Done for a Dime

by David Corbett

  Peering through bodies in the dim light, Nadya thought she spotted friends of the band in front. She wanted to move up, join them. Toby’s father resisted, gesturing that he wanted to hang back. He motioned for her to go on ahead.

  “No.” To disguise her worry, she took a sip of her drink. “I’d rather stay with you.”

  He began searching the crowd, too. Nadya suspected he was looking for Toby’s mother, Felicia—he’d been warned she wasn’t coming, some church function, but apparently he’d held out hope regardless. By the time his eyes returned to the bandstand they had an ugliness in them. His jaw set hard, he downed his drink in one swallow.

  Onstage, Francis stepped forward on tenor to announce the theme and claim the chorus, building his solo from climbing triplets that ended in a scream. Snapping to, Toby’s father shouted, “Yeah! Get on it!” Kids standing near him shrank away. “What is wrong with you people?” Sweat broke out on his face. He tugged at his collar, licked his lips.

  Nadya touched his sleeve. “Do you need some air?”

  He waved her off as “East Dallas Special” ended to scattered cheers. A round of boos erupted as well, deep within the bar. Toby’s father spun toward the sound. Before Nadya knew what was happening he was moving. She grabbed at his sleeve, but he shook her off, making her follow as the septet launched into the next tune, Cannonball Adderley’s “Sack o’ Woe.”

  He charged through the crowd into the packed bar, dodging the clustered groups that provided cover for his approach. Grady Bradshaw stood with his back to the room, addressing the four roughnecks, some kind of argument. As Nadya rushed up behind she heard them shouting over each other.

  “—any your business?”

  “I’m just saying—”

  “Hey, chilluns. Look who’s back. Spook Ellington.”

  Toby’s father came up on Grady Bradshaw fast and yanked him around. “Two-faced son of a bitch.” He caught him quick with a straight flat shot to the bridge of his nose. It landed like a hammer. Grady’s head jerked back, his knees buckled. Threads of blood spumed everywhere.

  Toby’s father got jumped from behind by someone in the crowd and locked into a bear hug. The man was young, large, and soft, with darkish skin but whitish features. Grady howled through bloody hands, “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Nadya tried to step in, get the man with his arms locked around Toby’s father to let go as the four hoods shot up off their stools, grateful for the excuse.

  Still wrapped tight in the big stranger’s arms, Toby’s father managed to duck two punches and caught one on the shoulder that was meant for his head, the whole time kicking wild. Nadya screamed, the sound barely audible above the crowd noise and music. Onlookers in the bar shrank back. The bartender barged in from the perimeter, gripping a golf club like a baton and shoving everybody apart. “That’s it! Over! It’s over!”

  The hold around him loosened, Toby’s father circled fast and delivered a quick jab to the eye of the soft, bearish stranger who’d held him. The young man crumpled. Toby’s father got a good kick in before the bartender grabbed him by the scruff, dragging him off.

  “The fuck I say?” the bartender said.

  Toby’s father tore free, shook off the punches he’d taken. His skin glistened with sweat. “You’re goddamn lucky you got something in your hand.”

  Grady Bradshaw, his back against the bar, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and applied it to his face. Toby’s father pointed. “Get religion, motherfucker. Insult my son—”

  Grady Bradshaw just shook his head, perplexed, disgusted.

  “You’re outta here,” the bartender said.

  “Yeah, yeah.” Toby’s father snatched his beret from the floor and reached out for Nadya’s hand. “Let’s catch the rest of the set.” He started toward the dance floor, but the bartender grabbed him by the scruff again, dragged him through the crowd to a side exit beyond the bar, saying, “No, no, no, old man. Not a chance.”

  The door banged hard against the iron rail of the landing. Toby’s father shook himself free. “I’ll walk.” He squared himself, framed by the doorway. “One man against five, you kick the one out first.”

  “You started it.”

  “Kick the nigger out first.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Here it comes.”

  “This is about your motherfucking tip, ain’t it?” Toby’s father jammed a hand into his pocket, withdrew a few bills, and tossed them at the bartender’s feet. “There. Now I’m going back inside to hear my boy.”

  “Like hell. You’re gonna pick up your fucking litter is what you’re gonna do. And I see your ass inside this bar again, you’ll sleep it off in Santa Rita.”

  Nadya squeezed through the doorway past the bartender to join Toby’s father. She took his hand. “Let’s get out of here.”

  Toby’s father stood his ground. “Send out your boys. We’ll finish this up right.” For the sake of finality, he spat at the bartender’s feet, but the man had already turned away.

  Nadya, tugging his arm, led Toby’s father down the metal steps as the door slammed shut. Their steps rang loud on the metal, then softened to a flagging thud on the asphalt. They were halfway through the parking lot as, back inside, “Sack o’ Woe” ended to polite applause.

  “No use in bein’ scared.” He lurched beside her toward the car. “You want to be with my son, about time you learned what it’s like.”

  She looked back over her shoulder, quickening her pace. He stumbled as they turned down the alley where the car was parked.

  “Please,” she said. “Try.”

  He shook free of her hold. “Don’t you start with the weepy, boo-hoo bullshit again. Damn, girl. Cried enough already tonight.” He adjusted his coat collar, shook his head to clear it. Not far away the freeway roared with traffic. “Besides, you ain’t the one gonna take the ass kickin’ regardless.”

  They were maybe fifty yards from the car. The shout Nadya had been fearing came from behind, at the far end of the alley. One word: “Hey!”

  Three silhouettes, lined up beneath the streetlights.

  Nadya pulled at Toby’s father’s sleeve. “Hurry.”

  He pulled back his arm. “Not my style.”

  Nadya shot another glance back, saw the three shapes closing. Why just three, she wondered. Which one had stayed behind? Or was he circling around behind them somewhere? She turned and ran, leaving Toby’s father where he stood, gaping at her, dumbfounded. She reached the car, got in, and fired up the engine. Toby’s father spun one direction, then the next, looking back at the three punks closing in from behind, then around again at Nadya.

  “Little Russian princess,” he hooted. “Well, ain’t that just it. Go on, run off. Good riddance.”

  She backed the car out fast, flipped the headlights on. Toby’s father turned back around toward the three hoods, ready to do whatever. He put a hand in his pocket to suggest a weapon. “Not goin’ down without one of you going with me!”

  Nadya slammed to a stop as the car pulled abreast of him, leaned across the passenger seat, flinging the door open. His body responded before he had time to change the look on his face. He barely got the door closed before Nadya jammed the transmission into reverse and, head turned back over her shoulder, gunned the motor. The car sped backward away from their pursuers, who, in frustration, hurled stones.

  “You’re good at this,” Toby’s father mused.

  At the alley’s end she stopped, lodged the transmission into drive, turned hard, and sped off between parked semitrailers down the side street and away.

  “Well now. Where did you learn—”

  “I drove a cab.”

  “Backwards?”

  Nadya headed for the freeway. “One of the older guys. He took me to Sears Point, the high-performance course they teach there.”

  Toby’s father went slack-jawed. “You are just one bottomless sack of surprises, young lady, know that?”

  “Why did you hit him? Grady Bradshaw. Why him?”

 
; “You hear what he said?”

  “It wasn’t him. It was one of the others.”

  “Naw, I heard different.” He wiped the sweat from his face. “And don’t you go righteous on me here. You hated him every bit as much as I did.”

  “That’s no excuse.”

  “Naw, naw, I mean it now. Don’t you start in shaming me, girl. It’s not like I planned to have a bunch of loudmouth rednecks pop up tonight. Grady, no Grady, pretty much all the same, you know? Put some thought under that, why don’t you.”

  “I just—” Her voice faltered. She swallowed and tried again. “I hate that sort of thing.”

  “Yeah, well.” He folded his hands in his lap. They were shaking. “You hate that kinda thing too much, all you’ll ever do is run from it. And all that means is you’ll spend the better part of your life running.”

  • • •

  “You’re saying the fourth man, or one of these other three—somebody followed you back home,” Murchison said.

  “I didn’t see anyone. I was busy, driving, arguing with Mr. Carlisle.”

  “Arguing?”

  The way Stluka said it made her turn. He was chewing gum now. Maybe he had been all along.

  “I was angry at him. I knew how much the night meant to Toby. He had a tribute planned for his father, but—”

  “Toby good and irked about that?” Stluka again.

  Nadya blinked. “Is Toby in trouble?”

  “Toby and Mr. Carlisle, they mixed it up serious earlier tonight, before the show, correct?”

  “You don’t think Toby—” She looked from one man to the other. “Can I see him? Is he all right?”

  “He’s fine,” Murchison said. “He’s at the station.”

  “Be a whole lot better,” Stluka said, “once the truth comes out.”

  “You want me to tell you Toby had something—That’s insane, you can’t—”

  Murchison stopped her. “Go back to what you saw when you looked out the window, saw Mr. Carlisle on the ground. Take your time. Picture it. Clear as you can.”

  It was confusing, the two moods, clinical and snide. Feeling less threatened by Murchison, the clinician, she did as he asked, closed her eyes and tried to focus. Shortly she saw the same unchanging thing—Toby’s father at the edge of the dim porch light, facedown in the mud like he’d been dropped from fifty feet up, convulsing in shock, fish-eyed, the hiss of air through his bloody teeth while one hand reached out, Help me. Not a memory. Happening all over again, inside her head.

  “Try to picture the gate,” Murchison said.

  “Toby, don’t forget. He was where?” Stluka added.

  Her eyes shot open. “Toby? I don’t know.”

  “But home already.” Stluka, pushing.

  “No.”

  “Francis there, too.”

  “No, I told you.” Nadya pulled the covers off her legs and dropped her feet to the floor. “The nurse—”

  “Nurse says you’re fine,” Stluka said. “Gave us crap for calling her in the first time, remember?”

  “You’re not calling her this time. I am.” She tried to stand. “I have to see the nurse.”

  She put weight on her legs, but they gave way. Murchison reached out quick, caught her, saying, “Whoa, whoa.”

  “Help me,” she whispered to him. “Please.”

  He shrank from her glance, then turned his head, nodded to Stluka.

  Stluka didn’t move. “Arlie Thigpen,” he said.

  “Who?”

  “Arlie Thigpen. Tell us about him. Francis introduced him to Toby. Or was it the other way round?”

  She had no idea what he meant. Murchison, still holding her, whispered, “If you know, it could help explain a great deal. I know it’s difficult. Please—”

  She tried to squirm free of his hold, couldn’t. Looking up into his face, she saw a gentle and fatherly insistence. But it was a mask. Behind the mask was something unspeakable.

  She tore free then, screaming, “I want the nurse!” So loud, she thought, a howl. Not me. But who? She fought through his hands, toppled in a heap to the floor, fending him off with kicks as she ripped at the swath of bandages girding her arm. I do know, she thought, I know, I know—clawing at the tape, wanting her skin, wanting to strip it away next, layer by layer, strip it away to see the blood. See beneath the mask.

  Murchison and Stluka hovered over her, dumbstruck. The nurse threw back the door and hurtled in, pushed them aside, kneeling in a rush to grab her wrists and tell her, “Stop. Now—listen to me, listen to me—stop this!”

  Nadya, blinking, saw the room bathed in a pall of grainy light. As she glanced down, her hand and arm took form before her as a faint growling whimper rose in her throat. Things melted into a welcoming misery, through which, in the background, as though from a different place, a different time, she heard the nurse say, “That’s all for now. Leave. Both of you.”

  7

  Murchison got out at the door for Custody Transfer as Stluka triggered the rattling chain-link gate to the parking lot. A stench fouled the air, the usual Sunday morning whiff of aqueous ammonia discharged from the refineries across the strait. Murchison punched in the security code at the dial pad and, once the lock clicked free, walked through to the holding area just beyond the door. It didn’t smell much better inside, but the stench was human, not chemical.

  Glancing through the smeary Plexiglas window of each of the cells, he finally spotted Arlie Thigpen alone inside the last lockup. He was skinny and short, all the more boyish because of that, something he no doubt played to good effect in presentencing interviews. He’d pulled the hood of his sweatshirt tight around his face—same as in Hennessey’s Polaroid—his legs tucked up on the bench and his shoulder leaning into the corner as he tried to catch some sleep. How many times, Murchison wondered, have I seen a kid brought in on a killing think a nap would make it all disappear?

  He slapped three times hard on the cell’s metal door. Arlie jerked upright, hands swinging fast to his cover his head. Good for you, Murchison thought—at least some part of you knows you’re scared. Peeking through his fingers as he spun his head around, Arlie squinted blearily at the overhead light first, then found the door, meeting Murchison’s eyes through the square of Plexiglas. The boy’s face, with its nettle of white scars around one eye, went blank. Just like that, nobody home. He stayed like that, coiled, watchful, as Murchison drew away.

  The overnight custody log bore eight names, but the only one Murchison recognized was Arlie’s. The other seven bodies awaited upcounty transfer, the usual Sunday morning assortment from what Murchison could tell given the code citations listed beside their names: three drunks, two hookers, a wife basher, and a doper. On the blotter where the log rested someone had scrawled in a faint hand: Johnson’s Law: The Lower the Altitude, the Greater the Reptile Density.

  Heading upstairs, he checked his watch to make sure he still had time to catch the end of the change-of-shift walk-through for the Sunday morning crew. The briefing room sat at the top of the stairs, low-ceilinged, small in size and made smaller with the dozen officers crammed inside. They sat wedged shoulder-to-shoulder at three tables surrounding the duty sergeant who stood at a lectern, reading out beat and car assignments. Murchison waited in the doorway till the roll was finished, then whistled softly. Catching his signal, the duty sergeant knocked three times on the side of his lectern and called out in a Central Valley drawl, “Listen, people. Detective wants a word before you head out to your cars.”

  A distinct switch in mood settled in. Murchison, feeling like the school principal everyone respected but nobody liked, waited it out. He assumed they’d been briefed on what had happened the preceding night, but decided to run it down again just in case, then added, “From what we know now, it’s possible, maybe likely, the Carlisle murder and the Fielding’s Liquors vandalism are linked. We’re tracking down leads right now, but what I’m going to need from you are want-and-warrant checks on the following names.”
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  He took out the Polaroid he’d shared with Marcellyne Pathon, its edges already worn, the image thumb-stained. He read the names handwritten on the back—Eshmont Carnes, Michael Brinkman, Waddell Bettencort, J. J. Glenn. He added the names Arlie Thigpen and James “Long Walk” Mooney, noting that one was in custody, the other wasn’t.

  “Don’t waste time. As soon as you’re in your cars, crank up the Panasonics. Apply some percussive maintenance if they screw up like usual, but do your checks. Stay in touch with each other so you can lend support if somebody pulls a runner. I want everybody in that crew, all known associates, talked to. And after them, if need be, their mothers, their sisters, their cousins, their friends and neighbors. You bring up eight-fourteens on anybody—they got so much as a fix-it ticket that’s overdue—I want them down here. Lock ‘em up, make ‘em sit. Separate cells if you can—if you can’t, put somebody who’s not in the crew in there with them. They don’t get to work up their stories while they sit down here, not without somebody else in the cell who can tell us about it. And they don’t get transferred upcounty, understand? I find out somebody got processed out and he’s walking around again with nothing but a court date to worry about, I’m gonna have something to say about it.”

  He glanced around the room, hoping for a little fervor. Heads nodded, eyes stared, not so much keyed in as just polite. Once upon a time he could have expected more, but with Stluka as a partner his words got taken in ways he could never predict. It had gotten to the point where he had to either explain everything he said five different ways or just say nothing. And the only thing cops distrusted more than a guy who talked too much was someone who said nothing at all.

  “If somebody in the crew doesn’t come back active with a want or warrant, go to whatever address you’ve got anyway, drag him out of bed, give him a Beheler, and bring him down. He doesn’t want to come, keep at him. Double up, second uniform talks to the parent, the girlfriend, the roomie, whatever. Apply pressure. Let him know: Silence equals suspicion. We’ll be on him, day and night, till he talks to us. And if we find out he’s lying, we’ll be back.”