Rescued

by David Rosenfelt

  I do know how Willie gets, and I’m not surprised he’s made this decision. Once we get dogs, Willie sees them as being under his protection, and he wants to be in charge of which families they go to. It’s an attitude and approach that I admire.

  “Fine with me,” I say.

  “Good. We should be ready to get started in about a week.”

  Willie and Sondra like to get to know a dog before they adopt him or her out. They want to make sure each dog gets with the right family, and for that, they need to know the personalities.

  I bring Tara with me because she loves to meet and play with new friends. I don’t bring Sebastian because he is asleep and snoring. When Sebastian is sleeping so soundly that he snores, it would take a marching band armed with Tasers to shake him awake.

  It may sound weird, but I always find it somehow refreshing to spend time at the foundation. It’s a hopeful place, in that all the inhabitants are about to start a new life, with a great attitude and wagging tails. I like being a part of that.

  By the time I get home, Hike is there with the lists, and Laurie is already looking at them. I join in and catch up quickly.

  The least promising part of the lists, at a quick glance, are those that Kramer feels might have a grudge against him. Many of them are from years ago, when he worked as a cop. A lesser number are not current, which raises the same issue as the one with Zimmer … why would they have waited?

  But each one has to be investigated because the one we don’t examine will be the guilty party. We divide the groups up; some go to me, and others to Laurie and Marcus. All of them will also go to Sam Willis, to dig up whatever background material he can through his online exploits.

  We’ve got a huge hill to climb, but at least we have identified the hill.

  That’s a start.

  Since every name and case will be investigated, there’s no compelling reason to prioritize.

  So we’re going to put our heads down, go down the lists, and check out each item, one at a time. There’s no sense having a bias about what might be important until we know more about them all.

  That’s why I’m sitting in the office of Carol Kvangnes, the head of HR for a midsize office products manufacturer called Scandrick’s Office Supplies. Her company employed Kramer on a worker’s compensation case, and he listed her as the contact.

  Scandrick’s takes up two floors of a six-story office building in Elizabeth. The offices are unimpressive and the furniture fairly nondescript; it’s my guess they don’t use this location as a showroom.

  Kvangnes is in her early thirties and has a knowing sort of expression on her face that announces bullshitting is unlikely to have any chance of working on her.

  “So you manufacture office furniture?” I ask. “Because I don’t see any manufacturing going on here.”

  “This is just where the back-office stuff is done. If you want to see our manufacturing plant, you go out the front gate, make a left, and go seven thousand miles.”

  “Asia?”

  She nods. “Generally. Thailand specifically.”

  “Let’s talk about Dave Kramer.”

  “Terrible about what happened,” she says. “I don’t believe it for a second.”

  “You know him well?” I ask.

  “Not really; talked to him maybe half a dozen times.”

  “So why don’t you believe it for a second?”

  She shrugs. “Yeah, maybe he did it.” And then she laughs one of those great laughs that makes you want to say funny things to prompt another.

  “He was working on a job for you?”

  “Right, checking a workers’ comp claim.”

  “But not a manufacturing accident, because that’s in Asia generally and Thailand specifically,” I say.

  “Right. This was a loading dock accident at our warehouse in Cranford. Our employee, Ralph Witherspoon, slipped and fell while loading a tractor trailer. Or so the story goes.”

  “So why did you need Kramer?”

  “We had reason to believe that Mr. Witherspoon might be exaggerating his injury, for the purpose of staying on disability for the next two thousand years.”

  “What was the injury?”

  “Hard to tell. The claim was a spinal injury, which left him confined to a wheelchair.”

  “And Kramer checked him out?”

  “He did and reported back in detail. Even took pictures.” She reaches into a folder and shows me a photograph. “Here’s one of Mr. Witherspoon leading his bowling team to victory four weeks after the accident. Shot a 227. It made us all proud.”

  “Mr. Witherspoon is no longer on disability?”

  She smiles. “And no longer employed. He might be on the professional bowlers’ tour even as we speak.”

  “So he might hold a grudge against Kramer?”

  “Unlikely. I wouldn’t imagine Kramer introduced himself; it’s not like he told him to pose for this shot. He’s a pro, and Witherspoon is obviously a dope. I doubt he knows Kramer exists.”

  “Maybe someone could have told him about Kramer? Somebody in your office?”

  She shakes her head. “No chance. I’m the only one who had that information, and I didn’t share it. Secrecy is important. If Witherspoon found out, he would have changed his behavior. I would imagine he likes disability payments even more than bowling.”

  The next stop on my “Dave Kramer, This Is Your Life” tour is Englewood.

  Brian Collier owns a deli on Grand Avenue, which he cleverly named Collier’s Deli. It’s been there for as long as I can remember, and though Brian has always been behind the counter when I’ve been there, the extent of my conversation with him has gone no further than to request he give me the leanest corned beef he has.

  He seemed eager to talk to me when I said I wanted to discuss his employment of Dave Kramer. Collier’s son, Nick, has been missing for a number of months, and he recently hired Kramer to try to find him.

  When I walk in the door, Brian immediately waves and tells his coworker to man the counter. It’s a Tuesday morning, so the place is not exactly jumping, though there are two customers being served.

  “Come on back in the office,” he says, so I walk behind the counter and follow him through a door. He asks me if I want something to drink, and though I usually say no in situations like this, I am in a deli. So I request a Dr. Brown’s Diet Cream Soda, which is at the absolute top of the soda scale.

  “That’s really something about Kramer, huh?”

  I nod. “Really something.”

  “I never would have guessed it,” he says, then shakes his head in amazement in order to demonstrate physically his verbally expressed inability to have ever guessed it.

  “Tell me about your son,” I say. “Please.”

  “Nick is a good kid; he just went down the wrong path. You know, I think life is a series of choices. You can take two kids, they can be identical in every way, but they make choices as they go along. And sometimes they are dumb choices, and sometimes they don’t even know they’re making them.” He shakes his head sadly. “But once you make them, you’re stuck with them. And they’re part of you forever.”

  “What was Nick’s choice?”

  “Drugs. But the thing about drugs is it stops becoming a choice.”

  The look on his face reflects a pain so deep it can never be dug out, no matter what ultimately happens. It hurts to watch, and as a father it scares the ever-loving shit out of me.

  “So Nick ran off?” I ask.

  He nods. “Four times. The first three times he came back; this time he didn’t. Yet. So I hired Kramer to find him.”

  “How did you hear about him?”

  “I’ve got a friend who’s a state cop; he recommended him.”

  “Did he have any luck?” Kramer’s list does not specify his actions in the case, so I doubt it.

  “I don’t know; he hadn’t reported back to me yet when this happened. I was hoping you were here to maybe give me some information.”
>
  “I wish I had some, but I don’t. You might want to hire someone else,” I say. “Even in a best case, Kramer won’t be available for a while.”

  “You know anyone?”

  I nod. “I can send you some names.”

  “My wife … his mother … thinks that it’s a mistake, that if Nick wants to come back, he’ll come back. And if he doesn’t, he won’t, no matter if we find him or not.”

  I think she’s right, but I don’t want to tell him that, because it’s none of my business. “I hope he comes back,” I say.

  As I’m leaving the deli, I look at my cell phone and see that Pete Stanton has called me. His voice mail tells me to call him back, which I do. Before I even ask him what he wanted, I ask if he’s familiar with the Nick Collier missing persons case.

  “I don’t think so,” he says. “Wait a minute, is that the son of the guy who owns the deli?”

  “Right.”

  “It’s not a missing persons case,” he says. “He’s a twenty-one-year-old adult who decided to leave. Adults have that right.”

  I know he’s correct, so I don’t push it. “You called?”

  “Yeah. I’m giving you the chance to invite me to lunch.”

  “Why would I do that?”

  “Because I’m a good conversationalist, and because this is a conversation you will be very interested in.”

  I’m already interested in it, so we make arrangements to meet at Charlie’s in an hour. When I get there, Pete is already at our table. It’s disorienting to see him in this place without a beer in front of him, but he doesn’t drink on duty.

  I no sooner get “hey, Pete” out of my mouth than he sets the ground rules for our conversation. “Who’s buying lunch?” he asks.

  “I thought we’d flip for it.”

  “Think again,” he says.

  “Okay. I’m buying.”

  “And who’s paying for burgers and beer for the rest of the natural life of Pete Stanton and Vince Sanders?”

  “Now you’re doing Vince’s dirty work?”

  “He’s a personal friend of mine.” Then he adds, pointedly, “What’s mine is his. So if I have permanent access to your money, then he has permanent access to your money.”

  “Heartwarming. Okay, I’m buying. It’s not like that changes anything.”

  “And these generous gestures have nothing to do with our upcoming conversation?”

  “Can we get to the upcoming conversation?” I ask. “Because at this rate I’m going to be buying dinner.”

  “Answer the question.”

  “Right. The generous gestures are from the pure goodness of my heart. There is no bribery involved.”

  “Glad we cleared that up. Let’s order, and then we’ll talk.”

  “We got prints from the storage rooms in the truck,” Pete says.

  As conversational starters go, this is a really good one. I don’t ask whose prints they are, because obviously that’s what Pete is here to tell me, so there’s no sense delaying things.

  “There were prints from six different people, so we ran them all through the database. We found matches for five of them. Three were military with no criminal record. One had a conviction for passing bad checks, and the fifth is the reason we’re having lunch.”

  “I’m all ears,” I say.

  “Good for you. His name is Eric Benjamin. You ever hear of him?”

  “No. I don’t think so,” I say.

  “He was a state cop, until about six years ago. Big shot detective, star on the rise.”

  “You said was a state cop.”

  He nods. “You’re a good listener. Internal Affairs went after him; he was accused of beating up a potential suspect in an investigation, but more importantly, he was accused of confiscating certain criminal property for his own personal gain.”

  “Drugs?”

  Pete nods. “And money. It was believed that when Benjamin made a number of arrests, valuable evidence and property never actually made it to state custody.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “Not much. His main accuser was a guy by the name of Orlando Guadalupe. But before actual charges could be brought, most of Mr. Guadalupe’s body was found in an alley in Garfield.”

  “Most?”

  “Right. His arms were found in an alley in Lyndhurst, and his head was found in another alley in East Rutherford.”

  “So without Guadalupe, there was no case?”

  “Depends on who you talk to. People in the department certainly thought there was, but the state attorney turned chickenshit. He was afraid they didn’t have enough, and he didn’t want to bring a case like that, which was sure to generate a lot of publicity, and then possibly lose it. Might impact his political ambitions.”

  “Where is Benjamin now?” I ask.

  “I have no idea, but it’s a pretty good bet he hasn’t entered the priesthood.”

  “Do you know why he was on that truck?”

  “No idea. And did I give you the impression I was conducting the investigation for you?”

  “Which brings me to the obvious question. Why are you telling me all this? If you gave it to Carla, I would have gotten it in discovery.”

  “You are the one who asked me to get the prints. So I wanted to make sure you got them.”

  “You think Carla would have withheld this?”

  “I don’t know her, but I don’t trust lawyers no matter what side they’re on. They are among the lowest life-forms we have.”

  “Stop, you’re making me blush.”

  “And whatever you do, don’t turn this into me thinking your boy is innocent, because I don’t, and he isn’t.”

  “Right,” I say. “Eric Benjamin was on the truck because he was adopting a Pomeranian.”

  I’m not sure how much to say to Pete. On the one hand, in the world that is our justice system, he is the opposition. On the other hand, I really do believe that he wants to know the truth and does not want anyone to be wrongly convicted even if he is the one who made the arrest. The fact that he is sitting here and telling me about the prints is evidence of that.

  “Let me tell you something,” I say. “And let me preface it with the fact that if you reveal this to anyone, all previous agreements regarding beer and hamburgers are null and void.”

  “Here it comes,” he says, preparing to mock me.

  “Our position is that Kramer acted in self-defense, that Zimmer came at him swinging a large knife.”

  “And Kramer took the knife with him when he left?” he asks. “As a souvenir?”

  “No.”

  “So Zimmer used an invisible knife?”

  “No, there was a third person on that truck. After Kramer left, he took off with the knife.”

  “And since there was a videotape of the entire event, the third person must have also been invisible, so when he left with the invisible knife, the camera couldn’t see it.” He smacks the table. “That’s it! You’ve cracked the case!”

  “If I had that invisible knife with me now, I’d cut out your larynx.”

  His laugh causes me to believe he doesn’t consider me a physical threat. Then he asks the same question that I asked him, “So why are you telling me all this?”

  “Because if you know what really happened, you might be more inclined to realize it if you learn something that confirms it. I’m trying to compensate for your lack of smarts, which requires a great deal of compensation.”

  “Hearing that causes me to want a beer,” he says, signaling to a waiter.

  “You’re on duty,” I point out.

  “Right you are. I’m getting a couple of six packs to go. Is your tab paid up? I don’t want to be embarrassed.”

  “Sam, it might be time to break out the Bubalah Brigade.”

  Bubalah is the pet name for Sam given him by one Hilda Mandlebaum, who along with her husband, Eli, and friends Morris Fishman and Leon Goldberg, took a seniors’ computer class that Sam gave at the YMHA.

&n
bsp; Despite the fact that they have logged at least 330 years between them, they were attentive, eager learners. Sam was amazed at their attitude and proficiency, and we have actually used them to help on a couple of cases. They have proven invaluable.

  “Really?” Sam asks. “Because I can handle what we have so far.”

  “We’re adding a lot,” I say. “Besides, I could go for some more of Hilda’s rugelach.” If I were condemned to death, Hilda’s rugelach would account for my last ten meals.

  “Okay, I’ll call Hilda, and she’ll round up the team. What have you got?”

  I tell him all that I know about Eric Benjamin, though I don’t bother going into the fact that his fingerprints were found in the truck. Knowing or not knowing that will in no way impact what Sam is doing.

  “I want to know as much as you can find out about him,” I say, “including how I can reach him if I choose to.”

  “That’s it?” he asks.

  “No. I then need you to cross-check him with every name on Kramer’s list, regardless of their reason for being on the lists. I want to know if there are any connections between Benjamin and any of them. Including phone calls.”

  “I’ll call Hilda right away,” he says, no doubt realizing the enormity of the assignment.

  I have an appointment in an hour to check out the next name on Kramer’s list, so that gives me time to call Laurie and tell her what I’ve learned. She has heard of Benjamin; as an ex-cop, she pays special attention to media stories about cops gone bad. It’s accurate to say that they are not her favorite people.

  She’s also excited about what the presence of Benjamin’s prints in the truck might mean. I’m not quite as optimistic about it as she is, but I’m not as optimistic about anything as she is. I’m not Hike, but I’m also not Mr. Sunshine.

  My next phone call is to George Davenport, the owner of the dog transport truck and Kenny Zimmer’s final employer. “Does the name Eric Benjamin mean anything to you?” I ask.

  “No. Should it?”

  “He’s been reported as having been on the truck that Zimmer was driving.”

  “Afraid I can’t help you. For all I know, Zimmer could have had the goddamn Russian army on there. I can’t keep tabs on my drivers like that; I just trust that they’ll get to where they’re going.”