Vaughn spent the next hour doing walk-ins, questioning mechanics and metalworkers, trying to get a line on a damaged red Ford. He talked to grease monkeys, straights, near idiots, guys who looked like they’d done time, and guys who looked like candidates for time. He turned up squat.
Vaughn drove into D.C. He still had an hour before his shift. He was the primary on a fresh homicide in Petworth, and that would cut into the time he could devote to the hit and run. From the history they’d turned up, the young man, Vernon Wilson, was clean. He had a steady job and was going on to college. He came from a family he loved and who loved him back. He was murdered, Vaughn decided, because he was colored. Vaughn felt he was close to nailing Wilson’s killer, and that got his blood up. All he had to do was find the car.
Vaughn went down to Arkansas Avenue between 14th and Piney Branch Parkway. A one-bay garage stood there near a glass shop and a commercial-refrigeration outlet. Vaughn knew the head mechanic, a huge colored guy named Leonard White, who he’d dropped on a B amp;E charge many years ago when Vaughn was working Robbery, his first position out of uniform.
Vaughn parked near a pay phone and tapped his finger on the wheel. He thought of a friend in Prince George’s County who might be of some help. First he’d play the long shot and talk to White.
White’s head was under the hood of a ’63 Valiant when Vaughn walked through the open bay door. Music came loud from the shop radio. Another colored guy, slim in his coveralls, with a watch cap cocked on his head, was handing White a ratchet arm. He cool-eyed Vaughn and said, “Leonard, the Man here to see you.” White looked up, squinting through the glare of a droplight hung over the Plymouth. The light gave the illusion of warmth, but the interior of the cinder-block box was cool as a tomb.
White stood to his full six-feet-something, wiped his hands off on a shop rag, and walked over to Vaughn. He wore black-rimmed eyeglass held together at the bridge with surgical tape. His head was the size of a calf’s. He looked like Roosevelt Grier.
“Officer Vaughn.”
“Leonard. See you’re still working on those Valiants.”
“Long as they keep puttin’ push-button trannies in those Signets, I’m gonna stay in business.”
“I talk to you a minute outside?”
White walked out without answering, and Vaughn followed. Vaughn shook an L amp;M from his deck. White took a pack of Viceroys from his breast pocket and put one between his lips. Vaughn produced his Zippo, lit White’s smoke, lit his own, then snapped the lighter shut.
“There was a homicide the other night over on Fourteenth.”
“That ain’t no surprise.”
“Not down in Shaw. A mile or two from here. Car ran down this colored kid, wasn’t doin’ anything but walking home.”
“I heard about it.”
“What’d you hear?”
“That it happened.”
White dragged on his Viceroy and let the smoke out slow.
“I’m lookin’ for a red Ford,” said Vaughn. “Galaxie Five Hundred, sixty-three, sixty-four. Damage to the grille, headlights, front quarters, like that.”
“Ain’t had nothin’ like it come through.”
“Here you go.” Vaughn handed White a card on which he’d scribbled his home number next to the printed station number. “Anything at all, you get up with me, hear?”
White nodded.
“Everything okay?” said Vaughn.
“God is good,” said White.
Leonard White finished his smoke and watched Frank Vaughn cross the street, heading for a pay phone near the bus stop. Vaughn amused him. He was like one of those dinosaurs, didn’t know the other dinosaurs had all laid down and died. Also, like many men who’d done time, White had a strange fondness for the one who’d sent him up. In a very direct way, Frank Vaughn had done what his mother, father, girlfriends, and minister had been unable to do: He’d turned his life around.
At the pay phone, Vaughn flicked away his cigarette. He pulled his wallet and ratfucked through its folds until he found a phone number jotted down on a piece of matchbook cover. He dropped a dime into the phone and dialed the number of a homicide cop over in PG County, a guy named Marin Scordato he’d befriended on the shooting range over in Upper Marlboro many years ago. Scordato kept a notebook detailing the current whereabouts of the men he’d arrested who’d done time and been sent back out into the world. He often squeezed these men for information. Almost all of them were parole violators in one way or another, and they readily responded to his threats. It was harassment, and very effective.
“Marin, it’s Frank.”
“Hound Dog, how’s it hangin’?”
“My meat’s okay,” said Vaughn. “But I got a problem with a case.”
MIKE GEORGELAKOS HAD torn the register tape off at three o’clock and was entering the day’s take in his green book. He sat on a stool near the register, glasses low on his nose, penciling figures into the book. Any sales made after three would go into his pocket and remain unreported to the IRS, a common practice among small businessmen in D.C.
Down behind the counter of the Three-Star Diner, Darius Strange used a brick to clean the grill while Halftime, Mike’s utility man, washed dishes on the other side of the plastic screen, humming the chorus of “I Was Made to Love Her” over and over as he worked. Ella Lockheart filled the Heinz bottles with A amp;P-brand ketchup as gospel music came from the house radio. They went about their tasks in an unhurried way. Lunch rush was over, and the end of the workday was near.
Derek Strange and Troy Peters sat at the counter eating cheeseburger platters and drinking Cokes, getting fueled up for the start of their four-to-midnight shift. They were in uniform, and their service revolvers hung holstered at their sides. Peters was thinking of his wife, Patty, and how she’d looked in sleep, her blond hair fanned out on the pillow, after they’d made it the night before. Strange had been dizzy with the thought of Carmen Hill all day, the curve of her backside in that dress, the cut of her thighs, the warmth of her privates against his as they danced. Those deep brown eyes. In addition, Strange and Peters were concentrating on the food that was before them, loving it the way they loved women, as young men tended to do.
“How’s that burger, son?” said Darius Strange.
“It’s good, Pop.”
“You do somethin’ long enough, I guess you get it right.” He looked over his shoulder at his son, and as he shifted his weight he felt a sharp pain down by his tailbone.
Derek watched his father wince, then return to his task. He had that big old chef’s hat, which he called a toque, on his head. Recently, Billy Georgelakos had taken a photograph of his own father, Mike, standing alongside Darius, with Darius wearing the hat and holding a spatula up in his hand. The photograph had been framed and hung by the front door.