Charles Willeford [Hoke Mosel Way We Die Now (epub)

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.Then, when you finish your smoke, you sign back in again and return to your desk or whatever.A lot of guys have already quit smoking, you see, and they've complained to the new chief that smoke from heavy smokers is invading their space.""What about the men's room?""No smoking inside the building, period.That includes interrogation rooms, suspect lockup, everywhere except the outside parking lot.""It won't work, Bill.Lieutenant Ramirez, in Robbery, smokes at least three packs a day.He might as well move his fucking desk out to the parking lot.""That's what we tried to tell the new chief.But he figures if he makes it hard on smokers, they'll either cut down radically or quit.""Does the new chief smoke? I never noticed.""Snoose.He dips Copenhagen.He usually has a lipful of snuff, but he doesn't spit.He swallows the spit instead.""That figures.The rule won't bother him any, so the bastard doesn't give a shit about the rest of us.But I don't think a rule that dumb can be enforced.Guys'll sneak 'em in the john or even at their desks.""Not if they get an automatic twenty-five-dollar fine they won't.""Jesus." Hoke took a Kool out of his pack and lighted it with his throwaway lighter.He took one drag and then butted it in his ashtray."I lit that without thinking, and I've still got an hour to go." He returned the butt to his pack."That's why I'm running this survey, Hoke.If a big majority complains, he probably won't put in the rule.So I'll put you down as opposing the new rule, right?""Right.Now let me tell you about this little gadget--""Some other time.I've got to see some other guys before they go off shift." Henderson got to his feet."One other thing--I almost forgot to tell you." Henderson snapped his fingers and turned in the doorway.At six-four and 250 pounds, his body almost filled the doorframe."Major Brownley said to tell you to let your beard grow, and he'd call you Sunday night at home and let you know about the meeting--""This is only Thursday, and I work tomorrow.Does he mean that I let my beard grow out now, or do I shave tomorrow?""All he said was what I told you.So I suppose he means to let it grow from now till he tells you to shave.""Did he say why? Perhaps I should talk to him about this first.""You can't.He went down to the Keys and won't be back till Sunday night.He'll call you at home then and explain it to you, and also about the meeting.""What meeting?""He didn't say.He's got a visitor, an old fraternity buddy he went to A and M with in Tallahassee, and they went fishing down in the Keys.Off Big Pine, I think.""I've never grown a beard, Bill.Even if I go a day or two without shaving, it makes my neck itch.Did he give you any hint--""I'm only the executive officer.Major Brownley's the division chief, and he doesn't take me into his confidence on every little thing.I'm just passing along the message he gave me over the phone.He didn't come in today, and that's why I went to the new chief's meeting instead of him.If it was important for me to know, he would have told me the reason.Don't worry about it.""Why shouldn't I worry? Wouldn't you be concerned if Willie ordered you to grow a beard?""I'd like to stay and talk about this with you, although it's a fruitless discussion.I say fruitless because anything we say would only be idle conjecture, based on inadequate information.But I suspect sometimes that Willie BrownIcy pulls shit like this once in a while just to keep us offbalance.My son Jimmy's like that.Only yesterday Jimmy asked me if he could grow a mustache.""Jimmy's only twelve years old.""Eleven.But I gave him permission anyway.I figure it'll take another six years before it grows out long enough to be noticed.But he was happy as hell when I told him to go ahead.""At least Jimmy asked for permission.Sue Ellen had her hair all kinked up and then dyed it electric blue right down the middle.She didn't say anything.She just did it.""But she's seventeen.If Jimmy was seventeen, he'd grow his mustache without asking me for permission.""She looks terrible.She looks like the kind of girl who goes with boys who've dropped out of school.""If she's still working at the car wash, that's the only kind of boy she's likely to meet.I'm not criticizing--at least she's got a job.But she's probably the only white girl in Miami working full-time at a car wash.""I know.She's even picked up some black dialect.But I've discouraged her from using it around the house."Henderson disappeared from the doorway.Hoke gathered his work sheets together and put them into the redflagged Dr.Russell file, He locked the file, together with the supplementary reports, in his two-drawer file cabinet.He slipped into his blue poplin leisure jacket and dropped the garage door opener into the left leather-lined outside pocket before leaving his cubicle on the fourth floor of the Miami police station.Hoke always carried several loose.38-caliber tracers in the outside pocket of his jacket, and he'd had it lined with glove leather for this purpose.Hoke rode the elevator down to the garage and climbed the ramp to the outside parking lot.He paused at the exit, inhaling the hot, humid air, and wondered where the new chief would put the smoking area in the lot.The fenced-in area would be crowded as hell if three hundred cops on each shift made trips back and forth to smoke.Not all of them smoked, however.But even one hundred and fifty cops going and coming from the building would crowd the elevator and stairways.It would take approximately twenty minutes for each cop who smoked to make his round trip and smoke a cigarette, and if each cigarette was charged to personal time, without pay, six smokes a day could mean a loss of two hours' pay for each smoker.That meant that many would be sneaking cigarettes and then get a twentyfive-dollar fine when they were caught.All this extra money coming into the department would mean that the new chief would probably meet his annual budget for the first time in the city's history.Hoke climbed into his battered 1973 Pontiac Le Mans and lighted a cigarette for the drive home to Green Lakes.If the rule went in, despite the advice not to do it, the odds were good that it would be rescinded within three days [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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