by Clark Howard
He cried for a long time.
Driving home that night, Kiley’s mind was in a turmoil.
Stella had comforted him that evening like he imagined she must comfort Jennie and Tessie; comforted him like he was a child; he the weak one, she the strong. The way he had cried had not been like the sporadic weeping he had experienced in the immediate wake of Nick’s death: some brief tears as he had left Nick in the alley to get to a phone for help; again when the body bag was zipped up and the morgue van took Nick away; then in the men’s room at the Shop, between interrogations; and since the funeral, every night, alone in his apartment, drinking.
But that had all been brief tearfulness, moments of grief intermingled with long hours of guilt. This, tonight, had been an emotional explosion, the proverbial dam giving way to a veritable flood of tears. This had been uncontrollable sobbing—the shaking, jerking, quivering kind, the kind one is certain will never end, will never remit its spasms, never absolve the grief that has generated it.
And all through it, as his tears wet Stella’s neck and collar, she had held him close, one hand in the middle of his back, the other stroking the back of his head, her voice, as soft in its own hoarseness as it could be, whispering, “All right, Joey—it’s all right—let it go—let it out, baby—it’s all right—”
When the convulsion of it all finally ended, Stella had led him into the downstairs half-bath and let him have a few minutes of privacy to clean up. He felt like a fool, but at the same time experienced an enormous sense of relief, like waking up the first morning after a virus had been purged from one’s body. Following the almost complete limpness, the awful slack, of the sobbing spell, he could now actually feel himself becoming physically stronger, muscles reforming; mentally stronger, endorphins expanding.
He had found Stella in the living room, idly thumbing through a magazine, and sat down next to her on the couch. “I feel like an idiot,” he said.
“Don’t be silly,” she slapped his arm gently. “You’re human, Joe, just like all the rest of us—even though you’d probably be the last one to admit it.” She patted where she had slapped. “You needed a shoulder to cry on, that’s all.”
“I’m glad it was yours, Stel.”
“So am I.”
When he was about to leave, a little while later, Stella got a fully packed garment bag out of the foyer closet and gave it to him. “Some of Nick’s things. Suits and stuff. You and Nick were about the same size, and I want you to have them.”
Like the Movado watch she had given him the day of the funeral, there was no way he could refuse to accept the gift. Stella did not know that all of the suits were probably hot; Nick had only told her that a friend gave him a “discount” for sending other cops around as customers. Both he and Joe occasionally had to field questions from Stella about why Nick never sent Joe around to get nicer suits. Nick’s usual answer was, “Because, Stella, face it, the godfather of your youngest daughter wants to dress like a hick.”
When Joe had taken the garment bag, Stella had added jokingly, “Now, listen, this has nothing to do with the fact that I’ve hated your gray suits all these years. I just thought you might get some wear out of these things. And I can’t give them to charity, Joe; to strangers.”
Now, as he left the suburbs and drove into the night city, the garment bag lying flat on the backseat was not what had thrown Kiley’s recently rejuvenated mind into its latest unrest. The disturbance this time was the memory of Stella’s body pressed close up against his. Even in the throes of his sobbing, there had been flashing spears of thought that she was against him: her breasts, stomach, thighs—His crying jag had not been allayed by those flashes; he could not have caught them in his mind even if he’d wanted to. But their presence—their purpose, for all he knew—had left indelible impressions for him to remember later: her breasts, her stomach, her thighs, against his body—
He tried to berate himself for the thoughts, but failed. Whether they were decent thoughts or not, whether honorable, seemly, moral, ethical, whether right, they were honest, and they were there.
Joe Kiley wanted Stella Bianco, and there wasn’t a goddamned thing in the world he could do about it.
But what he could do, he told himself firmly, was meet the problem head-on, as he usually met all problems; meet it squarely and directly—and overcome it. Not overcome the desire; he wasn’t sure that was possible. But overcome the growing, gnawing nagging that the desire generated. Kiley could not stop wanting Stella, but he could damned sure force himself to stop thinking about wanting her. Thinking about her at length, anyway; stop himself from dwelling on her, from sliding so dangerously near to deliberate, habitual fantasies of her. He had overcome that weakness once before, years earlier, when he had first been brought home by Nick, first met Stella, first been so taken with her; when he had realized that his feelings were getting out of hand that first time, and he had done something about it.
He would do something about it again, he told himself, ordered himself, now.
The key to overcoming bothersome thoughts—the nuns had called them “provocative” thoughts, those that led to an “occasion of sin”—the key to overcoming them was to use other thoughts that were just as compelling, just as demanding. A priest had once told Kiley’s eighth-grade boys class, bluntly, “Don’t think of titties, think of sports: baseball, basketball, and the like.” Joe and his hooligan friends had compromised. “She’s got tits like basketballs,” they would say, or something similar.
The theory, nevertheless, was sound. Substitute one pressing thought for another.
Deciding to begin right then, driving now well back into the city, Kiley started looking for an outdoor pay phone. He found a booth outside a closed cigar store and pulled over. The ceiling light of the booth was smashed out and an old wino, his bottle of Ripple on his lap, was sitting in it with his legs stretched out on the sidewalk. Kiley instinctively pulled out his badge and said, “Move it.”
“Okay—okay, ossifer, sir—I’m going—” the wino said immediately.
But when the old man began a frustrating struggle to get to his feet, Kiley put the badge away and said, “Never mind, forget it. Stay where you are; just don’t make any noise while I’m on the phone, understand?”
“Yes, sir, ossifer—”
Taking a slip of paper from his wallet, Kiley reached into the booth, dropped a quarter in the slot, and held the receiver in the same hand with which he dialed Captain Leo Madzak’s home number. Then he pulled the receiver as far out of the booth as it would reach and warned the wino, “Don’t you piss on my shoes.”
After two rings, Madzak’s number was answered by a machine. Kiley waited for the greeting—by a female voice, Mrs. Madzak, he guessed—to play, then after a beep, said, “Captain, this is Joe Kiley. I’m sorry to bother you this late, but I was wondering—”
The answering machine was cut off and Leo Madzak said, “Yeah, Joe, what is it?”
“Sorry it’s so late, sir,” Kiley said. “I was wondering if there’s been any activity from our bus bomber tonight—it’s Thursday—”
“Nothing, Joe,” the B-and-A commander said. “I’ve spoken to the transit people twice and everything’s quiet. What have you got?”
“I’ve made direct contact with the guy, Captain. We’re practically buddies; had a few beers together last night. I think he may be gun-shy right now; he doesn’t want to be busted in the act. There’s some new background information I have to run tomorrow that might flesh the guy out a little.”
“You still think he’s the man?”
“Definitely do, yessir.”
“What kind of time frame we looking at, Joe?”
“A week, max,” Kiley said. “We won’t have to worry about next Thursday.”
“That’s what I like to hear, Joe. You keep me up to date on it.”
“Yessir, I will.”
“Goodnight, Joe.”
“Goodnight, Captain.”
Kiley hun
g up, feeling momentarily elated. The scam he was running on Winston was working! Winston’s pattern had been broken: he was on the street, he wasn’t under surveillance, it was Thursday, and he hadn’t planted a bomb. It made Joe feel good. This was the first thing that had gone right since he and Nick went into that alley where Ronnie Lynn lay dead.
Looking down at the wino, he asked, “You live anywhere? You got a place to stay?”
“Shurtenly, I do,” the drunk replied.
“Where? Where do you live?”
“Right down the street there—shee that sign—?”
Kiley saw a sign half a block down that said HOTEL—NIGHTLY & WEEKLY. “You want me to walk you down there?”
“Definen’ly not,” the old man said. “Sho happens I am waiting for a call—”
“Suit yourself,” Kiley said, and left him there.
Now, he thought, back in the car, driving away, was the time to tentatively put into place his plan to nail Tony Touhy. Although it was not entirely laid out in his mind—he was not sure exactly where it would lead him, for one thing—he did have enough of a course plotted to at least begin.
So he began. He drove to 3333 Lake Shore Drive.
There was a half-circle driveway in front of the building for picking up and dropping off people, and two limited-time parking spaces along the driveway curb. Kiley parked in one of them and walked over to the buzzer-controlled foyer entrance. Beyond the double glass doors operated by the buzzer, an older man in a maroon doorman’s uniform sat at a desk, idly directing his attention between a newspaper spread open before him, and three small TV monitors each with a different black-and-white picture. The lobby itself, smart and stylish without being opulent, was deserted except for the doorman.
Kiley used a knuckle to tap on one of the glass doors, and held up his badge for the doorman to see. The buzzer was sounded and he pushed on in as the doorman got up to meet him. Kiley let him take a close look at his detective’s badge, but kept his photo ID folded under.
“Ed Monroe,” Kiley said, extending his hand. “Robbery detail.”
“Bernard Oznina, night doorman. Is something wrong?”
“Nothing for you to worry about, Mr. Oznina. We’ve had a rash of purse snatchings a few blocks from here—over on Broadway, around there. Some young jigs doing it. We’ve got stakeouts trying to catch them but the bastards have been too fast for us so far—”
“Yeah, them jigs can run—”
“We’re trying to get a line on which way they go after they snatch a purse. Have you seen any black kids running past your building, say, last week, ten days?”
“No, not once,” said Oznina. “You think they’re running down here, to the Drive?”
“We think they may be running over into the park,” Joe said. “Just thought they may have run past one of the buildings along here. What hours you work, Mr. Oznina?”
“Four to midnight.”
“You’re the one to see, then. All the incidents have occurred between nine-thirty and eleven-forty. Say, have you got a water fountain in here?”
“Water cooler. Follow me.” The doorman led Joe to a small utility room off the lobby and pointed to a bottled water dispenser with a tube of paper cups on its side. “Help yourself.”
Kiley drank two cups of water, tossed the cup in a wastebasket, and said, “That was good. Thanks a lot, Mr. Oznina—”
“Anytime, officer. Listen,” he said as he walked Kiley to the door, “you’ll let me know if these purse snatchings get any closer to the Drive, won’t you?”
“We don’t think they will,” Kiley told him. “Most residents here on the Drive come and go in cars. These punks are hitting people on foot: leaving the all-night market, coming out of a movie, that kind of thing. But I’ll let you know if anything happens closer. In the meantime, I wouldn’t mention it to anyone. No sense alarming your tenants.”
“Mum’s the word for me,” Oznina said.
Kiley gave him a wink and left.
Now, he thought as he got back into his car, all he had to do was find a way to get Bernard Oznina to let him into Tony Touhy’s apartment.
Thirteen
Early the next morning, a full two hours before his shift was to begin, Kiley walked into the B-and-A squad room and hung his coat on the back of the chair at what was now his desk. Lee Tumac, who was still the night duty officer, looked up from his own desk where he was surviving the last two hours of his shift on steaming black coffee from the machine in the hall.
“Jesus, Kiley, what the fuck are you, an insomniac or something?” he asked, without rancor.
“My body clock’s all fucked up,” Kiley told him. “I guess I worked nights too long. I’ve been awake since three; finally I decided I might as well try to accomplish something.”
“Well, don’t log in until eight, okay? Otherwise you’ll make the rest of us look bad.”
“I’ve been on the force fourteen years, Tumac,” Joe replied. “I don’t need to be told something like that.”
“No offense,” Tumac said, waving a hand to dismiss the subject. “It’s been a long night.”
“Take off now if you want to,” Joe said. “I’ll cover for you.”
“Seriously?” Tumac’s face lit up.
“Why not, I’m here anyway. I’ll log you out at eight when I log myself in. Go on, beat it.”
“All right! Listen, Joe, I owe you one.”
“Forget it.”
As Lee Tumac was leaving, Joe was activating one of the terminals against the back wall and turning on its monitor. When the document window came up, he cursored across the menu bar to FORMS and keyed ENTER. The terminal asked: INTERNAL OR EXTERNAL? Kiley selected the latter. A cascade menu immediately dropped down the window listing the various forms developed by the department for communicating with external agencies. Kiley cursored down to REQUEST FOR INFORMATION and keyed ENTER again. Several seconds later, the form came onto the screen. Kiley began to fill in the blanks.
Directing the form to the Detroit Police Department in Detroit, Michigan, he requested a full record check run on Winston, Harold Paul, beginning with birth records, department of health records, board of education records, available juvenile offender records, plus any related or other informational records the Detroit Police Department considered appropriate. As the reason for the records request, Kiley stated that the subject was a suspect in the vandalism of Chicago city buses by use of minor explosive devices.
When he had completed the form, Kiley keyed in the Spell Check feature of the terminal and watched as it went through his typed input and found his errors. After he corrected his mistakes, he turned on the printer connected to the three terminals, initialized the proper terminal to the printer, and requested four copies of the filled-out form. The printer warmed up in thirty seconds, read the hard disc of the terminal in two, accessed the information on that disc in five, and began printing one second later. The four copies slid out one by one, smoothly and precisely, like playing cards being cast by an expert dealer.
When the printing function terminated, the terminal asked in its document window: ANOTHER FORM? or CLOSE? Kiley keyed for another form. This one he directed to the Dayton Police Department, in Dayton, Ohio. He asked for the same information, just in case, but added several new areas of search: adult police records; city, county, or state employment records; local credit bureau records; civil litigation records; city and county real estate records; and business license records. When he had the form completed, he went through the same procedure again and had four copies printed.
Back at his desk, Kiley put one copy of each request into his own file. Then he got out a B-and-A inter-squad memo form, rolled it into his typewriter, and typed:
To: Captain Leo Madzak
Commander, B&A
From: Joseph F. Kiley, Det. 1st (TAD)
Subject: Requests made for external agency information.
In the text section, he wrote:
Enclosed are copies of
two requests for information on subject Winston, Harold Paul. Will advise upon receipt this information. Proceeding with second personal contact with subject as soon as possible, and will advise results. Transferring field surveillance to place of employment: Olson Rug Co., 4484 Montrose Avenue.
That last item was a cover. Kiley did not intend to conduct a surveillance of Winston at his job or anywhere else. Watching Winston would have been as useless as giving him the third degree. The only way to make Winston was to handle him—slowly, subtly, slyly. But Kiley needed a reason to be out of the office nearly all day, in order to keep Leo Madzak clean, and there wasn’t a better way than a reasonable, logical surveillance excuse.
Stapling the Madzak memo to the information request forms, Kiley crossed the squad room to the commander’s office and dropped the papers into the IN basket. Then he returned to his own desk and took out still another blank form, this one mimeographed instead of printed, and only one-third the size of a normal sheet. He filled it out in ballpoint:
To: Aldena
From: Kiley
FAX to: Detroit PD Mich.
Dayton PD Oh.
At the bottom, he printed in capital letters: ASAP PLEASE. He stapled it to two copies of each request.
As Kiley was going over to put it on Aldena’s desk, in she walked, with her customary don’t-fuck-with-me frown.
“You come in early just to think up more work for me to do?” she demanded.
“That’s right,” Kiley said “Captain told me to try and keep you busy. Said when you’re not busy, you start messing with the male employees.”
“Shee-it,” Aldena scoffed. “Nobody in this building worth messing with. I be better off going over to the jail and messing around.”
“I’ll have to report that remark,” Kiley told her solemnly.
“Don’t make no difference to me what you report,” she declared. “I’m black, female, a single mother, and handicapped. Can’t nobody touch my job.”
