Killing Orders

by Sara Paretsky

  In the winter twilight, I felt as though I had slipped back five or six centuries in time. The brothers in their white robes, the candlelight flickering on the simple wooden altar to my left, the few people coming in from the outside to worship in the public space divided from the main chapel by a carved wooden screen-all evoked the medieval Church. I was the discordant note in my black wool suit, my high heels, my makeup.

  Father Carroll led the service, singing in a clear, well-trained voice. The whole service was sung antiphonally between the two banks of stalls. It’s true, as Rosa said, that I’m no Christian, but I found the service satisfying.

  Afterward, Carroll invited me back to his office for tea. Almost all tea tastes like stewed alfalfa to me, but I politely drank a cup of the pale green brew and asked him if he’d heard anything more from the FBI.

  “They tested the shares for fingerprints and a lot of other things-I don’t know what. They thought there might be dust or something on them that would show where the things had been stored. I guess they didn’t find anything, so they’re going to bring them back tomorrow.” He grinned mischievously. “I’m making them give me an armed escort over to the Bank of Melrose Park. We’re getting those things into a bank vault.”

  He asked me to stay for dinner, which was being served in five minutes. Memories of Kraft American cheese restrained me. On an impulse I invited him to eat with me in Melrose Park. The town has a couple of excellent Italian restaurants. Somewhat surprised, he accepted.

  “I’ll just change out of my robe.” He smiled again. “The young brothers like to go out in them in public-they like people to look at them and know they’re seeing a foreign breed. But we older men lose our taste for showing off.”

  He returned in ten minutes in a plaid shirt, black slacks, and a black jacket. We had a pleasant meal at one of the little restaurants on North Avenue. We talked about singing; I complimented him on his voice and learned he’d been a student at the American Conservatory before entering the priesthood. He asked me about my work and I tried to think of some interesting cases.

  “I guess the payoff is you get to be your own boss. And you have the satisfaction of solving problems, even if they’re only little problems most of the time. I was just out in Elgin today, testifying at the state court there. It brought back my early days with the Chicago public defender’s office. Either we had to defend maniacs who ought to have been behind bars for the good of the world at large, or we had poor chumps who were caught in the system and couldn’t buy their way out. You’d leave court every day feeling as though you’d just helped worsen the situation. As a detective, if I can get at the truth of a problem, I feel as though I’ve made some contribution.”

  “I see. Not a glamorous occupation, but it sounds very worthwhile…I’d never heard Mrs. Vignelli mention you. Until she called last week, I didn’t know she had any family besides her son. Are there other relatives?”

  I shook my head. “My mother was her only Chicago relative-my grandfather and she were brother and sister. There may be some family on my uncle Carl’s side. He died years before I was born. Shot himself, actually-very sad for Rosa.” I fiddled with the stem on my wineglass, tempted to ask him if he knew what lay behind Rosa ’s dark insinuations about Gabriella. But even if he knew, he probably wouldn’t tell me. And it seemed vulgar to bring up the family emnity in public.

  After I took him back to the priory I swung onto the Eisenhower back to Chicago. A little light snow had begun falling. It was a few minutes before ten; I turned on WBBM, Chicago ’s news station, to catch news and a weather forecast.

  I listened vaguely to reports of failed peace initiatives in Lebanon, continued high unemployment, poor retail sales in December despite Christmas shopping. Then Alan Swanson’s crisp voice continued:

  Tonight’s top local story is the violent death of a Chicago stockbroker. Cleaning woman Martha Gonzales found the body of broker Agnes Paciorek in one of the conference rooms in the offices of Feldstein, Holtz and Woods, where Miss Paciorek worked. She had been shot twice in the head. Police have not ruled out suicide as a cause of death. CBS news correspondent Mark Weintraub is with Sergeant McGonnigal at the Fort Dearborn Tower offices of Feldstein, Holtz and Woods.

  Swanson switched over to Weintraub. I almost swerved into a ditch at Cicero Avenue. My hands were shaking and I pulled the car over to the side. I turned off the engine. Semis roared past, rattling the little Omega. The car cooled, and my feet began growing numb inside their pumps. “Two shots in the head and the police still haven’t ruled out suicide,” I muttered. My voice jarred me back to myself; I turned the motor on and headed back into the city at a sober pace.

  WBBM played the story at ten-minute intervals, with few new details. The bullets were from a twenty-two-caliber pistol. The police finally decided to eliminate suicide since no gun was found by the body. Miss Paciorek’s purse had been recovered from a locked drawer in her desk. I heard Sergeant McGonnigal saying in a voice made scratchy by static that someone must have intended to rob her, then killed her in rage because she didn’t have a purse.

  On impulse I drove north to Addison and stopped in front of Lotty’s apartment. It was almost eleven: no lights showed. Lotty gets her sleep when she can-her practice involves a lot of night emergencies. My trouble would keep.

  Back at my own apartment, I changed from my suit into a quilted robe and sat down in the living room with a glass of Black Label whiskey. Agnes and I went back a long way together, back to the Golden Age of the sixties, when we thought love and energy would end racism and sexism. She’d come from a wealthy family, her father a heart surgeon at one of the big suburban hospitals. They’d fought her about her friends, her life-style, her ambitions, and she’d won every battle. Relations with her mother became more and more strained. I would have to call Mrs. Paciorek, who disliked me since I represented everything she didn’t want Agnes to be. I’d have to hear how they always knew this would happen, working downtown where the niggers are. I drank another glass of whiskey.

  I’d forgotten all about laying some bait for my anonymous phone caller until the telephone interrupted my maudlin mood. I jumped slightly and looked at my watch: eleven-thirty. I picked up a Dictaphone from my desk and turned it to “Record” before picking up the receiver.

  It was Roger Ferrant, feeling troubled about Agnes’s death. He’d seen it on the ten o’clock news and tried calling me then. We commiserated a bit; then he said hesitantly, “I feel responsible for her death.”

  The whiskey was fogging my brain slightly. “What’d you do-send a punk up to the sixtieth floor of the Fort Dearborn Tower?” I switched off the Dictaphone and sat down.

  “Vic, I don’t need your tough-girl act. I feel responsible because she was staying late working on this possible Ajax takeover. It wasn’t something she had time for during the day. If you hadn’t called her-”

  “If you hadn’t called her, she would have been there late working on another project,” I interrupted him coldly. “Agnes often finished her day late-the lady worked hard. And if it comes to that, you wouldn’t have called her if I hadn’t given you her number, so if anyone’s responsible, it’s me.” I took another swallow of whiskey. “And I won’t believe that.”

  We hung up. I finished my third glass of scotch and put the bottle away in the built-in cupboard in the dining room, draped my robe over a chair back, and climbed naked into bed. Just as I turned out the bedside light, something Ferrant had said rang a bell with me. I called him back on the bedside phone.

  “It’s me, Vic. How did you know Agnes was working late on your project tonight?”

  “I talked to her this afternoon. She said she was going to stay late and talk to some of her broker pals; she didn’t have time to get to it during the day.”

  “In person or on the phone?”

  “Huh? Oh, I don’t know.” He thought about it. “I can’t remember exactly what she said. But it left me with the impression that she was planning to see so
meone in person.”

  “You should talk to the police, Roger.” I hung up and fell asleep almost immediately.

  X

  Mixed Grill

  NO MATTER HOW often I wake up with a headache, I never remember it the next time I’m putting away five or six ounces of whiskey. Thursday morning a dry mouth and pounding head and heart woke me at five-thirty. I looked disgustedly at myself in the bathroom mirror. “You’re getting old, V.!., and unattractive. When your face has cracks in it the morning after five ounces of scotch, it’s time to stop drinking.”

  I squeezed some fresh orange juice and drank it in one long swallow, took four aspirins, and went back to bed. The ringing phone woke me again at eight-thirty. A neutral young male voice said he was connected with Lieutenant Robert Mallory of the Chicago police department and would I be able to come downtown that morning and talk to the lieutenant.

  “It’s always a pleasure for me to talk to Lieutenant Mallory,” I replied formally, if somewhat thickly, through the miasma of sleep. “Perhaps you could tell me what this is about.”

  The neutral young man didn’t know, but if I was free at nine-thirty, the lieutenant would see me then.

  My next call was to the Herald-Star. Murray Ryerson hadn’t yet come in for the day. I called his apartment, and felt vindictive pleasure at getting him out of bed. “ Murray, what do you know about Agnes Paciorek?”

  He was furious. “I can’t believe you got me out of bed to ask me that. Go buy the fucking morning edition.” He slammed the phone down.

  Angry myself, I dialed again. “Listen, Ryerson. Agnes Paciorek was one of my oldest friends. She got shot last night. Now Bobby Mallory wants to talk to me. I’m sure he’s not calling for deep background on University Women United, or Clergy and Laity Concerned About Vietnam. What was in her office that makes him want to see me?”

  “Hang on a second.” He put the receiver down; I could hear his feet padding away down the hall, then water running and a woman’s voice saying something indistinguishable. I ran into the kitchen and put a small pot of water on the stove, ground beans for one cup of coffee, and brought cup, water, and filter back to my bedside phone-all before Murray returned.

  “I hope you can hold off Jessica or whatever her name is for a few seconds.”

  “Don’t be catty, Vic. It isn’t attractive.” I heard springs creaking, then a muffled “ouch” from Murray.

  “Right,” I said dryly. “Now tell me about Agnes.”

  Paper rustled, springs creaked again, and Murray ’s smothered voice whispered, “Knock it off, Alice.” Then he put the mouthpiece in front of his lips again and began reading from his notes.

  “Agnes Paciorek was shot at about eight last night. Two twenty-two bullets in the brain. Office doors not locked- cleaning women lock behind when they finish sixtieth floor, usually at eleven o’clock. Martha Gonzales cleans floors fifty-seven through sixty, got to floor at her usual time, nine-fifteen, saw nothing unusual on premises, got to conference room at nine-thirty, saw body, called police. No personal attack-no signs of rape or struggle. Police presume attacker took her completely by surprise or possibly someone she knew

  That’s the lot. You’re someone she knew. They probably just want to know where you were at eight last night. By the way, since you’re on the phone, where were you?”

  “In a bar, waiting for a report from my hired gun.” I hung up and looked sourly around the room. The orange juice and aspirin had dissipated the headache, but I felt rotten. I wasn’t going to have time for running if I had to be in Mallory’s office by nine-thirty, and a long, slow run was what I needed to get the poisons Out of my system. I didn’t even have time for a long bath, so I steamed myself under the shower for ten minutes, put on the crepe-de-chine pant-suit, this time with a man-tailored shirt of pale lemon, and ran down the stairs two at a time to my car.

  If the Warshawski family has a motto, which I doubt, it’s “Never skip a meal,” perhaps in Old Church Slavonic, wreathed around a dinner plate with knife and fork rampant. At any rate, I stopped at a bakery on Halsted for coffee and a ham croissant and headed for Lake Shore Drive and the Loop. The croissant was stale, and the ham might have been rancid, but I plowed into it bravely. Bobby’s little chats can go on for hours. I wanted to fortify myself.

  Lieutenant Mallory had joined the police the same year as my dad. But my father, his better in brains, never had a lot of ambition, certainly not enough to buck the prejudice against Polish cops in an all-Irish world. So Mallory had risen and Tony had stayed on the beat, but the two remained good friends. That’s why Mallory hates talking to me about crime. He thinks Tony Warshawski’s daughter should be making a better world’ by producing happy healthy babies, not by catching desperadoes.

  I pulled into the visitors’ parking lot at the Eleventh Street station at nine-twenty-three. I sat in the car to relax for a few minutes, finish my coffee, clear my mind of all thoughts. For once, I had no guilty secrets. It should be a straightforward conversation.

  At nine-thirty I made my way past the high wooden admissions desk where pimps were lining up to redeem last night’s haul of hookers, and went down the hallway to Mallory’s office, The place smelled a lot like St. Albert ’s priory. Must be the linoleum floors. Or maybe all the people in uniform.

  Mallory was on the phone when I got to the cubicle he calls an office. His shirt sleeves were rolled up and the muscular arm that waved me in strained the white fabric. Before entering, I helped myself to coffee from a pot in the corner of the hall, then sat in an uncomfortable folding chair across the desk while he finished his call. Mallory’s face betrays his moods. He turns red and blustery on days when I’m on the periphery of some crime; relaxed and genial means he’s thinking of me as his old buddy Tony’s daughter. Today he looked at me gravely as he hung up the phone. Trouble. I took a swallow of coffee and waited.

  He flicked a switch on the intercom on his desk and waited silently while someone answered his summons. A young black officer, resembling Neil Washington from Hill Street Blues, came in shortly with a steno pad in one hand and a cup of coffee for Mallory in the other. Mallory introduced him as Officer Tarkinton.

  “Miss Warshawski is a private investigator,” Mallory informed Tarkinton, spelling the name for him. “Officer Tarkinton is going to keep a record of our conversation.”

  The formality and the display of officialdom were supposed to intimidate. I drank some more coffee, puzzled.

  “Were you a friend of Agnes Marie Paciorek?”

  “Bobby, you’re making me feel like I ought to have my attorney here. What’s going on?”

  “Just answer the questions. We’ll get to the reasons quickly enough.”

  “My relations with Agnes aren’t a secret. You can get the details from anyone who knows both of us. Unless you tell me what’s behind this, I’m not answering any questions.”

  “When did you first meet Agnes Paciorek?”

  I drank some more coffee and said nothing.

  “You and Paciorek are described as sharing an alternate lifestyle. This same witness says you are responsible for introducing the dead woman to unconventional behavior. Do you want to comment on that?”

  I felt my temper rising and controlled it with an effort. It’s a typical police tactic in this type of interrogation-get the witness mad enough to start mouthing off. And who knows what self-constructed pitfalls you’ll wander into? I used to see it all the time in the public defender’s office. I counted to ten in Italian and waited.

  Mallory clenched his fist tightly around the edge of his metal desk. “You and Paciorek were lesbians, weren’t you?” Suddenly his control broke and he smashed his fist on the desk top. “When Tony was dying you were up at the University of Chicago screwing around like a pervert, weren’t you? It wasn’t enough that you demonstrated against the war and got involved with that filthy abortion underground. Don’t think we couldn’t have pulled you in on that. We could have, a hundred times over. But everyone wa
nted to protect Tony. You were the most important thing in the world to him, and all the time- Jesus Christ, Victoria. When I talked to Mrs. Paciorek this morning, I wanted to puke.”

  “Are you charging me with something, Bobby?”

  He sat smoldering.

  “Because if you’re not, I’m leaving.” I got up, putting an empty Styrofoam cup on the corner of his desk, and started out the door.

  “No you don’t, young lady. Not until we get this straightened out.”

  “There’s nothing to straighten out,” I said coldly. “First of all, under the Illinois criminal code, lesbianism between consenting adults is not an indictable offense. Therefore it is none of your goddamned business whether or not Ms. Paciorek and I were lovers. Second, my relations with her are totally unconnected with your murder investigation. Unless you can demonstrate some kind of connection, I have absolutely nothing to say to you.”

  We locked gazes for an angry minute. Then Bobby, his face still set in hurt hard lines, asked Officer Tarkinton to leave. When we were alone he said in a tight voice, “I should have gotten someone else to handle the interrogation. But goddamn it, Vicki..

  His voice trailed off. I was still angry, but I felt grudging sympathy for him. “You know, Bobby, what hurts me is that you talk to Mrs. Paciorek, whom you never met before in your life, and believe a shopping list of calumny from her without even asking me, and you’ve known me since I was born.”

  “Okay, talk. I’m asking. Talk to me about the Paciorek girl.”

  I picked up the Styrofoam cup and looked inside. It was still empty. “Agnes and I met when we were both students in the college. I was prelaw and she was a math major who ultimately decided to get an MBA. I’m not going to try to describe to you what it felt like in those days-you don’t have much sympathy for the causes that consumed us. I think sometimes that I’ll never feel so-so alive again.”