Page 176 - Labelle Gramercy, Detective

Slow Burn

We knocked. And waited. And knocked again. Finally, a voice
from within: “What is it? I’m trying to sleep.”
“Police, Mr. Carbone. Open the door, please.”
After another interval we finally got into Quincy Carbone’s
cramped quarters. He hadn’t shaved, but his membership in the
quintet was obvious, at least from the neck up. He was wearing a
threadbare blue bathrobe over nondescript pajamas. A single bulb
suspended from the ceiling of his room weakly illumined its contents:
a sofa bed with crumpled sheets and blanket, a chest of drawers in
need of repair, dirty laundry in a plastic tub, an old rocking chair and
a twelve-inch TV on a rickety cart.
“I’m Lt. Gramercy and this is—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know. Old Uncle Al’s ashes are barely cold and
you’re out beating the bushes because of the Carbone trust. I won’t
deny I’m glad the bastard is dead and gone. He gave me nothing but
grief.”
“Oh? Why was that?” Labelle sounded almost sympathetic. Not
motherly, of course—unless you were an infant alligator.
“We differed over matters of faith: he had none and I had less.”
“Weren’t you in the same church?”
“Uncle Al? He hasn’t been in a house of worship in years. Well,
maybe now he is.”
Quincy’s anger switched instantly to amusement at his own
pleasantry. It was nice to see someone taking a death in the family
with such a healthy attitude.
“And you?”
“Me? I go to all the evangelical holy-roller revival shows in the
county. That’s how I make a living, or didn’t you know?”
“Pretend we don’t, and tell us about it.” Labelle’s tone was
changing as fast as Quincy’s. So far, these guys had been
exceptionally cool under fire. But she kept at them, hoping to rattle
their cages.
“It’s nothing glamorous, just acting out a cripple as a shill for the
faith-healer. I’ve been cured by the laying on of hands of arthritis,
cancer in every organ but the brain, broken and paralyzed limbs, even
stuttering. I get fifty bucks and fifteen cents a mile. Amazing, isn’t it,
what people will believe when they’re in the mood?”
“Is that where you were yesterday afternoon?”

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