Finnegan's Week by Joseph Wambaugh Read Free Book Online

Mexican nationals ended up with their resident “green cards” (which were no longer green, but blue) and were entitled to remain legally in the United States.
    When the Green Earth van got to the quay there were other trucks already there, mostly eighteen-wheelers unloading at the mammoth warehouses on what was a very busy day.
    Shelby said, “Look at all them lazy deck apes, smokin ’n jokin. Can’t tell me anybody works in the navy. I shoulda been a swab.”
    â€œEen the navy?”
    â€œYeah, but they don’t want guys that been in jail.”
    â€œWhy een jail?” Abel asked.
    â€œFor GTA once,” Shelby said. “Drove a hot Porsche for six months ’fore they nailed me. Wouldn’ta got me ’cept I was usin too much meth then. My brain got fried from snortin all that crank. Used to do a teener every night.”
    â€œTeener?”
    â€œTeener means one sixteenth of an ounce. One eighth is called a eightball. You ever do cringe? That’s what we called meth, cringe .”
    â€œNo,” Abel said. “Leetle marijuana sometime.”
    â€œSecond time I got busted, I was workin for a guy had a big tanker rig. He figured a way to tap in to this oil line that went from California to Utah. When the line started operatin he installed a spigot and hose. The stupid oil company thought the atmospheric conditions caused the oil drop and never did figure it out. I got in on it toward the end. I use to sell the oil to guys at truck stops. A helicopter finally spotted a big spill in the desert and got suspicious and that’s how it got shut down.”
    â€œJoo was caught?” Abel asked.
    â€œNot for that. Only for stealin a goddamn Harley hog. Shoulda stayed in the oil business, but no, I had to steal that bike. Hard for the cops to get serial numbers off crude oil, right, Flaco?”
    The ox snorted like a horse at that one, pausing to hawk up a lunger and spit it out the window. The Mexican didn’t understand what he meant.
    â€œGreen Earth!” Abel shouted to a manifester in blue coveralls who was sitting on a pile of pallets beside the huge oiler at the quay wall.
    â€œOkay,” the manifester said. “Guess your paperwork’s in the office.”
    Shelby followed Abel Durazo and the manifester, trying to check the time on a stainless-steel wristwatch that wasn’t there anymore. On Saturday night in National City he’d traded it for some good crystal meth and bad black pussy. When he’d sobered up he began to worry about AIDS. She was a burned-out junkie, uglier than west Texas. Every time he looked at his wrist he thought about that junkie hose-bag and wondered if maybe he should get a blood test.
    When he’d got to work on Monday and described his evening to a few of the guys, his foreman said, “Shelby, your cock takes you places I wouldn’t go with a gun !”
    Inside the monster warehouse was a little office off to the right. In it was a metal desk, a chair, a phone. The manifester entered, made a notation or two, and handed Abel the paperwork, saying, “We put the two pallets inside. We never know if you guys’re gonna show this month or next.”
    â€œNot our company,” Abel said. “We come on time.”
    There were pallets, boxes and crates stacked twenty feet high from one wall to the other. Abel saw the ox read the stenciled content markings on the nearest mountain of boxes.
    â€œMan, jist imagine what they gotta store for those aircraft carriers,” Shelby said. “Like, you gotta stash enough stuff for an army, right? I mean a navy. What’s in all them boxes?”
    Shelby looked at Abel when he said it, and Abel wondered if the ox could read his mind.
    â€œWe’re loaded to the gunnels,” the manifester said. “Got some big ships coming into port and they’re taking on enough supplies to go out on the high seas for a ninety-day exercise. You got