by Tim O'Mara
“Elsa,” Harold said. “You know Mr. Donne here?”
“We just met.”
“You be careful what you say ’round him, girl.” He lowered his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “Used to be a policeman.”
Elsa gave me a long look and said, “Really?”
Harold said, “Yup. Take care now.”
Elsa and I walked to the street. I turned to the left. She was going the other way, toward the J and M subway trains.
“It was nice meeting you, Mr. Donne.”
“Same here.”
“Are you going to bring Frankie home?”
“I’ll see what I can do,” I said, because it sounded better than “I don’t know.”
“Then maybe we will see each other again.”
“Maybe,” I said, pointing at the logo on her shirt. “Say hi to Maria for me.”
“You know Maria?”
“My first assignment was Midtown North. She took good care of us.”
Elsa smiled and said, “I’ll tell her.”
* * *
I got about a block before getting light-headed. I needed water an hour ago. The air-conditioning in the corner bodega felt so good I wanted to stay for a couple of hours. I bought a large bottled water and stepped back outside before I changed my mind.
By the time I got to the next corner, my water was gone. I tossed the bottle into an overflowing trash basket and waited for the light to turn. A couple of guys were sitting on milk crates in front of the laundromat, their boom box blaring what passed for hip hop these days, and drinking out of brown paper bags. First day the temperature hits ninety, it’s summertime in the ’Burg. Don’t make no difference what the calendar says. Time to kick it. Worry about the rules come winter. Bad time to be a cop. Or a schoolteacher. The two caught me looking at them; the one on the left reached down and lowered the volume on the radio.
“You see something you like?” he asked.
I shook my head. “You looked familiar,” I said. “Sorry.”
The other guy said, “Maybe you the one look familiar. Cop.”
I shook my head as the light went green. “Have a nice day,” I said.
“Fuck you, five-oh.” They both laughed and bumped fists. I crossed the street, not missing my old job one bit.
The Williamsburg Bridge was in full rush-hour mode as I walked under it. Cars and trucks crawling in the direction of Manhattan, the traffic coming into Brooklyn not much better. The subway just ambled along. Back in the days when my knees worked the way they were supposed to, one of my favorite things to do was to take my bike over the bridge into Manhattan and ride along the other side of the East River. On the way back, I’d stop in the middle and watch as the river traffic flowed by and listen as the cars and trucks hummed along.
I got to the fenced-in parking lot on the corner of Rivas’s block. It wasn’t too long ago that the blocks around here would be filled day and night with the smell of sugar from the Domino factory by the river. For over a hundred years it stood there, the largest sugar factory on the planet. It was bought a couple years ago by some brothers from the Dominican Republic, two of the richest landowners down there and heroes to the people in this neighborhood. The kind of guys who wielded enough power in this country that they could get the president on the phone and talk about sugar tariffs and federal tax breaks and political contributions. The same guys who sold the place off to real estate developers a while back, leaving a few hundred neighborhood folks out of work.
Man, this block used to smell sweet.
Frankie’s dad lived in one of an identical pair of adjacent buildings across the street from where I stood. At least they used to be identical. The one on the left sported new windows, flower boxes, and a recent paint job. The one on the right had what must have been the original windows—even from across the street, I could see they didn’t sit right anymore—and a paint job at least a decade old. I found myself wondering how much more in rent the tenants in the one on the left paid. Frankie’s dad lived in the one on the right.
I crossed over, stepped up to the buttons, and buzzed. No answer. I tried again. No answer. I reached over and tried the front door. Unlocked. I climbed the three flights up to Rivas’s apartment. My knees were throbbing and ready to call it a day. I knocked on the apartment door, waited half a minute, and knocked again with my umbrella. The sound reminded me of my nightstick. I did it again. In the middle of my third attempt, a door behind me opened.
“Jesus,” a man’s voice said. I turned, and for the second time that day, a pair of eyes looked at me from over a chain lock. “Ya gonna wake the dead with that knocking.”
“I’m looking for Francisco Rivas,” I said. “Senior.”
“He buzz you in?”
“Front door’s unlocked. I think it’s busted.”
“Shit. Again?” The eyes watched me a little longer, and the voice said, “You a cop?”
I caught the aroma of marijuana coming into the hallway and said, “No.”
“He owe you money?”
“I’m from his kid’s school.”
“Milagros?”
Frankie’s sister. I’d forgotten she lived with the father.
“Frankie’s.”
“Christ,” he said. “About time.”
I took a step closer. “What’s that mean?”
“Been hanging around here all week. During school hours. Almost took my head off throwing that damn ball against the front of the building. You the truant officer?”
“I’m from the school. You know if he’s home?”
“The kid or the father?”
“Either one.”
“Not answering, huh?” I didn’t justify that with an answer, and it took a few seconds for him to say, “Oh, yeah. Why else would you be—”
“Have you seen Mr. Rivas around lately?”
“Two, three days ago maybe. Maybe longer. You sure you ain’t a cop?”
I took another step toward his door. “If I were,” I said, “what would stop me from entering your apartment and locating the source of that smell?”
“Ever hear of a warrant?”
“Sure, I think it was right after the lecture on reasonable cause.”
“Shit,” he said. “Hold on a second.” He shut the door, and when he opened it again he handed me a key. “Here. Rivas had a habit of forgettin’ his.”
I took the key. “Just like that?”
“Hey. You either a cop, one of his lowlife friends, or from the school, like you said. Any way I play it, ain’t no positive for me carrying on this conversation. Rivas gives ya shit about that key, tell him you told me you was a cop, and reasonable cause and shit. You can also tell him to keep the damn thing.”
Without waiting for a response, he shut the door. I knocked on Rivas’s door one more time, and when I again got no answer, looked at the key in my hand. Technically, what I was about to do was breaking the law. However, I didn’t see myself getting into any real trouble, as all I wanted to do was verify that no one was at home. Then at school the next day, I could call the attendance guy and report Frankie’s absences. If Rivas was home, I’d talk my way around why I had his key and opened his door. After all, he was the one keeping his kid out of school. If he were angry enough to call the cops on me, he would be opening himself up to some unwanted scrutiny.
I stuck the key in the lock and turned. I eased the door open, let go, and waited for it to swing fully open.
“Mr. Rivas?” I called. “Frankie?”
Silence. Still in the doorway, I looked at the room in front of me. To my left, there was a couch with a crumpled sheet and blanket tucked behind the cushions and hanging over the front. A sleeping bag with a pillow was on the floor, halfway under the coffee table, which was covered with fast-food wrappers and half-empty soda bottles. The smell of stale smoke and a cheap air freshener hung in the air. The windows were closed, the air conditioner silent.
No one had been here for days.
I took my umbrella and hooked it around the leg of the coffee table. I pulled it toward me and used it to make sure the door didn’t swing back and close on me. A cop I used to work with got stuck in an apartment with a pit bull once. Swore the place was empty. It took him thirty seconds and four bullets to get the dog off his leg. Last I heard, he was spending his early retirement in a reclining chair, a remote control in one hand and a can of beer in the other.
I waited and listened for a few seconds—a small hallway off to the right, a dining table to my left—before I stepped into the living room. Against the far wall, directly under the painting of a smiling Jesus touching two children on their heads, was an entertainment center with a flat-screen TV, VCR, DVD, and CD players and enough movies to start a rental service.
I walked into the kitchen. All the drawers and cabinets were open. The floor was a mess of silverware, broken plates and cups, a blender, and a toaster oven. The refrigerator door was covered with schoolwork, a postcard from some place that had palm trees, and a child’s drawing of a white house with a red barn along its side. I opened the fridge: half a loaf of bread, a jar of jelly, and a container of milk, which I opened. It was beginning to turn.
I went back into the living room and crossed over to the other side of the apartment. There were two doors to choose from. I tried the one on my left. It was the bathroom, and it was in the same shape as the kitchen. The medicine chest had been tossed, towels were on the floor, and the shower curtain ripped from its rod. A litter box was on the side of the toilet, untouched and clean. I backed out and shut the door.
The door to my right was shut. I knocked, maybe because it had to be the bedroom and a certain amount of privacy was expected. I turned the knob and slowly pushed. An orange cat sprinted out between my legs followed by the smells of shit and piss. Beneath those odors was another smell, and I knew what I’d find when I fully opened the door to Rivas’s bedroom.
It took my eyes a few seconds to adjust to the darkness of the bedroom. I let the bedroom door swing all the way open, allowing a little more light into the room. I could make out a lump on the bed, almost like someone had dumped a pile of dirty clothes. Almost.
I moved toward the bed, reached out with my umbrella, and poked the lump on the bed. It didn’t give. Another step—my eyes able to make out more than just shapes now—and I could tell that the lump of clothes on the bed had a person inside.
I stumbled back a few feet and hit the wall. Instinctively, I reached over, found the light switch, and flicked it on.
The dead guy looked as if he’d been sitting on the edge of the bed and just fell back, his legs dangling over the side. And there I was—like a fucking rookie—standing stupid in the middle of a crime scene. The last two things I noticed before stumbling out of the room were a dark stain on the floor below the dead guy’s feet and that he was clutching a child’s book bag with a bright yellow flower painted on its back pocket.
The next thing I know, I’m knocking on the neighbor’s door with my umbrella.
Loud enough to wake the dead.
Chapter 3
“MR. DONNE?”
I turned and looked up into the face of the patrolman who earlier had instructed me to wait outside. He was standing on the step above the one I was sitting on. The shine on his belt and holster told me he’d been on the streets for maybe three months. A bright red zit was forming above his lip among the facial hairs he hoped would one day grow into a mustache.
“Detective Royce wants me to tell you that he appreciates your patience,” he said.
“Big black guy in the suit?” I asked.
“That would be him,” the cop said. He raised his hand to show me a five-dollar bill. “He wants to know if you’d like a water or something from the corner.”
“How much longer before I can go?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Crime Scene guys are almost done.”
“They notice the flower?”
He looked at me like I was starting to lose it in the heat.
“Sir?”
“The flower,” I repeated. “On the book bag. There was no blood on it.”
“I’m sure they did.” He took the steps down to the sidewalk. “Something to drink, sir?”
“Yeah. Water would be good. How much more time did you say?”
“They gotta finish up in the apartment, and the detective needs you to talk to the youth officers.” Youth officers, when they were available, dealt with crimes committed by—or against—juveniles. “They should be here in a few minutes.”
“A few minutes real time?” I asked. “Or a few minutes police time?”
He smiled. “A few minutes, sir.”
* * *
About an hour later—after finishing my water, watching the Crime Scene people leave, and telling the youth officers everything I could about Frankie—I was leaning against the railing on the steps outside Rivas’s apartment when Detective Royce came out of the building. He walked right past me, over to a car that was parked across the street. He took off his jacket and, before tossing it through the open passenger’s window, removed something from one of the pockets. As he crossed back over, he was slapping a pack of cigarettes against his palm. When he got to the steps, he looked up at me and said, “D.O.N.N.E.?”
“That’s how it’s spelled,” I said.
“First name … Raymond?”
“Yes.”
“Hmmm.” He opened the pack of smokes and stuck one in his mouth. “We got a chief by that name over at One Police Plaza.”
“Yeah. I’ve got an uncle by that name who’s a chief over at One P.P.”
“Shit.” He thought about that for a moment, took the unlit cigarette from his mouth, and let out an imaginary plume of smoke. After putting it back between his lips, he sat down, reached inside his jacket, and pulled out a small notepad and a pen. “You’re Chief Donne’s nephew?”
“Sorry.”
He looked at my umbrella and said, “You used to work out of the Nine-Oh, right?”
I nodded. If he knew my story, he knew enough not to mention it.
“Wanna tell me what you were doing here?”
“Like I told the officer upstairs,” I said. “Looking for Frankie Rivas.”
“I heard that. But why you? Don’t they have folks for that?”
“Attendance teachers, yeah. And after the kid’s out for two weeks, they put him on their list of homes to visit.” I told him about Frankie’s scholarship to Our Lady, how it was contingent upon his grades and attendance, and how waiting two weeks wouldn’t work.
“That the only reason?”
“Yes, Detective,” I said. “That’s the only reason.”
“Grandma hasn’t seen the boy in ten days, huh?” he asked.
“That’s what she told me.”
Royce wrote that down. “Guy across the way says that he hasn’t seen anybody around for the past coupla days.”
“He didn’t strike me as the type who gets out a lot.”
“Picked up on that, huh?” The detective grinned. “Guy had all his windows open and the AC going full blast. Think he mighta been hiding something?”
“Crossed my mind,” I said. “How fast before you start the mobilization?”
“It’s started. Officers should be over at the grandmother’s, and they’ll canvas the neighborhood—both neighborhoods—and work their way out from there.”
“Right,” I said, knowing the mobilization would have to include the East River. The news will be all over this, I thought.
“Any idea where they might have gone?” Royce asked.
“Assuming they’re not with whoever killed the father?”
“Assuming that, yes.”
“No. I don’t. Any idea exactly what happened up there, Detective?”
“Exactly? No. Crime Scene seems to think it’s a combination of a blunt instrument to the head and some sort of blow to the face. Nose is where all the blood came from. There’s also a decent-size dent just abov
e the left ear.” He paused. “You say the kid was a baseball player?”
“Yeah.”
“There’s no bats in the apartment.”
“He probably keeps them at his grandmother’s.”
“Yeah,” Royce said. “I guess we’ll find out.”
“Detective,” I said. “Frankie did not kill his father.”
“Gotta check out all possibilities, Mr. Donne.” He was studying my reaction. I tried not to give him one. “You know that. Neighbor said the kid’s in special education.”
“Yes, Detective. Frankie’s a grade or two behind in reading and math. I teach a small group of kids. Right now I have eleven. None of them is violent.”
Royce took the still-unlit cigarette from his mouth and rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. It was a full thirty seconds before he spoke again.
“You noticed the book bag the victim was holding?”
“I did.”
“And the lack of blood on the flower?”
“Yes.”
“Means two things,” he said. “One: you were a bit too involved in my crime scene. I’ll let that go, considering you discovered the DB and got a bit edgy.”
“Thanks.”
“Two: the bag found its way into his arms after the bleeding was done. Bag was empty, by the way. There’s a lot of blood at the feet of the vic, who we are presently identifying as Francisco Rivas, Senior. You ever meet the man?”
“No. I only dealt with the grandmother.”
“Looks like the book bag belongs to the sister.” He looked at his notebook. “Milagros. You wouldn’t have a contact on her, would ya?”
“No,” I said. “Her school should.”
“Have to wait until morning then.” He stood up and flicked the cigarette into the street. Then he pulled a card out of his shirt pocket. “You think of anything useful, give me a call.”
“That’s it?” I took the card. “I can go?”
“Unless there’s something you left out of your statement. You came. You saw. You called it in. And you don’t strike me as the type who would enjoy waiting around for the newspapers to show up. I can have Officer Sikes take you home if you want.”
I thought about the cop with the zit. “He’s got a driver’s license?”
