“Oh, we came to blows, all right, that part of it is most certainly true,” Foster said, grinning. “It’s the ‘debate’ part I would challenge. I wouldn’t exactly call his diatribe a debate.”
Kling was trying to decide whether he liked the man or not. He had become overly sensitive in his dealings with black people ever since he’d begun living with a black woman. What he tried to do was see all black people through Sharyn’s eyes. In that way, all the color bullshit disappeared. The first thing he’d learned from her was that she despised the label “African-American.” The second thing he’d learned was that she liked to kiss with her eyes open. Sharyn Cooke was a medical doctor and a Deputy Chief in the Police Department, but Kling never saluted her.
He guessed he liked the mischievous gleam in Foster’s eyes. He knew the man was a troublemaker, but sometimes troublemakers were good if they raked up the right kind of trouble. He was wondering how Lester Henderson had managed to survive a fist fight with the man who’d once been Rhino Jones. Henderson’s pictures in this morning’s paper showed him as a slight man with narrow shoulders and the sort of haircut every politician on television sported, a nonpartisan trim that Kling personally called “The Trent Lott Cut.” Weren’t the Reverend Foster’s hamlike fists registered as deadly weapons? Or had he pulled his punches? And when, exactly, had that boxing match taken place, anyway?
Reading his mind, Carella said, “Tell us about that fight, Reverend Foster.”
“Most people call me Gabe,” Foster said. “It was hardly what I’d call a fight, either. A fight is where two people exchange punches with the idea of knocking somebody unconscious. That is what a fight is all about. Or evenkillingthe other person—which I understand might be a sensitive subject at the moment, considering what happened to that S.O.B.” Foster grinned again. “A week ago Sunday, Lester threw a punch at me, which I sidestepped, and I shoved out at him, which caused him to fall on his ass, and that was the end of that. Photo op for all the cameras in town, but no decision.”
“Why’d he punch you, Gabe?” Kling asked.
“He did notpunchme, per se, hetriedto punch me. I saw it coming all the way from North Dakota, and was out of the way before it was even a thought.”
“Why’d hetryto punch you?” Kling asked.
“Are you the brother dating Sharyn Cooke?” Foster said.
“Brother” was not a word Kling might have used. Neither was “dating.”
“What’s that got to do with the price of fish?” he asked.
“Just wondered. I used to know Sharyn’s mother. Cleaning lady up here in Diamondback. She helped around the church every now and then. When I was just starting out.”
“Why’d Henderson try to punch you?” Kling asked. Third time around. Maybe he’d get lucky.
“Gee, I really don’t know,” Foster said. “You think it’s cause I called him a racist pig?”
“Now why’d you go say something like that?” Carella asked. His eyes, his faint smile betrayed the knowledge that Lester Henderson had been called this before, in many variations on the theme, the most recent one from a state senator, who’d called him “Hitler without a mustache.”
“It’s a known fact that he was targeting Diamondback for extinction,” Foster said. “If I’m not mistaken, Detective Carella, you yourself investigated a case just recently where the drug problem up here played an important role. Well, Henderson was all for toughening the state’s already Draconian drug laws, laws that are methodically clearing young black people off the streets…”
Here comes a speech, Kling thought.
“…and throwing them into already overcrowded prisons that are costing taxpayers a fortune to maintain. Instead of helping these youths to become productive members of a thriving community, we are instead turning them into criminals. I pointed this out to Lester, and I casually mentioned that only a racist pig would pursue a course as politically motivated as the one he was promoting. That was when he tried to pop me.”
“Small wonder,” Carella said. “So where were you around ten-thirty Monday morning, Gabe?”
“Oh dear,” Foster said.
“Oh dear indeed.”
“I fear I was asleep in my own little beddie-bye, all by my little self.”
“Which would have been where?”
“1112 Roosevelt Av. Apartment 6B.”
“And what time did you getoutof your little beddie-bye?”
“I came to the office here at eleven. I had a scheduled eleven-thirty interview with a reporter.”
“What time did you leave the apartment?” Kling asked.
“Around ten-thirty. Whenever the weather is good, I walk to work.”
“So you weren’t anywhere near King Memorial at ten-thirty Monday morning, is that right?”
“Nowhere near it at all.”
“Be nice if someone had been in bed with you,” Carella said.
“Yes, it’s always nice to have someone in bed with you,” Foster said.
“But no one was.”
“No one at all.”
“What’dyou say your address was again?” Kling asked.
“1112 Roosevelt.”
“That’s between Twenty-eighth and Twenty-ninth, isn’t it?”
“No, it’s further uptown.”
“Near King Memorial?”
“A few blocks away, yes.”
“Where exactly?” Carella asked.
“Between Thirty-first and -second.”
“The Hall’s on St. Sab’s, corner of Thirtieth,” Kling said.
“So it is,” Foster said.
“If you’d walked one block over, you could’ve passed it on your way to work.”
“IfI’d walked one block over,” Foster said. “But I came straight down Roosevelt. Same way I always do.”
“You walk the ten blocks down to Twenty-first here…”
“Yes, and then I walk the block crosstown to St. Sab’s.”
“Nice walk.”
“If the weather’s nice, yes.”
“It certainly was nice Monday,” Kling said.
“It certainly was,” Carella said.
“Fellas, let’s cut the idle bullshit, okay?” Foster said. “You know I didn’t kill that prick, so it doesn’t matterwhereI was Monday morning. I could’ve been home in bed with the entire Mormon Tabernacle Choir, or I could’ve been right outside King Memorial tying my shoelaces. I may have done some foolish things in my lifetime, but killing a man a week after we had a brawl is definitely not one of them.”
“I tend to agree,” Carella said.
“Me, too,” Kling said.
“But we have to ask,” Carella said.
“You know how it is,” Kling said.
“Thanks for your time, Gabe. If you happen to hear anything…”
“What would I hear?”
“Well, youdohave your finger on the community pulse. Maybe somebody saw something, heard something, feels it’s his duty to report it to a community leader…”
“That’s yetmorebullshit,” Foster said. “I’m still a suspect, right?”
“Teach you to sleep alone,” Carella said.
5
