track down people, and how much information is public and free, half the PIs in America will have to close up shop.
Alvy lived in a house off Belmont Avenue, near where Belmont crosses over I-440. I knew the neighborhood well, had once had an apartment over there myself before my ill-fated and ill-timed marriage. It’s an area of older homes, some classic near-mansions, all mixed in with a variety of rental housing ranging from upscale, remodeled apartment buildings to tenement duplexes. It was a fun neighborhood, kind of funky. But I wouldn’t want to walk the streets alone in the middle of the night.
By the time I’d tracked Alvy’s home address down, it was nearly four. I gassed up the car and picked up an afternoon paper at the Shell station just across the river on Main Street. The headline read HOSTAGE SITUATION WORSENS and below the main story, a headline announced that the state attorney general had ruled Evangeline would have to have an autopsy. No way around it.
“Oh, hell,” I muttered, spewing a sigh of disgust. This wasn’t going to cool anything off.
“Yeah, that be something, don’t it?” I looked up from the paper to find an older black man with thinning, gray hair reading over my shoulder as we stood in line to pay.
“It’s awful,” I agreed.
“You know, somebody oughta go in there and just get those people out of there.”
“Pump number six?” the cashier asked.
I nodded my head. “Twelve sixty-four,” she said, “plus thirty-five cents for the paper. Will that be all?”
“Yes, thanks.” I handed her a ten and a five, then stood waiting for change.
Back at the house, I waved at Mrs. Hawkins through her kitchen window before she had a chance to come out and rope me into a conversation. Right now I didn’t have the energy.
The answering machine in my apartment was empty, so I called my office. When I punched the remote code, the answering machine came back at me with two messages. The first was from Roger Vaden, Slim’s first lawyer, who said he’d forwarded my agreement on to Herman Reid, who’d be taking over the criminal defense. That put a kink in my gut, since I was counting on being under some lawyer’s aegis now. The second was a tight, frantic message from Ray basically asking where the hell I’d been. He hadn’t seen me in the office in a couple of days and I hadn’t called.
“That’s right, Ray,” I said to the wall. “I’ve been a little busy.”
I dialed his office number and got their machine. It was weird to hear Slim’s voice on the recording, knowing where he was now. I found myself filled with a heaviness I hadn’t expected; something about seeing an innocent man languish in jail gets to me. I had no sympathy for the guys who were in jail because that’s where they belonged, but nobody can deny there are some there who shouldn’t be.
I left Ray a quick message, then finished the rest of the newspaper. A few community leaders were beginning to question the wisdom of the mayor’s decision to negotiate. There were also a few letters on the editorial page suggesting we just go in there and blow them all to hell, including one amusing epistle from a regular letter writer who suggested that since these people were so looking forward to being with Jesus, we should just go in there and help them along a little.
“Bloody hell,” I muttered. “Idiots …”
Later, as I lay in bed and stared at the ceiling, I tried to will myself to fall asleep for a couple of hours. The brain would not disengage, however, and I kept running around in circles. I kept imagining Alvy Barnes and Agon Dumbler whispering on the phone to each other, telling secrets, giving away insider information, then meeting in a dark alley to pass an envelope stuffed with cash from his fat hand to her slender, pale one. Gradually, the visions began to run together until they became first a bit surreal, then full-fledged dreams.
Without even being aware of it, I slipped off to sleep.
When I woke up, I was facing the wall. Only a faint glow of streetlights filtered through the shades. I rolled over. The luminous dial on the clock read ten-thirty.
I felt like I was slugging my way to the surface of a barrel full of fresh mud. My joints ached and my eyes burned, but it was a measure of how crappy I’d felt earlier that I perceived this as an improvement.
Painfully, I staggered to my feet and stumbled into the bathroom. A full sixty seconds of running warm water over my face followed by a serious tooth scrubbing got me to the half-alive point. I combed my hair back and pulled on a flannel shirt and jeans.
I thought about calling Marsha. Wondered, in fact, why she hadn’t called me. I grabbed the phone, punched in her number, and got a busy signal. Maybe she was on the phone with Howard Spellman. Maybe they were negotiating an end to this mess.
When, I tried to remember, had I last eaten? I hadn’t paid much attention at first, but hunger had caught up with me. Mrs. Lee’s was already closed, but I felt more like breakfast anyway. I jumped in the car and headed back across the river, to the all-night International House of Pancakes on Twenty-first Avenue. The IHOP had been a late-night mecca for decades. With this being a Friday night close to final exams at Vanderbilt, I was lucky to get a booth.
I snarfed down a plate of eggs and grits, toast and bacon, with two cups of decaf. Slowly, I was beginning to feel a little less fragmented. I walked outside into the brightly lit parking lot. Back in the cool night air, cars were rolling by in an endless stream from left to right. I remembered what Nashville had been like when I was growing up as a child. Back then, if you lived as far out as the airport, you were in the country, and the town went to bed so early you didn’t need traffic lights after nine. That was a long time ago; that memory combined with all the perky, tight little undergraduates in the IHOP made me feel about a hundred years old.
I got back in the Mazda and joined the long parade. I cut left on some side street, then jogged my way over to Belmont Avenue. Down Belmont past the International Market, I turned right up a hill into a neighborhood of restored nineteenth-century homes. Inside my shirt pocket was a slip of paper with Alvy Barnes’s address. I unfolded it and held it up to the window, reading it by the flickering silver and orange of the streetlights as I drove by.
A half block from Alvy’s house, I pulled over to the curb and parked. I leaned down low in the seat and stared over the top of the dashboard, studying the brick-and-stucco two-story house. Sometimes it was hard to tell, but I think this one was rental property, a large, towering house that had been converted to apartments. The yard was neatly trimmed and bordered in sculptured shrubs. Whoever owned this place cared for it.
I left the Mazda behind and walked up the street. Alvy’s house was on a hill, with a half flight of concrete steps leading up to a long walk that led to the front door. On either side of the double front doors, light filtered through drawn shades. I huffed up the stairs, then walked to the front porch. The front door was open, leading into a small foyer with four apartment doors, each with a brass number nailed to the front. Alvy’s apartment was number one, the door to the immediate left. On the darkly varnished door, there was a white card in a holder: BARNES/HOYT.
I checked my watch. Midnight would be rolling around in a few minutes. I hoped I hadn’t caught Alvy at a bad time, at least not too bad a time. I wanted to catch her off guard, but not in the throes of anything sweaty and embarrassing.
My knock echoed off the walls of the foyer, reverberating in the cramped space. Silence followed, so I rapped on the door again, this time loud enough to wake anyone sleeping. There was a rustle behind the door, then a female voice.
“Who is it?”
I cleared my throat. “I’m sorry to bother you so late, but I’m looking for Alvy Barnes.”
A lock rattled, then turned. The door opened a crack. Blonde hair and clear blue eyes looked out at me from behind a cheap security chain. “It’s late. She’s gone to bed.”
“I’m really sorry, but I’ve got to talk to her now. It’s very important. You might even say it’s an emergency.”
“Who are you?”
“My name’s Denton. Harry James Denton.”
I heard an exasperated, impatient sigh, then she shut the door and relocked it. I stood there wondering if she’d gone to get Alvy or had just decided to close the door in my face. I looked down at my watch. I’d give her a couple of minutes before I knocked again.
I didn’t have to wait that long. The lock rattled again, then the door opened without the security chain. Alvy
