Page 117 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Soaked to the Bone

getting up here pushing a cart. So he must be fairly young and strong:
hard to tell with the beard and tatters and grime.”
“Did you see him yesterday?”
“No, of course not: I left before Gene put out the barrels. I would
guess the scavenger gets here very early in the morning, maybe just
after dawn to beat the collection trucks. I don’t know which type of
truck gets here first, but I’ll bet the scavenger has their schedule
down pat.”
Labelle stared at me, a disconcerting unblinking bright-green-eyed
stare. “Could you recognize him?”
“Probably, if he weren’t surrounded by a bunch of his peers: they
all wind up looking more or less identical.”
“Let’s go.”
She gripped my arm above the elbow and steered me down the
driveway. Resistance, as the robotic or fascistic celluloid villains
always say, was futile. We headed straight for an unmarked sedan;
hers, I deduced: totally unpretentious.
“Officer, we’ll be back in a few minutes. Search and hold anyone
who arrives, but keep them separated.”
“Yes, ma’am.” It was the same cop who had stopped me. No
question who was getting the respect around here.

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I barely had time to get seated and strapped in before she tore off
down Camino Costoso. She said nothing, but I knew to keep my eyes
peeled. We came to the stop sign at the bottom of the hill and began
a crazy zigzag course through the upscale cul-de-sacs of Empyrean
Heights. These people were certainly well-served by the municipal
trash collection: the trash in my neighborhood was rarely picked up
before noon, and it was done by the noisiest trucks in the city—or so
I cynically believed on those days they came by when I was trying to
sleep late. After fruitlessly casting about street after street with
emptied barrels, we stopped and listened for the telltale whining
hydraulics, a brief respite from this throw-up ride in the theme park
of the wealthy. I looked at my watch: ten-thirty.
Labelle abruptly gave the steering wheel a vicious twist and we
made a squealing U-turn; the residents would have something to

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