Tonight he told me astringently that he was very busy and if it was business it could wait until he was in the office tomorrow.
“Does she have a name?” I asked hopefully.
“Make it snappy, Warshawski. I’m not in the mood.”
It was easy to be brief since I didn’t have much to say. “Roz Fuentes. She’s on the county ticket and she thinks I think she’s hiding something. Is she?”
“God, Vic, I don’t know. If you had to bother me at home to ask me that—”
“I wouldn’t have,” I interrupted him. “Do you know who Ralph MacDonald is?”
“You’re wasting my time, Warshawski. Everyone knows MacDonald. He’s the leading contender to put together the package for the new stadium-retail-housing complex.”
I hadn’t heard that. Murray told me loftily I didn’t know everything, that it was just county scuttlebutt because of Boots being tight with MacDonald.
“And I don’t need you calling me at home catechizing me to remember what an inside track Ralph MacDonald has in county building projects. He and Boots grew up together. They got big together. Everyone knows that. So come to the point or hang up.”
I scowled at the phone but plowed ahead in my best Girl Scout style. “Ralph is hanging out with a lady I sort of know—Marissa Duncan. She’s kind of a political PR woman, fund-raiser, that type of thing. She trotted him out for me tonight at her Lincoln Park town house to tell me to lay off Roz.”
“Yeah, I know Marissa. She’s at all the right events. If she and Ralph want you to leave them alone, it’s not news—they must know what a pain in the ass you are. It still could have waited until morning.”
When I didn’t say anything he grudgingly allowed that he didn’t know of anything about Roz that the paper was holding back. They do that more often than the trusting public likes to think—they don’t run a juicy story because it will stub an important advertiser or religious figure’s toe. Or even worse, they want to wait and drop it like a stink bomb when it will hurt the most people.
“But you’ll check tomorrow for me?” I persisted.
“Only if I get an exclusive on your obituary, Warshawski.”
I made a face at the phone. “The number of french fries you eat I’m bound to outlive you, Murray…. Did you see anything about a dead junkie picked up at the Rapelec construction site?”
I could feel him trying to figure it out on the phone— which was the real reason I’d called, Roz or the junkie. “I missed that one,” he said cautiously. “Friend of yours?”
“In a way.” Peppy got up and started sniffing around the corners. “I ID’d her. It just seemed strange to me that some of the city’s top cops were there—thought you might know about it. Well, sorry to have bothered you at home—I’ll talk to you at the paper tomorrow.”
“Warshawski—oh, the hell with you. Go find someone else to run your errands.” He hung up with a bang.
Peppy had found some dust balls behind the piano that she was bent on eating. I retrieved them from her mouth and hunted around for a tennis ball to play a little indoor fetch with her. She likes to sit on her haunches and catch the ball without letting it bounce. The hitch is, I have to go scampering after it if she doesn’t make it. I was lying on my back pulling it from under the piano when the phone rang. I clambered upright to answer the phone and bounced the ball to Peppy. She watched it go by her with a look of pure disgust and slumped dejectedly onto her forepaws.
It was Michael Furey. I stiffened at once, thinking Bobby must have given him a little godfatherly advice on the best way to handle stubborn women.
Furey was ill at ease. I didn’t do anything to make him relax. “Sorry to bother you so late in the day. Do you have a minute? I need to talk to you about something. Can I come over?”
“Is this Bobby’s idea?” I demanded.
“Well, yes, I mean not that I come over, but—”
“You can tell him from me to butt out of my business. Or I’ll tell him myself.”
“Don’t make this harder for me than it already is, Vic. She’s not just your private business, even if you wish she was.”
I held the receiver away from my face and looked at it for a minute. “You’re not calling about—about Tuesday night?” I asked stupidly.
“No. No, nothing like that. Though I admit I owe you an apology. This—it’s about your aunt and it’s not real easy talking about it on the phone.”
My heart squeezed shut. “Is she dead?”
“No, oh no, it’s just—look, I hate being the one to do this to you, but Uncle Bobby—the lieutenant—he thought you and I were, well, since we’d been friends it would come better from me than anyone else.”
Wild thoughts of Elena’s somehow being responsible for the fire at the Indiana Arms clashed with the fear of a drunken stupor turned to disaster. I sat on the piano bench and demanded to know what Michael was talking about.