Authors: John Katzenbach
the hot air over the heads of the children, who played on, oblivious to the sound. Robinson knew that as the day dwindled into nighttime, the same voices would be accompanied by the inevitable sound of liquor bottles smashing and an occasional, but hardly infrequent, gunshot.
He hesitated, and two of the playing children stopped and looked up toward him. They pointed, and he realized how he stood out, in his tan suit, button-down shirt and tie, polished shoes. The children stared at him, put their heads together momentarily, then returned to their game, ignoring his presence.
He shook his head and thought: seven years old and already they make the cop. In ten years will some policeman come looking for them with his pistol drawn? He did not have to answer that question.
He looked around to see if he could spot someone keeping an eye on the children as they played, but saw no one. At least, when I was growing up, my mother watched me, he thought. The memory filled him with a sense of isolated sadness, and he turned away quickly, back to his task.
A breeze swirled some dust around his feet, but brought no relief to his temple, and he set off down the block toward the first of the pawnshops. He stood outside, pausing before pushing his way inside. As he reached out his hand for the door, he heard a car pull to the curb behind him, and he turned quickly.
It was a white City of Miami police cruiser. The sunlight hitting the car’s hood almost blinded him. A window rolled down and he heard a familiar voice:
‘So, it’s the famous Beach detective, here to make trouble.’
Walter Robinson shaded his eyes from the glare and quickly replied: ‘Well, only because you deadbeats and
do-nothings let all your bad guys come make trouble in my town.’
He heard laughter from the passenger seat, and as he stepped to the side of the cruiser, another voice said:
‘Well, better there than here, that’s for sure.’
The cruiser’s door swung open and a large black man, wearing the navy-blue uniform of the city police, with a sergeant’s stripes on the shoulder, stepped out. There was a quick handshake and a ‘Hey, Walter, my man, how yah doin’?’
‘Fine, Lionel, just fine.’
The police sergeant was joined by a thin, considerably smaller hispanic officer, who also shook hands. ‘Hey Walt, amigo, como esta?
‘What’s that foreign tongue you’re talking, John?’ Walter Robinson grinned and accentuated the man’s name.
‘It’s Juan, not John, and don’t you forget it, you big old black gringo. You’re as bad as my partner. And anyway, it’s gonna be the national language any day now, and we’re gonna force you guys to speak it.’
The three men laughed together.
‘So big guy, you on a case?’ the police sergeant asked. His name was Lionel Anderson, and Walter Robinson knew that on the street he was called Lion-man at least in part for his regal bearing, but also because of his no-compromise attitudes. He had been a classmate of Robinson’s at the academy, as had Juan Rodriguez, the other sergeant at his side.
‘Why else would I want to visit this particular locale?’ Robinson replied.
‘Maybe because you miss the ambiance, the sense of community spirit and attitudes?’
‘I think it’s the cooking, partner. The detective cannot get proper black cuisine out on the Beach. He’s tired of
chicken soup and matzoh balls. He needs a fix of collard greens and ham hocks.’
‘Well, perhaps,’ Lionel Anderson answered. ‘Sure taste a whole lot better than those fried banana things you’re always wolfing down and forcing me to eat. Disgusting.’
‘Plaintains are good for you. Help you learn a new language and understand a whole culture.’
Robinson shook his head and said: ‘Hell, Juan, the Lion-man can’t even understand the one he’s got, and you want him to understand another? A new one?’
‘Well, Walt, amigo, I admit you gotta point there__’
The three men started laughing again.
‘So,’ Anderson asked again, ‘whatcha doing over here in scenic Liberty City?’
‘You know about that killing we had the other night?’
‘Little old lady?’
‘Right.’
‘We had a flyer. Stolen jewelry. Came out of your office.’
‘That’s the case. I think maybe the perp rode the G-75 over and back.’
‘You think he took a bus to kill somebody?’
‘I don’t know he meant to kill anyone. He’d been having some luck over the past coupla weeks just doing B and E’s.’
‘That weren’t no routine breaking and entering the other night.’
‘No, you’re right about that. But I figure he still had to get back, and only this time all the hot stuff he’s used to carrying is a mite hotter. Maybe like burning a hole in his pocket…’
‘… And so,’ Rodriguez said, ‘you think he just jumped off the bus and wanted to dump it quick and he’d take whatever he could, right?’
‘You got it, Juan.’
‘Makes sense. I mean, none of it makes sense to any reasonable person. But in this world, sure. Makes sense.’
‘So,’ Robinson continued, ‘I’m looking for someplace that maybe hasn’t been keeping regular hours, you know? Someplace maybe that’s open in the middle of the night
Lionel Anderson and Juan Rodriguez looked at each other momentarily, then almost in unison they said: ‘The Helping Hand.’
‘What?’
‘The Helping Hand Pawnshop. Three blocks up…’
‘Great name, huh?’ Rodriguez said.
Anderson shook his head. ‘Maybe three, four times, guys on my shift have been complaining about the dude that runs the place. They say that place is open at the oddest times, day and night and they ain’t dumb, they know what that means. Anyway, the owner’s name’s Reginald Johnson. Got a gal working with him named Yolanda, says she’s his niece down from Georgia, but I don’t buy that and neither does nobody else around here. Ain’t nobody’s niece look like Yolanda. She’s one of those girl-women. I mean, she’s the entire package. Tits that go north. Butt that heads south. Long legs and something real special waiting at the top of them, you can bet. We’re talking sweeter than your ordinary sugar, that’s Yolanda. Anyway, word is, he’s trying to expand his operation a bit. Got a couple of receiving stolen property busts, but they always fizzle, you know? Walks in, pays a bit of cash to some lawyer, gets it all continued to the next century, shifts it from court to court, finally pleads it out to misdemeanor possession of stolen goods, pays a fine and he’s back in business thinking he’s a whole lot smarter than the cops, the state attorney, and the rest of the world. I hear he’s
moved into a new house and filled it with new furniture, because Yolanda, she wants a real home. I was told he has his eye on a new Buick for Yolanda too. A nice red one. Now, Walter, you know I wish I had a niece do what she does…’
The policeman laughed and his partner joined in, grinning, slapping a hand against his leg, nodding his head.
‘Now, you just know he’s gonna be looking to keep her happy, and you know that the way things are going, well, little old Yolanda, she may not be the brightest light around, but it ain’t gonna be too hard for her to figure out who’s who and what’s what and she’s gonna get a quick taste for the nicer things and the finer things.’ ‘Ain’t life sweet,’ Juan Rodriguez added. ‘And you know, those things cost money …’ Lionel Anderson rolled his eyes and opened his palms skyward, as if exhorting the heavens to rain down some cash. ‘I think I get the picture.’
Rodriguez smiled. ‘I would just love to see you screw up this nice little side business he’s got going. And, if your perp came from here, why, the Helping Hand is sure where he’d run first and fastest. Only one problem …’ ‘What’s that?’
‘I think old Reginald has figured out that he can’t be leaving that stolen shit around his store too long, because even us dumb old cops gonna come looking for it. I don’t know where he connects, but I think he’s dumping that stuff fast’
Lionel Anderson nodded. ‘You may be too late to find that stuff in the store. And you ain’t gonna get no warrant on a hunch.’
The big man smiled over at his partner. ‘Still, it wouldn’t do no harm to help this brother
detective out and watch old Reg squirm a bit. Likely even he understands the difference between receiving stolen property and accessory to first-degree murder. Perhaps we can enlighten him further.’
Walter Robinson let some of the amusement the two uniformed officers were sharing linger on his face, but inwardly he felt a narrowing, a harshness, and allowed himself the hope that he was riding the right path.
‘Lead the way,’ he said quietly.
The Helping Hand was a narrow storefront, its windows set behind thick black bars. The door itself was reinforced with steel plates and several dead-bolt locks, giving the entrance to the pawnshop all the welcoming appearance of some particularly dark, medieval fortress. Walter Robinson saw that a series of mirrors prevented anyone arriving inside the Helping Hand from discovering any shadow in which to hide. A video camera mounted adjacent to the front door switched on as the door opened, a detail that Juan Rodriguez immediately pointed out.
‘Hey, Reginald, my man,’ the wiry policeman called out in accented language. ‘This is very fancy shit. Very high-tech. I like it. I do. Muy bueno.’
‘I got to protect my stuff,’ came a sullen voice from behind a counter.
Reginald Johnson was a short, thickset man, scowling, close-eyed, with bodybuilder’s arms that pressed hard against the cloth of his sport shirt. He wore a holstered nine-millimeter pistol on his right hip to discourage any customers from debate, and Robinson suspected that a twelve-gauge was lying on a counter shelf just out of sight, within easy reach.
‘Whatcha doing here?’ Johnson asked. ‘You need a warrant to search the place.’
‘Why Reggie, we’re just inspecting the merchandise. We like to see what the local merchants have to offer. Just our way of helping to promote good police and community relations,’ Juan Rodriguez said, his voice filled with mockery. ‘Like this showcase filled with guns, Reg. Now, I just know that you can produce the paper on each and every one of them, am I not right?’
Rodriguez drummed his finger on a glass countertop. ‘Sheeit,’ the pawnshop owner muttered. ‘Reg, you want me to get the gun file from the safe?’ This question floated from the darkened rear of the pawnshop.
‘That sweet voice would be Yolanda,’ Lionel Anderson whispered to Robinson. ‘Hey! Sugar. Come on out here and say hello to my partner and me!’
‘Yolanda!’ Reginald Johnson admonished quickly, but not quickly enough.
‘Is that Sergeant Lion-man?’ she asked as she stepped beneath the fluorescent lights that illuminated the interior of the pawnshop. Walter Robinson quickly realized that his old friend had not exaggerated Yolanda’s considerable attributes. She had cocoa skin and a sweep of night-black hair that cascaded down across her shoulders. She wore a tight, white vee-necked T-shirt that forced one’s eyes directly into her cleavage, and she grinned at Lionel Anderson whose attention was riveted on her barely contained breasts. ‘Why, Sergeant, how come we don’t never see you no more?’ she asked. ‘I’ve been missing
YOU.
Anderson rolled his eyes back, looking up toward the ceiling for assistance in answering the question.
‘Why, sweetness, if I knew you wanted to pass the time of day with this old cop, why don’t you know you’d get the best police protection that this city has to offer? I mean,
round-the-clock, twenty-four-hour police protection….’
Yolanda laughed and shook her head. Walter Robinson wondered if she was fourteen or twenty-four. Either was a strong possibility.
‘Yolanda! Go get those papers from the safe!’ Reginald Johnson almost shouted.
The young woman turned at him, frowning. ‘I already asked you if n that’s what you wanted,’ she retorted.
‘Go get them so we can clear these cops out of here.’
‘I’m going.’
‘Well, get a move on, gal.’
‘I said I was going.’ Yolanda turned toward Lionel Anderson. ‘I’ll be right back Sergeant Lion-Man.’ Then she glanced over at Robinson. ‘I didn’t know you and your little partner were gonna bring a handsome friend along on this visit,’ she added.
‘I’m Walter Robinson, Miami Beach P.D.,’ he said.
‘Miami Beach,’ Yolanda said wistfully, as if she were talking about some faraway, exotic location. ‘Reggie ain’t never taken me over there to look at the waves. I bet it’s right beautiful, ain’t it Mr Detective?’
‘It has its attractions,’ Robinson replied.
‘See, Reggie, I told you so,’ Yolanda said, turning and pouting.
‘Yolanda!’ Johnson yelled again, without effect.
‘Little partner! Little! Yolanda, you break my heart!’ Juan Rodriguez interrupted, grinning. ‘I may not be some big old lunk like him, but you got no idea. You ever heard of Latin lovers, Yolanda? They’re the best. Muy perfectoV
‘I never heard that.’ The young woman smiled at Rodriguez. ‘I’ll bet you’d like to prove it too.’
Rodriguez clasped both hands over his heart, as if smitten, and Yolanda laughed.
‘Yolanda, go get those papers,’ Reginald Johnson
muttered. He stomped across the store, grasped her by the arm and steered her to the back office area, behind a wire-mesh gate, and triple locks.
‘I ain’t done nothing wrong,’ the pawnshop owner insisted. ‘And you stop screwing around with Yolanda.’ ‘Your niece,’ Anderson reminded him.
Johnson scowled again.
Walter Robinson started to move throughout the small store, inspecting the items in various display cases, a dizzying collection of weapons, cameras, toaster ovens, tape recorders, cutlery, a waffle iron, several guitars and saxophones, and occasional pots and pans. The accessories of life, the detective thought. He moved quickly over to a display case containing an assortment of jewelry and began examining each earring, necklace, and bracelet. He pulled out the flyer he’d prepared and began checking the descriptions of items stolen from Sophie Millstein’s apartment against what he saw arrayed on the shelves in front of him.
Reginald Johnson approached Robinson, leaning over the countertop toward him, his voice low and iron. ‘I got paper on all this shit too, Detective. You ain’t gonna find whatever it is you looking for.’