Money Men (8 page)

After Kelly hung up the phone, it was exactly four minutes until a black-and-white police car drove into the parking lot.

Kelly approached it. The uniformed officers inside nodded their heads as Kelly displayed his Treasury badge. After speaking animatedly for a few moments, he pointed toward Leach's Cadillac. After a short discussion, the police car pulled out of the lot and parked down the street.

Kelly trotted back to the car and slid into the driver's seat. He turned off the radio.

"He's ready," he told Carr. "I counted at least seven drinks. He's in there trying to pick up teenyboppers, but they've all shined him on."

Leach walked out the front door and waited for the valet to bring the Cadillac. He looked unsteady on his feet. He seemed to fall into his car as the valet opened the door.

The red lights of the police car went on as soon as the Cadillac passed.

Kelly started the engine. They drove past the flashing red light of the police car and saw Leach, arms outstretched, trying to touch the tip of his index finger to his pimpled nose.

Kelly stepped on the gas.

The black sheriffs deputy shoved Leach roughly into the dark cell.

Carr lay on the top bunk feigning sleep, his face embedded in a pillow that smelled faintly of Clorox. He had decided not to say anything until morning, figuring that Leach would not be too enthusiastic about gabbing with a cellmate at 3:00 A.M. No use rushing it.

Leach walked the four steps to the commode and urinated loudly. He flopped on the lower bunk and dropped his shoes to the floor one at a time. He began snoring within ten minutes.

Carr told himself there was no reason why he shouldn't be able to sleep. He rethought the tack he would use, then dozed fitfully.

An echoing scream woke him. He sat up in the bunk. There was the sound of a scuffle farther down the tier, then a loud moaning. People fighting over a cigarette or perhaps a plastic comb?

Carr rolled over and stared at the flaking ceiling. He thought of bicycling along the beach to Sally's house; he knocked and she wasn't home.

He closed his eyes.

Carr woke up as the tier lights went on. He slid off the bunk, put his shoes on, and washed his face with cold water at the yellowish sink. The cell reminded him of a service-station bathroom: filthy cement.

"How long you been in?" asked Leach, yawning. He stood up from the bunk, stretching. He had no shirt on. His face was a mask of ripe, red infections, his neck a collar of thick purple scar tissue with protruding unshavable whiskers.

"Ten days," Carr answered. He dried his hands on a gray towel.

"What're you in for?" Leach yawned again without covering his mouth.

"Drunk driving," Carr said. "I'm getting out today." ("Chance meetings require common topics," said the agents' manual.)

"No shit," Leach said. "That's what I'm in for. Had a few drinks at a bar. I'm on my way home and the cops give me the red lights. No shit." He made his fingers into a comb and raked his sticky hair.

"The goddamn pigs must of needed one more for their quota," Carr said. Without looking at the other man, he climbed back onto the top bunk, lit a cigarette, and leaned against the wall.

Leach was at the sink now, drinking handfuls from the faucet. He spit water into the sink. "Sounds like you don't get along with the man." Leach looked at his wet hands for a moment, turned, and began drying them on a corner of Carr's blanket.

"Get your hands off the blanket," Carr said matter-of-factly.

Leach stopped drying his hands with the blanket but continued to hold it. He stared amusedly at Carr. "Sounds like you learned some of the rules during the last ten days."

"I learned the rules in Leavenworth," Carr said. "Now get your goddamn hooks off the blanket." ("Don't be afraid to poke the lion," said the T-school instructor.)

Leach dropped the corner of the blanket. "No shit," he said.

"How much time did you do in Leavenworth?" He rubbed his hands back and forth on his pants.

"A deuce."

"What for?"

"Passing funny money," Carr said.

"
No
shit? How'd they make you on it?"

"Feds lied on me in court. Said they found funny money in my car." He paused. "What makes you so interested?"

Leach opened up his palms and furrowed his brow. "Easy, dude! You're talking to somebody who's done time in
Folsom
,
Atlanta,
and
San Quentin.
Maybe you heard of me. Papers used to call me 'The Drugstore Forger.' I was in the papers and everything before my last case. Name's Leach. They call me 'Pleach.'" He stuck out his hand for the jive handshake

"Right on," Carr said. He shook hands.

Carr smelled the odor of oatmeal and grease as it wafted along the cellblock, mixing with that of humans in cages of concrete. A cement nursery school?

Leach stepped to the bars and grasped them. "My bail bondsman should be waiting in the arraignment court to bail me out," he said.

"I should make the noon release myself. This is my last day." Carr bit his lip, hoping Leach would take the bait.

"
No
shit."

That was the last thing Leach said for a few minutes.

Finally he spoke. "What do you have planned?"

"Make a few bucks and head back east," Carr said.

"I'm going to pick up some phony cashier's checks soon as I get out. A friend's got a load. They're always easy to down without ID."

"Not as easy as funny money."

"Maybe not, but he ain't got funny money. He's got checks."

"Who's your friend?" He cupped his hand to his ear. "Speak up. I didn't hear you."

"Just testing," said the scarred man.

Nothing more was said for at least a half-hour.

"Are you still into funny money?" Leach said at last.

Carr casually swung his feet over the side of the bunk. "You might say that."

****

EIGHT

Carr heard the sheriff's deputies walking along the tier as they called out prisoners' names. "Bloodsaw, Tyrone. Zavala, Jesus. Leach, Virgil."

"Here!" Leach answered. The deputy stepped to the bars, checked Leach's wrist tag. "Courtline bus number one," the deputy said, looking at a clipboard.

"Looks like I'll be bailed out in an hour or so. I got the first bus... By the way, what's your name?"

"Charlie."

Leach eyed the deputy. He whispered, "Charlie, think you'd be interested in some nice green stuff? No shit."

"What flavor?" Carr said.

"Number twenty...with ten different serial numbers." He held up all fingers.

"What's the price?"

"Eighteen points on the dollar. A hundred and eighty bucks for a grand."

The hydraulic lock snapped open cells farther down the tier. Prisoners shuffled.

"I might be interested."

"No shit. How much can you handle?"

"How much heat is on the batch?" Carr said. "Are the Feds on to the serial numbers?"

"No way, my man. The product is cool. No shit. If you can prove otherwise, I'll give you your money back...and that is no shit." Leach stuffed cigarettes in his pocket. He tucked in his prison shirt.

The hydraulic lock buzzed, and the cell door slid open slowly. "You'll make the noon release, right?" Leach said.

Carr nodded.

Leach whispered from the side of his mouth. "Meet me tonight at the Paradise Isle on Hollywood Boulevard. I'll have a sample for you. No shit." He stepped out of the cell.

Carr waited on a barstool at the Paradise Isle. The place was dark and crowded, the jukebox deafening. Kelly sat at the opposite end of the bar, near the rear door. He wore a purple bowling shirt and needed a shave.

Carr felt uneasy. The place was all nicknames and handshakes. A fat blonde touched tongues with the black man next to her, knocking off his knit cap.

"Haven't seen ya here before," the bartender said. "Name's Gabe."

Carr shook the offered wet hand.

"Waiting for somebody?"

"Pleach. You seen him around?"

"He'll be in. Stops by every night. Nuther drink?" A fish smile.

Carr nodded.

Gabe served Carr another drink. He dried glasses for a few minutes before approaching Kelly, the other stranger in the place. He asked the preliminaries.

"I'm waiting for some good-looking cunt to walk in here. That's what I'm waiting for," Kelly said, in his normal tone of voice. The fat blonde looked up.

Gabe offered his hand to the Irishman. Kelly put his glass in it. "Put some booze in it this time, little man."

Gabe frowned.

Carr sipped his drink, wondering whether he and Kelly had passed the bartender's test.

Gabe picked up the phone at the end of the bar and dialed, whispered a few words, and hung up.

Fifteen minutes later Leach came in the back door and walked directly to the bar. Carr's breathing quickened.

"See? I showed up," said Leach. "No shit."

"That's good. I don't like to be hung up."

"Don't worry about Pleach. I always take care of business." He swung himself onto a barstool.

"We gonna be able to do some business tonight?" Carr asked.

"That depends." Leach glanced at the black wearing the knit cap. "After I bailed out today I started thinking. I don't know you. Nothing personal, you understand. I just don't know where you're comin' from. I mean like I just met you in County last night and I really haven't had time to check you out. No shit."

The bartender handed Leach a drink. He took a sip.

"In other words, you were just running your mouth this morning and you don't really have a connection. Is that what you're telling me?" Carr smiled.

"No, I didn't say that." Leach smiled back.

"Because if it is, it's no problem. I just talked to another guy today who's got some paper lined up for me. Fifties, with all different serial numbers. Price isn't as good as yours, but he'll come down. What I'm saying is that I can score tonight somewhere else." Carr took a sip and placed the glass back on the wet napkin.

"Oh," Leach said. He picked at his face for a moment, then stopped abruptly. "What if I said I could get you a load tonight? Do you have the four grand right now?"

"Sure. I got the four G's right here in my pocket. I'm sitting here in this toilet with my back facing the door and I've got four grand in my pocket. I'm tired of living. I
want
to get ripped off."

"I don't mean
that. I
mean can you come up with the money tonight if I can get..."

Carr leaned over and spoke directly into the other's face. "What did I tell you this morning?"