They all joined in her laughter. Even Clarisse began to chuckle, falling down on the bed and allowing herself the first good laugh she’d had since she’d let them into her home the night before. For a full minute, they shared a piece of humanity that was never present when crack was involved. For that minute, they weren’t pipers. They were just regular people, relaxing and enjoying one of those laughs that lift the weight of the world from one’s shoulders.
Pookie was the first to stop laughing. She sat there in the corner, with her arms wrapped around her legs, and looked at Clarisse. While the last vestiges of laughter seeped slowly from the room, Pookie’s look became a stare, as if for the first time she could see the resemblance between the two of them. Somewhere down deep, they were sisters.
They had come from the same mold and traveled many of the same paths. They had lived many of the same experiences and seen many of the same things. They had both fallen somewhere along the way, and they had both ended up in the same trap. Now, amid the strains of laughter that enveloped the room, they both tried to fight through the haze that was their lives to come to an understanding of it all. By the time the laughter stopped, Pookie was ready to begin.
“Why you ask me that?” she said to Clarisse.
Clarisse, who had just stopped laughing, was momentarily confused.
“Why did I ask you what?” she said, then suddenly remembered the reason she had started laughing in the first place. “Oh, you mean why did I ask you
that.
I was just curious.”
“You was more than curious,” Pookie said. “You knew. I mean, it ain’t like you was wrong or nothin’, but if you know all that before I even tell you, you must know it from experience.”
“That’s why y’all keep tryin’ to kill each other,” Black said. “Y’all just alike.”
Nobody bothered to offer a conflicting opinion.
“So are you going to answer the question or not?” Clarisse said.
“What question?” Pookie said, teasing.
“What happened when the guy told you he’d forgotten to give you something?”
Pookie stood up and walked across the room to where Clarisse sat on the bed. She sat down beside her. And then, with a deep sigh, she continued her story.
“It ain’t like it’s a whole lot to tell,” Pookie said. “He played me. After he told me he forgot to give me something, I closed the car door and we rode to his house. I’d say he lived about ten blocks from us, in one of those big mansions up there on Stenton Avenue, so it only took like two minutes to get there. But in those two minutes, I musta asked him at least ten times what he had for me. You know how little kids act when you get something for ’em and you won’t tell ’em what it is? Well, that’s how I was.”
Pookie shook her head, thinking of how gullible she’d been. Then she slapped her hands against her thighs and continued.
“So when we got to his house, he hit a remote control and these big black gates opened. Now, I’m sittin’ there like, drugged, ’cause I ain’t never seen this before, right? But I’m tryin’ to play it off like I’m used to bein’ in big mansions with big black gates and driveways that’s a block long. And he just drivin’ along, actin’ like he don’t notice me over there lookin’ happier than a faggot in Boys Town. But every time I think about it, I know that he knew right then that he had me.
“I can’t imagine how I musta looked, just sittin’ there, lookin’ stupid, wonderin’ what was on the other side of those big oak doors with the brass handles that I saw comin’ up at the end of the driveway. I guess y’all can probably imagine how I musta looked, too.”
Black couldn’t imagine how Pookie must have looked. And he couldn’t imagine her being stupid about anything, either. He guessed that she must have been a different person before. Maybe she had the luxury of being able to show her feelings, or the luxury of being able to make stupid mistakes. But the streets had taken that away from her. They had taken that away from all of them. Because showing your feelings or making mistakes in the streets can be fatal. And with so many other lethal things in such close proximity, feelings and mistakes become unattainable luxuries.
They all knew that, and Pookie did, too. But she needed to finish, to purge herself. The rest of them needed to listen. So when she started talking again, Black turned from the window, looked in her face, and did just that.
“When we got in his house,” Pookie said hesitantly, as if she were struggling to remember the details, “we walked through this big hallway. I guess you would call it a foyer, ’cause it was way too big to be a vestibule. He told me to sit down while he went upstairs to get my gift. So I’m sittin’ there, chillin’, and he hollers downstairs and tells this guy to bring me some cognac, right? It ain’t click till like the next day that dude was the butler, but that’s a whole ’nother story.
“So anyway, I take the cognac. I’m sittin’ there sippin’, tryin’ not to just scream out loud ’bout how phat dude’s crib is, right? Then he came downstairs and asked me to come in the next room.
“When I went in there, I almost fell out. Dude had a Jacuzzi in the middle of the floor, six-foot speakers in every corner of the room, a bar on one wall, and a fish tank, no, not a fish tank—an aquarium that ran around the other three walls of the room. He told me to sit down. But I think I was too busy tryin’ to drag my bottom lip off the carpet. It was like somethin’ on
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous.
“Well, it took me a minute, but when I finally got myself together to the point where I could sit down, dude reached behind one of the speakers and pulled out this little box and handed it to me. So I looked at it, and it was too big to be a ring, and too small to be a necklace. He told me to open it. But I was so nervous, thinkin’ it was gon’ be one o’ them big diamonds with a platinum chain attached to it, I couldn’t even get my hands to work together long enough to take the ribbon off.
“He saw what I was goin’ through, so he laughed a little bit, then he took the box and opened it for me. When I looked inside, it was a gold key on a gold link chain. He took it out the box, put it around my neck, and pointed to a cabinet over by the bar. When I walked over to the cabinet, I noticed it had a big lock in the middle of it. I looked over at him, and he pointed to the key around my neck. When I opened it . . .”
Pookie stopped and reminisced for a moment, thinking about what she saw in the cabinet.
“When I opened it,” she said, quieting her voice to dramatize the moment, “it was a coke rock in there that was so big, it scared me. I looked at dude like: What is this? He just smiled and came over to the cabinet. He took out two pipes, two little blowtorches, broke off a piece of the rock, and lit it up.
“I swear to God, y’all. Soon as I seen him light that pipe, I was ready to leave. Somethin’ in my mind kept tellin’ me to go get my little pocketbook and walk out the front door. But the more I tried to walk away, the more my body wouldn’t let me move. It had me curious, man.
“It was like, I had seen pipers before, and I knew by watchin’ them, I ain’t want to go out like that. But then here was dude, livin’ in the phattest house I ever seen in my life, drivin’ a brand-new Lexus, givin’ out five hundred dollars like it wasn’t nothin’, callin’ the butler and tellin’ him to go get me a drink. So I guess anything dude did, in my eyes, it was cool. ’Cause he had all the things I was tryin’ to get, and if smokin’ was part o’ how he got there, or if that was part o’ the life once you got there, then that’s what I wanted.”
Pookie stopped again and put her face in her hands. She looked like she wanted to cry, but there wouldn’t be any tears. Because the crack had dehydrated her body so badly that her eyes couldn’t produce enough moisture to make tears. So whatever she felt at that moment, she was stuck with it.
“I watched you last night, Clarisse,” Pookie said after she’d gathered herself. “I watched you when you took that blast, and it scared me, you know why? ’Cause it reminded me of the first time I took a blast. But I wasn’t lucky as you. It didn’t take me a while to get that first good one. I got it from the door. That’s why I’m out here like this now. ’Cause I’m still tryin’ to find another blast like that first one.
“I still remember it. Dude lit that thing up, and the smoke swirled around in his bowl like a storm cloud. It ain’t turn gray, though. The whole thing turned this clear, shiny white. He sucked like half the smoke out of the bowl and sat it down on the bar. Then he held it in for like half a minute and blew it out real slow through his nose.
“When he handed me the other pipe, I ain’t know if that’s what I really wanted to do. But he looked so happy—not that old bug-eyed, scary look you get when you smoke this garbage we be smokin’. I’m talkin’ ’bout dude looked straight-up happy. So, lookin’ at him, I ain’t think it would hurt me. I relaxed a little bit and watched him take off a big chunk of that rock he had sittin’ in the cabinet. He put it in my stem, told me to hold the pipe to my lips, and next thing I know, he was holdin’ that little torch next to the rock and telling me to pull the smoke in slow.
“I saw the same cloud rollin’ around in my bowl that I saw in his, and I remember thinkin’ to myself how pretty it was. Then I heard his voice in my ear tellin’ me not to swallow the smoke. He was like tellin’ me to hold it in and blow it out slow through my nose.
“After that, it was like everything was caught up in this wind. But the wind wasn’t a wind. It was a sound. And the sound was like this bell that just rang through me and made me all wet and sticky inside. I closed my eyes and got lost in it for a long time. It felt like it was a hundred tongues just lickin’ me, fingers just touchin’ me. I think I mighta even came. And when I opened my eyes and looked up at this ugly man, I swear to God, he was Denzel. And I was in the hot tub, jumpin’ up and down on him all night long while the fish swam around his aquarium and watched us.
“I stayed there for four days. That’s how long it took to smoke up the rock he had in that cabinet. When I came home, my clothes was in trash bags with a note on top that said:
Don’t be here when I get home.
“I ripped up the note and started hangin’ my clothes back up in the closet, like I really thought my man was just a little upset and everything was cool. While I was hangin’ my stuff up, I rewound the answering machine. It was a message on there from my job sayin’ I was terminated for going AWOL. It was another message on there from my mom askin’ where I was at. It was another one on there from my best friend askin’ where I was at. And you know what I did? I ain’t call my job. I ain’t call my mom. I ain’t call my girlfriend. I called dude, and I asked him how much coke I could get for five hundred dollars. He told me to come on over.
“I stayed with that man for a month after that. He bought me a brand-new wardrobe, fed me, bought me brand-new jewelry. Nigger was tellin’ me not to worry ’bout my job or my man or none o’ that. He was gon’ take care o’ me. But I was smokin’ too much. Sneakin’ out and drivin’ his Lexus down the way to buy dope, callin’ up niggers, havin’ ’em bring packages to the house, wakin’ up and goin’ to sleep with the pipe in my mouth.
“It was cool for a minute, but after a while he wasn’t goin’ for that no more. He came home one day, dragged me in the bathroom, took off my clothes, and made me look at myself. I had lost like forty pounds in a month. After I got a good, long look, he gave me a hundred dollars and told me I had to go.
“I tried stayin’ with my mom for a minute, but I stole some stuff outta her house and she told me I had to roll. It took me two weeks to get kicked out o’ four different houses. When the last one kicked me out, I ended up in the street, down Broad and Erie, settin’ niggers up for forty or fifty dollars at a time.
“And now look what it got me,” Pookie said, looking slowly around the room at all of them. “Everything I got away with, or thought I got away with, and they lookin’ for me for killin’ somebody I ain’t even touch.”
Chapter 13
B
y the time Hillman got back to the crime scene, Ramirez had already received a copy of Podres’s death certificate from the medical examiner and was on his way to the bail commissioner’s office to pick up the warrants.
As Ramirez was getting into his car, Hillman pulled up, jumped out of his car, and jogged over to him. He had to stop to catch his breath before he started talking.
Ramirez chuckled. “You look like you’re about to keel over. You only ran, what, twenty feet?”
“I’m an old man, remember? Anyway, I’m glad I caught you.”
“Unless you’re going to tell me that you’ve apprehended the suspects, I don’t have time to talk. I’m on my way to pick up warrants.”
“Okay, I’ll ride with you.”
When Hillman got in the car, he got straight to the point. “I think we’re looking for the wrong people.”
“What are you talking about?” Ramirez said, stopping the car. “I don’t have time for this, Hillman.”
“Listen to me, Lieutenant. I just finished going through the radio calls from last night and I’ve got a priest in a church at Broad and Butler who says Leroy was crossing Broad Street heading toward Germantown Avenue maybe three minutes before the shooting took place. I’ve also got a burglary that happened right around the time of the shooting. It was probably committed by Black.”
“Did you talk to a complainant on the burglary?”
“No, but I talked to Black’s mother and she told me something that I already knew: that the Samuel she knows would not have killed anyone.”
“She’s his mother!” Ramirez yelled. “What do you expect her to say?”
Hillman was silent for a moment. When he spoke, it was with a quiet anger.
“Every mother isn’t blind to her children’s faults,” he said evenly. “Especially not his. But you wouldn’t know that, because you’ve never taken the time to learn anything about these suspects that’s not written down on some sheet of paper.”
Ramirez pulled off, thinking of how the normally aloof Hillman had managed to connect with the people in the community. Ramirez admired that. But Hillman’s connection was starting to cloud his judgment. And Ramirez couldn’t allow it to cloud his own.
“Look, Hillman,” Ramirez said. “I know you don’t think these suspects are capable of something like this. I heard what Leroy’s friend said about his past and the gang wars and everything. But we’ve all got a past. And I learned a long time ago never to put anything past a drug addict.”
“But, Ramirez—”
“We’ve still got Mrs. Green on Park Avenue saying she saw Leroy go in the house right before the shots were fired,” Ramirez said. “She heard his voice, recognized it, and knew what he was wearing when he went in. She’s a good, solid witness.”
“Come on, you don’t believe that any more than I do,” Hillman said. “In her statement, Mrs. Green said that the shooting started five seconds after Leroy went in. Think about it. How does Leroy ambush the councilman, wrestle away his gun, and get off four shots in five seconds? And not only that, how does he rifle the councilman’s pockets and get away from the scene before the police arrive at the house at eleven-fifty? Mind you, the priest at Broad and Butler says that Leroy was walking
away
from the house at eleven-forty-five.”
“Okay,” Ramirez said, turning onto the expressway. “Suppose you’re right. Suppose Leroy didn’t have enough time to come in and rob Podres, and Black was around the corner committing a burglary that no one’s reported. Suppose all of that is true and they didn’t do it? Who did?”
“Let me tell you a little story,” Hillman said. “I was over at Abbottsford Hospital about an hour and a half ago, talking to Darnell Thomas—our only eyewitness. Granted, he’s a piper, and he’ll probably say anything to save his ass at this point. But he swears that a blond-haired white man wearing a white shirt, black pants, and a gold link bracelet killed Podres.”
“Yeah, right,” Ramirez said.
“That’s the same thing I said. But his sister was in the room when we interrogated him. She taped the interrogation and passed the tape off to some reporter. Five minutes later, the reporter’s dead in the parking lot, the tape is gone, and witnesses are saying that a cop in an unmarked car is the shooter.”
Ramirez’s attitude began to change. He looked like he was beginning to take Hillman seriously. “Was there a description?”
“The hospital security guard said he had brown hair and a bushy mustache, and that he was wearing black pants and a gray blazer.”
Ramirez was silent.
“Lieutenant,” Hillman said earnestly, “I know it sounds crazy. But when you put it all together . . .”
“When you put it all together what? Are you saying that a cop had something to do with Podres’s murder?”
“Who had more to gain from Podres’s death than corrupt cops?” Hillman said.
Ramirez knew that Hillman was right. There were plenty of cops who would have liked nothing more than to see Podres dead. Ramirez had seen them operate: robbing criminals, planting evidence, taking bribes. There was nothing in the world worse than a dirty cop.
Still, there was the unwritten rule: You never rat on another cop, no matter what. If he does something to someone on the street, you look the other way. If he does something to you personally, you take care of it man-to-man. But you don’t rat. You never, ever do that.
Ramirez hated the rule. But he followed it anyway. Of course, Ramirez had never run across a cop who was killing people, especially people who were involved in the biggest murder investigation to hit Philadelphia since the Ira Einhorn case.
“Did anybody get the tag on the unmarked car?” Ramirez said.
“They got the last three numbers,” Hillman said, flipping through his notebook. “It was . . . 342.”
“If we assume that the first three are UJV or UNV, like the prefixes the narcs use, can’t we call Fleet Management and find out what unit the car’s assigned to?”
“You’re talking about a city agency knowing where its equipment is located,” Hillman said, his voice laced with sarcasm.
“I think it’s worth a shot,” Ramirez said, handing Hillman his phone. “If there’s a car with that plate number assigned to any of our units, you may be right. And God help us if you are.”
“So what do we do now?” Hillman said, dialing the number to the office that handled police vehicles.
“We get the warrants because that’s what we’ve been ordered to do,” Ramirez said. “But after we get them, we go back and have a talk with the commissioner and Sheldon. Then we hope that nobody else has to die before we find out what’s going on.”
Jeanette Deveraux knew that there was more to the Podres investigation than what appeared on the surface. And since nobody was talking, she went back to basics and started checking details. She knew that if she did that, she’d eventually uncover something.
She’d spent the better part of the night trying to find out who lived in the house on Dell Street and had finally ended up at the deeds office in city hall. She hadn’t slept at all, and the hour-and-a-half wait was a little more than she was willing to bear. To make matters worse, people who recognized her as a reporter kept trying to hold conversations with her because they felt as if they knew her from seeing her on television.
She had a standard response for all of them.
“It tears my heart in two to report the news sometimes,” she would say, looking into their eyes with the same grave sincerity she used on the nightly newscasts. “But I feel that people need to know what goes on in the world around them. Now, if you’ll excuse me.”
At that point, she would go into a mock conference with her cameraman, discussing some contrived vital fact for the next story. She was in one of those miniconferences—not knowing how many more she could bear—when the clerk emerged from the back room, called Deveraux’s number, and handed her a copy of the deed to 3934 Dell Street.
The deed said the property belonged to Clarisse Williams.
“Where to now?” the cameraman asked when they got out into the hallway.
“I’m just going to make a couple of phone calls,” Deveraux said as she sat down and pulled out a cell phone.
Her cameraman sat down and watched her while she dialed the number.
“Robin?” she said when her contact at the Roundhouse answered the phone. “I’ve got a big favor to ask you. . . . What? Oh, sure, you can call me right back.”
Deveraux’s phone rang a minute later.
“Hello?” Deveraux said, listening as the woman apologized. “No, that’s all right. I know they tape the calls in the office. Could you do me a big favor? Could you run the license tag CWRN, and let me know if it comes back on a Honda to a Clarisse Williams?”
Her source asked if it had anything to do with the Podres case.
“Yes, that’s the tag they’re looking for in the Podres shooting,” Deveraux said.
She listened with mounting panic as her source said she couldn’t help her with anything having to do with the Podres case because she’d risk losing her job.
“Is Podres that much of a priority?” Deveraux asked, removing a notepad from her purse and jotting down her source’s response as her cameraman edged closer to listen to the conversation.
“And how long have supervisors been threatening disciplinary action for anyone releasing information on the Podres case?” she added, glancing at her cameraman as she wrote down the source’s answer.
“Look, whatever you tell me, it’ll never get traced back to you,” Deveraux said earnestly. “Have I ever let anything get traced back to you before?”
The source agreed to run the license plate and took about five minutes to come back on the line and confirm that the tag belonged on a 1991 Accord owned by Clarisse Williams of 3934 Dell Street.
“Thanks so much, Robin. I owe you one. Could you do me another favor? Could you tell me where the call came from for 3934 Dell Street last night?”
Her source said something Deveraux hadn’t expected.
“What?” the reporter said, flabbergasted.
Her source repeated the demand.
“Hold on,” she said, placing her hand over the phone and speaking to her cameraman. “Mike, could you give me a minute?”
Reluctantly, he got up and walked down to the end of the hallway. When he was out of earshot, Deveraux resumed the conversation.
“I can’t give you eight hundred dollars,” she hissed into the phone. “We don’t pay for stories, and even if we did . . .”
Her source said she couldn’t help her for free. Then she said she had to get back to work and got ready to hang up.
“Okay, okay, wait,” Deveraux said, looking up and down the hallway self-consciously and cupping her hand over the phone. “I’ll meet you outside the Roundhouse in ten minutes. I can’t give you eight hundred. But if you have the information, I’ll give you five.”
The source agreed to the meet, and Deveraux disconnected the call, feeling dirty. As she walked down the hallway toward her cameraman, she shivered and scratched her arm feverishly, wishing that the low-down feeling that gripped her would go away.
“You ready?” he asked as she walked up to him.
“Yeah, Mike,” she said, her voice nonchalant. “Just let me go over to Market Street and tap the cash machine.”
“And then?”
“And then I want to make a run down to the Roundhouse,” she said, trying hard not to look in his eyes for fear that he might see the truth.
After all, even Jeanette Deveraux had a conscience.
The source came out of police headquarters and walked past the throng of reporters who were standing around listening to another staged police press briefing.
“Mike, I’ve got to talk to this woman for a minute,” Deveraux said to her cameraman. “Would you be a doll and wait for me over there?”
He looked at her like he wanted to say something, then he thought better of it and went over to stand next to one of the thirty or so unmarked police cars that occupied the Roundhouse parking lot.
“Hey, Jeanette,” the woman said, walking up to her and hugging her warmly as if they were old friends.
“Hi, Robin,” Deveraux said, wondering when the woman would loosen her bear hug.
“I hope you put the money in an envelope,” the source whispered in Deveraux’s ear.
“I did. It’s in my pocketbook.”
“Good. When I let you go, we’ll exchange envelopes.”
The woman disengaged her embrace and Deveraux handed her the envelope. Then the source passed her an envelope containing the Scotts’ address and phone number. Without a word, the source turned and walked quickly back toward the Roundhouse. Deveraux turned slowly and walked over to her cameraman, pulling out her cell phone and dialing the number.
“What’d you give her?” the cameraman asked her.
Deveraux didn’t answer.
“Hi,” she said to Eldridge Scott, turning on the charm as the man answered the telephone. “I’m calling from Homicide, Mr. Scott. We need to ask you a few more questions concerning last night’s incident at Miss Williams’s house.”
Deveraux listened intently as the neighbor asked her if the police had found Clarisse.
“No, we haven’t, Mr. Scott. That’s why we want to ask you a few more questions. Perhaps you can help us determine where she might be.”
Eldridge hesitated slightly, then asked her why he couldn’t just talk to the officers who were posted outside Clarisse’s house.
Deveraux thought frantically. She should have known that there were police posted outside because they would want to protect whatever evidence was in the house. But that presented another problem: how to get past them to talk to Eldridge Scott.
“Well,” she said, stalling and hoping that what she was about to say would sound authentic. “They’re not handling the case, Mr. Scott. They’re just there to keep the property secure until we can get back there with a search warrant.”
As Deveraux bit her bottom lip, hoping that Scott wouldn’t detect that she was a phony, the old man said something that caused her mouth to drop completely open. He asked why they needed a search warrant when they’d already searched Clarisse’s house the night before.
“Are you sure about that, Mr. Scott?” she asked, trying not to sound excited.