"What do you mean, it's St. Timothy's?" says Agnes.
"It's St. Timothy's now and it's always been St. Timothy's."
"I don't get it."
"Your father found the church for us. He made up the name because it sounded so beautiful. He wanted to surround me with beauty, and this was all he could afford."
"Ma, didn't you notice?"
"It was my wedding day."
Johnny always had a problem with the truth. He had lied at his first meeting with Hannah. They met in the Diplomat movie theater, where Hannah spent so much time that she was friendly with the projectionist, Seymour Anzelone. To modern eyes, Seymour was a tragedy waiting to happen—a three-hundred-pound mama's boy with a compulsion to take off his shoes in front of women. "Oh, these corns!" he'd complain to the popcorn girl as his penis poked at his zipper—but back then, who knew? Seymour appeared to be a solid citizen. Hannah was shocked when he attacked her in the projection booth. One minute they were discussing her favorite male stars—and she was proudly idiosyncratic in her tastes: Robert Walker, Basil Rathbone, Elisha Cook—and the next....Seymour took Hannah's stated disdain for conventional good looks in a way she hadn't intended.
"His breath reeked of liverwurst. It overpowered me," she told the policeman who spirited her away to the manager's office for questioning. When she regained her composure she looked the policeman up and down.
"Where's your uniform?"
"I'm plainclothes."
"Plain indeed," she sniffed.
Did she know that Johnny Travertine was not a detective but the man who delivered the candy? If she did, she never let on. That he would lie to be near her was flattering. She married him, and the deception was never formally corrected. After a while, he just wasn't a detective anymore. He hauled Jujubes and Tootsie Rolls. Maybe Hannah thought he was on a very long undercover assignment.
"What about Daddy's first marriage?" asks Agnes.
"Those papers are all in order," Hannah huffs. "Isn't it always the way?"
"Why are we having problems with Social Security? After Daddy died, didn't you collect surviving children's benefits?"
"Never."
"Then what were those green checks that came the first of every month?"
"They were from the Veteran's Administration."
Agnes's teeth clench. "You always called it your Social Security money."
"I can't see that it matters what I called it."
"I'm coming to see you tomorrow," says Agnes urgently. "We'll go to Social Security together. And I'll bring you those library books I promised."
"Forget about those," says Hannah.
"Why? What are you planning to read?"
"We have a library here," Hannah informs her.
"Which you refuse to set foot in."
"Well, I finally did and it's not so bad," says Hannah without irony. "They had a Spinet I haven't read—A Tisket, A Tasket, A Teal And Ecru Casket. It was in the pay collection."
"I thought Queens residents were too backward for Basil Spinet."
"As a matter of fact, they are," says Hannah. "The library was deserted. I was like a kid in a candy store. I checked out ten books. Ten! I had to take a cab home."
"A cab?" says Agnes, calculating the fare. "Do me a favor, Ma. Go easy on that pay collection."
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Detective Whitey Walker ushers Agnes into a dark office. On the other side of a one-way mirror, Tommy sits across a table from Rabbi Bloch and Dov. Rabbi Bloch is at least ten pounds lighter. His face is lined and pouchy.
"We're sorry to drag you down here again," says Tommy, "but there are a few things we still have to clear up."
Dov sits with one foot on a chair. a sidecurl wrapped defiantly around his finger.
"I'm a Jew," he says. "I'm not comfortable here. For the Jew, the doors to the police station open only in."
"Be civil," says the rabbi.
Downstairs, in front of the precinct, a crowd of Orthodox men has gathered. They are angry. They want an arrest. The police are not doing all they can because the victims were Jewish. Inspector Razumovsky is on his way to placate them.
Tommy has Dov retrace his steps on the night of the slayings. Dov cannot explain why he didn't hear the telephone when the matchmaker called to tell him he had forgotten The Chronicle of the Lodz Ghetto. Tommy then reads from a statement sworn by a neighbor of the Blochs', a Mr. Berman. Mr. Berman says that he came to the Blochs' at approximately 10 p.m. to show the rabbi a newspaper article about the Congregation Mount Horab of Rivington Street, the synagogue to which both men had belonged in the 1970s. Mr. Berman rang the bell repeatedly and received no answer.
The rabbi looks at Dov for an explanation.
"Berman is an old lunatic," says Dov. "Always telling me how Christ was a good Jew. A good Jew! A man who turns his back on the faith to start his own religion, a good Jew!"
"Can Berman ring a doorbell?" says the Rabbi.
Dov's face twists into a frown. "He knew you wouldn't be there."
"I did tell him I'd be with my brother," says the rabbi.
"So why did he come?" says Dov. "Berman doesn't make sense."
Tommy asks the rabbi if he may speak with his son privately.
There is a commotion downstairs. Agnes looks out the window. On the steps of the precinct, a big barrel-chested cop with a thick beard is explaining something to the crowd of Orthodox men, who shake their heads skeptically.
With the rabbi gone, Tommy says, "I need to know if you were on the roof that night."
Dov stands up and paces the room. "I don't know what you mean."
"Admit it, Dov. I know about the skylight and the chair."
Dov stops at the mirror. Agnes looks right into his eyes. She tries to imagine him without the accessories of his belief, the sidecurls and hat, and dark suit, the tzitzis, the coarse collarless yellowing white shirt.
"We all like looking at naked women. It's no crime, says Tommy."
Agnes sees what Tommy can't: Dov closes his eyes and winces.
Behind Agnes, a door flies open. The lights go on. The big bearded cop she saw downstairs heaves his bulk into the room. His coat is open. Agnes's eye is caught by his nameplate: Razumovsky. He wears the many-pointed star of the Inspector. It looks like a magical symbol. Its center is a deep blue, like the iris of some all-penetrating eye. He is obviously not Irish or Italian or Hispanic or black; his Eastern European features look odd in a New York City police uniform.
"Walker!" he barks. "Where's the rabbi's kid?"
Whitey points to the mirror.
Dov has a strange look on his face. His streaky eyes are wide. Tommy will explain later that Razumovsky's turning on of the lights made Agnes partly visible in the one-way glass. She appears to Dov as a ghost—the spirit of moral rectitude, her eyes hooded with disapproval—hovering just above his shoulder.
"Her!" he cries. He shudders and moans. His shoulders sag.
"You're right," he says, turning to Tommy. "I was on the roof. I saw it all. I saw him shoot my mother. I saw him stab the whore." His voice is oddly flat.
"Who, Dov?"
"It was the boyfriend," Dov answers, his voice breaking. "The one you are looking for."
Dov collapses. He weeps with guilt and relief.
The rabbi returns. He folds his son into his arms. He looks confused. Tommy leaves looking-glass land and comes into Agnes and Whitey.
Whitey loosens his tie. "Unbelievable."
All Tommy's attention is on Agnes. Razumovsky and Whitey and the rabbi and a clutch of uniforms swirl around him, vying unsuccessfully for his ear.
"Wasn't that great?" he says to Agnes.
"I'm still shaking. Look—goose bumps."
"That what people think being is cop is like but it never is. Nothing like that's ever happened to me," he says.
He takes Agnes to another part of the precinct, where there are empty holding cells, where they can have a little privacy.
"I actu
ally cared about what happened in there. I really want to catch the Pinboy—for you," he tells her.
"Every girl's dream," says Agnes.
Her sarcasm hurts him. "What's the matter?"
"I'm sorry. I wish we met under different circumstances, that's all."
"These are the only circumstances I've got," he says.
"I feel guilty," she says.
"Don't be such a woman," he says. "We should go out—it's obvious."
Agnes puts her foot up on the bars. "I feel disrespectful to Barbara."
He looks irritated. "I'm selfish. I'm not thinking about anyone but me. And I want to fuck you."
They stand silently for a moment. Someone walks with a heavy step on the floor above.
"I'm sorry," he says. "I'm being a jerk. I'm forgetting that it's all real. Someone actually died. For cops, it's like a show. Special effects. I don't even notice the smells anymore. I forget your friend just died."
Agnes wants him so much that she could cry.
Detective Diaz pokes his head into the room. He coughs politely. "Tommy, Razumovsky needs to see you ASAP."
Tommy actually sniffles a little. "He's probably heard about my new interrogation skills. From now on, I'm going to be the most single-minded cop on the force. I plan to have half this city confessing to me. Come along, Miss Travertine. The game is afoot. There are Pinboys at large."
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The translator, an old professor of Irish Literature from Fordham University, listens to the tape from Barbara's answering machine. He lays a finger thoughtfully beside his scone of a nose.
"It is Gaelic," he says. "Very poorly spoken."
"What's he saying?" Tommy says.
"Eader Caiseal agus Ur-choill a casadh domh an cuilin/'Si a' teacht go ciuin fa mo choinne sa rod," he sings in a quavering tenor. "It's the first two lines of a very old song called Donald O'Mullen."
"What is it in English?"
Enjoying the moment, he sings again. "Between Caiseal and Urshoill I came upon a maiden/Coming quietly and steadily towards me on the road...." Do you want to hear the rest?"
"Yes."
"And by the hair I caught her and upon the dew I laid her/ And left her there crying with her eyes full of tears."
Agnes and Tommy exchange a knowing look.
Later on, Tommy takes Agnes to the basement of the precinct. The officers have fashioned a makeshift staff lounge. Ancient file cabinets sit three-deep in a corner. Agnes sees office equipment in disrepair, a uniform rack held together with duct tape, a punching bag, some free weights and a card table. The pipes come to life every time someone upstairs flushes a toilet.
Agnes wants to know as much about the investigation as Tommy can tell her. He goes through the reports with her. Blue woolen fibers, possibly from a rug of high quality, were found near both bodies, as well as traces of mud. The silica content and PH indicate that the soil is of a type found at or near the southernmost shore areas of the city: Coney Island, Manhattan and Brighton Beaches, the Rockaways. Fingerprints: Agnes's have turned up all over the place, including on the brick of puff pastry sitting in Barbara's freezer. There are several useless partials, which might belong to the Pinboy.
Detective Diaz joins them. Agnes is relieved to see him. Tommy seems relieved, too. They are not comfortable alone together. When Diaz is around he is the show. He never stops spouting off. His good humor seems boundless. He is profoundly shallow, and happily so.
Diaz carries a shopping bag. "You know, I still didn't believe you about the hole in the bedsheet. I had to find out for myself."
"It's true," says Tommy. "What's the big deal? Is it any stranger than fish on Friday?"
"Yes it is," says Diaz. "And I want to show you something."
He goes behind the boiler and wheels over a human skeleton.
"I know I shouldn't have done it," says Diaz, "but I lifted one of Rabbi Bloch's bedsheets."
Tommy shakes his head. "What a dope."
"I had to see for myself," says Diaz. From the shopping bag he takes out a blue striped bedsheet, which he drapes over the skeleton's skull. He adjusts the sheet and, sure enough, a circular hole lines up with the skeleton's crotch.
"Isn't that amazing?" says Diaz. He rubs his chin thoughtfully. "But here's the most amazing part."
He turns the skeleton around. There is a second hole, placed right where the anus would be.
"I had no idea," says Diaz.
He can't contain himself any longer. He roars with laughter at his elaborate joke. His pleasure is infectious. Agnes and Tommy laugh as well. Agnes can't stop herself. There is a strange, shrieking quality to her laughter.
"I like her," Diaz tells Tommy.
After Diaz leaves, Agnes feels cold and spent. She drapes someone's uniform jacket over her shoulders.
Why did she feel she had the right to laugh? Diaz is just stupid, and she's every bit his equal.
"I want to see the photographs," says Tommy.
"Come on, Agnes."
"I want to see them"
He opens the envelope with the crime scene pictures. "They'll give you nightmares."
"I don't care."
He hands her the envelope, but doesn't release his grip.
"It's too late to be good to Barbara, you know," he says. "You get no more points from the Friendship Police for torturing yourself now."
"I'll take my chances," she says, pulling the envelope away.
"One more thing," he says. "There's no such thing as the Friendship Police."
Chapter Twenty-Nine
When the Greenpoint waterfront was flourishing, there was heavy trade with the Far East in coffee and spices. The street names reflect this: Java Street, India Street, Myrrh Lane. Constantinople Avenue exists for a mere block; the sign is nearly as long as the street.
Bezel trudges through the snow. He hates it, but if he doesn't exercise his bad leg it starts to hurt. He moves slowly down Luther Street. He carries a quart of milk, six eggs, two cans of chili and an apple. The onion domes of the Greek Orthodox Church shine like rockets in the sun. Across the street are the abandoned Brooklyn-Pratt works of the Socony-Vacuum Oil Company, and an old ironworks. They're demolishing the ironworks and building something on the site, but Bezel doesn't know what.
On the corner of Greenpoint Avenue stands a pawnshop. The disagreeable old man who ran the place recently died, and the new owner is a darting little fellow from Columbia named Luis. Bezel has already pawned and reclaimed several items from him. Luis is very chatty, very enthusiastic. He has cleaned the place up so it looks like something. When he heard Bezel's accent he wanted to discuss London, where he once lived. Luis has a great fondness for London. He likes the clean subway and the allowances he received for having children.
"Fifty pounds," he told Bezel. "Each!"
Unfortunately, the topic of London has been exhausted, and now the only thing Luis will talk about is Columbia. He is always showing Bezel newspaper cuttings about the arrests of Columbian drug lords or the exploits of Columbian baseball players or, most often, the latest visit by the Pope. The fucking Pope is always in Columbia. Bezel wonders if they've moved the bleeding Vatican.
Luis is outside the pawnshop. He hops from foot to foot in the cold. He watches the demolition of the ironworks. When he sees Bezel his face lights up.
"What a thing!" he says to Bezel. He points to the construction activity, then ticks off the components of the project on his fingers. "Offices, shopping center, condominiums, four movie theaters—unbelievable!"
Bezel takes in the tatty surroundings. "Here?"
"You better believe it," says Luis. He vanishes into the shop and returns with a cutting from the Times that looks a hundred years old but is actually from yesterday's paper. He's probably shown it to half of Greenpoint. The article is all about something called the Upper Greenpoint Avenue Development Corporation.
"They're giving tax breaks so companies will move here," Luis synopsizes. "Ron Wegeman, man
—unbelievable! Look—this is one artist's conception of what it will look like. Beautiful, no?"
He shows Bezel the drawing. Bezel looks at fountains and plazas and things that look like twenty-story ice trays.
"They had to do something," says Luis ruefully, gesturing toward the ironworks. "All kinds of scum were living in there. But soon"—his eyes shine like Krugerrands as he rubs his palms together—"nice and clean."
Agnes Among the Gargoyles Page 14
