Murder, She Reported

by Peg Cochran

  “You found her?”

  “Yes. We agreed to meet here under the shelter of the El. But when I got here…” Irene took a deep breath and looked down at her hands.

  “Do you have any idea who might have done this to her?”

  Irene shook her head. “When I saw her like that…I thought she might still be alive but I couldn’t find a pulse, and she was so cold. That’s when I covered her with my coat. A man came along and said he would call the police.” Irene started to cry again. “He looked at me…like I was nothing but a piece of trash that had been tossed into the street.”

  Elizabeth felt sick to her stomach. She couldn’t bear it that Irene had been reduced to walking the streets to stay alive. How long before she ended up like that poor girl on the platform?

  Elizabeth dug in her handbag, pulled out a clean handkerchief and handed it to Irene.

  “Was anyone on the platform when you got here? Did you notice anyone?”

  “The train had just pulled up—that was before I noticed Julia’s body. There was a man getting on.”

  “What did he look like?”

  Elizabeth waited while Irene blew her nose.

  “He was wearing an overcoat and was dressed like someone who works in an office, but I noticed that the hem of his coat was quite worn. He had his hat in his hand—it looked like a cap of some sort.”

  “I don’t suppose you saw his face?”

  “I’m sorry, no.”

  “Did you see anything else that might be helpful in finding the person who did this?”

  Irene shook her head again. “I wish I had, but as soon as I saw Julia I…”

  Elizabeth hated leaving Irene, but Kaminsky was waiting for her and she could sense his impatience. She hugged her friend and promised she would find a way to help.

  “Let’s wait for the meat wagon,” Kaminsky said when Elizabeth reached him. He was leaning against a post watching as the medical examiner examined the body. “I’d like to get a picture of it. Speaking of pictures, did you get one of the gal who found the body?”

  “No. There’s no need to print her photograph in the paper. She’s a decent person who’s fallen on hard times.”

  “Going soft on me, are you, Biz?”

  “I’m sorry. It wouldn’t be fair. It would be taking advantage of someone in a difficult position.”

  “I guess I’m the one going soft now.” Kaminsky shook his head. “If you were any of the other photographers, I’d get you fired.” He glanced toward the police car where Irene still huddled in the backseat. “Did you get me any information, though? Anything that’ll help us scoop the other papers?” He gestured toward a man in a brown trilby hat with a notepad in his hand.

  Elizabeth recognized him from Marino’s press conference at the Waldorf Astoria.

  “Irene said the train was pulling in when she got here, and a man was getting on.” Elizabeth described him.

  “So he could be our murderer. Otherwise why wouldn’t he have seen the body and raised the alarm? Maybe he was a john, and he decided he didn’t want to pay. Or she borrowed money from the wrong person and payment was overdue, and they decided to make an example of her.”

  Elizabeth shuddered.

  The van from the morgue had arrived, and they were loading the body into it. The driver shut the doors and hopped into the driver’s seat. Marino slapped the side of the van as it pulled away.

  “I’m going to see if I can catch the ME before he leaves,” Kaminsky said.

  He and Marino passed each other as Marino sauntered over toward Elizabeth.

  Marino smiled at Elizabeth, catching and holding her gaze with his own. “Have you ever had pasta con pesce spada e melanzana before?”

  Elizabeth didn’t even know what that was. “No, I haven’t.”

  She tried to look away but the light dancing in Marino’s dark eyes was mesmerizing.

  “Then come have lunch with me. We’ll go to Angelo’s on Mulberry Street. It’s one of their specialties.”

  Elizabeth was afraid that if she opened her mouth she would simply stutter so she nodded her head yes.

  Marino snapped his fingers and whistled, and one of the uniformed officers approached at a trot.

  “I’m going to lunch,” he told the young man. “When you’re finished here you can head back to the station. I’ll take a cab.”

  “Let’s go.” He put a hand under Elizabeth’s elbow and began to lead her toward Second Avenue.

  Elizabeth let him lead her, all the while feeling that she was making a huge mistake.

  Chapter 18

  Elizabeth followed somewhat numbly as Marino hailed a Checker cab and held open the door. Her mind was whirling with images of everything she had seen: Julia’s dead body, Irene’s tearstained face, Marino’s lively eyes. She badly needed to take a deep breath and get her bearings, but instead found herself rocketing down Second Avenue at breakneck speed in the backseat of a taxicab.

  The cab hit a large pothole and Elizabeth was thrown against Marino, landing half in his lap. So much for maintaining her dignity or any sense of propriety, she thought as she righted herself and inched away from him. He didn’t seem in the least disturbed by the occurrence and continued with his story about the time he’d been ambushed by a thief wielding a dangerous-looking scythe.

  The cab headed west and plunged into the narrow, congested streets of lower Manhattan. Suddenly Elizabeth felt as if she was in another world. A young boy chased a ball into the street and the cab stopped short. The cabbie rolled down his window and shook his fist at the boy, who dashed across the street without looking back, the ball tucked securely under his arm.

  Finally, the cab turned down Mulberry Street, where laundry drying on clotheslines formed a colorful canopy over the alleys between the cramped buildings. Old men sat out on the stoops despite the frigid weather, caps pulled down low on their foreheads, hands stuffed in their pockets, the tips of their ears bright red.

  Street vendors jostled for room on the crowded sidewalks, their carts piled high with everything from produce to bed linens.

  The taxi pulled up in front of a restaurant with a dark blue awning over the glass front with Angelo’s written on it in white script.

  The smell was what struck Elizabeth first when she got out of the cab. It was like a complex symphony of both harmonious and discordant notes—spicy, earthy, pungent and slightly fetid all at once. She detected the odor of roasting tomatoes, the brininess of raw fish, the slight funkiness of fresh meat all mixing with the scent of laundry drying in the open air.

  Instead of the manicured hush of Park Avenue, there was constant noise—horns blaring, music pouring out of cracked windows, women standing on front steps shouting across the street to one another.

  Marino ushered Elizabeth into Angelo’s, where they were greeted effusively by a maître d’ with thick dark hair slicked back from a high forehead and a huge handlebar mustache. He clapped Marino on the back and shook his hand, all the while examining Elizabeth intensely.

  “I have a lovely table in the back. Very private.” he said to Marino, in staccato-accented English. “Come, please, signorina.” He gestured to Elizabeth to follow him to a secluded table in the corner where he pulled out a chair.

  Elizabeth took a seat and looked around her. The restaurant was just beginning to fill up with lunchtime customers but none of the tables close to theirs was occupied.

  Despite having had her share of experience with men, Elizabeth was nervous. Marino, she suspected, wouldn’t be playing by the same rules as the likes of Phillips Sloan or any of the other boys she’d dated.

  And that was the real difference, she realized—Marino was a man. The others had been boys playing at being grown-up—taking her to expensive restaurants like Delmonico’s and the Stork Club and paying for the meal with their father’s
money.

  The thought made Elizabeth nervous, and her stomach felt queasy as Marino took the seat opposite her.

  A waiter appeared and hovered near their table. Marino snapped his fingers at the man.

  “Yes, sir?” the waiter said. “A bottle of your usual?”

  “Yes. And an antipasto platter. Tell the chef it’s for someone special.”

  The waiter nodded at Marino and gave Elizabeth a knowing smile.

  Elizabeth glanced at Marino. He looked almost as nervous as she felt, as if all the bravado had leaked out of him suddenly. He fiddled with his fork, turning it over and over again. He looked up suddenly.

  “You’re an intriguing woman, Biz,” he said.

  Elizabeth began to protest, but Marino held up a hand.

  “You’re doing a tough job—coming across things like you saw today would be rough on anyone. I’ve known tough women—women who’ve had hard lives and done difficult things, but you don’t seem like them at all. You’re different. I don’t understand it.”

  The waiter arrived with a bottle of Pinot Grigio and two glasses. He uncorked the wine and poured a measure into each glass. Marino took a sip, nodded, and the waiter moved away.

  “You know the girl who found the prostitute’s body,” Marino said, fiddling with the stem of his wineglass. “How did you come to know someone like that?” He waved a hand encompassing Elizabeth’s appearance. “You don’t look like someone who would come across women living that sort of life.”

  “Irene—she’s the girl who found the body—isn’t what you think. She’s down on her luck like so many other people in the city. She was desperate.”

  Marino tilted his head to the side.

  “Irene and I met in the hospital years ago, when we both were being treated for polio.”

  Marino’s dark eyes widened.

  “We became friends and kept in touch after we got out. Irene was more affected than I was. I only have a slight limp.” Elizabeth felt herself color. Would she ever get over her embarrassment about her disability? “Irene wasn’t so lucky and ended up in leg braces. Others died,” Elizabeth said, thinking of poor Clara.

  She took a sip of her wine. “Irene’s parents are gone and she has no one. She has to look after herself. She had a good job but lost it because she couldn’t move fast enough.” Elizabeth’s voice broke.

  “I’m sorry,” Marino said. “It’s no life for a woman. Too many of them end up dead like that poor girl.”

  The swinging doors to the kitchen opened and the chef, in his white apron and checked pants, came out bearing a platter, which he ceremoniously placed in the middle of the table.

  Marino jumped up and the two men embraced briefly. The chef turned around and beamed at Elizabeth.

  “Buon appetito, signorina,” he said, bowing his head. He turned to Marino. “I recommend the pasta con pesce spada e melanzana.” He bunched together the fingertips of his right hand and kissed them.

  Marino laughed. “You know me too well, Luigi.”

  Luigi smiled and turned away.

  Elizabeth stared at the array of food on the platter—cheeses, meats, olives and pickled vegetables. It was a feast all by itself.

  Marino slipped off his suit jacket and hung it from the back of his chair. He loosened his tie, rolled up his sleeves and tucked his napkin into his collar.

  Elizabeth watched in fascination. She’d never seen anyone do that before, although she had passed building sites where the workers tucked their napkins into their work shirts as they sat around their lunch pails eating sandwiches.

  Marino picked up a fork and began putting morsels of food on Elizabeth’s plate. He pointed to a sliver of cheese.

  “Fresh provolone,” he said. “Taste it.”

  Elizabeth cut off a sliver with her knife and fork. The smell gave a hint to the taste: sharp and pungent. She took a bite. It was delicious.

  “Now try this.” Marino pointed his fork at a slice of meat. “Salami.”

  Elizabeth tasted the meat. It was garlicky—not a taste she was accustomed to—but delicious. Everything was so different from the sort of cooking Mrs. Murphy did—stews and plain roasts, potatoes with butter, maybe a simple cream sauce or cheese sauce to dress up boiled vegetables.

  “Mmmmm.” She couldn’t help making small noises of pleasure as she chewed. Tastes exploded in her mouth in ways they never had before.

  Marino smiled and held out his fork with another tidbit on it.

  Elizabeth didn’t hesitate—she leaned forward and took it into her mouth. It was cold, slightly chewy with the sharp taste of vinegar tempered by the smoothness of olive oil. She raised her eyebrows at Marino.

  “Marinated artichoke,” he said, smiling.

  “I’ve never had anything like this before,” Elizabeth said, reaching for her wineglass.

  Marino leaned back in his chair, looking very pleased.

  The waiter returned to their table, removed the antipasto platter and replaced their used dishes with two bowls of pasta. Marino leaned over his bowl and inhaled the fragrant steam.

  “My nonna is from Ragusa, and she made this dish all the time. She would walk down to the docks and get fish straight from the sea as the sailors were coming in with their catch.” He pointed his fork at Elizabeth. “My mother…Now, she’s from Naples and she makes the best spaghetti con vongole—spaghetti with clams—that you’ve ever had. You’ll have to come for dinner sometime and I’ll ask her to make it for you.”

  Elizabeth felt her face coloring. She was still surprised to find herself having lunch with Marino. She hadn’t thought about a next time. She couldn’t imagine herself going to Marino’s house for dinner.

  “My mother is a tough woman,” Marino said, twirling his spaghetti around his fork.

  Elizabeth was still struggling with hers. Spaghetti wasn’t in Mrs. Murphy’s repertoire. She tried to imitate what Marino was doing, but the strands of spaghetti kept slipping off her fork.

  “My mother came to this country as a newlywed. Neither of my parents knew the language or much of anything about New York. My father had a second cousin—Domenico—who had come over a few years before, so my father decided they would make a new life in America, too. My father works on the docks and my mother takes in laundry and does piecework.” He stabbed a piece of fish with his fork. “Not exactly the idyllic life they pictured, I would imagine.

  “I was born here, and I decided I needed to make something of myself so my parents’ sacrifice wouldn’t be for nothing. I graduated from the police academy and joined the force. As soon as I’ve saved enough money, I’m going to buy them a nice little place outside the city where they can have a garden and sit in the sun in the summertime.”

  The waiter appeared and refilled their wineglasses. He looked at Elizabeth’s plate.

  “You no like, signorina? I can bring you something else.”

  “No, no, it’s delicious. Everything is delicious. I’ve already eaten so much…..”

  The waiter nodded and moved away.

  Marino looked up from his plate. “Right now, it’s the four of us living in the apartment—my sister is sixteen and finishing high school next year, but she’ll stay until she marries.”

  Elizabeth took another cautious sip of her wine. She had to be careful—the sights, scents and tastes she was experiencing for the first time were intoxicating enough.

  Marino finished his spaghetti and pushed his plate away. He leaned his arms on the table. “I don’t know anything about you. How did you end up working for the Daily Trumpet?”

  Elizabeth froze with her hand on her fork. How much should she reveal about herself? Did it matter?

  “I got interested in photography when I was in college. I took a few classes and was fortunate to spend time with my roommate’s aunt, who is an accomplished photograph
er. I decided that when I graduated I wanted to work for a newspaper.”

  Elizabeth pushed her own plate away and leaned forward. Marino was listening with an intensity that was new to her, his lively dark eyes never leaving her face. She wasn’t used to this—all Phillips and the other boys in her set ever wanted to do was to talk about themselves.

  “I took a job at the Daily Trumpet as a gal Friday, but one night all the photographers were already out on a story or home sick and I had the opportunity to show them I could take pictures.”

  Marino grinned. “I knew you had guts the moment I saw you. I like that in a woman.”

  Elizabeth found herself grinning back. Marino was brash, slightly vulgar, handsome and very cocky, and Elizabeth found herself drawn to him. But they lived and moved in such different spheres, she doubted they would ever get beyond having lunch with each other. If she couldn’t imagine going to Marino’s house for dinner, she certainly couldn’t imagine bringing him home to hers.

  “I should be getting back to the newsroom,” Elizabeth said, picking up her gloves.

  Marino put out a hand and covered one of hers. “You must have un dolce.” He snapped his fingers and the waiter, who had been hovering near the door to the kitchen, jumped to attention and strode toward their table.

  He and Marino conferred in low voices. Finally, the waiter nodded and headed toward the kitchen.

  “He’s bringing us a little something to end our meal.”

  Elizabeth put down her gloves and leaned back in her seat. Moments later the waiter reappeared with two small cups of coffee and a platter of pastries.

  Marino pointed to the plate. “That’s a cannoli, a sfogliatella, and those are pignoli,” he indicated several round cookies studded with nuts. He picked up a cannoli and put it on Elizabeth’s plate.

  She stared at it for a moment, uncertain as to how to eat it. She watched as Marino picked his up in his fingers and bit into it, cream squirting out the other end and plopping on his plate.