Fiddlers by Ed McBain Read Free Book Online Page A

know she was selling beauty products?�
    �Huh?�
    �If you haven�t seen her in ten years, how do you happen to know that?�
    �I heard around.�
    �From who?�
    �I forget who told me. She was selling nail polish and shit. Was what I heard. She was like a sales rep, is what they call it. Look, if you got any more questions, make it fast, okay? I gotta get back on the stand.�
    �Where were you last Friday night at eight o�clock?�
    �Right here. On Fridays I play here from eight at night to two in the morning.�
    He looked Parker dead in the eye.
    �Anything else?� he asked.
    Parker took that to mean Good-bye.
    * * * *
    The two detectives from Narcotics thought dope was what made the world go round. They were convinced that 9/11 was all about dope. So was the Iraq War. Everything had to do with dope. If we really wanted to end the war on terrorism, if in fact we wanted to end all wars, for all time, then all we had to do was win the war on dope. Dope was evil. Dope dealers were evil. Even people who used dope were evil. This is why they had no sympathy for the sixteen-year-old girl who�d dropped dead from an overdose of Angel Dust in the alley outside Ninotchka.
    �She had it coming,� Brancusi said.
    He was the bigger of the two Narcotics dicks. You would not want to struggle with this man over a dime bag of shit.
    �You know what Angel Dust is?� his partner said.
    As tall as Brancusi, but not as broad in the shoulders or thick in the middle. Irishman named Mickey Connors. Meyer and Carella sensed a bit of condescension here; they both knew what Angel Dust was.
    �Angel Dust is phencyclidine,� Connors explained.
    �PCP,� Brancusi further elucidated.
    �It�s also called crystal, hog, or tic�
    �You forgot zoot,� Meyer said.
    �Are we wasting our time with these guys?� Connors asked his partner.
    �No, go ahead, enlighten us,� Meyer said.
    �Go to hell,� Connors said. �Let�s go, Benny.�
    �Stick around,� Carella advised. �We�re talking a pair of homicides here.�
    �What is that supposed to do, the word �homicide�?� Brancusi asked. �Make us wet our pants? You know how many drug-related murders we see every day of the week?�
    �That�s why we�re here,� Carella said.
    �Yeah, why are you here?� Connors asked.
    �Drug-related. Two of our vics may have been users. And one of them was killed outside the club where you guys caught a sixteen-year-old who overdosed on the peace pill.�
    �Her own hard luck,� Connors said.
    �Also, the manager of Ninotchka took a fall for dealing ten years ago. So we�ve got a dead duster and now another vic outside the same club, who may or may not have been using, and the manager once dealt dope, so maybe there�s a connection, hmm? So we want to know all about this girl.�
    �Naomi Maines,� Brancusi said.
    �She walked out of a club up the street, disassociating, that�s for sure, maybe hallucinating, too��
    �Then La Paglia was giving us the straight goods.�
    �Who�s La Paglia?� Brancusi asked.
    �Manager of Ninotchka. The ex-con.�
    �Oh yeah, him,� Brancusi said, remembering. �A scumbag.�
    �Told us the girl just wandered by Ninotchka. We think she may have walked over from the other club,� Meyer said.
    �Yeah, that checks out,� Connors said. �Her sister and a girlfriend told us she dropped two tabs of dust inside there.�
    �That�ll do it, all right,� Brancusi said.
    �Must�ve started convulsing as she came up the alley, dropped dead outside Ninotchka, the garbage cans out back there.�
    �Just stopped breathing,� Brancusi said.
    �What�s this other club called?� Meyer asked.
    �Grandma�s Bloomers.�
    �Cute.�
    �Clean, too. Naomi didn�t buy the stuff in there, that�s for sure.�
    * * * *
    There was a time not too long ago - five years? ten years? - when this stretch of turf was lined with rave clubs. These nocturnal dance clubs were