05-Client

by Parnell Hall

  He was out in twenty minutes with a couple of bags of groceries. He loaded them into the Mercedes and drove off.

  I followed him home. He parked the Mercedes, took out the groceries, and went into his house.

  I resumed my position on the corner.

  I had a few choice thoughts about the effectiveness of Creely’s plan.

  Kraswell was out again by twelve-thirty. I followed him through a series of turns onto Route 29, and got off again somewhere downtown. A few more turns and Kraswell pulled into a municipal garage. I gave him half a minute head start and pulled in too. I twisted around and around and spotted Kraswell catching a parking space on level three. I whizzed on by and got my own spot on level four. I left the car and sprinted down the ramp just in time to see Kraswell disappear into a stairwell at the far corner of the garage. I hotfooted it over there and followed him down the stairs.

  I came out into daylight, looked around and saw him walking down the street half a block away. I followed him, not too close, not too far. Jesus Christ, what the hell is routine, anyway? What a hell of an assignment. Act normal. That’s like act casual. Can’t be done. What the hell is normal, and how the hell do you simulate that?

  Kraswell walked up a block and turned left on State Street, which sounded promising.

  It was. After a few blocks the street widened, and we came upon massive stone structures that could only be government buildings. In fact, the first one had a sign out in front of it that said, STATE HOUSE. I was disappointed at first when Kraswell walked right by it, but when I got a little closer I saw the sign actually read, STATE HOUSE RENOVATIONS IN PROGRESS: LEGISLATURE MEETS IN ANNEX. The next big stone building said, ANNEX, and Kraswell went in there.

  I did too, from a normally discreet distance, which was a bit hard to determine since it was a U-shaped building—or since it wasn’t curved I should say a double-L shaped building—with the entrance set way back from the street so you had to walk into it between the double Ls. Which left you trapped there, in case the guy you were tailing happened to turn around.

  Kraswell didn’t. He just went right in the front door. I quickened my pace and got there just in time to see him walk through the small lobby and step into an elevator.

  All right. That decision I could handle. Under normal routine surveillance, I didn’t take that elevator.

  I stood there looking stupid and watching the elevator indicator, which stopped on three. Which might or might not have meant anything, ’cause it could have been Kraswell getting off or it could have been someone else getting on. But what the hell, I figured routine surveillance might be to check it out. When the next elevator arrived I took it up to three and found myself in a long hallway with a lot of closed doors and no sign of Kraswell, nothing to choose from.

  I took the elevator back down, went out and staked out the State House Annex from across the street.

  Kraswell was out in about fifteen minutes with a well-dressed, portly gentleman, probably, I figured, uncharitably, a senator or assemblyman Kraswell wished to bribe. They came out and walked back down the street the way Kraswell had come. I tailed them from across the street and half a block behind. That seemed as normal as I could get, not knowing what normal really was.

  They walked a few blocks, went into a small restaurant, and proceeded to have lunch. I stayed outside getting hungry and waiting for them to come out, perfectly normal there.

  They split up after lunch and Kraswell headed back for the garage. I tagged along. Kraswell took the stair. I followed a flight behind. I took the last flight of steps two at a time, ran to my car, started the engine, nosed down the ramp, and waited for the Mercedes to pull out ahead of me. It did and I followed, always one floor behind. I waited up the ramp until Kraswell paid his ticket, and I saw which way he turned. He pulled out and I pulled up fast, paid my ticket, and took off after him. I caught him in three blocks, dropped back to a safe distance behind.

  We took Route 29 again, followed a by-now familiar route through a couple of turns and home.

  Kraswell parked the Mercedes in the drive, locked it, opened his door and went inside.

  And that was it. After that he stayed put. He didn’t go out, and no one went in.

  By the time five o’clock rolled around, absolutely nothing else had happened. That was the time Creely had told me to pack it in, so I started the car, pulled out, and drove around till I found a pay phone. I took out my notebook, looked up the number Creely’d given me, and punched it in.

  Two rings and a voice said, “Yeah?”

  “Stanley Hastings, reporting in.”

  The voice said, “Just a minute,” and I was on hold.

  It was closer to two minutes. Then a voice said, “Hastings? How’d it go?”

  “Creely?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What are you doing here?”

  “What, you think I got some case more important than this? What’s the story?”

  “It’s a washout.”

  “He didn’t go out?”

  “Yeah. He went out twice. Once to the supermarket and once to the State Capitol.”

  “And what did he do?”

  “First time he bought groceries. Second time he had lunch with someone.”

  “Who?”

  “I don’t know. Guy in a suit. Probably a senator or assemblyman or something. Met him at the State House, they went out for lunch. After that he went home and stayed put.”

  “O.K. Good work.”

  “Good work, hell. It’s a washout.”

  “Why is it a washout?”

  “’Cause he didn’t spot me.”

  “You sure of that?”

  “Absolutely. And he’s not gonna, either. You got to let me crowd him.”

  “No way. Don’t even think that.”

  “If I don’t this is never gonna work.”

  “You’re wrong. This the only way it’s gonna work. You try it your way, you blow it. You blow it for you, you blow it for me. You blow it for me, I’m history. So you don’t try it, you got that?”

  I took a breath. “Yeah.”

  “Fine. You did good. He didn’t spot you today, you hang it up, you try again tomorrow. Don’t worry so much. You’re doing good.”

  The phone clicked dead.

  I looked at it a moment before hanging up. Doing good, was I? I wondered what it felt like to do bad.

  I hung up the phone, got back in the car. Creely’d had me make a reservation at a downtown hotel, just in case. I’d been hoping I wouldn’t have to use it, but I guess I should have known better. I drove over there, registered, and went up to my room, which was as drab and cheerless as I’d expected.

  I called Alice and told her what had happened, or rather what hadn’t. She was sympathetic and supportive as could be, but somehow it didn’t help. I was really bummed out.

  I went down to the lobby, had an overpriced and undistinguished meal in the hotel dining room, bought a paper to check out the movies, didn’t see anything I felt like going to enough to hassle with finding out where they were, went back up to my room and watched TV.

  When eleven o’clock rolled around I found out Trenton’s local news wasn’t any more inspiring than Poughkeepsie’s. I stayed awake through Johnny Carson’s monologue, then switched the set off and went to sleep.

  I woke up to the sound of a key sliding into the lock.

  38.

  THIS WAS IT. Suddenly, unexpectedly, from out of left field, it was happening here and now. Creely was right and I was wrong, and his plan had worked after all, and I was an incompetent detective (“The Number One Answer!”), and despite my best efforts, Carlton Kraswell had spotted me anyway, and backtracked me to the hotel, and here he was coming in the door, and the plan had worked, only I’d told the cops it hadn’t and called them off, and now they were nowhere around, and here was Carlton Kraswell coming in to kill me.

  As I said, I don’t wake up well under the best of circumstances. I tend to be groggy and co
nfused, and have trouble getting my bearings. With a murderer coming in the door, the problem escalates. Holy shit, what do I do now?

  Well, Carlton Kraswell was a shrimp and I’m nearly six feet tall, but I can’t fight to save my life, which is what we’re talking about here, and I’m unarmed and the son of a bitch was bound to have a gun, and guns reduce me to jelly.

  Round One to Kraswell.

  I’m wide awake, skip the coffee, I’ll just get up without it. I’m sure a shot of adrenaline will do.

  The sound of the key turning in the lock provided that.

  I slid out of bed. I was sleeping in my underwear. Momma says always wear clean underwear, you never know when you’re gonna get hit by a truck. Or shot. Actually, my mom never said anything like that, but that’s the way the old saw goes. Or was it clean socks?

  Who cares? Schmuck. What you gonna do?

  No place to run, no place to hide.

  Except the bathroom. I darted for it on little cat feet. Sprang inside.

  Just as the door swung open.

  Shit. Too late. He knows you’re there. So what? You think he wouldn’t find you in the bathroom?

  I slammed the door. Is there a lock? Can’t see, it’s dark, should I risk a light?

  No. No lock. But my hand, groping for it, touched the knob.

  Which started to turn.

  I grabbed it, hung on for dear life.

  There. I’m bigger, I’m stronger, he can’t turn it.

  Wrong again. False premise. It’s easier to turn a doorknob than it is to hold it still.

  The knob was turning. This way, that way, a little more, back and forth—

  Click!

  He’d done it. And now he was heaving his weight, what there was of it, against the door. I pushed back, but Jesus Christ, the door is moving! That little shrimp must really want to kill me bad.

  I heaved back, put my whole weight into it, gained an inch or two back.

  Paranoid-Flash-Number-907: what if he starts shooting through the door?

  He didn’t. He just heaved furiously with a burst that gained a little ground, and I heaved back and he heaved again, and I gave a giant lunge with all my weight and the door slammed shut.

  I grabbed for the knob again.

  But it didn’t turn.

  Instead there was a knock on the door.

  A knock? (“Knock knock.” “Who’s there?” “Carlton.” “Carlton who?” “Carlton Kumta-kilya.”)

  A voice said, “Hastings. Open up.” A familiar voice. A voice affecting a high-pitched Southern drawl.

  I opened the door.

  The lights were on. Chief Creely was standing there. Two Jersey cops were holding a handcuffed Carlton Kraswell.

  I turned to Creely. “How the hell’d you get here?”

  Creely grinned. “You kidding? You think I’d take your word for anything? You tell me he didn’t spot you, it’s odds-on he did. Lucky for us he didn’t spot the two cops that were tailing him too.”

  “You had cops on him all the time?”

  “Yeah.”

  “You didn’t tell me that.”

  “No. You’d have looked for them.” He jerked his thumb at Kraswell. “Probably tipped him off to them too.”

  I looked at Kraswell. “He have a gun?”

  “Oh yeah.” Creely jerked his thumb again, and one of the cops held up a plastic evidence bag. “Didn’t think he’d take on a big bad dude like you with his bare hands, did you? Naw, he was armed and we got him dead to rights.”

  “Then we have our deal?”

  “Well, I could penalize you for telling us the guy wasn’t wise, but basically I’m just a nice guy.”

  Creely turned to the Jersey cops. “O.K., boys, before you run him in, we give this joker five minutes in return for his almost getting killed.”

  One of the cops said, “That’s irregular as all hell.”

  “Ain’t it now?” Creely said. “But on the other hand, who gives a shit?” He jerked his thumb at Kraswell. “This joker’s got the right to remain silent, but that don’t mean he can’t listen.” He turned to me. “All right. You’re on.”

  This was it. My big scene. I was gonna have to play it in my underwear, but what the hell, you gotta work with what you got.

  I grabbed my briefcase, threw it on the bed, and popped it open. I reached in and pulled out a stack of papers, computer printouts I’d had Alice make me. I took them, marched up to Carlton Kraswell, and stuck my finger in his face.

  “You’re busted for murder. But that’s the least of your troubles.” I thrust the papers at him. “You know what this is? It’s a bill for my services. You hired me to do a job for you, I did it, and now you’re gonna pay. I talked to my lawyer about it, and he says there’s no question. All the work I’ve done in this case was a direct result of representations made by you. Now those representations happen to be false, but that does not relieve you of responsibility, or in any way alter the validity of our oral contract. You’re responsible for everything, up to and including my being here today. These bills come to a total of four thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven dollars and thirty-two cents. The reason there’s so many is, I billed you individually, so I could break ’em down into lots of less than fifteen hundred dollars each, which means I can take you to small claims court. Which means I can make you pay ’em without even having to hire a lawyer. Though if it came to that, my attorney would be happy to oblige. But he says there’s no question—four thousand, four hundred and twenty-seven dollars and thirty-two cents, and you’re gonna have to pay.

  “Which is kind of interesting, don’t you think? ’Cause you’re probably the first murderer in history who ever hired a private detective to help catch him. You can think about that while you’re in jail.”

  I turned to Creely. “Chief, this is a great pleasure. Allow me to introduce you to Carlton Kraswell, alias Marvin Nickleson.” I turned, gestured to Kraswell, smiled and said, with considerable satisfaction, “My client.”

  39.

  THAT MORE OR LESS wrapped things up. The cops took Kraswell into custody and we all moseyed down to the police station and the Jersey cops charged Kraswell with the attempted murder of me, and Creely charged Kraswell with the murder of Julie Steinmetz, and Kraswell called his attorney, who turned out to be as slick and slippery a shyster as one would have expected, and he showed up and started screaming entrapment and frame-up and police corruption, and Creely started talking about instituting extradition proceedings, and the lawyer started talking about fighting them, and the Jersey cops started talking about which crime took precedence, and Kraswell, who’d been advised by his attorney to remain silent, just sat there tugging at his moustache, and aside from him, all of them seemed happy as clams because it was just business as usual and they were getting on with it.

  Somewhere in all that the cops took my statement and after that I was free to go, and before I knew it there I was, driving up the New Jersey Turnpike through the early morning rush hour traffic just like some damn commuter and just as if the whole thing had never happened.

  But it had happened, every bit of it. And by and large, I had to admit I was pretty pleased with the way it had turned out.

  Which bothered me. Being pleased with it, I mean. ’Cause the thing is, I realized what I was pleased about.

  I suppose I could be proud of my accomplishments. After all, it had been my first real client, my first professional case. And I’d been lied to, cheated and framed. And despite that, I’d managed to plow through the bullshit, sort out the facts, deduce what had happened, and find the killer. Maybe not as quickly and easily as the professionals had, but I’d still done it. Which had to be encouraging to a man in my position. Which had to give me reason for being pleased.

  But that wasn’t it, and I knew it. No, by and large, I had to admit, the thing that pleased me most about the whole affair was the prospect of having Carlton Kraswell pay me my fee.

  Which bothered me a lot.

 
You have to understand, I’m a product of the sixties. And if you grew up in the sixties, you’ve got a lot of problems in this day and age. For one thing, you’re getting old. For another thing, you got a legacy from your childhood that’s sometimes hard to live with. For example, it’s embarrassing to be part of a generation that screamed, “Make Love, Not War,” only to find out twenty years later with the advent of AIDS, that making love may kill more people than making war ever did. And it’s hard to emerge from that psychedelic culture into the modern world of crack and death, and find yourself with kids of your own, for whom you’re fighting a valiant struggle to try to teach them to Just Say No. Different times, different values.

  Yeah, values, that’s what it’s all about.

  Value.

  Money.

  When I went to college, none of us studied business administration. Few of us went to med or law school, either. Liberal arts, that was where it was at. Fine arts. And no crass commercialism, either. Art for art’s sake. No, I’m not a money-grubbing industrialist. I’m an actor, a poet, a prophet, a writer, a sage.

  Plans for the future? What future? I don’t trust anyone over thirty, so I’m never gonna be over thirty, right? The Peter Pan generation. I won’t grow up.

  Rude awakenings.

  Yeah, you get older and things change, and you find you have more and more regrets. And you wonder how many of them are just because you’re getting old. And then you start to question your own motives and values and feelings.

  Like my zinging Kevin Drexel in the bar. That was, I must admit, a wholly gratuitous exercise that had absolutely nothing to do with my investigation. And I have to ask myself, did I do it because the smug son of a bitch was a sleazy bribe-taking scum who deserved the comeuppance, or did I do it merely because I’m a middle-aged family man who can’t buy sanitary napkins without blushing, and he’s a handsome young stud, and I couldn’t resist popping him one in front of his flashy blonde?

  And then there’s Alice. I think of Alice and I feel bad too, ’cause I realize I’ve done an injustice there. Because Alice’s work on the computer is important to her, and I should take an interest. And looking at it rationally, I know that selling computer programs at seventy-five bucks a pop is just pie in the sky, and isn’t going to get us rich any more than printing resumes at ten cents a page, and it’s wrong for me to be more interested in one because it sounds more lucrative than the other. And even if it was, that shouldn’t matter, I should be supporting her in any case. And yet for all that, here I am, a crass, capitalistic moron, whose interest picked up immensely when she mentioned seventy-five bucks.