A Dog's Ransom (6 page)

Mustn’t go straight home, Kenneth thought, in case the cop decided to follow him. The street was rather dark. Kenneth concealed his limp as much as possible. He wanted to kill some time in a coffee-shop, or by buying beer and eggs in a delicatessen, but these places had lights, and if the cop did come in, he didn’t want the cop to have a good look at him. He wished very much to know if the cop was following him or not.

Kenneth reached Broadway and turned downtown, walking on the east side of the street. At 105th Street, Kenneth stopped and casually looked behind him. There were at least eight people on the sidewalk, but no cop. Good. Kenneth decided to head for home. He had a sense of fleeing now, but also a sense of being in the clear. He let himself in the front door and slammed it, then limped to his own door and unlocked it.

He was safe.

Kenneth went to his table and hastily folded the page he had written to Reynolds. He put it in the top drawer of his chest of drawers under some articles of clothing. He looked at the unmade bed, thinking of the money. Relax, he told himself. Have a beer. But there wasn’t any beer. Now he didn’t dare go out again. Just do without, unfortunately. He set about making his dinner.

Open a can of beans. He had a specially good brand of beans a little more expensive than Heinz, and that was one small treat for tonight. Kenneth read the paper, which he had already looked at, while he ate. Politics scarcely interested him. International conferences, even wars, were like things going on thousands of miles away from him, not touching his life at all—any more than a stage production could touch a person’s actual life. Sometimes a news item captured his attention, a woman mugged in a doorway on 95th Street, or a suicide found in a New York apartment, and he read every word of these things.

Kenneth had tidied up and was stripped to the waist, washing himself at his basin, when there came a knock at his door. Because of the running water, he hadn’t heard any steps. Kenneth cursed, feeling extreme annoyance and slight fear. He buttoned his shirt again, but left it hanging out of his trousers.

“Who is it?” he called sharply to the door.

“Mrs. Williams!” came the assertive voice, as if the name itself were enough to gain admittance. It was his landlady.

Kenneth irritably unlocked his door and slid the bolt back.

Mrs. Williams was tallish, stout, shapeless. Her hair was gray, her expression anxious and sour. Under her arched eye-sockets her pinkish eyes were always stretched wide, as if she had just been affronted. “Are you in any trouble, Mr. Rowajinski?” She had an abominable way of pronouncing his name.

“I am
not
.”

She came back at him: “Because if you are, you’re getting out, do you understand? I’m not so fond of you, you know, or of your twenty dollars a week. I’m not going to have any doubtful characters on
my
property.” And so forth.

Kenneth wondered what had happened.

At last she came to it. “A
policeman
was just here asking me what your name was and what you did for a living.”

“A policeman?”

“He didn’t say what it was about. I’m asking
you
.”

“How should I know? I haven’t done anything.”

“You sure you haven’t? Spying in people’s windows or something like that?”

“Did you come here to insult me?” said Kenneth, drawing himself up a little. “If you—”

“A policeman doesn’t come asking questions unless there’s a reason,” she interrupted him. “I’m not having any creeps in my house, Mr. Rowajinski, because I don’t have to have them, there’s too many decent people in the world. If that policeman comes again, I’m putting you out, you hear me?”

She’d have to give him some notice, Kenneth thought, but he was too taken aback to point this out. “All right, Mrs. Williams!” he said bitterly. He was holding his doorknob so fiercely his fingers had begun to hurt.

“I just want you to know.” She turned and went.

Kenneth closed the door firmly and relocked it. Well! At least the cop hadn’t asked to see him, hadn’t wanted to talk to him or search his room. Or was he coming back with a search warrant? This thought caused perspiration to break out on Kenneth’s body. The rest of the evening was miserable for him. He took the folded letter from his top drawer and destroyed it. He kept listening for footsteps, even when he was in bed.

6

C
larence had been on the brink of asking to see the little man called Kenneth Rowajinski, but by that time it was nearly nine, and Clarence had not yet covered his beat once on foot, and he was to be rejoined by his partner for that night, a fellow named Cobb. Cops went in pairs after nightfall. MacGregor had told him and Cobb at the briefing to pay special attention to 105th Street tonight, because a woman had reported a strange man today in her apartment building, a man who had entered in some way other than by passing the doorman, and maybe he was in hiding there still, or maybe he had been casing the place for a robbery. Since 8 p.m. when he had gone on duty, however, Clarence had had eyes only for possible poison-pen letter-writers—that was to say odd- or furtive-looking people, and parting from Cobb for a few minutes, he had followed a stooped man, who did look very furtive, to a house on West 95th Street.

This man was an Italian named John Vanetti, aged sixty or more, who didn’t speak English very well, and seemed to have a speech impediment besides. He had been terrified by Clarence’s following him, of his insistence on coming into his apartment, although Clarence had been as polite and gentle as anyone could possibly have been.

“I’m going to ask you to print something for me.”

“What? What?” The Italian had been shaking.

“Write. Please. Just print. ‘Dear Sir. Will you meet me at York Avenue . . .’ ” It had been difficult, agonizing.

The old fellow was a shoe repairman and worked in a shop on Broadway. Of this Clarence was sure. There were some cobbler’s tools in his crummy little one-room place. The man could hardly print at all, and kept making letters in script, so that Clarence was positive he was not “Anon.” Clarence had apologized and left. Astounding, Clarence thought, that old guys like that still existed in New York. He had thought they had died out in his childhood.

After that, back with Cobb, Clarence had spotted the cripple, and at the sight of him Clarence felt that he had seen him before in the neighborhood. This was a quicker, brighter type than the Italian, with a slight limp and something about him made the word “eccentric” come to mind. That was the type he was after. Clarence had followed him and spoken to his landlady. But by then it was nearly nine, and Clarence had to make his hourly call to the precinct house on the hour tonight, so he had rejoined Cobb. But he knew the name now, Rowajinski, and where he lived, and he intended to come back tomorrow.

To Clarence and Cobb, 105th Street looked as usual. They stopped to ask the doorman at the apartment house if all was well. The doorman seemed glad to see them. All was well, he said, as far as he knew.

Just after 10 p.m., Clarence again parted from Cobb and went to Mr. Reynolds’s building. He asked the doorman to ring the Reynolds apartment. Mr. Reynolds answered.

“This is Patrolman Duhamell. I wondered if you’ve had any messages. Any news.”

“No, we haven’t. And you?”

“Nothing. No clues from the letters, sir. I’ll check with you again tomorrow.” Clarence had rung Centre Street, but they said they had no letters in a similar handwriting.

“Thanks. Thanks very much.”

Clarence was touched by the disappointment in Mr. Reynolds’s voice.

The next afternoon, Monday, around 4 p.m., Clarence went to the house of Kenneth Rowajinski. He was in civilian clothes. The landlady answered, and Clarence was in luck: she said Mr. Rowajinski was in. She showed him through a door and then down some steps into a hall. Then she recognized him from yesterday.

“You’re the
policeman
!” she said, and seemed to be horrified.

“Yes.” Clarence smiled. “I spoke with you yesterday.” It was astonishing the difference a uniform made. People seemed to think cops weren’t human, or didn’t own any ordinary clothing.

“Tell me,” she whispered, “has this man done anything wrong? Because if he has—”

“No. I just want to speak with him.”

Clarence could see that she was dying to ask about what, but she led him to the pale-green door.

“It’s here.” She knocked. “Mr. Rowajinski?”

Kenneth opened the door, after sliding some bolts. “What is it?” He jumped back a little at the sight of Clarence.

“Patrolman Duhamell,” Clarence said, and produced his billfold with his police card visible. “Can I talk to you for a few minutes?”

Mrs. Williams gave a jerky nod at Rowajinski, as if to say now you’re going to get it. Clarence went into the man’s apartment. Mrs. Williams was still standing there when Rowajinski closed the door. He bolted it, and slid some kind of metal piece back through the bolt. It was a depressing, untidy room, quite big but ugly with grime and unfinished paint efforts. There was no sign of a dog.

“What is it?” asked Rowajinski.

Clarence looked at him directly and pleasantly. “We’re looking for someone—in this neighborhood—who has kidnapped a dog. Naturally we have to talk to a lot of people.” Clarence hesitated, startled a little by the man’s eyes that had grown suddenly sharp; but his dark pink lips were almost smiling. “Do you mind printing something for me? Just a few words?”

Rowajinski shrugged, fidgeted, half turned away, and turned back. “Why should I?”

Clarence didn’t know how he meant that. But he decided to assume it was an affirmative, so he pulled a notebook from his inside pocket and took it to the table, where lay a soiled plate, a fork, pens, pencils, a couple of newspapers. The man whisked the dirty plate away.

He accepted the ball-point pen Clarence handed him, and sat down.

“Please print,” Clarence said, “in block letters, ‘Dear Sir. Will you meet me at York Avenue.’ ”

Kenneth had every intention of disguising his printing and started out with a
D
that swept back at top and bottom, followed by a small
e
, but by the time he got to “meet me at” he was printing the way he usually did, almost, and his heart was racing. It was curiously pleasant, as a sensation, and at the same time terrifying. He had been discovered, found out. No doubt about that. After “avenue” he handed the paper to the young man, trembling. He saw the recognition in the blue eyes.

“Mr. Rowolowski—”

“Mr. Rowajinski—uh—I’ll have to ask you some more questions.” Clarence pulled a straight chair near the table and sat down. “Your writing has a similarity to the letters at the station house. You wrote, didn’t you, to a Mr. Edward Reynolds, who lives at a Hundred and sixth Street?”

Kenneth was trembling slightly. There was no way out now. “I did,” he replied, though not in a tone of total surrender.

“And you have Mr. Reynolds’s dog?” Clarence asked on a gentler note. “Mr. Reynolds is mainly interested in getting his dog back.”

Kenneth smiled slightly, stalling for time. Tell a story, he thought, prolong it. An idea was coming to him, out of the blue. “The dog is with my sister. In Long Island. The dog is all right.” At the same time, Kenneth realized it was an awful admittance: he had just admitted kidnapping the dog. The same as admitting he had pocketed a thousand dollars.

“I suggest you get that dog here as quickly as possible,” Clarence stood up, smiling.

The cop looked triumphant, Kenneth thought. Kenneth rubbed his chin.

“Will you give me your sister’s address, Mr.—Rowajinski? I can pick up the dog right away.”

“No,” said Kenneth quickly.

“What do you mean ‘no’?” Clarence frowned. “I want that dog today and no nonsense about it! What’s your sister’s address?”

“Queens.”

“Has she got a phone?”

“No.”

“What’s her name? Her married name?—Look, Mr. So-and-so, I’m not going, to fool around with this. I want the answers, you get me?” Clarence took a menacing step towards him, and could have shaken the hell out of him by his shirt-front so eager was he to get on with it, but he was afraid this wasn’t quite the right moment, that he might gain more by a few minutes’ patience. “Let’s have her name and address.”

“I would like another thousand dollars,” said Kenneth.

Clarence gave a laugh. “Mr. Rowalski or whatever, I’m going to turn this place upside-down and get her address—now—or you’re going to the precinct house where you’ll get worse treatment. So let’s have it.”

Kenneth was still seated at the table, and now he folded his arms. He was braced for slaps, blows, whatever. “You won’t find her address in this house,” he said rather grandly. “Also she knows if I do not receive another thousand dollars by tomorrow night, the dog is to be killed.”

Clarence laughed again. He put his hands on his hips and surveyed the room, turning. “You can start by opening that chest of drawers or whatever it is,” said Clarence. “Okay, start.” He gestured.

Kenneth got up. He had to. At that moment, no doubt because of their raised voices in the last seconds, footsteps sounded in the hall, the busy carpet-slipper-shuffling footsteps of the old bag Mrs. Williams, also the clump of Orrin whom she had probably summoned. They were going to listen outside the door, damn them. Kenneth went to his low chest which had three long drawers in it.

“Empty your pockets first, would you?”

“Have you got a search warrant? I’d like to see it.”

“I’ll go on that,” Clarence replied, pointing to the paper Kenneth had printed, which lay on the table.

As Kenneth moved towards it, Clarence leapt for it, folded it and pocketed it.

Clarence assisted the man in hauling things out of his pockets—some wadded bills, keyring, filthy handkerchief, a couple of grimy shopping lists. Clarence was interested only in the address of the sister, and was already imagining having to search New York census departments to get it. “Haven’t you got a wallet? An address book?”

“No.” Kenneth pulled out the third drawer. He hated that anyone saw and also touched his belongings.

Next the table. It had a drawer, but in it were mainly knives and forks and spoons, some stolen from Horn and Hardart, a can-opener, and in one corner Kenneth’s Social Security card and papers pertaining to his disability money. The policeman copied his Social Security number.

Now the books. Kenneth had eight or ten paperbacks and a couple of books from the public library on the floor under the front window. Clarence flipped through them. He also looked under the bed, and pulled the bed out so he could see behind it. He looked in the toilet, and also on the kitchen shelf above Kenneth’s hanging clothes, and in the pockets of all the clothes there.

“I suppose the address is in your head,” Clarence said, frustrated and angry now, because he hadn’t found the money either.

“My sister has instructions,” said Kenneth, “to kill the dog tomorrow night unless I have the thousand dollars by eleven p.m.”

“And you expect to get away with this? And get
more
money? You’ve written another letter to Mr. Reynolds?”

“I was going to phone him,” Kenneth said boldly, “at his house. If he wants his dog—” Kenneth’s temper burst forth. “The address of my sister
is
in my head and you’ll never get it!”

Torture it out of the bastard, Clarence thought. He lit a cigarette. Haul him in, Clarence thought. Let a tough guy like Santini or Manzoni work him over. But how far would Santini or Manzoni bother going? One would have to whet their appetite somehow. Suppose they weren’t interested? Suppose Rowajinski didn’t crack? Could he himself crack Rowajinski? Here or at the precinct house? Would MacGregor let him, for instance? “Who’s bringing the dog over from Queens?”

“My—my sister. I’ll meet her somewhere.”

“She has a car? Her husband?”

“She’ll come with her husband in their car.”

What a fine family you have, Clarence wanted to say, but was afraid of antagonizing the man any further. The important thing, as Mr. Reynolds had said, was to get the dog back alive. But was he to believe this story? “Your sister lives in an apartment?”

“A little house,” said Kenneth.

“Can you give me some kind of guarantee?”

“What kind?”

“That’s for you to think of. Maybe I can speak with your sister on the telephone, make sure the dog’s alive, that she’ll bring it. Can I?”

“I told you my sister has no telephone. I don’t want my sister involved!”

The guy was really cracked. For the first time since he had been questioning him, Clarence averted his eyes out of a curious fear. Insane people—well, they disturbed him. You never knew what they were going to do. This fact reminded him that he had better keep his eyes on Rowajinski. But Clarence, much as he wanted the distinction of having found his man by his own effort, realized with comfort that he wasn’t alone. He’d ask Santini or MacGregor to have him worked over for the sister’s address. Meanwhile he would tell the Reynoldses he’d caught the kidnapper. His gloom lifted at the thought.

“Mr. Rowajinski, you’ll please come with me to the station house,” Clarence said.

There were protests. What a bore the man was!

“Get your coat!” Clarence said.

Kenneth was on the defensive, yet he felt a core of security in himself. How could they find a sister? At least on Long Island? His sister was in Pennsylvania. Kenneth once had her address somewhere, but he had lost it, and it certainly wasn’t in his head. “You will see it’s no use, if you want the dog. My sister will kill the dog by tomorrow night at six, if I don’t tell her the money is coming.”

“How’re you going to communicate with her?”

“I’ll call her some place. We have an arrangement.”

Clarence hesitated. Was it true? The man hadn’t sent a letter to Mr. Reynolds, but it might be true that he was going to telephone him, and if he didn’t get the money, inform his sister. What did he have to lose by waiting another eighteen or twenty hours, Clarence asked himself. He put on an air of contempt and self-assurance. Officially, he should report Rowajinski at once at the precinct. But Reynolds wanted his dog. If the sister heard nothing, she would probably just kill the dog to be rid of it.

“You see what I mean,” said Kenneth, pressing his advantage. The dog’s life was indeed a great weapon. “You know very well Mr. Reynolds can pay another thousand dollars. I promised my sister.”