The problem was, she had no proof that Mike Collins was anything other than the concerned federal agent he purported to be. She called her one good friend in the Baltimore City homicide squad, Detective Martin Tull.
“Not a good time,” the detective said with his customary curtness. “Got a red ball so far up my ass that it might end up coming out of my nose the next time I blow it.”
“Canton, yeah, I heard it on ’BAL. I’ll be quick. You got an open case on a kid named Le’andro Watkins? He was killed last week. Shot, typical drug-murder stuff.” Or so it would appear.
A moment of silence. Tull must be glancing at the board that carried the cases, listed by number and victims’ last names. The board was color-coded-black for closed ones, red for those still open. Tess would bet anything there was a sea of red on the board this year.
Tull came back on the line. “Yeah, that’s Rainier’s.”
Shit. If Tess had only one friend in homicide, she also had only one enemy. Still, she didn’t carry a grudge, and maybe Rainier didn’t either. In the end she had done right by him, handed him a bouquet of clearances. Tess had probably helped Rainier earn his highest clearance rate since he joined the department.
“He around?”
“That worthless fucker called in from the field this morning, said he was doing some interviews. He’s hiding, worried that he’ll be pulled to help on this case.”
“Got a cell for him?”
“Yeah. And maybe he’ll answer if he doesn’t see the 396 prefix.” All city numbers, including those from police headquarters, began with those three numbers.
“Good luck,” Tess said. “I owe you one.”
“You’ve lost count if you think all you owe me is one.”
“Final question: If you were the kind of homicide detective who ever pretended to be out in the field to avoid a difficult assignment-we all know you’d never do that, just being theoretical here-but if you were that kind of detective and you weren’t working and you didn’t want to be found, where would you be?”
Tull began laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
‘Truth be told, I’d go to your father’s bar, because no one’s ever going to find anyone in that little bend of Franklintown Road. But if I were Jay Rainier-and I thank God every day that I’m not-I’d be on Fort Avenue. He came up through Southern District patrol, has a soft spot for Locust Point.”
“Tull, there’s a bar in almost every block of Fort.”
“Yeah, but it’s only, what, two, three miles long? And it’s a nice day for a pub crawl. Cool, but sunny.”
Tess called Crow’s new number but got no answer. She left careful instructions about how to access the Hotmail account, then made a quick costume change before heading to South Baltimore, trading her suede jacket for a nylon windbreaker of a startling bright blue, lined with synthetic plush of the same color. It had belonged to her father and still had his name, Patrick, embroidered on the front.
But it was the back, proclaiming Tess a member of the Colts Corral, No. 34, that should make the Fort Avenue bartenders warm to her.
Crow and Lloyd were loading supplies at the 84 Lumber off Route 26 when the cell rang, and Crow couldn’t get his hands free to answer it without dropping a two-by-four on Lloyd’s toe. It was wonderful just to hear it ring, to know Tess was trying to get in touch with him. He checked the message on the drive back, listened to her breathless instructions to get to a computer and review the photos she had sent.
But the South Coastal Library, so helpful in all other respects, thwarted him. Its computer network was loaded with virus protections that refused to allow him to download the images Tess had forwarded. One of the librarians could probably help him bypass the program, but Crow didn’t want to risk drawing that much attention to himself. Maybe Ed had a computer.
“We take technology too much for granted,” he said to Lloyd as they drove back to Fenwick.
“What you mean?”
“We assume everyone has a cell phone, computers, Internet access-or that cell phones will always work or we’ll be able to find a wireless hot spot when we need it. Can you imagine the chaos if terrorists or hackers brought down all the landlines and cell access and wireless connections for even an hour? If you couldn’t call anyone, use an ATM, send an e-mail?”
“I’d be okay,” Lloyd said.
Crow started to explain that Lloyd was missing the larger point of what he was trying to describe, the global nature of technological dependence. But Lloyd had spoken a simple truth. Lloyd would be okay, probably better than most. On the day that the shit really came down-when buildings fell again or if a similar nightmare scenario played out-Crow wouldn’t mind having Lloyd Jupiter at his side.
Fort Avenue dead-ended into Fort McHenry, the star-shaped fort where a pivotal battle in the War of 1812 had inspired Francis Scott Key to write “The Star-Spangled Banner.” In honor of that deed, the fort had commissioned a statue of Orpheus-or, as locals called him, that naked guy with the harp. Tess parked in the public lot and began heading west along a street where there was a bar, on average, every two blocks.
She had not been in the Locust Point section of Baltimore for two years, and the area had changed considerably, like most of the city’s waterfront. She could see the shells of expensive town houses-at this width and price, they would never allow themselves to be called rowhouses-rising by the harbor, and there was a fancy-schmancy bakery, the kind of place where a cupcake cost almost as much as a Lady Baltimore in the old-fashioned stalls in Cross Street Market. But most of the old bars were hanging on, with only a few chichi interlopers. Given that her father was once an inspector for the liquor board, Tess couldn’t help speculating why so many licenses had been granted in the area. It had to be tied to political patronage; the question was whether it implied a surplus of clout or a complete lack thereof. She also wondered how many of the places made illegal payouts on the video poker games where, even at midday, stonefaced zombies sat pressing buttons forlornly.
The bartenders at such places were expert at protecting their regulars, especially from women inquiring after them. But with reasonable deployments of charm and cash, she managed to ascertain whether Jay Rainier was known in these parts. “Captain Larry’s?” the bartender at Truman’s volunteered, but the skipper there sent her to Hogan’s Alley, which recommended the End Zone, a cruel joke, as that bar had been replaced by a yuppie joint, the Idle Hour. She had worked her way almost two miles down Fort Avenue when she found the man himself in Dorothy’s, a pale lager and a large cheeseburger in front of him.
“Don’t you worry about mad cow disease?” Tess asked, taking the stool next to him.
“Hmmmph,” Rainier said, his mouth full.
“Me neither. I’ll have what the gentleman’s having, medium rare, Swiss cheese if you’ve got it.”
“And a Coors Light, too?” the waitress asked.
Tess didn’t believe in the light version of anything. She studied the handles on the draft taps. “Yuengling.”
“You want fries with that?” The waitress’s tone suggested she had a vested interest in Tess’s weight.
“I want fries with everything.”
“Hey, Monaghan,” Rainer said after a hard swallow. He seemed wary but not unfriendly. “Is this a chance encounter?”
“Not exactly.”
“Fuck me.” There was no edge to his words, however. He studied the silent television above them, tuned to ESPN. “Second real day of the baseball season and probably the last one that the Mets will be in first place.”
Tess nodded in pretend empathy. She had been brought up to hate the Mets more than any other team in major-league baseball. The very mention of 1969-the year that Baltimore teams had lost to New York ones in the World Series, the Super Bowl, and the NBA championships-could ruin her father’s day.