more, finding some warmth and comfort in something I didn’t see. He placed his right hand on my shoulder and looked at me with old black eyes. “The cops know.”
I didn’t answer.
“After I made a deal with the Feds,
two state cops tracked me down here,” he said. “They wanted the painting. They said if I talked, they’d tell Jimmy where to find me.”
“I’m sure for the greater good of the art world.”
“I told them where I’d stashed it in Boston,” he said. “I didn’t need any trouble. I’d already bought this building, started this church, and began my new life.”
“A lot to lose.”
“Do you know these men?”
“Indeed I do, Pastor.”
54
WHEN WE ARRIVED IN BOSTON the next afternoon, Frank Belson was waiting for me at baggage claim.
“Moonlighting for Uber?” I said.
Vinnie looked up from the baggage carousel, gold Elvis glasses pushed high on his head. He met eyes with Belson and reached for his hanging bag. He snatched the handle and walked in the opposite direction.
“You and Morris?” he said. “That’s a dream team.”
“I think I just lost my ride.”
“You’re in luck,” he said. “I offer one-way transportation to headquarters. I’ll even take the fucking scenic route through Southie.”
“To what do I owe this honor?”
“A British dandy named Paul Marston got three in the head last night,” he said. “Figured you might know something about it.”
“As you already know, I was in Memphis.”
“I understand you didn’t like him.”
“Couldn’t stand him.”
“He was sitting outside your place in the Navy Yard when he got shot.”
I shrugged. I eyed the carousel for my bag. I’d brought Pearl back an official Elvis hound-dog collar. I couldn’t wait to give it to her.
“He worked for the Winthrop,” I said. “Talk to them. He’d been tailing me.”
“I guess he knew you were out of town,” Belson said. “A jogger spotted the body in some shitty old Land Cruiser parked by the pier.”
“Gunmetal gray like mine?”
“Yep, because it was your freakin’ car.”
“Messy?”
“No,” Belson said. “Nice and neat. Three bullets in the back of a man’s head looks like Martha Stewart’s kitchen.”
“Shit.”
“Come on,” he said. “You won’t get that truck back for a while. Glass wants to have a chance. After that, I can take you to Susan’s.”
“How did you know I wanted to go to Susan’s?”
Belson didn’t answer. I spotted my bag on the carousel, grabbed it, and followed him to the elevator and up to the parking garage. As soon as he paid the toll and hit the highway, he punched up the cigarette lighter and set fire to a nub of a cigar.
“Funny how every bastard who comes to Boston gets to be a Sox fan,” he said.
I let down my window to get some fresh air. After Jimmy Morelli’s shop, I’d had enough of cigar smoke.
“Marston had on a Sox cap,” I said.
“He’s a lot leaner,” he said. “But about your same height.”
“Someone mistook him for me.”
“Damn, Spenser,” he said. “Who said you’ve lost a step?”
“Muddling through my car at night,” I said. “Someone could’ve easily made the mistake.”
“Good thing you were gyrating those hips down south,” he said. “Or me and Quirk might be forced to say something nice about you to the papers.”
“You old softie.”
“Glass is another story,” Belson said. “She’d give the press a solid ‘No comment.’”
“Jackie DeMarco?” I said.
“Who better,” he said, driving with one hand, ashing the cigar outside the window with the other. “Maybe you and Susan should take a little vacation until we sort out this shit sandwich you served up.”
“I got a little sorting to do on my own.”
“You find the painting?”
I didn’t answer. Belson shook his head and groaned. He picked up his cell and muttered a few affirmatives into the phone before tossing it onto the seat between us. The unmarked car was this year’s model, but the interior looked a decade old. In the flickering afternoon light, Belson’s five-o’clock shadow had reached six.
“Can you tell me why Jackie wants you dead?” he said. “Again?”
“He thinks I have the painting.”
“But you don’t.”
“Nope.”
“And you won’t tell us who does.”
“Not until I’m absolutely sure,” I said. “And I’ve gotten it safe and sound back to the Winthrop.”
“Son of a bitch,” he said. “I’m trying to run a little interference for you because I know that even though you often walk through shit, you come out smelling like Chanel Number Five.”
“Ah, Frank.”
“Don’t ‘Ah, Frank’ me,” he said. “Your buddy Topper Townsend and his fuddy-duddy silver cane have been rattling a lot of desks at headquarters. He firmly believed you’d killed Marston until we proved to him that you were out of town. Even now, he wants to see travel receipts, video of you in your hotel. That guy talks to all of us like we carry his fucking water. I can’t stand him.”
“We agree on some things.”
“Hell,” he said. “We agree on most things. But this crap has gotten too hot. Let’s sit down, let me know what you know, and let us handle it from here. Okay, ace?”
“How long have we known each other?”
Frank puffed on his cigar and took the off-ramp to Roxbury.
“Long enough.”
“And do you expect me to agree?”
“No fucking way,” he said. “But I told Glass I’d try. Now you’ll have the extreme pleasure of spending some time with her. And let me warn you, she ain’t serving you no hot coffee and donuts. It’s not that kind of shit anymore.”
“Canapés?”
“Christ Almighty.”
55
IT WAS NEARLY MIDNIGHT, and I was lying on Susan’s sofa with my head in her lap. After traveling all day and spending some quality time with Captain Glass, it took only a double of Blanton’s and two aspirins to soothe my aching head. We had on the television. Pearl snuffled and snoozed at Susan’s feet while Ben Mankiewicz introduced Beat the Devil on TCM.
“Sounds like your kind of movie.”
“I’ve seen it,” I said. “Bogart loses in the end.”
“He always loses in the end.”
“Me and Bogie,” I said, getting to my feet, and walked back to Susan’s kitchen. Pearl obediently followed while I poured a fresh drink.
When I got back to the sofa, Susan sat upright and settled into the far corner. She had a shrink look on her face, although it was difficult to take her seriously with her hair up in a bun and a mud mask on her face.
“You look like a shrink.”
“I am a shrink.”
“And you look concerned.”
“I am concerned.”
“I’m not,” I said. “I have the matter firmly in my grasp.”
“Um-hmm,” she said. “By firmly, you mean that you have to wrestle a priceless work of art from two state cops with questionable morals.”
“Ex–state cops,” I said. “And their morals aren’t questionable. They’re deplorable.”
“Why not just tell Belson and Glass?” she said. “Or your friend Epstein.”
“And let them have all the fun?”
“A man was murdered because someone thought he was you.”
“True,” I said. “But if the shooter thinks I look like Paul Marston, they’re not very good.”
“I hate to say it,” she said. “But your ego might someday be your undoing.”
“What’s done can’t be undone.”
“What the hell does that mean?” Susan said.
“I’m not really s
ure,” I said. “Let me finish this drink and I’ll let you know.”
On TV, Bogart was tooling about the Amalfi Coast with Jennifer Jones. They looked like they were having a hell of a time. I took another swig and stretched out my feet. My bag remained unopened at the top of Susan’s staircase.
I had just about grown comfortable when my cell skittered across the coffee table. Pearl pricked her ears at the sound. I looked down at the screen and recognized the number. Against my better judgment, I answered.
“Where the hell have you been?” Devon Murphy said.
“Down where the catfish are jumping and the cotton is high.”
“I called your office a dozen times,” he said. “I stopped by twice. Met your secretary. The broad with the blue hair?”
“She’s not my secretary,” I said. “And like I said, I’ve been gone.”
“But you’re back now?”
I looked to Susan and she lifted one eyebrow. Sensing a shift in the balance of power, Pearl hopped up between us and rested her head in Susan’s lap. Traitor.
“Indeed I am.”
“We need to talk,” he said. “Can you meet me at the auction house?”
“How about noon?”
“How about now?”
“It’s midnight.”
“I got a fucking watch,” Murphy said.
“I can’t tonight.”
“You want The Gentleman in Black?” he said. “Or not.”
“You told me you didn’t know where to find it.”
There was a long pause. Pearl turned on her back and pressed her hind legs into my thigh. She made a deep groan and shuffled in Susan’s lap.
“Okay,” Murphy said. “I may have lied a little.”
“That’s lying a lot.”
“Oh, well,” Murphy said. “You know how it goes.”
“Why should I trust you now?”
“’Cause I’ve been the swingman to that big old painting since the Morelli Brothers stole it.”
“I heard.”
“Did you find Famous Ray?”
“Was Alan Garner fronting for you and your silent partners?” I said.
He didn’t answer. I heard crunching sounds, like he was working over some hard candy in his molars. I waited for him for about twenty seconds, until he asked if I was still there.