“What were you doing out here in the alleyway?” Andy asked.
“Getting a little air.”
“If you were getting a little air, then you must have been inside some place that didn’t have much air. So where were you before you walked out here?” Andy inquired.
“Having me a little drink.” She nodded at Freckles. “It was mighty smoky in there, ‘specially ’cause that big trooper never puts one out without lighting up another one.”
Andy immediately thought of Macovich. So did Hammer.
“Check to see if he’s still in there,” Hammer said to Andy.
He trotted around to the front of the small old neighborhood bar, and scores of bleary eyes turned on him as he walked through the door. Macovich was sitting in a booth by himself, drunk and sucking on another cigarette. Andy slid into the seat across from him.
“We just picked up Major Trader in the alleyway,” he said. “Didn’t you hear all those gunshots?”
“Thought they was car backfires,” Macovich slurred through a cloud of smoke. “And I’m off duty,” he sullenly added. “I know Trader was in the area, though. ‘Cause he was sitting up there at the bar for a long time, drinking beers all by himself. Now, I didn’t speak to him or draw no attention to myself.”
“Did you notice him interacting with anyone or talking on the cell phone? Anything that might give you reason to believe he was here to meet someone and maybe buy a package of guns?”
“Wooo! Ain’t nothing but trouble these days,” Macovich said, turning a beer bottle in little circles on the table. “Much as I don’t like that man, I can’t say I saw him up to nothing.”
“Then we can’t prove he had anything to do with those guns,” Andy said, disappointed. “At least not at the moment. And it’s really not our jurisdiction to charge him with promiscuous shooting. The city police will have to do that, if they are so inclined. Were you in here with Hooter?”
“Wooo, that was a mistake. She don’t hold her beer worth a damn and got nasty. That’s what I get for picking up a toll lady.”
Macovich tried to act as if he didn’t care at all for Hooter. She was beneath him–a lowly tollbooth operator. So what if she got ugly and stormed out? He could find women every minute of the day, and he sure didn’t need a tollbooth operator, senior or not.
“Guess I’d better give her a ride home,” Macovich said. “She don’t have a car.”
“I think a better solution is for me to call both of you a cab,” Andy replied. “But she may have some explaining to do to the police.”
Hammer was asking Hooter about the police even as Andy said this.
“Are you the one who called them?” Hammer inquired. “Because somebody must have.”
“I yelled up at all them helichoppers.” Hooter looked up at a Black Hawk thundering overhead. “So I reckon one of them radioed for help.”
“It’s not possible that people in a helicopter heard you yelling down here,” Hammer pointed out as Trader continued to splash the alleyway behind the Dumpster.
“Well, all I know is I was yelling up at them and waving my arms, so it had to be the helichoppers who called the police ’cause I didn’t call nobody. I never heard nobody pee that long before, either.” She stared off in the direction of the noise. “That one strange man. I think you better check him out. Bet he done other things that ain’t right, you ask me. Maybe he’s a homosensual, too, ’cause he was trying to shoot his privates off like he hate his manhood. So that probably mean he got AIDS and lots of dirty money in his pockets. I wouldn’t touch him without gloves, you want my advice. I got a pair in my purse, you want to borrow ’em,” she offered Hammer. “I figure you gonna have to lock him up,” she added as Andy emerged from the back of Freckles.
“Trader was inside drinking,” Andy told Hammer. “Macovich saw him. Did you?” he asked Hooter.
“I didn’t notice him, if he was in there,” Hooter replied. “There was too much smoke hanging over the table.”