"Ain't working out for y'all, huh?" " Mars is the god of war, right?" " Planet, too." "I know it's a planet." "But the clue is "Greek god of war."" "Ares." "Greeks called him Ares." "Same dude, different name, is all." "Ares fits." "Thanks." "It's all good." "See, back in middle school and all, I used to love them myths." "That stuff was deep." "Truly." "You're up." "State calls Omar Little, Your Honour." "Faggot." "Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God?" "I surely do." " State your name for the record." " Omar Devon Little." " Mr Little, how old are you?" " About 29, thereabout." " And where do you live?" " No place in particular, ma'am." " You're homeless?" " ln the wind, so to speak." " And what is your occupation?" " Occupation?" "What do you do for a living, Mr Little?" "I rip and run." " You..." " l robs drug dealers." "And exactly how long has this been your occupation, Mr Little?" "I don't know exactly." "I venture to say maybe about eight or nine years." "How does a man rob drug dealers for eight or nine years and live to tell about it?" "Day at a time, I suppose." "What do we know?" "On Sobotka, very little." "He seems to live within his means." "House in Glen Burnie, paid-off truck, modest savings." " Credit history is OK." " There's no flash to him, nothing dramatic." "Doesn't sound much like a money man." " Or maybe he's hiding it." " The union is also a little threadbare." "They paid the taxes on union hall almost a year late, and only after they got hit with liens." "Looking at their books..." " You subpoenaed their books?" " You don't need to." "lbs books are open to the Justice Department under the terms of a federal racketeering case that came out of New York." "Washington sent us a copy of everything the Baltimore locals have filed." "The books show there's less than 100 checkers still paying dues to 15-1 4." "And that's down from about 300 in the '70s." "They're hurting." "So where's all this money Valchek is talking about?" "The lbs hired Bruce DiBiago to lobby Annapolis." "And through individual officers and union members they paid about $70,000 to various PACs and Democratic organisations in the last eight months." "They show that on their books?" "We pieced that together from campaign finance reports." "That's just what was in the names of union officers we cross-referenced." " So, where's the cash coming from?" " Drugs?" "So far, DNRs on the union hall phones don't show much." "Union business and personal calls, but no beepers, and not much in the way of cell numbers or payphones either." "What's with those hand-to-hands?" "We're buying from a lot of white boys." "O'Donnell Heights, Greektown, Highlandtown above the park." " But any port connections feel random." " The money comes from somewhere." "Maybe it's what the checkers do." "I mean, they monitor what comes in and out of the port." "That's what they do, that's their value." "They're bringing the shit in?" "Or they're letting it happen." "Like that can full of dead girls." "They kept that out of the computer." "Which is why we're gonna quietly do some work on that side of things." "Kima, Prez, I want you to start looking at girls." "No problem." "Who's working them?" "Are they club dancing, whoring?" "We need to plug into that circuit." "As for the rest of you, Lester stays with the paper trail and with the DNRs, looking for connections to the union money." "Herc and Carver, keep working the drug corners near the port." "Officer Russell and Bunk Moreland are assigned to Homicide, but for the time being they'll be with us, running the port database, looking for any pattern involving contraband." "Questions?" "Excuse me." " l'm Thomas." " Beadie." "Would you like to go to Royal Farms, maybe get a cup of coffee?" "Right." "Yo, I'm Thomas." "You want a coffee?" "Listen, I was gonna ask her for her panties to make some soup with, but I was afraid she'd take it the wrong way." "You were at the opposite end of the parking lot when the assailant drew his gun?" "Thereabout." "Do you see the gunman who killed Mr Gant anywhere in the courtroom today?" "Yo, what up, Bird?" "For the record, you are identifying the defendant, Marquis Hilton." "It's just Bird to me." "And, Mr Little, you had seen him many times before, had you not?" " We jailed together down the Cut..." " Objection, Your Honour." "May we approach?" "Quite a witness, ain't he?" "Word on the street is, Omar ain't nowhere near them rises when the shit pop." "Street said cocksucker was on the East Side, sticking up some Ashland Avenue niggers." "That's the word on the street, huh?" "Trouble is, String, we ain't on the street." "We're in a court of law." "Your Honour..." "Objection is noted and preserved for the record, Mr Levy." "Move on." "Thank you, Your Honour." "Jurors will disregard that comment from the witness in which he explained where he had last encountered the defendant." "Yes or no, Mr Little?" "Prior to the shooting, did you know the defendant?" "I knew the man but wasn't like he was no friend or nothing." "So you would have no trouble recognising him from a moderate distance, say 20, 25 yards in daylight?" "No problem." "Mr Little, do you recognise... this particular weapon?" "That's Bird's gun, the .380." " You've seen it before?" " Bird always flashing that thing." "So you'd actually seen it before the day in question." " And on the day in question?" " lt was in Bird's hand." "When he shot at Mr Gant?" "Yes, ma'am." " Bird covet them shiny little pistols." " Objection, Your Honour." "And the boy too trifling to throw it off even after a daytime murder." "You're a lying cocksucker." "I'll rip your heart out your goddamn chest!" "The defendant will regain control or he will be forcibly restrained and I will clear the court." "The witness's last answer is to be stricken and disregarded by the jury." "Niko." "Eton is my friend." "It's good to have friends meet, no?" "Eton, huh?" "That's from the Greek, meaning what?" "No Greek. Israeli." "Yeah?" "Cos you look Greek, no offence." "Either way, I mean." " You have the chemicals?" " l can get them, as much as you want." "When?" "I was gonna do something this week." "There's been a problem, though." " What problem?" " My cousin, Ziggy." "He got into a beef with these East Baltimore guys." "Drug dealer by the name of Cheese took his car, burned it." "Now he's saying he's gonna dust Zig if he doesn't pay." "Yeah, malaka, right." "Zig fucked up the package." "So, you bring us the chemicals, we pay." "Then you pay your debt." "It was 2,700, right?" "Now this asshole is saying it's double." "54, you believe that?" "First he takes the car and now he's jacking us around on the money." "You want, we kill him." "No." " That ain't it either, no." " Why no?" "Cos first of all, Zig fucked it up." "He owes 27." "Second, you kill Cheese, and we're gonna have a fight with his people, right?" "A year down the road, some nigger sees my cousin coming out the burger shop, putting gas in his car on Central Avenue, no questions, puts a cap in his ass." "He's smart, huh?" "Niko, smart." "Look, we don't have the muscle to go talk to this guy, make things right." "I was hoping maybe you do." "Mr Little, can I ask why you came forward in this case?" "I told the police what I know." "Were you offered anything in exchange?" " Like what?" " Were you arrested?" "Were you going to be charged with a crime and did the police agree to drop charges?" "No, man, it ain't even about that." "How many times have you been arrested as an adult, Mr Little?" "Shoot, I done lost count." "Enough, though, not to take it personal." "Possession of a handgun, possessing a concealed weapon, assault by pointing." "Robbery, deadly weapon, possession of a handgun again." "Followed by violation of parole on weapon charges, one count of attempted murder, and use of a handgun in commission of a felony." "That wasn't no attempt murder." "What was it, Mr Little?" "I shot the boy Mike-Mike in his hind parts, that all." "Fixed it so he couldn't sit right." "Why'd you shoot Mike-Mike in his hind parts, Mr Little?" " Let's say we had a disagreement." " A disagreement over?" "Mike-Mike thought he should keep that cocaine he was slinging, and the money he was making from slinging it." "I thought otherwise." "So you rob drug dealers?" "This is what you do." "Yes, sir." "You walk the streets of Baltimore with a gun, taking what you want, when you want it, willing to use violence when your demands aren't met." "This is who you are." "Why should we believe your testimony?" "Why believe anything you say?" "That's up to y'all, really." "You say you aren't testifying against the defendant" " because of any deal you made with police." " True that." "That you are here because you want to tell the truth about what happened to Mr Gant in that project parking lot." "Yeah." "When in fact you are exactly the kind of person who would, if you felt you needed to, shoot a man down on a project parking lot, then lie to the police about it, are you not?" "Look, I ain't never put my gun on no citizen." "You are amoral, are you not?" "You are feeding off the violence and the despair of the drug trade." "You are stealing from those who themselves are stealing the lifeblood from our city." " You are a parasite who leeches off..." " Just like you, man." "..the culture of drugs..." "Excuse me?" "I got the shotgun." "You got the briefcase." "It's all in the game, though, right?" "And with the economy what it is, you can consider coming in 10 or 20% below asking and still feel competitive." " Even on the Hamburg Street address?" " Absolutely." "I have to admit, I like the house at 1501 ." "Although I didn't like the whirlpool tub in the master suite bathroom." "Magenta?" "That's cosmetic." "If they want to make the sale they should have the couth to change the colour." " l know it's a tiny point to harp on." " Well..." "You're right." "We should keep looking." "We shouldn't settle for just anything." "And you think that there will be some new open houses this Sunday?" "I'm sorry, what were you saying?" "We'll keep looking." "You'll take us around on Sunday?" "Oh, definitely." " OK then, see you Sunday, early." " Great." "Thank you." "I'll see you then." "You are a child, you know that?" " What do you want?" " Dinner and a movie." " Come on, stop it." " Why not?" "This isn't going anywhere, Jimmy." "Dinner and a movie, then I'll walk you to the door and you tell me to go fuck myself." "How about I tell you to fuck yourself now?" "Then you can save that money." "Come on, Elena." "Come on, I signed all your damn papers." "Give me another shot." "Friday." "You pay for the sitter." " So how that DC game, man?" " Same as it ever was." "Chocolate City, I ain't been there in a while." "Call it Drama City nowadays." "Otherwise, same old gogo." "Same old bamas." "Same soup, just reheated, know what I'm saying?" "If you need anything to make this happen, you gotta get it yourself." "I can't go through my people." "If Stringer Bell reaching all the way past Baltimore with this kind of work, then we got a real mystery going on, don't we?" "Don't worry, no mistakes." "Nothing that might come back on you." " You sure of your people?" " My cousin up in there, he on it." "All right." "I can't stand that gogo shit, anyhow." "Ain't heard it live, then. I know a club in Oxon Hill that would wreck y'all." "All right." "If I'm around the way." "So, how you doing?" " Nursing school right now." " Good, that's good." "Lester's been pushing me." "He does it, kind of without you knowing that he's doing it." "Yeah, I know what you mean." "He said that you would be by today to talk about the clubs." "About some girls, Russian." " Or from that part of the world." " The ones from the circuit, yeah." "You should try this place called Nightshift down off of Holabird." "I have a friend who works there." "She worked with a bunch of Russian girls last year for about three months." " Think she'll talk to me?" " Only if I ask her." "Thank you, Detective, nothing further." " Anything more on redirect, Miss Nathan?" " No, Your Honour." "Let's take 10 minutes and run the closing arguments." "I have every intention of beginning tomorrow with jury instructions." " How'd Omar do?" " You didn't see it?" "Not the cross." "That bad?" " You have no problem." " No?" "To start, he wants you to pay 54." "Then we talk." " He says, "No, you pay just the 27."" " Yeah, I saw how you talked." "But you will not pay the 27." "Instead you will get the money for the car that burned." " Yeah?" " Yeah." "Him we don't know." "But the one he calls boss, him we know." "You gonna sit there and pout?" "I know you don't think I'm going down to that club just to look at pussy." "I know you know me better than that." " l ain't even looking." " Everybody's looking." " Most of them women are dykes." " Cheryl, it's police work." "That's supposed to make me feel better?" "Kima's out on the street doing her detective thing?" "All that hospital shit, all that rehab." " All them promises." " We talked about this." "No, you talked." "I didn't get a word in edgewise once you made up your mind." " Where you going?" " With you." "Excuse me?" "I might see a little something I happen to like." "So all of that's on the table?" "There's money in the budget for the grain pier." "Also, a bond issue that pays for dredging on the main channel." " But not the canal?" " Nope, not the canal." "For that we'll have to fight longer and dig deeper." "So says Frank." "For my money, we're lucky if we pull out the grain pier." "Be that as it may, we spent the money and took our best shot." "Hired a couple lobbyists, made some contributions, paid for a report to argue against the environmental stuff." "It cost, but we're starting to see it." " Where y'all find the cash?" " l've been robbing liquor stores, two a week." "Seriously." "We got some help from the national office." "There've been some timely donations from a few friends." "The point is, we're likely to see the grain pier back up by next year, which means a couple hundred more ships a year, at least." " lf." " And it's a big fucking "if'." "If that Polack mothertucker..." "No offence." "If Krawczyk don't fuck us by throwing up condominiums first, right?" "Nat's right." "The back-door threat is that Kraw or some other developer gets enough last-minute votes to sink the rehab money for the pier." "Those guys are looking at that location." "So we need everybody making phone calls." "Let your legislators know we're watching." "The money only goes so far." "Now we gotta make some noise, right?" " Make some noise." " Enough talk." "Some of you got ships to work in the morning." "The rest need to be drunk." "I'll drink to that." "Help from the national office, huh?" "Timely donations from friends?" "Watch your ass, Frank." " This is it?" " Yeah." "Just picked it up from the port administrator." "What am I looking at?" "The Atlantic Light on the day the can with the women was offloaded." "The boxes are containers." "This one's being offloaded and set on a chassis." "Here's the time - 10:31 hours." "See?" "It was moved to Lane L, Stack 6, Row 3, by an RTG at 10:37 hours." " RTG?" " Rubber tyre gantry." "So from ship to stack took six minutes." "That's the way it's supposed to work, but..." ""AQQZ," as in zebra." ""396594."" "Check digit seven." "That's the number of the can with the women in it." "It was never entered by the checker." "So as far as the computer is concerned, it no longer exists." "Sobotka says that that can happen when the radio waves get knocked down, or when a checker inputs a bad serial number." "It came off Atlantic Light at 1 1 :26 hours and it doesn't show up in the computer again until 15:12 hours." "I find it two hours after that." "So for nearly four hours, it's out on the docks, unaccounted for." "Sobotka says cans get lost all the time." "When they get found, they get put back in the computer." "You believe him?" "No, not this can." "So what's the plan?" "The database on this computer has records for every ship that berthed at Patapsco over the last two years." "We gotta go back and find what other cans might've disappeared like that." " See if there's a pattern." " How many ships we talking about?" "Hundreds." "It ain't like I got a prayer of bringing this case in otherwise." " That's what I'm talking about." " All right." " What the hell is your problem?" " Nothing." "You look like you about to be sick or something." "I just can't look at 'em." "Prez, you ain't never been to a titty bar?" "Yeah, sure." "But not with women." "You're not gonna have a problem for talking to us?" "I don't give a shit." "You friends with Shardene, all that matters." "Besides, I'm from Westport, and I told them club owners straight-up, I was here before them hos got here, and they better make sure I'm here after they leave." " How long ago did they come through?" " Six months back was the last batch." "Russians, I think, but shit all sound the same when you can't understand a damn word." " Who brought them?" " Club owner pays extra for them." "There was a woman, the madam who handled the cash." " But I ain't get a name." " She Russian, too?" "She was something." "She had an accent." "So it's like, one day all Baltimore girls are at the bar, and the next, what?" " All foreign girls?" " That about right." "They was making so much money with them, they let some of their regular dancers go." "Not me, cos l mean, I got clientele here, but some of the others." "Where'd the girls stay?" "Where they told." "Shit, they ain't here legally." "They don't know shit." "They ain't got no family." "The men they got handling them are always with them." "Right there to take them from whatever motel they use to the club and back." "Right there when they need to get food, or go to the Rite Aid." "Right outside the motel door when they up in them rooms with the johns." "Anyone try to get away?" "Shit, I seen one of them get lit up with one of them stun guns, just for going down the block to get some dinner." "They barely let them girls go to the bathroom by themselves." "And if they see one getting too close to the johns, that's when they move the crew to another town." "Keep it so they don't get no help." "You up after the next song." "Push my numbers then." "I gotta go get paid, honey." "You need anything else, you can call me." "Help if I can." "I'll tell Shardene you said hi." "She must be doing good, to be out for so long." "She must've landed a rich one, right?" " You her girl?" " Yeah." "I wouldn't let mine come in here without me." "These bitches in here are no joke." "Thirteen of them." "They had about a third of that space hidden behind a fake wall." "A few flashlights, some junk food, some water." "A portable toilet they had to share." "And not enough air." "I'm going to schedule sentencing for the third week of next month." "Anything else today?" "Your Honour, my client, having preserved grounds for appeal in the record, wishes me to state that regardless of this jury's verdict, he is the victim of perjury on the part of the state's key witness." "We ask that an appeal bond be set, so that he can participate in this investigation." "On a conviction of first-degree murder?" "Mr Levy, get a grip on yourself." " Your Honour..." " There will be no bond pending sentencing." "As far as I'm concerned, the pre-sentencing report is a mere formality." "Mr Hilton has been found guilty of killing a state's witness, who testified in this very courtroom." "He did so in cold blood, and for pay." "Unless the pre-sentence report indicates that he is the Messiah come again, he will very likely be sentenced to life, no parole, by a Baltimore judge who, for once in his life, gets to leave his office feeling that his job matters." "Mr Hilton, are you the second coming of our Saviour?" " Excuse me?" " Are you Jesus Christ come back to Earth?" "See you at sentencing." "Was it good for you, too?" "Mr Little, this is good to get-out-of-jail-free one time only, on anything up to aggravated assault." " Why, thank you, ma'am." " No, thank you." "A rare pleasure." "Now for the ceremonial eyefuck." "Come see me down the Cut, you punk-ass snitch." " l'll shove a shiv down your throat!" " You think on it, Bird." "You think on Brandon." "I'm gonna see you, man, I swear to God!" "Fuck that, I'll do you like a dog." "You really see him shoot the man?" "You really asking?" "But it's fucked because the man got to where he needed to be and she wasn't even worth it." "Daisy wasn't nothing past any other bitch, anyway, you know?" "And he did all that for her and in the end, it ain't amount to shit." "Fitzgerald said that there were no second acts in American lives." " Do you believe that?" " Man, shit, we locked up." "We best not believe that, right?" "He's saying that the past is always with us." "And where we come from, what we go through, how we go through it, all this shit matters." "I mean, that's what I thought he meant." "Go ahead." "Like at the end of the book, you know?" "Boats and tides and all." "It's like you can change up, right?" "You can say you're somebody new, you can give yourself a whole new story." "But what came first is who you really are and what happened before is what really happened." "It don't matter that some fool say he different." "The only thing that make you different is what you do or what you go through." "Like, you know, like all them books in his library." "Now, he fronting with all them books, but if we pull one down off the shelf, ain't none of the pages ever been opened." "He got all them books and he ain't read near one of them." "Gatsby, he was who he was and he did what he did, and cos he wasn't ready to get real with the story," "that shit caught up to him." "I think, anyway." "Sorry, homey." "You done with your trial?" " All right then, let's take her on out." " Tomorrow." " l'm back tomorrow, Diggsy." " You got something else to do today?" "Yeah, last bit of business." " This is your business." " This is retirement." "And after today, I'm retired." "Talk when I say, not before." " Tovarich." " Sergei, my nigger." " You're losing weight." " Shit." "Down to nothing." "In this country, supermarkets are cathedrals." "I worry for you, buddy." " How your peoples, dog?" " Same, good." "You talk to the man about that other thing." "I can get behind that business in a big way." "We will talk later." " Now, another business." " Right." "This the man with the raggedy-ass Camaro?" "Wasn't mine, it was my cousin's." "It wasn't all that raggedy." "Sorry." "Nicky is with us." "His cousin..." " But family cannot be helped." " Who you telling?" "I got mothertucking nephews and in-laws fucking all my shit up all the time." "And it ain't like I can pop a cap in their ass and not hear about it Thanksgiving time." "For real, I'm living life with some burdensome niggers." "So what the fuck?" "You ain't pay my boy Cheese, and Cheese ain't paying me, right?" "I ain't talking about all the money in the world." "But it ain't like Cheese be in a position out on that corner to let your cuz exemplify shit, you feel?" "The man cut you some slack and every fucking-up white boy be on his titty." "We wanna pay what we owe." "The 27 anyway." " We're gonna have it soon." " Your man doubled it though." "He also burned the car." "Now the blue book on that Camaro was 51 ." "Now, let me understand." "You gonna come up in here, having fucked up a package, asking me to tell Cheese, who you fucked it up on, to pay you out $2,400." "He gets to keep the Camaro." "Just how good a friend is this mothertucker to y'all?" "The Cheese ain't gonna be happy having to pay me back, so I would advise y'all to give him some distance." "Just so he don't come back on my cousin." "Anyway, thanks for being straight on this." "Fool, if it wasn't for Sergei here, you and your cuz both would be cadaverous mothertuckers." "I went through ins, customs, even the State Department." "Nothing." "It's time, Jimmy." "You did what you could, right?" "Yeah, fuck it, let her go." "This one to the anatomy board in the morning." "Jane Doe on the paperwork." " Ain't right, Doc." " What the fuck ever is?" "You leave it to Avon." "He's gonna get some years off your sentence." "No doubt, knowing Avon." "It's all good, Dee." "Just show up, and say what Levy tells you to." "What the hell is wrong with you?" "I'm asking you." "Those hot shots, that was Avon." "I want you home, Dee." "You asked me to carry this. I'm carrying it." " This is mine, right here, right now." " You ain't listening. I am telling..." "Ma." "Remember we used to live on Linden Avenue?" "Remember that house?" "I was about six, seven years old." "I was playing on the porch." "Them twins came by, started picking on me, messing with me." "Remember that?" "I'm banging on the door, trying to get in, and you standing right there to open the door, except you ain't letting me inside." "You told me to go back out there and fight them, whether I lose or not." "Remember?" " They beat the shit out of you." " Yeah." "Then you say to me," ""Boy, I might have brung you into this world," ""but you the one who gonna have to live in it."" "Ma, I'm still here." "Me." "You gotta let me live like I need to live." "You tell Avon, Stringer, and Donette, all of them, to leave me be." "All right, look, fuck y'all. I need a drink." " Come on, we're almost through 2002." " No." " Tomorrow is another goddamn day, right?" " Yeah." "They look thirsty, a round on me." "Yo, Mr Sobotka, friend to the working man, master of the game." "How many votes we get in Annapolis tonight?" " Been here long?" " Since my hair was brown." "I was telling Chess about Benny." " Benny with the harelip?" " That's a good one." "Benny was working the hole and got hit with a shackle." "Chunk of steel clocked him good but he didn't tell nobody." "Not until he came in here." "Little Nose told Benny to call the union lawyer." " Paul Sevel?" " God rest his soul." "So Benny calls Paul." ""Me been hit with a 'ackerel," Benny says." ""A mackerel?" "You working frozen foods again?" Paul says." ""No, 'od damn it, a 'ackerel."" "He slams the phone down." ""'Other'ucker on 'is way over 'ere." ""Says he can't undertan' me."" "Little Nose says, "Why he wanna do that?" ""Benny don't talk no fucking better in person."" "So that's it?" "Me and Cheese are straight?" "Yeah, you're straight." "That there's 2,400 for Princess." "She was worth more than that." "Dolo." "One for the bar, hon." "You win the lotto?" "If my old man can do it, who the hell says I can't?" " What the fuck is wrong with you?" " Nick, when I'm flush, I'm flush." " We ain't gonna live forever, right?" " Next round's on me." " Not for me, I'm gonna head out." " Come on, Frank, belly up." "Take a rain check." " And that one as well, huh?" " Makes 22." "All on the Talco line." "All with Horseface Pakusa working the ship." " We're on it, then." " You gonna call Bunk?" "Detective Moreland is indisposed." " You with Daniels and them?" " No." "We just parked the computer down there." "We're orphaned, man." " Orphaned?" " Yeah." "Rawls is talking like if I don't come home with 1 4 clearances, I can't come home at all." "Lester, too." "Where's the love, Jimmy?" "Where is the mothertucking love?" " So what's up with you, man?" " Nothing." "Nothing, huh?" "I'm done, Bunk." "Bird is my last piece of old business." "I got nothing new." "I was trying for an id on this one... and I can't even tell you why." "Just a way to pretend I was still a murder police, I guess." "Who gives a fuck, right?" "Elena and I are gonna try again." "Oh, shit." "I'm done fucking myself up, Bunk. I am done." "Come on, man, let's go home." "All right, man." "Over here, shitbird." "What the hell happened to you?" "I fell down." "How many times?" "Let's walk." " Pop, I'm..." " Walk with me, Zig." "Votes break for us, that pier comes back online by next spring." " More ships, more work." " Yeah, great." " What the fuck are you about?" " What?" "Was that my son lighting $100 bills like an asshole, in a bar full of working stiffs?" " What the fuck is that?" " Just a smile." " A smile?" " Yep, a smile." "You wanna hit me again, Pop, go ahead, take a shot." "Where you come by that kind of cash?" "You know you ain't had the days." "Definitely not." "It's cos my father's in the union." "Fuck that." "Seniority prevails, Zig." " lt's the only way to keep it halfway honest." " l know, I ain't complaining." "I wish I could give you more." "You don't think I want to throw you more?" " You throw plenty." " lt's just, Christ, Zig." "If I'd listened to your mother, she's always talking about..." " lt's cool." " You should do community college." "Pop, don't." "You wanna know what I remember?" "Do you?" "I remember you, and Uncle Jerry, and Uncle Walt, Pe-Pop," "sitting around the kitchen, talking shit about this gang and that gang, who's better with the break-bulk, who could turn it around faster, who's lazy." " Always a fucking argument, right?" " Four Polacks, six opinions." "I remember when youse all went down to picket them scabs at Covington Piers, how Jackie Taylor got run over by a police car in the middle of that whole goddamn mess." "I remember when the Paceco fell during that windstorm." "You remember?" "Killed Fat Rick dead." " Yeah, what else you remember?" " Everything." "Everything." "So tell me, Mr "Back ln The Day", what are we doing down here with the whart rats in the middle of the goddamn night?" "Beats the fuck outta me." "Every one of those Post-its is a can that disappears when it's being offloaded." "The yellow slips, they show up again with legitimate cargo intact and are re-entered, so you figure those are honest mistakes." "But the pink and the green never come back." "They stay out of the computer for good." "Pink, like the can full of dead girls, they're all from the same shipping line, Talco." "And on all of them, the same checker, Thomas Pakusa, Horseface, he's the one working." "You went at him already?" "We grand juried his ass but that mothertucker didn't blink." "You wanna hit the head?" "Get yourself right, Detective?" "No, I'm good." "The point is, we have a pattern here." "What they're doing eliminates almost all of the paper trail." "As long as they can get a truck past the outbound lanes, the only thing they leave behind is a little telltale in the computer." "A box comes off the ship, flashes for a few moments and blip, then it's gone." "Our target is supposed to be Sobotka, right?" "I mean, on paper anyway." "You're telling me it's better than a fair bet that he actually is a target in Bunk's murders." "Maybe we can fold our investigation into yours." "And put my ass in the air with 1 4 open homicides that might never clear?" " The bosses wouldn't blame you for that." " l wouldn't shine either." "I'm using what we do with this detail to get a major case squad." "I come up out of here with all those open files, it doesn't smell as sweet." "What's the next move?" "We clone the computer and watch the docks in real time." "Shit." "Yo, Dee." "Just wine, huh?" "I'm not drinking much any more." "No Jameson's?" "Maybe a quick fuck with the waitress, then." "OK, I deserve that one, too, even though I'm not doing much of that any more either." " Anything else?" " l'm sorry." "I don't know where it still comes from." "It's been a year." " You deserve to be angry." " What's the point, though?" "How's work?" "What, just so we talk about everything in my life that pisses you off?" " Drinking, women, the work?" " Just trying to make conversation." " l retired." " Excuse me?" "It's boats, not bodies." "On a good day, I catch crabs and count seagulls." " That's not you." " lt wasn't me." "It wasn't me not to drink, or dog around either." "A lot of things weren't me." "I want another chance." "How about a fuck for the road instead?" " How you doing?" " OK." "Unload this, ditch the trucks and trailers." "Make it look like it was a hijack, all right?" "Niko." "If you want, I will pay you straight, or Eton can pay in heroin." "Wholesale." "Turn it around, you can make 60, 70,000." "Nicky, he's offering, like, three, four times the value." "I'm out on this." "Nick, even if we walk it up to White Mike, we can make 30, 35,000." "Nicky, come on, man." "Half in cash, half in dope." "Nicky, I can turn that package around, no problem." " No, Zig, I got it." " Nicky, you don't know..." "You hear me?" "I said I fucking got this one." "Stay at home and watch cartoons." "Let me handle this shit for the both of us, all right?" "You fucking walking home or what?" "Hey, girl." "What do we do with the day?" "Me?" "I gotta pick up the boys from the sitter." "OK, great." "They're gonna be coming back here." "Michael has piano." "No problem, we'll do something after that." "Maybe we go by my place, pick up some things." "I don't want the boys to know that you were here." "It's gonna get them hoping." "So you need to leave." "Look at this sorry shit." "Mothertuckers do not appreciate nothing that comes free." "I'll take it in the back." "Maybe they got some duct tape will fix it." " Dee, right?" " Yeah." "You can't be in here now, man." "Yo, man, y'all get any Final Calls this week?" " Yeah, we got some." " l didn't see any out there." "Give me a minute." "Let me finish up right here real quick and I'll go and get one for you." "Hey, y'all." "I know you got my mothertucking cigs, yo." "You trying to curb me, yo?" "What's in there?" "English"