3 Quarters (17 page)

“Did you get to see Tom Larkin?” Shine asked as Bobby wedged himself through the crowd of men and women.

“Yeah,” Bobby said.

“He have anything for you?”

“Just hunches,” Bobby said.

“What hunches?”

Bobby didn't feel like regurgitating what Larkin had said. And he wasn't going to tell anyone but Gleason about what he'd learned from Carlos. A good investigator always asked everything and offered nothing. He watched the front door as customers arrived in groups.

“Case files,” Bobby said. “He wouldn't be specific until he had something positive.”

“He's a cryptic old coot, all right,” Shine said. “He might be able to help. Me, too. But in the end, you'll have to crack your case yourself. ‘Trust thyself; every heart vibrates to that iron string.' ”

“You have an Emerson quote for every occasion,” Bobby said.

“That's because every occasion is about life,” Shine said. “And Emerson decodes the mystery of existence. At least for me.”

Shine offered to buy Bobby a drink, which he declined.

“The last time I had a drink, I wound up in the clink,” Bobby said.

“Suit yourself,” Shine said, and ordered himself a Stolichnaya vodka on the rocks with an orange rind. “But I'm always out of here by nine, the
latest,
so I can have
one.”

“What time does Sandy show up?”

“Around now,” Shine said. “Her first. Then Barnicle. He feels a need for a royal solo entrance with his court jesters.”

Just then Bobby caught a glimpse of Sandy Fraser, in a tight white skirt suit and red high heels, wearing small oval sunglasses, entering the front door, her radiant beauty catching the eyes of the men at the bar.

“Here she is,” Bobby said. “Mind if I play a little?” Bobby pointed to the kitchen, telling Shine what he'd like to do.

“Knock yourself out,” Shine said. He laboriously pushed himself up from the barstool and escorted Bobby through the flapping doors that led from the bar area into the spacious commercial kitchen.

A tired-looking waitress was busy telling a busboy to set up Sandy's table. Bobby placed a starched linen napkin over his forearm, walked to the busboy, and gently took the basket of bread and glasses of water from him. The busboy was confused until Shine nodded his approval.

Bobby smiled at the nervous waitress and softly said, “For the record, it isn't true what they say about me.”

The waitress looked him straight in the eye and managed a half smile. Bobby carried the table setup through the flapping doors leading from the kitchen to the dining room and walked briskly to Sandy's table. Sandy paid little attention as he stood to her left, reaching past her to place the bread and water on the tabletop.

“The specials today are Oysters Barnicle and a very Sandy spinach salad, rather an odd combination, no?” Bobby said in an oily voice. Sandy looked up, startled. She swallowed hard as Bobby sat down at the table and took a sip from a glass of water. She checked her diamond-studded Rolex watch and then the front door, anxious.

“He'll go ape shit if he finds you sitting here,” she said, and then smiled sweetly. “How
are
you, Bobby?”

“I need to talk to you,” Bobby said. “I need your help.”

“I can't,” she said. “I have more to think about now than myself. The baby . . . you understand.”

“How the hell did that happen, anyway?”

“It's too long a story,” Sandy said. “Look, Bobby, I know you could never hurt a hair on Dorothea's head. And I wish I could help. But if I get involved, they'll take my baby, and . . .”

“No one's going to steal your baby,” Bobby said, leaning across the table toward Sandy.

“What do you want?”

“Tell me what you know about Dorothea. She was your friend, Sandy, before she was mine. I have to know everything you know . . . .”

The menu in Sandy's hands began to quake, her fingers sliding up and down its glossy spine. Her long eyelashes batted like little black wings. She took a trembling sip of water, cleared her throat.

“Bobby,” Sandy whispered. “I'm glad you're home. But please . . . please don't put me and my baby in deep shit. You simply have no idea. You can't even help yourself. How can you help me? My baby? These bastards have connections, money, power. Plans. Big freakin' plans. They are very, very dangerous,
capisce?”

“I think maybe me and you should go somewhere and talk,” Bobby said. “In a place you'll feel safe.”

“He has friends
everywhere
,” Sandy said. “You were probably safer inside than out here.”

“You don't even
like
Barnicle, do you?” Bobby said. “I could tell this morning.”

“You didn't like it when people rushed to judgment against you,” Sandy said, angry and defensive now. “So don't you dare judge me, Bobby. I never did you wrong in my life.”

“If you don't tell me what you know about Dorothea,” Bobby said, “you are doing both me
and
her wrong.”

“I'm doing what I gotta do for my kid,” Sandy said, her eyes icy. “Fuck
you,
if you interfere with that.”

Bobby considered her for a long moment. The expensive perfume. The invisible price tags on the clothes. The real jewelry. He searched her big, confused eyes. He studied her full, painted lips, wishing they would tell him what she knew about Dorothea. The lips remained pressed together. He felt like biting them open.

“You're better than this Barnicle, Sandy,” Bobby said.

“Grow up,” she said. “You have no idea . . .”

“I'm gonna find her, Sandy.”

“I hope you do,” Sandy said. “In fact, I'm sure you will. If you dig deep enough. But I'm not willing to do that, Bobby. If I start digging, it'll be my own freakin' grave. So please . . .”

“You think she's alive,” Bobby whispered, leaning closer, “don't you, Sandy? You think Dorothea is alive, too.”

She turned toward a small bustle at the front entrance, where Zeke held open the door for Lou Barnicle, who wore a light-colored summer suit, a straw hat, and white Italian mesh shoes with mahogany-colored leather heels. No socks. A parody of himself. To his right was Kuzak. With Bobby's back to them, they didn't notice Bobby.

“I'm gonna do this with or without your help,” he said quickly. “I don't want to hurt
you
doing it.”

“All I know is threats,” Sandy said. “One more won't matter.”

S
omeone was already on board.

It was his first night of freedom and of fighting goddamn traffic on the West Side Highway again; Bobby was exhausted and looking forward to collapsing into bed. But he had uninvited company.

He'd stopped on the rotunda above the boatyard before he drove down the incline to the parking lot. From up there he'd noticed that the boat was swaying differently from the other darkened vessels lolling in the night tide. Something moving, something
alive
was on board. He parked in the old indoor garage and carried The Club antitheft device with him as a weapon. The security shack was empty, which meant that Doug the dockmaster was probably on a break or doing his rounds. So Bobby walked cautiously along the wooden walkway toward
The Fifth Amendment,
moving quietly under a sky without stars.

Control. They are here to mess with you, but you must take control.

As he walked cautiously up the small gangplank, he heard muffled mumbling from inside the cabin. Then he saw a flashlight splaying across the floor, the light bleeding under the closed door. Whoever was inside was very close to the door. He jerked it open, cocking his Club like a cave dweller protecting his lair.

“Go ahead, crack my skull open; what's one more dead woman on your yellow sheet, Emmet,” said the short-haired woman in the black pinstripe pants suit. Bobby reached for the wall switch and turned on the overhead light in the galley. Cis Tuzio might once have been pretty if there had ever been a pretty thought in that head. But to Bobby, her face resembled a bench warrant, with cold eyes like official government seals, a pug nose that might have been hammered flat by a judge's gavel, thin lips like a docket number. It was as if she had gotten the job and then fashioned a mask that smothered any ember of human warmth, even choosing funereal black pants suits to fit the caricature of a bloodless prosecutor.

“Dingdong, Attica calling,” sang a man's voice from the saloon as he stepped through the door into the galley. Hanratty, one of Tuzio's Brooklyn DA cops, was now standing by her side. Bobby had worked with him on a few joint-county-jurisdictional cases during the five years Bobby was in the Manhattan DA's office. Hanratty had gotten the transfer from the NYPD Community Relations post to the Brooklyn DA's office for tireless work in the reelection campaign of Sol Diamond, Tuzio's boss. It was hard to imagine anyone taking Hanratty's advice on anything, but he had managed to deliver a good hunk of what was left of the Irish voting bloc from Bay Ridge. Bobby was convinced he was even a subordinate in Tuzio's bed.

“You're trespassing,” Bobby said to Cis Tuzio, stepping out onto the deck, holding the door open for them to leave. “Unless you have a warrant, I suggest you leave the way you came. You're out of your jurisdiction in Manhattan, and you're on private property.”

Tuzio had her hands in her pants pockets, trying to look like a tough guy as she stepped out of the galley into the cool night air of the deck. The boat swayed on what river people called a “snotty” tide. Every so often, all 3500 pounds slammed against the pier, the rubber bumpers bouncing her back on the roiled river. Tuzio took a few short awkward steps toward Bobby, pulling her hands from her pockets for balance. Bobby grabbed her by the arms to steady her and looked her deep in the empty eyes.

“Your attorney said I could find you here,” Tuzio said. “That was tantamount to an invitation aboard. You're on bail. You're
shit
, and I'm in charge of shoveling you up.”

“You got promoted to that, huh?” Bobby said with a grin.

“Fitting,” she said as Hanratty helped ease her free of Bobby's firm grip. “You living on a boat owned by one of the biggest sleazebag lawyers in the city.”

“Jeez, Cis, you sound jealous of old Izzy,” Bobby said.

“I came in person, as a professional law-enforcement courtesy, because you once worked for the Manhattan district attorney's office,” Tuzio said. “I think you're scum. But you did adequate work for the people once. So I'm here with a deal. Cop to manslaughter one, ten to fifteen, time served included. You would save the state the money of trying you all over again.”

Bobby took a pack of peppermint Tic Tacs out of his jacket and shook the plastic box, popping one into his hand and offering the box to Tuzio. “Please, do me a
favor,
take one, will ya.”

She was momentarily flustered, self-conscious of halitosis, and her right hand went involuntarily to her mouth. It was a gimmick Bobby had used when questioning seemingly unflappable white-collar suspects. A simple interruption in someone's prepared alibi often made a hole small enough for the truth to leak out like gas.

“I didn't mean to be rude,” Bobby said. “But everything that comes out of your mouth smells bad.”

“Careful,” said Hanratty.

“Plus you got some nerve discussing a plea when my lawyer isn't present,” Bobby said.

“I didn't hear a thing,” Hanratty said.

“What's his feeding time?” Bobby asked Tuzio. “He looks restless.”

“I'm here to see that you haven't left the jurisdiction,” Tuzio said. “And to tell you that I am going to send your murdering ass right back to jail as soon as I can schedule a trial.”

“Fess up, Hanratty,” Bobby said, smiling, popping another Tic Tac. “You wrote that little speech for lovely Cissy here, didn't ya? With your little pocket dictionary next to you, you pecked it out on your typewriter one letter at a time.”

“How about I peck out your eyes, Emmet,” Hanratty said.

“Cis, wasn't that a threat? You're an officer of the court; quick, impanel a grand jury.”

“You find this amusing now,” Tuzio said. “It won't be after the trial. You'll be right back where you belong.”

Bobby leaned closer to the austere woman and said, “You're right. This isn't amusing. So, why don't you and Columbo here
really
investigate this case. Find out if Dorothea is dead or alive and who actually was cremated and where all that blood came from . . .”

He was tempted to tell her what he knew about Carlos Orosco and the pacemaker he found in the cremation furnace. But he wanted to tell Gleason first.

“Same lame, tired alibi,” Tuzio said. “We did investigate and it was you.”

“No,” Bobby said. “It wasn't me. But it was me you wanted.”

“Twelve people agreed it was you,” Tuzio said. “They will again.”

“You don't really care whether Dorothea is alive or not, do you?” Bobby said. “All you want is me as a trophy conviction so you can continue to climb your political ladder. Well, that isn't gonna happen . . . bitch.”

“You better watch your language,” Hanratty said.

“Oh, sorry, Hanratty, you thought I was talking to
you,
” Bobby said with a wink. “Wrong bitch.”

Hanratty stepped past Cis Tuzio and threw a punch at Bobby. Bobby bent under the punch, and the boat rocked. Hanratty's forward motion sent him stumbling across the deck and lurching over the three-foot railing of the swaying boat. Dangling on the outside of the boat, the big cop grabbed desperately for the slippery railing. He tried to get his footing on the slimy hull, but his feet couldn't find traction. The boat was shifting back and forth, occasionally careening against the pier with the rough tide. When the next swell came, Hanratty would be in danger of being crushed between the heavy boat and the pier.