Known to Evil

by Walter Mosley

  "Where is he?"

  "Please," she said. "I promised I would not tell you."

  "Why would he think that you would tell me anything if you're at a girlfriend's house?"

  "Twilliam told him that men came here after him. He said that you figured it out. I told him that I would call you."

  "Why didn't you?"

  "Because Twilliam told me to meet you . . . not on the phone."

  "Twill's a teenager."

  "He is man." She knew the right diction, I was sure, but this Russian phrasing brought her point home.

  I smiled. I had to. Twill was slight of build but he left a footprint like Tyrannosaurus rex.

  "You won't tell me?" I asked.

  She didn't reply.

  Her green dress was made from raw silk, her cream-colored jacket might have been merino. Tatyana wore no hose, and her dark-brown shoes were sensible, designed for walking--or running.

  She was the right girl in a long life of wrong days; the kind of woman that made you wish everything was different--somehow.

  Twill was right. Tatyana's intentions toward my son were meaningless compared to what he would learn from her.

  "How many girls does Gustav have?"

  "Always less than twenty. Sometimes as little as twelve."

  "Is there a place where he keeps them?"

  "They work out of a building in the East Village, but they live above the pool hall," she said. "On the fourth and fifth floors. He is protected. There is a policeman who comes there."

  "What's his name?"

  "Saul Thinnes. He's a captain."

  I liked straight talk with the Russian. It felt rare, like plain truth in advertising, a contract with no fine print, or honesty in politics.

  I nodded. She understood that I had a plan. She also knew enough not to ask me what that plan was.

  "What do you want from me?" she asked.

  I shook my head slightly. This caused her brow to furrow, reminding me of Hush.

  "It's for Dimitri," I explained.

  "Do you want something for him?"

  "No."

  Again she scrutinized my face, this time looking for danger.

  "Sometimes," I said, "things just don't make sense. They happen and we are left to deal with the results. You are one of those things. I am, too."

  This explanation seemed to quiet Tatyana's unspoken trepidations. She smiled.

  I squelched the urge to kiss her.

  "Take D down to Philly for a few days," I said. "No more than three. Things will be fixed when you get back."

  She nodded and stood but I remained seated.

  "Aren't you going upstairs?" she asked.

  "I'm gonna sit here and think for a while."

  43

  The conversation with Tatyana had lasted all of a dozen minutes.

  I intended to leave right after she did. There was nothing I really needed from the apartment. And unless I wanted a very uncomfortable situation I couldn't go there, anyway.

  But it was cold outside and my mind was preoccupied with the minefield I'd wandered into over the past few days.

  Almost reflexively I took out my cell phone and entered the letters A-U-R. Then I hit the green button.

  "Hello?" she said.

  "Hey."

  "Leonid," Aura Ullman breathed. "I'm surprised."

  "Bad time?"

  "You can always call me," she said, and for the briefest of moments the weight of my life was lifted. I noticed that my headache was gone.

  "Thank you."

  "Why are you calling?"

  "Just wanted to say hi, I guess."

  "No."

  "What? I can't call to say hey?"

  "You never do. What's going on with you?"

  "Too many jobs at once. Trying to make your boss's rent is a bitch."

  "Do you need to talk?"

  "Yeah, but I don't have anything to say."

  That bought me a brief span of silence.

  After a bit she spoke up again.

  "Tell me one thing," she said.

  "What?"

  "Anything."

  "Okay. Dimitri's fallen in love and run off with a high-end call girl and her pimp wants her back. D's gone and his mother wants him back. Twill's got all the plates spinning and I have to catch them one by one before they crash. And that's the least of my troubles."

  "Can I help?"

  "You already have."

  That was what I had been looking for, the turn in the road. It wasn't some clue or confession, threat by the police or flash of intuition about what exactly the crime or who the culprit was. It wasn't even a revelation about my feelings for Aura. I already knew that I loved her. My problem was the crack that had been opened when she told me about Toller. The pain I felt there was what was throwing me off.

  It was a deep ache and it wasn't going away, but that didn't matter because now I knew what I was dealing with and I could negotiate a path toward my revival.

  I exhaled loudly.

  "What?" Aura asked.

  "How's Theda?"

  "She's fine. Going out for JV basketball. The coach says she has talent."

  "I have to go, Aura."

  "I know," she said.

  SIXTEEN MINUTES LATER BERTRAND ARNOLD came out of the elevator, rushing for the door.

  I laughed silently seeing the top of his head out of the window as he went past. I waited for a while more and then made my way up the stairs, the strength in my legs and lungs returning along with my confidence.

  I found Katrina in the kitchen wearing a peacock-blue dress under a tan apron, worrying over something in a red enameled pot.

  "Hey, babe," I said.

  She turned to look at me, trying to hide the desperate sex that was still thrumming in her blood. Her eyes had that startled look of new love. Her lipstick was dulled from the pressure of a dozen hello and goodbye kisses.

  "Leonid. I didn't hear you come in."

  "I'm sorry," I said, "but I have to run. There's a case and I just had a breakthrough. No time to eat. I probably won't be home tonight."

  "All night?"

  "Yeah. I've had this case that I haven't been taking seriously but now I've got to get down to business."

  "Have you heard from Dimitri?"

  "He'll be home in three days like he told you already."

  "Is he all right?"

  "Is love a disease?"

  I left her to ponder that question.

  IN MY DEN I put on a long-sleeved black shirt and a pair of dark trousers that were designed to keep me warm in near freezing temperatures. I had gloves and a roll of burglar tools, a .38 and a knife that had a handle that could also be used as brass knuckles.

  I topped it all off with a black beret to take some of the edge off the intentions of my clothes.

  She was waiting in the hall outside the den.

  "If you're out all night I might go see a movie," she said. She had reapplied her lipstick.

  "Yeah. Sure."

  "Is there anything wrong, Leonid?"

  "You mean other than my oldest friend dying of cancer, my sons missing in action, my lawyer calling me every day, and clients who just don't seem to know how to act?"

  Katrina put her hand on my neck. It was warm. Usually her hands were cold.

  "Can I help you?" she asked.

  "I don't see how."

  "Do want me to stay home?"

  "How would that help anything?"

  "I could be here if you needed to call. If you needed help."

  "Thanks anyway, babe. No. You go out and have a good time. And don't worry about me. I just got a little behind, that's all."

  Katrina smiled and kissed my cheek.

  "You take care of yourself," she said.

  "You too, honey."

  NOT LONG AFTER THAT I was in a cab going across Twenty-seventh Street. That's where John Prince's apartment was. It was a seedy block with many first-floor businesses and a parking lot, a few apartment buildings and a scatteri
ng of cars parked for the night.

  I pretended to have made a mistake about the address and had the driver go around the block. After the second pass my plans were set.

  Carrying my burglar's briefcase and wearing a black trench coat, I walked with certainty to an eight-story apartment building that didn't seem to have any kind of high-tech security system. I pressed all the buttons, except for the top floor, declaring "UPS!" for anyone who answered.

  The buzzer for the outer and inner doors sounded and I rushed in.

  This time I waited for the elevator because someone I hoodwinked might be waiting at their door for their hand-delivered package.

  Getting off on floor eight, I made my way to the door to the roof. I was happy to see that it was padlocked with a chain. I used a fold-out metal cutter to unlock the door and made my way onto the tarpaper roof. I put a wedge under the door so I wouldn't be disturbed, then walked softly on rubber-soled shoes so as not to disturb the residents below.

  There was a ledge and a slanted roof where the building looked down on Twenty-seventh. I nestled there with my nighttime binoculars (which also housed a high-speed digital camera) and cell phone. As long as I remained pretty still, my dark skin and black hat were camouflage enough to keep the casual glance from noticing me.

  The street was quiet. Cars passed at an ever lessening rate, and pedestrians came in and out of view, usually alone. Most were going somewhere else, but a few entered buildings like the one I sat astride. A pudgy man wearing a windbreaker and tan khakis went into a bodega next to the parking lot. A woman wearing a fur-collared jacket walked a three-pound dog. Two young lovers stopped for a while, leaning against each other and a stucco wall. She was a chubby black woman and he a skinny light-skinned guy.

  You couldn't pay for the kind of kisses she was giving him.

  The night got darker and the traffic waned but never stopped.

  At nine I called John Prince's number.

  "Hello?"

  "John Prince?" I asked, throwing a slight accent into the words.

  The ensuing silence fairly wavered. "Yes? Who is this?"

  "My name is Henri Oure. My niece is, was, Wanda Soa. I am just arriving to visit my niece and the police are telling me that she is dead. I once met her friend in Salvador. A young woman named Angelique. This is the number I 'ave for her."

  The accent was terrible, but so are all accents in the end. The big chance I was taking was assuming that Angie and John were close when she was down in South America.

  "I'm sorry about your niece, sir," John said.

  "Do you know what happens? The police won't tell me anything."

  "I don't really know, sir. Angie told me about it but she, she didn't know anything a-about it."

  Like hell.

  "Do you know how I can speak to Angelique?"

  "I'm supposed to see her tomorrow," he said. "If you tell me where you are I could ask her to call."

  "I am in Queens, at the Miller Hotel," I said.

  The Miller was an electronic fabrication presenting a series of recordings designed to make the caller believe that they're connected to a hotel with an automatic phone system that guides its callers through an arcane pathway ending up with them frustrated and having to leave a message.

  I gave him the phone for the hotel and my fictitious room number.

  While talking to John I kept my magnified eyes on the front door of his building. If Angie was staying with him there was a good chance that, upon hearing someone call for her, she'd bolt.

  "I'll have her call you as soon as I speak to her, Mr. Oure," John was saying.

  At the same time a man was walking past the front door of the Prince residence. This man wore a brown windbreaker and tan khaki pants.

  "Thank you so much," I said.

  "No problem, sir."

  The man walked maybe fifty feet up the street and turned. I saw the face in my infrared viewer and snapped the digital camera four times. Then I followed the man back to a dark-colored American-made car parked down toward the other end of the block. I connected the binoculars to my cell phone via a built-in cord, downloaded the pictures, and then sent them to Hush's phone.

  I sat there on the roof, wondering what the pudgy little white man meant. He could have been anyone doing anything. Just because he was sitting in a car on Twenty-seventh Street didn't mean that he was looking for Angelique.

  My phone vibrated.

  Where are you? the text line asked.

  I keyed in the answer.

  Meet me at Bundy's.

  44

  Bundy's Barbeque made the hottest sauce in town, and it was only a few blocks away from John Prince's place.

  As long as I was waiting for Hush I ordered a big plate of baby back ribs with collard greens and corn bread. They served olive oil with the bread--to cut down on the glut of trans fats, I guess.

  I was feeling emotional, like an army reserve corporal who is playing badminton in the backyard with his daughters one day and in the field in Afghanistan the next.

  "You sure know how to get into trouble, don't you, LT?" an unmistakable deep voice rumbled.

  He was sliding into the opposite side of the booth.

  Hush always wore a dark suit and a monochrome tie. There was a spark of excitement in his usually expressionless eyes.

  "What?" I asked.

  He held out his phone screen with the picture of the dumpy little man on it.

  "You remember I told you about a guy named Patrick?"

  Hush liked Bundy's because the booth we preferred to sit in was removed from the rest. It was in the back, near the toilet, and was usually the last place anyone wanted to sit.

  "This little guy?" I said.

  "He's a stone killer, LT. Either walk away or ice him now."

  I pretended to think about his words for a few beats, and then said, "You want some ribs?"

  Hush let his spine slap against the navy-blue backrest of his bench. A smile, like a jittery mosquito, flitted across his face.

  "I know you try to stay away from me, LT," he said. "I know you want a different kind of life. But once you've seen the battlefield you can't pretend that it doesn't exist."

  "I'm not tryin' to hide from anything, man. I got a job to do and killing some guy I never met is not in the description."

  "I could take a walk down that street," he offered.

  "I need him alive."

  "Like a cobra needs a mongoose."

  "Like the Scarecrow needs a brain."

  Again Hush's smile flittered. He slid to his right and stood in an unbroken motion.

  "Call me if you have to, Leonid. If Patrick's involved, I can tell you that this is too deep for you alone."

  "I got your number."

  I'D BROKEN THE LOCK on my lookout building's front door to allow easy access. That night spent on the slanted roof was peaceful. The November chill was bracing and the threat of the man below was like a promise. He, too, felt that Angie was near.

  I was the stalker stalking the stalker stalking, like a lone hyena fixed on the spoor of a lion.

  At three in the morning I entered a number.

  "Hello," he said in a low, guarded tone. You could hardly discern the Spanish accent.

  "Diego."

  "Brother man."

  "Where are you?"

  "Down where Indian blood runs pure and often."

  DIEGO WAS A CITIZEN of the Third World. I'd met him when a New York crime boss wanted me to do some divorce work for a movie-star friend of his out in Los Angeles. The target, a minor actress, was half Mexican, from L.A.'s barrio. I was teamed up with Diego to make sure the woman would have more trouble than it was worth in a court. She had a brother who was wild. His name was Valentin. Diego and I made sure that Valentin was caught with evidence linking him to the drug trade and very possibly to a string of killings. There was evidence to clear him, but only we had it.

  We paved the way for Tony "the Suit" to offer his aid.

  That was b
ack when I was working the dark side of the street.

  Diego was a phantom no one knew and few remembered. He had done some import-export work for my employer but we became friends over the job.

  "I am what they didn't see when they used to look at your people," Diego had once told me.

  "I see you just fine," was my reply.

  "WHAT CAN I DO for you, LT?" Diego asked over the phone. I heard the loud screech of a bird in the background.

  "I'm told by someone I trust that I might need some serious help," I said.

  "What kind of help?"

  "I need a face that no one here knows."

  "What time is it where you are, amigo?"

  "Three oh three in the morning."

  "I can be to you by midnight. How long?"

  "Three days, tops."

  "Okay."

  "I got five thousand."

  "I'll need seven."

  "See you then."

  NOT FOR THE FIRST time, I wondered about my commitment to leave the criminal life behind. I worked among killers and thieves, made my livelihood from the fact of their existence. I breathed their air and shared their stench. How could I ever stay on the straight and narrow with a length of chain behind me that would put Dickens's Marley to shame?

  Diego and Hush (who was retired but not reformed), and Alphonse Rinaldo, for that matter, were all part of the dark matter that was the glue holding together the known, and unsuspecting, world. I was a free-floating radical that sometimes tended the connection between the lightness and this dark.

  AT FIVE-THIRTY IN THE morning I clambered downstairs and took a cab to my office.

  I'm no Sherlock Holmes. I can't read cigarette ash or pretend to have the most important and up-to-date forensic science stored in my lobes. Neither am I a master of disguises or dialects.

  But I do own a ski hat and an old dark-green trench coat that smells strongly of sour sweat--and other human scents. I have a pair of worn-out boots and tattered cotton gloves. And the past few days had produced the grizzled salt-and-pepper beginnings of a beard.

  Add to these a pair of plain-glass, thick-rimmed spectacles, and even a Superman like me can be transformed into a down-at-heels black Clark Kent.