Bell: “Not a whorehouse. Mother of God, I don’t know why I make this call.”
“So…what’s up, Larry?”
“Lawrence. Your BCA and Minneapolis police raided me yesterday,” Bell said.
“I heard.”
“They found nothing, of course. Only me and a lonely cleaning woman.”
“Good for you, Larry. Well, take it easy…” Lucas began.
“Wait, wait, wait. Something happened last night,” Bell said. “I don’t know what it is, but something happened.”
“Happened?”
“With these people who interest you,” Bell said. “The ones in touch with the Old Country.”
“Let’s start from the beginning,” Lucas said. “Where were you when you heard something happened?”
“I have breakfast with…friends. I don’t tell you who they are, because it would hurt them, and they don’t know much. But they knew something happened last night. Somebody was asked to take a girl to a dance club in the northeast. Maybe this Nightshade club. These people who send the girl, they are the people who interest you. My friends say she made a delivery. We thought maybe drugs, but that seemed unusual. Drugs, you can find them laying on the street, why the big secret? My friends, they didn’t know where she came from, or what she delivered.”
“What girl?”
“They don’t know. A girl,” Bell said.
“Who sent her? Exactly?” Lucas asked.
“Nobody knows this. People talk, other people hear things. A pretty girl was taken to a dance club in the northeast. Maybe this Nightshade. That’s all.”
Lucas worked on him for another two minutes, but Bell had nothing but a further request: “The Minneapolis police were on the raid yesterday. One of them was…a friend…but he didn’t act like afriend. He didn’t want to know me. He was difficult, he wanted to tear my house apart. I’m afraid he might come back on me, trying to lay down some tracks that say he’s not a friend of ours. Can you help that?”
“You could move out of Minneapolis,” Lucas suggested.
“I own this house,” Bell said. “I fixed it, I would not get my money back.”
“This friend…was he slipping the old pink piccolo to your girls for free?” Lucas asked.
“What is this piccolo, what are you talking about?”
“Was he screwing your girls? And not paying?”
“He…Yes. Sometimes. He provided coverage for us,” Bell said. “You know, if there were rumors in the police department, if there was some interest in us, we might get a warning.”
“What’s his name?”
“Cordell Shea. He is this big pussy hound,” Bell said.
“Okay. I know a deputy chief over there,” Lucas said. “I’ll have a chat with her, maybe cool things off. Maybe. I’ll get back to you.”
“I could be a source, for a long time, for your chief, if I’m not driven out.”
“I’ll tell her that,” Lucas said.
• • •
Lucas called Sherwood,who, without saying hello, went with, “I knew it. You got something that the FBI doesn’t.”
“Where was Bernie last night?” Lucas asked.
