Chapter 19

I was early to Highland High School. School was in session, but there wasn't anyone on the track or the field it circled. High school football fields are the same everywhere, and though Albuquerque's not as dry as Needles, California – nor as humid, a paradox which works only because of the Colorado River – the field and the track were familiar. I'd graduated from high school in 1982, but it was still familiar.

Since I was early I sat in the Blazer for a while just looking at things. I always park away from other vehicles, because I hate having to squeeze between cars to get into my seat. I don't worry about dents – anyone who's going to have a fit because there's a dent the size of a flea in his door would be better off without a car – but I do hate getting someone else's door handle in my back while I open my door. So there was no one near me, and I could look out across the other cars. There wasn't an obvious Mafia car, but it could have been behind something else, and of course Joey wouldn't necessarily have come in something that came out of The Godfather.

Out on the track and the field there was, as I said, no one. From where I'd parked I couldn't tell whether anyone was in the bleachers, or in the tunnel that led to the bathrooms and the concession stand in back of them, though I could see that back side and unless someone was staying on the other side of the buildings, no one was there.

Seeing no one didn't reassure me. Crooks – Joey the Rabbit included – are crooks not only because they've got anti-social personalities, but because they're not all that smart. If they were, they wouldn't be crooks. Most crooks "make" less money in their life than they'd have made working an honest job – and then they think they've got it easy, and we're the idiots. Thinking things through will never lead to a life of crime. Nevertheless, successful crooks do have a species of cunning, and they don't survive by doing things that tend to reduce their chances of survival. If I still gambled, which I haven't in 20 years or thereabouts, I'd have been willing to bet that Joey and a bodyguard or two were in the bleachers somewhere, either skulking in the tunnel where they'd be harder to see, or up at the top where no one could come at them from behind. If it were me, I'd be up top – I don't like people coming up on me from behind either.

When it was about five minutes after the time, I got out of the Blazer. I left my gun under the seat – this was a meeting, not an ambush. The protocol was pretty settled after decades, and I knew that unless I really provoked him Joey wouldn't have anyone shoot me – not here and now, anyway. I could have worn it – Joey might not have a gun but his bodyguards surely would – but carrying openly on school property would almost certainly get me arrested and wreck my chances of getting anything from Joey. And I wasn't going to untuck my shirt just to carry concealed – cowboy shirts don't work well that way, especially with boots, jeans, and hat.

I walked through the gate and began circling the track. I scanned the bleachers and there was Joey, up at the top – one bodyguard beside him and another about 20 feet beyond him. As I approached Joey stood and began coming down the bleachers. I made to climb up te meet him, and he called down, "Stay there, Carpenter. I gotta get down there anyway."

So I waited. When he reached the ground he looked me over from behind his shades – black framed things like you'd see in the 60s. At least I assumed he was looking me over; that was at least the posture he took, and what else would he be doing anyway. Finally he said, "So what you need to see me about?"

We began walking, going the direction I'd been headed when I'd spotted Joey, going counterclockwise around the track. "I'm looking for someone," I said, and pulled out a copy of The Terrified Child. "I've come across information that tells me she now belongs to Jimmy Spero."

He took the picture, glanced at it, and handed it to the bodyguard who'd come down with him. The other one was lower than he had been, I saw when I looked back, but still up in the bleachers. I idly wondered how he was at shooting downhill – hitting with a pistol can be chancy anyway, with the short barrel, and shooting downhill makes it trickier.

"So Jimmy's doing porn. I knew that."

"Look at the picture, Joey. Tell me how old she is."

He shrugged and took it back. When he looked back at me his face didn't show anything. "You tellin' me Jimmy's doing kiddie porn?"

"That's the word I have." He shook his head, looking at the picture. "Look, Joey, I don't care if Jimmy's making every porn flick in the country. You know how I work – I handle whatever case I'm working on and leave the rest alone. If I was out to get you I'd have done it already, but you haven't come into any of my cases and so I don't bother you. Same with Jimmy. The only reason I'm interested in him is I'm looking for that girl. All I want is to find her and get her out – he can do as he pleases elsewise."

"You think I believe you? You think I believe you don't care about anything else?" I couldn't tell whether his accent was New York, or New Jersey – or Maine or Vermont, for that matter. All those northeasterners sound the same to me.

I waved a hand. "Okay, I detest what you do, and I detest what Spero does. I won't lie about that. But I'm only working on this one case. I'm not out to take you down or to take Spero down."

"You know, there's guys woulda hit you a long time ago."

I shrugged. Maybe it was true, but the kind of cases I do I tended to doubt it.

"But me," he said, "I'm old school. You don't hit honest reporters, and you don't hit honest cops. Yeah, I know, you got a private license. You're still a cop in my book, but you're an honest one. You're just doing your job, right? So I don't hit you even if you mess up my business. You know, this thing of ours, we don't need heat, so we don't make heat – bad for business, right?" He tapped the picture with a finger. "Same thing with kiddie porn. We don't need that kind of heat. Grown women, yeah, nobody really cares – consenting adults, right? Kids, we don't do that. I gotta have a talk with ol' Jimmy."