Swan Dive

I’ll tell you if I find it before they do.”
    ”Hey, man, I figure you owe me a favor for pulling you dick out of the fire.” He took a card from his pocket and handed it to me. Just his name and a telephone number. ”So maybe you pay me back with a little tip when the time come.”
    ”To make up for you losing Angel.”
    ”Fucken A.”
    ”My friend, I’m not about to tip you about any drug stash. I’m just interested in finding out who killed Marsh and the Angel so I can get off the hook.”
    ”Hey, so maybe I can help you there. You want to talk with some of my other ladies, maybe they can tell you things about the Angel.”
    I thought about it. Couldn’t hurt. ”When?”
    ”As they say in the Hollywood , let’s do lunch.”
    ”Jesus.”
    ”Tomorrow. Say late, ‘round one-thirty.”
    ”Okay. Where?”
    ”I got a favorite place. La Flor. On Sommer off Appleton .”
    ”South End?”
    ”You got it.” Niño looked at me again. ”You talk with her girlfriend yet?”
    ”Girlfriend?”
    ”The Angel, she like to see all the life can offer, man. She have this butch chick, name of Goldberg, Reena Goldberg.”
    ”How do I find her?”
    ”South End. Just a coupla blocks from La Flor. She in the book.”
    ”Thanks.”
    Niño scratched under his chin. ”You didn’t know about the girlfriend, you ain’t seen the Angel’s place yet either.”
    ”That’s right. The cops aren’t exactly sharing notes with me.”
    He started to say something else, then stopped and said, ”I got a key. To her apartment. You wanna see it?”
    ”Yeah.”
    ”Tomorrow night, maybe. We talk about it at lunch.”
    He pulled up two blocks from my building, saying, ”Sorry about the service, but if J.J. watching you place again, I don’t want Terdell making me as the one who put him down.”
    ”Your secret’s safe. And thanks.”
    I got out of the car gingerly, then left my door open. ”You looked pretty professional, sapping Terdell tonight.”
    ”Man, you small as me, you gotta learn how to stop guys like him. Without killing them, I mean.”
    ”Mind telling me where you were when I got hit Monday afternoon?”
    He laughed and nailed the gas, using his acceleration to close the door as he moved out.

    I walked toward the condominium building slowly, partly because of my aching body and partly because of watching for J.J. and Terdell. Aside from a couple walking hand in hand, I didn’t see anybody.
    When I reached the front stoop, a shadow began to move in the shrubbery. I registered a black face and started before I recognized him.
    ”Sergeant,” I said.
    Dawkins nodded. ”You looking a little ragged, Cuddy.”
    I brushed at some of the mud, now caking dry here and there. ”Want to come up?”
    ”That’s what I’m here for.”
    He climbed the outside and inside stairs behind me, waiting patiently as I fumbled with the keys at each door. I motioned him into the living room. ”I’m going to change before I sit on my landlord’s furniture. Help yourself to the refrigerator if you want.”
    I went into the bedroom and eased out of the clothes I was wearing. I found some loose-fitting sweats and carried them into the bathroom.
    I had a purple bruise swirled with red at each place where Terdell pasted me with the two-by-four. The skin under my chin from his last shot was broken, but closing over already in that regenerating, reassuring way skin has. I killed the light and went into the living room.
    Dawkins was sitting back in a deep, comfortable chair, legs stretched out straight, arms spread-eagled, with a bottle of Molson’s in his right hand. He was wearing a silk dress shirt and silk suit, sleeves pushed up to his elbows.
    I sat on the couch, leaned back, and closed my eyes. After about two minutes, Dawkins said, ”Murphy said you a cool one.”
    ”Look, it’s been a long day, and I hurt like hell. What do you want?”
    ”Picked up a ripple that J.J. and his man Terdell out to talk with a guy tonight. Looks like you not their idea of good conversation.”
    ”Word travels fast.”
    ”Like the wind, babe. Like the wind.”
    ”Just get to it, okay?”
    ”Okay. Marsh’s stuff hasn’t hit the street yet.”
    ”How do you know?”
    ”J.J. deals in smallish quantity, but high quality. If shit that good appeared in somebody else’s merchandise, I’d know about it.”
    ”Couldn’t a big dealer kind of hide it in his volume?”
    ”Yeah, and if he stepped on it enough times, nobody’d know the