“I take a philosophical view on these things, since I’m a observer of human nature,” Lula said. “I figure you gotta have the right attitude about this stuff. Take Dolly, for instance. Dolly was gonna try to keep her lunch date, which is a good thing, because life gotta go on. And even though he was dead, Dirk sort of looked like he was smiling.”

“He did look like he died smiling.”

“See, it’s all part of the circle of life,” Lula said. “And pretty soon, we’ll be dead, too, only you’ll go first because you’re older than me.”

“Do you have any doughnuts left? I need a doughnut.”

“I ate them all, but we can stop at the bakery again. They had some red velvet cupcakes that I’m pretty sure were made with beet juice. Either that or red dye #13.”

I hooked a left into the bakery lot and bought myself a doughnut with white icing and colorful sprinkles. “This is a happy doughnut,” I said to Lula.

“Fuckin’ A,” Lula said. “But then I never saw a sad doughnut.”

I ate my doughnut and felt much better, so I drove down Greenwood to Hamilton, past the office, and on to the government buildings on the river. It was lunchtime, and I was guessing Mickey Gritch would be hanging out, looking to run some numbers.

“Oh boy,” Lula said when I pulled into the 7-Eleven lot on Marble Street. “You’re not gonna do what I think you’re gonna do, are you?”

“I’m going to talk to Mickey Gritch.”

I spotted his car, parked to the side of the lot. No other cars around it. It was early. Lunch hours hadn’t kicked in yet. I pulled up beside him, and his tinted window rolled down.

Mickey Gritch had white-blond hair cut in a sixties Beatle mop style. He had little pig eyes that were always behind shades, a big pasty potato head, and a body gone soft. He was in his late forties, and he was living proof that anyone could be successful at crime in Trenton if he truly worked at it.

“What?” Mickey Gritch asked me.

“I want to talk to you about Vinnie.”

“What about him?”

“No one wants to fork up the money.”

“Doesn’t surprise me,” Gritch said. “He’s a turd. Don’t get me wrong. I like Vinnie. We’ve done business for a lot of years. But he’s still a turd.”

“Maybe we can make a deal?”

“Like what?”

“Like you don’t kill him, and he can get some kind of a payment plan.”

“Listen, if it was me, that would be okay. But it’s not me. I don’t have anything to do with it anymore. This is Bobby Sunflower’s deal, and it’s more complicated than you know.”

“Complicated how?”

“Just complicated. I don’t know. I don’t want to know. There’s bad people involved. Badder than Bobby Sunflower.” He leaned out a little. “Is that Lula? Hey, momma.”

“Don’t you hey momma me,” Lula said. “I’ll be out of a job if they off Vinnie, and then what? I got bills to pay. I got a standard of living.”

“I got a job for you,” Gritch said.

“Hunh,” Lula said. “I don’t do that no more, you little runt-ass Polish sausage.”

The tinted window rolled up on Gritch’s Mercedes. I put the Jeep in gear and drove out of the lot.

“THINGS ARE GOING good today,” Lula said. “We haven’t been shot at or nothin’. Have you got the bottle with you?”

“No. I left it at home.”

“Imagine if you had the bottle.”

“I’ve got Chopper’s file in my bag,” I said to Lula. “Pull it out and read me his address. I think he’s off South Broad.”

“I’m not sure I want to go after someone named Chopper,” Lula said. “Suppose he got his name chopping off fingers and toes. I don’t want to lose none of mine. I couldn’t wear peep-toe shoes. It would limit my fashion potential.”

“Does it say anything in his file about fingers or toes?”

Lula paged through the file. “No. His real name is Mortimer Gonzolez, but it says everyone calls him Chopper. And it says he got a pet named Mr. Jingles, and you want to be careful about Mr. Jingles. I hope it’s not a cat. It sounds like a cat name. Just thinking about it makes my eyes itch.”

“Has he got priors?”

“Yeah, lots of them. All like this. All for dealin’ drugs. Don’t see no assault with a deadly weapon in here. Looks to me like he’s a businessman. Middle management.”

“Did Connie include a map?”

“Yeah. You have to turn right off Broad onto Cotter Street.”

I drove down Broad, and I thought about Mickey Gritch. He said he was out of it. I hoped he wasn’t so out of it that he couldn’t lead me to Vinnie. And what the heck did he mean when he said it was complicated and there were bad people involved? I thought this was about a simple gambling debt.

“Hey!” Lula said. “You just drove past the street.”

I hooked a U-turn and doubled back to Cotter. “I was thinking about the conversation with Gritch. How bad would you have to be to be worse than Bobby Sunflower?”

“I hear you,” Lula said. “I think Vinnie got himself into a real mess this time.”

I drove one block down Cotter, and Lula counted off numbers.

“Here,” she said. “He’s living over this plumbing supply warehouse. Must be a loft apartment.”

Cotter Street was an odd mix of light industrial and residential. Low-income single-family houses were mixed between auto body shops, small warehouse facilities, and a variety of building supply businesses. I drove around the block to see if it was intersected by an alley. Turned out it was, so I drove down the alley and idled behind the plumbing supply warehouse, looking up at the second-floor loft.

“How do you want to do this?” Lula asked. “Girl Scout cookies? Pizza delivery? Census survey?”

There were stairs leading up to a small deck and a back door. So far as I could tell, this was the only entrance. “I’m in a mood to just go up and kick the door down,” I said to Lula.

“Me, too. That was gonna be my next suggestion.” Lula looked over at me. “You learn how to kick a door down?”

“No. I thought you’d do it.”

“I’m wearing four-inch slut shoes. I can’t kick a door down in slut shoes. It isn’t done. You need boots to kick a door down. Everyone knows that.”

“Then I guess we’ll ring the doorbell and identify ourselves.”

“Whatever,” Lula said.

I parked behind a rusted-out Econoline van, and Lula and I got out and walked up the stairs to the deck. There was no doorbell, so I knocked on the door. No answer. I knocked again. Still no answer. I pulled my phone out and dialed Chopper’s number. We could hear the phone ringing inside, but no one was answering that, either.

“Too bad we don’t know how to break the door down,” Lula said. “He might be hiding under the bed.”

I stood on tiptoes and felt over the doorjamb and found a key.

“If I was in this neighborhood, and I had a bunch of drug money and drugs stashed here, I’d be more careful about my key,” Lula said.

“Maybe he has an alarm system.”

I plugged the key into the door, held my breath, and pushed the door open. No alarm sounded. I looked around for an alarm keypad. None visible.

“Guess he’s just one of those trusting people,” Lula said. “Sort of refreshing in this day and age. Especially in the criminal element.”

We were standing in a large room that had a bare-bones galley kitchen at one end, a kitchen table and four chairs, and beyond that a couch and two easy chairs in front of a large flat screen TV. There was a door to the right, which I assumed led to the bedroom.

“It’s just amazin’ how normal a criminal could be,” Lula said. “This looks just like any other person’s apartment. ’Course you gotta sell drugs to afford something this big, but aside from that, you gotta admit it’s real normal.” She looked around. “I don’t see Mr. Jingles. And I don’t think it’s a cat, because I’m not sneezing. I bet it’s a cute puppy or something.”

“I don’t see any dog bowls or dog toys.”

“Here, Mr. Jingles,” Lula called. “Here, boy! Here, Mr. Jingles. Come to Lula.”