“He came to my apartment the night before last and tried to get in. He was abusive in the hall, and he made a mess on my door. If it happens again, I'm filing charges.”
Alpha was visibly shaken. “Nobody told me. He didn't hurt anybody, did he?”
“No one was hurt.”
Alpha took a card from the top of his desk and scribbled a number on it. “This is my home phone,” he said, handing me the card. “You have any more trouble, you call me right away. If he damaged your door I'll make good on it.”
“The door's okay. Just keep him away from me.”
Alpha pressed his lips together and nodded.
“I don't suppose you know anything about Carmen Sanchez?”
“Only what I read in the papers.”
* * * * *
I TURNED LEFT AT STATE STREET and pushed my way into rush-hour traffic. The light changed, and we all inched forward. I had enough money left to buy a few groceries, so I bypassed my apartment and drove an extra quarter mile down the road to Super-Fresh.
It occurred to me while I was standing at the checkout that Morelli had to be getting food from somewhere or someone. Did he scuttle around Super-Fresh wearing a Groucho Marx mustache and glasses with a fake nose attached? And where was he living? Maybe he was living in the blue van. I'd assumed he'd dumped it after being spotted, but maybe not. Maybe it was too convenient. Maybe it was his command headquarters with a cache of canned goods. And, I thought it was possible he had monitoring equipment in the van. He'd been across the street, spying on Ramirez, so maybe he was listening as well.
I hadn't seen the van on Stark Street. I hadn't been actively looking for it, but I wouldn't have passed it by, either. I didn't know a whole lot about electronic surveillance, but I knew the surveillor had to be fairly close to the surveillee. Something to think about. Maybe I could find Morelli by looking for the van.
I was forced to park at the rear of my lot, and did so harboring a few testy thoughts about handicapped old people who took all the best parking slots. I gripped three plastic grocery bags in each hand, plus a six-pack. I eased the Cherokee's door closed with my knee. I could feel my arms stretching against the weight, the bags clumsily banging around my knees as I walked, reminding me of a joke I'd once heard having to do with elephant testicles.
I took the elevator, wobbled the short distance down the hall, and set my bags on the carpet while I felt around for my key. I opened the door, switched on the light, shuttled my groceries into the kitchen, and returned to lock my front door. I did the grocery unpacking bit, sorting out cupboard stuff from refrigerator stuff. It felt good to have a little cache of food again. It was my heritage to hoard. Housewives in the burg were always prepared for disaster, stockpiling toilet paper and cans of creamed corn in case the blizzard of aughty-aught should ever repeat itself.
Even Rex was excited by the activity, watching from his cage with his little pink hamster feet pressed against the glass.
“Better days are coming, Rex,” I said, giving him an apple slice. “From here on in it's all apples and broccoli.”
I'd gotten a city map at the supermarket, and I spread it out on my table while I picked at dinner. Tomorrow I'd be methodical about searching for the blue van. I'd check the area surrounding the gym, and I'd also check out Ramirez's home address. I hauled out my phone book and looked up Ramirez. Twenty-three were listed. Three had B as the first initial. There were two Benitos. I dialed the first Benito and a woman answered on the fourth ring. I could hear a baby crying in the background.
“Does Benito Ramirez, the boxer, live there?” I asked.
The reply came in Spanish and didn't sound friendly. I apologized for disturbing her and hung up. The second Benito answered his own phone and was definitely not the Ramirez I was looking for. The three Bs were also dead ends. It didn't seem worthwhile to call the remaining eighteen numbers. In a way I was relieved not to have found him. I don't know what I would have said. Nothing, I suppose. I was looking for an address, not a conversation. And the truth is the very thought of Ramirez sent a chill to my heart. I could stake out the gym and try to follow Ramirez when he left for the day, but the big red Cherokee wasn't exactly inconspicuous. Eddie might be able to help me. Cops had ways of getting addresses. Who else did I know who had access to addresses? Marilyn Truro worked for the DMV. If I had a license plate number, she could probably pull an address. Or I could call the gym. Nah, that'd be too easy.
Well, what the hell, I thought. Give it a shot. I'd torn the page advertising the gym out of my phone book, so I dialed information. I thanked the operator and dialed the number. I told the man who answered the phone that I was supposed to meet Benito, but I'd lost his address.
“Sure,” he said. “It's 320 Polk. Don't know the apartment number, but it's on the second floor. It's at the rear of the hall. Got his name on the door. Can't miss it.”
“Thanks,” I told him. “Really appreciate it.”
I pushed the phone to the far corner of the table and turned to the map to place Polk. The map showed it to be at the edge of the ghetto, running parallel to Stark. I circled the address with yellow marker. Now I had two sites to search for the van. I'd park and go on foot if I had to, prowling through alleys and investigating garages. I'd do this first thing in the morning, and if nothing developed, I'd go back to the stack of FTAs Connie had given me and try to make some rent money doing nickel-and-dime cases.
I double-checked all my windows to make sure they were locked, then I drew all the curtains. I wanted to take a shower and go to bed early, and I didn't want any surprise visitors.
I straightened my apartment, trying not to notice the empty spaces where appliances had been, trying to ignore the phantom furniture indentations persisting in the living room carpet. Morelli's $10,000 recovery fee would go a long way toward restoring some semblance of normalcy to my life, but it was a stopgap measure. Probably I should still be applying for jobs.
Who was I kidding. I'd covered all the bases in my field.
I could stay with skip tracing, but it seemed risky at best. And at worst . . . I didn't even want to think about worst. Besides getting used to being threatened, hated, and possibly molested, wounded, or God forbid killed, I'd have to establish a self-employed mind-set. And I'd have to invest in martial arts coaching and learn some police techniques for subduing felons. I didn't want to turn myself into the Terminator, but I didn't want to continue to operate at my present Elmer Fudd level, either. If I had a television I could watch reruns of Cagney and Lacey.
I remembered my plan to get another dead bolt installed and decided to visit Dillon Ruddick, the super. Dillon and I were buds, being that we were just about the only two people in the building who didn't think Metamusil was one of the four major food groups. Dillon moved his lips when he read the funnies, but put a tool in the man's hand and he was pure genius. He lived in the bowels of the building, in a carpeted efficiency that never saw the natural light of day. There was a constant backround seranade as boilers and water heaters rumbled and water swished through pipes. Dillon said he liked it. Said he pretended it was the ocean.
“Hey Dillon,” I said when he answered the door. “How's it going?”