Kinko’s, one with an Internet connection and a printer. It took a while, but Fred Jacobs was as good as his word. A little after nine, I left with the set of prints I needed to test my theory. Now I wanted a place to think and drink. Not necessarily in that order.
CHAPTER 31
J oe’s on Broadway opened at six a.m. and sold cans of beer for a dollar and a quarter. I sat under a sign that hung from the ceiling and read sorry, we’re open. The bar was full with its evening crowd, which meant there were five people in the place. Four of them were talking to themselves, which was okay because that meant they wouldn’t bother me. The fifth was the bartender.
“Yeah?”
He spoke without taking his eyes off the screen. Bob Barker was playing the plip-plop game with an overweight housewife I’d be willing to bet was from Ohio.
“A Bud,” I said.
“Yes.”
The bartender made a fist and pumped it once. Onscreen, the housewife hung on Bob Barker’s neck as he described the recreational vehicle she had just won.
“Isn’t that on during the day?” I said.
“Actually, it’s not on at all. We taped the old shows and watch them back-to-back all night.”
I didn’t have a whole lot to add to that and took my cold can of booze to a stool by the window. The beginnings of a Chicago rainstorm knocked politely against the glass. A homeless woman sat on a bench near the bus stop. I tipped the Bud her way. She shuffled over to the window, stood in front of me, and held out her hand. I walked outside and gave her a couple of bucks. Then I went back inside, took a seat at the bar, and pulled out the booking photo and prints Jacobs had sent me. The picture was more than a decade old, but I recognized the face. Remembered the anger.
I slid the prints and photo back into the envelope and pulled out some notes from my conversation with the volunteer named Teen. I needed to talk to her. But not tonight. I took a sip of beer and wondered if it was too late to call Rodriguez. Probably. On TV, a woman from Pharr, Texas, won Bob Barker’s grand showcase. I toasted her success. Then I took a glass of Irish and another beer. It was warm inside the bar, and the whiskey tasted all the better with rain pounding against the awning outside and washing the streets clean. I decided things could wait until tomorrow and was about to order a microwave pizza when a friend scraped into the empty stool next door.
“Drinking alone. Not good, Kelly. Not good.”
Willie Dawson shook the rain off his shoulders, lifted a finger, and ordered himself a water glass full of Johnnie Walker Red.
“What brings you in here, Willie?”
The bartender measured out the drink and pushed it across the bar. Willie took a taste and smacked his lips.
“Nothing like whiskey on a night like this. Nothing close. But I don’t need to tell you that.”
I waited. Willie took a look around the place and then back at me.
“You spend a lot of time here, Kelly?”
“What’s up, Willie?”
Dawson glanced toward the front windows and beyond. I could see smoke from a tailpipe, a wink of red, and the metallic black flank of a car, idling under the streetlight in front of Joe’s.
“He wants to have a word.”
I wondered how the mayor had tracked me to a dive bar on a Friday night. Even better, why? The former question would probably remain exactly that. The answer to the latter, however, was just a few feet away. I finished my Irish and nodded to the inch and a half of booze left in Willie’s glass.
“Finish up, then. Don’t want to keep Himself waiting.”
A CHIME BEEPED as I opened the back door to the Town Car. The mayor was bundled into a corner, gazing out over Broadway, his face half lit by an interior light. I climbed into the seat across from him. Willie slammed the door shut and got into the front beside the driver. I caught a final glimpse of the back of Willie’s head before a partition slid across, sealing the mayor and me in back.
“Thanks for taking the time, Kelly.”
The mayor talked without taking his eyes off the street. He wore a tuxedo under the cashmere of a gray overcoat, and white calves peeked out from where his pants rode up too high. Or maybe his socks were just too short. Either way, the mayor seemed uncomfortable with the whole lot of it.
“You like wearing the monkey suit?” I said.
The mayor pulled his eyes off the street and flicked at the silk scarf tucked under his chin.
“This fucking thing? Hate it. You want a drink?”
I shook my head. The mayor leaned forward and poured himself a vodka over ice from the minibar at his elbow.
“You think I like any of this shit, Kelly?”
“I think you like being mayor, Mr. Mayor.”
Wilson took a sip of his drink. “You mean the power, right?”
“I think it’s a rush for you,” I said. “Just like it would be for anyone.”
“You say that like you’d exclude yourself,” the mayor said.
I shrugged and felt his eyes measuring me from across the car.
“My mother’s maiden name is Sviokla.” Wilson washed his mouth out with his drink. “Polish. Southeast Side.”
“The old steel mills.”
“That’s right. Ironworkers and Old Style. People who worked paycheck to paycheck and knew when it was time to die.”
“Excuse me?”
The mayor bared his teeth and laughed like a horse. If a horse could laugh, that is.
“A lot to be said for knowing when to die, Kelly. Heart attack, stroke. Whatever the fuck it is, get on with it when you hit sixty-five and make some room for somebody else. You know what I’m talking about?”
I nodded, just because it was interesting as hell.
“Today people want to live forever,” the mayor said. “Expect it, for chrissakes. But here’s the question. Who’s gonna pay for it all?”
“The government?”
Wilson dropped his head and grunted into his chest.
“That’s exactly right. The fucking government. I’m a Democrat. Don’t get me wrong. But let me ask you, how does a city pay for all that? People can’t live until they’re eighty, ninety years old. It just isn’t natural. You don’t want a drink?”
I shook my head no. The mayor freshened his own.
“Anyway, that’s me. Still live in the bungalow neighborhood I grew up in. Sure, it’s a bigger house than the rest of them. But still the same neighborhood. Same tavern at the end of the street.”
“It’s your power base,” I said.
“And I won’t stray too far from it, right?”
“Why would you?”
Wilson shrugged. “Know where I was tonight?”
“Fund-raiser?”
“Kid’s name is Jeffrey Dobey. Has MS. Muscles like fucking Jell-O. Tough life, right?”
I nodded. The mayor took another sip of his vodka.
