Last Stop in Brooklyn

by Lawrence H. Levy

  Colleen and the man had already exited the elevator and were walking down the fourth-floor corridor with their backs to Mary when she arrived. Still staying a good distance away, Mary slowly followed them and watched them enter a room at the end of the hall. She then walked to their door, noted the room number, and left.

  Knocking on the door seemed too risky. Mary had only met Colleen a few times, and the last was years ago, but there was a very good chance she would recognize Mary. Besides, even if she didn’t, she’d have to make up some story in order to get the man to identify himself, so she could report who Colleen was seeing to Brian. There was an easier way.

  Mary went to the front desk and approached the clerk. “I was just up on the fourth floor and I was aghast at what I saw. A man was quite irate. Apparently, he had ordered champagne on the teleseme a full hour ago, and nothing had arrived.”

  “Oh my goodness,” exclaimed the clerk, who immediately checked the teleseme. If a guest turned on the teleseme in his room and pointed to the item he desired, the information at the desk would be received by two different devices. Discolored water in one would reveal which room was requesting service, and the second device, identical to the one in the guest’s room, would point to what the guest wanted. “Are you sure?” said the clerk, a bit puzzled. “No champagne has been ordered from the fourth floor in the last hour.”

  “Sure?” responded Mary. “You should have heard him. Not very pleasant. I believe the expression is ‘fit to be tied.’ ” Mary stared at the clerk for emphasis. “Maybe you know him. He was wearing a white linen suit and a straw boater hat. He told me his name, but unfortunately I don’t remember. The shouting startled me.”

  “Do you know what room he was in?”

  “Ah yes, very smart. What room? I should have mentioned that right away. I saw him enter room four twenty-four.”

  “Room four twenty-four,” the clerk repeated while scouring the guest list. “Yes, four twenty-four. He’s been with us several times before. Always takes the same room. Mr. Walter Cooper. I better take care of that right away. Thank you so much.” And the clerk left to make sure his guest got the champagne with the hotel’s compliments.

  The clerk was so immersed in his desire to do his job that he didn’t notice the blood drain from Mary’s face when he mentioned the guest’s name. She knew the man’s walk had looked familiar. Walter Cooper was her friend Sarah’s husband!

  Mary staggered toward the exit in a daze. It was true that she had only seen the man from behind and from a distance, and he was wearing a hat, but she chastised herself for not recognizing Walter. Was it that she didn’t want it to be him or that she genuinely didn’t recognize him? Both prospects were disturbing, but it didn’t matter. She was now faced with an even bigger dilemma, involving a host of questions. Should she tell Sarah, how should she tell her, what would it do to her, what about the children, what would happen if she didn’t tell Sarah, how would it affect their relationship if she told her or didn’t tell her?

  These thoughts were swimming through her head as she stepped outside. Suddenly, she got angry, very angry. How dare Walter do that to Sarah and their children! Sarah is a beautiful, vibrant woman, and he— Mary didn’t want to think about it anymore. Wild-eyed, she looked around and spotted the man who was tailing her, his ice cream now melting. She marched up to the man and swatted the cone out of his hand.

  “What do you want from me? Either tell me or I’ll thump you right here!” she demanded.

  Needless to say, the man was taken aback. He’d had no idea Mary knew he was following her. He paused, then stammered for a few moments until he finally got his words out. He had a French accent. “I am Basem Ben Ali. My brother has been convicted of murder. He didn’t do it, and I want you to prove his innocence.”

  Surprisingly, this news calmed Mary. She much preferred dealing with murder than with her best friend’s errant husband.

  2

  Mary told Basem Ben Ali to meet her back at her office in a couple of hours, and he obliged. Besides preferring her client discussions to be in a private setting, she had had her fill of Coney Island and did not want to spend one more minute there than was absolutely necessary. The momentary wave of calmness that overtook her when Basem Ben Ali asked for her help was indeed fleeting. The anger she felt at Walter’s betrayal of her close friend surged through her body once more. She caught the train, taking the Sea Beach Line away from Coney Island toward downtown Brooklyn. Mary calmed somewhat during the train ride. One’s body, or rather one’s mind, seems to sense that living at that level of emotional distress for extended periods of time is unhealthy and it finds a way to momentarily quiet the storm. But her outrage was bound to surface again.

  Mary’s office was in Lazlo’s Books, a fairly well-known bookstore in Brooklyn owned by her good friend Lazlo. His name was emblazoned on the store because he fancied himself an expert on all things literary. He had also deemed himself an expert in many other areas, but he felt it all could be traced back to his love of books.

  “Anything worthwhile in this world has at one point or another been put down on paper. Everything else is inconsequential,” Lazlo had once told Mary, the twinkle in his eye making him seem younger than his fifty-eight years.

  “Are you trying to tell me,” Mary had shot back, “that your many witticisms are inconsequential? I am shocked.”

  “Don’t be. I do write them down, so the world will benefit from them when I am but a mere memory.”

  “I believe there’s a word for that. Ah, yes: ‘narcissism.’ ”

  “Actually, a little bit of narcissism is healthy. It only turns ugly when one exaggerates one’s abilities, and that can hardly apply to me.” Lazlo’s wily smile had somehow been enhanced by his flock of bushy gray hair with an accompanying mustache.

  Mary enjoyed their repartee, and she was hoping Lazlo would cheer her up. About a block before getting to Lazlo’s she saw a sign in a grocery store window that read, HIRING. DOGS AND IRISH NEED NOT APPLY. She had seen similar signs in other parts of Brooklyn and New York. It was a sour reminder that the ugliness on display at Coney Island wasn’t limited to the end of Brooklyn.

  As she entered the bookstore, passing the small sign in the right corner of the window that read, OFFICE OF MARY HANDLEY, CONSULTING DETECTIVE, she perked up. It had been four years, but that sign still gave her a lift each time she saw it.

  The store was quiet with only one potential customer, an older woman, currently perusing the biography section. There was one salesclerk and a very bored Lazlo, who brightened when he saw Mary, a woman he had dubbed, in his mind but not aloud, his surrogate daughter.

  “Ah, Mary, so good to see you. You must tell me all about your adventures today.”

  “Is business that slow?”

  “I’m contemplating christening it Snail Thursdays,” he whispered, then gestured toward the one customer. “A professional browser.”

  “She never buys?”

  “Never.”

  “Then my arrival should cheer you up. I have your rent.” Mary started to dig through her pocketbook.

  “Please, Mary, how many times do I have to tell you? I don’t want your money.”

  The discussion of rent was a constant bone of contention between the two. Lazlo had originally given Mary an office in the back of his store for free when her detective career was floundering and she was doubling as a salesclerk in his store. When business started to flourish and she no longer could work for Lazlo, she insisted on paying rent. They were both bullheaded, and the argument went on for a while, Lazlo refusing money and Mary demanding he take it. Finally, Lazlo acquiesced. He asked for one dollar a month, but Mary insisted on it being much more. They finally settled on seven dollars. Mary took out the money and handed it to him.

  “Once again, I am uncomfortable and feel more like I’m collecting a tithe rather than accepting remuneration for services rendered.”

  “Duly noted.”

  “Now that
we’ve dispensed with the unpleasantries, tell me about your day.”

  Lazlo was a very good friend and completely discreet, but Mary still didn’t mention Walter, as if saying it out loud would make it too real. She told him about the woman she was following, the man who was following her, and how much she detested Coney Island.

  “Coney Island,” Lazlo remarked. “It’s where intelligence and human decency go to die.”

  At that point they were interrupted by the female browser, who was sporting a very pleasant smile. “Excuse me, Mr. Lazlo, but I was wondering whether you carry La revue blanche. I understand it has some marvelous articles by a young writer named Marcel Proust.”

  “I’ll be with you momentarily. If you can’t wait, I’m sure Martha will be happy to help you.” And Lazlo pointed to the sole salesclerk in the store.

  “Oh, I’m in no rush. I’ll wait,” she said, then smiled again and walked off.

  This time Mary spoke in a whisper. “Well, it looks like the tide has turned.”

  “She won’t buy it. Believe me. She’s done this an infinite amount of times.”

  “Lazlo, you need to reassess the situation.”

  “Why reassess something that is so clearly—”

  “You’re missing a key element. Her browsing is not limited to or even involves books.”

  It finally dawned on Lazlo what Mary was implying. “Well, should that be true, she is most definitely barking up the wrong tree. I view ‘relationship’ as synonymous with ‘abhorrent.’ ”

  “That’s impossible. ‘Relationship’ is a noun and ‘abhorrent’ is an adjective. It looks like she already has you off your game.” And Mary left for her office, her conversation with Lazlo having lifted her out of the doldrums.

  Approximately forty-five minutes later, Basem Ben Ali appeared at her office door, and Mary ushered him to a seat facing her desk. Basem was from Algeria. Mary knew that meant he was most probably fluent in both French and Arabic. Since he spoke English in a thick French accent, Mary surmised there might be a communication problem. Luckily, she knew a reasonable amount of French. Lazlo had chastised her a few years back for not reading the French version of Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert.

  “In order to get the true sense of Flaubert’s genius,” Lazlo had said, “you must read his original words. Anything else pales in comparison.”

  Mary resisted and argued for a while, but he eventually wore her down and she did study French. After reading it in Flaubert’s native language, she had to admit that Lazlo was right, and at this time, she was especially pleased because it allowed her to make her new client feel comfortable by speaking in one of his native languages.

  “Je l’espère votre voyage à mon bureau a été facil,” she said, expressing her hope that he’d had an easy trip to her office.

  “It was simple. No problem,” he replied in English.

  “Cela est trés bon à entendre,” Mary responded, indicating that it was good to hear.

  Ali took out a tobacco pouch and brown papers, began rolling a cigarette, and again spoke in English. “They’re mass-producing these now, but I still prefer to roll them myself. I hope you don’t mind, Miss Handley.”

  Mary always kept up on the latest scientific advancements. “Si vous ne craignez pas les risques pour votre santé, je ne me dérange pas,” she replied, informing him that if he didn’t mind the health risks, she didn’t mind either.

  “The reports are conflicting, and besides, I enjoy it too much to discard it. By the way, Miss Handley, could you please speak English? Your French accent is difficult to understand.”

  Mary emitted a short chuckle at the irony that she was the one having trouble communicating. “Certainly, Mr. Ali. I would be happy to. Please tell me about yourself.”

  He explained that he was born in Algeria, had served four years in the French Foreign Legion, then had come to America. “I lived in Pennsylvania for a number of years, returned to Algeria, and now I’m back. Because of my accent, people always assume I know very little English.”

  “I guess I am guilty of it, too. I apologize, and thank you for alerting me to my pronunciation problems in French. I obviously need to work on that.”

  “It’s understandable. People in America only need to speak one language. I grew up having to speak two, so learning a third wasn’t much of a burden.”

  “I suppose the other language you grew up speaking is Algerian Arabic.”

  “Very good, Miss Handley, and quite refreshing. Most Americans lump all Arabic languages into one when there are many dialects and differences. I have learned never to speak my native tongue here. The few times I did the reactions I received were…off-putting.”

  “The Statue of Liberty has been sitting in New York Harbor for eight years, and I’m still hoping that one day we will finally live up to its welcoming inscription. We’re a nation of immigrants, and yet a person who is different is often shunned. It defies explanation.”

  “I applaud your candor, Miss Handley, and I now see it is not just an investigative technique.” He lit his cigarette and the strong aroma of Turkish tobacco was immediately evident. Mary found it unpleasant, but she had already given him permission to smoke.

  She crinkled her nose and continued. “I can use candor or be devious. I do what the situation requires. And though I appreciate your caution, you didn’t have to follow me for ten days to ascertain that. If you had approached me, I gladly would have told you much sooner.”

  “It’s a strange land with strange customs. I wanted to be certain. Mea culpa.”

  “Ah, Latin. Do you speak yet a fourth language?”

  “Only those two words, I’m afraid.”

  “I know at least four,” she said with mock conceit. “Now, tell me about your brother.”

  “He was convicted three years ago of murdering a prostitute in Manhattan. My brother is not a saint. He was jailed briefly for vagrancy, but, I assure you, he is not a killer.”

  “Why have you waited three years to investigate?”

  “It took time to save up enough money to return to America.”

  “Of course. Can you give me some information about the murder?”

  “He was renting a room in a—I believe the best word to describe it is ‘fleabag.’ No?”

  “Probably right. Go ahead.”

  “I’ve been down to see it. The East River Hotel. He was—”

  “Is your brother’s name Ameer Ben Ali?”

  “Yes. Most people here call him Frenchy. It’s ironic because his French isn’t much better than his English, which is less than marginal. He contends his lack of fluency in French is evidence of his patriotism for a free Algeria. I personally think it’s just his way of hiding that he’s not very good at language.”

  Mary was already familiar with the crime. In fact, most of New York and Brooklyn were. A prostitute around sixty years old by the name of Carrie Brown, who was nicknamed “Old Shakespeare” for her tendency to break into Shakespearean verse when drunk, had been brutally murdered in Manhattan at the East River Hotel. A man they called Frenchy had been arrested and convicted. Normally, a prostitute’s murder would not get so much press, but the style in which she was murdered resembled the infamous Whitechapel murders that had both terrorized and fascinated London. That killer had been dubbed “Jack the Ripper” from the signature on a letter that someone had written to a newspaper claiming to be the culprit. More importantly, he had never been caught.

  “You realize, Mr. Ali, that all of New York was in a panic over that murder, and that dredging it up again could intensify anti-immigrant, anti-Arab, and anti-black sentiment.”

  “I have no choice. My brother is innocent.”

  His belief in his brother’s innocence was so resolute that Mary felt Basem Ben Ali deserved a full investigation. It was not that long ago that her brother, Sean, had been arrested on murder charges, and her belief in him had been the only thing he had on his side.

  “I will take your case, M
r. Ali. I hope you won’t be disappointed with what I uncover.”

  Delighted, he hastily agreed to her fee, then gave her an address where he had rented an apartment. “If you need me during the day, I work at Leo’s Meats. It’s a butcher shop on Montague Street.”

  “Are you sure it’s all right? My father works in a butcher shop, and I know how busy it can be.”

  “It’s not a problem. My boss is very understanding.”

  “He must be in order to give you the time off to follow me.”

  “He is, but this is just a job to—what’s the word—to defray costs. If I lose it, I’ll get another one.”

  “ ‘Defray’ is the word, and once again I’m impressed by your command of the English language.” They shook hands, and he left.

  Mary had something else on her mind that she hadn’t mentioned to him. Shortly before the Carrie Brown murder, Thomas Byrnes had made a bold claim that if Jack the Ripper ever came to New York from London he would have him in custody within thirty-six hours. Byrnes had arrested and secured a confession from Ameer Ben Ali within that time frame, a feat that added to his already legendary reputation. In order to free him, she would have to prove that the most respected policeman in New York had, at the very least, made a mistake, and Thomas Byrnes would be the first to tell you: he didn’t make mistakes, and he especially didn’t like people who said he did.

  3

  It was late afternoon when Mary arrived at Superintendent Campbell’s office. They had been friends since he had hired her for the Goodrich case years before, and he had remained a valuable source of information. His secretary, a Miss Carroll, ushered her into his office and left.