Bloody River Blues Read online

  He wondered what the point to the story was. He looked for something concluding-something to tie it into what she was saying-and fell silent.

  Weiser said, "We're used to behavior like that. It's part of recovery. You may get some of it right back from me. I grew up with three brothers. I've got kind of a short fuse myself sometimes." She retrieved her cigarette from her pocket and broke away the crushed part. She lit it again and drew three times then went through the extinguishing routine once again. "The fourth phase is where we get the work done. You're going to come to understand what's happened. The defenses-whether it's anger or denial or rationalization-will crumble and you'll confront it."

  "I never did understand that word. Confront. Like deal with. Those aren't words that mean a lot to me."

  "You're not there yet so you can't expect them to. You'll be in heavy-duty physical therapy throughout this phase. Finally… You're looking skeptical again. Are you listening? The final phase is the coping phase. In effect, you accept what's happened and you reorganize your life around the way you are."

  Buffett laughed again. "Yeah, yeah, I'll be able to play the violin after the operation."

  Weiser's smile faded and she leaned forward. For an instant he was wholly unnerved by the eye contact but was compelled to return her gaze. He felt electricity between them. His scalp bristled and his heart suddenly pounded like a snare drum.

  He felt a twitch of pain. Well, phantom pain. When he spoke, it was not his own voice that he heard but one that was lower and more mature and calmer. "Doctor, I don't want you to think I've got a swollen head or anything but I'm a survivor. I don't lose. At anything. Ever. Getting into the police academy, getting onto the varsity basketball team, yeah, even at five ten. Everything I've ever set my mind to do, I've done. Well, what happened to me is crap, sure. But I'm alive. I got friends. I got family." His right hand curled into a fist. "And I'm going to get through this."

  Weiser sat back, her pine green eyes neither cautious nor inspirational, but immensely pleased. It seemed as if by delivering his monolog he'd passed a test of some sort. "It's going to be a real pleasure working with you, Donnie."

  They shook hands and made an appointment for their next session.

  When the door closed, Donnie Buffett exhaled slowly and said a short, silent prayer of thanks. If Weiser had turned inches to the right she would've seen the hypodermic syringe that a harried orderly had accidentally left on the bedside table just before the doctor entered the room-the syringe that had been virtually the only thing in Buffett's thoughts during the doctor's entire visit. He gripped the head of the bed with his large hands and tightened his ample biceps. He moved up one inch. Sweat broke out. Another huge flex, another inch. He felt as if he were dragging the weight of ten men with him. He reached for the syringe.

  No, not yet. Six inches to go.

  He inhaled deeply and gripped the bed once more. Another inch, then another.

  He kept at it, two more inches, closer and closer. A half inch. He paused for a minute, wiping the slick sweat from his eyes and feeling his heart slam fiercely from the immense effort. Donnie Buffett figured this exertion was good. It was perfect. Because when he injected the air into his vein, the course of his racing blood would speed the bubble straight to his heart and jam it stopped like a swollen piston, sending his whole body to join his legs in a sleep that was cold and deep and forever.

  ***

  "Howdy." John Pellam stepped into the hospital room.

  He startled the cop, who dropped something on the floor. "Hell," Buffett snapped. "You scared me."

  "Sorry." Pellam walked past the flowers, looking around. Dozens of bouquets, wreaths, plants. Pellam wondered if the nurses got irritated, having to water all this foliage.

  A pale, pretty face appeared in the doorway. Pellam motioned her in. 'This is Nina. Donnie Buffett."

  She said hello.

  "How you doing?" came Buffett's muffled voice. He was contorted sideways, bending down trying to pick up something from the floor, struggling. His face was red and slick with sweat.

  "You okay?" Pellam walked around the bed. Buffett was reaching for a pen he had dropped… No, not a pen, a syringe.

  "Here, I'll get it." Pellam bent down, retrieved the needle, and stepped over to a plastic box that said Used Syringe Disposal Only.

  "No!" Buffett shouted.

  Pellam paused, and he and Nina looked at the cop curiously.

  "I've got to give myself a shot."

  "You?" she asked. "Don't the nurses do that?"

  Buffett stared at the needle for several seconds. He cleared his throat. "I'm, you know, a diabetic. I can give them to myself."

  Pellam shrugged. "It was on the floor. I'll ask the nurse for a clean one." He dropped it in the disposal box. "I don't mind."

  Buffett's eyes clung to the disposal box, looking heartsick. Pellam reached for the nurse call button. Buffett barked,

  "I'll do it myself later."

  "No trouble."

  Buffett snatched the button away from him. "I said I'd do it myself."

  A difficult silence arose. Nina and Pellam simultaneously asked him how he was feeling, and he answered, "Fine. I'm fine." More silence. Nina turned to the flowers, examined them and refilled several of the vases with water. Buffett seemed angered by this but he said nothing and she didn't seem to notice that he was out of sorts.

  Pellam studied Buffett for a moment and decided he looked pretty good, all things considered. Apart from the red face and sweat, he seemed to be a healthy man lying in bed. The only evidence of injury: He was dressed in a white, blouselike gown speckled with small, pale blue dots.

  "Something you wanted?" Buffett asked.

  Pellam did not know how to respond. He wasn't expecting this constant level of hostility. He said the first thing that came into his mind. "You need anything?"

  "No. I'm doing fine." When the silence filled the room again Buffett relented and made conversation. "I get kind of bored, you know. I got TV." He motioned broadly at the old set as if they couldn't spot it themselves.

  Pellam said, "I guess I came by, one of the reasons, I was a little hotheaded the other day."

  Buffett was being forced to apologize and he didn't want to. He watched a silent CNN news broadcast for a moment. Tankers unloading in some foreign port. Pellam was just starting to wonder if the cop would clam up and that would be that. He was glancing at Nina when Buffett said, "I started it. You were just, you know, reacting. All this… It's got me kind of shook up."

  "I read in this magazine one time," Nina said. "Glamour. No, Mademoiselle, 1 think. That if you have a serious accident, it's like you're a whole different person for at least six months afterwards." She abruptly stopped speaking, perhaps worried that Buffett would think he was doomed to a half year of mental anguish.

  But Buffett was laughing. "Well, it's got me a shitload of flowers. You want any, go right ahead."

  Nina shook her head. "Oh, I couldn't, no."

  Buffett glanced at Pellam. "And the mayor came by to visit me. Which isn't as exciting as, say, the mayor of LA., since our guy also has the Buick dealership out on 104. He's that kind of mayor, you know." There was a manic edge to Buffett's voice. Maybe he was being cynical, maybe he was really impressed that the mayor had come to visit him. Pellam couldn't tell. Buffett broke the silence that followed this by saying, "It's just so damn boring. TV sucks, you know that?"

  "I don't own one," Pellam said with more enthusiasm than he intended. "I've got a monitor, but it doesn't receive. It's just hooked up to a VCR."

  Buffett sighed and began clicking the gray box of the remote control through a series of stations. An old movie came on.

  He shut the set off. "I should probably get some sleep. I'm still in shock No, really. Spinal shock, it's called. Not like, ha, normal shock. Sleeping's a good thing."

  The script in Pellam's mind now called for the cop to ask what he had come here to ask: Could Buffett please call up his detectiv
e buddies and ask them to stop ruining his life.

  But he coulnd't ask. Pellam wondered what stopped him. He believed it was not the fact that Pellam was going to leave in a moment with a pretty woman beside him and go back to his job. Nor was it Buffett's face, which no longer looked so healthy as Pellam had thought- mouth hanging loose, eyes darting, filled with a fear that he perhaps thought he was concealing.

  No, what stopped Pellam was simply that he stood and Buffett lay.

  As simple as that.

  "We better be going," Pellam said. "Just wanted to stop by."

  "Yeah." Buffett nodded. "Good seeing you."

  "What do you read?' Pellam asked. "I'll bring you a magazine next time I stop by."

  "I don't read. I don't like to read." The mystery that Pellam had brought on the first visit sat prominently unopened under the bedside table.

  "You got any hobbies?"

  "Yeah, I got hobbies."

  "What?"

  Buffett looked from the square of the TV screen to the box where Pellam had pitched the hypodermic needle. "Basketball, softball, jogging, and hockey. Those're my hobbies."

  At the main desk of the hospital, downstairs, Pellam remembered that he had met Nina when she was visiting her mother.

  He now asked if she wanted to see the woman.

  She shook her head. "I visited her this morning. Twice a day is a little much. She can be a dear, but…" They stepped outside. The day had grown overcast and chill. She asked, "Your parents both alive?"

  "Just my mother. She lives in upstate New York. I don't see her that often. We run out of things to talk about after three days."

  Nina took a scarf from her pocket, a long one covered with blotches of brilliant green and yellow. She began to tie it around her neck. He watched the flimsy cloth cover the pale skin at her throat.

  She said, "I'm really enjoying that job you got me. Everybody's really nice."

  "Making movies is fun at a certain level. You get much higher up than location work or makeup and it's a pain in the ass."

  "The only yucky part is special effects. All that fake blood and those gunshot wounds." She closed her eyes and shivered.

  "Why does Mr. Sloan make such violent movies?"

  "Because many, many people pay money to watch them."

  "Why," she asked, "are you looking around so much?"

  "Am I?"

  "Yeah. Its like you think somebody's following you."

  "Naw. Always working. Looking for locations. In fact, that's where we're going right now. Find a big field. 1 need the help of a local."

  "I'm not a local, remember. I'm from Cranston."

  "You're more local than I am."

  "Is that the reason you want me to come along?" A faint smile on her frosted pink lips.

  "Well, scouting isn't as easy as it looks. I sense you're a natural at it."

  "Me?"

  "I need a big field next to the river. And a road running through it. How would you go about finding one?"

  "Well, I don't know. I guess I'd just drive along a road beside the river until I found a field.

  "See what I mean. You're a born location scout."

  They both laughed.

  "All right. But I have to be back at seven. I've got a call then. See, I can talk movie. Call. Oh, I didn't want to ask on the set but what's the difference between a gaffer and a grip?"

  'The most-asked question in the movie business. Gaffer's an electrician and lighting guy. Grips are workmen who do rigging and other nonelectrical work."

  They approached her car.

  "Another question."

  Pellam preempted her. 'The best boy is the key grip's first assistant."

  "No," Nina said, tossing him the keys. "I was going to ask if you knew any casting couch stories."

  ***

  Peter Crimmins was a member of the Ukrainian Social Club in St. Louis.

  He could easily have afforded to join the elite Metropolitan Club or, although he was a bar-sinister Christian, the Covington Hills Country Club. Yet this was the only social organization he belonged to. The club was in a shabby, two-story building, greasy-windowed and grimy, nestled between vacant lots filled with saplings strangled by kudzu. The inside, smelling of onions and cigarette smoke and mold, was one large room, filled with broken tables and chipped chairs. The club seemed locked in a time warp dating to the year it had opened-1954.

  This afternoon Crimmins was sitting at a table with Joshua, his driver and security chief. They drank tea that had been brewed in a cheap samovar. There were four or five other men in the club who would have liked to sit with Crimmins but who tended not to when Joshua was with him. The bodyguard's presence made them uncomfortable. They, of course, knew all about Crimmins. They read the Post-Dispatch as well as the Ukranian Daily News, which reported, respectively, on his criminal activities and on his social, ethnic, and professional endeavors. The latter did not interest them in the least; any fool can give away money. But a successful criminal is hot stuff. So they sat around him, basking in his dangerous presence. Crimmins gave them status. John Gotti had gone to his social club in Little Italy in New York; Peter Crimmins went here. They believed the nearby streets were safer because of him.

  Crimmins and Joshua had been drinking tea for ten minutes when a broad-shouldered man wearing a blue denim jacket and jeans entered. His shirt was dirty. He was squat, though he moved with a certain elegance. Crimmins did not approve of the common clothes, but this sort of man might be a foreman or carpenter in addition to being what Crimmins was now hiring him for.

  Joshua said, "Tom Stettle. Mr. Crimmins."

  "How do you do, sir." Stettle's eyes swung one way then the other, settling on Crimmins s mole of an eye for a moment.

  "Stettle, is it?'

  "Yeah," the voice said. "Yessir."

  "Sit down."

  He did. The Samsonite folding chair creaked under his weight. Crimmins let the silence run up for a moment. Rather than feeling uncomfortable, Stettle grew more at ease and gazed back at Crimmins pleasantly.

  Finally Crimmins said, "Joshua talked to you?'

  "Yessir."

  This was not the safest way, meeting Stettle face-to-face. The identification issue later, if it all went sour, but Crimmins liked to see the people who worked for him. You could have a better conversation with someone when you knew what he looked like. You could pick up on his mannerisms, match them to his words. That helped you decide if he was telling the truth, if he was dependable, how much he could be bought for.

  "You've been following him? Pellam?"

  Stettle nodded.

  "The police have been, too, I know. Have you seen anyone else? Anyone from Peterson's office?'

  "Some. Off and on. It's funny. It's like, hey, we got the budget for it today but not tomorrow. They're not there more than they're there."

  Crimmins had an urge to remind the man that he was making fifteen thousand dollars for this job. But he said nothing.

  Another of his basic rules, like providing for the family, was: Don't jerk leashes until you need to.

  "Stick with him."

  "This being the country, pretty much, it's harder, you know what I'm saying? In the city, with a lot of people around, there are more ways to get away, like cabs and subways. You can set up things a lot faster." The measured and respectful tone of Stettle's reply made Crimmins feel comfortable. He was pleased that Stettle was giving a frank appraisal. Crimmins himself would have guessed it was easier to do this sort of thing in the country.

  "All right. Keep at it. Joshua knows where to get in touch with you?"

  Both men nodded.

  "Thanks for stopping by. You want some tea? Some pastry?"

  "No, sir."

  Stettle left the club, glancing around him with studious eyes. Crimmins supposed he was surveying the shoddy paneling job and thinking he could do better.

  Crimmins said to Joshua, "Is he good with it?"

  "With what?"

  Crimmins
forgot that some people did not think as quickly as he did. "A gun."

  "That's not really the question. All's I know is he's got one and he doesn't mind using it. Maddox's got a mandatory sentencing thing and a lot of guys have a problem with that. He doesn't."

  Crimmins rose and poured both Joshua and himself two more glasses of tea.

  ELEVEN

  "S'il vous plait, est-ce que vous avez un… guest, Monsieur Wetter?"

  The crackling of the eight thousand miles of cables and airwaves filled the phone.

  "Non, monsieur."

  "Well, est-ce qu'il a une reservation?"

  The crash behind Pellam nearly made him drop the cellular phone. He spun around. He saw the fist knock on the camper door again. Pellam leaned forward and looked outside with a sinking heart. Them. For some reason he could remember the names of the FBI agents more easily than he could those of the Italian cop and the WASP cop. Bracken and Monroe.

  "Just a minute!" he called. "I'm on the phone." More knocking. "Just a minute. I'm on the phone to Paris. Repetez? S'il vous plait… He's not? Okay. I mean, merci."

  Damn.

  Marty Weller had left London six hours ago, supposedly bound for Paris. He was not, however, at the Plaza Athenee- where he always stayed (or where he told everyone he stayed)-and Pellam had no idea where he might be. Pellam was trying to make nice for the missed appointment with Weller and Telorian.

  He dropped the phone in its cradle and opened the door. He nodded solemnly but did not invite them in.

  "How you doing, sir?" Monroe said.

  Silence.

  Bracken, looking much less scruffy today, asked, "Mr. Pellam, you mind if we come in?"

  "I think I would mind that, yes."

  "It won't take very long."

  Pellam asked, "I really don't-"

  "We'd just like to ask you a few more questions. Our discussion-"

  "Discussion?"

  "-the other day wasn't very productive."

  "Last night I told the cops in Maddox exactly what happened. For the second time. Maybe the third. Don't you people talk to each other?"