Absolution

by Henry Hack

  “I took them from his pocket when the deputy medical examiner arrived. They’re in a plastic bag with his other stuff. I’ll go get them.”

  “What else did he have in his pockets?”

  “An old pen knife, a handkerchief, and a wallet with six singles in it.”

  “No comb?”

  “No, he’s about as bald as a cue ball with just a few white hairs around the fringe. Didn’t you notice?”

  “Yeah, I noticed, but Mort used to have a thick head of hair and was a creature of habit.”

  “How old was he, Boss?”

  I pondered over that for a moment and said, “I’m not certain. At least ninety. He survived the war – the Big War. He spent all of 1944 in Auschwitz until the Russkies liberated it in January of 1945. Did you notice the numbers tattooed on his forearm?”

  “No. Jesus, Auschwitz?”

  “Yeah, now I remember. He was thirty-seven, he told me, when the camp was liberated.”

  “That makes him ninety-two. My God, Mike, he survived the fucking Holocaust to die like this? What made him stay in this damned store all these years? Why –?”

  “Because this was his life. He had other options and choices offered to him – and to his wife – but they refused to leave.”

  “But –”

  “John, go get the keys. I’ll finish the story after we wrap this scene up.”

  I walked back up the stairs with him and motioned over one of the uniformed cops who was keeping the on-lookers and the press at bay. I looked at her nameplate and said, “Officer Jamison, are you assigned to the sector car here?”

  “Yes, sir, with my partner, Officer Ferrand.”

  “Don’t leave here until I have a chance to chat with you both.”

  “Uh, I’ll try Detective, but my sergeant wants us back on patrol ASAP.”

  “Inform your sergeant that Lieutenant Simon, Commanding Officer of Queens Homicide, will release you back on patrol at his earliest opportunity.”

  She snapped to attention saying, “Yes, sir, Lieutenant. Will do.”

  Micena came back with the keys and we went back down the cellar stairs, unlocked the door, and went inside. The dank, unfinished space was illuminated by a single hundred-watt bulb that flashed on when I flipped the switch inside the door. We both immediately noticed the wooden box lying on the floor, smashed open, the lid hanging off, and empty of all its contents. “I wonder how much the bastard got,” John said.

  “And I wonder how the hell he got it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Did he shoot Mort, remove the keys from his pocket, come down here and unlock the door, break open this box after ripping it from the beams, go out and re-lock the door, go back upstairs, put the keys back in the old man’s pocket, and then calmly leave?”

  “I see what you mean. Let me check around some more.”

  It didn’t take Detective John Micena long to discover a sizable hole in the ceiling near the rear of the basement. The old floor boards had been neatly sawn through between the beams, and the hole was big enough to slide through. Not big enough for me now, but when I was a skinny teen-ager it would not have been a problem. “This was no spur of the moment crime,” John said. “This was planned out, and the perp knew exactly what he was looking for down here.”

  “I agree,” I said. “Let’s go back upstairs and get crime scene to check this out further.”

  . . .

  When we went back into the store, the crime scene guys were packing up, but being the pros they were, they took their cameras and equipment, and headed to the basement at my request without a gripe. I said, “Let’s take Mort’s keys and go upstairs to his apartment and check it out.”

  “I didn’t know he lived above his store,” John said. “Guess he didn’t travel far from here.”

  “No, not recently. In his younger days he and Lily would occasionally take the bus to Jamaica to see a movie. Or visit some Yiddish-speaking friends they had in the area. Maybe they’d stop for a beer at the local neighborhood joint, O’Gorman’s Tavern, once-in-a-while.”

  “No car?”

  “No car. No computer. No cell phone. One land line in the kitchen and in the store. One small TV in the living room.”

  “Rotary phone?” John asked with a smile.

  “Nope, touchtone. And the TV is color.” I said, smiling back.

  I walked outside and went over to the uniformed officers. I spotted Jamison and said, “Officer, get your partner and come upstairs with me and Detective Micena.”

  John found the right key to the cylinder lock, and we walked up the cracked linoleum steps and into Mort Stern’s sparse living quarters. A glance around the place showed no signs of disturbance. The bed was made. The dishes were drying in the rack next to the sink – a cup, a saucer, a small plate. A spoon and a fork. I motioned for everyone to take a seat in the living room. When everyone had settled in I said, “Here’s what it looks like. Bad guy comes in and shoots Mort Stern. He goes to the back supply closet where he, or an accomplice, had recently cut a hole in the floor boards, goes down to the basement and breaks into the money box. He puts a wooden milk crate by the hole – it may have been under it already – climbs back up into the store and strolls out the front door. Anything to add to that, Detective Micena?”

  “No, Boss, I think you got it figured out which means –”

  “Which means this was done by someone with inside knowledge that Mr. Stern had a money box in the basement. Now tell me Officer Ferrand and Officer Jamison, who might have that knowledge?”

  “The kid who works for Stern – the floor sweeper and box carrier,” Ferrand replied.

  “And his name is?”

  “There have been three of them over the last few months, right Artie?”

  “Right, Cindy. There was the kid from Mexico – Julio Sanchez, and the black kid, uh….Willie something….”

  “I think it was Willie Turner,” Jamison said. “And the white kid – the most recent employee – was Vinny DeGiglio.”

  “Good,” I said. “Now tell us, Cindy and Artie, which one of those three killed Mordechai Stern and stole his money?”

  “DeGiglio,” they both said in unison.

  “Explain, please.”

  Ferrand began, “Julio was a real good kid, and so was Willie. Julio had to go back to Mexico with his mother so she could tend to her sick father. That was about, uh –”

  “Six months ago,” Jamison said.

  “Then Mort hired Willie who lasted about five months,” Ferrand said.

  “So this DeGiglio has been working here for how long?” Detective Micena asked.

  “About five or six weeks.” Jamison said. “Against our advice.”

  “Oh?” I said.

  “It was obvious to us DeGiglio was a junkie, but Mort wouldn’t be swayed,” Ferrand said. “Told us everyone deserves a chance to earn a few bucks and straighten out.”

  “That was Mort,” I said.

  “Uh, sir, I think I noticed you on a few occasions coming out of the store. Was Mr. Stern a good friend of yours?”

  “Like a father,” I said. “Please continue.”

  “We were both certain Vinny’s hard-earned dollars went right into his veins,” Jamison said, “and we tried to intervene to get him some help, but he insisted he didn’t have a problem.”

  “He’s a good kid,” Ferrand said. “Hard to believe he’d shoot Mort.”

  “Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he just set it up,” Micena said. “Maybe his habit demanded more money than he earned here.”
/>   “Let us go find this Vinny DeGiglio and persuade him to tell us,” I said.

  SIX

  I had taken a liking to these two sharp, young patrol officers. They knew their assigned sector well, and it was obvious they cared about Mort Stern, which probably meant they cared about all the people on their beat, even a stone junkie named Vinny DeGiglio. I said, “Here’s our initial plan of investigation. You two fine officers, assisted by four of my detectives, will find Vinny and bring him in for questioning.”

  Jamison and Ferrand looked at each other, appearing a bit stunned, and Jamison said, “Uh, Lieutenant, did you say four detectives will assist us?”

  “I did. You two know what Vinny looks like, and we all don’t. By the way, do you have any idea where he lives?”

  “He takes the Q-10 Green Line bus to get to work, I know,” Cindy said.

  “I think he lives in Richmond Hill somewhere,” Artie said. “I live up there, too, and saw him walking on Liberty Avenue one day. I know a lot of people around there.”

  “Drive back to the station house and change into your civvies. I’ll call the detective squad and get you an unmarked car. My two homicide detectives, plus the two from the 106 Squad, will give us six cops to do a full-court press to scoop up DeGiglio before he leaves town, or before he overdoses from his newly-stolen wealth.”

  “But sir,” Artie Ferrand said, “Our commanding officer, Captain McHale –”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll clear your assignment with him. Now move out.”

  . . .

  After they all left, Mort’s death hit me again, and I plopped down hard in an armchair. I had something to do, and I had to do it sooner or later, as tough as it would be. I checked my address book and found the phone number of Mort and Lily’s only child, Robert, who lived out on the West coast. I punched in the number using Mort’s phone and Robert answered on the second ring saying, “Dad?”

  “Hello Robert,” I said. “It’s Mike Simon.”

  “Mike? Uh, is anything wrong? Is my father all right?”

  There was no easy way to do this so I said, “No, Robert, there was a robbery and Mort was shot. I’m sorry, but he’s dead.”

  “Oh, my God! Why didn’t he listen to me and Debbie? Why didn’t –”

  “Bobby, we both knew your parents were set deep in their ways despite what you offered them. A house in sunny California. No bills, no worries. Believe me I tried time and time again to convince them to make the move. And when Lily died I figured he’d call it quits here, but no, not Mort. ‘Mikey,’ he said. ‘I’m an old New York Jew. Vat would I do vit all those goyim out there? Who vud I talk Yiddish vit?’”

  “Yeah, he was beyond convincing, Mike, even though me and Debbie and his two grandkids are his only family now. I yelled at him that he was going to dry up and die in that crummy old candy store – turn into a decrepit mummy behind the counter. Do you know what he said? ‘A good vay to go, no?’”

  “He’s at the morgue now. What do you want me to do? Do you have a funeral home in mind?”

  “No, he was specific. ‘Burn me up, Bobby. Take some ashes vit you to California. Throw a handful in front of the store right in front of the For Sale sign. Give some to Mikey. Put the rest by Lily’s marker.’”

  “I’m surprised he wanted to be cremated,” I remarked. “I mean, you know, him being in Auschwitz –”

  “It’s sacrilegious, but as you know he was not a religious man, a non-believer as he said so many times. It’s like his last act is spitting in the eye of the Lord himself.”

  “Yeah, I know. Mort the Philosopher and I had a lot of discussions about that.”

  “And what about you, Mike? What do you believe? Do you have any conflicts between your Catholic upbringing and your Jewish heritage?”

  “No, Bobby, no conflict at all.” I wanted to add there was no conflict because I now did not believe one word I had ever read, heard, or been taught in either religion. Not one. But Robert was a true believer, and this was not the time to challenge that, so we hung up and I awaited his arrival to take care of his beloved father.

  Six million Jews murdered during the war.

  My parents murdered when I was an infant.

  Mort shot dead and lying on the floor.

  There is no God.

  Tell me I’m wrong.

  . . .

  While Robert was making plans to fly to New York to supervise his father’s cremation, I made some plans of my own. If the effort to locate Vinny DeGiglio failed to pick him up in the next four to six hours, I’d have Ferrand and Jamison sit down with a sketch artist and draw up a composite photo of him for distribution in the metro area as a “person of interest” in the Stern homicide.

  I had a bad feeling if we didn’t grab DeGiglio soon we would have a hard time cracking the case. My guess was whoever killed Mort, and I didn’t think it was DeGiglio himself, was savvy enough not to leave any fingerprints at the scene. Those latent prints lifted off the cash register were most likely Stern’s or Vinny’s, I figured, as I picked up the phone and called the Latent Print Section at the Police Lab. And, unfortunately, I was correct. Having worked fast on a homicide case, the technician, Detective Dave Metzdorf said, “Sorry, Loot, the prints we lifted off the register belong to Mr. Stern. All the other partials and smudges we lifted throughout the store were either his or unidentifiable.”

  “How about the money box in the basement?”

  “No prints on it at all, even though the wood it was made of was smooth and varnished. The perp probably wore gloves.”

  Sanded and varnished by me thirty years ago.

  “Any other evidence found by the crime scene guys you are aware of, Dave? Hairs? Fibers, maybe?”

  “Yes on the fibers. A lot of them from the sawn edges of the hole in the floor the perp went through. And they collected some sawdust and wood samples from the floor, which was old and might be maple wood. It’s all over in the lab being analyzed now. Give them a few days to figure it all out.”

  “Even if they identify the samples, that knowledge won’t help us until we get the perp and the clothes he was wearing, right?”

  “Right, Loot,” Metzdorf said. “Tell Micena to go lock his ass up right now.”

  I knew what the technician was going to say next, with typical cynical police humor, when I responded to his comment. I played along and said what I knew he was expecting. “As soon as you tell me and Micena where the hell he is.”

  Metzdorf chuckled and said, “Sorry, Loot, but that’s your job, right?”

  . . .

  I took one last look around Mort’s apartment, but did not disturb anything, or do an unnecessary search I was certain would yield no helpful evidence. I’d let Robert and Debbie perform that sorrowful task when they arrived from the coast. I securely locked both the top and bottom doors of his apartment and went back into the store.

  After Mort’s body had been removed to the morgue and the crime scene truck had rolled away, the onlookers gradually drifted off, encouraged to do so by the uniformed officers stationed there. A patrol sergeant came up to me and said, “Is the scene secured, Lieutenant?”

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m going to take one last look around and then lock it up. You can have your guys remove the crime scene tape and resume patrol.”

  “Yes, sir. Uh, where’s the sector car?”

  “Back at the house. Jamison and Ferrand are changing into civvies. They’ll be working with me for a while.”

  “Uh, for how long?”

  “For as long as it takes, Sarge.”

  “They’re both fairly new on the job, you know.”
/>   “Yeah, but sharp, too. Did you train them?”

  “Yes, I did, sir,” he said, puffing out his chest.

  “You did a good job. They’ll be a big help with this investigation.”

  The sergeant smiled, snapped off a salute, and said, “I’m sure they will, sir. Anything else we can do for you before we wrap it up?”

  “Yes, station one officer at the front door until the shift changes at midnight. The sector car can keep an eye on it from time to time.”

  “You got it, Loot. Uh, any suspects yet?”

  “We’re looking at a former employee who Ferrand and Jamison know and can identify. I hope we can scoop him up and put this case to bed fast.”

  “So do I. I knew Mort a long time, too. Sad ending for a real good man.”

  “That it was, Sarge. That it was.”

  I walked through Stern’s for the last time. The For Sale sign would no doubt be on the front door as Robert and Debbie were winging their way back to California. I gazed around looking for any evidence the crime scene guys might have missed, though I had no hopes there would be any. But my mind was not on evidence of a crime, it was awash in nostalgia as it reeled back the years to when I was a teenager. I sat on one of the round, red vinyl-covered swivel stools, spun around on it and said aloud, “I’m done sweeping, Mr. Stern. All the soda crates and candy cartons are put away and stacked neat, and all the unsold newspapers and magazines are tied and bundled for return.”

  “So?” he would say. “That’s vat I pay you for bubala. Good for you. Geh Heim.”

  Go home. But he knew what I wanted, so I didn’t move off the stool. “Uh, Mr. Stern –”

  “Vat? Oh, I suppose you vant an egg cream, huh?”

  He was busting my chops, like he did almost every day I worked there after I finished up my chores, making me wait and beg for one of his delicious chocolate egg creams, a drink only a New York candy store owner – preferably a Jewish one – could concoct. And I always respectfully replied, “Yes, I do, Mr. Stern.”