My Brother's Keeper Read Online Free PDF Page B

drop of sweat from his forehead with his shirtsleeve.
    â€˜I’ll give you an example. I did a favor for a couple of guys last year, took me three hours. I’d been taking my lunches, the liquid variety, in Craig’s Tavern in Drexel Hill and one day I met these three Mexican landscapers who could barely speak English. I didn’t know how the hell they made it to Philly and I didn’t care. Anyway, they hadn’t been paid for a job and all they wanted was their money but they didn’t know how to go about getting it.’
    â€˜So whad’ya do?’
    â€˜They bought me six or seven beers and drove me to this big stone mansion on Lexington Avenue. I rang the doorbell and asked the shithead who opened the door if he hired a couple Mexicans to cut his lawn and trim the pubic hairs on his asshole.’
    â€˜What did he say to that?’
    â€˜He ordered me off his property and threatened to call the cops. But by that time, I had to piss like a fucking racehorse. So I turned my back to him, unzipped my fly and started pissing on his freshly trimmed junipers.’
    â€˜Did you get the money?’
    â€˜What do you think?’

THREE
    L ou had rented a second-floor office on Lancaster Avenue in Bryn Mawr. If there was a high-rent district left anywhere in Philadelphia, Bryn Mawr was it. At least that’s what the zip code would tell prospective clients, the wealthy and the spoiled from the suburbs who didn’t know shit about the city anymore except what they saw through the streaked-glass windows of their high-rise office buildings. They’d see Bryn Mawr and think Lou Klein was the type of private dick who knew the difference between his ass and a hole in the ground.
    It was two rooms over a Chinese laundry, up a dark, constricted staircase that smelled like urine and ammonia. Even in the high-rent district, the homeless needed a place to crash and it wasn’t their fault if the accommodation failed to provide adequate facilities. Lou had signed the lease earlier in the month while sitting at a table in Starbucks with the landlord, a retired teacher from the Philadelphia School District with a bad comb-over and a twitching left eye. He’d dropped two sets of keys on the table in front of Lou and bought him a latte and a dried-out piece of yellow sponge cake. He’d failed to mention that Lou wouldn’t need the keys since he’d stopped repairing the broken lock on the stairwell door a long time ago.
    The next morning Lou had gone over early with a bucket and a mop and a few old T-shirts he used as rags and a toolbox full of rusty screwdrivers, a wrench, a hammer and a tape measure. He stopped at the Home Depot on the way over for a pack of sandpaper and a can of paint. The color on the label said Eggshell.
    The screen door had let out a squeal as he yanked it open and the guy asleep on the stairs pried his eyes open and rolled over with a congested groan. They had stared at each other for a long second, Lou noticing the pint bottle of cheap bourbon poking out of a crumpled brown bag on the stair. Lou had stepped back and propped the door open with a brick that appeared to be there for that exact purpose. He’d slid the brick into place with his foot hoping a little cold air would motivate the guy to check out early. He’d looked a little too comfortable and Lou had assumed he was a regular.
    It smelled like an open sewer in there. Lou had put the bucket and the toolbox down in the foyer with a thud and reached around on the inside wall for a light switch. He’d found the switch and been surprised when a dim bulb clicked on at the top of the stairs.
    The guy had been wearing a green and black Philadelphia Eagles knit hat pulled down low over his forehead. His clouded red eyes had slowly opened. He’d used his green army field jacket as a blanket, a bare knee poking out through a tear in his jeans. A pair of socks that might have been white at one