“They call themselves the RUF, which stands for the Revolutionary United Front. They’re eleven-year-old kids armed with AK-47s and machetes,” she said. “They chop off people’s arms and legs, that’s how they maintain control. But you’re wrong if you think these rocks are cheaper than a legit diamond, Frank. In fact, once this rough ice is traded and polished, it’s impossible to know where it came from. That may be one of them you’re showing us right this minute.”
I never knew Margie was so smart.
Before then, I thought she was just a good-looking babe who got shot and divorced all the time.
It just goes to show.
I did not make the acquaintance of Mercer Grant till the next day. That is not his real name. He told me right off it wasn’t his real name. He said it would be too dangerous for him to give me his real name. Grant (or Lee or Jackson or Jones or Smith or whatever his real name might have been) was a tall, light-skinned Jamaican with a neat little mustache under his nose. He came up to the squadroom around ten o’clock on that Tuesday morning in question, and he asked to talk to a police detective, of which there were only eight or nine in the squadroom that minute, it’s a wonder he didn’t trip over one of us. I signaled him over to my desk, and offered him a chair, and asked him his name.
“My name is Mercer Grant,” he said. “But that is not my real name.”
“Then what is your real name, Mr. Grant?”
“I can’t tell you my real name,” he said. “It would be too dangerous to tell you my real name.”
All of this in that sort of Jamaican lilt they have, you know? Like Harry Belafonte doing “Hey, Mr. Taliban.”
“Because, you see,” I said, “we’re required to fill in the name and address spaces on these complaint forms. Plus a lot of other information.”
“I am not making a complaint,” Mercer said.
“Then why are you here?” I asked.
“I am here because my wife is missing,” he said.
“Well, that’s a complaint,” I said.
“Not in the case ofmywife,” he said, and grinned, because he was making a joke, you see. He was saying nobody wascomplainingthat his wife was missing. He had a gold tooth in the center of his mouth. The tooth had a little diamond chip in one corner. His mouth lit up like a Christmas tree when he grinned. He thought his little joke was pretty funny. He kept grinning.
“Well,” I said, “what is yourwife’sname then?”
“I can’t tell you her name,” he said. “It would be too dangerous.”
“Then how am I supposed to find her if you won’t give me her name?” I asked reasonably.
“You’re the detective, not me,” he said reasonably. “Although I must tell you I’ve never dealt with a female detective before, and I’m not sure how happy I am about it,” the sexist pig.
“What kind of detectives have you dealt with before, Mr. Grant?”
“I have never been in trouble with the law,” he said. “I’m reporting my wife missing because it’s my duty as a citizen. My cousin Ambrose said I should report her missing.”
“Ambrose what?” I asked at once.
“Ambrose Fields. But that’s not his real name, either.”
“Does anyone in your family have a real name?”
“Yes, but these names would be too dangerous to reveal.”
“Can you tell me where you live?”
“No.”
“Can you give me your phone number?”
“No.”
“Well, Mr. Grant, let’s suppose by some weird stroke of luck—me being a female detective and all—Idofind your wife. How am I supposed to let you know I’ve got her?”
“I will stay in touch.”
“I have to tell you, you don’t sound tooeagerto find her, now do you?”
He thought this over for a moment. Then he said, “The truth is I don’t think youwillfind her.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I think she may already be dead.”
“I see.”
“Yes.”
“So you’re here to report a murder, is that it?”
“No, I am here to tell you my wife is missing. As is my duty.”
“But you think she may be dead.”
“Yes.”
“Do you also think you know who killed her?”
“No.”
“It wouldn’t beyouwho killed her, would it, Mr. Grant? This wouldn’t be a confession here, would it?”
Grant, or whatever his name was, leaned closer to me.
“Have you ever heard of the RUF?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said. “Once. Last night, in fact. Why? Do you think the RUF had something to do with your wife’s death?”
“No.”
“If, in fact, sheisdead?”
“Oh, she’s dead, all right, oh yes.”
“How do you know that?”
“She wrote me a note.”
“Saying she was dead?”
“No. Saying if I didn’t hear from her by Tuesday, shemightbe dead.”
“Today is Tuesday,” I said.
“Yes. So she must be dead, am I correct?”
“Well, she only said shemightbe dead.”
“She must have had an inkling,” Grant said.
“What else did she say in this note?”
“Here, read it for yourself,” Grant said, and took a folded sheet of paper from his pocket, and unfolded it, and smoothed it neatly on my desk top. The note read:
Dear Mercer…
“That’s not my real name,” he said at once.
“Then why did she address you as such?”
“I told you. She must have had an inkling.”
Dear Mercer,
By the time you read this, I will be gone.
Do not try to find me, it is too dangerous.
If I am not back by Tuesday, I guess I will be dead.
Your loving wife,
Marie
“That’s notherreal name, either,” Grant said.
“I know. She must have had an inkling.”
“Exactly.”
“So you think the RUF had something to do with her disappearance, is that it?”
“No,” Grant said.
“Then why did you bring them up?”
“I thought you might have heard of them.”
“Is that diamond in your mouth a so-called conflict diamond?” I asked.
“What is a conflict diamond?” Grant asked.
“Is your wife—orwasshe, as the case may be—involved in any way with the sale or transport of illicit diamonds in Sierra Leone or Angola?”
“My wife and I never discussed her private affairs. You will have to ask her personally. When you find her. If you find her. But you won’t find her because it’s Tuesday and she said she’d be dead.”
“Well, you’ve filed a complaint…”
“I’m not complaining,” he said, and grinned again.
“…so I guess I’ll have to investigate. Can you tell me what your wife looks like, please?”
“If she’s still alive, she is a dark-skinned woman of about your height and weight, with black hair and brown eyes.”
“How old is she?”
“About your age.”
“Twenty-nine?”
“I should have thought twenty-five,” he said, and grinned his charming gold-and-diamond grin.
“Any visible scars or tattoos?”
“None that I ever noticed.”
“How long have you been married?” I asked.
“Too long,” he said, and then suddenly ducked his head, perhaps to hide a falling tear. “She was a good woman,” he murmured.
The challenge now seemed clear: Find a good woman in this city. Which was not as simple as it first appeared. With all due respect, Commish, nothing is ever simple in police work, nothing is ever uncomplicated.