Harrison Ronald poured himself another cup of coffee and lit another cigarette. He glanced out the dirty window at the building across the alley, then resumed his seat at the kitchen table and flipped to the comics. After he scanned them and grinned at “Cathy,” he picked up a pencil and began the crossword puzzle.
Harrison Ronald liked crossword puzzles. He had discovered long ago that he could think about other things while he filled in the little squares. Today he had much to think about.
At the head of his list was Freeman McNally. He knew that McNally had been laundering money through Harrington’s S-and-L. What would McNally do now? McNally’s operation was taking in almost three million cash a week. About a fourth of that amount went to the West Coast to pay for new raw product, and a big chunk went to salaries and payoffs and other expenses. Still the operation produced a million a week pure profit — a little over four million a month — cash that Freeman McNally had to somehow turn into legitimate funds that he and his immediate cronies could spend and squirrel away.
It was certainly a pleasant problem, but a problem nonetheless. It would be interesting to hear Freeman’s solution.
In the year that Harrison Ronald had spent working for the organization he had acquired a tremendous respect for Freeman McNally. A sixth-grade dropout, McNally had common sense, superior intelligence, and a cat’s ability to land on his feet when the unexpected occurred, as it did with a frequency that would have appalled any legitimate businessman.
Many of McNally’s troubles were caused by the people who worked for him: they got greedy, they became addicted, they liked to strut their stuff in front of the wrong people, they became convinced of their own personal invulnerability. McNally was a natural leader. His judgments were hard to fault. Those people that he concluded were a danger disappeared, quickly and forever. Those errant souls whom he believed trainable he corrected and trusted.
Like every crack dealer, McNally was in a never-ending battle to protect his turf, the street corners and houses where his street dealers sold his product. This was combat and McNally had a natural aptitude for it. He was ruthless efficiency incarnate.
And like every crack dealer, McNally was in a cash-and-carry business that demanded constant vigilance against cheaters and thieves. Here too McNally excelled, but he had been blessed with a generous dollop of paranoia and a natural talent for larceny. To Harrison Ronald’s personal knowledge, poorly advised optimists had attempted to swindle Freeman McNally on two occasions. Several of these foolish individuals had received bullets in the brain as souvenirs of their adventure and one had been dismembered with a chain saw while still alive.
But although Freeman McNally had many attributes in common with other successful crack-ring leaders, he was also unique. McNally intuitively understood that the most serious threat to the health of his enterprise was the authorities — the police, the DEA, the FBI. So he had systematically set about reducing that threat to an acceptable level. He found politicians, cops and drug enforcement agents who could be bought and he bought them.
Consequently Harrison Ronald Ford was in Washington undercover instead of riding around Evansville, Indiana, in a patrol car. He wasn’t known as Harrison Ronald Ford here though, but as Sammy Z.
Mother of Galahad, 23 Across. Six letters, the last of which is an E.
Ford had arrived in Washington a year ago and rented this shithole to live in. After two weeks of hanging around bars, he got a job as a lookout for one of McNally’s distributors. He had been doing that for about a month when who should come strolling down the street one rainy Thursday night but his high school baseball buddy from Evansville, Jack Yocke.
He had leveled with Yocke — he had no choice: Yocke knew he was a cop — and the reporter apparently had kept the secret. Ten months had passed, Harrison Ronald was still alive, with all his arms and legs firmly attached, and he was now personally running errands and delivering product for Freeman.
He was close. Very close. He knew the names of two of the local cops on Freeman’s list and one of the politicians, but he had no evidence that would stand up in court.
It would come. Sooner or later he would get the evidence. If he lived long enough.
Elaine. Elaine was the mother of Galahad.
If that fox Freeman McNally didn’t catch on.
Damn that Yocke anyway. Why did that white boy have to pick today to call? Oh well, if worse came to worst, Jack Yocke would write him one hell of an obituary.
The late Judson Lincoln had lived in a modest three-story town house in a fashionably chic neighborhood a mile or so northeast of the White House. T. Jefferson Brody wheeled his Mercedes into a vacant parking place a block past the Lincoln residence and walked back.
He was expected. He had telephoned the widow this morning and informed her of his interest in discussing the purchase of the business that had belonged to her deceased husband. She had apparently called her attorney, then called him back and proposed this meeting at two p.m.
Mrs. Lincoln had sounded calm enough on the phone this morning, but that was certainly nothing to bank upon. This would in all likelihood be a tense afternoon with the sniveling widow, probably some brainless, ill-mannered brats, and for sure, one overpaid fat lawyer anxious to split hairs and niggle ad nauseam over contractual phrasing. Looming like a thunderstorm on the horizon would be the question of who had killed Judson Lincoln, prominent black businessman and civic pillar to whom we point with pride. And police. They would be in constant contact with the widow, asking every question they thought they could get away with.
Oh well, T. Jefferson could handle it.
After pushing the doorbell, Brody adjusted the twenty-dollar royal-blue silk hanky in his breast pocket. He hoped he wouldn’t need to offer it as a repository for the contents of the widow’s nose, but.… He straightened his tie and made sure his suit jacket was properly buttoned and hanging correctly under his knee-length mohair topcoat.
The door was opened by a black woman in a maid outfit that was complete right down to the little white apron. He handed her his card and said, “To see Mrs. Lincoln, please.”
“I’ll take your coat, sir.” When Brody had shed the garment, the maid said, “This way, sir.”
She led Brody fifteen feet down the hallway to the study.
Mrs. Lincoln was a tall woman with chiseled features and a magnificent figure. Her waist, Brody noted appreciatively, wouldn’t go over twenty-two inches. Her bust, he estimated, would tape almost twice that. Judson Lincoln must have been out of his mind to go chasing floozies with this magnificent piece waiting for him at home!
Then she smiled.
T. Jefferson Brody felt his knees get watery.
“I’m Deborah Lincoln, Mr. Brody. This is my attorney, Jeremiah Jones.”
For the first time Brody glanced at the attorney. He was about twenty-five with slicked-back hair, miserable teeth, and a weasel smile. “Yes, yes, Mr. Brody. Deborah has told me of your client’s interest in her husband’s business. Such a tragedy that took him from her so early in life.”
As Brody feasted his eyes upon the widow, it occurred to him that she seemed to be weathering her husband’s unfortunate demise very well. Just now she made eye contact with Jones and they both smiled slightly. She turned back to Brody and, it seemed to him, made a real effort to arrange her face.
“A tragedy,” Brody agreed after another look at gigolo Jones. “Ahem, well, life must go on. Sorry to disturb you so soon after … ah, but my clients are anxious that I speak to you about their interest in your husband’s business before you … ah, before you …”