I wrote down “finger sizzled.”
“So then she pulls my finger away, but the two of them are still holding me, and Mrs. Gorkin, she comes around, stands in front me, must be a good foot shorter than I am, and she wags a finger in my face and says, ‘Next time, we put your whole arm in. Or we cut off your dick and drop it in and serve it to somebody as a hot dog.’ She says, ‘You understand?’ And all I can do is nod, her fucking daughter still has her hand over my mouth. And then she says, ‘After we cook your dick, we go find your wife, we cut off her tits, and we cook them too. And your kids, because some people, they like their meat extra tender.’”
He was shaking. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a tissue, and wiped his nose.
I finished writing and looked at him.
“Did you talk to your supervisor?” I said. “This Frank Ellinger guy?”
“Yeah,” Brian Sandler said, pulling himself together. “I told him I’d been to see the Gorkins. He says, ‘Hey, you can cut them some slack. They’re just trying to make a go of it here.’ If I looked after them, they’d look after me. I said to him, ‘They tried to fry my fucking finger.’ And you know what he says?”
“What?”
“He says be glad that’s all they fried. But the thing is, it’s not just the Gorkins. They’re connected with some other places, run by their Russian or whatever friends. They do all other kinds of shit on the side. Drugs, I’m pretty sure. It’s like a dropoff point or something. A shipment comes in, they leave it with the Gorkins, someone else comes to pick it up. They figure, they have this legit business, the burger joint, makes them look less suspicious, since people are coming in and out all the time anyway.”
“How many others in the department are being threatened or taking bribes?”
“I don’t know. I don’t want to talk about it with anyone. But this other guy I work with, Harry? He’s been buying all this hot-shit electronic stuff the last few months. Gadgets. Going out, partying, new clothes. We don’t make that kind of money. He didn’t used to have it. Now he does.”
“What about the cops?”
Sandler craned his neck around, checking the parking lot for strange cars. “I’ve thought about it. But what if they start checking around, can’t prove anything? What’s going to happen to me then? The Gorkins figure out it was me, or Frank rats me out to them, what happens? But if there’s a story in the paper, if you guys can blow the lid off this all at once, the city, the mayor and council, they’ll have to take action. They’ll demand an investigation. It’ll all be out there, in the public. They won’t be able to do anything to me then, or to my family. Right? And then, the cops will have to protect me. Won’t they?”
“Probably,” I said.
“Can you do this story?”
“I think so.” I decided not to tell Sandler that I was not, technically, a reporter at the moment.
“What do you mean, you think so?”
“I mean, yes. This can be done. Why are you telling me all this? As opposed to some other reporter.”
“When you called, about your son, and the incident at Burger Crisp, I figured it was only a matter of time before the shit hit the fan. I want to get out in front of this. I don’t want to be dragged down by it. I’d rather be the guy who blew the whistle than get caught in this with everybody else.”
I asked him a few more questions. Names and dates, as many specific details as I could pull out of him. Plus where I could reach him.
“You gotta be really careful how you go about asking questions,” he said. “I don’t want anyone knowing where all this came from, not before the story hits the paper.”
“I understand.” I paused. “Does your wife know what’s happening?”
Sandler shook his head. “I’m too ashamed. Maybe, when it comes out, it’ll give me some of my pride back, and then I can tell her.” He looked at his watch. “I gotta go.”
“Listen,” I said, “I have a couple of other things I have to deal with first.” I was thinking of my trip to Canborough and beyond. “But in a day or so, I’ll start looking into this.”
Unburdened, he said thank you, asked me for an e-mail address, which he wrote down, then slipped out of my car and back into his Buick. The tires of his car crunched the gravel and he backed out, turned around, and drove out of Bayside Park.
I sat there, a plan taking shape in my mind, a plan that could get me, and Sarah, our rightful jobs back. If I had a story about rampant corruption in the health department, about restaurant owners offering bribes, making death threats, I’d—
The passenger door opened abruptly. Before I could even think, I’d shouted, “Jesus!”
Lawrence Jones settled in next to me. “You always that jumpy when a black man gets in your car?” He pulled the door shut, looked at what I was driving. “Wow. This makes my Jag look like a piece of shit.”
19