Saints Of New York

by R.J. Ellory

  'Maybe you should.'

  'There's a great deal of things I should do, and using my intuition is somewhere down near the bottom of the list. I've used intuition before and it's gotten me in trouble.'

  'I was thinking about you yesterday, Frank.'

  'Okay, so here we go. I knew this was coming—'

  'Frank, listen to me. Joking aside now.'

  'Sense of humor is very therapeutic, isn't that so?'

  'I was thinking that you have to learn how to trust yourself.'

  'What?'

  'Perhaps re-learn. Perhaps it's not learning, but re-learning. It happens with a lot of people who have gone through divorces, who've had difficulty with their children ... all the important things in life, you know? Those things start to go wrong, or don't turn out the way they intended, people can start to doubt their own ability to make the right decisions. Does that make sense?'

  'You wanna know what happened on Saturday?'

  'Saturday? Sure, tell me what happened on Saturday.'

  'I met someone in a bar, an old-timer, someone who knew of my father. You know what I told him?'

  'What?'

  'The truth. That's what I told him. What my father was really like. The kind of asshole he actually was.'

  'And what did this person say?' 'He said that maybe I shouldn't drink so much, refused to buy me another, didn't seem to find what I was saying too interesting.'

  'And how did you feel when you said these things?'

  'I don't remember. I think I was drunk.'

  'Hardest thing that people have to face is the truth, Frank. I'm sure there are a lot of people who saw your father as a role model, as an example of what it's like to be a good cop, and they don't like to have that ideal taken away.'

  'His whole life was a lie.'

  'I know that, Frank, but I can imagine there are many people who wouldn't want to hear you say that. Some of them because they were involved with him, others because they don't want to lose their ideals.'

  'But I can say what the hell I like to you and it never leaves the room, right?'

  'That's right, yes. And I think it's a good sign that you said these things to this person.'

  'Why?'

  'Because it signifies that you're now willing to face up to some of the truth about you father.'

  'I've always known the truth about him, about what he was really like.'

  'Sure you have, but you've never said anything. You've had to defend him.'

  'Defend him? I don't think so. It was more a case of being ashamed for who he was.'

  'I see . . .'

  'So what do you want me to talk about today?'

  'You were going to talk about Lufthansa, remember, and your father's involvement in that, but we don't have to. We can talk about whatever you like.'

  'I do want to talk about that, but I have this case on my mind.'

  'Okay, tell me about that first.'

  'I just want to say some things out loud. Just me talking and you listening, that's all.'

  'Okay . . . what do you want to say?'

  'This case I have going on, the girl that was strangled. I went to her school to speak to some of her friends, and this guy tells me about someone up at Waterbury, this girl who had a friend who was found strangled last Christmas. I went and spoke to this someone, and I get a line on this dead girl. I go see her parents and I find out that this dead girl from last Christmas was also adopted, also processed through Child Services, and for some reason I cannot get this out of my head.'

  'You think they're connected?'

  'I . . . maybe, but... I don't believe they are, no.'

  'I sense some hesitation there, Frank.'

  'Well, the first girl, the junkie's sister . . . she had her hair cut and her nails were done with colored varnish. And this girl from Waterbury, she was dressed in clothes that her mother said she would never wear.'

  'I see. And is there something else?'

  'Well, I got interested in other missing girls, you know? I did a search and went through all the disappearances and homicides that fitted the same demographic, and I ended up with five more girls - two homicides, and three apparent runaways.'

  'And they went through Child Services as well?'

  'I don't know for sure. I haven't followed them up yet.'

  'But you're going to.'

  'Yes.'

  'And they're all your earlier unclosed cases?'

  'No, they're not my cases. Never were, still aren't.'

  'Well, won't it cause trouble between you and your colleagues?'

  'If they find out, yes.'

  'But you're not going to tell them.'

  'Only person I'm telling is you.'

  'Well, Frank, I don't know what to say. I'm a therapist, not a detective, but in your circumstances I think it might be a good idea to tell the original investigating officers that you're taking over their cases—'

  'I'm not "taking over" their cases.'

  'What would you call it?'

  'Homework.'

  'Seriously, Frank, you cannot forget the situation you're in. You have a dead partner, you've had your drivers' license taken from you, you're assigned to see me every day until further notice, and you're on a one-third pay hold until the end of the year.'

  'Good that my shrink comes for free then, isn't it?' 'Frank, I really don't see how you can afford to be so facetious—'

  'Look, Marie: if I tell them, it becomes official. These old cases become new workload. If I get nowhere with them I wind up with another five unclosed cases on my list, and that doesn't look so good. If I say nothing and nothing happens with them, then it's not a problem. No-one loses. I also avoid any possibility of generating ill-will with the other guys.'

  'And if you solve the cases?'

  'Well, I would hope that my fellow homicide detectives would be big enough to recognize that a solved case is a lot more important than who did it or how.'

  'I imagine your superiors would think that, but I'm really not at all sure your colleagues will agree with you.'

  'We'll see. The only important thing right now is whether or not the cases come to anything, whether there is a link between them.'

  'Are you hoping that there is?'

  'You're damn right I am.'

  'So you can get a commendation?'

  'No! For God's sake, you think this is what it's about?'

  'I don't know what this is about, Frank. That's why I'm asking.'

  'It's about my job. It's about what I'm in the PD for. Because there's actually very little that's more important than stopping the people who do this kind of thing.'

  'You believe that?'

  'Sure, don't you?'

  'We're not asking about me.'

  'Sure I believe it. If I didn't, then I wouldn't do the job. I would have quit by now, especially after all this recent bullshit.'

  'What, particularly?'

  'All of it. My partner ... all of this crap during the past six months.'

  'Do you feel angry about it?'

  'I don't feel angry, no. Disbelief perhaps . . . disbelief, and the same thing that everyone goes through when . . .'

  'When what?'

  'When something happens, something like this. Going back over it time and again. What could I have done? How could it have turned out differently? Over and over and over in your mind.' 'Have you been made to feel that you were responsible for what happened to your partner?'

  'Sure. Well, no . . . not like that. Not directly. I was responsible, we both were, but this is what we do. This is what the job is.'

  'But the people that evaluate liability in these situations are police themselves. These are people who've also been in the firing line.'

  'Sure they have, I know that, but until you're there, until you're right inside the situation you can't make a judgement. Every situation is different, and no-one is equipped for the kind of decisions you have to make in such scenarios.'

  'So you do what you think is right
at the time.'

  'Yeah. And then you review and regret and repent at your leisure, after the fact.'

  'Do you regret the decision to leave him back there by himself?'

  'How can I? I didn't have a choice, did I? Whichever way I look at it, I don't see there could have been a different outcome. That doesn't change the fact that I'll be thinking about it forever. But I know two things for sure. First, because of what we did, two people are dead and thirty-four are alive; and the second thing, the most important thing as far as I'm concerned, is that if the positions had been reversed then he would have done the same.'

  'You're sure of that?'

  'Absolutely.'

  'Do you want to tell me what happened that day?'

  'No.'

  'Because?'

  'Because we still have to talk about Lufthansa. We're talking about my father, and until we're done talking about him I don't really want to talk about anything else.'

  'Okay. So start talking.'

  'I can't. I'm real sorry, but I have to meet Jimmy Radick, and we have a squad briefing at ten.'

  'Tomorrow then.'

  'Tomorrow it is.'

  'One question before you go.'

  'Shoot.'

  'How much did you drink over the weekend?'

  'Oh, I don't know . . . probably just about enough to get me through 'til today.'

  TWENTY-FOUR

  Parrish picked up the phone, chased the Lange tox test again.

  He wanted to ensure that it got done before she was sewn up and shipped out to the big hereafter.

  Jimmy Radick seemed agitated, and as soon as Frank came off the phone he told him that Valderas had been snooping around.

  'Saying what?'

  Radick shrugged. 'The usual shit, you know. How is the caseload? How is Frank? What are you working on? When do we see daylight on some of these files? The stuff all squad sergeants say.'

  'And you told him what?'

  'The non-denial denial. We're following up leads, had something promising and it turned out not to be so good . . . got things to move on today. We should have something solid before too long. I didn't say anything about Karen Pulaski.'

  Parrish leaned forward. 'By itself, I don't see where this thing is going to go. I have one other guy I want to speak to, an old-time friend of Danny Lange's. He lives over the other side of the expressway. I thought of him when I was coming in this morning. He goes way back to when Danny was just a corner boy. We go see him, and if that comes to nothing then we're going to have to go wider.'

  'Let's get out of here then,' Radick said. 'Anything's better than sitting around waiting for Valderas to come back and bust my balls.'

  Wayne Thorson, called Swede for as long as anyone could recall, lived in the kind of place that most people rarely saw. A mess of semi-derelict tenements amidst Harper Street, Dean and Van Sneed. A place where the smell of the piers and Upper New York Bay, that rank and fetid funk, came away on your clothes, in your hair, in your mouth. The kind of place if people were born there they got out fast, and if they didn't make it they spent the whole of their lives wishing they had. Parrish had not been down there for a year or more, Radick for longer. He sat in the car, quiet, a thoughtful expression on his face, once again trying to understand how people could live like this. This was just another image he would try so hard to forget but knew he would always remember.

  'What shoes you got on?' Parrish asked. 'Needles all over the stairs. You don't want to go down there with sneakers.'

  'I'm okay,' Radick replied. 'Proper shoes today.'

  'Let's go then.'

  Swede wore green Marine Corps pants and a tee-shirt that had forgotten how it was to be clean. Opening the apartment door just an inch or two sent the stench of overflowing ashtrays, stale beer, weed, puke, sweat and apathy out to the hallway.

  'Aah fuck, now what? Frank motherfucking Parrish. Can you not let it alone?'

  Parrish smiled. He raised his hand and pushed on the door and Swede stepped back to let him in.

  'A year,' Parrish said. 'Has to be. Jesus, you look good, Swede. Man, you look well. Best I ever seen you look. And you remembered my name? I'm honored, Swede, real honored.'

  'Fuck off, Frank.'

  Radick went in after Parrish, down the narrow, lightless hallway into a room that was nothing more than stripped walls, dirty windows, mattresses on the floor. A cheap stereo box sat in the corner, surrounding it a small army of empty bottles, burger cartons and newspapers. There was nowhere to sit aside from the stained and damp mattresses.

  'So I'm looking out for Danny,' Parrish said.

  'Heard he got done.'

  'You heard right.'

  'And you think I know who did it?'

  Radick watched Thorson. His eyes were narrow and furtive, hit complexion junkie-yellow, the skin raddled with sores and pock- marks. His right ear lobe had been pierced, and then stretched with a black hoop through which Radick could see the filthy window behind him. He carried the kind of look that said everything thus far had been a disappointment.

  'I don't think anything, Swede. You know me better than that by now. This isn't a shake-down, my friend, this is merely a social call.'

  Swede sneered contemptuously. He looked at Radick. 'Who's your new punk bitch?'

  'This here's Jimmy. Jimmy's one of the good guys, Swede. Jimmy ain't a knucklehead, okay? You don't need to be disrespectful.'

  'Whatever, man. I don't know nothin' about what happened to Danny, okay? I ain't seen Danny for two, maybe three weeks—'

  'You meet his sister?'

  Swede smiled. It was a nasty expression. 'I seen her, yes. What about it?'

  'When did you see her?'

  'Coupla times. Three weeks ago maybe. Saw her when I last saw Danny.'

  'They came here?'

  'No, man, they didn't come here. Saw them in the diner near where Danny lives. Near the park, you know? Saw them there.' Swede smiled again.

  'What?'

  'Cute piece of ass that one,' he said, leering.

  'Cute piece of dead ass,' Parrish replied.

  'Wha—'

  'She got herself whacked too, Swede. She got herself strangled last week in Danny's place. And this isn't something I'm gonna forget about, you understand? I'm gonna keep pushing on this until something gives.'

  'Man . . . what the fuck . . . What the fuck is this? Jesus Christ, man, she get herself killed as well?'

  'Sure did. Deader than Elvis. Sweet girl. I don't see that anyone had a reason to kill her, and I'm thinking it could only have happened because of something Danny was into. That's why I wanted to come see you. See if you might have an idea or two. He owe anyone any big money? He rip someone off? He get himself Involved with someone he shouldn't have?'

  It was the hesitation that gave Swede away, gave him away but good.

  He looked at Parrish, at Radick, and then back to Parrish. He opened his mouth as if to speak, and then closed it again.

  'What?' Parrish prompted.

  Swede shook his head.

  'Speak to me, Swede, or I'm gonna be down here on a daily basis 'til I get you for possession, and then you're going away for good. You got two strikes, my friend, and you cannot afford a third.'

  'Aah, fuck, no,' Swede said. He backed up and sat down on a mattress. He pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. He looked like a twelve-year-old, yet had the eyes of an old and dying man.

  'Swede, for God's sake tell me what you know,' Parrish said, his voice resigned to the inevitability of this game they would now play.

  'You cannot do this, man. You cannot hold this shit over me. I don't know anything, okay? I hear this, I hear that. I don't know Danny Lange any better than any of the other junkies that come down here. They're all full of wild ideas. You know that. They're all on this plan and that plan. They all got something going on that's gonna get them out of the life. They've all got some shit going down that's the big fucking rescue from this. You know how it
is, man, you seen it for as long as I have.'

  'So what did Danny say? What did he have going on?'

  'It's all bullshit. It's all fucking pipe dreams—'

  'What was it you thought about when you heard he'd been killed? Hey? What was the first thing you thought about?'

  'It was nothing, man. The same old bullshit these mother fuckers always come out with—'

  'Tell me what it was, Swede.'

  Swede looked up. His eyes were shadowed. He looked like three weeks from dead. There was something in his face, something like a quiet and perpetual wonder - whether each new day would be anything more than its own particular brand of bullshit. Once you went with this life it owned you. You got out and walked, or you braced yourself for the inevitable collision.

  'Swede—'

  'Hey, man, enough already.' Swede looked up. Hurt and anger and hatred flashed in his eyes. 'You can't keep pushin' on me. Push on someone enough and they snap.'

  'I haven't been here for a year, maybe more,' Parrish said. 'Give me a break, for God's sake. I'm trying to find out who did your buddy.'

  'He wasn't my buddy. I knew him from around and about. We didn't have any special fucking relationship, you know?'

  Parrish sighed resignedly. 'Swede, tell me what the fuck you know or I'm taking you in.'

  'What?' Swede started to get up. Radick stepped forward aggressively and Swede sat down again.

  'What the fuck you gonna take me in for?'

  'Abusive behavior. Suspicion of possession. We came in here with probable cause. We smelled weed from the hallway. We tried to speak with you, you got violent, right, Jimmy?'

  Radick nodded but didn't speak. He continued looking directly at Swede.

  'You're a cocksucker, Frank Parrish, a no-good fucked-up—'

  'Tell me what you know, Swede, or we're taking you in.'

  'The porno/ he said suddenly.

  'The what?'

  'Danny's sister. I heard she was gonna do a porno.'

  'Danny told you this?'

  'Sure he did. He told me she wanted to do a porno. She wasn't no sweetheart like everyone thought. She wasn't no clean-cut ail- American schoolgirl. She was a nasty bitch, Frank. She wanted to do a porno, and Danny already had this thing going with this