I lit a cigarette, watching the dogs sniff the air, trying to do the same. From where I sat, there was no way to approach the gas station without me seeing it. I wasn't worried about customers - the only gas in the place was in the plastic bottle in my paper bag.
Almost an hour passed. I'd gone through several smokes, and the dogs had exhausted my supply of cheese. They wouldn't come close enough for me to touch, but the big guy sat about ten feet away, watching me; his partner stretched out next to him.
I was completely in shadow when the red Camaro pulled up to the pumps. The windows were down. A woman in the front seat. She turned off the engine. The dogs left me, ambling over to the car. Trucks rumbled by on Metropolitan.
She got out of the car. A big woman. Honey-taffy hair, hacked off near her shoulders, bangs covering her forehead almost to her eyes. She was wearing a peach-colored sweatshirt over a pair of loose white pants. Hands on hips she turned one complete circle, sweeping the area.
I came to my feet quietly, moved to her. She saw me coming, a wino with a paper bag in one hand. She stood her ground.
'Hello, Belle,' I said.
'You're Burke?'
I nodded, watching her eyes to see if she was expecting company of her own. Her eyes were small, dark, set close together. Her face was round, smooth - unformed except for a tiny pointed chin. She was as tall as I was, wider through the shoulders and hips. I glanced at her feet. White running shoes, small, like her hands. No watch. No rings.
The back seat of the Camaro was empty. 'Would you open the trunk?' I asked her.
'Why?'
'I want to see if you've got a spare.'
She bobbed her head like she understood. Bent inside the car to pull the keys from the ignition. Her hips flexed under the loose white pants. She handed me the keys. The trunk held only a blue overnight case.
I motioned her to get in the car, climbed behind the wheel, and started it up. She walked around the front of the car, opened the passenger door, turned her back to me, swung her butt inside, and dropped it into the seat. Pulled her legs in and closed the door. She filled the seat. Sat there, tiny hands in her lap. Waiting.
I drove aimlessly around the area for a few minutes. Nothing out of place. The second time I passed the spot where I'd parked the Plymouth, I pulled in next to it, nose toward the water. I got out, walked around to the back of the car, leaned against the trunk. Belle followed me. Stood next to me. Put her hands behind her, palms against the trunk. Hoisted herself up. The trunk bounced a few times with her weight. If the hot metal was burning into her backside, she didn't show it.
'The man who wants to meet you . . .'
I held up my hand like a traffic cop. 'We had a deal.' She pulled up her sweatshirt. A bunch of bills was folded into the waistband of her pants. Green on milk. She pulled the sheaf of bills out, handed it to me. All fifties. Ten of them. Used. I slipped them into my shirt pocket.
'Fifteen minutes,' I told her.
'There's a man who wants to meet with you. He doesn't want you to get the wrong idea.'
'This man have a name?'
I watched her face in profile. Her nose was barely a bump - lost on her broad, round face. A bead of clear sweat ran down one cheek. 'Marques Dupree,' she said.
I took a drag on my cigarette. 'I already have the wrong idea,' I told her.
'You said you'd hear me out.'
I took another drag.
'He has a problem. A big problem. He said you're the man to help him - you'd know what to do.'
'I know what to do. Why should I do it?'
'He said this is something you'd want to do.'
'You know what it is?'
'No.'
'So what's there to talk about?'
'Marques wants to meet with you. He said you wouldn't come if he called.'
'He's right.'
'He sent me to show you he's on the square. It's a job, okay? That's all.'
'I don't work for Marques.'
'He said you'd say that too. All he wants is for you to meet with him.'
I bit into the cigarette, thinking. Marques was doing this the right way. He wouldn't be stupid enough to just roll up on me - he didn't have the weight for that. If Marques Dupree was coming to me, he had to have real troubles.
'You one of his ladies?' I asked her.
Her tiny chin came up. She turned full-face to me. Her close-set eyes were almost black; I couldn't see the pupils. 'I'm not a whore.' She wasn't mad - just setting it straight.
'So why you doing this?'
She reached out a tiny hand, patted my shirt pocket.
Where the money was.
'I'll think about it, okay? Where can I find you?'
'Me?'
'Yeah. You. I
'I work at The Satellite Dish. Out by JFK.'
'That's a strip joint,' I said.
Something must have shown in my face. Her tiny rose-bud mouth made a quick kissing motion. 'You think I'm over qualified?'
I shrugged.
'I work every night except Tuesday.'
I put my hand on her wrist. Gently, holding her attention.
'Tell Marques not to call me. If I want to meet him I'll come and tell you first.'
'What if you don't want to see him?'
'Then I won't,' I told her, guiding her back into the driver's seat, motioning for her to take off.
I started walking in the opposite direction. The Camaro drove off. I watched over my shoulder as she turned the corner; then I went back to the Plymouth.
21
The warehouse off Division Street in Chinatown looked like it always does. Empty. Deserted. I pulled in, turned off the engine. Waited. When I heard the door close behind me, I knew Max was home.
The warehouse was furnished with dim shadows. I followed Max up the back stairs to the second floor. He usually went to the back room, where we'd work on our life-sentence gin game. Something different tooay. Max stopped on the landing. His temple was upstairs. The dojo where he practiced, the teak floor marked with a white- pine border. The sacred ground where Flood met a freak who called himself the Cobra. The killing floor.
Immaculata was sitting in a low chair in a corner of the white room. A black lacquer table covered with hooks and papers at her elbow. The baby sat across from her, wearing only a diaper, her little face grave as she watched her mother work. A butcher-block table ran the length of one wall, with hardwood straight-back chairs at each end. Max gestured to one of the chairs. I sat down as Immaculata put her notes aside and rose to her feet.
'Hello, Burke.'
'Hi, Mac. How's Flower?'
'She is a perfect child,' Mac said, as though she'd carefully considered all the other possibilities. 'Some tea?'
'Thank you,' I said, knowing what she meant.
