Read Online Reversible Error by Robert K. Tanenbaum - Free Book Online
Authors: Robert K. Tanenbaum
Ads: Link
the next week or so, but there's nothing much else I feel like doing anyway. I'll get back to you in a couple of days."
Pepper Soames's club, on the old part of 125th where it curves down to the river, was one of the last of the old-time Harlem jazz clubs. It was a relic of the days, thirty years past, when the audience for real jazz was small, hip, and almost entirely black, before stereo, heroin, integration, or rock and roll.
Art Dugman walked into Pepper's around midnight, took a table in the nearly empty room, ordered a J amp;B on the rocks, and watched his boss, Detective Lieutenant Clay Fulton, finish his set. Fulton was playing keyboard in a trio: a hotshot kid alto player and an elderly man on bass. Dugman thought they were pretty good, but he didn't know anything about jazz.
After they finished playing, Fulton came over to Dugman's table and sat down. He was holding a glass of what Dugman knew was club soda. Fulton didn't drink anymore.
Fulton said, "Why ain't you home, Dugman? Streets are dangerous this time of night."
"You said report to you. I'm reporting."
"So cop a squat, Jack. What's happening on the dealer murders?"
"Let me spin it out for you, just like we got it. See if you come up with the same bad thoughts I did."
"Bad thoughts?" said Fulton.
"Just listen up, Loo," said Dugman, and quickly recited what he and his team had learned since the night of Larue Clarry's murder: the details of the killing itself, the evidence from Clarry's apartment, their interrogation of Slo Mo, and the murder of what ought to have been their best witness, the prostitute Haze.
"Whores get killed all the time," said Fulton after a thoughtful pause.
"Yeah, but look here, we know who did it," said Dugman. Some of the girls on Haze's stroll saw Haze getting into a car with a black man about one-thirty this morning. The M.E. says she was killed between two and three the same morning. Nobody ever saw her alive again."
"You got a good make on the guy from that?"
"No, we had to shake the place up a little."
Fulton grunted. "Am I gonna have trouble on this?" Fulton understood what happened when the King Cole Trio shook the place up a little. People came flying headfirst out of shooting galleries. People found themselves hanging by their ankles from rooftop parapets. TV sets fell from windows. Normal trade shut down at the public drug markets and the places where stolen goods changed hands. The underworld got sick, heaved its belly, and spewed forth a sacrifice.
"No trouble," said Dugman, "we just hustled the mutts. Anyhow, a junkie name of Laxton shook out. Says he saw the whole thing."
"He saw the whore get it?"
"Shit, no! He saw Clarry get it. The fuck I care about some whore-he saw the guy did Clarry, and if you right about this, the guy that did all the dealers. And the whore."
"This Laxton witness the actual killing?"
"No, what he saw was Clarry's car pull up under the highway, and the guy get out, go in the back of the car for a minute, and get out again and walk away. Laxton was nodding off in a pile of trash. He jumped when he saw the guy, made some noise, and the guy spooked and got small real fast. That's probably why he left the piece on the seat of the car."
"So did he see the guy close enough to put him on the mug books?"
Dugman smiled. "No need. He made the guy right there. He knew him from way back."
"Who was it?" asked Fulton, taking a sip of his drink.
"Name's Tecumseh Booth."
Fulton let loose a great snorting laugh, spraying soda from his mouth over the table. When he had stopped coughing, he wiped his face with a cocktail napkin and said, "God damn! You got to be shittin' me, man. Tecumseh? I know Tecumseh Booth. I sent him up for armed robbery a couple of years back. He's a lot of things, but he ain't no hit man."
"Maybe he changed professions," Dugman said carefully.
"Uh-uh. Not likely. Tecumseh will hold your horse while you ace somebody. He might drive you away from the scene. But he never
Pepper Soames's club, on the old part of 125th where it curves down to the river, was one of the last of the old-time Harlem jazz clubs. It was a relic of the days, thirty years past, when the audience for real jazz was small, hip, and almost entirely black, before stereo, heroin, integration, or rock and roll.
Art Dugman walked into Pepper's around midnight, took a table in the nearly empty room, ordered a J amp;B on the rocks, and watched his boss, Detective Lieutenant Clay Fulton, finish his set. Fulton was playing keyboard in a trio: a hotshot kid alto player and an elderly man on bass. Dugman thought they were pretty good, but he didn't know anything about jazz.
After they finished playing, Fulton came over to Dugman's table and sat down. He was holding a glass of what Dugman knew was club soda. Fulton didn't drink anymore.
Fulton said, "Why ain't you home, Dugman? Streets are dangerous this time of night."
"You said report to you. I'm reporting."
"So cop a squat, Jack. What's happening on the dealer murders?"
"Let me spin it out for you, just like we got it. See if you come up with the same bad thoughts I did."
"Bad thoughts?" said Fulton.
"Just listen up, Loo," said Dugman, and quickly recited what he and his team had learned since the night of Larue Clarry's murder: the details of the killing itself, the evidence from Clarry's apartment, their interrogation of Slo Mo, and the murder of what ought to have been their best witness, the prostitute Haze.
"Whores get killed all the time," said Fulton after a thoughtful pause.
"Yeah, but look here, we know who did it," said Dugman. Some of the girls on Haze's stroll saw Haze getting into a car with a black man about one-thirty this morning. The M.E. says she was killed between two and three the same morning. Nobody ever saw her alive again."
"You got a good make on the guy from that?"
"No, we had to shake the place up a little."
Fulton grunted. "Am I gonna have trouble on this?" Fulton understood what happened when the King Cole Trio shook the place up a little. People came flying headfirst out of shooting galleries. People found themselves hanging by their ankles from rooftop parapets. TV sets fell from windows. Normal trade shut down at the public drug markets and the places where stolen goods changed hands. The underworld got sick, heaved its belly, and spewed forth a sacrifice.
"No trouble," said Dugman, "we just hustled the mutts. Anyhow, a junkie name of Laxton shook out. Says he saw the whole thing."
"He saw the whore get it?"
"Shit, no! He saw Clarry get it. The fuck I care about some whore-he saw the guy did Clarry, and if you right about this, the guy that did all the dealers. And the whore."
"This Laxton witness the actual killing?"
"No, what he saw was Clarry's car pull up under the highway, and the guy get out, go in the back of the car for a minute, and get out again and walk away. Laxton was nodding off in a pile of trash. He jumped when he saw the guy, made some noise, and the guy spooked and got small real fast. That's probably why he left the piece on the seat of the car."
"So did he see the guy close enough to put him on the mug books?"
Dugman smiled. "No need. He made the guy right there. He knew him from way back."
"Who was it?" asked Fulton, taking a sip of his drink.
"Name's Tecumseh Booth."
Fulton let loose a great snorting laugh, spraying soda from his mouth over the table. When he had stopped coughing, he wiped his face with a cocktail napkin and said, "God damn! You got to be shittin' me, man. Tecumseh? I know Tecumseh Booth. I sent him up for armed robbery a couple of years back. He's a lot of things, but he ain't no hit man."
"Maybe he changed professions," Dugman said carefully.
"Uh-uh. Not likely. Tecumseh will hold your horse while you ace somebody. He might drive you away from the scene. But he never
Similar Books
