In one corner of the pen, Charles White finished sponging Trooper down with warm, soapy water. Diesel’s owner, in the opposite corner, did the same. Many dogs were treated with chemicals that could disorient the opponent. The rule in this arena was that both dogs had to be washed prior to a fight.
White scratched the top of Trooper’s head, bent in, and uttered random words into his ear with a soothing tone. The referee, an obese young man, stepped into the ring after a nod from the owner of the garage.
“Both corners ready?” said the referee. “Cornermen out of the pit.”
White moved behind his dog into the space of the open gate, still holding Trooper back.
“Face your dogs,” said the referee. They did this, and quickly the referee said, “Let go!”
The dogs shot into the center of the pit. Both of them got up on their hind legs, attacking the head of the other with their jaws. They snapped at each other’s ears and sought purchase in the area of the neck. In the fury of their battle, the dogs did not make a sound. The garage echoed with the shouts and laughter of the spectators crowding the ring.
For a moment the dogs seemed to reach a stalemate. Suddenly their motions accelerated. Their bodies meshed in a blur of brown and black, and the bright pink of exposed gums. Droplets of blood arced up in the center of the ring.
Diesel got a neck-hold and Trooper was taken down. Trooper, adrenalized, his eyes bright and wild, scrambled up and out of the hold. One of his ears had been partially torn away, and blood had leaked onto the dog’s white mask. Diesel went in, back to the neck. And now Trooper was down again, in the jaws of Diesel, squirming beneath the black dog.
“Stop it!” shouted White.
Potter nudged Little, who nodded by way of reply.
“That’s it,” said the referee, waving his arms.
White went into the ring and grabbed Trooper’s hind legs, pulling back. Diesel’s owner did the same. Diesel relaxed his jaws, releasing Trooper to his man. The spectators moved away from the pen, laughing, giving one another skin, already trying out stories on one another that exaggerated the details of the fight.
“You were right,” said Little. “That dog was a cur.”
“What I tell you?” said Potter. “Dog’s personality only as strong as the man who owns it.”
White arrived with Trooper, back on his leash. “I need to fix him up some,” said White, not looking into his friends’ eyes.
“We’ll do it now,” said Potter. “Let’s go.”
A COUPLE of blocks away, near Fort Slocum Park, Potter pulled the Chevy into an alley where there seemed to be no activity. He cut the engine and looked over the backseat at White; Trooper sat panting, his hip resting against his owner’s.
“Dog needs to pee,” said Potter.
“He went,” said White. “Let’s just take him to the vet place.”
“He already bleedin’ all over the backseat. He pees back there, too, I ain’t gonna be too happy. Gimme the leash, man, I’ll walk him.”
“I’ll walk him,” said White. His lip quivered when he spoke.
“Let D walk him if he wants to, Coon,” said Little. “Dog needs to pee, don’t make no difference who be holdin’ the leash.”
Potter got out of the car and went around to White’s side. He opened the door and took hold of the leash. The dog looked over at White and then jumped his lap and was out of the car.
Potter walked Trooper down the alley until they were behind a high wooden privacy fence. Potter looked around briefly, saw no one in the neighboring yards or in the windows of the houses, and commanded the dog to sit.
When Trooper sat, Potter pulled the .357 Colt from his waistband, pointed it close to the dog’s right eye, and squeezed the trigger. Trooper’s muzzle and most of his face exploded out into the alley in a haze of bone and blood. The dog toppled over onto its side and its legs straightened in a shudder. Potter stepped back and shot the dog in the ribcage one more time. Trooper’s carcass lifted an inch or two off the ground and came to rest.
Potter went back to the car and got behind the wheel. Little was holding a match to the half of the White Owl blunt he had not yet smoked.
“Gun works,” said Potter.
Little nodded. “Loud, too.”
Potter put the trans in gear, draped his arm over the bench seat, and turned his head to look out the rear window as he reversed the car out of the alley. White was staring out the window, his face dirty from tears he had tried to wipe away.
“Go on and get it out you,” said Potter. “Someone you know see you cryin’ over some dumb animal, they gonna mistake you for a bitch. And I ain’t ridin’ with none of that.”
POTTER, Little, and White bought a kilo of marijuana from their dealer in Columbia Heights, dimed out half of it back at their place, and delivered the dimes to their runners so they could get started on the evening rush. Then the three of them drove north up Georgia Avenue and over to Roosevelt High. They went into the parking lot at Iowa Avenue and parked the Chevy beside a black Cadillac Brougham. There were several other cars in the lot.
Potter looked in the rearview at White, staring ahead. “We straight, Coon?”
“Just a dumb animal, like you said. Don’t mean nothin’ to me.”
Potter didn’t like the tone in White’s voice. But White was just showing a little pride. That was good, but he’d never act on his anger for real. Like his weak-ass dog, he wasn’t game.
“I’ll check it out,” said Potter to Little.
He walked across the parking lot and stood at the fence that bordered the stadium down below. After a while he came back to the car.
“You see him?” said Little as Potter got back behind the wheel.
“Nah,” said Potter. “Just some kids playin’ football. Some old-time motherfuckers, coaches and shit.”
“We can come back.”
“We will. I’m gonna smoke that motherfucker when I see him, too.”
“Wilder don’t owe you but a hundred dollars, D.”
“Thinks he can ignore his debt. Tryin’ to take me for bad; you know I can’t just let that go.”
“Ain’t like you need the money today or nothin’ like that.”
“It ain’t the money,” said Potter. “And I can wait.”
chapter 2
DEREK Strange was coming out of a massage parlor when he felt his beeper vibrate against his hip. He checked the number printed out across the horizontal screen and walked through Chinatown over to the MLK library on 9th, where a bank of pay phones was set outside the facility. Strange owned a cell, but he still used street phones whenever he could.
“Janine,” said Strange.
“Derek.”
“You rang?”
“Those women been calling you again. The two investigators from out in Montgomery County?”
“I called them back, didn’t I?”
“You mean I did. They been trying to get an appointment with you for a week now.”
“So they’re still trying.”
“They’re being a little bit more aggressive than that. They’re heading into town right now, want to meet you for lunch. Said they’d pick up the tab.”
Strange tugged his jeans away from his crotch where they had stuck.
“It’s a money job, Derek.”
“Hold up, Janine.” Strange put the receiver against his chest as a man who was passing by stopped to shake his hand.
“Tommy, how you been?”
“Doin’ real good, Derek,” said Tommy. “Say, you got any spare love you can lay on me till I see you next time?”
Strange looked at the black baggage beneath Tommy’s eyes, the way his pants rode low on his bony hips. Strange had come up with Tommy’s older brother, Scott, who was gone ten years now from the cancer that took his shell. Scott wouldn’t want Strange to give his baby brother any money, not for what Tommy had in mind.