5 A Sporting Murder by CHESTER D CAMPBELL Page A

shooting?”
    “How?”
    “Yeah, what do you know that’s
worth my giving you any cash to find out? Do you know who fired the shot?”
    “Maybe.”
    “Did you see the shooter?”
    “I heard him shoot and saw him run
out to his car.”
    “What kind of car did he drive?”
    “Now we’re talking cash.” He
grinned, showing a couple of missing teeth.
    “Tell me the make of the car and a
license number and I’ll give you twenty bucks.”
    His reddened eyes flared like Roman
candles about to fire. He jammed his fists against spindly hips. “Twenty! You
think I’m some idgit asshole? You know how much it cost me to ride a bus out
here? Make it a hunnert.”
    I checked him out a little more
closely. He was nobody’s fool. “Why did you come here instead of to the cops?”
    “I don’t like cops. They’re nothin’
but trouble.”
    “How do I know you aren’t just
making this up?”
    “Gimme fifty now and the other
fifty when you check it out.”
    I had to admire his tenacity, but I
wasn’t about to put out that kind of money on faith alone. “How would I find
you if I came looking?”
    “I hang out around Dickerson Pike
and Trinity Lane. Just ask for Fingers.”
    I wondered if that nickname had come
from a habit of picking pockets or doing a little shoplifting. “Tell me
somebody out there who’d know you.”
    He looked down, obviously scratching
about for an answer. “Tommy at A and R Café. He gives me a cup of coffee now
and then.”
    I reached down and flipped through
my phone book to the café’s listing. I called the number and asked for Tommy.
    “You’re talking to him,” a lively
voice said.
    “I have a guy here who goes by the
name of Fingers,” I said. “He tells me you know him.”
    “Afraid so. He’s harmless, though.
Always hanging around the area. He trying to talk you out of some money?”
    “A little business deal. He wants
to sell me some information. Is he believable?”
    Tommy paused a moment. “My caller
ID shows McKenzie Investigations. Are you the man who found that body over here
Saturday night?”
    I looked across at Fingers and
wondered what was coming. “Right.”
    “I guess I’m responsible. I gave
him your name.”
    “How’d that happen?”
    “He asked me if there was something
in the newspaper Sunday about a shooting around here the night before. I read
the story to him—he’s not too good at reading. He wanted to know where your
office was. I had no idea he’d go out there.”
    “He rode the bus,” I said. “Sounds
like he might be legitimate, doesn’t it. Do you think I could find him over
there if I came looking?”
    “Long as you don’t plan to make him
rich. I know where he sleeps when it doesn’t get too far below freezing.”
    I thanked him and hung up. I pulled
out my billfold and counted out two twenties and a ten. I laid them on the desk
but kept my hand on them.
    “The information, please,” I said.
    He took a scrap of paper from his
coat pocket and tossed it on my desk. It had the three-letter, three-number
combination found on Tennessee license plates.
    “What kind of car?” I asked.
    “One of them big sport utility
trucks. Black. Not sure what make. It was too dark.”
    “Where were you when you saw it?”
    “In front of the building next to
the repair shop. His truck was parked on the street.”
    “Could you identify the man?”
    “Naw. I didn’t get a good look at
him. Didn’t look too big, though, even bundled up in that wind.”
    “But you’re sure of this number?”
    “Sure as my name’s Fingers
O’Malley.”
    I pushed the bills toward him. He
grabbed them and hurried out the door. I picked up the phone and called Phil
Adamson.
    “You did what?” he said when I told
him about Fingers.
    “I paid him fifty bucks for the
license number of Arnold Wechsel’s killer. Sounded like the SUV we saw on the
street last night.”
    I read off the tag number.
    “Hold on and let me check it out.”
I listened to muffled office