A scar-faced gentleman of Italian descent by the name of Alphonse Gabriel Capone paid off both police and politicians on a truly massive scale and, in William Hale Thompson, Capone had Chicago’s compliant mayor in his back pocket. Chicago’s mob—nicknamed the Outfit—rose to power under the control of both Johnny Torrio and Al Capone, and, since those halcyon days of speakeasies and Tommy Guns, the Outfit continued to be involved in extortion, loansharking, gambling, prostitution, political corruption … and, of course, murder. Later yet, Chicago street gangs began controlling the distribution of drugs and, as such, cut dirty deals with dirty cops—drug trafficking with gang members paying several of the boys in blue for protection.
As far as the apprehended bad apples in uniform went, in the past fifty years over three hundred Chicago police officers have been convicted of offenses ranging from drug dealing, assault, and protecting mobsters to destroying evidence, theft, and murder. The hefty folder on the kitchen table in front of me included information about a police lieutenant by the name of Jon Burge who ran a torture mill—burning suspects with radiators, electrocuting testicles, you name it. The folder also contained data about a certain chief of detectives and assistant police superintendent named William Hanhardt, who had been convicted of using confidential police data to oversee a mob-connected jewelry theft ring. Moreover, the folder covered an officer by the name of Joseph Miedzianowski. Miedzianowski ran the Chicago Gangs Unit while also running his own private drug gang—evidently multitasking as both cop and drug lord, and was ultimately convicted on ten counts, up to and including racketeering and drug conspiracy.
Unfortunately, the beat goes on and the cluster of acronyms: IAD, IPRA, PB—Internal Affairs Division, Independent Police Review Authority, Police Board, as well as the Mayor’s Office and the State’s Attorney’s Office—have yet to succeed in keeping CPD’s corruption completely in check. The blue wall of silence and a bureaucratic indifference has prevented the top brass from eliminating police corruption.
“Wow,” I said, after reviewing Kippy’s ream of background material. She’d spent quite a bit of time compiling this dossier of macro data on the Windy City’s turbulent history in order to frame our discussion. “It’s like an FBI agent should be assigned to keep tabs on each one of you.”
“Not funny,” Officer Wabiszewski replied. “Not funny at all.”
By calling in the troops, I realized that any pierced ego on my part over being just friends with Kippy would need to take a back seat now that we strongly suspected that Police Superintendent Gerald Callum, the man who leads the largest law enforcement agency in the city of Chicago, and his chauffeur-slash-henchman—make that two henchmen based on the man’s excessive girth—were responsible for the murder of Peter Feist, the head of the Special Prosecutions Bureau in the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office.
Vira had caught a whiff of it on one or both of them.
Truth be told, I’d been in more than a trivial state of alarm since yesterday morning’s scene at Washington Park, and I damn near dropped ticker tape upon Kippy and Wabiszewski’s arrival.
We were scraping pretzels and potato chips through a mildly expired dip I’d found lurking behind a definitely expired carton of milk in the back of the fridge and drinking bottled water—no one had yet to reach for the beer—in my living room as we pored over our homework assignments. Dawn and Maggie May were loafing about outside and, hopefully, keeping tabs on Bill; Sue manned the sofa, while Vira chose to stick with us fogies. My golden retriever had initially appeared interested in our conversation, then her attention turned to begging for pretzels, then in licking Kippy’s hand for ten minutes, but now she was sacked out, bored by our discussions, and napping atop Kippy’s feet.
“It doesn’t help that every other governor in Illinois winds up in prison,” Kippy said, and looked at her stack of papers. “Bank fraud, bribery, pay-to-play, lying to the FBI, etcetera.”
“It’s the Chicago way?” Wabiszewski replied. “You know, like a fish tank that never gets aerated—the water gets all skanky.”
When I had shared the news of Vira’s having had another occurrence after her discovery of Special Prosecutor Peter Feist in a fishpond in Washington Park and her subsequent agitation upon Police Superintendent Gerald Callum or, more likely, his driver’s arrival, Kippy took it in stride, but as for her partner—although Wabiszewski had turned over a new leaf in regard to Vira’s unique ability—the man remained a tougher sell. But Wabs was a skeptical son of a bitch on most matters under the sun and I planned on taking him along to the dealership next time I bartered for a pickup truck.
Officer Wabiszewski’s homework assignment had been more micro in nature. Wabiszewski provided background data on Police Superintendent Gerald “Jerry” Callum. Police superintendent is, of course, the highest rank in the Chicago Police Department, and the position is appointed by the mayor. Ultimately, Superintendent Callum manages the four bureaus—the Bureau of Patrol, the Bureau of Detectives, the Bureau of Organized Crime, and the Bureau of Support Services—with each bureau commanded by a police or bureau chief. Police Superintendent Callum had been strongly recommended by the Chicago City Council—CPD falls under the jurisdiction of the City Council—and had been appointed superintendent four years earlier in one of the prior mayor’s concluding acts, with an eye toward addressing the Windy City’s soaring homicide rate.
Wabiszewski read from his notes: “There were seven hundred eighty-one murders in Chicago in 2016—one of the deadliest years in decades … a bloodbath. The rate dropped to six hundred sixty-four murders in 2017, and then just over five hundred in both 2018 and 2019—which is good news, I guess, but still a goddamned shame.” Wabs looked up and added, “Of course we all know how shitty 2020 was, but with nearly three thousand ‘shooting incidents’ every year, I don’t know—maybe we’re lucky the homicide rates aren’t higher.”
I shook my head in response. Depressing numbers.
“And don’t get me started on the homicide clearance rates because we’re talking percentages in the lower double digits,” Wabiszewski continued. “Hell, if we hit twenty percent in a given year, march out the brass band. More realistically, maybe one in six homicides ever gets solved.”
Wabiszewski wasn’t able to compile much information on Police Superintendent Callum outside of what was already public knowledge or the bits and pieces from the city’s newspapers or the superintendent’s curriculum vitae. At age twenty-two, in the late-seventies, Callum joined the Chicago Police Department as a beat cop. Callum then rose through the ranks and was appointed commander of the 12th District in 2004 and became bureau chief of BOC—Bureau of Organized Crime—in 2011.
And it was from BOC that Gerald Callum had made his great leap forward to police superintendent.
Neither Kippy nor Wabiszewski had ever met Superintendent Callum in person, but both had been present at an official CPD event last August where Callum had given a speech. The superintendent’s words were mostly praise for the hard work, dedication, and determination of his bureau chiefs in their ongoing efforts to reduce Chicago’s unacceptable homicide rate as our most recent fatal shooting levels were five times those of New York City while having a third of NYC’s population; hitting the African American community the hardest—more specifically young black males. Superintendent Callum had both outlined his pet program—the implementation of proactive policing—as well as his wish list—advocating the tightening up of sentencing policies, getting smart on bail reform to keep violent felons off the streets, stop handing out probation as though it were Chiclets—and called upon politicians on both sides of the aisle to stay the course and find it in their annual budgets to provide CPD with the required resources. Per the images Wabiszewski had provided from the various press clippings, Superintendent Callum had sharp blue eyes—which I remembered from Washington Park—as well as a lined and weathered face that had seen many a mile.
Until today, Kippy and Wabiszewski had no strong opinion
one way or the other regarding Police Superintendent Callum. He was far too removed from their day-to-day functions, too far up the department’s totem pole. Both officers got the general sense Callum was respected in his role as the head of the CPD, and certainly wished the superintendent well in reducing the city’s murder rate.
Neither Kippy nor Wabiszewski could find anything on the superintendent’s driver—the Sasquatch-sized henchman who had stepped from the Lincoln Continental and tripped Vira’s trigger in Washington Park. However, Wabiszewski recalled a similar-sized fellow who’d attended Gerald Callum’s speech that August afternoon. A mountainous gentleman had hung out in the background, hovering about the periphery of the superintendent’s official entourage. The man had loomed large as hell and, as Wabiszewski noted, he might have looked more familiar had he been carrying Fay Wray in one hand while scaling the Sears Tower.
Wabiszewski looked about the room after his quick debrief on Gerald Callum and continued, “We’re at that junction once again—you know, with Vira—where we can’t go skipping to the mayor or the feebs or the papers and, when they ask how we came by this vital information, tell them we’ve got us this Mensa dog. ‘No shit, Mr. Mayor, really, Vira scored sixteen hundred on the SAT and plans to get a Ph.D. in Biophysics at Stanford—and that’s how we figured out Superintendent Callum whacked Peter Feist.’”
We absorbed Wabiszewski’s analysis in silence.
Wabiszewski went on, “Listen, I love Vira. If she were taller and brunette, I’d ask for her paw in marriage. And I know what she can do, but describing what Vira can do will make us sound like a bunch of fucking nutjobs and we’ll get matching bunks in Lakeshore.”
Chicago Lakeshore was the city’s major psychiatric hospital.
We’d been down the Lakeshore path before.
“Obviously we need hard evidence, Wabs,” Kippy replied. “Vira told us whodunit, okay, so now we need to walk back the cat—figure out motive, means, and opportunity—and use them to nail Callum’s ass to the wall.”
Wabiszewski shrugged. “Piece of cake.”
“Piece of cake,” Kippy repeated.
Wabiszewski then turned his attention my way. “You got anything, Reid?”
My homework assignment had been easy-peasy. I was to serve treats and drinks, listen and comb through the information Kippy and Wabs had presented, and then do my damnedest to ask intelligent questions … of which I had but one.
“What do we do now?”
Wabiszewski tossed a hand in the air. “You know what the safest thing to do would be? Forget all this horseshit. It’s Chicago for Christ’s sake. Without proof, any anonymous bullshit, like sending a letter or something to the feds or the mayor will be shredded as just some screwball crawling out of the woodwork. And if we start poking about Peter Feist’s death on our own, it’ll call attention to us … and then Vira will have one of her occurrences over our bodies.”
Kippy said, “So the bastard gets away with it?”
“Feist flew too close to the sun and got burned. Why should we follow suit? Think about it for a minute. As long as street crime is in steady decline, which is what everyone in Chicago and America is rooting for, why should we give a shit if one of the assholes at the top is on the take?”
“I know you, Wabs,” Kippy said. “You don’t mean a word of that.”
“Unless we’re able to cobble together some kind of hard proof, I’m as serious as lung cancer.” Wabiszewski tugged absentmindedly on the collar of his shirt and looked my way. “Besides,” he said, “I’m a big fan of what you baited Eddie Clare with the other day … karma. Superintendent Callum will eventually get his, one way or another.”
Kippy didn’t buy it. “But what if we’re meant to be his karma?”
CHAPTER 20
After another exhausting hour of batting ideas around, Wabiszewski announced, “Those of us with hot dates tonight are heading out.” He looked at Kippy. “You coming?”
She checked her watch. “It’s still early.”
“I think we can all agree I’m a nine, but it takes a little additional time and effort on my part—hair mousse and moisturizers—to achieve that perfect ten,” Wabiszewski replied. “I only do it for them.”
“You peak at a seven, Wabs,” Kippy said. “Get some booze in the poor girl and maybe that’ll up the needle to a seven-point-one.”
“I could take you home in a bit if you want to keep brainstorming,” I blurted out, only to find dead air in need of filling. “I mean Vira and I could run you home whenever you’d like. It’s no big deal. Really.”
Wabiszewski looked at Kippy as he was donning his jacket and said, “Well, I’ll just leave you two lovebirds be, then.”
* * *
Another hour of dead ends later and we decided I’d make a quick Jimmy John’s run for an early dinner while Kippy tossed the Frisbee with Vira and Bill—Maggie and Delta Dawn had grown bored with Frisbee a few years earlier and, based on their temperaments, would rather be quilting or scrapbooking. And Sue had television to watch; it was imperative he not miss a show—the Nielsen Company should rig him up with a box for their TV ratings. Kippy and I thought food might help stimulate the neurons in our brains, help us concoct a plan to—oh, you know—take down CPD’s sitting police superintendent and his henchman in the great city of Chicago.
I grabbed my wallet and keys but paused at the door. “The Tribune said no one in Feist’s office had a clue what he was up to in Washington Park.”
Kippy added, “Which means he intentionally kept them in the dark.”
I nibbled on that as I stepped across the driveway and almost made it to my pickup when I heard the car engine approach me from behind. A red Miata pulled between my F-150 and the doublewide. Something the size of the Eiffel Tower lodged in my throat when I spotted who sat behind the driver’s wheel. I walked over as my ex-wife stepped from the convertible.
“Hey, Mickie,” I managed to mutter.
“Hi, Mace.”
“You got a new car.” I set my fingertips on the hood of the Miata. I’d flunk a polygraph if I didn’t admit that Mickie looked great—shorter hair and, of course, a perfect tan.
“Brian felt I should be driving something under warranty.”
“Always a good idea.”
“I bumped into Kathy at Costco the other day.”
“Really?” Kathy is my older sister.
“I asked her how you were doing and she said nobody’d seen much of you lately, that you were all hermited up here with the dogs.”
I cringed internally … and possibly outwardly.
Kathy and I would soon be having a conversation and not necessarily a pleasant one. I’d like to believe my brothers would have told Mickie I was dating someone—preferably a Chicago Bears’ cheerleader—but not Big Sis with her never-ending affinity for the truth.
We fidgeted another moment before Mickie plowed ahead. “Look, Mace, we’ve not spoken since that night you called.”
I nodded and began wondering if a person could indeed melt down in a Wicked Witch fashion, figuring I was seconds away from finding out.
“I know my engagement with Brian may have seemed rushed at the time—it was a bit of a whirlwind, I admit—and I apologize if that hurt your feelings.” Mickie looked at me. “I care about you, Mace, and I wanted to stop by and make sure you were okay.”
At a loss, I continued bobbing my head like one of those dunking birds mounted on an adjustable crosspiece.
“Are you—”
“And pick up some Scrubbing Bubbles, Mason, if you ever want me in that shower again,” a voice from behind my screen door interrupted Mickie, and suddenly Kippy stepped outside with Vira hot on her heels. “Oh my god, I didn’t know we had company.” Kippy’s roll-tab shirt was now tucked into her chinos, and a button at the top of her roll-tab had come undone since I’d last seen her. Vira sat upright in the shade of the front awning as Kippy walked over and slid a hand behind my back. “I’m so embarrassed.”
<
br /> I’m not sure who sank deeper into shock at this point, Mickie or me, but my ex-wife recovered first, held out a hand and said, “Hi, I’m Mickie.”
Kippy’s face lit up. “I’ve heard so much about you.” She introduced herself, ignored Mickie’s hand, and leaned in for a hug and cheek kisses. “So when’s the big day?”
“Next weekend.”
“Where are you guys going on your honeymoon?”
“Cancun.”
“Oh, yes, Cancun’ll be so much fun,” Kippy replied, all rainbows and unicorns. “Mason and I are thinking about spending Christmas in Maui.”
I think Mickie may have glanced in my direction before turning back to Kippy, but I couldn’t be positive on account of all blood flow in my body having ceased. Vira sat nonchalantly as though a spectator at a tennis match, which perhaps she was. I tried recalling if Dick Weech from up the road had a defibrillator.
“Mace is thinking that?” Mickie asked all incredulously, as though I’d been plotting a trip to the outer ring of Saturn.
“The guy’s been pushing it nonstop. My parents own a timeshare there and are always yakking at us to use it.”
The Keepers Page 9
