1929 Book 4 - Drifter

by ML Gardner

  “I said, Aryl Sullivan and his wife, Claire. Ava and Claire don’t have records so I can’t tell you their maiden names—are you okay, Detective Sloan?”

  “Fine,” I said. This is how people must feel when they’ve learned they’ve inherited thousands of dollars. I had hit the jackpot. I rubbed my stomach. My guts may have exploded, but damn if they weren’t always right. I was tempted to jump up and shout “I knew it! I knew the bastards were connected!” But I didn’t. Instead, I tried to control the excited tremor in my voice.

  “I really appreciate the time you’ve taken with me. And I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask one more favor. I need you to tell me everything, in excruciating detail, about these people. I cannot tell you how important it is.”

  It was then I saw the hesitation in his face.

  “Is something wrong, Detective Goodwin?”

  He closed the file and clasped his hands over it. “This doesn’t have anything to do with Kimberly Weiss, does it?”

  There was no use lying. “No.”

  “Would you like to tell me what it is about?”

  “I’m afraid that’s confidential.”

  He laughed. “Isn’t everything? Seriously, Sloan. Tell me the reason you’re here and I’ll see what I can do to help you.”

  “I’m a little confused. A few minutes ago you were spewing information about these people. Now your lips are sealed.”

  My wheels were turning so fast, so many ideas and possibilities that I hardly knew which theory to entertain. We had a dead man’s wallet, a missing criminal who was related to one of his friends, cops getting killed monthly back in Boston and a New York detective who turned cold real quick. Somehow, somehow, they were all connected.

  “Unless I know more, or you have a court order, I’m afraid this is where our conversation ends.” He stood, telling me he was serious. I could feel eyes on me and turned, seeing a man staring at me through the plate glass of the door.

  “Is there anywhere we can go, Detective Goodwin? To talk privately?” I asked, keeping my back turned to the man outside the door.

  He raised his voice far too loud for me to be the only one intended to hear him.

  “Why don’t I show you back to the train station, Detective Sloan. Let’s get you back to Boston.”

  ***

  We walked along quietly and not in a rush. Just as my shoulder twitched, Goodwin spoke.

  “Don’t bother to look over your shoulder. We’re being followed. I assure you.”

  “By who?”

  “My partner.”

  “What kind of precinct do you guys run here?”

  He smiled. “It’s complicated. But I promise, I’m one of the good guys.”

  “Well, lucky for me.”

  “Not only am I one of the good guys, I’m good. I haven’t survived this long without being so. I noticed how your face changed when I said the name Aryl Sullivan. Suddenly you wanted to know everything about these people. But when you walked into my office, you wanted to know about Daniel Bellamy. You didn’t know anything about Garrett and Jenkins. So why don’t you tell me how one relates to the other.”

  “I didn’t know that they did. Not for sure, until today.”

  “I don’t suppose promising confidentiality would change anything?”

  “There’s no way you can promise that and you know it.”

  “I might,” he said, “Does this have anything to do with Victor Drayton.”

  “Never heard of him.”

  “Well, if it doesn’t involve him, then I can keep this whole conversation confidential.”

  “Why would that matter?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “Isn’t it always?” I asked. “We have a decent walk ahead of us. Why don’t you fill me in?”

  “It’s not nearly long enough a walk, Sloan, sorry.”

  “Or perhaps you don’t trust me? After all, if your own partner is following you, something tells me trust is hard to come by around here.”

  “You got that right. About how it is around here. Not that I don’t trust you. I knew everything about you before you stepped off that train.”

  “From Harris? When he told you I was coming?”

  Goodwin nodded slowly. “And if you were trying to get information out of me, my partner wouldn’t be following me, now would he? He’d just sit back and wait for the report.”

  “Why would I try to get information out of you? Information about what?”

  The look on his face began to frustrate me. “Let me guess, it’s complicated.”

  “I can make it real simple. Stay away from Victor Drayton. You say this has nothing to do with him, but if it has to do with those other people, Garrett and Jenkins, it has to do with him, trust me.”

  “Why Garrett and Jenkins? Why not Sullivan?”

  “Because he’s dead.”

  I touched the wallet, his wallet, that I carried everywhere.

  “Have you ever been onto something big, Goodwin…real important and you knew you were close, you just needed to get your information without answering any questions or it would compromise everything?”

  Goodwin smiled wide and glanced at me sidelong.

  “What do you think I’m doing right now?”

  “But are we onto the same thing? Maybe we can help each other out?” I asked, narrowing my eyes, slowing my pace.

  “Doubtful.”

  We continued our way down the busy street, waiting at a corner to cross.

  “We could play one for one,” I suggested.

  “What’s that?”

  “Well, it’s where we don’t ask any direct questions but give one small piece of information in exchange for another. Only what we’re comfortable sharing. We might walk away with what we need without giving up too much.”

  He didn’t look like it was a good idea.

  “I just need to know that we aren’t onto the same thing. I don’t care about Victor Drayton or why your partner is following you. But I need this bust. Personally, I need it. I don’t know if you can understand that.”

  His eyes floated over the crowd. He wasn’t searching for anyone. “I know exactly what you mean.”

  “Then I’ll start. I know Aryl Sullivan is dead. I think someone is using his identity. Or was using it.”

  “The cop killer in Boston?”

  “No questions, Goodwin. Your turn.”

  “Victor Drayton knew all of those people I listed.”

  “Are you telling me that’s somehow connected to Aryl’s death?”

  “No questions,” he said with a grin.

  I stopped, leaned against a street sign and put my hand to my side, not entirely pretending to have a stitch. I hadn’t walked this much in over a month and my scar was pulling from the inside. I put on an exaggerated wince for Goodwin’s partner, who stopped as well about a block back, pretending to be window shopping.

  “Back home partners trust each other,” I said.

  Goodwin turned, putting his back to the wind and conveniently, his spying partner. “Maybe back home, detectives aren’t so susceptible to bribes,” he said, lighting a cigarette with his eyebrows arched.

  “Well, I can take that as you or him,” I said, grinning. “It’s a coin toss at this point.”

  “I,” he said with emphasis, “Have earned every cent I have ever brought home.”

  “Well, that narrows it down to him, then, doesn’t it. You got a spare?” I asked.

  He shimmied one out of the pack and held it out to me. “We’d better not sit here too long.”

  “Just long enough for an old man to catch his breath. That’s what you can tell him, anyway,” I said, inconspicuously nodding to his partner who was studying crystal glasses in a store window case.

  “You’ll have to do better than that. What are you, forty?” Goodwin asked.

  My smile dropped. “Thirty-five.”

  “Oh, sorry.”

  “You?”

  “Forty-two.”


  Well, wasn’t that just peachy. And I wanted to like this guy, too. Bastard didn’t look a day over thirty.

  “My favorite color is blue and I take my whiskey neat. Why don’t we stop getting to know each other and get back to our game?” I asked with annoyance.

  “I believe I volunteered the last piece of information.”

  “Your age hardly counts,” I said, with a hard flick of the cigarette.

  We continued on toward the train station, slower. I threw in a sedate limp for our audience behind.

  What the hell. Either I’d get something I could really use or I’d be back to square one. At least I was familiar with that particular spot. My gut told me Goodwin was a good guy. And truth was, as much as I wanted to bust this open solo, I wasn’t going to get anywhere without Goodwin’s help.

  “I have reason to believe that Daniel Bellamy is using Aryl Sullivan’s identity.”

  He stared at me, wanting to ask questions, waiting for more.

  “I don’t know that they are connected to the cop killings. All the evidence tells me they are not.”

  Okay, so I might have stretched the truth a little there. But I couldn’t risk this guy sniffing out my leads and stealing my glory.

  “But your gut tells you they are.”

  “If they are…” I stopped, turning to him. “I think it should be someone from Boston to make the bust.”

  He nodded in agreement and glanced at a shop window, not to view the merchandise, but to watch the angled glass. Determining how close his partner was.

  “I know where they are,” he said, growing serious. “And I’ll tell you, if you promise me you won’t seek out Victor Drayton. He’s my special bust. You don’t touch it, alright?”

  And suddenly we were spilling secrets like girls in a bathroom.

  “Deal.”

  “Technically we aren’t on the same trail,” he continued. “But they are close enough that the paths could cross. I can’t risk that happening. So I’ll tell you where they are if you promise to stay away from Drayton. Don’t mention his name, don’t seek him out. Because honestly, after Aryl died, he doesn’t have anything to do with what you’re looking for.”

  Childishly, I crossed the fingers in my pocket and agreed with a nod.

  “They’re in Rockport, Massachusetts. I don’t have addresses. Not handy. But I can warn you that if you go poking around blindly, you’ll get thrown out on your ass. They aren’t too friendly to outsiders. Go in as an old school buddy. You just heard the news.”

  “That’s a bit of a stretch, don’t you think? Unless I’ve been living under a rock. It’s been nearly four months.”

  “Not so much. You see, the papers originally reported that Jonathan Garrett died. It was his boat, the Ava-Maura that went down. But he wasn’t on the boat that day. There’s a little start up paper called the Rockport Review that found the error and made a correction. The bigger papers ran a similar correction recently on the first of October. So, no. It’s not that much of a stretch that you just found out Aryl died. Since the rest of the world just did, too.”

  “I don’t suppose you could afford me one question?” I asked.

  “You can ask, I can’t promise I’ll answer.”

  “You know why I want to find Daniel Bellamy. The connection I’m assuming with Aryl Sullivan. I came here with my lips sealed and a damn good plan. But you’re right. You’re good. You got me to show all my cards and I am going on good faith that you aren’t going to get on the phone as soon as you get back and spill everything I’ve got.”

  “I won’t do that.”

  “Then tell me why Victor Drayton is your special bust?”

  Talk about a gut wrenching expression. He looked damn near in pain. Almost writhing with the decision.

  “He ruined my best friend,” he said finally.

  “Financially?”

  “No. Personally. The guy watching us, the guy who follows me and knows where I live, where my wife sleeps…the one that would kill me in a second if he knew I knew…” Goodwin shoved his hands in his pockets. “I’ll just leave his name out of it, if it’s all the same. But he used to be a real good guy. My best friend and a top notch detective with strong ethics.

  “Then we started looking into some insurance fraud having to do with Drayton. Suddenly, while the rest of the world is eating potatoes and trying to scrape together two pennies, his wife shows up at the Christmas party in a new fur coat. He throws one hell of a New Years party and his suits start to get real nice.

  “It didn’t take long for me to figure out that Drayton’s paying him off and even less time to find proof.”

  “That’s a lot of trouble for Drayton to go to for insurance fraud. Wouldn’t it have been cheaper to hire an attorney?”

  “If that’s all it was. But the more I dig, the more I find. That was just the tip of the iceberg. My partner stays busy covering trails, muddling files and trying to throw the rest of us off Drayton’s scent. When Victor’s wife turned up missing, my partner turned up with a new car. A Packard.”

  My face popped in surprise. “Drayton’s wife is missing?”

  “Dead, most likely.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “No. But that’s not my main concern. I want Drayton. Alive. I want him to confess to everything. Including ruining my friend with his filthy money.”

  “But your partner might go to prison.”

  I began to feel like we’d loitered too long. I could feel Goodwin’s nameless partner’s eyes burning my back. And Goodwin had stopped sharing abruptly when I pointed out the obvious.

  I stopped at the steps of the train station.

  “I want to thank you, Detective Goodwin, for all your help.”

  “I hope it did help.”

  “More than you know. I wish I could have done the same for you.”

  “Well, there’s something you might do, in the future.”

  “What’s that?”

  “If you hear anything about Victor, anything in your wanderings, could you give me a ring?”

  “Of course.”

  “Only me. No one else.”

  “Yes. Only you.”

  “And if I hear anything about Daniel Bellamy you will be the first person I call,” he promised in return.

  “Or Aryl Sullivan.”

  “Aryl’s dead.”

  I smiled.

  “Oh, right,” he said. “If anyone uses his name.”

  “Right. Take care, Detective Goodwin.”

  I turned into the train station and waited until he walked away. Then I slipped out the side door. I wasn’t quite ready to leave New York.

  ***

  “Richard, where have you been?!” Maggie screeched as I set my bag down. She flew across the room at me and boy was she lit. “Tell me right now, where were you?”

  “I was out of town, following leads like I told you.”

  “You’re lying. They were here. The Captain was here. Fred and Felix, too. No one knew where you were! We thought…” She clamped her hand over her mouth, her eyes were pained. “We thought the cop killer got you,” she finished in a choke.

  I dropped my head. “I’m so sorry, Maggie. I should have called.”

  “Captain’s had someone stopping by today on the hour to see if you’re home.”

  “Alright, I’ll…I’ll go talk to him now.”

  “No need. They’ll be back any minute.”

  Well wasn’t this a pretty pickle. I had to pull off one hell of a lie but my problem was, one lie wouldn’t fit all. If I told Cap I was in New York following a lead on Kimberly, like I’d told Maggie, he’d know it was a lie since I came back with nothing new. Hell, I didn’t even have her file, Fred did. I had to come up with an entirely new story, and quick, and keep it from Maggie.

  She was right. I didn’t have to wait long. The impatient knock on the door didn’t cease until I opened it.

  Captain’s face froze and then fell. “You’re here.” Fred stood next to
him, looking relieved to see me. Two uniformed officers stood behind them. And they didn’t look happy.

  “I am. What’s going on?” I asked, looking between the two of them.

  “Where’ve you been, Sloan?”

  “Why?”

  “Will you step outside, please?”

  “Sure.” I stepped outside slowly, thinking furiously of a lie and closed the door behind me. Suddenly the two officers grabbed me and pressed me against the door. Next thing I know I’m cuffed, being dragged to the car and the Captain is reading me my rights. Arresting me for yesterday’s murder of Officer Adam Lawrence.

  ***

  When you’re a suspected cop killer, life is hell. When you’re a detective suspected of being a cop killer, it’s a bit rougher. I was alone in a cell for three days before anyone would tell me what was going on. When they brought me to a room for questioning, officers I’d worked with for nearly ten years treated me like dirt. They pushed me along the hall and shoved me in a chair. When Captain emerged from the door, he looked like he wanted to spit on me.

  “I’ll give you one chance to tell me where you were, Sloan.”

  “I was in New York,” I said. Putting my cuffed hands on the table in front of me. “This is nuts. How can you think that I’m the cop killer, Cap?”

  “I have my reasons. When did you leave for New York?”

  “Two days ago.”

  “Do you have a train ticket?”

  “I threw it out.”

  “Convenient. Where’d you throw it?”

  “In the last garbage can to the left, just before the doors at the station here in Boston.”

  “And if I were to send Fred there to dig through the trash, he’d find a ticket with your name on it?”

  “I used my father’s name.”

  “Why?”

  I stared stubbornly ahead.

  “What were you doing there?”

  I sat back with a thud. I wasn’t going to give up my theory. They could not feed me for a week if they wanted, but no amount of hunger was going to make me give up all my hard work. My one shot at doing something great. I was so close. So very close. I just needed to get to Rockport. I had to use the only thing I had.

  “I was looking into a lead on the Weiss case.”