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"Who was he arguing with?"
"I didn't see it. I just heard."
"He ever do drugs that you saw?"
"No."
"Were you aware that he killed himself?"
Sonja blinked. "No shit."
"We're following up on his death. . . . I'd appreciate keeping it to yourself, my asking you about it."
"Yeah, sure."
"Can you tell me anything about him?"
"God, I don't even know his name. I guess he was in here maybe three times. He have a family?"
"Yes, he did."
"Oh, that's tough. That's harsh."
"Wife and a teenage boy."
Sonja shook her head. Then she said, "Gerte might've known him better. She's the other bartender. She works more'n me."
"Is she here now?"
"Naw, should be here in a while. You want I should have her call you?"
"Give me her number."
The woman jotted it down. Sachs leaned forward and nodded toward the picture of Creeley and said, "Did he meet anybody in particular here that you can remember?"
"All I know is it was in there. Where they usually hang." She nodded at the back room.
A millionaire businessman and that crowd? Had two of them been the ones who'd broken into the Creeleys' Westchester house and had the marshmallow roast in his fireplace?
Sachs looked into the mirror, studying the men's table, littered with beer bottles, ashtrays and gnawed chicken wing bones. These guys had to be in a crew. Maybe young capos in an organized crime outfit. There were a lot of Sopranos franchises around the city. They were usually petty criminals but often it was the smaller crews who were more dangerous than the traditional Mafia, which avoided hurting civilians and steered clear of crack and meth and the seamier side of the underworld. She tried to get her head around a Benjamin Creeley-gang connection. It was tough.
"You see them with pot, coke--any drugs?"
Sonja shook her head. "Nope."
/> Sachs leaned forward and whispered to Sonja, "You know what crew're they connected with?"
"Crew?"
"A gang. Who's their boss, who they report to? Anything?"
Sonja didn't speak for a moment. She glanced at Sachs to see if she was serious and then gave a laugh. "They're not in a gang. I thought you knew. They're cops."
At last the clocks--the Watchmaker's calling cards--arrived from the bomb squad with a clean bill of health.
"Oh, you mean they didn't find any really tiny weapons of mass destruction inside?" Rhyme asked caustically. He was irritated that they'd been out of his possession--more risk of contamination--and at the delay in their arrival.
Pulaski signed the chain-of-custody cards and the patrolman who'd delivered the clocks left.
