by Thomas Laird
‘This is all very embarrassing. I don’t know why I’m involved in this ... investigation,’ she sputtered.
I identified Doc and myself, we showed her our credentials, and then I got down to it as Doc carried on checking out the tomes in leather.
‘You know Jimmy Preggio.’
‘Yes. Or you wouldn’t be here. Right?’
‘Look, Caroline. We’re not here to flame up on you. We’re interested in Preggio ... You were at his place several times in the last few weeks?’
She was right on the money with her size, complexion, hair color. It was a mousy brown, my wife Erin would have called it. She was not outstanding in the face, but she was attractive, like the other two. And there was a very up-front sexuality about her, as there was with Jacoby and Ripley.
‘You’re having a relationship with Mr Preggio. A sexual one, I mean,’ Doc said, his face still aimed at the stacks.
Caroline eyeballed the doors behind her, just to make sure she had closed them.
‘That’s none of your business,’ she snapped at my partner.
‘Yeah, it is. When it’s involved in a homicide case it is. So?’
‘My father has a number of very fine attorneys —’
‘I’m sure he does, sweety. Just answer what I asked,’ Doc said, his back still toward her.
‘You are very rude, sir,’
‘You oughta see how downright snotty I can become in the Loop ... How will you explain all that interviewing in the homicide department to your dear old Pa-pa?’
She appeared furious at my partner, so she turned to me.
‘Don’t look to me for any help,’ I said as I put my palms up at her. ‘You just answer what he’s asking and we’ll be out of here before tea.’
‘Look, I have a relationship with Jimmy, yes.’
‘Is that why he brings in outside help? To encourage your ... relationship?’ I asked.
‘I didn’t know that it was against the law.’
‘It isn’t. I don’t think. Unless the redhead was a pro. And I think she was. That’s where it might get messy, Caroline. If money actually changed hands. Oh, don’t get me wrong. We’re not Vice. But I’ve got a lot of friends in that department.’
I stared at her, and then I saw her visibly weaken.
‘What we do behind closed doors is none of your business.’
‘That’s right. But I’m going to turn every screw I can to get you to pay attention to me, Caroline. This guy Preggio is a loser with a record that includes sexual molestation. He’s very dangerous and he might have killed the two women I told you about over the phone. So why not just answer our questions, and then we’ll leave you to your privacy?’
Slowly, she nodded her head. And then the three of us sat down amidst that wealth of literature, and I began the interview.
*
‘I like the way she played innocence. She was first-rate, Jimmy. You can bet the bitch is a user, just like our Ms Ripley. And Ellen Jacoby, for that matter. All three are lying down with canines, and they’re all likely bearing those little mites caught from just such an occasion.’
‘Fleas, you mean.’
‘Yessir. Precisely ... You like her, Jimmy?’
‘She fits the physical description the best of the three ... But I got my doubts after listening to you and to Dr Gray.’
‘Don’t second-guess yourself.’ He looked out the passenger’s side as a cold Lakeshore Drive flew past us. ‘Like you said, Jimmy P. We have to eliminate these three assholes and their girlfriends, and when we do we’ll keep going right on down that list.’
He looked over at me, and I knew he was thinking what I was thinking: We didn’t have time to track down a list of forty. The Farmer was going to start hacking and whacking again, once he got himself set up on the Internet for business. We couldn’t rely on Matty McGinn to catch him in cyberspace because we wouldn’t get any more clues from my cousin Billy: I was not going to get that half-wit member of my family killed by his own people.
The machine narrowed my list to three, and they still seemed likely. Each one of them.
Of the women, Ellen Jacoby was the nastiest. She had killer eyes. But we might have seen Janice Ripley on downers. Maybe she sprouted fangs when she took amphetamines. There was no telling unless you were there. And the recent graduate of Wellington College — Caroline Keady. Was she the corrupt rich, slumming with a piece of shit like Jimmy Preggio because she actually knew how deadly he might be? Did that float her fucking boat?
I was getting headaches from trying to sort all these men and women out. What I had to do was simplify. I had to pick a pair, and then go for their throats. This was the selection process that Doc and I talked about. You always had the terror of hopping on the wrong trolley. It was like a confidence game. The dealer had three cards. The Queen of Spades was one of the three. His hands shuffled them so deftly, so quickly, that often you were fooled about where that dark lady was hiding.
And sometimes the dealer cheated. Sometimes he palmed the Queen. Sometimes the game was a fix.
‘Three little sweethearts. And one of them is giving it up for free to our guy. The more I think about it, the more I like your selections, Jimmy.’
He had just grabbed hold of me before I fell off this cliff on whose edge I had been standing. He had reached out and snatched me before vertigo took over. I didn’t feel quite so dizzy now.
‘But of the three pairs, it’s anybody’s guess. I mean really, I don’t have a favorite, and that is no shit, Jimmy P.’
The Lake water was grey-blue. Winter was closing in on the city, and the Farmer’s Almanac was predicting a bull bitch of a season for us this year. We’d had it easy, the last few years.
‘We put twenty-four hour surveillance on the women. We let the males think we’ve loosened the knot. We watch the girls, and one of them leads us right where we want to go,’ I told him.
‘Let’s hope he’s not all copacetic with the Internet, Jimmy. Let’s hope he’s not quite ready to go back out into the field yet.’
‘He felt the heat on his neck when the girl almost got picked, at the Zoo. He’ll lie doggo until he thinks the heat’s turned down to low. He’ll try to outwait us. This guy needs to do what he does, but he’ll wait until he thinks he can get away with it a little more easily.’
I felt my confidence soar. All that backsliding with Dr Gray had disappeared. My gut and my head were telling me we were headed in the right direction.
Three women, three criminals.
It came to me as I saw the Sears Tower ahead of us:
What if one of the females had a record? What if one of the girls had a jacket for us to read up on, downtown?
Chapter Sixteen
He was a mass of tubes. Somebody had shot him as he walked out of the lube place where he worked. I found out about it during the second half of my midnight shift.
Doc came down to St Luke’s with me. Jack was left on the phones downtown until we could find out what the hell had happened to Billy Ciccio.
He was in serious but stable condition, we learned as we arrived at his room. The doctor was on his way out. Seemed that Billy took two .22 caliber hits, one to his left shoulder and the other to his lower back.
‘They woulda put it in the back of my head, Jimmy, if I hadn’t heard them come up from behind me out in the alley. Then I started to run and they tried to pop me anyways.’
He looked pale, but not as bad as I thought he’d look with two rounds in his back.
‘This is about your thing, Jimmy. I know it is. Somebody thought I’d put the finger on them around here, and they were takin’ me out. I know it.’
‘Just take it easy. We’ll take care of it, Billy.’
Doc stood by the door. He was never a big fan of my cousin, but I could see some concern on my partner’s face.
‘You’ll take care of it? This is one of our things, now. How’re you gonna take care of things?’
‘I’ll find out who it was. I�
��ll take him.’
‘You ain’t gonna clip any of these bastards. I oughta know. I’m one of them!’
‘Take it easy, Billy ... The guy who came up from behind you. You never caught a glance at him?’
‘Hell, no. I went down and played dead. And I’m fuckin’ lucky he didn’t waste a coupla more rounds makin’ sure I was out. But I heard him hurry past me. I saw the backs of his shoes, and that was that.’
‘It’s because you talked to me, wasn’t it?’
His tired face aimed itself at me.
‘I can’t think of nothin’ else that’d get two .22s in my back end.’
‘So I’m going to tell you how we save your ass,’ I told him.
‘Yeah? I’d like to hear that.’
‘Listen, Billy. You want to keep on breathing, the only way to do it is to help me find this guy who’s been using the knife. He was the guy with the gun, and if it wasn’t him personally, then he’s got somebody inside who’s working with him. You want to keep living, you better get more aggressive about finding out just who the hell he is.’
‘You got me into this, cousin.’
‘Saying sorry’s not going to help you out, Cheech. This time you’ll have to help me and yourself. I never wanted you in harm’s way. You know that.’
‘So I’m your guy on the inside ... And what else do you want me to find out?’
‘I’m Homicide, Billy. I’m only interested in one case. I told you. I’ll let the Feds put you and your crew away. You want to steal, you deal with them. But I told you the truth. I never wanted to see you get hurt. And now the only way to make things right is to help me.’
He was far more tired now than he’d been when Doc and I got there. I had to let him rest.
‘Will you do it, Billy?’
He looked at me and I saw that he was watering up as if he was going to cry.
‘Like I got a fuckin’ choice?’
‘I don’t think the cutter’s a member of your crew. He’s not Sicilian, I don’t think. He’d be an associate, or he’d be tight with a crew member, but he’s not a blood brother ... You have to try and remember who you pumped to get me the stuff about Imperial Products of Bridgeport. The guy you talked to and the guys he talked to. You know how to follow a rat trail by now.’
‘Yeah. I do. I just hope I get up that fuckin’ trail a ways before somebody gets a better shot at my fuckin’ noggin.’
‘I’m sorry about all this, Billy. But this guy’s been killing other people. Two women and a doorman, so far. We’ll keep an eye on you until you get out of here. You call me if you need anything. I’ll keep coming in until you leave. Then I won’t do any more face-to-faces with you. You won’t need a cop up next to you when you go back to the crew. Right?’
I reached out and grasped his right hand. If things had been different, I might’ve wound up where he was. In the Outfit, I mean. I’d had my opportunities when I was as young as he was, when he joined up. A lot of the guys he hung with I went to high school with. Some of my old classmates were dead or behind the wire now, too.
I walked over to Doc at the door.
‘You cops are always fuckin’ with people,’ Billy lamented.
I looked over at him and smiled, and I was wondering if he’d get back to where he started. Whoever popped him wouldn’t be satisfied with scaring the guy. He wanted my cousin dead.
*
The search for information on the three women led us to a file on Caroline Keady, the rich girl from Lake Forest. She’d been arrested twice for possession of marijuana. Both charges were dropped at the insistence of her very prominent attorneys, I was sure.
The other thing was a weapons charge against Janice Ripley. She was caught with a .32, trying to board a plane to San Francisco. She was hauled in and then later placed on probation.
We found nothing on Ellen Jacoby. Not even a traffic beef. Which confused me. None of these three were choir-girls. I’d expected to find a little something on each of them. So we’d come up somewhat empty.
Which was the smarts of The Farmer showing. He wouldn’t want someone with a sheet being his partner. Paper trails were how you got caught. Statements, documents, IRS return forms. Paper nailed your heinie. So he picked something close to a virgin, as far as the state was concerned.
I was looking at Ellen Jacoby. I knew her face. It was still bothering me. But the memory wouldn’t come to me. Her face was maddeningly familiar.
Suddenly I made a tiny connection with her. It had to do with Billy Ciccio. Maybe with his cousin, Danny Ciccio. But that was as far as I could take it. Then it all crumbled in front of me. If I wanted Danny Cheech’s help, I’d have to go to Joliet and have a talk with my second cousin, but I didn’t have the time right now. Maybe Billy would recognize her from the photos we had of the three women. I made a mental note to ask him when he was feeling stronger.
The women were only a little bit tarnished, and Ellen Jacoby was the cleanest of the three. That was why I liked her. She was a front, not substance. Something had to be underneath her exterior. Something past that ‘come fuck me’ look that she liked to throw toward any male in her vicinity.
One of these females was hooked to The Farmer. I knew it in my blood. It had gone beyond the gut and into my veins, and if I could remember where it was that I’d first seen Ellen Jacoby, maybe I’d be able to find the Queen of Spades that was hidden beneath one of those three facedown cards.
Chapter Seventeen
All it takes is the word that we’re up and running, and I’m back in business again. She tells me we’re aboard the Internet and I’ve set up shop within hours.
College campuses can be crowded, but laboratories and libraries are not the most popular places to be after, say, 9.00 p.m. This college campus is only three miles from our farmhouse, so it is very convenient for me. Ten minutes and I’m there. Fifteen minutes to operate, and I’m on my way home, product stowed.
The geology lab seems to be the most unpopular classroom on campus of this university. There are only two students and one faculty member still here — apart from me. I’ve secured a gray work-shirt with ‘Ralph’ sewn above the left breast pocket. I spent last night checking out the maintenance crew, and the school has no particular precautions when it comes to security. Their staff are not ID’d. At least, not with laminated cards attached to their shirts and blouses.
So I walk in with a broom and I avoid the real maintenance man — Carl — who’s still working on the labs in the biology wing.
Finally the two female students depart, and I’m left with the associate professor who’s come down here to grade papers. It’s quieter here than in the library. I’ve been to the library previously, too.
She looks up at me and smiles, and I return the expression. She’s very young for my tastes. Perhaps in her late twenties.
She’s probably just received her PhD and she’s still a go-getter who grades her own work without the aid of a Teaching Assistant. I feel something like regret that she’s the one who’s here with me, but the feeling quickly fades since this is a business matter. And she’s close enough to the right age. The memories come back, and what struck me as a passing sympathy has vanished. I can see her the way I saw the other two. I can impose that portrait on her face, just as I did with Delores Winston and Genevieve Malone. This geology professor or instructor fits the bill.
I go out into the hall and I walk toward the biology wing, here in the science building. The place is now deserted. It’s a Friday night, so all the undergraduates are at the bars or at some dormitory party. Or they’re rutting with a mate in their little garrets somewhere. But they have left these premises. I find the maintenance man sitting at the teacher’s desk in one of the classrooms in the next wing. I can hear him snoring from the hallway. I pop my head into the classroom, and I see that he is indeed asleep, his forehead resting on the desk top.
I walk back to the geology room. I’ve left my bag out in the hallway. I reach down and take it up as I p
rop the broom handle against the brick wall.
When I walk in, I see the blonde teacher has left the room. I begin to panic. How could she have left this abruptly? Then I see all of her paperwork has been gathered and removed as well.
I find my jacket in the bag, and I put it on. It’s blustery and cold tonight.
She cannot have gotten far if she’s outside. But if I pursue her, there are all the variables of catching her and working on her outdoors. I’ve got no choice. I’ve come this far. I’ve got orders to fill and miles to go before I sleep.
I trot down the hallway and then I bolt out the exit. I stop and look. I don’t see her at first.
She’s about five feet six, about 125 pounds. Nice tits, even though she tries to hide them under an oversized white blouse. I never saw the bottom half of her, but I can imagine she’s got the kind of body I could enjoy, if I had the time to enjoy it.
I walk out into the darkness of the campus. It’s then that I make her out. It’s beginning to drizzle, so there is no one else out here. If it becomes any colder, this drizzle might turn to ice. It feels frosty enough.
She’s walking toward the school’s lagoon, her briefcase full of papers crammed up under her right arm. When I close in on her, I can see that her rear end is just as juicy as the front torso. Why would a woman as ripe as this have made a life in the study of rocks?
I close the block between her and me very quickly. There are no lovers down by the university lagoon because of the elements. And because it is Friday night, bar night on this campus, there are no lonely strollers to interrupt me.
The distance is down to a quarter of a block when she drops the briefcase.
‘Can I help you?’ I ask her. She’s still bent over, trying to pick up the mess she’s made.
When she stands straight, she shoves her eyeglasses back up onto her nose. Her gesture inflames me. Then I see that she’s startled by my presence.
Before she says a word, I have the T-shirt over her mouth and I’m forcing her back into the shrubbery that surrounds the tiny body of water they call a lagoon.
