‘Because, by that time, my father will already have rung Plunkitt up himself, and told the senator what to say.’
‘And that’s all it will take?’ Blackstone asked, amazed.
‘That’s all it will take,’ Meade confirmed. ‘You see, guys like Plunkitt treat favours owed to them in the same way misers treat gold coins. Their greatest pleasure in life is to build up a big old chest full of them.’
‘So Plunkitt will do it because your father asks him to, and then your father will owe Plunkitt?’
‘Sure.’
‘And doesn’t putting him in debt to the senator bother you at all?’
‘Hell, no!’ Meade said. ‘It’s highly unlikely that Plunkitt will ever call the favour in.’
‘You think so?’
‘I do. See, the miser doesn’t want to spend his gold — he just wants to have it. And sometimes, late at night, he’ll open the chest and let all his gold coins trickle through his fingers. I think Plunkitt’s like that, too — he likes to let all the favours that he’s owed trickle through his fingers, then he just sits back and thinks about how rich he is.’
‘You’re forgetting one thing,’ Blackstone said.
‘And what’s that?’
‘It’s still just possible he was involved in whatever O’Brien was investigating. And if he was involved in it, then the last thing he’ll want to do is anything that may help us catch the inspector’s killer.’
‘Men like him are so arrogant they don’t think anything can touch them, even if they’re as guilty as sin,’ Meade said. ‘And after I allowed him to run rings round me this morning. .’
‘What?’
Meade grinned sheepishly. ‘OK, after he ran rings round me, whether I wanted him to or not, he’s got us marked down as two guys who couldn’t find their own assholes — even if he gave them a detailed map. But we’re gonna prove him wrong on that, ain’t we?’
‘I certainly hope so,’ Blackstone said.
‘So shall we go downstairs and see what our bait’s hauled in for us?’ Meade suggested.
‘Why not?’ Blackstone agreed.
The people whom Meade hoped would make Inspector O’Brien’s files unnecessary had been herded into the three cells closest to the door.
They were a mixed bunch, Blackstone noted — men and women, young and old. Some of them were dressed more or less respectably, though a fair number wore clothes which would have been pushed to pass themselves off as rags. But there was one thing that united them all — the look of expectant greed which shone in their eyes when they saw Meade arrive.
A young patrolman stood guard over this motley crew.
‘Exactly how many of these people are there, Officer Turcotte?’ Alex Meade asked.
The patrolman shrugged. ‘Don’t know for sure,’ he admitted. ‘I kept countin’ till I reached thirty, then I kinda lost interest.’
Blackstone did his own headcount, and estimated there were around fifty of the ‘informers’.
And how many of these informers would be a complete waste of time? he asked himself.
Around fifty would be as good a guess as any, he decided.
‘I’ll be interviewing them in Inspector O’Brien’s office,’ Meade told the patrolman. ‘I want to see them one at a time, and I’ll leave it up to you to choose what order I see them in. Is that all right with you?’
‘Sure,’ Turcotte agreed.
But it was clearly not all right with some of the current residents of the cells, who had overheard the conversation.
‘Why should he choose?’ demanded an old woman who was wearing a thick shawl, despite the heat.
‘Yeah, it should be first come, first served,’ said a younger woman in a floral hat. ‘An’ I was here first.’
‘The hell you were,’ called out a voice from behind her. ‘I was here first. Ask the cop.’
‘I got another important appointment to go to,’ said a man who, from the downtrodden look of him, had never had an appointment — important or otherwise — in his entire life.
Meade waited until the noise had died down. ‘Anyone who doesn’t like the arrangement I’ve suggested is perfectly free to leave now,’ he said, gesturing towards the stairs with his hand.
But none of the people in the cells took him up on the offer. They all had the scent of money in their nostrils, and they were determined not to leave without at least getting a chance to take a bite at it.
‘It feels strange,’ Meade said uncomfortably.
‘What does?’
‘To be sitting here in Patrick O’Brien’s office, behind Patrick O’Brien’s desk.’
‘Somebody always has to step into dead men’s shoes eventually,’ Blackstone pointed out.
‘I know they do,’ Meade agreed, still sounding ill at ease. ‘But that person, whoever he is, should be worthy of filling those shoes — and I don’t feel worthy of filling Patrick’s.’
‘You’ll fill them well enough, given time,’ Blackstone assured him. ‘And even if you don’t, it won’t be through lack of trying.’
‘Sometimes, you know, you’re almost like a father to me, Sam,’ Meade said emotionally.
‘Then maybe I’ll take you out on a Tammany Hall picnic,’ Blackstone countered.
Meade grinned. ‘Yeah, I was getting kinda maudlin just then, wasn’t I?’
‘Yeah, you kinda were,’ Blackstone agreed, smiling as he imitated the young detective sergeant.
Meade squared his shoulders and turned his attention to the stack of plain white paper which was on the desk in front of him. He peeled off the top sheet and wrote ‘1’ on it in pencil.
‘Send in the first of the informants,’ he called out to Officer Turcotte, who was waiting in the corridor.
Turcotte shepherded the potential informant into the room. It was a man somewhere in his late thirties. He was unshaven, had bad teeth, and emitted an essence of eau de vie de sewer, even from a distance.
‘Name?’ Meade said.
‘Dickie Thomas.’
Meade wrote it down.
‘Occupation?’
‘Well. . you know, Sergeant.’
‘No, as a matter of fact, I don’t,’ Meade replied sharply.
‘I do a bit o’ this, an’ I do a bit o’ that.’
‘Address?’
‘I’m kinda between addresses at the moment.’
‘No fixed abode,’ Meade wrote down. ‘So what have you got to tell me, Mr Thomas?’
‘I seen him.’
‘Inspector O’Brien?’
‘That’s right.’
‘Where?’
‘O’Malley’s Saloon.’
‘When?’
‘Tuesday night.’
‘Give me all the details.’
‘O’Malley was standin’ behind the counter, and this cop walks up to him, bold as brass, and asks for his bribe money. Well, O’Malley says business is bad, an’ he can’t afford to pay this week, and this inspector says in that case he’ll be closing the place down.’ Thomas paused for a second. ‘I just had a thought,’ he continued unconvincingly.
‘Well, that must be a novelty,’ Meade said.
‘You what?’
‘Tell me about this thought you’ve just had.’
‘Ain’t it obvious?’
‘Not to me.’
‘It was O’Malley what killed him.’
‘And why should he have done that?’
‘To stop him from closin’ the place down, o’ course.’ Thomas held out a dirty hand, palm up. ‘Can I have my money now?’
‘I don’t think the inspector was ever in O’Malley’s Saloon,’ Meade said. ‘I think you made all that up.’
‘I didn’t,’ Thomas told him. ‘I swear I didn’t.’
‘And the reason I think you made it all up was because I know for a fact that, when Inspector O’Brien went out collecting bribes, he always wore his lucky green hat.’
‘What?’
‘He always wore his lucky gr
een hat when he was collecting his bribes. And you never mentioned that.’
‘Didn’t I?’ Thomas asked. ‘I thought I did.’
‘No.’
‘Then I must just have forgotten to.’
‘So he was wearing the hat?’
‘Yes, he was. He definitely was.’
‘With the pink feather in the hatband?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘And with the small wooden duck, sewn on to the crown?’
‘I. . er. . don’t think I saw that,’ Thomas said uncertainly. ‘Maybe it had fallen off before he went into the saloon.’
Meade screwed up the sheet of paper, and threw it into the bin.
‘Officer Turcotte, please show this man out, and then bring me the next one,’ he said.
‘O’ course, the little wooden duck!’ Thomas said wildly. ‘Painted yellow, wasn’t it? I didn’t notice it at first, because the lightin’ in O’Malley’s Saloon is very poor. .’
‘No, it isn’t.’
‘An’ besides, my eyesight ain’t what it was.’
But despite his protest, Thomas knew as well as Meade did that the game was up, and when the officer grabbed hold of his arm and hauled him to his feet, he did not resist.
Meade did not seem in the least discouraged by the way that the interview had gone.
‘When you’re panning for gold, you have to sift a lot of silt before you get to the nugget,’ he said.
‘True,’ Blackstone agreed.
But he was thinking that sometimes there wasn’t even a nugget there for you to find.
FOURTEEN
Meade wrote ‘27’ at the top of the clean white sheet of paper and then looked up at the girl.
She was perhaps nineteen or twenty, but she was wearing as much powder and rouge as a woman with sixty years of ravages to hide. Her dress was of good quality material, and had been cut not-so-much to show off her figure to its best advantage as to put her merchandise on display. She could, perhaps, have been called a lady, but only if the words ‘of the night’ were added as a qualification.
‘Name?’ Meade said.
‘Trixie,’ the girl supplied.
‘Full name?’
‘I’d rather not say.’
‘Occupation?’
‘Entertainer.’
‘Address?’
The girl hesitated. ‘I’ll give my address, and I’ll give you all the information you want, but you have to keep my name out of it, because if Mad. . if my employer ever finds out I’ve been talking to you, I’ll be out on the street before I’ve had time to turn round.’
‘We’ll keep your name out of it,’ Meade promised.
The girl gave him the address.
‘And that’s a brothel, is it?’ Meade asked.
‘No, of course not!’
‘Then what is it?’
‘Well, I suppose you’d call it an exclusive club for discriminating gentlemen,’ Trixie said primly.
‘If you can’t be honest with me, then I’m not interested in talking to you,’ Meade said impatiently. ‘Is it a brothel or isn’t it?’
‘It’s sort of a brothel,’ Trixie said reluctantly.
‘So where exactly did you see Inspector O’Brien on Tuesday?’ the sergeant asked.
‘In the club,’ Trixie said. Then, when Meade glared at her, she looked down at the floor and murmured, ‘In the brothel.’
‘When?’
‘Around half past five on Tuesday afternoon.’
‘Describe him to me,’ Meade said.
Trixie shrugged. ‘What can I say? He looked exactly like the man in the picture.’
Meade shook his head. ‘That’s not good enough. You have to convince me that you really saw him.’
‘He was wearing a brown suit and a straw boater, but he took the boater off once he came through the door, which not every gentleman who visits us does.’ Trixie giggled. ‘Sometimes they even keep their hats on when they’ve taken everything else off.’
Meade laid down his pencil, and scrunched up the piece of paper he’d been writing on.
‘Thank you for your time,’ he said.
‘Don’t you want me to tell you what this inspector did?’
Meade shook his head again. ‘There’s no point in hearing any more, unless you convince me that it really was Inspector O’Brien you saw. And I really don’t think you can do that.’
‘But I still get the reward, don’t I?’ Trixie said anxiously.
‘I’m afraid not,’ Meade said. ‘Officer Turcotte will show you out.’
‘Hold your horses,’ Trixie told him, starting to sound desperate. She closed her eyes for a second, and when she opened them again, she said, ‘I remember now — he was wearing a ring on his index finger.’
‘How did you happen to notice that?’
‘It was jewellery, wasn’t it?’
‘So?’
‘So I always notice jewellery.’
‘Describe the ring to me.’
‘The band was gold. .’
‘Yes?’
‘It had a red stone in it. I think that the stone might well have been a ruby.’
‘Go on,’ Meade said, both encouraged and encouraging.
‘And it had something carved into it.’
‘What kind of something?’
‘Some kind of animal.’
‘What kind of animal?’ Meade asked sceptically. ‘An elephant? An elk? A duck-billed platypus?’
Trixie giggled. ‘I don’t even know what a duck-billed thingy looks like,’ she said. ‘But it wasn’t an elephant or an elk. It was some kind of big cat. I think it might have been a lion.’
Meade reached for a fresh sheet of paper, rapidly scribbled a few words on it, then slid it across to Blackstone.
Mary gave him that ring, Blackstone read. She said he had the heart of a lion.
Trixie had watched the whole thing, and now a smile came to her face. ‘I got it right, didn’t I?’ she asked. ‘It was him!’
‘Yes, it was,’ Meade agreed. ‘I want you to tell me exactly what happened, Trixie. Start at the beginning, and don’t leave anything out.’
‘Well, half past five is a very quiet time at the club,’ Trixie said. ‘You see, we get the gentlemen who like to visit us during their lunch hour, and we get the gentlemen who always come in the evening — either before or after dinner — but at that time of the afternoon. .’
‘I get the point,’ Meade said.
‘So since there’s not much business to be had, most of the girls are off-duty then. So there were only two of us there when Imre showed this particular gentleman into the parlour.’
‘Who’s Imre?’ Blackstone asked.
‘The doorman. Not that he’ll ever admit that’s what he is. He says that he’s Madam’s business manager, but you can take that with a pinch of salt, because he also says he’s a Hungerarian count.’
‘Do you mean Hungarian?’ Blackstone asked.
‘That’s right,’ Trixie agreed, as if, Hungarian or Hungerarian, it was all the same to her. ‘Anyway, Imre led the gentleman into the parlour. And do you know what he says then?’
‘No.’
‘He says to the inspector, “I’m sorry there’s not much choice, sir.” What a pig! As if me and Lucy weren’t enough choice for anybody!’
‘What did Inspector O’Brien say?’
‘He says that he’s not there to. . to. .’
‘To avail himself of the services that the house offered?’
‘That’s right, he’s not there for that, he’s just come to see Madam. Well, Imre tells him that Madam only ever sees very special clients who she’s known for a long time.’
‘What happened then?’
‘O’Brien keeps on saying it’s very important he sees her. And Imre keeps on saying he can’t and that if he wants to take one of us upstairs, he’s very welcome, but if he doesn’t, he has to leave. And let me tell you, when Imre orders somebody to leave, that’s just what th
ey do, because he’s six feet four and built like a brick shithouse.’
‘So Inspector O’Brien left, did he?’ Meade asked, his disappointment very obvious.
‘No, he didn’t. That’s when he reaches into his pocket and pulls out his detective shield. I don’t think he wanted to show it at all, you know — I think he’d just decided that if he didn’t, Imre would give him the five-second bounce and he’d end up lying in the street.’
‘What did Imre say when he saw the shield?’
‘He shrugs his shoulders, to show it doesn’t impress him. Well, he is a count, after all — though I can think of another word which sounds rather like “count” but would describe him much better, if you know what I mean.’
‘I know what you mean,’ Meade said.
And Blackstone was amused to note that the young sergeant had reddened slightly.
‘Anyway, Imre says it makes no difference whether O’Brien is a cop or not, because we pay our protection money directly to the local precinct captain. And that’s when this inspector suddenly loses his temper — but not for the reasons you might think.’
‘No?’
‘No. He isn’t exactly angry. He’s — what’s the word? — he’s outraged. He says it’s a disgrace that any policeman should take bribes from a whorehouse. But I don’t see what’s wrong with it myself. It’s the way it’s always been done.’
‘You see what a state we’re in?’ Meade asked Blackstone in a low whisper. ‘We’ve reached such a level of corruption that it doesn’t even seem like corruption any more.’
‘What was that?’ Trixie asked.
‘Nothing. Carry on with your story.’
‘Well, Imre starts to look worried, and he takes a step or two backwards, because now, if it comes to a fight, the inspector’s so full of rage that you can see Imre thinks he might just win.’
‘Did it come to a fight?’
‘No, the inspector forces himself to calm down — you could see him do it — and when he is calm, he becomes all crisp and official. He says there are two choices. Either Imre takes him to see Madam or else he’ll be arrested on the spot for keeping a disorderly house.’
‘And what did Imre do?’
‘What would you have done? He asks the inspector to wait there while he goes and sees if Madam is available. And the three of us — me, Lucy and the cop — are left alone in the parlour.’ The girl giggled again. ‘It was too funny for words.’
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