Do” or “I Found a Love” with a powerful tenor that turned the living room into a church of regret.
Now Rodney removed the cheesecloth, carefully shaking some coke off the folds back into the wok and gently tapping the eggbeater against the side. He pulled out several gray cardboard boxes from under the couch, passed a box to Strike and opened one for himself. Each box contained a gross of glass bottles about two inches high and a half inch in diameter. Next came two plastic bags, each filled with hundreds of tiny purple stoppers. Purple stoppers were Rodney’s street brand. If anybody was caught selling any other color in Rodney’s territory, whether they worked for Champ or not, Rodney had the right to take away their dope and put them in the hospital—something he had only needed to do once, to some green-stoppered docker about six months before, in order for everybody in town to get the message.
Strike looked down at all the piecework to come, thinking about how he was the only guy he knew his age who had no interest in or reaction to music, going back in his memory again to hear his father singing in the living room, with the nubby rub of that green couch on the backs of his legs, then snapping out of it as Rodney took a pocketknife out of an end table drawer, dipped the blade into the bowl and silently offered Strike a chunky hit. Strike just stared at him, not in the mood for jokes. Neither of them so much as drank beer, although Rodney had been a heroin addict all through the 1970s.
“Yeah, I got me a partner on the Papi thing,” Rodney drawled as he tilted the coke off the blade back into the wok, took two glass bottles, one in each hand, and dipped them daintily into the mix. Then he tapped them against each other, letting the coke settle, measuring roughly a tenth of a gram by eye. “He’s a real fuck-up, though. I just found out the nigger stealing me blind since the gitty-up.”
“Oh yeah?” Strike hesitated before joining in the bottling operation. It had been his very first job around dope for Rodney and he always hated it, but once he started, his fingers fell to it automatically, and soon he was lost in thought, starting to put the night together a little, figuring that if this other guy was on the way out, Rodney was probably asking him in.
“Greedy, greedy, greedy,” Rodney clucked, eyes on his work. They labored in silence for a few minutes, building up a nice scoop-and-tap rhythm, seesaw style, each one hesitating for a beat as the other one dipped, like two lumberjacks manning a double-handled saw. Between the two of them they were filling two dozen bottles a minute.
“Stealing from you how?” Strike asked flatly.
The door handle rattled. Gently, swiftly, Rodney put the wok between his feet, the cardboard boxes on the floor. The filled bottles vanished into his hands, then under the couch.
The front door opened and Rodney’s wife, Clover, came in. She was light-skinned, a bit chunky with a flattened-down face, her hair straight and short, shiny and stiff, curling up on one side like a frozen wave.
Strike stood up awkwardly and bobbed his head. She ignored him, her hands filled with plastic shopping bags, yarn spilling out of one.
“You find something in the kitchen?” she asked Rodney.
“Yeah. I’m good, how’re you?”
“The Lord’s seein’ me through.”
Rodney winked at Strike, and they both watched her move straight through the shotgun flat: first to the bedroom, dumping her bags and her coat on the bed, then into the kitchen, where she ducked into the refrigerator and pulled out a pink bowl covered with plastic wrap, and finally into the back bedroom, the only room that had a door, which she shut behind her.
Rodney pulled out the dope and the bottles again and got back to work. Strike knew that Rodney had been some kind of dope dealer since high school, but he insisted that his wife thought he just ran the candy store. He also insisted that she didn’t know
Now Rodney removed the cheesecloth, carefully shaking some coke off the folds back into the wok and gently tapping the eggbeater against the side. He pulled out several gray cardboard boxes from under the couch, passed a box to Strike and opened one for himself. Each box contained a gross of glass bottles about two inches high and a half inch in diameter. Next came two plastic bags, each filled with hundreds of tiny purple stoppers. Purple stoppers were Rodney’s street brand. If anybody was caught selling any other color in Rodney’s territory, whether they worked for Champ or not, Rodney had the right to take away their dope and put them in the hospital—something he had only needed to do once, to some green-stoppered docker about six months before, in order for everybody in town to get the message.
Strike looked down at all the piecework to come, thinking about how he was the only guy he knew his age who had no interest in or reaction to music, going back in his memory again to hear his father singing in the living room, with the nubby rub of that green couch on the backs of his legs, then snapping out of it as Rodney took a pocketknife out of an end table drawer, dipped the blade into the bowl and silently offered Strike a chunky hit. Strike just stared at him, not in the mood for jokes. Neither of them so much as drank beer, although Rodney had been a heroin addict all through the 1970s.
“Yeah, I got me a partner on the Papi thing,” Rodney drawled as he tilted the coke off the blade back into the wok, took two glass bottles, one in each hand, and dipped them daintily into the mix. Then he tapped them against each other, letting the coke settle, measuring roughly a tenth of a gram by eye. “He’s a real fuck-up, though. I just found out the nigger stealing me blind since the gitty-up.”
“Oh yeah?” Strike hesitated before joining in the bottling operation. It had been his very first job around dope for Rodney and he always hated it, but once he started, his fingers fell to it automatically, and soon he was lost in thought, starting to put the night together a little, figuring that if this other guy was on the way out, Rodney was probably asking him in.
“Greedy, greedy, greedy,” Rodney clucked, eyes on his work. They labored in silence for a few minutes, building up a nice scoop-and-tap rhythm, seesaw style, each one hesitating for a beat as the other one dipped, like two lumberjacks manning a double-handled saw. Between the two of them they were filling two dozen bottles a minute.
“Stealing from you how?” Strike asked flatly.
The door handle rattled. Gently, swiftly, Rodney put the wok between his feet, the cardboard boxes on the floor. The filled bottles vanished into his hands, then under the couch.
The front door opened and Rodney’s wife, Clover, came in. She was light-skinned, a bit chunky with a flattened-down face, her hair straight and short, shiny and stiff, curling up on one side like a frozen wave.
Strike stood up awkwardly and bobbed his head. She ignored him, her hands filled with plastic shopping bags, yarn spilling out of one.
“You find something in the kitchen?” she asked Rodney.
“Yeah. I’m good, how’re you?”
“The Lord’s seein’ me through.”
Rodney winked at Strike, and they both watched her move straight through the shotgun flat: first to the bedroom, dumping her bags and her coat on the bed, then into the kitchen, where she ducked into the refrigerator and pulled out a pink bowl covered with plastic wrap, and finally into the back bedroom, the only room that had a door, which she shut behind her.
Rodney pulled out the dope and the bottles again and got back to work. Strike knew that Rodney had been some kind of dope dealer since high school, but he insisted that his wife thought he just ran the candy store. He also insisted that she didn’t know
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