Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 124, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 757 & 758, September/October 2004

Dog-tired after making my rounds, I still couldn’t fall back to sleep. My mind kept trying to make sense of it, to find some connection. Can bad times really come around again? All the elements were in place. Workers from Idlewild. Nate Crowell, blind now, waiting tables in the dark. “Table for one, sir?”

Coley Barnes and Misirlou playing in the ballroom again. With his empty trumpet case still onstage. As though he’d just stepped out. And he’d be right back.

I finally managed to nod off, but still couldn’t rest. Tossing and turning, hearing Coley’s big band playing onstage. Withered corpses in tattered tuxedos, playing rusty instruments, their rotting skin sloughing off. And then Misirlou stepped to the microphone... and screamed!

Sweet Jesus!

I snapped awake. My freaking alarm clock was buzzing. Time to get up, for real. Stumbling to my feet, I got dressed, feeling like I hadn’t slept five consecutive minutes all night. Which wasn’t far from the truth.

I made my morning rounds anyway, making sure everybody was where they were supposed to be. But they weren’t. Mafe Rochon was missing.

“I don’t like it,” Puck said. “Maybe you’d better check on him.”

“Check, hell, he’s juicing again. You told me so yourself.”

“Maybe, but it ain’t like Mafe to miss work. And with our schedule, we need every man we got.”

“Fine, I’ll go check on him. But if he’s tanked up, Puck, I’m gonna fire him. And then I’m gonna kick his ass around the block.”

“Hell, in that case I’ll come with ya.” Puck grinned. “You been moody all week and Mafe’s mean as a snake when he’s hung over. The two of you havin’ a go ought to be worth seeing.”

“You don’t think I can take him?”

“Damned if I know, Danny. Maybe. Maybe not.”

“I don’t know, either,” I admitted. “But I’m in the mood to find out.”

The Aztec Motel was on the low-rent end of Malverne, two dozen cheap rooms with a Burger King on one side, Slaney’s Tavern on the other. Perfect spot for a gypsy construction crew. Most of the men shared rooms. Not Mafe. He preferred to drink alone, and nobody wanted to be in the same country with him when he woke up.

Except me. I hammered on his door. “Rochon! Wake up, dammit! Come on!” No answer. Tried again. Still nothing. Puck and I glanced at each other, worried now.

“What the hell?” Puck frowned. “If he’s here, he’s gotta be awake by — whoa. Somebody’s moving in there. Mafe? Are you okay?”

“...help me...”

It was barely a whisper but we both heard it. Rearing back, I kicked in the door. The stench of booze and vomit rolled over us like riot gas. Mafe was on his hands and knees by the bed, head down, drooling, panting like a dog.

“Danny?” he said, staring blankly toward us. “I can’t see.”

“Do you know what he drank?” the intern asked. We were at Malverne’s tiny emergency hospital, a four-bed doc-in-the-box.

“This,” I said, handing him the half-empty bottle of Belknap’s Best I’d found on the nightstand.

“My God,” he said, wincing as he sniffed the bottle. “Bad bootleg. Probably enough lead in it to poison a regiment.”

“Lead?” Puck echoed.

“Sure. Good bootleggers use copper tubing, bad ones use automobile radiators. Faster, cheaper, and deadlier. Radiators are soldered together with lead. The longer they’re in use, the worse the mix gets. Is your friend a heavy drinker?”

“Compared to what?”

“Oddly enough, that’s in his favor. His body’s built up some resistance, and he’s got the constitution of a Kodiak bear. His system should purge the worst of it in thirty-six hours or so, but it was a near thing. I worked Detroit before I moved up here. I’ve seen men go blind and suffer permanent brain damage from bad hooch. Some even die. Your friend was lucky.”

“Think so?” Puck shrugged, eyeing Mafe, still unconscious on the gurney. “He don’t look so lucky to me.”

“Where did he get it?” I asked. We were headed back to the Belknap in my pickup.

“Hell, Danny, he found the still, remember? Probably stashed a half-dozen bottles before he told us about it.”

“This started out to be a simple job, Puck. Remodel the storefronts, convert the upper floors to condos. Should have been easy, a warm, indoor gig for the winter. But since we found that damned Gin Mill, everything’s coming unglued.”

“Told you that first day we should dynamite it— What the hell is all that?”

Ahead of us, the downtown district was a sea of flashing lights, emergency vehicles, fire trucks, cops.

“It’s the Belknap,” I breathed. “It’s on fire.”

The streets were barricaded, so we ditched the pickup and ran the last two blocks to the site. Fire trucks were hosing the building down from the street side. My crew was huddled in a group behind the fire lines.

“What happened?” Puck asked, grabbing Deke LaPlaunt by the arm, leading him away from the others.

“Place blew up. Some kind of blast in the east side of the basement. Fire took off from there, tore up the elevator shaft. Hosin’ it down from out here won’t do nothin’, Puck. It’s in the walls. We tried to tell ’em, but—”