'He had a silenced .22 Ruger automatic on him and Hippo Bimstine's address in his pocket. We'd better go talk to Motley and this guy with a mouthful of collard greens.'
'We?'
'Let's be serious a minute, Dave. I think you're fucking with some very bad guys. I don't know who they are, why they're interested in this submarine, or what the connections are between this citizens committee and dope dealers in the projects having their hearts cut out. But I'll bet my ass politics doesn't have diddle-shit to do with it.'
'I think this time it might.'
'Anyway, I'm backing your action, Jackson, whether you like it or not.' He leaned back in his swivel chair, grinned, and drummed on his stomach with his knuckles like a zoo creature at play.
I called Motley and told him that Clete and I would meet him at his office.
'You don't need to bring Purcel,' he said.
'Yeah, I do.'
'Suit yourself. I remember now, you always did drink down.'
'Thanks, Motley.'
Then I called the Reverend Oswald Flat and asked what I could do for him.
'Hit's about this man killed hisself in custody,' he said.
'Why would you call me?'
'Because you cain't seem to keep your tallywhacker out of the hay baler.'
'I beg your pardon?'
'You disturb me. I think there's people fixing to do you some harm, but you have a way of not hearing me. Is there a cinder block up there between your ears?'
'Reverend, I'd appreciate it if you'd—'
'All right, son, I'll try not to offend you anymore. Now, get your nose out of the air and listen to me a minute. I do counseling with prisoners. I bring 'em my Faith Made Easy tapes. I tried to counsel this crazy man they brought in there with tattoos on his head and a stink you'd have to carry on the end of a dung fork—' He stopped, as though his words had outpaced his thoughts.
'What is it?' I said.
'Hit wasn't a good moment. No, sir, hit surely wasn't. I looked into his eyes, and if that man had a soul, I believe demons had already claimed hit.'
'He was shooting up with speed and paint thinner, Reve
rend.'
'That may be. Your kind always got a scientific explanation. Anyway, I taped what he said. I want you to hear hit.'
I asked him to meet Clete and me down at Motley's office. He said he'd be there, but he didn't reply when I said good-bye and started to hang up.
'Is there something else?' I said.
'No, not really. Maybe like you say, he was just a man who filled his veins with chemicals. I just never had a fellow, not even the worst of them, claw at my eyes and spit in my face before.'
Oswald Flat was wearing a rain-spotted seersucker suit, a clip-on bow tie, white athletic socks with black shoes, and his cork sun helmet when he came through the squad room at district headquarters and sat on a wood bench next to me and Clete. He carried a small black plastic tape recorder in his hand. He blew out his breath and wiped his rimless glasses on his coat sleeve.
At the other end of the room we could see Motley through the glass of Nate Baxter's office. Motley was standing; he and Baxter were arguing.
'You want to hear hit?' Oswald Flat said, resting the recorder on his thigh. The side of his face wrinkled, as though he were reluctant to go ahead with his own purpose.
'That'd be fine, Reverend,' I said.