Sunday, October 30, 2005

Who wants to know?

Cindy was sitting up on the stoop demonstrating just how distracting a simple black tee shirt can be while I stood down on the sidewalk tossing a football back and forth with Monte. I figure you don’t have to even be a teenager yet to start understanding politics, so Cindy and I were chatting him up about the recent White House CIA leak. While I was waiting for his comment, and the ball to come flying back at me, a brother I never saw before walked up and started talking to me, while he was staring at the house. Or maybe he was staring at Cindy.

“You live here?”

“Yeah.” I caught the ball and turned to check him out more closely.

“What’s the rent like? What do these places go for?”

I looked him in the eye and lowered my voice. “Who wants to know?”

To his credit, the brother showed me his palms, smiled, and walked off. Cindy and I shared a smirk but Monte looked puzzled as he walked toward me.

“Well, that seemed kind of hostile,” he said when he got close enough. “What’s up with that, H?” Lately he’s taken to calling me that. I let him.

“Monte, I know that between Jerry Springer and Oprah, people are starting to think they need to share every detail of their lives, but the truth is, a man just doesn’t need to tell everybody his business, just cause they ask.”

I could see why Monte, raised by his grandmother, might not get it. I was still kind of surprised when he actually asked, “What’s the big deal. Why keep everything on the down low? You ashamed of something?”

Then I got another surprise: Cindy answered before I could, and she answered like the lawyer she is.

“Life is a game, kid,” she said. “And except for your family and closest friends, you’re playing against everybody out there. It’s like when you play your little three card monte game, hustler. If you lay your cards out on the table, the other guy knows how to bet. Being too free with what you know is a bad habit. That’s what happened to Karl Rove.”

“I hear you,” Monte said, “but I don’t think Hannibal thinks that deep. I think H here just ain’t big on sharing.”

I stopped for a second to gather my thoughts. He was right, of course, but beyond that it seemed important to make sure Monte learned the right lesson.

“Cindy’s got a point of course. In my business you soon learn that in today’s world, mystery is currency. When you know what others don’t, you can trade that knowledge for whatever you want. But there’s more to it than that. Your business, your troubles, your big wins, those things belong to you. If you hold them close, they can drive you, power your life. If you put them out on the wind they just become gossip that can bring you down.”

“I don’t know, man,” Monte said. His eyes were shining the way they do when he’s being a pain in the ass on purpose. Cindy would call it playing devil’s advocate. “If you want people to trust you, you’ve got to be open with them, right?”

“That’s for girls,” I said before I had time to think. Then I had to survive Cindy’s indignant stare. Too bad. I was committed now, so I just had to keep going.

“Brother, I don’t trust any man who tells me how much he makes, or what his house cost him or how his hernia operation went. Just like neither of you knows my father’s last words to me. That’s between me and the old man. But you trust me, don’t you?”

“Well, yeah, I do.”


“A lot of people do. If they didn’t I couldn’t stay in business. I know my attitude is kind of old school, but I also know I’m not alone on this. You see, people know that a man who keeps his own secrets will keep yours.”

Saturday, October 22, 2005

A Mini-mystery: To serve and protect

To serve and protect - A date delayed

There’s a good reason that nobody should be sitting in their office finishing some paperwork on a Friday evening. I should have been across the hall in my apartment, getting ready to take Cindy to a late supper. Then I wouldn’t have been behind the desk when Buster came rushing in. I know I looked irritated when I saw him, because he answered my question before I could ask it.

“Hannibal, I need your help. Somebody pried the store safe open and took off with the money. It’s the whole week’s receipts.”

I’ve known Buster since I moved into that little flat in Anacostia. He’s the bald, fiftyish black man who runs the little grocery store on the corner, barely making a living supplying his neighbors with the bare necessities. He used to let people move drugs through his place, but I put a stop to that. Since then it’s been tough for him to make a living, so maybe I did owe him a hand if he got robbed.

I gave Cindy a call, letting her know I’d be picking her up late, and followed Buster out into the crisp autumn air. He was still out of breath and I could see his chest heaving even in the dim twilight. When we got to the store, he took me into the back room to show me the damage. His safe was sitting under a desk in the back of the room. It was small, weak and light – more a place to store money than to protect it - and it was obvious that someone had ripped the door open with a crowbar. We went back through the door to the front of the store and while I looked around I asked him what happened.

“They were just waiting for their chance at me,” Buster said, shaking his head. “You know Suzanne quit the other day so I have to run the place all by myself. It ain’t easy, man.”

“I know, Buster,” I said, resting a hand on his shoulder. “Just tell me what happened.”

Buster looked at me for a second, and then pointed toward the cooler doors on the other side of the store. “Well, it was close to closing time and I was over in that corner there, stocking shelves when I heard this loud noise in the back room. I ran to the door but this kid rushed past me, almost knocking me over, and shot out the front door. I could see my blue deposit bag in his hand with the whole week’s receipts.”

I leaned back against the counter. “You hadn’t been to the bank all week?”

“I don’t like to go alone,” Buster said. “It ain’t safe. So every Friday night one of the cops come by on his patrol and walks me over there.”

“But he wasn’t here yet.”

“Nope, so I took off down the street after the thief, but he was too fast for me. I chased him for a few blocks, right past your office, but then he turned a corner and I lost him. I was whipped, and bummed out. But on the way back, I realized you might be able to help.”

I didn’t want to be cold, so I forced a smile. “I think I understand, man, but I don’t think I can…”

We both looked to the door as a patrolman walked in. The cop was younger, taller, darker, and more cheerful than either of us. I recognized his easy smile. It was the one I used to wear back when I was a rookie cop, before I found out that most citizens didn’t really want me around to protect and to serve them.

Buster said, “Billy am I glad to see you. I just got robbed. I already told Hannibal here all about it.”

“You’re Hannibal Jones?” the officer asked.

I lowered my voice and turned to my neighbor. “Don’t do this, Buster. Don’t pull me into this.”

“What do you mean, man?” Buster asked, his palms spread wide. “Hannibal, I need you. You can back me up with the timeline and stuff. The cops will believe you.”

“You’re THE Hannibal Jones?” the cop asked. “The guy I’ve heard about?”

“This is him,” Buster said. “Go ahead, Hannibal. Tell him what I told you.”

I turned back to the cop and turned up the charm. “Officer, can I talk to my friend here in the back for a minute?”

The cop shrugged. I gave him a wink, and then I took Buster’s arm and walked him into the back room. When we got to the middle of the floor I dropped the smile. I didn’t need it anymore. I just stood there with my hands on my hips, staring at the floor.

“I don’t understand,” Buster said. “Why won’t you back me up, man?”

“Do you want to go to jail for fraud?”

“What?”

“Buster, please.” I was trying to keep it soft, but my voice came out as a hoarse stage whisper. “You told me you saw the thief come out of the back room, right? You chased him, and when you lost him, you gave up and came to my place.”

“So?”

“So you never came into the back room until I came back with you. How did you know the thief pried the safe open?”

Buster hesitated, his eyes flashing side to side the way I’d seen so many times before. “He had my deposit bag.”

“I saw the safe, Buster. A thief could just as easily pick the lock, pop the hinges or just bust it open with a hammer. But you said pried, which you could not have known unless you did it yourself. Now go tell our young friend out there that it was a false alarm, that you found your money in here.”

“You ain’t going to turn me in?” Buster asked.

“Can’t hang around to talk to the police, Buster. I got a date.”

Of course I wasn’t going to turn him in. As much as I resented Buster trying to play me, he wasn’t a criminal, just desperate. More importantly, it was too soon for that boy out there to get disillusioned about the people he was sworn to protect.

Let him think we all appreciate and respect him, at least for a little while longer.

Sunday, October 16, 2005

Respecting the military

Every time I see the U.S. military in action I think of my dad.

We lost him in Vietnam, before I was old enough to appreciate what a great father God gave me to. I was lucky to have a mother who could make him real to me, even years after he was gone. She made me understand his dedication to duty as a soldier. And when I look at today’s force, I still see all that she told me. Whenever we need for something important to get done, and done right, we fall back on the guys in uniform, don’t we?

Since my dad’s day, I don’t think those guys get enough respect. Guys AND gals I should say. The one thing military service does is train you that getting the job done is all that matters. That’s what I know my father was all about. Get it done, or die trying. It was the same way when I was in the Secret Service. I hate to say it, but I don’t see that kind of feeling anywhere else in our government.

Look at what just happened with Hurricane Katrina. Look at the difference between the FEMA guy who got fired and the Coast Guard Admiral who took his place. Nobody should be surprised. A natural disaster just isn’t like dealing with politics here inside the beltway. It’s a lot more like fighting a war, really. Even if it’s nature, you’re still under attack by an enemy that wants to kill your citizens and destroy your way of life. It only makes sense that the military is best equipped to deal with it.

In law enforcement I learned about Posse Comitatus, and I don’t know if the average troop should be enforcing the law, but he can sure help in civilian disasters. Besides, does anybody today really understand the whole Posse Comitatus thing? Do people remember that the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 was pushed through by Southerners to keep the military from protecting my Black ancestors from the Ku Klux Klan after the Civil War? As far as I’m concerned, it was written to stop the military from defending one part of the country - the African American part.

Now, Bush has already admitted that he should have sent troops into New Orleans sooner, after Katrina hit. And any idiot can see how much better things went with Rita, with troops there at the outset. And we’re already talking about using the military to help against this bird-flu threat. I think that’s a lot of boogey-man stuff, but good on the President for saying he knows who the right team is to protect us, even from an epidemic.

Yeah, we’d all like to see the whole government work as well as the military does. Like that’ll happen. Face it, we aren’t all born understanding sacrifice to get the job done. Most people have to be trained to think that way. Most parents don’t give their kids that, and that’s why we need an Army, a Navy, a Marine Corps, a Coast Guard and even the Air Force I guess. Civilian government will never get there, because being a politician is the exact opposite of sacrifice and a dedication to getting a job done. So we ought to use the military whenever we need something important done.

And we really need to learn to appreciate them more. A lot more.

Saturday, October 08, 2005

Painting the Shutters

Cindy thought the house I live in, in Southeast Washington D.C., would look better with shutters. The owner, her boss, agreed. I didn’t have a vote. I don’t pay rent because I’m the building superintendent. The net result of all that was that one of the first things I did after moving into my new six-flat home was to spend a Saturday hanging shutters at the windows. The good thing about row houses is that you only have the front to beautify.

But time passes and, like anything else covered with paint and exposed to the outdoors, the shutters need maintenance or they cease to beautify. That’s why I spent so much of last weekend on a ladder with Monte holding it steady and Cindy standing beside it, supervising. Monte lives across the street with his grandmother, the lady we all call Mother Washington. She’s kind of the unofficial mayor of the neighborhood. Monte is kind of the official pre-teen wise-ass. But I’ve tried to take him under my wing, in a way, sort of mentor him.

So he was being a good troop, holding the ladder good and steady while I scraped a year’s worth of smog and pigeon droppings off the shutters. When I reached the ground at last, Cindy was still looking up.

“You nicked the paint on that one top left,” she said. “You can see it from here.”

“What’s the difference?” Monte asked. “Aren’t we done?”

“So we paint it,” I said, ignoring Monte as best I could.

“You know, I loved the red shutters when you originally hung them,” Cindy said, still staring up at the front of the building.

“You chose the color, as I recall.”

“Yes, I know, Hannibal,” she said. “It was my idea. But now I really think black would be better. Give the building a nice touch of elegance.”

“But then you’d have to paint them all,” Monte said.

I shrugged. “A little more paint. A little more time.”

Yes, Cindy is my woman and she always gets her way. But aside from that, the building deserved it. She’s a grand old lady who had been allowed to fall into disrepair and decay, and had been turned into a crack house for a while. That was the way I found her, a bit earlier in my
Troubleshooter career, when the owner, Dan Balor, hired me to clear the bad element out. Balor’s a partner at the law firm where Cindy works. Anyway, once we chased the druggies out, some friends and I decided to move in. Balor fixed the building up, and the new tenants keep her up because she has been through enough and deserves to be treated with respect.

Monte took off for lunch while Cindy and I went to the paint store. But he was typical of boys his age in that money was a reliable lure so he was back for round two. Back, yes, but his heart wasn’t in it. As I was about to mount the ladder he muttered under his breath.

“Why don’t you just hire a painter?”

I just shook my head and started climbing. How could a kid who’s so smart have missed the point like that? It’s as if he just wasn’t paying attention. But as I climbed I wondered if maybe it was me. Maybe I just believe in doing things the hard way.

Conversation died as I started painting the first shutter. One coat was going to do it, but it was slow going because I was using a fairly small brush. You see, each shutter had a little tree-shaped cutout in the middle. I had to be able to get the brush inside the hole, to paint the inside edge.

“Hannibal, is that as hard as it looks?”

Maybe it was because his father ran off before he could walk that Monte had missed some important lessons. “Ever see A League of Their Own?” I called down, not losing focus on the movement of the brush.

“The old movie with girls playing baseball?”

“Yeah. There’s a scene where Tom Hanks, talking about baseball, tells the team that the hard is what makes it great. That’s not just in sports, buddy.”

“I know,” Monte yelled back up. “I work on my jump shot for hours. But this is different. Nobody can see that inside edge from down here. Why waste the time to paint in there?”

“Because when you got a job you do it right.”

“But you won’t get any credit for that, not even from Cindy or the landlord. I mean, you’re doing extra work but who’s going to know?”

I stopped painting. I’m embarrassed to say that I had to think a minute.

“I will.” Then I nodded, looking down at my young friend and said, more to myself, “You will.”

The bottom line, as I later explained to Monte, is that to be a success a man needs to resist the lure of three things: drugs, alcohol and shortcuts.

Saturday, October 01, 2005

From the journal of Hannibal Jones


Hannibal Jones is The Troubleshooter Posted by Picasa

I don’t generally like being in the spotlight. I guess the Secret Service taught me it’s better to keep a low profile.

But I’m not with them anymore, and this reporter Irma Andrews helped me unravel a series of murders that caused a lot of collateral damage among the families of the victims. So when Irma asked for an interview I didn’t see how I could say no. Despite my girl Cindy’s prompting I refused to do a TV piece. Appearing in print is bad enough. At least Irma didn’t misquote me, but I think she left out some stuff that makes the whole thing a little misleading. Anyway, here’s the way the piece ran:
_______________________________________________________________________________________________


I met with private investigator Hannibal Jones in his office in the Anacostia section of Washington. He offered me an excellent cup of coffee, which he said was made from Costa Rican beans, and sat at his desk with sunlight pouring in through large front windows. The office was small and Spartan, sparely furnished but warm and bright. Significantly, while I took notes during the interview, so did Mr. Jones.

Irma Andrews: Thank you for speaking with me today. You are listed as a private investigator but your card describes you as a troubleshooter. How would you describe what you do, and why is it different from what most P.I.’s do?

Hannibal Jones: Most private investigators do employment vetting, matrimonial and divorce work, insurance claims and that kind of stuff. My work is a lot more focused. My clientele is individuals, not corporations. I work with people who are in trouble and don’t know where to get help.

IA: But you do bodyguard work.

HJ: Sometimes.

IA: And solve mysteries like any detective.

HJ: On occasion.

IA: And if a person has been threatened?

HJ: Look, I do whatever’s necessary to help somebody who’s gotten themselves into a jam. I don’t think much about what that might be, going in.

IA: What qualifies you to do this sort of work? What is your professional background?

HJ: As soon as I was old enough I moved to the States and joined the New York City police force.

IA: You weren’t born in the United States?

HJ: No. I was raised in Germany. My dad was an MP in the army. My mom was a German national. We lost Dad in Vietnam. Anyway, I came to the U.S. to be a cop and I was going to bring Mama over as soon as I was settled but she passed.

IA: While you were away.

HJ: (pause.) Yes. While I was away.

IA: I’m sorry. So, you became a policeman…

HJ: Three years on the force to make detective J.G. Then three more as a detective. Then I passed the Secret Service entry exam. I spent seven years as a special agent for the Treasury Department, in the protective service.

IA: But after seven years, you resigned.

HJ: Yeah, well, stuff happened. I should have been one of the uniforms instead of going to the protective service. You see, in the protective service they expect you to not only protect your principal’s life, but his reputation too. I didn’t think my duty should included covering up a politician’s stupid actions. My boss disagreed.

IA: Any politician in particular?

HJ: Not going to go there.

IA: A national figure? Executive branch or…

HJ: I’m not going to go there.

IA: All right. So you had friction with your supervisor. For that you resigned?

HJ: Yeah. Well, after I knocked him on his ass the service was good enough to let me resign.

IA: Should I print that?

HJ: Why not. It’s what happened. They were actually pretty nice about it. Could have stopped me from getting the P.I license you know.

IA: So why this whole troubleshooter concept? How did you get into this business?

HJ: I guess in a way I did it for Mama. She always wanted me to follow my dad’s example. He was always there for people, always looking out for the little guy. Here in Washington, it seemed like there was an overabundance of little guys that needed looking out for.

IA: How do you get enough clients?

HJ: It was slow at first, but word of mouth is a powerful force in the hood. I did a couple of jobs pro bono - kept a couple of kids from being approached by drug dealers. After that people started to find me when they had problems.

IA: So your neighbors are your clients?

HJ: My clients are people with problems bigger than they are. Naturally that happens more often to people without big money.

IA: I know you’ve also had more affluent clients.

HJ: Well, I do get referrals from old Secret Service contacts. And I get business referred to me by the attorney I introduced you to, Cindy Santiago, my, um, friend.

IA: So you do have entrees into a higher financial stratum, but the well-to-do don’t come to Anacostia. Why have your office here?

HJ: That’s a bit of a story. This building used to be a crack house, believe it or not. I was hired to clear the bad element out of here for the owner. In the process I kind of bonded with the neighborhood. I felt at home here, and I knew if I stayed, the bad element wouldn’t be back. I guess the owner knew it too. He made me a very attractive offer to stay.

IA: Why not join a larger detective agency?

HJ: I like deciding who I’ll take as a client, and what kind of job I’ll do.

IA: What kind of job will you do?

HJ: All kinds. Well, no matrimonial stuff, or spying on people waiting for them to do wrong. But I do personal protection, missing persons, sometimes get hired to prove an accused person innocent. I’ll chase a bad element away like I did here, keep drug dealers away from kids or a pimp away from a hooker who wants to quit. Negotiate with loan sharks. Basically, if you have to deal with the bad guys and don’t want the police involved, I’ll usually handle it.

IA: You carry a pistol. What do you think of gun control laws?

HJ: Good gun control means being able to hit the target. Anybody who wants a gun can get one, so restrictive laws only keep people who obey the law unarmed and unable to defend themselves.

IA: But isn’t it too dangerous for everyone to be able to have a gun?

HJ: Based on statistics, it’s too dangerous for everyone to be able to have a car. Maybe guns should be more like cars. You get a license to carry at 18, after passing a mandatory training course.

IA: Interesting. How would you describe your relationship with the police?

HJ: I’d call it mutual grudging respect. I don’t mess with them. They don’t mess with me.

IA: How would you describe your personal relationship with Cindy Santiago?

HJ: I would describe it as personal.

IA: What have you learned doing this?

HJ: I’ve learned that most people are sheep. They’re not looking for trouble and they’ll do the right thing if you let them. A few people are wolves. They prey on the sheep, and they’re going to do wrong no matter what you do. They need to be shut out or put down hard.

IA: And you? Where do you fit in?

HJ: Me? I guess I’m the sheepdog.


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