The Blacker Death: An Ebola Thriller

by Larry Enright

  “He said he found a hotel nearby, but I’ll ask him.”

  “All right, kid. I’ve got to get going. Be good and no banging the nurses.”

  Dr. Williamson stopped me by the elevator and handed me an envelope with a packet of papers inside. “Mr. Driscoll said you were nowhere near the deceased, but I want you to read through these anyway. It’s important information on the disease. There’s also a digital thermometer in there. I want you to take your temperature twice a day. If it’s 100° or more, call me.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Try to keep your distance from people for the time being. Especially avoid any intimate contact. If you experience any of the symptoms, if you even think you might be experiencing them, call me. My cell number is on the top sheet. This isn’t a trivial matter.”

  I took the packet. “Okay, Doc. I get it. How many rooms have you got here in the Hotel California?”

  “Just this one.”

  “So, if I come down with it, you’ll ship me off to Philly?”

  He shook his head. “They’re already at capacity. We’d set up something for you here.”

  “What if more people turn up on your doorstep with symptoms?”

  “We’re trying our best not to let that happen.”

  I handed him the list with the names and numbers of the people who had been at the scene. There were twelve of them. “You might want to cancel your afternoon tee time,” I said. “These people were with the guy when we found him.”

  The doctor looked at the list. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. The wrinkles on his forehead did all the talking for him. I told him I’d see him later. I took the elevator down to the garage, found the Gremlin, and left.

  It’s hard not to think about dying when death is staring you in the face. Billy was just a kid. He didn’t deserve this. Nobody does. The more I thought about it, the madder I got, and by the time I’d pulled into the parking lot at the Six, I decided I was going to find out what the hell that guy with Ebola was doing at the hotel.

  The Six, that’s what we call 600 Arch Street in Philadelphia, our field office. We share the building with IRS and the Secret Service. It’s right across from the Federal Reserve Bank. I think I’ve spent more time at the Six than I have at home. Ask my ex. She’ll tell you that’s why we broke up. She wanted someone who could be there more than once in a while. That wasn’t me. Never will be.

  When I got to my desk, it was before 3:00 p.m., so I made a few phone calls. The first was to a buddy of mine at West Detectives. If anyone knew what was going on with the stiff, it was Detective Jimmy Barnes.

  “Jimmy,” I said, when he answered the phone. “It’s me, Bam.”

  “Hey, Bam. Long time no see. Still humping sheep in South Jersey?”

  “Nah, I’ve moved up the food chain to larger mammals.”

  “I hate to do this, brother, but can I call you back later? I’m up to my elbows in shit here.”

  “Just a quick question.”

  “Okay. Shoot.”

  “Have you ID’d the stiff from the Hyatt?”

  “That’s the shit I’m wading around in. His name is François Birot. He’s Belgium’s head guy at the U.N.”

  “What was he doing in Philly?”

  “Sorry, man. You said one question, and I’ve really got to go.”

  “No problem. Thanks, Jimmy.”

  “Hey, sorry about Billy.”

  “He’s not dead yet,” I said.

  “I’ll call you later, okay? Let’s have a drink and catch up.”

  “You got it.”

  My next call was to my college roommate at Penn, Tom Stalter. He’d gone on to become a heart surgeon, then got tired of looking inside sick people and took a job with the CDC a few years back. I hadn’t seen him since he moved to Atlanta, but I still had his cell number.

  “It’s me, Tom,” I said, when he picked up.

  “Bam? Is that you?”

  “Yeah. How’s it going?”

  “I’m doing good. What’s up?”

  “I don’t know. You tell me.”

  “Are you calling about what’s going on in Philadelphia?”

  “That’s right. Can you talk?”

  “Not on the record.”

  “I don’t care if it’s on or off. They’re holding my partner in isolation right now.”

  “Sorry, compadre. We won’t know anything until the blood and tissue samples arrive.”

  “How long till you will know something?”

  “A few days, less to rule out the usual suspects. We’re fast-tracking this one.”

  “A few days?”

  “I know. It seems like forever, but you have to understand our position. First, the man is already dead. Second, we’ve gotten some serious egg on our face lately with procedural lapses, and reporting a false positive would destroy what’s left of our credibility. We’re going all out on this one, Bam: real-time PCR assay, ELISA testing. They’re even setting up a lab to isolate the virus.”

  “I don’t know what the hell you just said, but it sounds like you guys think it’s the real deal.”

  The line seemed to go dead for a second before Tom said, “Yes, we do.”

  “What do I tell Billy?”

  “I don’t know, Bam.”

  “What are his odds?”

  “If he’s got it, not good. The World Health Organization puts the official mortality rate at ninety percent, but that’s without proper care, and it’s based on historical numbers. We’ve gotten better at this since the seventies, so Billy’s chances are not that bad, but not by much.”

  “Would you give him fifty-fifty?”

  The deep exhale on the other end of the phone told me everything I needed to know about Billy’s odds of making it.

  “Thanks, Tom. Will you call me when you know something?”

  “Sure, Bam. Will do.”

  “Okay, see you around.”

  I waited until Tom hung up and slammed the phone down. I don’t like feeling helpless. Never have. I picked up the phone again and got the operator, who connected me with procurement. I ordered a thirty-six inch flat-screen TV and a laptop to be delivered to Billy, and asked the guy in charge down there to set it up with the hospital for Billy to get connected to cable and the Internet. I gave him a purchase order number and told him to charge it to Fink. It was almost 3:00 p.m., so I headed for the interrogation room, itching for a fight.

  Carmine and his lawyer were inside with Fink and Roberts, our chief interrogator. Roberts had worked in the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office before coming over to us. As a former prosecutor, she knew what questions to ask to get what she wanted. She didn’t bully. She didn’t coerce. She just asked politely and let the facts do their work. I closed the door behind me and sat down next to her.

  “Okay, everyone’s here,” said Fink. “Let’s get started.”

  Carmine’s mouthpiece tried to take over the discussion right off the bat. “These charges are ridiculous, Agent Fink.”

  “Mr. Grasso, this is Special Agent Matthews,” said Roberts. “He was the arresting officer. Agent Matthews, this is Mr. Grasso. He’s representing the four detainees.”

  “Nice to meet you,” I said.

  Grasso ignored me and went after Fink again. I guess he smelled blood on the weak link in the chain. “I’ll have your badge for this, Fink. Illegal search and seizure, harassment, ethnic profiling…”

  Roberts stepped in again. “This conversation is being recorded and anything you or your client says can be used as evidence in any subsequent trial. Is that clear, Mr. Grasso?”

  “Yes, perfectly,” he replied, sitting back in his seat.

  Roberts one. Grasso zip.

  She looked at Carmine. “Mr. DiPasquale, do you understand?”

  “Yeah, whatever,” he shrugged.

  “That’s a good look for you, Carmine,” I said, pointing to his orange jumpsuit. If looks could kill, Fink would have been under arrest right then fo
r my murder.

  Carmine gave me a quick chin flick.

  “I’m sorry you missed your show,” I continued. He looked at me like I was talking gibberish. “Maybe they’ll give you a refund on the tickets if you tell them why you couldn’t make it.”

  The light bulb finally turned on in Tree Trunk’s thick skull. “Fuck you,” he said.

  Grasso shook his head at Carmine to keep him from saying any more. “No more questions, no more chitchat until we straighten this out,” Grasso said.

  Carmine scowled at him, then at me. We had ourselves a good old-fashioned stare-down.

  Roberts opened the file on the table in front of her. “In Pennsylvania, it’s a third-degree felony to carry a concealed weapon without a permit. Penalties include a fine of up to $15,000, up to seven years in prison, or both. For your reference, counselor, that’s Pennsylvania Revised Statue 18. Your clients will be charged with violating this statute.”

  “It was harassment and an illegal search.”

  “Nevertheless, that will be the charge when your client goes before the judge Monday morning,” said Roberts.

  “That’s it?” Grasso asked.

  “Unless there’s something else you want to tell us about, Carmine,” I said.

  “Fuck you,” Carmine said.

  “Didn’t your mother ever tell you that it’s not nice to talk like that?”

  “And fuck your little dog too.”

  “My little dog’s ex-Philly PD. I’d stack him up against you any day, pal.”

  Tree Trunk was pissed and Grasso couldn’t stop him. “This is bullshit,” he said, pointing a meaty finger at me. His hands looked naked without all that jewelry. “You were fucking harassing us at the Nineteen, Matthews. You violated my civil rights.”

  “Your civil rights? Do you even know what that means, you prick?”

  Fink tried, but there was no way he was going to stop me.

  “I was hungry,” I said. “I stopped in for lunch. I asked you what was good. You recommended the Crab Cake Benedict, remember? It was great, by the way. I ate yours. I didn’t think you’d mind. Then one thing led to another. That’s not harassment, just good conversation gone bad.”

  “Bullshit. You came there looking for me. You knew I was from Brooklyn.”

  “I hate to tell you, buddy, but your accent is a dead giveaway.”

  “Yeah? How’d you know about Tony?”

  “Tony? Who’s Tony?” I was playing him like a banjo in the Mummer’s Day parade.

  “Garotto,” he said. “Anthony Garotto.”

  “Oh, that Tony. The mobster. The lowlife you work for?”

  When a Tree Trunk falls in the forest and nobody’s around, does it make a sound? I can tell you, it makes a hell of a racket when somebody is around. Carmine started f-bombing that it was entrapment, that I had tricked him, that I was a scumbag, and that he would get me for it. And we were getting it all on tape.

  Grasso finally stood up. “This interview is over. My client has nothing further to say.”

  “He’s pretty much said it all,” I replied.

  Fink buzzed for the guards and they took Carmine and his mouthpiece away.

  “You just can’t keep your big mouth shut, can you?” Fink said to me.

  “I thought it went pretty well.”

  “Baiting a suspect on the record with his lawyer present? That’s not helpful.”

  “What did you expect from me?”

  “I expected nothing from you. I expected to hear Roberts conducting the interrogation.”

  “Well, you expected nothing and that’s what you got. Why didn’t you say anything to them about the murder?”

  “There’s no point in saying anything until we’ve got our act together. You should know that.”

  “We’ve already asked the D.A. to go for the maximum sentence on the weapons offense and request no bail because of the flight risk,” Roberts said. “That will give us more time to collect and process the murder evidence.”

  I liked Roberts. She was a stand-up kind of girl trying to make it in a testosterone-filled boy’s club.

  “Did anyone show up to claim the body?” I asked.

  “No,” Fink replied. “Gyro had no wife or kids. He had a business partner, but he didn’t want anything to do with the body and wouldn’t talk to us.”

  “Do you want me to lean on him a little?”

  “I don’t want you leaning on anyone.”

  “Okay. What have we got so far?” I asked.

  Roberts slid the file over to Fink, and he read from it. “DiPasquale, Carmine Anthony. Age thirty-seven. Born, Brooklyn, New York. Dropped out of high school at age fifteen when he was arrested for assault. He nearly beat a student to death over a cigarette. He was held at Rikers Island for three months before they released him to the custody of his parents. We think that’s where he met someone who hooked him up with Garotto. When he got out of jail, he started running numbers for one of Garotto’s boys. His parents died when he was sixteen. Murdered.”

  “Tough way to grow up fast,” I said.

  “Don’t feel too sorry for him. He was charged with the murders, but released when the one and only witness disappeared.”

  “And they never found him?”

  “They found him, all right. In the East River.” Fink went back to the report. “He graduated to muscle, worked his way up the ladder, and now he’s a top lieutenant in Garotto’s organization. Plenty of arrests, no convictions.”

  “This doesn’t make sense. Carmine doesn’t have the brains to broker a deal. Why would Garotto send him down here if it wasn’t to whack Gyro?”

  “Maybe it was a hostile takeover,” said Roberts.

  “Of a two-bit operation in Northeast Philly?” I said. “Why?”

  “The intel said they were working their way slowly into a new area to avoid heat. It’s happened before, Bam.”

  “I don’t know, Roberts. It doesn’t smell right.”

  “Our informant said it was a business deal,” said Fink. “We have no reason to believe otherwise.”

  “We’ll see. What else have you got?”

  Fink continued, “The toxicology results won’t be back until next week, but the medical examiner said it’s not your typical heroin overdose case. There were no needle marks anywhere on his body except where the syringe was hanging off his arm. No skin discoloration. No signs of abnormal enlargement of any internal organs. They’ll be testing the liver and kidneys, but he doesn’t think they’ll find the usual evidence of a long-term addict. There was no sign of a struggle, plenty of prints though. We’re processing them now.”

  “So, it’s murder. We knew that already.”

  “The ME’s not willing to go that far, at least not yet. It could have been Gyro’s first time shooting up. Maybe he didn’t know what he was doing, how much he was taking.”

  “Yeah, right. He didn’t read the heroin dealer owner’s manual.”

  “It does happen,” Roberts said. “People get curious and do stupid things.”

  She was right. People do stupid things.

  “What about the security cameras?” I said. “They cover all the common areas.”

  Fink slid a copy of a floor plan over to me.

  “We’ve got Gyro entering and leaving his room,” he said. “We’ve got him walking to the stairwell, and that’s it. We found him in that office right there, 1105,” he pointed, “next to the stairs. There are no cameras on the stairs and the one on eleven above the exit door was spray-painted black.”

  “Did you find the paint can?”

  “Not yet.”

  “What about Carmine? Do you have footage of him?”

  “We’ve got him and his men entering the elevator in the lobby, and we’ve got them getting off on eighteen and going to their room. They left the room a few minutes later and took the stairs. We don’t know if they went up or down. There are no cameras on nineteen and the one on eleven is out of service.”

  “Why no c
ameras on nineteen?”

  “The manager said they had gotten complaints from the restaurant patrons and people who rent out the space for wedding receptions so they had them removed.”

  “How long?”

  “How long what?”

  “How long between when they left the room and showed up at the restaurant?”

  “We’re still trying to nail that down. We’ve got the time-stamp on the footage, but the waiter wasn’t sure and the hostess had no idea. It could be anywhere from five to forty-five minutes.”

  “Did you interview the cook?”

  “The cook?”

  “Yeah, the cook. Maybe no one else in that place keeps track of time, but he’ll know exactly how long it takes to make Crab Cake Benedict, and I can tell you when it was delivered. We can narrow it down from there. I put it on the company card, by the way.”

  Roberts cleared her throat to keep from laughing while Fink jotted down the note.

  “What about the flower?” I asked.

  “He said he doesn’t remember any flower,” said Fink. “The lab boys are doubtful we can come up with anything to tie it to him.”

  “Did Gyro have a cell phone?”

  “He did. His call log showed one incoming call. We tracked it down. It’s a house phone in the hotel lobby.”

  “Any footage covering the house phones?”

  “No.”

  “So, we’ve got opportunity but no motive, and nothing but circumstantial evidence so far?” I said.

  “Pretty much,” Fink replied.

  “What about the tickets?”

  “What tickets?”

  “He said they were in town to catch a show. Did he have any tickets on him?”

  Fink looked down the inventory sheet and shook his head. “Not on them, and not on the list of room contents.”

  “Did you find their car?”

  “No car.”

  “Maybe you should have someone call around to see if they had tickets waiting for them at the door.”

  “What’s the big deal about the tickets?”

  “Did they have any luggage?”

  “No, they didn’t,” Fink said.

  “So, no play tickets to the play they were going to see, no bags for the night they were spending at the hotel, and only one room for four guys. Makes perfect sense to me.”