King of Swords

'Know who's in charge?'

'Bill Forsey. He's real tight with Burns.'

'Shit, I know,' Max said.

We could pretend we're talking to him as part of our official investigation.'

'Won't fly. Forsey's a Cutman. Probably knows as much — if not more — about what Eldon's up to than me.'

'What are we gonna do if Eldon finds out?'

'Say we're tyin' up loose ends.'

'You mean cuttin' tripwires.'

'Yeah.' Max nodded. 'We'll just have to make sure we lie convincingly. He gets so much as a hint of the truth and you're done. We can't have that.'

'Let's focus on the positive.'Joe frowned. 'This is gonna involve a lotta paper — reports, lists, photographs. We can't keep it in the office.'

'I've thought of that.' Max grinned. 'Mi casa!

You got the space?' Joe looked back through the window at the untidiness that was Max's living room.

'I got plenty of room,' Max said. 'We'll use here as a base.'

'Dunno,' Joe said. 'Wouldn't put it past Burns to break in here, bug the place, knowwhumsayin? Why don't we rent us somewhere? My cousin knows a couple of places we can use.'

“You gotta point. Let's do that. Other thing is, we're gonna have to fund this all ourselves. I wanna put my informant, Drake, on this, find out what he knows. He don't come cheap. I got some cash put away. You?'

'Some,' Joe said.

'Then there's time. We do this right, it'll mean doin'

double shifts.'

'I know that.'

'Your old lady gonna be all right with that?'

'If she ain't, I ain't . . . with the right girl. She'll be cool.

She already knows how it is.'

'We'll start on this next Tuesday, after the news conference,'

Max said. 'Which end you wanna bite on?'

'I'll look into missing person reports and multiple murders of families.'

'OK. I'll do the tarot cards and deal with the lab. How soon can you get our base camp set up?'

Til call my cousin tonight, soon as he gets home. He should be able to hook us up with somewhere in the next twenty-four.'

'OK. We're on.'

They shook hands.

'How's about that brew now?' Joe asked.

After Joe had gone, Max poured himself a shotglass of Jim Beam and sunk it in one. He took Bad Girls off the turntable and put it back in its sleeve. He went to the room where he kept his records. It was supposed to be an extra bedroom, hut three of the walls had floor-to-ceiling shelves with over two thousand albums lined up in alphabetical order on them.

There were more on the floor too — wooden crates of LPs, and 12- and 7-inch singles. He'd won half his collection at a SAW auction. It had originally belonged to a drug dealer called Lovell the Lodger, who'd doubled as a DJ. The rest he'd bought himself, or confiscated during busts and kept, if they were rare.

He took out Miles Davis' Sketches of Spain and put it on. He flopped down on his brown leather couch. The deep-rooted melancholia of Miles' trumpet pierced him to the edge of his soul and made him feel suddenly very alone and empty, as close to vulnerable as he could be.

He closed his eyes. Quickly he fell asleep.

He awoke four hours later feeling a little refreshed. It was dark and hot and the room smelled of rain. The storm had broken in his absence, but there was still more to come.

He stepped back out onto the balcony. The Drive's pink sidewalks were wet but quickly drying. It was full of people, babe-in-the-woods tourists looking to get skinned, lowlifes looking to give or get cheap thrills. On either side of him he heard the usual barrage of Spanish songs and shouting.

Max took a shower, shaved and brushed his teeth. He dressed in a pale blue shirt, black chinos and leather slip-ons and went out.

I

I 25

La Miel was and always had been Max's favourite spot in Miami clubland. It was located in the Airport Hilton on Blue Lagoon Drive. There was no better place for meeting women you'd never see again, because half the club's clientele were travellers on overnight transit, specifically foreign airline stewardesses. He didn't have to bullshit them about what he did. In fact it was an asset in the pick-up game: once they heard he was a cop, they channelled their Starsky & Hutch fantasies and got all starstruck and tongue-tied, and from there it'd be a shortcut from club to hotel room.

Though Max had been going to clubs since 1968, he couldn't really dance for shit - his main moves being either a cracked mirror to what he saw men around him doing, or a sole to sole shuffle that had more in common with defensive boxing footwork than groovy gesticulation. He'd presided over the rise of disco, the 'Theme from Shaft' giving way to quarter-hour long epics with fourfour beats, easy to follow bass patterns and empty, innuendo-laden lyrics.