The Big Bout Read online

  Gus had helped his injured sparring partner into the dressing room.

  We were the only two people in the gym.

  “You got no clue,” he said. “You know it? No clue. Don’t think you do. ’Cause you don’t.”

  I still didn’t say anything, just kept looking around the gym, watching the door.

  “Just can’t stand no cracker thinkin’ he understand anything about us,” he said. “You got no idea what it like to be us.”

  “Us?” I said, regretting it the moment I did.

  “Negroes,” he said.

  I nodded, determined not to say anything else.

  “And not just,” he said. “Anyone who isn’t like y’all. All us poor, non-white bastards that don’t matter none down here under y’alls feet.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Them.”

  “Not them. Us.”

  I nodded.

  “You think ’cause Clip work for you, you ain’t racist?”

  “Actually, I’m workin’ for him.”

  “You think ’cause you workin’ for Clip, you ain’t racist?”

  “I’ll give it some thought and get back to you,” I said.

  “I’m serious,” he said. “Don’t try to make a fool out of me.”

  “Wouldn’t ever attempt to do something for you that you do so well for yourself.”

  “Don’t think that missin’ arm keep me from comin’ up there and whippin’ the shit out of you.”

  “Sparring all these bums has you thinkin’ you’re better than you really are,” I said. “And you’ve forgotten that boxing isn’t fighting.”

  “Shit man, I’d kill you without breaking a sweat.”

  “The problem with people like you,” I said.

  “People like me,” he said, his voice taking on a challenging edge, his eyes narrowing beneath a deeply furrowed brow.

  “Loud-mouths with a righteous cause always looking for a fight.”

  “Oh,” he said. “So do tell me, white boy. What’s the problem with people like me.”

  “You’re right about much of what you say but you think everything you say is right,” I said. “You choose fighting as a way of life and I get it. I get why you do it. But then you don’t know when not to fight, then you fight against those fighting with you.”

  “You?” he said. “You fighting with me? We on the same side? Shee-it.”

  “See? You can’t even see it. Your justifiably angry approach has you doing the very thing you’re railing against.”

  “Oh yeah? What’s that?”

  “Making assumptions. Pre-judging. Being racist.”

  Clip arrived to relieve me.

  “You hear this shit?” Freddy said to him.

  “What that?”

  Freddy told him.

  “Freddy, you is a dumb ass nigger. I mean, got-damn. Man is here tryin’ to protect your stupid ass and you got the rocks to say he ain’t fightin’ with you, ain’t on your side?”

  “You really think he take a bullet for me?” Freddy said.

  Clip shook his head in frustration and disgust.

  “You need to think long and hard about what I doin’ for you, for all us, ’fore you be callin’ me a dumb nigger,” Freddy said.

  “Jimmy here already done far more for me than you ever could,” Clip said. “Damn site more than what your running your mouth in the paper ever gonna do.”

  “What happen when I beat the bum?” Freddy said. “What you say then? I win the fight, my words take on more weight. People listen. And I ain’t afraid to say what need to be said. You gonna show me some goddamn respect then, ain’t you boy?”

  Clip didn’t even acknowledge anything had been said.

  “Can’t believe your Uncle Tom ass gonna side with this cracker ass motherfucker,” Freddy said. “One of them. A member of the very machine we bein’ flattened by.”

  “What was it tipped you off?” Clip asked. “The way he dress? The work he do? Who he work for? Who he associate with?”

  “He married to money.”

  “He ain’t married to nobody,” Clip said. “That alone show he ain’t a cog in the machine. And if who he with happen to have some money, fact that he still here doin’ this say even more about him. But more than that, it say the most about you. Your puppet ass ain’t had an original thought and you too blind to see what really goin’ on around you. You just parroting shit you heard somebody else say. Ain’t thinkin’ for yourself. Ain’t speaking for yourself. But no matter who got they hand up your ass or pullin’ your strings, you say some shit like this again, and we walk. We let whoever want to kill your dumb ass do it. Hell, may even help ’em.”

  Chapter Thirty-three

  Lady Bird Bennett not only opened her enormous solid wood door for Henry Folsom, she welcomed us inside as well.

  “So good of you to come,” she said, as she ushered us in. “I’m sorry the house is such a mess, but I’ve been so devastated I’ve been unable to do anything at all.”

  Of the many things wrong with what she had said, two in particular stood out most prominently. The house was truly and exquisitely immaculate. And whatever cleaning needed doing and whenever it needed doing, it wouldn’t be the lady Bird of the house doing it.

  “Noah and I were just about to have some tea,” she said. “Would you gentleman please join us?”

  She led us through the house and out onto the back porch overlooking the bay where Noah Mosley sat in a three-piece suit sipping tea and enjoying one of the best views in town.

  He was a tall, large older man whose dramatic features had only become more exaggerated with age––elongated ears, enormous nose, and huge teeth in a slightly misshapen mouth.

  “Henry,” he said, standing and extending his hand enthusiastically.

  Nothing about the ravages of time or the toll taken on his body had diminished the dignity with which Noah Mosley comported himself. He had money. He had power. He mattered. No one else did––or at least not nearly as much.

  “Noah,” Folsom said, shaking his hand. “How are you?”

  “Never better.”

  “This is Jimmy Riley. Don’t know if you two’ve met.”

  “Heard of him, but we haven’t met,” Noah said, and there was something in the way he said it, a subtle but undeniable something––some knowledge he believed he possessed, some scrap of information he could disapprove of.

  “I know of him through Harry Lewis,” he said to Folsom, never actually looking at me.

  He shook my left hand awkwardly with his right––making a point to point out just how awkward it was––quickly, dismissively, then returned to his seat.

  Lady Bird’s maid appeared and poured our tea and served our scones.

  “Do you have news about who killed my Jeffrey?”

  “We do need to talk to you about that,” Folsom said, cutting his eyes quickly over to Mosley then back.

  “Noah is my closest adviser, Henry,” she said. “You know that. You can say anything in front of him. Anything. And I insist you do. Be just as candid as you would’ve been had it been just me.”

  “Well, it’s just . . . there’s some question about the identification.”

  “Identification?”

  “Of the body.”

  “What body?”

  “The one you identified as your son.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “We have another identification that––”

  “Another? Of Jeffrey? Why? Who?”

  “She says it’s not him,” he said. “That she’s certain of it.”

  “She?” Lady Bird said, her voice conveying more outrage and incredulity than seemed possible to fit into one syllable. “Certain?”

  Folsom waited.

  “Henry, I’m sure you can imagine but this is hard enough without the added . . . absurdity of someone saying I don’t know my own son. Who would do such a–– It’s that horrible home wrecker, isn’t it? Hudson.”

  “She was with him rece
ntly,” Folsom said. “Says she’s certain it’s not him. Mentioned a recent wound he got overseas.”

  “I’m sure I don’t know what she’s playing at, but I’m surprised you could be so gullible. For Christ’s sake, Henry. I know you’re upset about Gladys. I know you’ve been shot and haven’t recovered, but this is just too much. It really is.”

  “We had to check,” he said. “Had to hear you say you were certain. Had to make sure that in your grief and . . . that you didn’t make a mistake.”

  “A mistake? A mistake?”

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “But we had to hear you say it.”

  “Well,” Noah Mosley said, “and now you have. I’ll see you out.”

  He stood. Folsom followed.

  I waited.

  “Why would she lie?” I said. “What’s she playing at?”

  “I’m sure I can’t imagine,” she said.

  Mosley and Folsom had taken a few steps out of the room and now had returned.

  “Rebecca could confirm the identification,” I said. “Still no word from her?”

  “My identification of my son needs no confirmation,” she said.

  “I’ll see you out, Mr. Riley,” Mosley said.

  “You still want me to find her, right?” I said. “Where was she last seen?”

  “Her brother lives in Port St. Joe,” she said. “She may have gone there. If I knew, I wouldn’t have hired you. A decision I’m beginning to have serious doubts about.”

  “Time to go,” Mosley said.

  “Let’s go, Jimmy,” Folsom said, touching my shoulder.

  I stood.

  “We’re very sorry to have had to disturb you like this,” Folsom said to Bennett.

  “I know you’re just doing your job, Henry,” she said. “I understand. I do. It’s just a tough time.”

  “Could you possibly be any more deferential, Henry?” I said.

  We were in the driveway, walking toward the car.

  “You don’t think I handled that the right way?” he said. “What would you have me do, Jimmy? It’s not like we know for sure which one of them is lying.”

  “You’re awfully close with them,” I said.

  “No, I’m not. It’s something they do. The rich are different. They act different. They act as if every public servant is a close friend.”

  When we reached the car, we didn’t get in, just stood on either side of it, talking to each other over the roof.

  “I’m not talking about how they acted,” I said.

  “I play along somewhat,” he said. “I have to. Goes with the territory.”

  “What else does?”

  “Whatta you mean?”

  “What else goes with that territory?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Come on, Henry,” I said. “You’re in their pocket.”

  “I’m not in anybody’s pocket.”

  “Don’t forget who you’re talkin’ to,” I said.

  “In my entire career––hell, in my entire life—I made one deal with the devil. I did it for Gladys. I had to. Never before. Never again. The end.”

  “Your name is on a list of people that includes theirs,” I said, jerking my head back toward Lady Bird’s house.

  “What kind of list?”

  “One Jeff Bennett made before he disappeared. Lee Perkins was on it too. Bennett was working on a story about local war profiteering and the black market in this area. What are y’all up to?”

  He frowned and shook his head. “I’m not up to anything. Not with them or anyone else. All I’m doing is my damn job. I’m a good cop. I’ve done a lot of good over the years––and it’s been a lot of years. I do one bad thing for a good reason and suddenly I’m corrupt, I’m . . . like them? Let me ask you something. What if you were judged not for decades of good, not for millions of good things, but for one bad thing?”

  “Well, as bad things go it was a doozie,” I said. “But that’s the thing, boss—no way to know that it was just the one thing. No way to ever be sure again.”

  “So the fact that you backshot a man . . .”

  “Means I’m capable of it,” I said. “Means you can never know for sure that I won’t do it again.”

  He frowned and shook his head again and we got into the car.

  “But two things––” I said as he cranked the car and began backing down the drive. “It was two men, not one. And comparing backshooting two career criminals to save Lauren with taking money from a black market bastard profiting on the wartime sacrifices of others, helping two sick fuck sadists torture and murder young women, and helping them try to do the same to Lauren and to kill me is a bit of a stretch, even for a corrupt cop like you.”

  Chapter Thirty-four

  I was alone in my office looking over Jeff’s notes again when our old secretary July opened the door and strolled in just like she used to.

  “Got a minute?” she said, sitting down across from me without waiting for my reply.

  The last time I had seen her, she had been on this side of the desk, her dead body splayed in my chair.

  “I’ve missed you,” I said.

  “You think you’re dreaming, don’t you, fella?” she said.

  I shook my head. “Pretty sure I’m awake.”

  “Then how do you explain this?”

  “Don’t plan to.”

  “Not even to yourself?” she asked.

  “Especially not to myself.”

  “You’re not curious?” she said. “You’ve got to be. You are about everything.”

  “Not everything. Only those things that might actually have an explanation.”

  She nodded appreciatively. “God, I’ve missed you.”

  We were silent a moment.

  “Looks like you’ve missed me more,” she added. “You don’t look so good, Soldier.”

  “Been worse.”

  “Before Lauren,” she said. “Before you got her back.”

  I nodded, but there was no need. She was making statements, not asking questions.

  “Do anything to keep her, wouldn’t you?” she said.

  “I think you know the answer to that,” I said.

  “I need to ask you something, Soldier,” she said. “Need your advice. What do you do when you need to tell someone you care about something they don’t want to hear?”

  I shrugged. “Depends.”

  “On?”

  I heard a creak on the staircase.

  Someone was coming up to my office.

  I pulled open the top left drawer of my desk and put my hand on the .38 that was there, even though I had been carrying one in a shoulder holster beneath what remained of my right arm since Miki’s uncle had issued his ultimatum.

  “Come over here behind me in case––” I started saying to July, but when I looked up from the drawer, she was gone.

  It sounded as if the person was trying to be quiet, but there was also a certain labored awkwardness that made that an impossibility.

  Was it two people? A heavy person? And then it hit me. It was the soft, injury-awkward steps of David Howell.

  “Don’t shoot, it’s me,” he yelled when he neared the top of the stairs.

  It took him a little while, but eventually he made it to the top of the steps, across the outer office, and into one of the same chairs across from my desk July had just been sitting in.

  “You think we can talk to the dead?” I said.

  His eyes widened. “You okay there, fella?”

  “Not sure exactly. Doesn’t matter. Been a while. Where you been?”

  “Around,” he said. “In the shadows. Keeping an eye on you.”

  “What’s it like watching a master?” I said. “Pick up any new detecting skills?”

  “Really surprised there’s been no Jap attack yet,” he said. “Wonder what he’s playin’ at?”

  “Wish I knew,” I said. “I’m carrying around some major tension in my shoulders I’d love to get rid of. He’s far more patient an
d calculating than I would’ve thought.”

  “Is it possible it was just a hollow threat?”

  I shook my head. “Don’t think so. Miki says not.”

  He nodded and seemed to mull it over.

  “Know anything about Noah Mosley?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Not much. I’ve seen him in Folsom’s office a few times. Hell, see him everywhere. Owns half the town, doesn’t he? Why?”

  “He was with Lady Bird Bennett when we went to talk to her this morning. His name’s on a list of corrupt people and war profiteers in Jeff’s notes.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Folsom’s on the list too.”

  He looked genuinely shocked.

  “No way he’s profiting off the war,” he said. “No way.”

  When I didn’t agree right away, his eyebrows shot up.

  “Something you need to tell me?” he said.

  “I’m not saying he’s a war profiteer,” I said. “I seriously doubt he is. But I’m not certain he’s not compromised. I don’t know. Think maybe he’s keeping the wrong company, closing his eyes to corruption if not participating in it directly.”

  He thought about it.

  “You know more than you’re saying,” he said.

  “Maybe, but not much.”

  “Level with me, fella,” he said. “Soldier to soldier.”

  “I know for sure of only one thing he did,” I said. “Said he did it for very personal reasons, which I believe. Said it was only the once, which I’m not as convinced of.”

  “What’d he do?”

  “It was what he didn’t do,” I said.

  He nodded. “That’s all I’m gettin’, isn’t it?”

  I nodded.

  “Okay, Soldier. Thanks for the trust.”

  He was right. I was trusting him some. Not much, but as far as it went, it was more than any other cop I was dealing with at the moment.

  “I got info of my own to share,” he said. “Why I’m here.”

  “Let’s have it.”

  “Got an ID on the body.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah,” he said. “Whatta you think? Bennett or not?”

  I thought about it. “Have no idea, but my guess, my gut, is not Bennett.”