As the guard returned to the shadows he backed out into the alley and fed gas.
The relief turned to disgust. He had sweated bullets all day, for what? For nothing!
Maybe he should just split. Why not? He had proved to himself he could make it through today. That was the main thing. Nothing’s going to happen tonight, and why should he deliver another load of shit for Freeman McNally? The feds already had enough evidence for 241 counts on an indictment. Why add another?
What are you proving, Harrison? You’ve had no sleep, you’ve been scared shitless for ten months, you killed a guy, you got enough evidence to send McNally and friends up the river so long that crack will be legal when they get out, but you have to be alive to testify.
Why dick around with it another night? Don’t lose sight of the main thing—you’ve made it through today.
But he knew the answer. He pointed the car toward Georgia Avenue and fed gas.
“How well do you know Captain Grafton?” Jack Yocke asked Toad Tarkington. It was about ten o’clock and they were standing on the balcony looking at the city. It was nippy but there was little wind.
“Oh, about as well as any junior officer can know a senior one. I think he personally likes me, but at the office I’m just another one of the guys.”
“By reputation, he’s one of the best officers in the Navy.”
“He’s the best I ever met. Period,” Toad said. “You want paper shuffled, Captain Grafton can handle it. You want critical decisions wisely made or carefully defended, he’s your man. You need a man to lead other men into combat, get Grafton. You want a plane flown to hell and back, nobody’s better than he is. If you want an officer who will always do right regardless of the consequences, then you want Jake Grafton.”
“How about you?”
“Me? I’m just a lieutenant. I fly when I’m told, sleep when I’m told, and shit when it’s on the schedule.”
“How does Captain Grafton always know what the right thing to do is?”
“What is this? Twenty questions? Don’t you ever lay off?”
“Just curious. I’m not going to print this.”
“You’d better not. I’ll break your pencil.”
“How does he know?”
“He’s got common sense. That’s a rare commodity inside the beltway. I haven’t seen enough of it in this town to fill a condom, but common sense is Jake Grafton’s long suit.”
Yocke chuckled.
“Better watch that,” Toad admonished. “Your press card may melt if you crack a smile. Your reputation as an uptight superprick is on the line here.”
Jack Yocke grinned. “I deserved that. Sorry about those cracks the first time I met you. I was having a bad day.”
“Had one of those myself one time,” Tarkington muttered. He stamped his feet. “I’m getting cold. Let’s go inside.”
Harrison Ronald stood by the side of the Mustang and stared at the right front tire. Flat.
Traffic whizzed by on Rhode Island Avenue. When he felt the wheel pulling and heard the thumping, he had pulled into a convenience store parking lot.
Fate, he decided, as he opened the trunk and rooted in it for the jack and lug wrench. On the way to his rendezvous with destiny, Galahad’s horse threw a shoe. How comes this stuff never happens in the movies?
He got the front end off the ground, but the lug nuts were rusted on. Damn that Freeman, he never had these tires rotated or balanced or aligned. Got so damned much money he never takes care of anything.
He needed a cheater bar or a hammer. Frustrated, he sat on the pavement and kicked at the end of the lug wrench. The wrench flew off, scarring the nut. He tried it again. And again. Finally the nut turned.
A police cruiser pulled into the lot and stopped in front of the store. Two white cops. They got out of the cruiser, stood for a moment or two silently watching Ford wrestle with the wrench, then went inside.
Jesus, didn’t they see the outline of the automatic in the small of his back, under his coat? Those shitheads. A weapon was the first thing they should have been looking for.
As Ford kicked at the last nut, he glanced through the big plate-glass windows. The cops were sipping coffee and flirting with the girl behind the counter.
He skinned his knuckle and it started bleeding. Well, it wouldn’t bleed long. The dirt and grease would get in the skinned place and stop the blood. His father’s hands had always had chunks missing, cavities full of dirt and grease that slowly, ever so slowly, healed just in time to be ripped open again. As a kid he had looked at his father’s thick, heavy hands and asked, “Don’t they hurt?”
Dad, wherever you are, my hands are cold and hurt like hell and my ass is freezing from the pavement and my nose is dripping.
He wiped his nose on his sleeve.
So what did’ya expect? The cops’d help? Get real!
Jack Yocke found himself staring at Tish Samuels. He had been watching her for several minutes when he realized with a start what he was doing. He glanced around to see if anyone had noticed. Jake Grafton met his eyes. Yocke smiled and looked away.
Okay, so she’s not Playboy beautiful, she’ll never be on the cover of Cosmo. In her own way she’s lovely.
Standing there watching her move, watching her gestures and body language, he remembered the Cuban madonna on the hood of the truck with the baby at her breast. How long had he looked at that girl? Thirty seconds? A minute? That woman had been life going down the road. In spite of war, revolution, poverty, starvation, she rode with courage from the past into the future.
He looked at Tish and tried to visualize her on the hood of that truck. She could ride there, he concluded. She’s a survivor.
He poured himself another drink and settled on the couch to watch Tish Samuels.
Maybe he was just getting older. His ambitions somehow seemed less important than they used to be and he was rapidly losing faith in his own opinions. How many of his colleagues truly believed in the ultimate wisdom of the voters? Opinionated, egotistical iconoclasts — Jack Yocke marching bravely among them — they believed only in themselves.
Okay, Jack. If your meager brains and wisdom won’t be enough, what will be? What do you believe in?
Musing thus, he found himself contemplating his shoes and in his mind’s eye seeing the people walking on the road to Havana, walking as the dust rose and the sun beat down, walking into the unknown.
In front of the Sanitary Bakery Harrison Ronald turned the car around on a whim and backed it up beside the others. Six other cars. A crowd tonight.
He went to the door and knocked.
The man inside shut the door behind him and bolted it and jerked his head. “They want you upstairs, second floor, way down at the end.”
The interior of the warehouse was dark, no lights. The only illumination came from streetlights outside through the dirty windows high up in the wall. He knew what was in here though and went along confidently as his eyes adjusted.
Second floor, down at the end. God, there was nothing down there but some empty offices with six inches of dust, dirt, and rat shit, and some broken-down furniture that was so trashed the last tenant had left it.
He checked the position of the automatic in his waistband at the small of his back and pushed against the thumb safety to ensure that it was still on. Wouldn’t do to shoot yourself in the ass, Harrison Ronald.
He went up the stairs and turned left, toward the east end of the building. He could hear moaning. A male voice.
He stopped dead. Someone groaning, a deep, animal sound.
Harrison Ronald stood frozen, listening. There! Again!
He slipped his hand under his coat and touched the butt of the automatic again, then pulled his hand away.