Hard Look

by Robert J. Randisi

  “I do,” he said. “His name’s Captain Enrico DeLeon. I’ll give you his number: In fact, I’ll call him so he’ll be expecting you.”

  “What will you tell him?”

  “Nothing,” Desoto said. “I’ll just ask him to listen to you, and then you lay it out for him.”

  “Will he listen?”

  “I did,” he said. “Why wouldn’t he?”

  “You’re right.”

  “There’s one thing you better be ready for, amigo.”

  I knew he was referring to me as “friend” only in deference to Carver.

  “What’s that?”

  “The two detectives, Rizzo and Becker? They won’t like you going over their heads.”

  “I know,” I said, “but I figured I needed to tell my story to somebody with some rank.”

  “You might be right about that,” he said, “but that will not put you in a good light as far as they are concerned.”

  I stared at him a few moments and then asked, “How does it sound to you?”

  “Honestly?”

  I nodded.

  “Not good,” he said, shaking his head. “The body in your room looks bad, but unless there’s something you’re not telling me, I can’t see a motive.”

  “I’ve told you all there is to tell,” I said. “In fact, I was honest with Becker and Rizzo about why I’m here.”

  “But you weren’t honest about knowing the dead man in your room, amigo.”

  “I was,” I said. “I didn’t know him, I just saw him in New York that once.”

  “That’s still something you should have told them,” Desoto said. “Any cop would consider that a lie.”

  “Well then, it’s the only one.”

  “Any cop will consider that if you lied to them once, you’d lie again.”

  I rubbed my hand across my forehead and said, “Yeah, I know. . . .”

  “Talk to DeLeon, see what he says,” Desoto said. “He’s a fair man.”

  “I appreciate the time you’ve given me, Lieutenant,” I said, “and I wish you’d let me buy dinner.”

  He held up his hand in silent protest, and we got separate checks.

  He walked out with me, and we shook hands in front of the restaurant.

  “I know you did this as a favor to Carver,” I said, “but I still thank you.”

  “No problem,” he said. “My advice is to be totally honest with Captain DeLeon. After that the situation should resolve itself.”

  I thanked him again and walked to my car thinking that murder is a situation that rarely resolves itself.

  53

  It was almost nine when I got back to Tampa. I’d call Desoto’s friend Captain DeLeon the next day and tell him the whole story. Maybe I’d even throw myself on his mercy.

  Patrick wasn’t on duty behind the desk when I entered the hotel. I decided not to check for messages. If there were any, the red light on my phone would be flashing.

  When I entered my room, the first thing I saw was the red message light on the phone—and the next thing I saw was stars. . . .

  54

  When I came to, I was lying facedown on the bed. I frowned and moved my hands. They weren’t bound, so I put them under me and started to get up.

  “If you’re gonna get up,” a voice said, “do it slow, okay?”

  “Yuh,” I said, because my mouth wasn’t working right at the moment and neither was my brain.

  I pushed myself up and rolled over so that I was sitting on the bed. The back of my head was throbbing, and I put both of my hands to it.

  “Sorry if I hit you too hard.”

  “That’s okay,” I said. “I got hit a lot in the ring.”

  “Yeah, I heard you was a fighter,” he said. “I don’t think I ever saw you, though.”

  “I never made it to cable,” I said.

  He laughed and said, “That’s a good one.”

  I thought it was about time I took a look at him, so I dropped my hands down from my head and did so. He was sitting in a chair over by the window, in front of the drawn curtains. He was about thirty-five or so, not too big, sitting real comfortable with one leg across the other, the right across the left. His right foot was going a mile a minute, shaking up and down, and he didn’t even seem to be aware of it. I took it for a nervous habit. He was looking at me with an amused look on his face.

  “New York?” I asked.

  “Bingo.”

  I was in trouble. I knew that when I heard his voice. This was no Florida musclehead, and no Jersey second-rater—not that I have anything against Jersey. They do have first-rate hoods there, I just hadn’t met one recently. This one, however, was a pro from New York, and that’s why I knew I was in trouble. He wouldn’t work for a yuppie like Jerry Meyer, or for a would-be Godmother like Angie Worth.

  “I could get you some ice for your head,” he said, “but in a little while you might not need it.”

  “Forget the ice,” I said, “let’s talk about why I might not need it.”

  “Well, I was sent here for one of two things,” the man said. “To get your cooperation or to kill you. You buy that?”

  “Oh, I buy it,” I said, watching his foot go up and down. “Tell me how I can cooperate?”

  “Good man,” he said. “I can call you Miles, right? I like makin’ new friends, Miles. We gonna be friends?”

  “Well, I guess that depends, doesn’t it?”

  “It sure does,” he said. “Look, you can call me Vito if you want, okay? It ain’t my name, but you can call me that for now.”

  “Okay, Vito,” I said, “what’s the plan?”

  “My people are interested in this lady you’re lookin’ for. What’s her name . . . Meyer? That’s it, ain’t it? Sandra Meyer?”

  “That’s her.” I was starting to get fascinated by his foot. The speed never varied, it just kept going and going. Didn’t he get tired? “Why do your people want her, Vito?”

  “I don’t ask questions like that,” he said. “I just do what I’m told. I was told to ask you about her. You find her yet?”

  “No.”

  He leaned forward and asked, “You close?” His foot stopped moving.

  “Maybe,” I said. “I’ve got some leads, but I’ve got to chase them down.”

  “There’s been a coupla murders here since you got here, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Any idea about those?”

  “All I know is I didn’t do either one.”

  “Naw, we didn’t think you did,” he said. “Now, the first guy, he was from New York, we know that. He was hired to watch you.”

  “I figured that.”

  “Yeah, you’re a smart one,” he said. “How’s come somebody as smart as you is workin’ for a jerk like Jerry Meyer?”

  “He paid me,” I said. “I generally work for whoever will pay me.”

  “I gotcha,” he said. He sat back in his chair and the foot started going again. “Gotta make a livin’, right?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Well, that’s what I’m doin’, Miles,” he explained. “I’m makin’ a livin’. I don’t whack guys out for fun, ya know?”

  “I know.”

  “I mean, there ain’t never nothin’ personal in it when I whack somebody. Like with you, fer instance. Nothin’ personal, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Just so’s you know.”

  “I know.”

  “Here’s the deal, then,” he said. “I’m gonna leave you a number where you can reach me. You got two days. When you find the broad, you give me a call. That’s all there is to it.”

  “That’s it, huh?”

  “Yeah,” he said, “unless you, like, say no. Then I gotta whack you now.”

  “No,” I said, lifting a hand, “that’s okay. Just leave me the number.”

  “I said you was smart,” he said. “The number’s on the pad by the phone.”

  I looked at the night table next to the b
ed and saw the number written on the pad.

  He gave his foot a few extra shakes and then stood up, and I saw that he was a little bigger than me, but still a middleweight, like me. His hands had seen a lot of action, but not in the ring.

  “Stay smart, Miles,” he said, moving toward the door. “Hey, I’m sorry about the tap on the head, but that was to get your attention.”

  “It’s okay,” I lied. “I hardly even feel it anymore.”

  “One more thing,” he said, pointing a finger at me. “No cops, got it?”

  “I’m, uh, seeing a lady deputy sheriff,” I said.

  “No kiddin’? A lady deputy? That’s a cop, right?”

  “Well . . . sort of.”

  “Well, listen, fuck her all you want, but stay away from real cops, okay? It wouldn’t be healthy for you to be talkin’ to no cops.”

  “I’m already under investigation for the guy they found dead in my room.”

  He looked annoyed.

  “Look, I ain’t stupid, Jacoby,” he said. “Yeah, talk to them when they ask you questions, but don’t go volunteerin’ anythin’ to anybody. Got it?”

  “I got it, I got it,” I said. “I understand perfectly.”

  “Good,” Vito said. “I knew you would. I’ll be waitin’ for your call.”

  “Yeah,” I said, and when he left I rubbed my head again and added, “wait till hell freezes over.”

  55

  “You got a Watneys?” I asked Christina, the bartender at Magadan’s.

  “No,” she said, leaning her elbows on the bar.

  “Okay,” I said, “I’ll have a St. Pauli Girl.” I put a ten-dollar bill down on the bar and added, “I’ll take my change in quarters.”

  “What?”

  “Change,” I said, “for the phone.”

  “Oh.”

  She brought me the beer, snatched up the ten, and counted out my change in quarters.

  “Thanks.”

  I took the beer and the quarters to the pay phone near the men’s room. I preferred to make the calls I had to make from here rather than from my hotel.

  Of course, now that I was standing in front of the phone, armed with quarters and my phone book, I wasn’t quite sure whom to call.

  There was a new wrinkle on this case, all of a sudden, a new player, and I had to find out who it was. I wasn’t that worried about Jerry Meyer, or about Angie Worth, but I knew who they were, and I had a pretty good idea what they could do. This new player, though, the one who had sent “Vito” to see me with a message, that one I didn’t know.

  I thought about calling my friend Nick Delvecchio. Nick actually had some family affiliations with the Mafia, although he wasn’t proud of it. Still, he lived and worked in Brooklyn, and I had a feeling that my message had been sent from Manhattan. Why? Well, because that was where the case had started. My figuring was that whoever Vito worked for was somebody who was working with, or maybe had financially backed, Jerry Meyer’s drug play. See, the Mafia very often backed independents for a piece of the action. Jerry, being the yuppie stockbroker that he was, probably had connections that told him where to go for the backing—maybe the same connections he’d scored his drugs through. For Meyer this big deal was probably also a new way of getting his rocks off, only once his wife split with the stash, his rocks were in a vise. Now, six months later, the vise was tightening. He’d hired me to find her, and maybe he was starting to think that was a mistake. Maybe he went to his backers, and they sent Vito to work with me.

  Or maybe I was full of shit and that wasn’t the case at all. That didn’t matter. I still had to find out who the extra player was before I could act.

  Okay, not Nick. I could call Detective Hocus, of the New York City Police Department. He and I had worked together—and at odds—many times before. Could he help? Maybe. Would he? Again, maybe. Whom could I call who would help, no questions asked?

  I could only come up with one name.

  Ray Carbone.

  Carbone was an ex-fighter like me, and he hired out like me, only not as a P.I. Ray didn’t have a license. He did mostly bodyguard work, and some strong-arm stuff, but he had plenty of contacts, on the street and off.

  I didn’t need my phone book for Ray’s number That one I knew by heart. I dialed it, and then fed the quarters in when the operator told me how much it was.

  The phone rang twice before it was answered.

  “Hey, Ray,” I said, “it’s Miles Jacoby.”

  “Hey, Jack, what’s up?”

  “I need a favor.”

  “A favor favor,” he asked, “or a paying favor?”

  “A paying favor,” I said. “I need you to stick your nose where it don’t belong.”

  “Ooh,” he said, “that’s a paying favor, all right. What’s the job?”

  I told him where I was and that I needed a make on a pro who went by the name “Vito.” The name was actually useless, so I described the guy to him, getting as detailed as I could.

  “Middleweight, you say?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Did he ever fight?”

  “A lot of times,” I said, “but not in the ring.”

  “Tell me somethin’ else about him, Jack,” Ray said. “There’s lots of guys around, you know?”

  “I know, Ray,” I said. “Wait a minute, he’s got like a nervous habit.”

  “What kind?”

  “His foot.”

  “What about it?”

  “It shakes.”

  “He’s got the shakes?”

  “Well, not the shakes, exactly,” I said. “He sits, uh, like with one leg crossed over the other? And he shakes his foot. Like, wiggles it, you know?”

  “I think so,” Ray said. I knew Ray well enough to know that he was probably crossing his legs right at that moment, so he could see what I was talking about. “I know what you mean, Jack.”

  “Okay, good.”

  “When do you need this?” he asked. “Coupla days maybe?”

  “Today.”

  “What?” he said. “Come on, Jack. I don’t know what time it is where you are, but it’s gettin’ late in the Big Apple, you know?”

  “The Apple never sleeps, Ray,” I said, “and it’s the same time here in Florida that it is there. We’re on the same coast.”

  “I knew that,” he said defensively. “This is gonna cost you extra, Jack.”

  “Don’t I know it, Ray. Just do it, okay?”

  “I’ll do my best, Jack.”

  “I know you will, Ray,” I said, and then something occurred to me. “Do one more thing for me, Ray.”

  “Tonight?”

  “No, this can wait until tomorrow.”

  “Okay, shoot.”

  “Check on a guy named Charles Haney for me. He’s a stockbroker with offices in the World Trade Center. At least, I think he is.”

  “Whataya mean, you think?”

  “Well, there is a Charles Haney office in the center, so I’m assuming there’s a guy by that name. Check it out for me, okay?”

  “Sure,” he said. “Whataya wanna know about him?”

  “The works.”

  “You got it,” he said. “Where do I call you?”

  I gave him the number on the pay phone and told him where I was. He could call me there tonight and at my hotel tomorrow. I gave him that number, too, but he was more interested in where I was now.

  “No shit?” Ray said. “Magadan’s? No shit?”

  I’d forgotten that Ray was a Mets fan.

  “Yeah, Ray, Magadan’s.”

  “Hey, Jack, can you get me a signed ball?”

  “As part of the deal?” I said, “Sure, Ray. No sweat.”

  “Hey thanks, Jack. Call you later.”

  I hung up. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I didn’t exactly know Magadan personally or anything, but maybe I could get his brother to sign a ball.

  56

  I stayed at Magadan’s watching late games, sitting at the neares
t table I could to the pay phone. I didn’t want anyone but me answering it when it rang. I had already told Christina and a couple of the waitresses that I was waiting for an important call. Christina told them all I was a private detective, so they all thought it was very exciting.

  When the phone rang, I got to it on the second ring, and it was Ray.

  “Did you get it?”

  “I think so,” Ray said. “It’s funny.”

  “What is?”

  “It was the foot shaking that gave it away,” he said. “The word I get is that he drives people crazy with it.”

  “I can see why,” I said. “So, who is he?”

  “His name’s Tony Allegretto,” Ray said. “He works for Carlo Caggiano.”

  “Caggiano?” I said, surprised. “Wait . . . junior or senior?”

  “Junior,” Ray said. “Carl Senior’s sort of semiretired. You had a run-in with Carl Junior a few years ago, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I did.” That was when I was looking for Aaron Steinway’s missing collection of pulp magazines. Steinway ended up dead, and while I found out who did that, I never did find the missing collection. Actually, I stopped looking, because with my client dead nobody was paying me. Carl Junior at that time had a wife who also collected pulp magazines—stuff like Black Mask and Dime Detective, stuff that was published in the thirties and forties so successfully.

  “Is he still married?” I asked.

  “Junior? Naw, he got divorced last year, I think. You gonna mess with Carl Junior, Jack?”

  “I don’t know, Ray. I guess it sort of depends on if he wants to mess with me.”

  “Well, you made out okay last time,” Ray said, “but I wouldn’t press my luck if I was you. He’s changed since then.”

  “In what way?”

  “He’s, I don’t know, matured, I think. Least that’s what I hear. He’s handlin’ a lot of legitimate stuff.”

  Sure, I thought, like investing in some yuppie drug deal. And if I recalled correctly, Carl Junior could have used some maturing back then.

  “Whataya wanna do now, Jack?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I guess I’ve got to talk to the man.”

  “You gonna come back to New York?”