"So he got a great price on the original building," Long said. "What are the chances that he delivered part of the original purchase price to the seller, under the table, to drive down the apparent price?"
"I wouldn't know about that," Spooner said stiffly.
"What are the chances that he uses dope-dealing money to make up shortfalls in tenant rents?" Lucas asked.
"Dope? Richard Rodriguez? I don't think so."
Lucas leaned into Spooner's desk. "If we got a subpoena for your loan records and asked a state examiner to look them over, you think he'd say they met state loan standards?"
"Absolutely. The minority status alone would bring applause from the state banking department." Spooner leaned back and relaxed a hair, the way a fence relaxes when he realizes that a cop doesn't really have anything on him.
Lucas looked at Long and shrugged. Long dipped into his brief-case, found a paper, and handed it to Reed. "It's a subpoena for your loan records."
Reed's face turned a little redder. "I thought we were handling this on a friendly basis."
"We wanted to," Lucas said. "But Bill here is bullshitting us, so we're gonna have to see all the records."
"I'mnot bullshitting you," Spooner said.
"You're bullshitting us, Billy, yes, you are," Lucas said. "And I'll tell you what. This case is part of the Alie'e Maison murder investigation. If Rodriguez turns out to be involved, because of his drug dealing, and you're helping him cover up well, then, you're involved. That's called murder one on the TV shows. Murder one in Minnesota is a minimum of thirty years in a cell the size of your desk. You look like you might be young enough to do the whole thirty."
"Wait, wait, wait," Spooner said. "I have absolutely nothing to do with any of this. I want a lawyer. Right now."
"Those are the magic words," Long said to Lucas. "No more questions, and read him his rights."
When they were done with the reading of the rights, Reed agreed to print out the loan records and Long walked out to the parking lot with Lucas. "It's the reading of the rights that scares the shit out of them," he said.
Lucas nodded. "The question is, will Spooner make a call?"
He made the call.
Long went back into the bank and Lucas climbed in the passenger side of the city car. "He's driving the Lexus in the corner," Del said.
Lucas looked down at a silver-toned car nosed in next to a power transformer. "So he's spending some money."
"He's a banker," Del said. "He's gotta have some kind of car to impress the neighbors."
Del took the car to the end of the block and found a spot where they could see Spooner's car. Del's phone rang twenty minutes later, and Long came on. "I'm not going to make lunch. I've got a thing I've got to do with a subpoena," he said.
"He's moving?"
"Absolutely, sweetheart," Long said.
Del said, "He's moving," and a minute later they spotted Spooner pushing through the front door, carrying his briefcase, pulling on a thigh-length black trench coat. He went to the Lexus, tossed the brief-case across the front seat onto the passenger side, and rolled out of the lot. They followed, a block behind, a half-dozen cars between them, past the capitol, down the hill toward downtown St. Paul, where Del closed up and Lucas eased down in the seat.
Halfway through downtown, Spooner took the Lexus into a parking ramp. Del pulled to the side, shoved the gearshift into park, said, "I'll catch him at the Skyway exit. Turn on your phone," and jumped out. When Spooner was out of sight, up the ramp, Lucas walked around the car and went looking for a parking meter.
Del called ten minutes later. "Got him. He's at an attorneys office."
"Goddamnit."
"So what do we do?"
"I'll call you back in two minutes," Lucas said. He punched the Off button, redialed Lane's cell phone number. Lane answered, and Lucas said, "Where's Rodriguez?"
"In his office. I can see his sleeve."
"Nothing going on?"
"A few things. My feet hurt like hell; I've got Homicide's interview notebook on the case, and I'm reading all the interviews; a nine-year-old kid tried to sell me what I believe are counterfeit baseball cards; and the St. Paul cops rousted me. That's about it."
"No trouble with St. Paul?"
"Nah. Just checking on why I'd been standing in the Skyway for two hours, reading a notebook," Lane said.
"Okay. Our guy's at an attorneys office. He's about two blocks from you."
"Let me know if anything happens."
"A Mickey Mantle rookie card's gotta be worth more than twenty, doesn't it?"
"Chump." Lucas redialed Del. "Rodriguez is at his office."
"So"
"So let's hang for a while. Give it an hour, anyway."
Twenty-five minutes into the hour, Del called. "He's moving."
"Where?"
"Looks like the parking garage."
"Goddamnit. Stay with him. If he heads to the car, I'll pick you up where you jumped out."
Five minutes later, Del was back in the car. Lucas drove around to the parking garage exit, and as they picked up Spooner, Del's phone rang. He took it out, listened for a second, said, "Lucas's phone is on now," and then handed it to Lucas. "I'm a fuckin' secretary," he said.
"Your boy made the call," Lester said.
"Yeah? When?"
"Six or seven minutes ago. He was calling from a lawyers office."
"Yeah, we took him there. He's out, and we're on him again. What'd he say?"
"Sounded like he was reading out of a script. He said, 'Mr. Rodriguez, allegations have been made against you by the Minneapolis police. I will no longer be allowed to have any direct dealings with you on the mortgages on your buildings, and I wanted to inform you that in the future your account will be handled by Mrs. Ellen Feldman.' Then Rodriguez said, 'What are you talking about? The police?' And then Spooner said, 'I'm not at liberty to discuss it, but you can get more information from Minneapolis Deputy Chief of Police Lucas Davenport or Mr. Tim Long, assistant Hennepin County Attorney' Then Rodriguez said, 'Is this about the party?' And Spooner says, I'm really not at liberty to discuss it. I suggest you call Chief Davenport or Mr. Long. I'm sorry this had to happen. I felt we had an excellent working relationship. I have to go now. I hope this works out for the best.' Then Rodriguez says, 'Okay Well, thanks for everything, you know.' And that's it."
"Thanks for everything," Lucas said. "He means the phone call."
"Pretty goddamn neat phone call, too," Lester said. "He warns him, but there's nothing in it to hang him with. Either one of them."
After Lucas hung up, they tracked Spooner back to the bank. He drove back slowly, well within the speed limit. When he was inside, Lucas said, "Fuck him. Let's go see Marcy."
Weather was outside the intensive care ward talking to Tom Black. They saw Lucas and Del coming, and Weather smiled and Del said, "Something good happened."
"What?" Lucas asked as they came up.
"She's somewhat awake. Everything's pretty much stabilized. She's still critical, but it's looking pretty good. For the first time."
Lucas went to the ward window and looked in. "Can we go in?"