Lieberman's Folly

by Stuart M. Kaminsky

“Who?” the woman repeated.

  “Police. The police. I’m Inspector Lieberman of the Chicago Police. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  “I’m alone,” the woman said.

  “I’m sorry to hear that,” said Lieberman.

  “Nobody’s in here with me,” she said.

  “I appreciate that,” said Lieberman.

  “But I have a very big dog,” she said.

  “That’s a good idea,” he said. “Can we talk for just a moment.”

  The door opened slightly to reveal chain and a very short woman. Lieberman could see that the woman was wearing a blue robe and a look of total panic.

  “That’s all I’m opening,” she said. “My dog is right here.”

  “That must be reassuring,” said Lieberman. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but there’s been an accident next door. Miss Valdez. Did you hear anything Miss …?”

  “Mrs. Warnake,” the woman said. “I heard plenty. Noise, throwing things. Woke my cat.”

  “You mean your dog.”

  “My dog,” she corrected.

  “You hear any voices, words?” he asked.

  “Music, noise,” she said. “I’m sorry if she’s had an accident but I think I’ll complain to Mr. Silver in the morning.”

  “She’s dead,” said Lieberman.

  “Oh,” said Mrs. Warnake.

  “You ever see people coming to visit her?” Lieberman asked.

  “I go to bed at ten,” said Mrs. Warnake. “Go to bed, watch Johnny, and Caroline and I go to sleep and mind our business.”

  “Caroline?”

  “My cat … dog.”

  “Deceptive name for a large dog,” said Lieberman.

  “It’s meant to be,” said Mrs. Warnake. “Was she murdered?”

  “Yes,” said Lieberman.

  “You said it was an accident. Murdering someone is not an accident.”

  “You’re safe,” said Lieberman. “We’ll have a policeman standing guard all night, but we’re pretty sure this was something personal and the killer is long gone.”

  “That’s reassuring,” said Mrs. Warnake. “I’m not staying in this building.”

  And with that she shut the door.

  The rest of Lieberman’s journey down the even numbers yielded the following information, which he shared at a quarter to one with Hanrahan in the building lobby. Five people were either not home or would not answer their doors. One man named Martin Franklin with a pinched face and receding hairline knew Estralda by sight though not by name and was sure she deserved whatever she got for dressing that way. His wife agreed. Mrs. Yavonovitch in 620 was somewhere in her late fifties, very lonely, and had a batch of cookies she wanted to share with Lieberman. Mrs. Yavonovitch did not remember seeing Estralda Valdez but Mrs. Yavonovitch was very grateful to Lieberman and the police force in general.

  Hanrahan’s information was a bit better. He checked his notes and passed his information on to Lieberman: an identical five unanswered doors, a man named Culp who did have a dog and said he wanted nothing to do with the police, a trio of women in their sixties who spoke a language Hanrahan knew was Scandinavian. None of the women acknowledged that she spoke English. The gem came from apartment 619.

  “Couple who live there came home from dinner and a show about nine-thirty,” Hanrahan said rubbing his chin. Hanrahan’s face was rapidly growing stubbly and he looked like Edward G. Robinson at the end of Little Caesar after he’s spent weeks in a flophouse, Lieberman thought, but there was a touch of excitement in his partner’s voice.

  “Couple both saw a scruff of a character in a long coat,” he said. “A wino they’ve seen in the neighborhood. Saw him on the stairwell when the husband and wife went to throw out the garbage. Wife says she called down to the doorman when they got back into their apartment. I checked with Clevenger and the doorman, Billy Tarton.”

  Hanrahan paused and looked at Lieberman. A good sign. Father Murphy was playing his audience.

  “And you wrapped up the case,” said Lieberman.

  “Not exactly, but I got a name. Jules the Walker. Hangs around the high-rises on the block, goes in when someone lets the door open, finds a place to curl up, usually a car parked in a garage. Guy’s been picked up dozens of times. Doorman sent a night maintenance man named Olson up to look. Couldn’t find our Jules.”

  “Let’s go back and write a report,” said Lieberman.

  “How about you going back and writing it, Abe?” said Hanrahan. “I’d like to spend a while looking for Jules. Leave it on my desk. I’ll sign it by morning and have it on Hughes’s desk before he gets there.”

  “You’re all right?” asked Lieberman.

  “No,” said Hanrahan. “You?”

  “We owe her one, Father Murphy,” he said.

  “We owe her one,” Hanrahan agreed.

  The two men walked to the door of the outer lobby of the Michigan Towers. A new doorman was on duty and Officer Clevenger was gone. The ambulance with Estralda’s body was probably standing in front of the coroner’s lab on Polk Street by now. They may have owed her one, but Estralda Valdez was beyond caring about vengeance. No, Lieberman thought as he moved toward his car and watched Hanrahan walk to the corner, we’ll do it for ourselves. We’ll do it and try to convince ourselves that when we find whoever did this everything will be even, the books will be balanced. We’ll try to convince ourselves.

  It was almost one-thirty and Lieberman had a report to write and a daughter to talk to if she was still up when he got home.

  Hanrahan moved around the corner and got into his car. He sat for about three minutes wondering which way to drive. He sat looking at the truck in front of him filled with green garbage bags and remembered that from the sixth floor it had looked like a beautiful blanket of silk.

  He reached into his shirt pocket and fished out the card for the Black Moon Restaurant. Her name, he thought. She gave me her name. What was …? Iris. Like Irish. Nice-looking woman, he thought. And then he remembered another nice-looking woman whose body was … He started the car and pulled into the street to start his search for Jules Van Beeber, Jules the Walker, who at that moment, hearing a car pull away, turned in his sleep and reached up to pull a vinyl bag of leaves over him like a blanket.

  4

  LIEBERMAN PULLED UP IN FRONT of his house just before three in the morning and parked in front of a fireplug, the only space left on the block. One of the advantages of being a cop. He had a garage in back but it was filled with junk, junk he planned to throw away, give to Goodwill, or move in the corner before winter came.

  He tiptoed up the three outside stairs, touched the mezuzah on the door, inserted his key, and turned it as quietly as he could. The report had taken him longer than he had anticipated. Covering himself and Hanrahan took everything short of a complete lie. There were a few places Hughes could nail them if he wanted to, but the report had been as good as he could make it. He had written it extra long, six pages, in the hope that Hughes would skim it instead of reading it carefully. It wasn’t much of a hope but it was a possibility and Lieberman didn’t want to miss any possibility.

  He closed the door gently. Barry and Melisa were sleeping in the living room. Melisa was in the hide-a-bed and Barry was in a red sleeping bag on the floor. It was Saturday. No summer school in the morning for Barry. No day camp for Melisa. Lisa, always the scientist, had picked the perfect day of the week to leave her husband.

  Lieberman took off his shoes, tucked them under his arm, and headed past the dining room toward the bedroom. He wouldn’t even brush his teeth and shave. He’d lay his clothes out in the dark and …

  “Dad?”

  Lisa was sitting in the kitchen at the table. She had whispered to him as he moved past. Lieberman stopped. The only light on in the kitchen was the night light on the oven. He stepped into the room, closed the door, turned on the light, and looked at his daughter.

  She was wearing a pink robe with a frilly collar. Her dark hair was
tied back. In front of her was a glass of milk and a plate with Oreo and chocolate chip cookies. She was dunking a chocolate chip the way she always did when she was a kid.

  Lieberman put his shoes down on the floor near the door, went to the refrigerator, pulled out his special carton of artificial dairy creamer, grabbed a glass, moved to the table across from his daughter, and reached for an Oreo.

  “Mom’s asleep,” she said.

  “I would hope so,” he answered around the soggy piece of cookie he had just dunked and put into his mouth.

  “You had a homicide?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “Want to talk about it?”

  “No,” he said. “Let’s talk about you.”

  And for the next hour they whispered about Lisa’s failed dreams, broken illusions, disappointments, memories, and fears for the future. Lieberman ate cookies, said practically nothing, nodded in appropriate places, and paid close attention. There were inconsistencies in her monologue. Lieberman had learned to pick up inconsistencies in people’s statements. There were protestations, sincere protestations that were a bit too sincere, a bit too emphatic. Lieberman had learned partly from instinct, mostly from experience, that it usually did no good to point out the flaws in a suspect’s statement unless you wanted to risk alienating her. There often came a point when alienation was the right step, but it would not come with his daughter, so he listened, made mental notes, attempted to remain awake, tried to keep the memory of Estralda in the zipper bag from haunting him, and found solace in the domestic tangle of his daughter’s life. He knew why. What had happened to Estralda Valdez was chaos. Murder was chaos. Family fights, even divorce, were part of the normal world. Lisa’s words became a pattern like the praises to God on Friday night.

  When she was sufficiently exhausted at 4:00 A.M., he said they would talk again later, not tomorrow. It was already tomorrow and had been for four hours. He kissed her forehead and let her clean up the glasses and remains of the cookies while he went to bed.

  Bess stirred when he took off his holster and gun, draped the holster over the nearby night light she had left on for him, and put the gun in the drawer near his bed. He locked the drawer with the key and then hung the key on the little hook at the head of the bed before getting undressed and putting on the pajamas she had laid out for him. He got into bed. The air conditioning was humming soothingly. It had recently been repaired, though the air conditioning man made no promises for next year.

  Lieberman turned off the night light and lay in bed. He squinted at the illuminated red numbers on the digital clock on the dresser. He had about three hours to sleep and was sure that sleep would not come. But it did.

  Lieberman had a dream. He didn’t remember it when his eyes opened automatically at seven in the morning as they always did. He didn’t remember it but he knew he had dreamed and that the dream had been a bad one.

  He got out of bed, kissed Bess, who stirred slightly, and went into the bathroom off their room where he showered and shaved, put on a clean shirt and tie, and settled for his blue slacks and favorite gray jacket. He looked at himself in the mirror and saw a very weary-looking man who should have been greeting mourners at Piser’s Funeral Chapel.

  Lisa was sleeping in her old room. The door was closed. Lieberman moved to the front door, shoes in hand. He put them on.

  “Grandpa,” came Barry’s voice.

  “How you doing, Pirate?” Lieberman whispered.

  “You don’t have to whisper,” Barry said. “Melisa’s only pretending to be asleep.”

  “I’m not,” Melisa said, her eyes closed tightly.

  “You going to work?” Barry said.

  “Annual physical and then to work,” said Lieberman, looking at the boy who was sitting up on the floor. Barry looked exactly like his father, which means he didn’t look in the least Jewish. His hair was corn yellow and straight. He was tall, taller than Lieberman, almost as tall as his father. He looked, Lieberman thought, like a young Spencer Tracy.

  “You know what happened?” Barry said. “Between Mom and Dad?”

  “Some,” said Lieberman.

  “They’re talking about a divorce,” Melisa said, her eyes still closed. Melisa looked exactly, heart-tuggingly like Lisa.

  “We’ll see,” said Lieberman.

  “We still going to the game Monday?” Barry asked.

  “Still going,” agreed Lieberman.

  “Am I going?” Melisa asked.

  “You don’t like baseball, come on,” Barry groaned.

  “I like baseball,” said Melisa. “Michael Jordan.”

  “He’s basketball, nitwit,” said Barry.

  “If your mother says you can come, you can come,” said Lieberman.

  Barry groaned again.

  “She’ll be asking to come home in the third inning,” sighed Barry.

  “I won’t,” said Melisa. “I promise. They have hot dogs.”

  “What are you working on, Grandpa?” Barry asked. He had had enough of his sister.

  “Murder,” said Lieberman.

  “Tell me about it later?” asked Barry.

  “Me too,” said Melisa, eyes still closed. “Can you bring us bagels and cream cheese from Uncle Maish’s when you come back?”

  “That’s Sunday food, stupid.” said Barry.

  “I’m not stupid,” said Melisa. “I’m going to sleep. Wake me when PeeWee’s on.”

  “I’ll see you later,” said Lieberman. “I’ll bring bagels and cream cheese.”

  The morning was sunny and already warm, promising a muggy Chicago August day.

  Lieberman checked his watch. No hurry. Instead of heading east on Peterson toward Uptown, he went south on California for twenty blocks to Foster, then turned west and–went to Kedzie. There he turned south, looking for 4851, where he hoped to find Francis Dupree at home. Dupree, the hackie who had picked up the woman who pretended to be Estralda Valdez, lived in Lieberman’s old neighborhood in Albany Park. Maish had owned his first deli, a ten-seater with two tables, a few blocks from here. Their father before them had owned a small tailor shop on Lawrence, also in the neighborhood. Temple Mir Shavot had originally been four blocks from where Lieberman now parked in front of an upholstery shop.

  The neighborhood was mostly East Indian now with a few really poor Russian Jews and a smattering of Haitians, Jamaicans, and even Cajuns like Dupree. The alderman in Albany Park was an independent named Lester Sax who had been reelected four times by substantial margins in a neighborhood with one of the lowest voter turnouts in the city. No administration had found it worthwhile to negotiate with Sax, who had no real power base, which was why Kedzie Avenue was one of the last streets swept in the summer and one of the last plowed in the winter. Forget about the side streets.

  Lieberman found 4851 wedged between a hot dog shop which smelled of yesterday’s onions and a used book store featuring books in foreign languages. Dupree’s name was marked in pencil on the mailboxes just inside the door. The five others who had apartments over the stores had written their names in everything from crude capitals in crayon to flowing Arabic script.

  Lieberman rang the bell. He thought he heard the distant sound of ringing. Nothing. He rang again and then heard a door open and someone pad out of an apartment and down the stairs. Lieberman walked to the inner door and looked through the dirty glass. A lean man in a gray and black robe and bare feet appeared on the steps and said, “What?”

  “Francis Dupree?”

  “So?”

  Lieberman showed his badge.

  “Come in,” said Dupree. “The damn door doesn’t lock.”

  Lieberman went in and followed Dupree back up the stairs. Dupree moved slowly, coughing once, and entered the open door of an apartment on the first floor. Lieberman followed him. Dupree closed the door behind them, bolted and chained it.

  “What you think?” asked Dupree, looking around his room.

  Lieberman looked at Dupree, figured him for about fifty,
maybe younger. Life had kicked him in the face with golf shoes. His skin was bad, his eyes were bleary, his hair a gray-yellow that suggested he had once dyed it but had long since given up the pretense. The room was reasonably neat, the furniture furnished-apartment unmatched, cheap, built so that if some tenant walked with it it could be replaced for a few bucks.

  There was a small television on a table, an unmade bed in the corner, and one surprising item, a neatly polished violin on a small chrome-legged table with a cracked white Formica top.

  “You play?” asked Lieberman.

  “Used to play with Louisiana Fonso’s Band,” said Dupree, running a hand through his hair and accomplishing nothing. “Never made no money, but had fun, you know? Then I got this.”

  He held up his left hand. The small finger and the one next to it were missing.

  “Can’t play good stuff no more,” said Dupree. “Jus’ play for myself. I’m talkin’ too much. You got questions. You wanna know about that fare las’ night, right? Dispatch called. He said somethin’ funny goin’ on. You wanna sit down? Drink a beer?”

  “No thanks. Woman was killed last night,” said Lieberman.

  “That got somethin’ to do with my fare?” asked Dupree, touching the fiddle and sitting down at one of his two kitchen tables. His knees were knobby and there were marks around his ankles. Lieberman had seen flea bites before.

  “Where did you pick up her bags?” asked Lieberman. “What floor?”

  “Don’t remember for sure,” he said, looking down at his feet and wiggling his toes. “Think it was sixth floor. She was out there with them before I got to the door. Told me she was in a hurry. I took her to the corner over on Broadway and Lawrence. She gave me fare, a tip, never another word.”

  “She have an accent?” Lieberman asked.

  “No, she talked … you know. Like you maybe,” he said. “Sometimes I think I’m getting the arthritis of the toes from cabbing, you know? Step on the pedals, feet sweating.”

  “I don’t think you get arthritis from sweating,” Lieberman said. “But you may be right. I’ve got it in the knees from walking.”

  “That a true fact?” asked Dupree, looking up as if he were receiving confirmation from a specialist.