King Suckerman
- Автор: Пелеканос Джордж
- Серия: D.C. Quartet #2
- Год: 1997
- Язык: английский
- Год: Little, Brown and Company
- ISBN: 978-0-316-69590-9
- Жанр: Триллеры
Электронная книга - «King Suckerman». Краткое содержание книги:
“We need peace,” said Russell. “We need uni-tee.”
Clagget laughed.
“Hey!” shouted Rasheed. “There ain’t no need—”
“Talk about the money,” said Cooper, sharply cutting him off.
“I don’t know... I’m tellin’ you, I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, man.”
Cooper stepped forward. Rasheed took a step back. Clagget looked down at Rasheed’s feet. He smiled and racked the shotgun’s pump.
“You know what that sound is?” said Clagget.
“Huh?” said Rasheed, wincing at the sudden rise in his voice. He stared openmouthed at the sawed-off, now pointed at his face.
“That there,” said Clagget, “is the sound of your own death.”
Rasheed looked at Cooper, smiled weakly.
“Hey, blood,” said Rasheed.
Clagget squeezed the shotgun’s trigger. Flame erupted from the sawed-off’s muzzle. Papers flew off the countertop and floated in the air.
“Damn,” said Russell.
Cooper looked out at the avenue. The sound had attracted a few faces at the window. The pedestrians saw black men in the shop and quickly got on their way. He figured one of those good citizens would be on a pay phone real quick.
“Little brother,” said Cooper. “You didn’t even give the boy a chance to speak.”
“Didn’t need to,” said Clagget, pointing at the floor. “Look.”
Cooper looked down to where Rasheed had been standing. The rug had been moved aside when Rasheed stepped back. There was the outline of a trapdoor cut into the hardwood floor.
Cooper got down on his haunches, lifted the piece of wood. He pulled out the cash box, opened it. He counted out ten thousand dollars joylessly, folded the money, put it in the pocket of his slacks.
“Cooper,” said Russell. “We best be on our way.”
All of them could hear the sound of a siren now in the distance.
“Get the money out the register, B.R.”
“Right,” said Clagget.
Cooper stood over Rasheed’s body. The double-aught shell had cleaned off the side of the boy’s face. It looked as if an animal had taken a bite from Rasheed, crown to jaw. Chunks of brain and clumps of damp hair dripped off the shelving beneath the counter. The blood looked black in the absence of light.
“Boy?” said Cooper softly, looking at the corpse. “Didn’t your people ever tell you? White man gonna find a way to fuck you up every time.”
“Got it,” said Clagget, holding up a short stack of bills.
“All right,” said Cooper. “Let’s go.”
The three of them ran out the back door, guns drawn. A couple of people on 20th had been hanging around since the shotgun sound had reached the street, and these people backed up quickly at the sight of the men. One of them, a student in his twenties, got on his belly and slid beneath a parked car.
Clagget dropped the sawed-off behind the front seat, got in first. Russell and Cooper were in soon after. Ronald had cooked the ignition and was pumping the gas against the clutch.
“Go on, Ronald,” said Cooper. “Show us what Big Bird can do.”
Ronald Thomas eased off the clutch pedal; the Daytona screamed away from the curb. The four of them were pinned against their seats as Ronald pulled back on the pistol-grip gearshift and caught long rubber in second. He double-clutched out of the Florida Avenue right turn. The Dodge fishtailed for fifty yards before straightening out on the way to 16th.
“Whewee,” said Cooper.
“That was bad, Wilton!”
“Yes it was,” said Cooper.
Bobby Roy Clagget yelled, “Man, we’re blowin’ this town all to hell!”
“Bo Hopkins,” said Cooper. “Right?”
“The Wild Bunch,” said Clagget, nodding his head.
Russell extended his hand, palm up, to the backseat. “You’re one crazy white boy, man! You all right.” Clagget slapped Russell’s palm.
Cooper found his Salem longs on the seat at his side. He lit one for himself, lit one for Clagget.
“Hey,” said Russell to Ronald. “Gimme one of them double-O’s.”
Ronald drew the deck of Kools from the visor, shook two out of the bottom of the pack.
The bright yellow Dodge with the big spoiler hit eighty miles an hour going east across the city. The men inside it were laughing loudly and giving each other skin. They could no longer hear the sirens of the police cars and ambulances converging on the record store at Connecticut and R.
Nineteen
Marcus Clay told Elaine to take the Riviera back to their row house in Mount Pleasant, that he’d meet her there. He and Karras left Vivian Lee at the Trauma Arms and jogged the two blocks to the store.
Clay and Karras were let through the police barricade and into the shop. Red light flashed intermittently on the cinder-block walls from the cherry-tops parked out on the street. A big man with a ruddy face stopped Clay as he came through the door. The man wore a plain khaki raincoat, though it was neither raining nor cool. The grip of his .38 curved out from beneath the coat’s wide lapels.
“You Marcus Clay?”
“Yeah.”
“Farrelly. Homicide.”
“How’d y’all find me so quick?”
“You got an employee list posted in the back with numbers. We tried you at your home number first, couldn’t get an answer. Tried a Mr. Cheek next, got him. He said you might be with Karras. Cheek gave us Karras’s number.” Farrelly moved his chin toward Karras. “That Karras?”
“Yeah.”
“He work here?”
“No.”
“Then he needs to stay out of everybody’s way. Tell him not to leave, though. Might want to have a few words with him myself.”
Karras heard Farrelly’s instructions. He stepped back against the nearest wall. He didn’t move.
Farrelly said to Clay, “You up for this now?”
Clay said, “Yeah.”
“Over here.”
Clay followed Farrelly toward the center island. He noticed but did not stop to touch the overturned displays and damaged inventory spread about the floor. Cheek was in a corner of the store, his shoulders jerking, tears running down his face. A uniformed cop stood next to him staring straight ahead.
They were through the opening and in the island now. Farrelly got down on one knee and pulled back the sheet. He looked up and into Clay’s expressionless eyes.
“Rasheed Adamson,” said Clay.
“Your employee?”
“Right.”
“Matches his wallet ID,” said Farrelly. He stood up and nodded shortly toward a small man in a gray suit wearing rimless bifocals. “Okay. Cover him up.”
Farrelly said to Clay, “You want a coffee?”
“Don’t drink it.”
“I’m gonna get me one,” said Farrelly. “I’ll meet you in the backroom in five. Okay?”
“Sure. You through with Cheek over there?”
“Yeah, he’s done.”
“I’m gonna tell him to get on home.”
“Fine. Five minutes, Clay.”
“Right.”
Clay went over to Cheek, put his arm around him, moved him away from the uniformed cop, talked to him, got him settled down. Cheek left the store without a word.
Clay saw a cop he had come up with in Shaw, a muscular guy named George Dozier, standing in street clothes by himself in the middle of the Jazz aisle. He went over to Dozier and the two of them shook hands.
“George.”
“Marcus. You all right, man?”
“Yeah. What you doin’ here, George?”
“Heard the call on my police-band at home, recognized the address. Came over, wanted to make sure... make sure it wasn’t you.”
“Thanks, man.”