A Walk Among the Tombstones Read online

Page 11

 

  "Whats that?"

  "Thats bribery in the second degree. Its the same as the other only its a class C felony. To qualify for Bribery Two, the benefit you confer or offer or agree to confer, Jesus, dont you love the way they word these things, the benefit has to be in excess of ten thousand dollars. "

  "Ah," I said. "I think class D is my limit. "

  "I was afraid of that. Can I ask you something? Before you commit your class D felony? How many years has it been since you were on the job?"

  "Its been a while. "

  "So howd you remember the class of felony, let alone the article number?"

  "Ive got that kind of memory. "

  "Bullshit. Theyve renumbered the sections over the years, theyve changed half the book at one time or another. I just want to know how you did it. "

  "You really want to know?"

  "Yes. "

  "I looked it up in Andreottis book on my way up here. "

  "Just to break my balls, right?"

  "Just to keep you on your toes. "

  "Only my best interests at heart. "

  "Absolutely," I said. Id set aside a bill in my jacket pocket earlier, and I palmed it now and tucked it into the pocket where he keeps his cigarettes, except during those intervals when he swears off and smokes other peoples. "Buy yourself a suit," I told him.

  We were all alone in the office, so he took the bill out and examined it. "Well have to update the terminology. A hats twenty-five dollars, a suits a hundred. I dont know what a decent hat costs these days, I cant remember the last time I bought one. But I dont know where youd get a suit for a hundred bucks outside a thrift shop. Heres a hundred bucks, take your wife to dinner. Whats this for, anyway?"

  "I need a favor. "

  "Oh?"

  "There was a case I read about," I said. "Had to be six months ago and it could have been as much as a year. Couple of guys grabbed a woman off the street, rode off with her in a truck. She turned up a few days later in the park. "

  "Dead, Im assuming. "

  "Dead. "

  " Police suspect foul play. Cant say it rings a bell. It wasnt one of our cases, was it?"

  "It wasnt even Manhattan. I seem to remember that she turned up on a golf course in Queens, but it could as easily have been somewhere in Brooklyn. I didnt pay any attention at the time, it was just an item I read while I drank a second cup of coffee. "

  "And what do you want now?"

  "I want my memory refreshed. "

  He looked at me. "Youre getting pretty free with a buck, arent you? Why make a donation to my wardrobe fund when you could go to the library, look it up in the Times Index?"

  "Under what? I dont know where or when it happened or any of the names. Id have to scan every issue for the last year, and I dont even know what paper I read it in. It may not have made the Times. "

  "Be easier if I made a couple of phone calls. "

  "Thats what I was thinking. "

  "Why dont you take a walk? Have yourself a cup of coffee. Get yourself a table at the Greek place on Eighth Avenue. Ill probably drop in there an hour from now, have myself some coffee and a piece of Danish. "

  Forty minutes later he came to my table in the coffee shop at Eighth and Fifty-third. "Just over a year ago," he said. "Woman named Marie Gotteskind. Whats that mean, God is kind?"

  "I think it means child of God. "

  "Thats better, because God wasnt kind to Marie. She was reported abducted in broad daylight while shopping on Jamaica Avenue in Woodhaven. Two men drove off with her in a truck, and three days later a couple of kids walking across the Forest Park Golf Course came upon her body. Sexual assault, multiple stab wounds. The One-Oh-Four caught the case and bounced it back to the One-Twelve once they IDd her, because that was where the original abduction took place. "

  "They get anywhere?"

  He shook his head. "Guy I talked to remembered the case well enough. It had people in the neighborhood pretty shook up for a couple of weeks there. Respectable woman walks down the street, couple of clowns grab her, its like getting struck by lightning, you know what I mean? If it can happen to her it can happen to anybody, and youre not even safe in your own home. They were afraid thered be more of the same, gang rape on wheels, the whole serial-killer bit. What was that case in L. A. , they made a miniseries out of it?"

  "I dont know. "

  "Two Italian guys, I think they were cousins. They were doing hookers and leaving them up in the hills. Hillside Strangler, thats what they called it. Stranglers, it should have been, but I guess the media named the case before they knew it was more than one person. "

  "The woman in Woodhaven," I said.

  "Right. They were afraid she was the first of a series, but then there werent any more and everybody relaxed. They still put a lot of effort into the case but nothing led anywhere. Its an open file now, and the thinking is that the only way theyll break it is if the perps get caught doing it again. He asked if we had anything tied into it. Do we?"

  "No. What did the womans husband do, did you happen to notice?"

  "I dont think she was married. I think she was a schoolteacher. Why?"

  "She live alone?"

  "What difference does it make?"

  "Id love to see the file, Joe. "

  "You would, huh? Whyntcha ride out to the One-Twelve and ask them to show it to you. "

  "I dont think that would work. "

  "You dont, huh? You mean there are cops in this town wont go out of their way to do a favor for a private license? Jesus, Im shocked. "

  "Id appreciate it. "

  "A phone call or twos one thing," he said. "I didnt have to commit a flagrant breach of departmental regulations and neither did the guy on the job in Queens. But youre asking for disclosure of confidential materials. That files not supposed to leave the office. "

  "It doesnt have to. All he has to do is take five minutes to fax it. "

  "You want the whole file? Full-scale homicide investigation, theres got to be twenty, thirty pages in that file. "

  "The department can afford the fax charges. "

  "I dont know," he said. "The mayor keeps telling us the citys going broke. Whats your interest in it, anyway?"

  "I cant say. "

  "Well, Jesus Christ, Matt. You want it all flowing in one direction, dont you?"

  "Its a confidential matter. "

  "No shit. Its confidential, but departmental files are an open book, is that it?" He lit a cigarette and coughed. He said, "This wouldnt have anything to do with a friend of yours, would it?"

  "I dont follow you. "

  "Your buddy Ballou. This got anything to do with him?"

  "Of course not. "

  "You sure of that?"

  "Hes out of the country," I said. "Hes been gone for over a month and I dont know when hes coming back. And hes never been big on raping women and leaving them in the middle of the fairway. "

  "I know, hes a gentleman, he replaces all divots. Theyre looking to put together a RICO case against him, but I suppose you already knew that. "

  "I heard something about it. "

  "I hope they make it stick, tuck him away in a federal joint for the next twenty years. But I suppose you feel differently. "

  "Hes a friend of mine. "

  "Yeah, so Ive been told. "

  "Anyway, hes got nothing to do with this matter. " He just looked at me, and I said, "I have a client whose wife disappeared. The MO looks similar to the Woodhaven incident. "

  "She was abducted?"

  "It looks that way. "

  "He report it?"

  "No. "

  "Why not?"

  "I guess he had his reasons. "

  "Thats not good enough, Matt. "

  "Suppose hes in the country illegally. "

  "Half the citys in the country illegally. You think we catch a kidnap case, the first thing we do is turn the victim over to the INS? And who is this guy, he cant swing a green card but hes got th
e money for a private investigator? Sounds to me like hes got to be dirty. "

  "Whatever you say. "

  "Whatever I say, huh?" He put out the cigarette and frowned at me. "The woman dead?"

  "Its beginning to look that way. If its the same people-"

  "Yeah, but why would it be the same people? Whats the connection, the MO of the abduction?" When I didnt say anything he picked up the check, glanced at it, and tossed it across the table to me. "Here," he said. "Your treat. You still at the same number? Ill call you this afternoon. "

  "Thanks Joe. "

  "No, dont thank me. I have to figure out if theres any way this is going to come back and haunt me. If not Ill make the call. Otherwise forget it. "

  I WENT to the noon meeting at Fireside, then back to my room. There was nothing from Durkin, but a message slip indicated that Id had a call from TJ. Just that- no number, no further message. I crumpled the slip and tossed it.

  TJ is a black teenager I met about a year and a half ago on Times Square. Thats his street name, and if he has another name hes kept it to himself. Id found him breezy and saucy and irreverent, a breath of fresh air in the fetid swamp of Forty-second Street, and the two of us had hit it off together. I let him do some minor legwork on a case a little later on with a Times Square handle on it, and since then hed kept in infrequent contact. Every couple of weeks there would be a call or a series of calls from him. He never left a number and I had no way of getting in touch with him, so his messages were just a way of letting me know he was thinking of me. If he really wanted to contact me hed keep calling until he caught me at home.

  When he did, we sometimes talked until his quarter ran out, or sometimes we would meet in his neighborhood or mine and I would buy him a meal. Twice Id given him little jobs to do in connection with cases I was working, and he seemed to get a kick out of the work that couldnt be explained by the small sums I paid him.

  I went to my room and called Elaine. "Danny Boy says hello," I said. "And Joe Durkin says youre a good influence on me. "

  "Of course I am," she said. "But how does he know?"

  "He says Im better dressed since we started keeping company. "

  "I told you that new suit is special. "

  "Thats not what I was wearing. "

  "Oh. "

  "I was wearing my blazer. Ive had the damn thing forever. "

  "Well, it still looks nice. Gray slacks with it? Which shirt and tie?" I told her, and she said, "Well, thats a nice outfit. "

  "Pretty ordinary, though. I saw a zoot suit last night. "

  "Honestly?"

  "With a drape shape and a reet pleat, according to Danny Boy. "

  "Danny Boy wasnt wearing a zoot suit. "

  "No, it was an associate of his named- well, it doesnt matter what his name was. He was also wearing a straw hat with a shocking-pink band. Now if Id worn something like that to Durkins office-"