“Any idea where Jay lives when he’s on the street? Where he stays?”
Another head shake. “Sorry, I’d like to help but I really don’t know where you might look … other than maybe the other shelters.”
“How about a guy about the same age as Jay? Name’s Max Levine. They were friends. Or a girl named Carly? Don’t have a last name. Probably younger than Jay or Max.”
Scott Friend thought, then shook his head slowly. “Sorry, can’t help with either of them. Maybe try some of the folks outside.” He pointed at the people we could see through the windows that faced the street.
“Thanks, Scott,” I said. “Good to see you again.”
Cobb handed him a business card. “If you happen to run into him or hear anything about where we might look, I’d appreciate a call. And thanks.”
Friend took the card, nodded. “Any time.”
We had no luck on the street with Max Levine or the girl named Carly. It seemed to me there was a less cordial feel to our second pass through the people outside the Salvation Army building.
Cobb and I split up to cover more ground faster. We mapped out two routes that would take us to several places where a runaway kid might hang out. We’d meet up two hours later outside a take-out pizza joint on 9th Avenue.
I got two hours of nothing. A couple of times I thought the person I was talking to knew something but wasn’t about to tell me. Code of the street people.
When I got to the rendezvous point, Cobb was already there but he wasn’t alone. He was engaged in a conversation with a short, bearded man wearing a bundle of winter clothes, none of which were what could be called colour coordinated, including his mitts, one of which was tan and huge, the other not a mitt at all but a glove, orange with blue trim.
The conversation was one-sided. Cobb was doing the talking, his voice low and controlled but forceful. He saw me, paused, and indicated I should come over.
“Adam Cullen, meet Ike Groves, the Grover.”
I nodded. Ike Groves did not respond.
“Now Grover, we’ve talked about the importance of manners. Say hello to the gentleman.”
Groves growled something that approximated hello. Cobb turned toward me without removing a hand from the shoulder of a coat that may have been tan once but was now the grey-brown of undercooked hamburger.
“Grover here was just about to tell me what he knows about a particular house not far from where we’re standing where some enterprising people are selling illicit products, isn’t that right, Grover?”
Groves looked around … worried.
“My friend Grover lives in the neighbourhood and knows everything, but sometimes he’s reluctant to share information with his friends. I was just reminding him about his involvement in an ill-advised scheme involving a number of automobiles that didn’t belong to him but somehow turned up in a storage garage he was renting.”
Groves squirmed but the hand remained firmly attached to his shoulder, and even with the coat as padding I guessed that the shoulder was in some discomfort.
“Happily for Grover the police never learned about the vehicles in question,” Cobb turned to Groves in mid-sentence, “but who did know all about the operation and chose not to inform the authorities about what was going on in that garage, Grover, who was that again? Speak up, I’m having trouble hearing you.”
“You, Cobb, and I appreciate it but I can’t say —”
“Oh, now see Grover, there’s a word I hate — that word but. Now what would have happened on that stolen auto thing if I’d been thinking, ‘I don’t really want to turn my friend Grover in for doing something very illegal, but …’ Thing is, Grover, there was no but then and there really shouldn’t be a but now. You can see my point here, can’t you?”
Groves winced and I was fairly sure the grip on the shoulder had just got tighter.
“Alls I know is that there’s a guy owns a few houses around here. Maybe three or four. That’s one of them. He buys places cheap, fixes ’em up a little bit, rents ’em to people who have … business interests.”
“Crack houses,” Cobb said.
“You didn’t hear that from me.”
“This particular house — you know the tenants?”
Vigorous head shake. “Uh-uh, and that’s the truth, man. From what I hear I don’t wanna know.”
“Bad guys?”
“There’s bad guys and there’s bad guys. These are guys people like me stay away from.”
Cobb said, “Jay Blevins.”
“Who’s that?”
“That’s my line, Grover. You know him?” Cobb held out the picture.
Groves studied the picture, thought for a few seconds. “I’ve seen the kid. Didn’t know his name. Pothead, crackhead, maybe other shit too.”
“He ever buy from you?”
“Aw, come on, Cobb, you know I don’t —”
Louder. “He ever buy from you?”
“Naw, I’ve seen him on the street a few times. Goin’ in and out of shelters. I don’t pay attention to them kind.”
“Because he’s not one of your customers?”
“Punks like that attract the wrong kind of people. Parents, cops, guys like you. Like I said, I steer clear.”
“When’s the last time you saw him?”
Another shrug. “No idea. Month ago maybe … or maybe two.”
“Where?”
“Told you man, I don’t pay attention to punks like him. Bottom feeders. Low life, you know?”
“I can see how having to associate with riff-raff like that would be upsetting.”
“Yeah, so now you know what I know and you can let go of my shoulder.”
“I need a name, Grover.”
“What?”
“A name. I’ll buy your story that you don’t know the people in the house. But I need the name of the owner. The guy with several properties.”
Groves shrugged. “Shit, how would I know that?”
“Guy owns three or four places around here that house the kind of businesses you described. You know who owns them.”
“Jesus, man …”
“The name.”
Groves winced again, looked over at me, and leaned closer to Cobb, whispered something. Cobb let go of the shoulder, took a step back. “Now, Grover, I’m hoping you aren’t thinking that you can mess with me, because if that happens, it will come back to haunt you.”
Groves feigned indignity. “I wouldn’t do that. You know me better than that, Cobb.”
“One last thing, Grover — you hear anything, I mean anything about that house or the people in it, I’m your first phone call. You got that?”
Grover didn’t answer and started moving quickly away from us.
Cobb and I watched him walk away, flexing the shoulder, rubbing it with the other hand.
“Friend of yours?”
“Yeah,”