“Him again. That’s a good sign.”
“That he’s someone David might have talked to?”
“Yes.”
“Do Jews confess to rabbis the way Catholics do to priests?”
“No, we prefer to wallow in our guilt. You can’t shut us up about it, but it doesn’t count as confession.”
We handed out laser photos and put posters up for another two blocks in each direction. In a few spots I found flyers Ron had put up the week before, covered over now by ads for tutoring, piano lessons and handyman services. When we were done, we sat in the car and used the GPS to locate the nearest FedEx so we could get David’s computer home. I dropped Jenn there and navigated my way over to the Brookline Police Department, a tall narrow old row house made awkwardly modern with a glass front and a glass-and-metal awning. On one side of it was Brookline’s municipal centre and an old dark-brick courthouse with three bland arches and a severe triangular roof that was plain as a Puritan’s hat. On the other side, what had probably been an early fire station, with doors wide and tall enough to admit a horse-drawn wagon.
The police station lobby had been made over with dark tile and pale wood. On the wall were plaques remembering the only two officers to have fallen in Brookline’s long line of policing, and a glass case with photos of sex offenders who had skipped bail or were otherwise known to be in the area.
I approached the desk, where a big blond man sat pecking at a keyboard with stiff blunt fingers. His hair was shaved close to the scalp everywhere but on top, where it grew thick as indoor-outdoor carpeting, and he looked like he spent more time training for mixed martial arts than in customer service seminars. He didn’t say anything or look up or otherwise acknowledge my presence, just stabbed at the keys. His name tag said W. Kennedy.
I said, “Good morning.”
He held up a finger to silence me and resumed tapping, using both index fingers and occasionally a thumb on the space bar. It was a good thing no crime spree erupted in the streets of Brookline. He kept pecking until he was good and finished. Then he looked up and said, “Help you?” like he almost meant it.
“I’d like to speak to Detective Mike Gianelli, please.”
He said, “Because?”
“Because he’s in charge of the David Fine investigation.”
“The David Fine investigation.”
“A missing persons case. I’m a private investigator. Hired by his parents—”
“Your licence.”
I got it out and slid it across the counter. I said, “His parents—”
He held up the same finger again while he took in the details of my Ontario licence. He didn’t seem to think any faster than he typed.
“Sir, are you armed?”
“No.”
“No weapons on your person?”
“None.”
“You have another piece of ID?”
I gave him my passport.
He took in its details at his usual speed and told me to have a seat at one of three chairs facing a large wall-mounted screen that was at present turned off. Kennedy picked up the phone and spoke into it at a level I couldn’t hear. Nodded. The man had a neck and shoulders you could break a log on. And wouldn’t it be fun to try?
He got off the phone and said, “Detective Gianelli will be down in a minute.”
Which turned out to be twelve.
“Jonah Geller?”
A man in a suit was holding my licence and passport. He was about my height, six feet, but heavier where it counted, the chest and shoulders. He came over and offered his hand; his grip was strong but he didn’t try to show off with it. He had thick dark hair, parted in the centre and held back by gel.
“I’m Mike Gianelli,” he said. “You wanted to speak to me?”
“David Fine’s parents hired me.”
“Ron and Sheila, huh? Yeah, nice people. Good people. They’ve been very cooperative, very supportive of our efforts.” He handed back my documents, which I pocketed. “And you’re from up there?”
“Yes.”
“Because this licence of yours, as far as the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the Town of Brookline are concerned, isn’t valid here, so right away we have a problem. We got no reciprocal agreements with Ontario—I checked. You carrying a weapon?”
“No.”
“You have one where you’re staying?”
“No.”
“Didn’t bring one?”
“No.”
“Because we have very strict gun laws here.”
“So does Ontario. I don’t carry a gun there either. I never have.”
“Better be careful where you go then. Some parts of Boston, I wouldn’t go unarmed.”
“Thank you. As for my accreditation, I’m just here to help his parents,” I said.
“At some fancy rate, I’ll bet.”
“It’s not like that. They’re friends of the family.”
“Says you. Look, I happen to like his parents and I feel bad for them. I really do. Their son sounds like a decent kid. Better than decent. But we did what we could. We interviewed his roommate, his neighbours, we even got an audience with his boss at work. Three minutes with the great man.”
“And?”
“The bottom line is, no crime scene,” Gianelli said. “Anywhere. No evidence of any kind that he’s met foul play. Not at his apartment or his place of work. No demands have ever been made to the family.”
“What about in between?”
“In between what?”
“The hospital and his apartment. He usually walks home.”
“That’s nearly two miles and only part of it is Brookline. There’s also a section that’s Boston.”
“I’m convinced he didn’t leave of his own accord,” I said.
“Based on what?”
“He is a very devout man,” I said.
“And?”
“We found religious articles in his closet that he never would leave behind if he were leaving of his own accord. He’d need them every day.”
“So he has spares or bought new ones.”
“It’s not like that. His own would have special meaning to him.”
I wondered whether I should tell Gianelli about the money in David’s tallis bag. But he might want it as evidence, and if David was truly gone, I wanted it to go to his parents: you could almost bury a man for that much.
“You got much experience with missing persons?” Gianelli asked.
“I’ve found a few,” I said.
“Let me guess,” he said. “Mostly runaways.”
“Mostly.”
“That’s because most missing persons turn out to be runaways. Boston, Toronto, doesn’t matter. The statistics are always the same. Then you get the elderly who wander off. Kids caught up in custody fights. Guys who owe money or stole money or are about to be arraigned for something. You get the ones about to get married, usually guys, need to have one last kick at the can, they disappear for a week. David Fine doesn’t fit any of these. He has no criminal history of any kind. No budgetary control at the hospital. No money missing there that anyone knew about. See, we did ask. We checked everything. But we found nothing. There is no reason for him to be missing, but he is. And I am frustrated by that and I do worry about him. But there is one thing I want to make clear.”
He paused, trying to make me ask what that was. I liked him all right so I asked.
“Ron Fine—I bet he told you how unfortunate it is his son lives in Brookline, not Boston, that he got stuck with our Mickey Mouse force instead of the good old BPD. And what I want you to be clear on is that it’s utter bullshit. I was Boston PD for twelve years before I came here, and this force is better in every way when it comes to serving and protecting our public. Don’t be fooled by this building. We’re a good-sized force for a town this size and when we get a call, we move on it. Maybe we don’t get all the problems Boston gets, and we certainly don’t get the homicides, but we get our share of actual crime
. We get scumbags drifting up here from Jamaica Plain and Roxbury. We get sexual assaults and gunpoint robberies and brawls and domestics and all-round bad behaviour, and we show up and close a better percentage of them than the BPD. So no moaning about we got stuck with the small-town force, okay?”
“Got it.”
“Ron Fine is goddamn lucky his son lives here because we’ve tried hard to find him and we are still trying. There just isn’t any trace. So here is what I’m going to do,” he said. “You want to ask around as a private citizen? Interview his roommate, neighbours, his boss if you’re so lucky? Go ahead. I won’t stop you, mostly because his parents should feel they’ve done everything they can. But don’t step on anyone’s toes around here. I don’t want to get complaints about you. And if you find out anything I didn’t, you share it with me quick—that fair?”
“Yes.”
“I also want the make, model and plate of your car. Case you plan on doing any surveillance within our boundaries.”
“It’s a Dodge Caliber.” I fished out the keys and read the plate number from a tag on the key ring.
As I was leaving he said, “You planning on introducing yourself to the BPD? Showing them your licence?”
“I guess I’ll have to,” I said. “Boston is where David works.”
“Wish I could be there when you do,” Gianelli said with a grin. “Having worked there those twelve years, I can tell you they’re not as accepting of private investigators as we are in Brookline. My advice to you, if your business takes you into Boston, contact the BPD before they need to contact you. And keep your head up when you do.”
CHAPTER 6
A uniformed cop stood under the glass entrance to the Brookline Police Department, arms folded across his chest, eyes following Jenn’s behind as she walked up Washington Street to where I sat on the lawn of the local library. His just reward for a hard day policing these tree-lined streets.
“All done,” she said, sitting down beside me. “Colin will have David’s laptop no later than nine a.m. tomorrow and Karl will pick it up on his way to the shop.”
I told her about the effort the Brookline police had mustered to find David, and what Gianelli had said about the BPD.
“So we shouldn’t expect any help from them.”
“Not much. Bullshit and bullying, maybe, according to Gianelli.”
“Disgruntled ex-employee?”
“Didn’t strike me that way.”
“Think he’s any good?”
“He seemed like a decent guy. I think David’s parents got to him too.”
“He’s not giving up?”
“He said he’s not. But unless a patrol officer bumps into David on the street, it’s up to us now. Let’s go back to his house around seven tonight.”
“Why then?”
“It’s the time he went missing,” I said. “And people are creatures of habit.”
Back at our hotel, we dumped all of David’s paperwork onto one of the beds in my room and began combing through it. His bank statements seemed very straightforward: nothing to explain how five thousand in cash came his way. His modest pay was deposited directly into his account every other Thursday, and he withdrew a hundred dollars every Monday, never more or less. His allowance for the week. His credit card statements had only small balances, always paid in full every month.
“I wish he could show me how that’s done,” Jenn said.
“I’d rather he showed us where the five grand came from. The only thing I can think of is those poker books … they stuck out like three sore thumbs.”
“You think he’s into big games?”
“I don’t know. Sheldon didn’t mention it.”
“Would he know? It didn’t sound like they pay much attention to each other.”
She continued rifling through papers while I called Sheldon. His cell went straight to voice mail. I left a message asking him to call on his next break.
Jenn had David’s phone bills on her lap: they showed regular long-distance calls to his parents in Toronto. Nothing else jumped out.
I picked up the research papers we had taken. From between them a folded sheet of paper fell to the floor like an autumn leaf.
It was a missing person poster. It showed a middle-aged Indian man named Harinder Patel, and he had vanished the week before David Fine.
Because Jenn is so much better at extracting information from people over the phone, she got to lie in bed in her room and make calls, while I got my first taste of driving in Boston. I took out the GPS unit, nestled it on the dash in its weighted sack and plugged it into the lighter socket. Once it was on, I punched in the address I wanted in Somerville, which I could see on the screen was north of Cambridge. I followed the posh gal’s instructions to Mass Avenue and took the bridge there across into Cambridge, where low-hanging clouds seemed to be trailing veils of rain. It reminded me a lot of the Annex at home, the streets lined with bookstores, cafés and indie restaurants. Young people walking everywhere, lost in their earbuds, cellphones and the occasional conversation with an actual person. Older lefties and ex-hippies, holding out against age, prowling around the bookstores in jeans, moccasins and soft leather jackets, grey ponytails poking out the backs of their ball caps.
As I got into Somerville, construction narrowed the road to a single lane, and many horns blared as one as drivers tried to force their way right. When that finally cleared, the GPS told me to turn left onto a street that was closed off and dug down to the pipes. As I missed the turn, she said, in an icy tone, “Recalculating,” then gave me a new route.
Madras Grocery was situated in the ground floor of an old house on Bow Street, whose name derives from its semicircular shape. The street was hard to find, which may have contributed to the business’s rundown look. That and the apparent scarcity of people of South Asian origin who might be in the market for its goods.
A bell tinkled over the door as I went in past a billboard stuffed with notices for local movers, tutors, music teachers and dog walkers. And a copy of the same poster we had found asking for help finding Harinder Patel. As I walked to the counter, the smell of spice crowded in: cumin, turmeric, others I knew but couldn’t name, all in a pungent swirl around me. The woman at the front cash was wrapped in a yellow-and-orange sari with silvery trim. She smiled warmly without saying anything. I took out my copy of the poster and she looked at it through glasses whose panes were scratched and fogged.
“I’d like to speak to you about this man,” I said. “He might be connected to another missing person’s case.”
She turned to face the back of the store and called out, “Sanjay!”
A well-built young man in his twenties came up the aisle. He wore a long-sleeved grey sweatshirt and blue jeans, and had jet-black hair combed straight up in front but forward from the back, giving him a fearsome cresting pompadour. A beard no thicker than wire traced his jawline and chin.
“Help you, sir?” he asked. He looked to be in his early twenties. But already serious. Serious about something.
I flashed the poster. “You’re looking for this man?”
He started to look hopeful. “Yes, yes. He’s my father. Have you found him? Found something?”
“I’m sorry, no.”
The expression sagged back to neutral. “Oh. Then why are you here?”
I showed him a picture of David Fine. “Because this man is missing too, and he had your flyer among his effects.”
He knew David. From the first widening of the eyes to the slight opening of his carefully barbered jaw, I could tell he knew him.
“Come to the back,” he said.
He led me past an office too tiny and crammed for the two of us, and into a storeroom made narrow by sacks of rice, beans and other goods stacked against its walls. “Who are you, please?”
“Jonah Geller. I’m a licensed investigator from Toronto.” He didn’t need to know the vagaries of my standing in Massachusetts. “This man’s family hired me to find him.”
>
“You say he’s missing too? For how long?”
“Two weeks.”
“My father went missing three weeks ago.”
“I’m sorry to hear that, Sanjay.”
“Call me Sammy.” We shook hands.
“So you know this man,” I said.
“Yes. He came into the store one evening about two weeks ago. Dad had been gone at least a week by then.”
“Definitely him?”
His eyes sparkled. “Oh, yes.”
“You remember the day of the week?”
“A Wednesday. Around eight-thirty. I was cleaning out the basement for our Thursday-morning delivery, which is our biggest. My mum doesn’t speak much English so she called me up. This guy said he had heard about my father and wanted to help the family, and he handed me an envelope.” Even though we were alone in the store, he lowered his voice. “It had five thousand bucks in it. Fifty hundred-dollar bills.”
“This man here,” I said, pointing at the photo. “David Fine.”
“If that’s his name, yes.”
“All in hundreds.”
“Yes.”
It had to be right. David’s stash was in hundreds too, an equal five thousand. In a doubled elastic band. Seemed like David had started out with ten thousand dollars, when he shouldn’t have had a nickel, and he had chosen to split it with a stranger.
“Trust me,” Sammy said. “It never happened in my life before, and it will probably never happen again, a guy handing me that much cash. And then he was gone, like one of those rich guys on a reality show who go around handing out money. Only there was no one filming my reaction. Which is too bad, in a way, because I remember I was pretty floored. But a little scared, too.”
“Of him?” Sammy looked like he could pick David up and body-slam him without losing his place in the sports page.
“No. It just seemed like a sign my father is dead. I don’t know why but that’s how it struck me.”
“Did he say why he wanted to help? Did he know your father?”
“He certainly wasn’t a regular customer,” Sammy said. “I’d never seen him in the neighbourhood before and neither had Mum.”
“He lives in Brookline.”
Boston Cream Page 5
