The Devil's Own Rag Doll (14 page)

I was in no mood to think about fairness. My thoughts were black as I stood at attention before the casket. The pastor of St. John's Episcopal said a few more words, mumbled something biblical and apologetic, and then turned away. I watched him go: a sad man, wrapped up in a world of books and weak prayers. The boy holding his umbrella tripped after him, unable to keep himself or the pastor from getting soaked.

Dressed neatly in black, Anna Swope sat with her knees together under the canopy that sheltered the few family members from the rain. Most of the police officers who had accompanied the procession from the church to the old cemetery on Mt. Elliott had gone on to their duties. The remainder now passed by Anna, who nodded without expression and allowed her hand to be squeezed as each mourner expressed condolence. I lingered at the grave, wishing I could muster the gravity to make an oath of revenge, but I could not do more than scan Bobby's coffin and study the wet earth piled up beside the grave. My hands felt swollen.

The rage and guilt that had blown through me over the last two days had left me hollow. Clearly, I had thought, as a man lives, he's responsible for what happens on his watch. And Bobby had gone down on my watch.
On my watch.
Because I did not believe in coincidence any more than I believed in divine providence, I knew that there was some deeper guilt I had to shoulder. If this same rat-shambling runt had been responsible for the loss of my own eye and fingers, so many years ago, then there must be some reason, some careless ember left smoldering below the surface, for what had happened to Bobby. It all turned on me, as if I had done something wrong but couldn't remember what it was. I had some debt to pay. I could not see what I had purchased at such cost; my life was not all roses, clearly. But if I had collared the runt years ago, as I might have, then maybe the present mess might have been avoided, and Bobby's carcass might not have been boxed up until his natural time. It seemed right to believe that there was some connection between Bobby's death and the Hardiman case, too, though there was nothing but the white-colored mix in both incidents. On the basis of intuition, which I didn't want to believe in, either, everything seemed connected. Maybe I had become addled enough with feeling and shame that I was inclined to take on any stray guilt that drifted my way. I'd accept the blame for Jane Hardiman's death, too; I'd have to put all of it to rest before my life could ever be right. But that was as far as I could go. The awful guilt had left me unable to string together any line of thought or deduction worth following.

I had given the sketch artist a good description of the runt, and so at least I had the assurance that half the police in the city were on the lookout. The runt was oddly small and wore clothes that cost a little something. My optimism wavered; on the one hand, there were so many people and so many nooks and crannies in the city that it seemed unlikely that we'd find someone who didn't want to be found. But I also knew that the beat cops and the dicks would all make a little effort to find something out. They'd ask around, spread a net of conversation around the city, and maybe turn up something to go on. I had not mentioned to anyone that I felt—I was sure—the runt was the same man responsible for my maiming. In that case, so many years ago, I had never seen the man's face as I chased him. Why had I been after him anyway? It was his walk that struck me. I could tell a familiar walk a block away, long before I could see well enough to recognize a face. I can see it in my mind now, even standing graveside in the pissing rain—how the little man's bandy-legs wavered in the heat bouncing off the paved parking lot as he scurried away from me—

“Pete,” said Anna, hovering near my elbow, “you're getting soaked. Let's go.”

I was startled out of my daydream. It took a moment for me to feel the rain again, to bring my mind back to the sodden grass, the dull light, and the hiss of the cars passing over the wet pavement of Mt. Elliott.

“Let's go.” She held an umbrella out to me, and I took it, bending toward her as we walked to my car.

“I'm sorry, Anna. I guess it was my fault.”

“Don't be foolish, Pete. It happened to him because—I know—he wasn't a careful man.” Her English was clipped and careful, the German accent muted.

I flinched to hear her speak so plainly. She was a tall woman, slender, with a handsome, square-jawed face, and this suited her personality: grim, plainspoken, and businesslike. Yet I could not accustom myself to her practicality.

“He was careless, but he wasn't stupid,” I said.

“He could be stupid.” She stopped at the passenger door and let me open it for her. “Pete, you can teach me how to drive one of these things?”

I said nothing as she slid onto the worn seat. I thought dully that from anyone but Anna the request would seem a come-on. “Sure,” I said. “But it'll have to wait a couple weeks till I get things straightened out.” I took down the umbrella as I walked to the driver's side and shook out the water as well as I could. Then I slipped out of my soaked coat and put it in the rear seat with the umbrella. Behind the wheel, I sat for a moment watching the water running down the windshield.

“The ladies are putting out some sandwiches and coffee,” said Anna, “in the basement of the church.”

“No disrespect, but I think I'll pass on that.” I started the car and began to drive toward the church.

“It's okay,” she said. She crossed her ankles and folded her gloved hands on her lap and stared listlessly out the window. “I would skip it myself.”

I hoped that the rain might suck the heat right out of the air and wash it away, but I knew that the heat would rise up like steam after the clouds blew away. It didn't seem fair. I glanced at Anna's angular profile and made out no trace of emotion. I had not seen her cry during any part of the proceedings.

“It'll be better in a while,” I said.

“I've been through worse things,” she said. “It's Lucy I worry about. Someone told her that Bobby had just gone to sleep, and now—and now she's terrified of the bed.”

I could think of nothing to say. I felt numb and weak and wanted to smash through something.

“I can't imagine what we will do now,” said Anna. She worked with long fingers to adjust the pins that held her little black hat to her hair.

Something about the way she was sitting or a murmur at the back of her voice seemed too open to me, too intimate. We had not spoken much before. I ground my teeth together and wondered how shook up I must be to let my body feel what it was feeling, with my partner's stiff, made-up fingers folded over his belly not half a mile away.

I drove slowly, peering through the bleary windshield. I could not quite suck in enough air.

“I am not fit for anything,” she said. “And who would hire me?”

I knew that her accent and history would make it hard for her to find something. I knew that most of the Japs in the country had been rounded up, even the ones who had been born here. Though I had never asked Bobby anything about it, I had gathered that Anna had come over from Germany in the 1930s with her brother, an engineer. Even if she had become a naturalized citizen since that time, her accent would hang like a cloud over her, at least until the war was over.

“But this is America,” said Anna. “Widows and orphans are not left out on the street.”

I saw no trace of humor or bitterness in her words. I could not say what she was feeling, though I could see that she, too, was clenching her jaw.

“Listen,” I said, “do you have any family over here?”

“No,” she said. “Not here.”

“Well, we'll think of something, I guess.” I scrambled to think of a way to come up with a little money. I could run over to Bobby's business and grab up all the sugar, unload it on the black market. Bobby had mentioned something about some money. It seemed clear that money could buy some flexibility, at least, or a little time.

“I don't really worry,” she said. “When I was a girl, it was much worse. You perhaps cannot imagine.”

We arrived at St. John's, and I pulled around to the side, where I knew the old ladies of the church would lay out their sandwiches and cookies. Though the sky still looked heavy and close, the rain had stopped.

“It's not my business,” I said, “but how did Bobby leave things?”

She coughed or choked back a laugh. “He was always at the end of his string, you know. At the end of his rope.”

“He worked pretty hard. He was always looking to get ahead. Had he saved anything up?”

Now she laughed bitterly. “He had hoped he could be a good man. He was always running away!”

“Running away?” I held both hands on the wheel and met her eyes.

“Pete, you are a dear man,” she said. She gripped my forearm hard enough to shift my muscles under her fingers. “But you seem to know nothing sometimes.” She loosened her grip on my arm and stroked her hand over the damp fabric of my jacket. Then she turned and opened the passenger door.

I could not imagine what to say.

Anna stepped out of the car. She leaned her head back in and said quietly, “You should know it, Pete. You should know what it means. Don't think less of me for the telling. Bobby was a
queer.
”

“Ah,” I stammered, “queer?”

Anna closed the car door, turned curtly, and walked into the church.

I put the car into gear and let the idling motor drift the vehicle away toward the street.

*   *   *

Probably at a dozen other beer gardens or back rooms in the city, the better part of the police force swallowed liquor that day, not out of remorse for the way Bobby ended up but because the situation allowed a certain show of self-pity. I found a place where I knew there would be no company and guzzled half a dozen highballs. But the alcohol could not produce much feeling for me or offer relief from the ideas slamming inside my head. I sat for an hour in my car, watching the rain come and go and wishing that I could fall asleep in the backseat. I pulled my revolver from the glove box and looked it over. I dropped the shells from the wheel into my palm and then held them up, one by one, turning them and eyeing them between my fingers. After reloading the shells, I put the gun into its holster and worked it into the squeaking leather the way a ballplayer might work a glove. Since I knew that the burning ache in my gut would not go away no matter where I went, I decided I might as well try to get back into the swing of work.

The police headquarters were empty for a Tuesday. In a room behind the main desk, I rummaged over the cluttered desk.

“I told you to take a few days off, Caudill.” Captain Mitchell's voice sounded close to my ear.

“I enjoy my work so much,” I told him, “this is a holiday for me.”

“You're his partner, you should have stayed at the church. A lot of the men are there.” Mitchell stood close and spoke softly. “I could smell the liquor on you before I came into the room.”

“They won't miss me.” I thumbed the pages of the order book. “Roscoe!” I called. “Where's the roster for the Fourth Precinct?”

Faintly, through the open doorway leading to the front desk, came Roscoe's thick voice. “It should be in there, I'm telling you.”

I told Mitchell, “I'm trying to find out who was supposed to be on the beat where Bobby got it.” I fumbled through the heavy book. “Hell with this,” I said. “I'll just run over there.”

Mitchell took me hard by the elbow. “Come up to my office for a minute, Caudill. And keep your mouth shut.”

I fought the urge to jerk my elbow free and followed Mitchell through the building to the back staircase that led up to the offices on the third floor. It always bothered me to pass by the second floor, tiled and furnished cheaply with desks for the detectives, and then to step up to the third floor, where the big brass kept house. Oak paneling as dark as mud, separate offices with walnut desks and windows overlooking Beaubien, a bank of secretaries set up in the middle of the floor. We passed into Mitchell's office, and I stepped to the window and looked down at the street. Mitchell closed the door.

“I won't mince words,” said Mitchell. “Frankly, Caudill, I wish I could see a little more spark behind that eye of yours. It's a disappointment for me to realize how limited your thinking is always going to be.”

“Then why the hell did you make me a detective?”

“I've told you before about that swearing. It's good enough for the tough-guy act down on the street, but up here you're supposed to be acting like a detective. It's an honorable position. I expect you to take some pride in yourself.”

“Why the hell did you make me a detective if I don't even look right?”

“I didn't,” said Mitchell. He sat behind his desk. “You don't seem to notice that there are people working behind the scenes here that you don't see every day. You did all right on the test, but I always thought—I still do—that you haven't got the temperament for the job. You don't have the patience. You'd rather just slug right through everything. We're not children here, so I can admit that your talents can be useful in a certain arena. But I'll tell you right now, if there wasn't a war on, you'd still be in the blues as far as I'd have a say in it.”

“Bust me back down,” I said. I stared down at the street. “I won't kick up a fuss about it.”

“No,” said Mitchell. “I won't do that. The only thing that's saving you right now is that I know you're not smart enough to lie to me effectively. Swope might have been smart enough, but he didn't have the grit that you do. He couldn't quite throw himself into his lies with enough vigor or lack of concern to be convincing. That's what made the two of you together so valuable to what we're into here.”

I wished I could think faster. I reminded myself that Mitchell knew more than I did. Had he known about Bobby? Was he trying to tell me something by speaking this way? Maybe it was the booze still muddling things up, but I could not make my mind race through everything fast enough.