Bodies in Winter hc-1

by Robert Knightly

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Removing and folding our coats was as much a signal as reading Ellen her rights. We were in control. We would proceed at a pace that we alone determined. The interrogation would be over when we said it was. This may seem absurd in light of our professed willingness to vacate the premises on demand, but I was almost certain that Ellen Lodge intended to stay the course, no matter how painful.

  Adele began with the same general questions I’d asked on the days following Lodge’s murder. The responses she drew echoed the party line. Ellen had offered her husband a pillow on which to lay his head, not because she loved, or even liked him, but out of the goodness of her heart. On the day of his release, she’d been too busy to talk when he showed up late in the afternoon and their dinner conversation had amounted to nothing more than chit-chat. On the next morning, she’d awakened him to answer the phone, after which he’d quit the house.

  Adele’s fingers drummed on the arm of the couch as she absorbed this recitation, occasionally shaking her head in disbelief. Ellen continued on, doggedly. From time to time, as she considered her answers, she focused on the turning spools of the little tape recorder as though to draw strength.

  ‘OK,’ Adele said when Ellen finally grew silent, ‘now that we’ve got the bullshit over with, let’s talk about the letters. Tell us what you did with them.’

  ‘I threw them out, because-’

  ‘I don’t need a reason. Tell me what was in them. Tell me what your husband had to say.’

  ‘He wrote me that Clarence Spott’s people were out for revenge. He wrote me that he was scared.’

  ‘Did he mention Spott by name?’

  That brought a moment of hesitation. What had she said at that first interview? But then she recalled her lines. ‘I don’t remember exactly. I think he did. I can’t be sure.’

  ‘My partner went up to Attica, Mrs Lodge. He was there for maybe three whole hours. In that time, he met a corrections officer, a deputy warden and a prison psychiatrist who say that your husband left Attica believing he was innocent, that the only revenge he was concerned about was the revenge he expected to wreak on the people who framed him. Explain how your version and their versions can be so different.’

  ‘What about Pete Jarazelsky? He’ll tell you Davy was afraid for his life.’

  ‘Oh, right, Jarazelsky. As it turns out, what you told us — that Pete and your husband were good buddies — was an outright lie. Not only didn’t they watch each other’s backs, we have reason to believe that Davy beat Jarazelsky to a pulp.’

  Adele was perched on the edge of the couch now, within six feet of Ellen Lodge who was pushed as far back in her chair as she could get. I didn’t blame Ellen. Between the look in Adele’s eye, her various wounds and the body armor, she seemed truly ferocious, even in profile.

  ‘Explain it,’ Adele again demanded. ‘Explain how these versions can be so utterly different.’

  ‘I can’t.’ Ellen’s eyes dropped to the tape recorder.

  ‘So, then it’s just a question of who I should believe: three disinterested professionals or a woman whose finances are tied up with Tony Szarek’s, Justin Whitlock’s and Dante Russo’s? Put yourself in my position, Ellen. Who would you believe, if you were me?’

  Though it was clear that Ellen Lodge didn’t want to answer the question, Adele forced a response by repeating herself twice more. ‘If you were me, who would you believe?’

  Finally, Ellen said, ‘You can believe who you want, but I’m telling the truth.’ This time her eyes never left the tape recorder. This was what she had to say, no more, no less. But the effort seemed to cost her as she began to pick at a loose thread in the arm of the couch.

  Adele was silent for a moment. Then she turned to me and asked me to retrieve a notebook in her coat pocket. When I complied, she flicked through several pages before asking a series of specific questions, each beginning with the phrase, ‘Did your husband ever mention…’

  His plans for the future. His job prospects. Friends he wanted to look up. Friends who could help him find a job. Dante Russo. Tony Szarek. Justin Whitlock.

  Ellen’s responses were evasive throughout, every statement included a qualifier. ‘I don’t remember, exactly, but… I’m not a hundred per cent sure, but…’ They continued to be evasive when Adele shifted to Ellen’s prison visit, asking the same questions she’d asked about his letters, snapping them out, one after another, her contempt even more obvious because she refused to challenge Ellen’s lies. Of course, David Lodge had discussed his future plans as the date of his release approached. The future is all convicts have. But Adele’s questions weren’t designed to elicit relevant information. Stamina is one of the big advantages cops have in the wars euphemistically called interrogations. Not only do we know how to pace ourselves, our suspects’ fatigue invigorates us. And Ellen Lodge was visibly wilting, the effort required to maintain the lies taking its toll.

  ‘Alright,’ Adele said, ‘let’s move on to a subject we haven’t discussed before. Your phone conversations with your husband. How many times did you speak to your husband in the three months prior to his release?’

  This was another of those weapons we’d been saving. State prisoners are allowed to make collect calls, a privilege that can be withdrawn for misbehavior. Ellen’s phone records indicated that she’d received sixteen collect calls from Attica in the three months before Davy got out. As this was fourteen more than she’d received in the prior six and a half years, it had naturally caught Adele’s attention.

  Once again, Ellen began with a series of qualifiers, but this time Adele stopped her in her tracks. ‘Sixteen times,’ she said, ‘between October fourteenth and January fourteenth. Does that refresh your memory?’

  Ellen shrugged. ‘I didn’t keep track.’

  ‘Sixteen times in three months. Tell me, did you speak to your husband that frequently throughout his incarceration?’

  ‘I don’t remember exactly.’

  ‘Then let me refresh your memory again. For the first seventy-eight months of the eighty-four months your husband spent in prison, you spoke to him exactly twice.’

  ‘I don’t recall exactly.’

  Adele exploded. ‘Don’t lie in my face. You spent a total of more than four hours talking directly to your husband in the last three months. I want you to tell me what those calls were about. In detail.’

  But Ellen Lodge had no choice, not at that point, and she continued to equivocate, as Adele continued to browbeat, asking exactly the same questions she’d asked about the letters and visits, until I finally stepped in. By that time, we’d been at it for three hours.

  I intervened because good guy was my role and because Ellen Lodge asked to use the bathroom. Whether she knew it or not, she’d acknowledged her subservience with the request, as she would have with any request.

  Adele and I exchanged smiles, but said nothing in the few moments we spent alone. Instead, we slipped into a little kitchen to have a drink of water, to splash water on our faces. By the time Ellen emerged from the bathroom, we were back in place.

  ‘Are we almost done?’ she asked as she sat down. ‘Because I have a dentist’s appointment later this afternoon.’

  As before, Adele ignored the question. ‘Tell me about Greenpoint Carton Supply.’

  Ellen began by announcing that (so far as she knew, of course) Greenpoint Carton was ‘wholly owned’ by Tony Szarek, Dante Russo and Pete Jarazelsky. That brought a smile to my lips. According to Szarek’s sister, Trina Zito, Szarek’s shares had reverted to the corporation upon his death. If Russo was crab food, as Adele believed, Pete Jarazelsky would be the last man standing. Pete, of course, had the ultimate alibi.

  I made a mental note to call Attica and speak to Deputy Warden Frank Beauchamp, the mighty hunter. To ask a question I might have asked a lot earlier.

  ‘They took me in,’ Ellen said after a moment, ‘because they knew I got a raw deal and they wanted to look out for me. I get paid two tho
usand dollars a month. I’m the secretary-treasurer, but I got no interest in the business. I’m not a partner.’

  ‘Tell us what you do for the two thousand,’ Adele asked. ‘What are your duties?’

  ‘I don’t have any.’

  ‘They pay you two thousand dollars a month for nothing?’

  ‘I sign papers once in a while. That’s it.’

  Adele shifted forward on the seat. ‘When did you become secretary-treasurer?’

  ‘I was there from the beginning.’

  ‘When was that?’

  ‘About six months after Davy killed the pimp.’

  ‘Was Greenpoint Carton in existence at that time? Or did they start it from scratch?’

  ‘They bought the business.’

  ‘Who from?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘How much did they pay for it?’

  ‘That wasn’t my business. Anyway, the deal was done before I was offered my… position.’

  ‘And who offered you that position?’

  ‘Dante.’

  ‘Not Tony Szarek or Pete Jarazelsky.’

  ‘I barely knew Tony and Pete.’

  ‘You didn’t visit Jarazelsky when you went up to Attica? Or exchange letters with him?’

  ‘Never.’

  ‘But you knew Dante Russo?’

  ‘We were lovers.’

  THIRTY-SIX

  ‘ Give me a fucking break,’ Adele snarled. ‘You weren’t Dante Russo’s lover. You were his whore.’

  Finally energized, Ellen Lodge came halfway out of her chair. ‘You bitch!’ she shouted back. ‘What right do you have to judge me?’

  ‘Cut the crap. You’re knocking down twenty-four grand a year for a no-show job given to you by a man who rings your bell in the middle of the night. And, yeah, we already knew about your sugar daddy. But you probably figured that out, being as you’re a girl who takes care of number one.’

  They both stood at that point, facing off across the hassock that held the tape recorder, their bodies now three feet apart.

  ‘Funny thing, Ellen, but you don’t look like you’re grieving, not for your husband or for Dante Russo. You look like you’re worried. But don’t be. If you’re a good girl, if you accept Russo’s death the way you accepted your husband’s, I’m sure that you’ll be well rewarded. Oh, by the way, Russo didn’t spend last Friday night in your bed, did he? You didn’t make one of those six-second phone calls just after he left? You didn’t set up Dante the way you set up your husband?’

  Ellen Lodge was sucking on her cheeks, narrowing an already narrow face, and her lips were moving rapidly. I think she would eventually have spoken if I hadn’t stepped in for the second time.

  ‘Partner,’ I said, rising to my feet, ‘do you think I could speak to you for a minute?’

  In the hallway, out of Ellen Lodge’s sight, Adele shrugged her shoulders. ‘How’d I do?’

  I answered by leaning down and kissing her (very gently, of course) on the lips. She touched a finger to her lips, her expression quizzical, then reached out to lay her hand on my chest before turning abruptly. I watched her trip down the stairs and out the door, realizing that there might, in fact, be something I wanted more than to break this case. As I walked back into the sitting room, I found myself imagining ten days with Adele in Hawaii, a sort of honeymoon in the course of which neither sand nor surf would even be glimpsed.

  Ellen was standing by the window. She’d pulled a curtain aside to look down at the street. I assumed she was watching Adele get into the Nissan.

  ‘So,’ she said without turning, ‘I take it that you’re the good cop.’

  The tape recorder clicked off at that point and I replaced the cassette before answering. ‘You’ll have to excuse my partner. She’s a bit on the self-righteous side.’

  I sat on the couch, in Adele’s place, and invited Ellen to resume her seat. She looked at me for a moment, her expression hard. I endured the glare.

  ‘Please, Ellen, bear with me for another few moments.’

  But she wasn’t ready, not yet. ‘You think I don’t know how this works? For Christ’s sake, I was a cop’s wife. First, the bitch pounds on my brain for hours, then you ride to the rescue. Excuse me if I say that you don’t look like anybody’s white knight.’

  ‘And what do I look like?’

  ‘You look like a hard-ass cop who’d cut off his grandfather’s balls to get a confession.’ Satisfied, she finally sat down, then lit a cigarette. ‘Hope you don’t mind if I smoke.’

  I waved her on, then asked, ‘When did Russo become your lover? Before or after Clarence Spott was killed?’ My tone was as gentle as I could make it.

  ‘Right before.’ She took another pull on her cigarette then flicked imaginary ash into an ashtray on the table alongside her chair. ‘And I’m not makin’ any apologies. I already told you what Davy was like. I needed something in my life and Dante was there.’

  ‘I understand that. You were stuck in a childless, abusive marriage and Davy wouldn’t let you escape. It’s natural to look for comfort under those circumstances.’ I might have added that comfort takes many forms: an embrace, a kind word, a birthday gift… or eliminating the discomfort at its source. Instead, I asked, ‘How did you meet him?’

  ‘Davy brought Dante around when they became partners.’

  ‘They were friends?’

  ‘Dante felt sorry for Davy. He was trying to help him.’

  ‘Then you believe your husband murdered Clarence Spott?’

  ‘Davy was convicted of manslaughter, not murder. If you remember.’ Ellen settled back in her chair, noticeably more relaxed now. True, she knew about good cop/bad cop, as did virtually every mutt I interrogated. But that didn’t mean she could resist its charms.

  ‘I know we spoke about this before,’ I said, ‘but I want you to describe your husband’s abuse.’ I nodded at the tape recorder. ‘For the record.’ When she hesitated, I added, ‘That’s why we started from the beginning. We just want to get your story down once and for all.’

  As I’d hoped, the question triggered a response Ellen was unable to control. She’d been rehearsing her grievances for many years. Her injuries were her drug of choice, her dope, and like any junkie, she couldn’t get through the day without them. Even in her most relaxed moments, they hung just below the surface, ever ready to impede an attack of conscience.

  I let her run on, nodding occasionally as she described a series of progressively gruesome incidents. Her husband, or so she told me, was given to sexual humiliation. By submitting, she was usually able to avoid his fists. But submission (and survival, too) had its own penalties. Over time, she’d built up a reservoir of self-hatred deep enough to drown in. And drown she did, falling into a depression that marked every hour of every day.

  ‘Suicidal ideation,’ she declared, her voice by then as soft as my own, ‘that’s what the shrinks call it. You think “suicidal ideation” describes my state of mind, detective?’

  ‘I think it lacks poetry.’

  She looked at me, her gaze mild, and I had the distinct impression that she wanted to trust me, as she’d once trusted Davy Lodge, as she’d trusted Dante Russo. For just a moment, I felt hopeful. Maybe if I got past her anger, she’d finally come clean.

  From suicide, Ellen Lodge again turned to her destroyed expectations. Everybody, she claimed, has a right to a life. Her husband had taken hers as surely as if he’d pulled the trigger when he’d jammed his gun into her mouth. She was no longer the person she’d been when she met David Lodge. She was not the person she would have become had she never met him. Instead, she was an embittered, childless, middle-aged woman scrabbling for economic survival. The two thousand a month she got from Greenpoint Carton didn’t cover her mortgage and taxes.

  I watched Ellen’s reserves gradually ebb, watched her shoulders slump and her breathing slow, until the little hand on the dial finally pointed to empty and she came to a stop. By that time, I was ready.
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br />   ‘Betrayal,’ I said, my voice so soft Ellen had to lean forward to catch my words, ‘I know what it is. My parents were junkies. They did coke, speed and whatever pills they could get their hands on. Percocets, Dilaudid, Codeine, Valium, Darvon, Ritalin, Demerol.’ I paused long enough to take a breath. ‘They got away with it because this was back in the Seventies when people were more tolerant of druggies, and because it’s almost impossible to fire civil servants, which both of them were. They missed a few days of work? They came in late? They snorted coke twice an hour to get through the day? Well, I remember one time my father was suspended for a week, and another time my mother was forced into rehab, and there might have been other punishments as well. I wouldn’t know about them because my parents mostly acted like I wasn’t there.’

  I shifted my weight slightly, and crossed my legs. My eyes drifted to my hands, as if my revelations were so intimate I couldn’t look her in the face. ‘You know, when you’re a kid, you blame yourself for everything. That’s because if you’re not causing your own pain, you have no control at all. In some ways, it’s like having a gun put to your head. I mean, where are you gonna run to when you’re a five-year-old? To your relatives? My mother was from St Louis and my father’s parents were living in Arizona. Plus, my parents’ friends were druggies, too.’

  When I finally raised my eyes to meet Ellen’s, her gaze was intense, but not skeptical. Encouraged, I again spoke.

  ‘OK, so you’re a kid and your parents barely know you’re alive and you blame yourself. What do you do?’

  ‘You try to become better.’

  ‘Is that what you did with your husband?’

  The question produced a short, choppy laugh devoid of mirth. ‘Yeah, why not? I was only eighteen when I married Davy. I thought if I did better — if I cooked better, if I wore that lingerie he liked — things would improve. Ya wanna hear something really sad? I used to read sex manuals on how to please a man.’