1 The Reluctant Dick - The Case of the Not-So-Fair Trader (30 page)

I wait for Abe to rush off to another part of the house. “One last question?”

“Fine,” she says.

“Was Alvin a crook?”

“You mean, did he cheat?” she asks.

“Yeah.”

“Lots of people cheat.”

“Did Alvin?”

“If he did, he had his own system, because it is tough to do when it’s all done electronically.”

“Easier to cheat if you trade on the floor?”

“Oh, yeah, they use the honor system on the floor.”

“Thank you for your time.” Walking towards the front door, I see Honest Abe emptying cat litter into a garbage bag.

“Good luck with the house.”

Before I leave, I sneak in one last question, “Do you know where I can find Mister Heffelfinger? I’ve been unable to reach him in the last few days.”

“He’s out of town. I don’t know where.”

“Well, then, meow.”

She smiles at my goodbye.

I pass the prospective couple on their way into the showing. I hope they are cat lovers.

___

I walk six blocks to the
“L”
station and ride the Red Line, transfer to the Brown at Fullerton, and get off at the Board of Trade stop.

I head inside to the administration office and flash my license at the clerk.

“Yeah, what?”

“I’m looking for a company or individual names Nivlia or Nivia or a sounds-like.”

“Good for you,” the clerk, a middle-aged man, who obviously doesn’t like his job
,
or doesn’t like me
-
or both
, says
.

“Could you help me?”

“I could.”

Out of my wallet I pull out a ten and slide it towards him. His fingers snap up the bill like a lizard tongue finding lunch.

“Hey, Bruno,” the clerk says to the janitor emptying wastepaper baskets behind him. “This guy wants to see the Nivla office.”

Bruno stops his collection process. “Another one?”

“Bruno don’t come cheap, either,” the clerk informs me.

I pull out another ten-spot and follow Bruno to the service elevator.

“I’m not allowed to use the regular elevator,” Bruno says as he hits the number-twenty-three button.

“Why did you say ‘another one’ when the clerk mentioned Nivla?”

“You’re the third guy to want to get in.”

“You make ten bucks each time?”

“The last guy gave me a twenty.”

The elevator jerks to a stop and we walk down the hall to the last door before the one marked MEN. On the spot where the company plaque should be is a small piece of paper with
the name NIVLA CORP. Scotched-t
aped in its place. “Classy,” I remark.

“People here are too busy making dough to be classy,” Bruno says as he pulls out a key ring with about a thousand keys. He picks one right out of the middle, slides it into the lock and opens the door.

“You don’t knock?”

He looks at me like I’m nuts.

One room, long and narrow with one desk, one chair, one phone. I pick up the receiver, no dial-tone, and place it back down in its cradle. I hear a slight whooshing sound.

Bruno hears it, too. “You can hear the toilet flush,” he says.

“Quaint.”

“Not the urinal, just the toilet.”

“Thank God for small favors.”

I pace around the room to the one window and look down on the alley below. “Tell me about the other guys who came and saw the place.”

“No.”

I hand him another ten-dollar bill.

“The first guy was like one of those muscle-head guys,” Bruno says and puffs up his chest like Charles Atlas. “The other guy was old.”

“Did he have a tweed sport coat?”

“Yeah, but he wasn’t from England. He was a Jew.”

“Work in the building?”

Bruno nods.

“The other guy about thirty, dark hair, about this tall,” I raise my hand a little less than my height, “dressed to impress the ladies?”

“Not my kind of ladies.”

“He’s the one who gave you the twenty?”

“Yeah, how’d you know?”

“I’m smart.”

There is one whooshing sound, then another.

“It always picks up after lunch,” Bruno says.

___

I am hardly euphoric, but I have made a connection; my first in the case. I can’t wait to go home and rearrange the index cards on the
Original Carlo
.

24

Bare witness

The elevator doors open on the lobby level
.
I step out and find myself in a sea of look-alikes. Each man is in a blue plastic jacket, white shirt, and tightly
-
tied
,
striped tie. They flood into the building like a swarm of Smurfs, flashing their badges high
for
identification. The well-dressed platoon is led by none other than Agent Romo Simpson.

Commoners, such as
I
,
are
caught in the lobby during the rush, part
ing
like the Red Sea, allowing the squad to commandeer the elevators.

Romo picks me out of the crowd. “What are you doing here?”

“Just visiting.”

“Well, you’re in the middle of an official FBI operation,” he says
,
as he waves cohorts into an elevator.

“I would have never guessed.”

Next, through the front doors come a gaggle of TV news crews, one from each of the stations. All have lights blazing, video cameras recording, and reporters announcing into microphones that they are “live at the scene.”

I wonder who tipped them off?

“By the way, did you ever find out who that guy was in the picture?” I ask Romo.

“I am not at liberty to say,” he says
,
and crowds into the car as if he were the last man jumping on a boat leaving the dock.

Figuring I will see all this on the news, I decide not to hang around. I have better things to do.

___

Tuesday night’s feast is macaroni surprise. Kelly and Care are not only not surprised, but not too thrilled as it sits in front of them at the table.

“This is gross.”

“It’s good, if you just taste it,” I say. “You can’t judge a book by its cover.”

Care asks, “You got this out of a cookbook?”

“Dad, this looks like one of those flesh-eating diseases,” Kelly says.

Maybe mixing tomato tuna casserole with mac and cheese wasn’t the best menu choice, but I am thinking nutrition for my girls.

“All four basic food groups are represented,” I tell them and take a bite to back up my “try it you’ll like it” argument. The ploy doesn’t work, so I add a cup
-
and
-
a
-
half of guilt
.
“You know people that are starving in Africa would die for a dinner this nutritious.”

“Then let’s put it in a baggie and send it to them,” Kelly suggests.

I boil the girls tube steaks, aka hot dogs, which they devour. They may have been right about the surprise; it was pretty bad.

“How is the number-one table, Kel?”

“How did you know I got picked?”

“Your dad’s a detective.”

“Did you tell him, Care?”

“No.”

“I knew because you didn’t tell me,” I explain to my eldest. “Teenage avoidance is always a great clue.”

“See,” Care says, pretending to understand.

“So far, it’s awesome,” Kelly says.

“Why?

“Because it just is. Everybody in school sees me sitting there.”

“And?”

“That’s awesome.”

“You should have known that, Dad,” Care says. “You’re a detective.”

“How long has it been?”

“One day.”

“Well, don’t be surprised if the glow fades fast.”

“It won’t,” Kelly argues.

“I don’t want my daughters getting their self-respect from the way others view them,” I lecture. “You should get your self-esteem from the way you view yourself.”

“Like in a mirror?” Care asks.

“No. Self-worth should come from within,” I speak slowly, fatherly. “If you are proud and happy about yourself, you won’t care what others think.”

“Dad,” Kelly says, “I’m beginning to understand why you don’t date.”

___

T
he
BOARD OF TRADE RAIDED BY FEDS headline in the
Sun Times
is twice the size of the
Tribune’s
BOARD OF TRADE INVESTIGATED. Romo Simpson’s picture isn’t on either cover
. Y
ou have to go all the way to page twenty-three and thirty-one, respectively, to see him in all his glory. Pity. The corresponding story in each is mostly flash and trash on how the FBI has been secretly recording conversations
,
and about their going
undercover
to weed out the dastardly criminals taking advantage of the honor policy on the trading floor.

Once, when I was still with the CPD, there was an investigation of illegal dog breeding in a number of kennels.
At
the Monday morning detective’s meeting I offered to go undercover as a cocker spaniel to help bust the bad breeders. My offer was refused.

___

In a day or two the RAID will disappear from the media, a few low-level doofusses will be charged and OPERATION FUNNY MONEY will fade into the FBI files of yore. It is obvious that Agent Romo spent months of taxpayer money and found little malfeasance. Failing in his investigation he does the next best thing, which is to stage a big bust, get on TV, get his name in the newspapers, and hopefully be promoted for his quick-thinking actions. If anyone has the audacity to see through his cleverly press-agented scam
,
and make a case of it, Romo will claim it was all done to put the fear of God into anyone trying to manipulate the hollowed tradition of the Board of Trade’s honor system. I can picture Agent Romo on TV, saying, “Future prevention is just as important as past indiscretion.”

___

I meet Steve and Norbert at Al’s Italian Beef on Wells Street. We sit at an outdoor table.

“So what do you know, Sherlock?” Steve asks.

“It’s not what I know at this point, it’s what I don’t know.”

Steve says, “You sound like a game show host.”

Norbert finishes one sandwich
;
but before starting on his next, says, “I got this feeling you got a list.”

Norbert is correct.
What a sleuth
.

Every good detective I have ever met or worked with is an incessant list-maker. To-do, What’s Missing, Don’t Understand, Doesn’t Fit, Probables, Improbables, Longshots, People, Places, Things -- lists, lists, and more lists. On each you’ll see cross-outs, additions, notes, memory floggers, arrows, phone numbers, directions, reminders, whatever. Lists are the only way to keep it all straight. I keep most of my lists in my head, a scary place no doubt; but with my memory, it works. Most other dicks keep them on their pocket writing tablets or on one of those yellow legal pads, although the latter is a pain to carry around all day. I guess you could put a list into one of those Blackberry or iPhone things, but I can barely figure out the phone part, much less the rest of their high-tech applications. My memory works
. W
hy not use it
?

Steve pushes his plate to the side, takes out his tablet and pen. “What do you need?”

“I still need the identity of the mystery man in the photo.”

Norbert speaks through a mouthful of fries, “Sent out a copy to every major department in the country, somebody has got to recognize the guy sooner or later.”

“I think Romo knows who it is,” I tell them.

“Romo doesn’t know his ass from his elbow,” Steve says.

“Anything on the two escorts who were servicing the family?”

“Nothing yet,” Steve says, “I got a friend in Vice who said he’d help.”

“Those two are hooked into this somehow,” I say. “Pardon the pun.” I eye the fries on my plate, but decide against grease, and push them toward Norbert. “Heffelfinger is gone, I suspect out of the country. Can you find out where?”