A Dark and Broken Heart

by R.J. Ellory

  “I want you to leave the death of David Valderas alone.”

  Madigan didn’t respond. Not a flinch, not a raised eyebrow, nothing. He smiled inside. “Okay,” he said after a moment’s pause. “I can do that.”

  Sandià smiled. “You are a good man, Vincent Madigan.”

  Madigan smiled again, internally. Sandià was the second person to say that today. If only they knew what he knew.

  “I am not a good man,” Madigan replied. “Neither of us is. If we start to believe that, then we really are in trouble.”

  Sandià smiled. It was a cold expression. Madigan drank to forget his conscience. Sandià did not drink—Madigan knew that—and thus to live with his conscience, he must have worked ceaselessly to convince himself of his own rightness.

  “So perhaps we are not good, but we are realistic and we are efficient. This is business, Vincent, nothing but business. And as any businessman will tell you, it is kill or be killed out there.”

  The tone irritated Madigan. The sense of self-importance, the certainty with which Sandià uttered his edicts and bullshit aphorisms. Madigan was unarmed—protocol dictated he leave his gun outside, but there were many things in the room—letter openers, a glass paperweight, a lamp stand on a nearby table—and he could have taken any one of them and killed Sandià right there and then. He would never have escaped the building. That was a given. But he would have perhaps gone some way toward redressing the wrongs that had been perpetrated by both of them.

  Maybe that was the way this would end. Both himself and Sandià dead.

  He thought again of Charlie Harris. Maybe Charlie Harris needed to die as well.

  “So, otherwise . . . how does this thing progress?” Sandià asked.

  “I am turning over every stone,” Madigan said. “That was how I found the connection to Valderas. But if you tell me that I need to look no further in that direction, then I will look no further.”

  “It will give you nothing,” Sandià said. “This man had nothing to do with what happened at my house . . . It had nothing to do with whoever stole my money and killed my nephew.”

  “Good enough for me,” Madigan said, and started to get up.

  Sandià raised his hand. “Stay a moment,” he said. He shifted in the chair, leaned back, seemed to relax. “We never talk, Vincent. We used to talk. Years have passed, we are older, and we should have found more time, but it seems we always have less.”

  “Always the way,” Madigan replied. He wondered what bullshit was on the way now.

  “I worry about you, Vincent.”

  Madigan frowned, and then he smiled. “Don’t,” he said. “I’m a lost cause.”

  “Well, perhaps I have chosen to be the Patron Saint of Lost Causes.”

  “No, my friend, we are the Patron Saints of Liars and Thieves and Killers. That’s who we are. That’s what we do—”

  “You have not spoken with your children recently, have you?”

  “Sorry?”

  “A man loses touch with his children, he loses touch with the most important things in his life. When was the last time you saw any of them?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “See? I told you. You need to see your children, Vincent. You need to be reminded of the importance of the future, what you leave behind.”

  “I’m afraid the best I’m going to leave behind is a lot of damaged people . . . and some dead ones as well.”

  “As we all are, Vincent, as we all are. But still the fact remains that you have children, and they may or may not become what you wish, but they are yours. And I see you are lonely, and there is no one to look after you. A man needs someone to look after him . . .”

  “And he reciprocates by looking after that person too, right? Well, it was that part I was never very good at.” Madigan got up. “I appreciate your concern, I really do, but I have a lot to do, and—”

  Sandià threw something—something pale and oblong—and it caught Madigan off guard. He snatched it out of the air before it hit the ground.

  An envelope. Manila, thick—about an inch and a half.

  “Expenses,” Sandià said. “And maybe to buy a little something for your children. Okay?”

  “I can’t—”

  “You can, and you will. If you deny me this, then I will be offended. I expect you to accept that courteously—a little bonus for helping me deal with these matters—and we shall say no more about it.”

  “Thank you,” Madigan said.

  “Say my name, Vincent . . . You never say my name. Time was that we would talk like friends and you would always say my name.”

  “Thank you, Dario . . . I appreciate it. I really do.”

  Sandià got up from behind the desk. He walked around the front and stood for a moment. He stepped forward, extended his arms, and then he embraced Madigan.

  “Don’t forget to care for your children,” he whispered in Madigan’s ear. “Don’t forget to love them. If children grow up without a father, there will be things about themselves that they will never understand.”

  Madigan felt every muscle in his body go tense. That was the second thing that Isabella had said that Sandià had now repeated.

  I am starting to believe that you are a good man, Vincent.

  If children grow up without a father, there will be things about themselves that they will never understand.

  Sandià let go of Madigan.

  “Thank you, Dario,” he said. He could hear tension and uncertainty in his voice.

  “I have upset you, Vincent?” Sandià asked.

  “No, you have just made me think about things that I didn’t want to think about.”

  “Maybe that is a good thing,” Sandià replied. “Maybe that is part of my job as the Patron Saint of Lost Causes.”

  “Maybe it is,” Madigan said, and he turned to the door.

  “Keep me informed of your progress,” Sandià said as Madigan stepped out into the corridor.

  “I will, Dario. I will.”

  Madigan closed the door quietly behind him and walked down the hallway with the thick manila envelope in his hand.

  He knew that Sandià had threatened him. Indirectly, simply by mentioning his children, Sandià had threatened him. And then given him money. That was the game here. Give with one hand, take with the other.

  It was about time Sandià was the subject of his own methods.

  It was time for the imbalance to be redressed.

  47

  GO TELL THE MOUNTAIN

  Walsh was waiting for him in the corridor. He seemed agitated. “Vincent,” he said. “I need to talk to you.”

  “Now?” Madigan didn’t need Walsh right now; he needed some space to think this thing through. Was Charlie Harris the one who had called Sandià? Was it also Charlie who had informed Sandià of Maribel’s presence in the Valderas house? And if so, how did he know that Maribel had been there?

  “Yes, now,” Walsh replied. “Can we go into your office?”

  Madigan opened the door. Walsh hurried after him, glanced back into the corridor as if alert for someone following him. He closed the door, stood with his back against it, and looked directly at Madigan. Madigan noticed then how pale and exhausted the man looked.

  “I have been in Evidence. The gun is missing. The .22 that Tomczak spoke of . . . It’s gone. Christ, Vincent, I don’t know what to think. I’m really in a fucking mess here.”

  Madigan laughed. “You’re worried because an item of evidence is missing from storage? Jesus, Duncan, will you just calm the fuck down? If I had an inventory done right now, I guarantee that at least twenty-five percent of the stuff that is supposed to be there is no longer there.”

  Walsh sat down. Then he stood up again. He paced back and forth between the door and the desk.

  “Hey, seriously . . . calm down, will you?” Madigan said. “I don’t think this is anywhere near as serious as you think. To tell you the truth, the fact that it’s missing might be a good thing.”
<
br />   “A good thing? How so?”

  Madigan could just feel how tense and anxious Walsh was. Walsh was precisely where Madigan needed him to be, and yet he had to calm him down a little. Too anxious, too desperate, and Walsh could do something stupid. More often than not, desperate situations did not call for desperate measures, but for something quite the opposite.

  “Well, if it ain’t there then you don’t have an excuse for not removing it, right?” Madigan said. “And whatever the hell kind of investigation might ensue as a result of its disappearance isn’t going to implicate you. You can’t lie about something you didn’t do.”

  “That won’t matter a damn, Vincent. Tomczak has a recording of me making an agreement with him—”

  “You could cover this so many ways,” Madigan said. “You’re doing a setup. You’re working on a project to identify a suspected leak inside the PD. Bernie was a test case. You wanted to find out if something you said to Bernie got back to the department . . .”

  “It doesn’t work that way, Vincent . . . I get even the slightest suspicion—”

  “Walsh, I got it covered,” Madigan said. “I’m taking care of it, okay? Just leave it to me and I will make this thing go away for you.”

  “What do you mean, make it go away?”

  “Like I say, make it go away. I got it covered. Stop fucking panicking, okay? You really don’t have anything to worry about.”

  “How can you say that? How the hell can you say that?”

  “Because I’m taking care of it, right? That’s how I can say that.”

  “And what happens if something goes wrong?”

  “Walsh, just sit down, for Christ’s sake.”

  Walsh looked at Madigan, and still that expression—drawn, overwhelmed—told Madigan that Walsh just did not get it.

  “Sit down.”

  Walsh complied.

  “Look, it’s real simple. Someone has something on you, you have something on them . . . Well, in this case I have something on them. You have to stop worrying about this thing. It’s gone, okay? It’s just gone.”

  “This guy . . . Bernie Tomczak . . . you have something on him?”

  “Jesus Christ, Walsh, could you be any more clueless? Hell, man, I have things on everyone.”

  “Including me, right?”

  “I don’t have anything on you. Bernie Tomczak, now, he does have something on you. But we’re taking care of it.”

  “We? What d’you mean we?”

  “Jesus, it’s just an expression. We—you and me, okay? We’re taking care of it.”

  “And what do you want from me?” Walsh asked, all of a sudden his tone both anxious and suspicious.

  “From you? I don’t want anything from you. What the hell would I need from you?”

  “I’m IA. I can make internals go away. I can make OIS reviews change date . . .”

  “I don’t want anything, all right? And as far as all that bullshit with whoever about moving OIS reviews and this and that, just forget about it. This bullshit information you got from Moran about the fourth man being a cop, well, that wouldn’t hold up under any kind of scrutiny. So if the information that Moran gave you was shit, then you don’t have to get his possession bust lifted, and if you don’t have to get the bust lifted—”

  “Then I don’t have to get the OIS review postponed for Benedict.”

  “Right.”

  “And you’re sure that the fourth man was not a cop?”

  Madigan laughed, and he was amazed at how spontaneous and natural that laugh sounded. “You really honestly believe that a cop would go into one of Sandià’s houses, kill a bunch of guys, Sandià’s nephew included, and make off with a bunch of cash . . . And then, just to get the party going full swing, he decides to whack his three compadres in a storage unit? Jesus Christ, that is some wild bullshit out of an airport paperback.”

  Walsh smiled. He tried to smile. It came out looking strained and awkward.

  “Get some sleep, okay?” Madigan said. “You don’t look like you’ve slept for a week. Take some time off sick or something . . .”

  “Two days,” Walsh interjected. “Two days, no sleep, barely eaten. Worried sick about this . . .”

  “Hell, man, you should’ve come and seen me earlier. This is just nothing, you understand? This is just nothing to get all wound up about. It’s gone. It’s history. Okay?”

  “I really appreciate your help, Vincent . . . And if there’s something I can do for you—”

  Madigan looked pensive for a moment. “Well, now that you mention it, my friend, there was a robbery I did, and I killed a bunch of guys, and I wondered whether you might just help me sweep it under the rug, so to speak.”

  Walsh smiled. He started to laugh. “Vincent . . . you’re a good man, and I really appreciate your help.”

  There it was again. Vincent, you’re a good man. What did they say? Once was happenstance, twice coincidence, third time was a conspiracy? Maybe the world was trying to make him a better person.

  “Forget it,” Madigan said. “Go take a sick leave for the day. Get some rest. You look like crap.”

  Walsh paused as Madigan held the door open for him. He extended his hand. Madigan took it and they shook.

  “I won’t forget this, Vincent,” Walsh said.

  “That’s exactly what you need to do.”

  “I don’t mean the thing with Bernie . . . I mean—”

  “I know what you mean,” Madigan interjected. “Go,” he said. “Eat. Sleep. Get some freakin’ space, will you?”

  Walsh nodded. He left the office, walked down the corridor, glanced back at Madigan as he reached the end.

  Madigan stepped back and closed the door. He returned to his desk, sat down, and felt the shakes coming long before they arrived. He managed to get the manila envelope out of his jacket pocket and put it in the desk drawer, but by the time the cellphone rang his hand was shaking so much he could barely hold it steady.

  “Vincent?”

  “Isabella . . . what’s up?”

  “I’m scared, Vincent. Someone came to the house. Someone knocked at the door. I think it was that man who was here the other evening . . .”

  “Which man? Bernie?”

  “I don’t know . . . He had a hat on when he came the other time . . .”

  “Yes, that’s Bernie. Don’t worry about Bernie. He’s fine.”

  “He didn’t look fine, Vincent. He looked real bad. He looked like someone had given him a real good beating.”

  “Okay. Do nothing. Go nowhere. I’ll find Bernie and find out what’s going on, okay?”

  “Okay, Vincent . . . but . . .”

  “But nothing, Isabella. Leave it to me.”

  “All right, Vincent, if you’re sure. I’m just scared, real scared.”

  “I know you are. There’s no need to be. No one but me knows where you are. Just leave Bernie to me. Now, hang up and go watch TV or something, and I’ll see you later. Okay?”

  “Okay,” she said. “Thank you, Vincent, and I’m sorry for calling.”

  “It was the right thing to do. Hang up now. I’ll sort out what’s going on.”

  She did so. Vincent put his cellphone on the desk. What the hell was this now? What was Bernie doing going to the house?

  Rock and a hard place. If he called Bernie to ask him why he was at the house, Bernie would know someone had been inside. Bernie Tomczak wasn’t the kind of person to let such a thing lie. If he didn’t get hold of Bernie, then he wouldn’t know whether he looked beaten up because of the beating Madigan himself had given him four days earlier, or if someone else had caught up with him. If it was the latter, well, if it was the latter, then Madigan needed to know if it was connected to this thing. Hell, Bernie was going to be in only one of three or four places. Madigan was going to have to trawl them for sight or sound. When he found him, it was going to have to be a coincidence.

  Madigan took the manila envelope and opened it. There was ten grand inside. He spl
it the ten grand into three parts, put one third in his pants pocket, one third in each of his jacket pockets. Whatever the hell might be awaiting him when he found Bernie was bound to go easier if he had a stack of cash along as company.

  Madigan’s first thought was to head back to the Bronx, but that had been Bernie’s first thought, that Madigan would be home. Bernie wouldn’t come to the precinct—not a prayer—and thus he would check out the haunts where he believed he would find Madigan. They were easy enough to scope out, and it was in the third place he tried that he was almost besieged by a fraught and shaken Bernie Tomczak, and whatever the hell kind of treatment he’d undergone at the hands of Madigan on Monday was just nothing compared to what he had suffered since Wednesday night.

  “Jesus fucking Christ, Vincent. I’ve been looking for you everywhere!” he said. Two of his teeth were missing, the right side of his face was swollen and pitted with burst blood vessels. He had a cut above his left eye that had bled down to the lid, and a thick gob of congealed blood had dried there.

  “What the hell happened to you?” Madigan asked, and he actually felt concerned for Bernie. Such a reaction surprised him.

  “I got an issue or two,” Bernie said. He grabbed Madigan’s arm and steered him toward the back of the bar, a quiet place on East 123rd that Madigan sometimes went to when he needed a break from his regular haunts.

  “Why the hell didn’t you call me?” Madigan asked.

  “Ah man, I got another phone and it didn’t have your number on it. And I would’ve called you from a pay phone, but I couldn’t remember all of your number . . . Anyway, whatever the fuck, it don’t matter. I got you now.”

  “So what the hell happened to you? You screwed someone’s little girl and she—”

  “I need some money, Vincent, and I need it fast. I don’t know where the hell else to go.”

  “How much, Bernie?”

  “Eight grand. I need eight grand in about three hours, and I—”

  “Eight grand? Are you fucking kidding me?”

  “Do I look like I’m kidding, Vincent? Do I look like I’m yanking your chain? I need eight grand, and I need it fast.”