Текст книги "On the Street Where You Die"
Автор книги: Al Stevens
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On the Street Where You Die
by
Al Stevens
http://www.alstevens.com
This is a work of fiction, and the people in this book are fictional. Any resemblance to any real person, living or dead, is coincidental.
On the Street Where You Die. Copyright 2012 by Al Stevens. All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part (except as provided by U.S. Copyright Law), without written permission from the author.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Joy Seymour for her suggestions and corrections to this story.
Dedication
To the memory of Frederick W. Stevens, Sr. who might have made it to 100 if he would have quit smoking.
Books by Al Stevens
Stanley Bentworth Mysteries Omnibus Books 1 – 3
Diabetics Behaving Badly
On the Street Where You Die (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 1)
A Dead Ringer (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 2)
Clueless (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 3)
The Rat Squad (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 4)
White Collar Murders (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 5)
Fugitive Warrant (Stanley Bentworth mysteries: Book 6)
War of the Singularity
Annie Somewhere
The Shadow on the Grassy Knoll
Confessions of a Cat Burglar (free book, referenced in A Dead Ringer)
Off the Wall Stories
Golden Eagle’s Final Flight (with Ron Skipper)
Ventriloquism: Art, Craft, Profession
Politically Incorrect Scripts for Comedy Ventriloquists
Welcome to Programming
Teach Yourself C++ 7th Edition
…and many other computer programming and usage books.
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
From the Author
Chapter 1
On the afternoon when all this trouble started, I was sitting alone in my office, reading the newspaper, and waiting for cocktail hour. Or daylight savings time, whichever came first. A half-empty fifth of cheap bourbon beckoned from my desk drawer, and I tried with good intentions to ignore its call. But when there’s no work for a private investigator and no woman in his life, drinking is what’s left. Come to think of it, it’s also what’s left when you’re busy and getting laid.
The outer door opened and closed, and footsteps sounded across the floor.
“A client?” I said to no one at all.
A client was just what the bill collector ordered. Business had slowed to a crawl. Blame it on the economy. People were staying married, in jail, at home, or some combination of the three. Times were tough.
I looked at my Mickey Mouse wristwatch. Don’t laugh. It’s all I got in the divorce. It was a few minutes past four, and Willa had gone home. I was about to get up and go greet the visitor when the door to my office opened. André the Giant stood in the doorway.
He hadn’t knocked. Good thing I wasn’t doing the bottle, scratching my nuts, or anything else private.
The light was directly behind him, and his height, broad shoulders, Al Capone fedora, and alpaca overcoat presented an imposing silhouette.
“Come in and sit down,” I said to the imposing silhouette. I took off my reading glasses and put them on the desk.
In my business, a big guy coming in uninvited and unexpected could be bad news. I made a fast mental inventory of cheating husbands I might have pissed off and bail jumpers I had restored to the judicial system, and none of them had been anywhere near that big.
My gun was in the safe. Plan ahead.
The big man moved into the light. The desk lamp cast shadows upward on his face giving him a fierce, chiseled look, hardened and set with a bigger jaw than anybody needed. His blue-gray eyes scanned the room and settled on me.
The alpaca overcoat was expensive. So were the spit-shined imported alligator-skin shoes, the cost of either one of which would have paid for my car and bought a tank of gas and a year’s insurance, neither of which I had at the moment. A man of means. A big man of means.
“Mr. Bentworth?” the big man of means said.
“That’s the name on the door,” I said. Not exactly the snappiest of repartees, but the best I could come up with on short notice. I’ve done better and am known for it.
The stranger shifted from side to side and adjusted his shoulders as if to take a more at-the-ready stance.
I fidgeted in my chair, and my skivvies wedged into the crack of my ass. Why does that always happen just when you can’t do anything about it? One of life’s small mysteries.
“Call me Stan,” I said. “And you are?”
He pulled a chair over and removed his cream-colored wool felt fedora. He dropped the hat on the desk, spun the chair around backward, and lowered himself onto the seat, his arms on the back, his knees high on either side of him. He looked around the room again and took in the office accoutrements. It didn’t take long. There wasn’t much to take in. A desk, two chairs, a safe, and a coat rack.
All that and me rutching around in my swivel chair from cheek to cheek trying to get my skivvies to pop out on their own. It never works.
“Sergeant Penrod says you’re the man I need,” the big guy said. He was articulate with a cultured voice that belied his tough guy stature and bearing. “He says you know how to find people.”
“That’s my specialty. Who’s lost?”
“Someone is putting the squeeze on me. I need to find out who.”
“What kind of squeeze?” I said.
He looked around again. “You don’t look all that prosperous.”
“My needs are simple. Who’s shaking you down, Mr...?”
“Overbee. Buford Overbee. You ever hear that name?”
I stifled a smile at the notion of a man who looked like Hulk Hogan having a name like Buford Overbee. But who am I to question a guy’s name? How many private dicks do you meet named Stanley?
“Can’t say I have,” I said. “So who needs finding?” I sat back, folded my arms, and waited.
He looked around the room again. “Never heard of me, huh? Buford Overbee?” He emphasized both halves of the name and seemed disappointed that I didn’t recognize it.
“Nope. So, when are you going to tell me who you need found? I got to be somewhere Tuesday.”
“Don’t get your briefs in a bunch,” he said. “I’m getting there.”
I wished he hadn’t mentioned briefs. Mine were still tucked up my ass.
“Bill Penrod recommended me?”
“He did.”
“He works homicide,” I said. “I hope you don’t want somebody killed.”
“I want somebody found.”
“What’s his name?”
“Don’t know.”
“Where’s he live?”
“Don’t know.”
“What’s he look like?”
“Don’t know.”
“I charge more for don’t know, don’t know, and don’t know.”
“Money’s no problem.”
My kind of client. “Makes things easier,” I said.
“If you’re willing to take this job, I’ll give you a few days to see what you can do.”
He opened his wallet, took out a handful of hundred dollar bills, and put the stack on the desk.
“That’s a thousand. Will it do for a retainer?”
I looked at the stack lovingly. This month’s rent and some left over for necessities. Such as bourbon.
“It will if I take the job, which I haven’t decided.”
That was bullshit. I was going to take the job. Whatever it involved. If he wanted Jimmy Hoffa found, I was going to take the job.
“Keep the dough. If you don’t want the job, it’ll be hush money to keep your yap shut about what I’m about to tell you. Does that work?”
I picked up the thousand, swiveled around, and put it in the safe.
“I’ll take that for a yes,” he said.
He stood and turned the chair around the way it was meant to be. He sat, put his elbows on the desk, and rested his Jay Leno chin in his Michael Jordan hands.
“Make no mistake,” he said. “I expect you to honor the confidentiality I just purchased.”
“Mr. Overbee, I didn’t invite you here just to get a lecture on professional ethics.”
“You didn’t invite me at all. I let myself in.”
“Fair enough.”
He got up, hung his coat on the coat rack, came back, and plopped down again. He shifted around. He was too big for that chair. His butt hung over the sides, and his knees were at chest level. He stared at me. Then after a moment he said, “What we are about to discuss is a matter of life and death.”
“Whose life and whose death?” I hoped he didn’t mean mine.
“If you find the guy, it could be his. If you don’t, it might be mine.”
“Sounds serious enough. Who is it? Inquiring minds and all that.”
It didn’t matter who the target was. In my current situation I would have found his cat if the fee was there.
I shook a cigarette out of the pack on my desk and offered one to Overbee. He shook his head. This would be my last cigarette. I was determined to quit smoking.
Overbee waited while I lit up, took a long drag, and exhaled a plume of blue smoke into the room. Then he said, “The guy I want found is shaking me down, and if I don’t pay him, I could get killed.”
“By whom?”
“There are people looking for me. He could tell them where I am.”
“Who’s looking for you?”
“Still not convinced you’re right for this job,” he said.
“Well, I’d certainly try to convince you if you’d only tell me more about the fucking job.”
He looked me up and down. “You talk tougher than you look.”
“If you want somebody found, I’m your man. If you’re looking for muscle, I’m not it.”
“I can tell.”
I wish people wouldn’t be so quick to notice that.
He continued. “Suppose when I came in here, I came to beat the shit out of you. What would happen?”
I looked him up and down. “You’d beat the shit out of me.” I paused. “Assuming you could catch me.”
“You don’t think I’d catch you?”
“You’d be slipping in shit the whole way.”
Not even a smile. Jokes were wasted on Overbee.
“What about the street?” he said. “How do you handle trouble?”
“Mr. Overbee—”
“Buford,” Overbee said.
“Buford. The wise and noble framers of our great Constitution bestowed upon us the right to own and bear arms.”
That’s an argument never lost on a real man. Or so they tell me.
“How are you with computers?” he asked. “I don’t see one here.” He looked around the room again. I wished he’d quit looking around the room.
“I get by with them, but I have a guy who’s a whiz.”
“How good is he?”
“Well, I’m not saying Bill Gates calls him whenever he can’t figure something out, but he could. Now tell me more.”
He took a deep breath and said, “I’ll start with a warning.” That caught my attention, and I leaned forward. “There are those,” he said, “who would do anything to know what you are about to learn. My life wouldn’t be worth a dime if they found it out. Anyone who knows who and where I am could be in similar danger if the wrong people find out. Do you want me to proceed?”
I sat for a moment and cogitated about what he could say that would put me in danger just for knowing it. Who was Buford Overbee? Who wanted to know? I was hooked and wasn’t going to pass up hearing this story.
“Proceed,” I said.
“I used to have other interests that, if exposed, could compromise the fiduciary trust that I enjoy with my clients.”
“Clients?”
“Investors. I have a dubious past, you might say.”
“How dubious?”
“I used to work for the mob.”
I dropped my pencil on the desk and sat back in my chair with a thump.
“Are these the guys I should be afraid of?” I said.
“Everybody should be afraid of them.”
I couldn’t sense any fear coming from him, but what do I know? I’m a wimp. He’s Jesse Ventura.
“What was your job back then?”
“Collections.”
Which meant if you owed the mob money, Buford would encourage you to do the right thing and meet your obligations. He looked qualified for that line of work.
“Got it. Did you use words like ‘fiduciary trust’ when you were a wise guy?”
“No.”
“So now something’s backfired.”
“It has. I’m being blackmailed.”
“Well, I’m shocked.” I leaned back in my chair and raised my eyebrows. “Given all the mobsters and shady investors you’ve done business with, it saddens me that someone would sink that low. What’s this world coming to?”
He didn’t crack a smile.
“Who do you think is putting the clamp on your nuts?” I asked.
He shrugged and raised his hands palms up. “That’s the problem, Stan. I don’t have a clue. He’s anonymous.”
This wasn’t going to be easy. I looked at my watch, the Timex with Mickey Mouse on the dial.
“It’s almost six. You want a drink?”
Overbee looked at his watch, a Rolex with diamonds on the dial. “It isn’t almost six, and yeah, I want a drink.”
I opened a desk drawer and took out the bottle and two glasses. I poured myself a drink, started to pour one for Overbee, and stopped.
“If you’re worried about the glass being dirty, and it probably is, there’s running water down the hall.”
“Pour.”
Nothing could live in that kerosene anyway. I poured and we each took a healthy swig. The bourbon burned going down. I took another gulp to put out the fire. It didn’t work.
After his first swig, he scrunched up his nose and mouth.
“You don’t like bourbon?” I asked.
“I do. And next time I’ll bring some.” He sniffed his glass, closed his eyes, and shook his head.
“Let’s don’t drink this horse piss,” I said. “We can go across the street. They pour a good drink at Oliver’s.”
He stood up and got his alpaca overcoat from the rack. I stood up, and my skivvies popped out of the crack of my ass. At last.
Chapter 2
Delbert Falls is a typical medium-sized town in Maryland, between Baltimore and Philadelphia. My office is in the northwest section, which has low-rent industrial and commercial buildings and a few low-rent apartment buildings.
“Elevator out of order?” Buford said.
“I don’t think there is an elevator. The doors and buttons are just for show.”
We went down the stairs and across the street to Oliver’s, a small saloon that serves an ample drink at a reasonable price.
We took a booth for the privacy. Sammy came over with my usual, a double Jack neat.
“This is Sammy,” I said, “my closest friend and confidant.”
Buford reached up to shake hands. “I’m Buford. I’ll have the same.”
Sammy went to the bar to get Buford’s drink.
“You can trust Sammy,” I said. “The soul of discretion.”
“Every good bartender is,” Buford said.
Sammy brought Buford’s drink and returned to the bar. Buford looked at his glass for a while then took a sip.
“This is better.” He took a cigar from his pocket and lit it. I lit my last cigarette ever. I was going to quit. Did I already say that?
“Penrod said you used to be a cop.”
“I was. We were partners. Homicide.”
“Tell me why you’re doing this and not a cop anymore. It can’t be for the money.”
I didn’t like telling this story. But everyone wants to hear it. I should just go on Jerry Springer.
“Got canned,” I said. “I was a good cop. Caught killers. Closed cases.”
“And they let you go?”
“That’s a nice way of putting it. I took a swing at a suspect. He swung back. End of fight. With me as first runner-up. According to the bosses, they can’t have suspects beating the shit out of detectives in the squad room. Makes them look bad.”
“They fired you for losing a fight?”
“They did. If only that citizen hadn’t been there with his cell phone. Click. Smile. You’re on candid Youtube. And the six o’clock news.”
“I can see where that would piss off the brass.”
He shifted around. His girth took up most of the bench.
“Punching that moke was the last straw, according to the Lieutenant. Came as a surprise. I didn’t know I had been piling up straws.”
“Sauce?”
My secret was out.
“Yeah. The Lieutenant was one of those guys who bores the shit out of you with his endless litany about the evils of drink, meetings, twelve steps, one day at a time, and all that shit.”
“I know the type. I married his sister.” He took another drink.
“He asked who my enabler was.”
“Your what?”
“Someone who encourages the drinking. Like my ex-wife. And maybe your wife. They nag you about your drinking so you drink more to block it out.”
I looked toward the bar and said, “I told him these days my enabler is Sammy.”
We both took slow sips. Buford took another pull on his cigar. I lit another last cigarette.
“So you wound up a P.I.”
“After I retired without a pension, I got a license, had cards printed, and painted my name on the door. It was that or be a Walmart greeter.”
“You like this line of work?”
“If I have to work for assholes, I might as well be self-employed.”
“And now you find missing persons.”
“Runaway teenagers, deadbeat dads, bail jumpers, cheating spouses, hidden assets. The usual.”
I downed the last of my bourbon.
“Now,” I said, “are you going to give me some details about the shakedown or are you going to have another drink?”
“Yes,” he said.
I signaled to Sammy to bring another round. I took a pencil and pad from my trench coat pocket. I don’t always take notes, but detectives on TV do it, and it’s expected.
Like most clients, Buford recited his life story first, something I usually don’t care about, but if you don’t let them spill their guts, they’ll keep trying. So, I am a good listener. A booth in a bar can be a kind of confessional.
“I’m a financier. Investment counselor. Big money. High-profile clientele. Moguls, movie stars, politicians. You ever read the financial section of the newspaper? Or the Wall Street Journal?”
“No. I figured I’d take that up after I make my second million.”
“Already made your first?” He was probably wondering if I was a potential client.
“No. Gave up on that. Working on my second.”
“That’s why you don’t know my name. I make a lot of money in investments.”
“Ponzi? Like Madoff?”
“No. Not yet anyway. I know my shit. My clients all made money in 2008. There’s a Rolls parked in the alley behind your office with a driver waiting to take me home to a twenty-two year old wife in a big house in the Heights. I want to keep the Rolls, the driver, and the house. Not to mention the wife. I need to hang onto my money.”
“And you need help with that?”
“I do.”
“To help you find a blackmailer.”
Buford leaned back and crossed his arms. His cigar hung out over his suit jacket, and the ash grew longer with each puff. I waited for it to drop off and burn a hole in the expensive garment.
“I wasn’t always a successful investment counselor,” he said.
“Were you an unsuccessful investment counselor?”
“No. I mean, I got into investments late in life. I’m good at it.”
“You don’t look like the typical investment counselor.”
“What do I look like?” he asked.
“More like the typical biker bar bouncer. Except for the clothes. You got tattoos under those threads?”
He ignored my sarcasm and took a long drag on his cigar. The ash grew longer.
“I know you’re a big mother,” I said, “but how does a guy with a moniker like Buford Overbee get a job as a wise guy?”
Buford smiled for the first time. “That wasn’t my name back then. I changed it when I went into this line of work. More respectable, more impressive.”
“More anonymous.”
“Right. I chose a name that doesn’t look like me. Not only do my present clients not know about my past, my former employers don’t know about my present. I keep a low profile. No pictures, no interviews. The press refers to me as ‘the elusive Buford Overbee.’ Like Howard Hughes in his later years. Always in the action but never in the picture.”
The cigar ash was due to fall off on its own. He flicked it off in the ash tray. Now I could breathe again.
“What was your name before?” I asked.
“You don’t need that.”
“Why not?”
“Because your knowing that could draw the attention of the boys back home.”
“And they’d come after me to learn what I know?”
“They would.”
“How would they know that I know?” This was getting complicated.
“Stan, you’re going to come into contact with some of my people and, I hope, the blackmailer himself. These kinds of secrets are hard to keep.”
“You don’t trust your people?”
“I don’t trust anyone. Remember, the family pays well for information. Like if you tell them what they want to know, you get to keep your arms and legs.”
He still had some secrets, even from me, his personal detective as of a thousand bucks ago. I’d have to break down that wall eventually, but not yet.
“I assume there’s a reason you don’t want your previous colleagues in the family to know where you are.”
“A very big reason having to do with a grand jury and a federal prosecutor.”
“Okay,” I said. “I’m guessing that after testifying, you joined the witness protection country club.”
“I did.”
“And that’s how they don’t know where you are.”
“It is.”
“And the blackmailer, whoever it is, figured it all out.”
“Apparently.”
I reached my arms out and stretched them behind me on the back of the bench.
“How does a wise guy from the streets choose investment counselor as a cover profession? Why not something easy like brain surgeon or theoretical physicist?”
“I always had a feel for the market. I learned the ins and outs of insider trading when I was connected. You can do great things if you don’t have scruples and don’t have to worry about being caught.”
“Which you don’t when the feds are your guardian angels,” I said.
“Which they are as long as you can be helpful.”
“How do you build up a list of clients when you’re an unknown, new investment counselor recently retired from the mob? Cold calls? Door-to-door?”
Imagine a guy his size knocking on your door selling mutual funds.
“I scammed my way into it.”
Why did that not surprise me?
He continued. “I sent e-mails to about two hundred investors and told half of them that a particular stock would go up and the other half it would drop. Whichever way it went, I removed the other half from my list and did it again with another stock.”
“I can see where this is going,” I said.
“I did it three times. After that, I had a list of twenty-five investors that had just gotten three consecutive hot tips. I sent them invitations to be clients. Most of them signed on. After that it was word of mouth.”
“After that you had to deliver.”
“And I do.”
“And now somebody has found you and wants to be paid for his silence.”
“Exactly. He uses e-mail and requires online payments, for chrissake, using OnlinePay.”
“What’s that?”
“You send money using the Internet.”
Learn something new every day.
“How much dust does he want?”
“Started out twenty grand, which I paid. But it seems that’s only the first installment. Apparently this goes on forever. This time he wants thirty. I can’t do that. Twenty grand here, thirty grand there, it adds up.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
“I want it stopped,” he said. “Not just because of the money, but because I don’t want some scumbag knowing he got one over on me. I hate that. That’s where you come in, Stan. Find out who and where he is. You say that’s your specialty? That’s what I’m buying. You find him. I’ll take it from there.”
“I just have to find someone whose name, address, and likeness we don’t know. Should be easy enough.”
That was a bluff.
“All I have is his e-mail address. Can you do anything with that?”
“Well, that will take some serious hacking. I’ll call in Rodney.”
Rodney was my nephew, my sister’s boy.
“Rodney?”
“My computer expert. When he’s not working for me, he surfs for porn and breaks into government computers. Just for the hell of it.”
“You sure a guy like that is reliable? Sounds flaky.”
“I’m sure. When it comes to computers, if he can’t do it, it can’t be done.”
“Okay. What’s your fee?”
“Five hundred a day plus expenses.”
I seldom got that much, but if you don’t ask...
“What kind of expenses?”
“Travel, bribes, tips for information, whatever I have to pay Rodney, and such.”
“Makes sense.”
“For now I need the e-mail address of the blackmailer. And a way to reach you.”
Buford took a card from his wallet and wrote on the back. “This is his e-mail address. My cell and e-mail are on the other side. Don’t pass them around.”
I looked at the card. “I’ll need your home address.”
“No, you won’t. You need to talk to me, call. You can e-mail or text an invoice when you need to be paid. Just don’t try to outbid the blackmailer. Keep me in the loop too. Daily progress reports.”
“Will do.”
“Stan, you do this for me and your financial worries are eased a bit. I’ll keep you on retainer for as long as I might have these kinds of problems.”
That was the best news I’d heard all day. “Don’t worry, Buford. I’ll find the rat.”
We shook hands and Buford threw a twenty on the table and left. I went to the front window and watched him cross the street and go behind my building to the alley. Soon a white Rolls Royce Phantom pulled out of the side street and turned north. I couldn’t see the driver. But the big man in the alpaca coat and fedora was in the back seat lighting another cigar. The Rolls sped away.
I ordered another drink.
