Cooper By The Gross (All 144 Cooper Stories In One Volume)

by Bill Bernico

  I can take care of that from the office,” Phil said. “But I’m afraid you’re going to have to come back with me, Matt.”

  “What?” Amy said, surprised at Phil’s comment.

  “Just a formality,” I said. “We’ll get this whole thing cleared up in no time.”

  Amy looked at her new brother-in-law. “You don’t have to take him in with handcuffs on do you?”

  Phil smiled. “No, Amy, I don’t,” he said. “We’ll keep this informal and low key. It won’t even make the papers.”

  “See?” I told Amy. “Nothing to worry about.” I turned to Phil. “Come on, let’s get this cleared up and done with.”

  “I’ll take you in the back door,” Phil said, giving a short wave to Betty as he and I walked out to his radio car.

  Before Phil started the engine, he turned in his seat and said, “You know, Matt, from what you say, you and Amy were together on Thursday. I think it might be a good idea to bring her along to corroborate for alibi for that day.”

  “You’re probably right,” I said, sliding back out of the car and heading back toward the house.

  I opened the door enough to poke my head inside. Amy and Betty were standing there talking. “Amy,” I said, and gestured for her to come over to the door.

  “You forget something?” Amy said.

  “No,” I said, “but Phil thought it might be a good idea if you came along with us, since you are my alibi for Thursday. Could speed things along a little if you’re there.”

  “Just let me grab my coat,” Amy said, ducking back inside. She returned thirty seconds later saying that she gave Betty an abbreviated version of what I’d told her, just so she wouldn’t worry while we were gone.

  Amy slid in, between Phil and me and the three of us drove down to the ninth precinct, parking behind the building. Phil led us to his office and pulled up a couple of chairs for us. “Stay put,” Phil said. “I’ll be right back.” He closed his door and headed off down the hall to the detectives squad room.

  As soon as Phil had gone, Amy turned to me. “You don’t think anything will come of this, do you? I mean, you and I both know you had nothing to do with that man’s death.”

  “Innocent until proven guilty?” I said. “Sounds good in theory, I suppose, but stranger things than this have happened. Still, I wouldn’t worry about it. Phil will get this whole thing straightened out.”

  We sat there, at a loss for anything further to say and just waited for Phil to return. Five minutes later he came back into his office with a plainclothes detective by his side. Amy and I stood immediately. Phil gestured toward me with an outstretched palm. “Frank Bellamy,” he said to the detective, “This is my brother, Matt Cooper and his wife Amy.”

  Bellamy shook my hand and nodded politely to Amy. Phil motioned for us to sit again. Bellamy pulled up a chair next to us and Phil sat behind his desk. Bellamy pulled out a notepad and started with me.

  “For the record,” Bellamy said, “Would you give me your full name, please?”

  “Matthew Nicholas Cooper,” I said.

  “Age?”

  Thirty-eight.”

  “Permanent residence?”

  I gave him my address in Hollywood and then remembered that I was selling it to move into Amy’s house. I corrected the address for him, explaining my situation.

  “Well, congratulations,” Bellamy said. “Okay, occupation?”

  “Licensed private investigator.” I said. When he looked up at me I added, “Just in California.”

  Bellamy jotted my comments down and flipped the page over. “Now tell me in detail what you did Thursday, where you went, who might have seen you and anything else that might help.”

  I described the day that Amy and I tailed Cora Finch to Bullock’s Department Store in Hollywood, what we saw and what we did from the time we got up until we were back home that evening. Amy gave her account of Thursday and within thirty minutes from when he began the interview, detective Bellamy folded his notepad closed and slipped it into his pocket.

  “I think I have everything we need,” Bellamy said.

  Phil turned to Bellamy and said, “Thanks, Frank. See what you can do about clearing this up as fast as you can, would you?”

  “Sure thing, Phil,” Bellamy said. “I’ll have Linda type up my notes and get a copy to you right away.”

  Detective Bellamy left the room and closed the door. Amy and I looked at Phil. He wasn’t looking at either of us at first.

  “Something wrong?” I said to Phil.

  “No,” Phil said. “Nothing really, it’s just that ‘loose end’ feeling I get when I don’t think I have everything I need to do my job.”

  “What do you think you’re missing?” Amy said.

  Phil spread his hands and shrugged. “I don’t know, and that’s the part that’s bothering me.”

  “Does it have anything to do with the Finch Case?” I said.

  “What case?” Dan said.

  “You remember Russell Finch?” I said. “Shot twice in some alley a while back. I was checking on his wife to see if she was cheating on him. That Russell Finch.”

  “Thanks, Matt,” Dan said. “Yes, that was my loose end. I must be losing my mind.”

  “Not so much fun being a lieutenant, is it?” I said.

  “I like the extra money and the bars on my shoulders,” Dan said, “but to tell you the truth, life was a lot simpler when I was just a sergeant. What the hell did I get myself into?”

  “It’ll get easier with time,” I said. “It always does. That was always the worst part of any job for me, just starting out. I always felt inadequate and ignorant. A few months later I wondered what I was worried about. The hard parts of the job will soon become second nature. You’ll see.”

  “I hope you’re right about that, Matt,” Dan said.

  There was a pause in the conversation and then impatience got the better of me while I waited for Dan to finish telling me about the Finch Case. It must have slipped right out of his head again so I prompted him again.

  “You were telling me about the outcome of the Finch Case,” I said. “Were you going to finish telling me about it or do I have to guess?”

  Dan shook his head. “See what I mean?” he said. “I can’t concentrate worth a damn anymore. Yes, I’ll finish the story. It was Cora Finch. Man, talk about a messed up love triangle.”

  “Don’t tell me that little worm of a man was doing his wife and Dorothy Carver both?” I said.

  “No, nothing that weird,” Dan said. Turns out sweet loveable, grandmotherly Dorothy Carver had a mean streak in her. And a jealous streak, too. The Finch woman tried to break it off with her, apparently telling Carver that she was going to try to work it out with her husband. Well, the Carver woman saw red and decided to eliminate the competition and gave Mr. Finch two in the chest.”

  “Hard to picture, isn’t it?” I said. “I mean she doesn’t look like a Lizzy Borden.”

  “That was an ax murder,” Dan said.

  “You know what I meant,” I said.

  “Well,” Dan continued, “When Mrs. Finch found out what Dorothy Carver did to poor little Russell, she just lost it and grabbed the first thing she could find—a baseball bat that Mr. Finch kept around the house for protection. She stormed over to her neighbor’s hose and when Dorothy Carver answered the door, the Finch woman let her have it in the head. Split it wide open and then beat her to a pulp as she laid there bleeding.”

  “Gees,” I said. “That’s not on my short list of ways I’d wanna go. What happened to Cora Finch?”

  “We picked her up at her house,” Dan explained. “She was calmly sitting in her living room knitting a scarf when they found her. She was babbling incoherently and rocking back and forth. Hell, she’ll never stand trial. She’s spend the rest of her days up at the asylum for the criminally insane.”

  “Just as well,” I said. “It might be hard to line up another girlfriend after word gets out about her last relatio
nship ended.”

  The intercom on Phil’s desk buzzed and a woman’s voice cut in. “Lieutenant Cooper, I have a call for you from Los Angeles.”

  “I’ll take it,” Phil said, releasing the intercom button and picking up his desk phone. “Cooper,” Phil said.

  There was obviously a pause on the other end because Phil repeated, “Lieutenant Cooper. Can I help you?” Another pause and then Phil chuckled. “Oh,” he said. “I guess that would throw you off. I’m sorry. Hang on, Matt’s right here.” He handed me the phone.”

  “Cooper,” I said.

  “That’s the same thing your brother said,” Dan Hollister said into the phone. “Threw me off there for a second when I didn’t recognize the voice that went with the name he gave.”

  “What do you have, Dan?” I said.

  “Good news and bad news,” Hollister said.

  “I could use some good news,” I said. “Let’s have that first.”

  “The good news,” Dan said, “Is that you’re off the hook for the Halstead killing. Bad news is, someone else had to die for us to find that out. Good news is that the someone who died was another no good like Halstead. Bad news is that my paperwork just increased by one more dead body. Good news is…”

  “Okay,” I said. “I get it. You worked out this Abbott and Costello routine for my benefit. Is that it for me here? Can I get back to my honeymoon?”

  “I give you good news like that and that’s all you have to say?” Dan said.

  “What did you want me to say?” I told him.

  “Aren’t you even curious to know who the other dead scumbag is?” Dan said. “And don’t you even want to know how finding the second victim clears you?”

  “Sorry, Dan,” I said. “I was still focused on getting this monkey off my back. Okay, who’s the second victim?”

  “Johnny Kincaid,” Dan said. “Remember him?”

  “Remember him?” I said. “I arrested him probably six or seven time only to have him sprung by that crooked lawyer, what’s his name.”

  “Bentley,” Dan said with a tinge of disgust in his voice. “Howard Bentley.

  “That’s the guy,” I said, recalling my encounters with the lawyer. “So tell me, Lieutenant, how does finding Kincaid clear me?”

  “Because Kincaid was killed in a shootout here this morning,” Dan explained. “And guess what he had on him?”

  “My gun,” I said, the pieces falling in place in my mind.

  “Give that man a Kewpie Doll,” Dan said. “Don’t ask me how he got a hold of your .38, but we had to pry it out of his cold dead hand when we were through with him. Didn’t you even miss it?”

  “I don’t use it that much,” I said. “It’s probably my backup piece. I cleaned it last month and stuck it back in the box up on the shelf in my closet and hadn’t touched it since.”

  “You might want to think about some new locks for your place, Matt,” Dan said. “Your place is not secure.”

  “Let the next guy worry about that,” I said. “I’m selling it and moving into Amy’s house.”

  Amy spoke up, “Our house,” she said, correcting me.

  “Pardon me,” I told Dan. “Our house. Hey, thanks a lot for the call. I’ll probably see you in a couple of days. Take care.”

  I hung up the phone and turned to Phil. “Just like that,” I said.

  “Just like that,” Phil echoed.

  “Matt,” Amy said, “We don’t have to wait a couple of days. I’d like to go home right away. Can we?”

  Phil shrugged. “Don’t look at me,” he said.

  “Sure,” I told Amy. “Is tomorrow soon enough? It’s too late today anymore. By the time we got back to L.A. it would be after midnight.”

  “Tomorrow will be just fine,” Amy said.

  Phil got up from behind his desk. “Come on, I’ll drive you two back home and tell Betty the good news. But you’ve got to let us take you out on the town tonight while you’re still here.”

  Amy nodded enthusiastically. I turned to Phil. “Sounds like a plan,” I said. “Can we take Troy and Little Matt along with us?”

  “Sure,” Phil said. “I’m sure they wouldn’t want to miss it.”

  Betty was glad to hear about my good news but disappointed that we were flying back home tomorrow. Phil told her about our plans for one last fling tonight on the town. That seemed to satisfy her.

  It was half past three when Troy and Little Matt walked in the door carrying their school books and lunch boxes. They laid their things down on the kitchen table and ran right up to me and hung on my coat.

  “You guys want to come with us and have dinner in a restaurant tonight?” I said.

  “Yeah, yeah,” they both shouted, jumping up and down. “Where are we going?” Troy said.

  I looked at Phil.

  “How about pizza at Gino’s?” Phil said.

  The boys jumped up and down again, voicing their support of Phil’s choice. Phil turned to Amy and me. “Pizza all right with you?”

  “Perfect,” Amy said. I nodded in agreement.

  “Then it’s settled,” Betty said. “Gino’s. How’s six o’clock sound? I know that’s early, but with the boys along…”

  “Six will be fine,” Amy said.

  Betty glanced up at the kitchen wall clock. “I have to give the boys their bath and get them dressed. Will you excuse me?”

  “Sure,” I said. “Go ahead. We’ll be right here.”

  I turned to Amy. “Still want to take that neighborhood walk?”

  Amy smiled and walked with me to the door. I turned back to Phil. “We won’t be long,” I said and walked Amy out to the street.

  I walked Amy north on Kedzie past Twenty-forth Street. Next to an Army surplus store I pointed out a three-story brick apartment building with two brick columns at the front door to the ground floor apartment.

  “This is one of the places we lived when I was a kid,” I said, pointing to the front bay window. “Phil was supposed to be watching me while mom went to the store. Big mistake.”

  “What happened?” Amy said, clinging to my arm.

  “Phil was about ten years old,” I said. “I was only four and hadn’t even started school yet. Well, Phil dropped a marble and it rolled under the couch. He got on his knees to see if he could find it, but it was dark under there.”

  “Oh oh,” Amy said. “What’d he do?”

  “He tore the cellophane wrapper off a pack of cigarettes, twisted it into a little rod and lit it, thinking he could use it like a little torch to see under the couch.”

  Amy started laughing even before I’d finished my story.

  “Wait,” I said. “It gets better. So he holds this little lit torch under the couch and the couch catches fire. Pretty soon the couch is blazing, the drapes behind it are blazing, he’s running to the kitchen and coming back with a saucepan half full of water, thinking her can put it out with that.”

  Amy held her side now, half bent over in laughter. “Stop, stop,” she begged me.

  “Phil decides that we better scram,” I said. “He drags me outside and down the street to the mom and pop store where we know our mom is shopping. He grabs her by the arm, trying to get her to leave the grocery store, all the while yelling hysterically about the couch. Mom can’t understand what he’s trying to tell her, but suddenly she hears a couple of fire trucks come screaming past the grocery store toward our apartment.”

  “Stop,” Amy says again. “Stop, I’m going to pee.”

  I pause at this point and let her catch her breath. I give it a few more seconds and then start right in where I’d left off. “So she gets back to the apartment, dragging Phil and me all the way down the sidewalk. There are fire hoses draped across the sidewalk, lawn, street, everywhere. And all she can do is stand there and watch from a distance as those front bay windows explode out into the street.”

  Amy had stopped laughing at this point and her face fell. “Was anyone hurt?” She said. “Where’d you guys live af
ter that?”

  “No one was hurt,” I said. “And the very next day dad rented a huge truck and packed up whatever wasn’t burned or water damaged and moved us to a farm up in northern Wisconsin. Talk about your contrasts. From the gritty streets to the hayseed capital of the world overnight—now that’s what I call culture shock.”

  “I didn’t know you were farmers,” Amy said.

  “Technically we weren’t,” I said. “That lasted two weeks. That’s all the time it took for dad to realize that he wasn’t cut out to be a farmer. Hell, most of our boxes were still unpacked after two weeks, so it was no big deal to throw everything back in the truck and head back to Chicago.”

  “Not back to that same apartment?” Amy said.

  “No,” I said. “Actually, dad found us a second-floor apartment just a few blocks from where Phil and Betty live now. It was over on Homan Avenue, which was just a short walk to McCormick school the following fall when I started the first grade.”

  “You know,” Amy said. “The longer I know you, the more I’m convinced that we could be entries in one of those ‘Separated at Birth’ books. My dad moved around a lot, too. But then I think I told you that already.”

  “My dad did move us around a few times that year,” I said. “But for the most part, we stayed put and I got to finish school here in Chicago. After I finished school I put in some time with the Chicago P.D. and then decided to move to California.”

  We moved on, walking west on Twenty-third Street for a few blocks and then turning south again on Homan Avenue. Four blocks further and I stopped and pointed up to the second floor window above us.

  “That was our apartment after dad’s short stint as a farmer,” I said. I pointed to the corner just south of us. “And if you walk half a block that way and three blocks east you’ll be in front of McCormick School.”

  “Let’s go there,” Amy said. “I have some good memories of that place.”

  She took my arm and we headed toward the grade school that both of us had attended, albeit a decade apart. We stopped in front of the school and I pointed to a second-floor window. “That was my classroom. Two twelve, Mrs. Powers.”