“Okay. And that this somehow had something to do with his murder.”
Damien sat on the step with his elbows on his knees, staring straight in front of him, to all appearances stumped. After a minute, he laughed softly to himself, hung his head, and shook it. “Seemed like I had it all worked out last night, but that wasn’t exactly it, what you just said.”
Mickey nodded, all understanding. Although he knew that if this was all he was going to get after the four hours he’d spent tracking this bozo down, he’d be sorely tempted to kill him. Still, he reined himself in and managed to sound sincere. “That’s all right,” he said.
“But that don’t mean it isn’t true.”
Mickey wasn’t clear what antecedent Damien was referring to here and, in fact, was reasonably sure that Damien couldn’t identify it himself. But all he said was, “No, I know.”
“I mean, it’s a racket, you know.”
“What is?”
“The whole, you know, the rehab thing.”
“A racket?”
“Yeah.”
“How’s that?”
“Well.” Damien looked up the street, making sure he was still out of earshot. The foghorn sounded, and he continued. “You know, they collecting money from the foundations. Big money.”
Suddenly Mickey felt a chill raise the hairs on his arms. Unbidden, the discussion he’d had with Alicia Thorpe the other day about the Sunset Youth Project’s funding from the city and from other foundations came back to him in sharp detail, particularly her disclosure that the city’s Health Services Department was the biggest single line item in the city’s budget. And now here was Mr. Jones, no relation to Mr. Einstein, referring to the same thing. Which didn’t necessarily mean anything, except for the rather salient fact that Mr. Jones, addled as he might be or might have been last night, somehow was introducing this funding issue into a discussion about Dominic Como’s murder.
And now, it seemed, Jones had found a scent. And it was Mickey’s job to keep him on it. “Right,” he said. “So the Mission Street Coalition gets money from the city. So what?”
“So what is they s’posed to use that to keep up the program. But it don’t go to no program.”
“So where’s it go, Damien?”
“Now, that I wish I knew.” He clucked in disappointment. “But, oh, yeah, this what I was sayin’. The whole thing is, they get me, ’stead of jail, into the program here, okay?”
“Right.”
“Okay, the thing is, they ain’t no program to the program. You know what I’m sayin’?”
Thinking, Patience, young Jedi, Mickey said, “Not exactly. Maybe you can tell me.”
“Okay, here’s the thing. We here for the rehab, you know. Otherwise, we maybe in jail, right? Right. So we get here, ain’t nobody doin’ that twelve-step shuffle, ain’t nobody urine testing, we just come in and say, ‘No, we ain’t doin’ no shit,’ and sign this form, and then we done. Except they make us work.”
Getting a little wound up now, Damien Jones’s expressive face went into a deep frown. “Hey! Look at me, now. Whatchu think I been doin’ all day ’cept humping these loads? And the company, the Coalition, they chargin’ the same as like Bekins, you know, the moving people. And they s’posedly payin’ us fair, but we don’t never get to see no money. See what I’m sayin’? That’s the money goes for rent and food, my money. Not no foundation money. So where’s all that foundation money go? That’s what I want to know. So bottom line is they got me workin’ for a year, payin’ all the bills here, and meanwhile I don’t do every little thing they ask, I’m out of the program and back in jail. You want to know the truth, they got theirselves a bunch a slaves workin’ here, nothin’ less, and I’m one of ’em. And that ain’t right.”
“No, it isn’t,” Mickey said. “And I’m glad you decided to tell me about all this. But you called last night originally about the reward, and I’m afraid if this doesn’t have anything to do with the murder of Dominic Como… well, you know what I’m saying, don’t you?”
For a long minute, Mickey thought he’d lost Damien for good. The faraway stare came back, the exhausted elbows-on-his-knees posture. Methodically, he bobbed his head as though listening to his own private soundtrack. Then, when at last he spoke, Mickey could barely hear him. “You know them Battalion people out there?”
Again, one of Alicia’s references, “sort of an urban Peace Corps,” and Mickey snapped back to full attention. “What about them?”
“Well, brothers I know in there, they gettin’ paid, all right, and they don’t do no real work, so I’m thinkin’ how’s that happen and how do I get some of that?”
“What do you mean, they don’t do work?”
Damien rolled his eyes, explaining the obvious. “I mean work like I’m doing. Humpin’ loads, cleanin’ up, sweepin’, kitchen work, like that.”
“So what do they do?”
“Whatever Dominic Como says.”
“Ah.” The explanation didn’t really turn any light on for Mickey, but now at least Como was overtly in the conversation. Now the trick was to keep him there. “So you’re saying what, exactly?”
“Well, first, I want to get me some of that.”
“That might be a little difficult, Damien, since Como’s dead now.”
“Okay, yeah, okay. But I’m talking if…” Here his eyes brightened, his whole demeanor perked up, and he snapped his fingers. “Here it is! Here it is! Thinkin’ on the reward now, what I got last night!”
“Hit me.”
“Okay, I’m in that Battalion, right. Like the most I got to do is wash a car or pass out some pamphlets or answer some phones, some shit like that, basically nothing, you with me?”
“So far.”
“So say I fuck up a little, maybe go off the rehab, something small-maybe a doob or a beer one time. You know they test out there, not like here. Anyway, who knows why, I get on Como’s bad side and now he’s tellin’ me I’m done with the Battalion, I’m back in the shit, workin’ like I’m doin’ here. Or say, even better, I’m close to done with my time, and he says he’s gonna violate me back to jail, out of the program. See what I’m sayin’ now?”
“Still not completely, I’m afraid.”
“Hey, he kicks me out now, I am fucked. I can’t let that happen. I got to stop him before, you know?”
“So you kill him?”
Damien Jones threw his hands up in celebration, flashed Mickey his brightest smile. “Now you got it. That’s what I’m talkin’ about.” He kept nodding as though making sure that the strands of his argument, if that’s what it was, held together. “That’s what I’m talkin’ about.” Now he looked straight at Mickey. “That’s where you look, at them Battalion people. It’s one of them, hallelujah, and you know where to find me.”
Suddenly and thoroughly deflated, Mickey all at once came to the full-blown realization that in spite of Damien’s enthusiastic narrative, he was in his own way another variant on the Blimp Lady. If not nuts, then certainly and fundamentally unhelpful.
By now just about completely baffled by trying to fathom the solution that Damien had apparently reached and was sharing with him, Mickey leaned in toward the young man. “And, just so I’m sure I understand, Damien, you’re saying you think Mr. Como’s killer is one of these Battalion people?”
“I’m saying you look there I bet you gonna be happy you did.”
“And if we do, after that, why exactly do we need to find you, then?”
Damien straightened his back, put on a look of surprised indignation. “What we been talkin’ ’bout all this time? First, I get his place in the Battalion out there, the killer’s, and second, ’cause then you got to give me that reward.”
Hunt had called Devin Juhle and Sarah Russo within minutes of his initial sighting of the tire iron, but they’d been in the field on another matter and hadn’t checked back in with him until lunchtime. Meanwhile, he’d taken down Cecil Rand’s vitals and promised to keep him anonymous at least until it was determined if the tire iron out in the mud was tied in any way to the death of Dominic Como.