Murder Most Merry

stuff down on the pad.

“Hold on the line.” he said finally, and keyed the mike to alert the guys who were probably damn near asleep in their cars by now. “Eighteen and Twenty-Seven.” He pushed each word slow and distinct, even for him. “Code Fifty-two—that’s Code Five-two—at Smokey’s—that’s Smokey’s—Seventy-seven Village Street. See Bob Gates, standing by in front.”

“Damn,” I said. “A stiff at Smokey’s.” It looked like I was going to have to go out in all that weather and act busy; double damn. But I didn’t know the worst of it yet.

“Wuzzit?” I asked. “Some wino fall asleep in the door?” Smokey’s is in a part of town where that happens some, so maybe I wouldn’t have to do much besides take pictures.

But my life just ain’t that pretty. Rosey looked up at me with no look at all in his eyes and said, “It is Mr. Smollett, Jake. And Bob says he was shot.”

That was worth a whistle, and I gave it one. If you believe some folks. Fred “Smokey” Smollett just ran a real busy bar at the edge of town, where we border up on the city. If you believe others, he ran everything out of that bar that would run for money: games, women, drugs, and the occasional bit of stolen property. If you believe still other people, he paid us for the privilege.

Mind you, he never paid me anything. I never got that high up the ladder. Never even got high enough to know for certain he was paying off. But there was lots of talk, and it don’t pay not to listen.

“Tell ‘em just to hold the scene.” If this was what it sounded like, I was going to have to get off my ass and do some detective work. But not much; once the brass learned who it was and what it was. they’d fall all over each other to get to Smokey’s. “Call the lieutenant and see if we can get a real photographer out there. See if he’ll let us call Dibbs.” Dibbs wouldn’t much like that after working all night, but he’d been to more evidence schools than me, so he was the man for an important job. And this was one. Talk was, Smollett had his hooks in some pretty major people here in the department, and that would include—

“What’s up?” Sergeant Sughrue was leaning on the doorframe, still looking bad hungover but talking casual. Rosey told him and he nodded, still leaning, still talking casual. “Cancel those calls.” he said. “Marley and me can take a look and see what has to be done before we go dragging everyone out on Christmas overtime.” He turned to me. “Fetch the car, Jake; I’ll get the kit.” And he slouched off.

Rosey and I traded looks. We both of us knew I was a bad photographer and even worse handling evidence. Any other day of the year, there’d be brass hats enough around the place to make sure a job like this got handled by the best—or carefulest—we had. But this was Merry-dammit-Christmas, the brass was at home, and Sergeant Sughrue had just handed us a direct order. Rosey sure as hell wasn’t going to cross him.

And me neither, I guess. I cursed the bones of old Kris Kringle and went out to get the car.

Traffic was light, and a good thing, too. because the streets were godawful. We saw just one snow plow on our way across town, slumping through the snow drifts like a whipped dog. The rest of the way, it was find the road and try to stay on it.

After a while, though. I got into the tracks made by the cruisers already on the scene ahead of us. and I figured this might be my chance. Now that I could drive with one hand, I reached out and got the radio mike.

“I’ll just make sure Rosey called the lieutenant—”

That was as far as I got with it before Sughrue’s big left hand jerked out and knocked the mike clean from my fingers.

That was a funny moment, right then. I mean, Sughrue had a temper, all right, and he was fast and mean and looked to be hungover bad, but hitting my hand like that was past the edge, even for him. I looked over—real quick because I had to pay attention to the road—and just for a second he was bent over, his face screwed up like he was mad as hell. Then his eyes opened up and locked on mine.

It couldn’t have been more than a quarter of a second, that glance, because I had to look right back at the road, but it was long enough for something to pass between us. Something really ugly.

“I’ll call him from Smokey’s.” Sughrue slumped back in the seat, his voice softer than I expected. I thought he was going to say more, and I think he thought so. too, but we were both quiet the rest of the way.

And that thing that passed between us. whatever it was. kept biting my butt.

I wasn’t long figuring it out, either. It didn’t take a real educated nose to smell the stink around this business pretty quick, and by the time we got to Smokey’s. I’d pretty much put it together.

I saw it like this: Smollett, who probably has more dirt on the department in general and Sughrue in particular than was safe for anyone, gets shot dead. And it happens on Christmas, when the senior detectives and the brass hats are all at home with the kiddies. And here’s Sughrue, he just comes tripping into work on Christmas morning looking like slime on a shingle and insisting him and me are going to investigate this all by ourselves—him that supposedly Smollett was paying off, and me...

Some folks say I became a cop because I’m too lazy to work and not smart enough to steal, but they’re only half right. I could see this one coming down Main Street. And I was getting scared, because when Sughrue knocked that mike out of my hand and we looked at each other, I could tell he didn’t want anyone at that crime scene who’d act like he gave a damn. And maybe in my eyes he saw I’d figured that out. And if he did see it. my life wasn’t worth dryer lint, because Sughrue was that much faster and stronger and meaner than me that if he got worried about me giving him up. and decided to do something about it, I was damn sure to finish second.

That’s what I was thinking when we walked into Smokey’s that Christmas day, and it was pretty damn grim, if you ask me. Of course, Sughrue’s dead now, and maybe I killed him. and I for sure didn’t have it all figured out like I thought I did. But you can understand, maybe, why I was sweating like a crack-head when Sughrue told the uniforms at the scene to secure the area and take a statement from old Bob Gates, who used to sweep up the place, while he and I went into the office where Smollett was laying around dead.

It looked like the office of every bar everywhere. Maybe bigger than some, but with the same battered desk, cheap paneling, and old steel safe you see in all of them. Only here the safe hung open: a dead man sat behind the desk, white like the snow, leaning way back in his chair, with a raunchy cigar still clenched in his teeth: and there was blood all over.

And I mean. There Was Blood All Over: it was on the wall behind Smollett’s body in big splash patterns, it was soaked into the carpet under his chair, it was spritzed across the top of his desk, and it dribbled from his private toilet—a closet-sized deal off to one side—clear to the front of the desk.

“Let’s check out the bathroom,” Sughrue said, and I followed him quick. It wasn’t quite as gross as the rest of the place, but there was plenty of blood on the floor by the sink, and like I said, the trail of drops to the front of the desk.

“This is where it started,” Sughrue said when we’d looked around a little. “Smollett got shot here, went to his desk, tried to call for help, then fell back in his chair and bled to death. I’ll call the coroner.” He took a couple of slow steps back to the office and dialed the dead man’s phone.

And if I had any doubts about the smell around this thing, I stopped having them right then. Because we never call the coroner till we’re completely through gathering evidence. Last thing we want is those guys coming in with their jumpsuits and body bags, stepping all over everything. But here Sughrue calls them first thing.

I didn’t say a word, though. No sense letting on I knew any more than he already thought I did. Just stay quiet, act dumb, and maybe you’ll get out of this better than Smollett did, I told myself.

So I took pictures, knowing that no better than I am, and in this light, they’d be worthless. I got shots of Smollett in his chair, supposedly showing how he’d sat down, leaned back against the wall where his blood was spattered, and bled to death. I took pictures of the empty safe, thinking whoever shot him also took all the incriminating records (that ‘s how long ago this was: nowadays there’d be computer disks and backup files and all but back then, if it wasn’t on paper, it wasn’t there, period), and just as the guys from the coroner’s came clomping in, I got pictures of the blood on Smollett’s desk and the drips running from his toilet into the office. And like I say, I knew every damn one of them was worthless: The way I handled a camera, no one’d even recognize it was Smollett unless they saw the cigar stuck in his mouth, and the other shots would be too light or too dark, or just not pointed right to show which way the blood was splattered—

So maybe I’m not bright, after all. It took me all the while they were moving Smollett to figure out what that blood was telling me. And to tie it in with how Sughrue was sitting heavy in a spare seat off to one side while the coroner’s boys made their haul. But by the time they left, I was almost curious about all this.