by Rick Polad
Several customers, all of whom I’m sure had “White Sox” tattooed on their rear ends, were waiting to hear my response. I didn’t have any.
“Best thing you ever said,” Beef smirked. “All I got to say is we got two series coming up with the Twins and we’re gonna make a run on first place.” He walked back to the counter, picked up my pancakes and put them in front of me with a smug look on his face.
I took a bite. He turned back for some more orders. “I did get a lead on a guy who may be Ronny,” I said. “I’ll look into it today.”
He nodded as he walked down the aisle.
I finished eating, walked outside, took a breath of hot air, and headed for my car. I waited for a minute after opening the doors before I got in. Only eight o’clock and the car was already an oven.
Twenty minutes later I pulled into the small lot next to precinct headquarters. It was usually tough finding a spot. This morning there were two. I took the first and the squad that pulled in behind me took the second. We got out at the same time and I was pleased to see Rose Marie Lonnigan.
Rosie was four years older than I and had joined the force a year before I had joined the army. Her folks were friends of my folks and Dad had taken her under his wing. But she didn’t need much winging. She had a pretty face and a body that looked good even under that unflattering blue uniform. Underneath she had an attitude that said: “Mess with me and I’ll break your legs.” There were several guys staring at bars who hadn’t bothered looking past the pretty face.
“Well as I live and breathe. If it isn’t little Rosie Lonnigan.”
“Hi, Spence! I didn’t get a chance to talk to you much at the dinner. I hope you know how sorry... I just wish... I mean I...”
“That’s okay, Rosie. I know, thanks.” I held out my arm. “May I escort you to the door?”
“I would be honored, sir,” she said, taking my arm.
“How’s the detective business? You doing okay?”
“Sure. I love it. Wouldn’t want to do anything else.” I didn’t want to tell her something else was about all I’d been doing.
I opened the door and followed her in.
“You just visiting?” she asked.
“Yes and no. I need to see Stosh about a case I’m working on. I’m hoping he’ll be able to give me some information.”
She gave me a coy little smile and tilted her head. “Stosh?” She said it with a real long “o”. “Do you mean the respected Lieutenant Powolski?”
I shook my head. “Afraid I’ll never be able to get used to that. He’ll always be Sarge to me.”
She waved to the desk sergeant, whom I didn’t recognize, and said, “I’ve got to stop at the little ladies room. Let’s have coffee, Spence. Anything I can do let me know.”
“Thanks, Rosie.” I started to walk away.
“Hey, Spence.”
Rosie turned to me with her arms folded across her chest and a challenging look on her face. “Care for a rematch?”
For as long as we had known each other Rosie had made it a goal to shoot better than me. We hadn’t shot since I left for the army but the last time she had come close. I would do everything I could to keep her from winning but I would be thrilled if she did.
I laughed. “Sure, kick a guy when he’s down. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve picked up a gun?”
“So practice. As much as you like. As a matter of fact, I’m going to the range this afternoon. Why don’t you come along?”
I had nothing better to do and I knew I should get some time in so I accepted.
“Pick me up here at three.” She turned and, over her shoulder, said, “I’ll have them put up the big targets for you.”
I watched her walk away and wondered for the hundredth time why we had never gone beyond friends. Maybe because we were such good friends. Why ruin a good thing? But there was something there. I’d kissed her once. A long time ago. She’d kissed me back, looking up at me with big blue eyes glistening with the start of tears. Then she ran away. We never brought it up and that was our first and last kiss. I took a deep breath and pulled my eyes away from the door where she had disappeared.
Before I went upstairs, I stopped to see Evelyn in records. She had to be close to retirement, but if they had any sense they wouldn’t let her. She’d been there as long as I could remember and anyone would readily admit that the place wouldn’t run without her. Used to be that every case went through her hands. Anybody wanted to know anything, they asked Evelyn. If she didn’t remember, she knew where to find it. Several years ago, when computers took over the record-keeping, Dad wrote that they’d hired her two assistants just to keep things straight. Evelyn wasn’t happy about that but she had to give in to progress, not to mention an increase in crime.
I quietly opened and closed the glass door and tip-toed up behind her.
“Anything I can do for you?” she asked as she continued to type.
“You still got some candy for a kid with a sweet tooth?”
“Bottom drawer.”
I opened the drawer and took two pieces of peppermint out of the jar.
She reached out and slapped my hand. “One piece. For cryin’ out loud, won’t you kids ever learn!” She stood up and gave me a bear hug. “You look great, Spencer,” she said with a wide smile.
“Thanks, Evelyn. You look pretty good yourself.”
“Stosh told me you were stopping by. I was hoping you’d peek in.” Her smile turned into a frown. “If there’s anything I can do... I know! You could probably use some home cooking. Just give me a day’s notice and let me know what you want to eat.”
“Thanks, Evelyn, I’ll do that.”
“Well, back to my friendly computer. Don’t be a stranger.”
“Not a chance.” I gave her a kiss on the cheek and let myself out.
Chapter 10
I took the stairs two at a time and bumped into Stosh as I rounded the corner. He managed to get out of the way of his coffee sloshing to the floor. He stared at me with a look that nailed me to the wall. I hurriedly got a paper towel from the nearby coffee cart and wiped it up. He was still staring.
I held out my arms. “Am I forgiven?”
“Kids. Everything’s such a hurry. You know, when I was a kid...”
I held up my hand. “Yeah, I’ve heard. You want to continue this at your desk? You know, the one with the Lieutenant nameplate on it?”
He scowled. He had been happy being a sergeant and had turned down several promotion possibilities. A year ago, Dad had written that Stosh’s wife was ill and he finally accepted the promotion because he needed the extra money. She had died six months later. I half expected him to give back the promotion.
I stopped to shake several hands along the way to Stosh’s office and had to run to catch up. His cubicle was at the far end of the room which had been organized into a maze. I would have lost him if I hadn’t been on his heels.
“This business or pleasure?” he asked.
I smiled my “aren’t I a nice guy” smile and said, “It’s always a pleasure to see you, Stosh.”
“Business, eh. Okay, what can I do for you?”
“I’m looking for somebody and it kinda overlaps a case that came in here a while ago.”
He sipped his coffee. “Who you looking for?”
I screwed up one side of my face. “Well, I don’t have a name. That’s part of the problem.”
“I’d say that’s all of the problem. You’re looking for somebody, but you don’t know who it is.” He shook his head. “And somebody pays you to do that? Boy, you P.I.s got it tough. You just hang out a shingle, come up with a fancy patter and a two-step that keeps everybody guessing and life’s a piece of cake; unlike us poor civil servants who gotta take tests to get our jobs and then get to sit behind a desk and watch you guys dance.”
I crossed my arms and gave him my best disgusted look. “Is there a big finish to this number?”
“That’s the trick about thi
s job, kid. There’s no big finish, just a new face floatin’ in the water.” He laced his fingers together around the cup and looked at me. “I assume you’re gonna explain this a little.”
I sat down on the edge of the desk. “A few months ago...”
“Hey. This is a Lieutenant’s desk for chrissake. A Sergeant’s desk, who cares? But this...” He spread out his hands over the old beat-up oak desk covered with piles of paper. “Let’s have some respect.” A smile spread across the tough, gravelly face, lined with years of seeing everything there was to see. “Pull up a chair from across the aisle. Maloney’s in the hospital with an ulcer.”
I did and sat down. “A few months ago, a lady by the name of Elizabeth Williams was shot to death in her apartment over on Hunter.”
Stosh nodded, leaned back in the chair, and folded his hands on his stomach. “I remember. Not one of your finer residences.”
“That’s what I was told. Anyway, she had a four-year-old daughter named Martha. Evidently she was never married and was the only one who knew who the father was. The kid is living with her uncle now and he’d like to know.”
While I was talking, Stosh pulled a file out of the cabinet next to his desk and leafed through it until he came to the page he wanted. I watched in silence as he refreshed his memory.
He had put on his glasses and now looked at me over the rims. “This uncle would be this Beef, right?”
“Right.”
“Well, I’ll be.”
“What?”
Stosh stretched his neck and scratched his adams apple. “At the time, I didn’t buy the story that the guy didn’t know the father. He told us his sister got monthly checks that paid for the kid. Maybe that’s what she told him but I doubted she got any checks. Didn’t much wash with her hookin’ in a rundown fire trap. This Beef had the mail forwarded to his address, but no more checks came, or so he told us.”
“Doesn’t mean there weren’t any checks.”
He folded his arms on his chest. “Okay, Mister bigtime P.I., what’s it mean?”
I shrugged. “Could be the father heard about the murder—read about it in the paper.”
“Or it could mean the father did the murder,” he said.
“Could. Or it could mean the father was hit by a bus the next day.”
“Maybe he had dinner in Chinatown and got run over by a rickshaw.”
“Too bad I’m not Charlie Chan,” I said. “I’d have this solved in no time.”
A detective stuck his face in the cubicle and waved a folder. Stosh held up a finger and nodded.
“I assume you checked her bank account,” I said. “Any regular deposits?”
“Nope. We went back two years and there was no pattern. Doesn’t mean much though. She could have cashed checks.”
“Anything in her personal effects?”
“Nope. Besides some clothes and toys, the place was pretty empty. A drawer had drawer-type stuff, a checkbook with less than twenty bucks in it, and forty bucks lying on the desk.”
“Doesn’t that seem strange?”
“What’s strange about it?”
“Where’s all her stuff, records, kid’s drawings, stuff like that.”
“You’re talking about people with normal lives. People like that don’t keep stuff. Life is too transient.”
“But she wasn’t like that. She had a normal life.”
Stosh shook his head. “Not at the end she didn’t.”
I knew that. Something had changed her life, but it didn’t have to change her, especially since she still had Marty.
“Can we back up to something you said?” I asked.
“Sure.”
I didn’t know how to ask without sounding dumb so I just said the word. “Hooking?”
Stosh’s eyebrows raised. “Something your client didn’t bother telling you?”
“I guess not.”
“Yeah, hooking. That’s mostly the profession of choice in that neighborhood.”
“You sure?”
“That’s what I would suspect. It was also confirmed by a neighbor who is in the same profession.”
“Okay. Then it could have been a john looking for money.”
“Sure. But there was the forty bucks, probably the night’s take, sitting in plain view, so probably not.”
“Where’s the checkbook?”
He scanned the file. “Personal effects turned over to the brother.”
“Do you buy Beef’s story now, Sarge?”
“Lieutenant, Kid. But between you and me, Sarge sounds better. I’m more likely to buy it since he hired you to find the father. If he’s willing to shell out cash, then, yes, I’m buying it.”
I didn’t bother telling Stosh that the cash being shelled out was in the form of meatloaf and pancakes. I leaned forward and put my elbows on a pile of paper. “Any of the neighbors shed any light on it?”
“People in that neighborhood are like the three monkeys. Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing. The broad next to her worked with her at a bakery. She claims not to know anything about making a living on the side. Not one of your finer citizens. We checked Ms. Williams’ previous address. Nice place. Kind you wouldn’t mind inviting your mother to dinner to. None of the old neighbors knew her well but they had nice things to say; quiet, minded her own business, pleasant, dressed well, cared for her daughter. Seems she was somewhat of a loner. Nobody could remember her having friends over.”
I sighed. “You sure she was hooking?”
“Fairly steady stream of men coming and going. I don’t think she was serving tea.” He shrugged, kind of apologetically. “We know it goes on there, but there’s never been any trouble and we’re kept plenty busy dealing with what goes on in plain view out in the streets. As long as they keep it behind their doors...” He waved his hand.
“Beef seems to think his sister was a nun. He didn’t like my suggestion that she might not be quite as pure as he thought.”
“I bet. But I thought you didn’t know about the hooking?”
“I didn’t. I made the suggestion based on a child out of wedlock.”
“Oh yeah.”
“You got a name for the neighbor and the bakery?”
“This look like a library?” he asked snidely. But he gave me the names. “This Beef tell you why he wants the father found?”
“Said the guy can probably provide for Marty better than he can.”
“You believe him?”
“I’d like to. Don’t you?”
He blew air out his nose. “I don’t believe or not believe anymore. I just find the facts. Is he taking care of the kid okay?”
“Sure. I don’t know much else, but I do know that. He loves Marty.”
“I hope so, Spence. It was my opinion at the time that she should have been left in the county home a while longer—see what turned up.”
I straightened in the chair. “Why leave her in a home when she’s got a relative. Why put her in a home in the first place?”
Again the raised eyebrows. “Seems like I know more about your client than you do.”
I sighed. “What now?”
“Well, maybe that your client was—is, a suspect in a murder case.”
Up till now, I’d had what I thought were some fairly good comebacks, but this time I was stumped. “Suspect?”
“Capital S. We had him in for questioning, but had to let him go. The bullet came from a twenty-two. Beef just happens to own one. We checked it. Not a match. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t use another gun. He gave us the description of a john he saw leaving the place but whoever that was was long gone. So, we got nothing concrete, but he’s still the only one we’ve got and I haven’t given up yet.”
“All this just because he found the body?”
“No. All this because he had a huge fight with his sister the night of the murder, slammed the door and ran out. The next-door neighbor, uh...” he checked the file, “Brewer, heard them yelling and saw him in the apartment. One
of the neighbors on the floor below said she was just about to call the cops. Said it was as loud as the el trains. A little exaggerated, I’d guess. Had her door open a crack and saw him come charging down the stairs. Coroner puts the time of death between ten and two. Beef was there between 10 and 10:30. The lock on the door was broken. Brewer says he broke it. He says he didn’t. She says the door opened and this guy ran out.”
“Did the neighbors hear a shot?”
“Nope. But when the trains go by you wouldn’t hear a shotgun go off.”
Stosh let his chair squeak back to straight. “Why do you think your client didn’t bother telling you a few pertinent facts?”
I shook my head. “He seems to have his own agenda and doesn’t stray from it.”
“Listen, Spence. I know you are looking for the father. But you could get messed up in a murder investigation and with a client who isn’t cooperative. I don’t feel real good about that.”
“Don’t worry, Stosh. If it looks like the two cross, I’ll get out of your way.” I stood up. He didn’t.
“Your getting in my way isn’t what bothers me. Your ending up on a slab is.”
I smiled. “That doesn’t appeal much to me, either. I promise to be careful. What was the fight about?”
“Don’t know, he wouldn’t say. But whatever it was could give him a motive. And if I find one I’m gonna get more serious about this.”
He stood up and put his arm around my shoulders. “You wouldn’t by chance have run into anything that I’d like to know have you?”
“Hey, I’m new at this. I don’t even know where to start.” I laughed.
He squinted his eyes and said, “Sure. If you do, call me.”
“What do you mean, call you? You never saw Mike Hammer calling Captain Chambers with every piece of information that came his way.”
He grinned. “No, but then Pat never changed Mike’s diapers either. Seriously, kid. You’re not some tough guy who grew up in the Bronx. You’re too nice for this kind of thing. There’s already one person dead in this case and, if there’s going to be two, I don’t want it to be you. I kind of made a promise to look after you if anything ever happened.”
