Shadow Roll by Ki Longfellow Page A

second best friend.  This added up to a lot of people in Saratoga Springs, not rich or influential, not even connected to the horse racing industry, who knew Babe Duffy did not choke to death on his ham sandwich, not without help.  The coroner’d told his sister—Clay’s wife’s second best friend—who’d told a bunch of people, including Clay’s wife, that he had his doubts about Babe choking.  Babe Duffy could of done no more than choke, true, but he could also of had more than half a sandwich shoved down his throat and held there until he suffocated.  It was possible.  There were marks on his jaw bearing this out.  The biggest thing Clay told me the coroner said: “You know what the mayor said to me privately?  He said if you’d just write down ‘accidental death,’ it would go a long way towards helping you keep your job.”
    The season paid the bills in Saratoga Springs.  No one wanted the season spoiled.
    Clay was proud to report that the brother of his wife’s friend did not take this lying down.  Not as the coroner, but as a private citizen, he was saying to those he trusted (no fool, that guy): “If I ever get a chance to get up in court and answer under oath, me being the official coroner with my reputation on the line, I’d state clear as a bell that it is possible Babe Duffy stuffed an entire ham sandwich into his mouth and tried to swallow it whole.  But I’ll also ask: is this feasible?  Who would do something like that?  I’d say if it was suicide, it was the weirdest damn suicide I’ve ever heard of.  I’d also say that if it was murder, it was also goddamn strange.  I’ve never heard of death by sandwich of any kind.  Choking on a wad of gum, now that’s happened.  Choking on most anything, that’s happened too.  But who would try and cram that much food in their mouth all at once?  A person wouldn’t die, his own bodily reflexes would hack the damn thing right back out.  Same goes if it was an accident.  Basically I’d say it’s unprecedented.  And on top of that, suicide or murder or accident, that dog that he had, the one that can’t bark—a basangi? a besoobi?—didn’t take it lightly.  I was there.  I saw it.  All around the body near the mineral spring, his paw prints were everywhere.  And some seemed to show the dog being shoved backwards.  I’d tell the inquest those paw prints were cleaned up fast.  Right in front of me.  So what I’d swear to, on oath, is I only wrote ‘death by accident’ to keep my job.  But if I could have, I would have written ‘death by circumstances unknown.’  And that’s what I’d say if asked.”
    I said: “He said all that?  In that order?  Damn.”
    “Indeed, sir.  As close as I can remember.  I could of embellished some.  I’m partial to embellishment.  But yes sir, he said most of all that.  And might I offer some advice?”
    “You might.”
    “Don’t go askin’ questions of just anyone around this place.  You come back here one o’clock in the mornin’, maybe two o’clock, and you talk to a young negro fella named Alonzo.  He runs elevator 9.  You remember that number and that name?”
    “I’ll remember.”
    “And don’t you be talkin’ where anybody sees you.”
    “Gotcha.”
    “Alonzo set you straight.  Meanwhile, you just have yourself a quick drink and then you get yourself out of here.  This ain’t the place a man everyone knows is lookin’ out for them dead jocks should be seen.”
    I thanked Thomas Clay Jefferson.  I handed him a large tip.  He took half, handed the other half back.  The first half he folded neatly and placed carefully under the cigars in the red lacquer box.  “A thing’s worth what a thing’s worth.  Dig up the truth, sir.  Cain’t have folks goin’ about hurtin’ other folks like that.”
    I said I’d be back.  I told him I’d let him know what I knew.  He smiled at me, a smile as warming as a winning ticket.
    “You come see me