The Holy City Hustle: A Duke Dempsey Mystery

by Ron Plante Jr

  He knew he couldn’t take the file without raising suspicion, so he made notes in his trusty notepad the best he could. He quickly looked toward the door when he heard some noises, but it was just a patrol officer heading to the men’s room. He knew he had to act fast, and put Duke’s file back where he’d found it.

  He continued to search Slate’s desk for anything relating to the murders, the ledger, or the assassination. The crafty vet felt more relief than disappointment that he couldn’t find something to link Slate to the events of the past few days. If Duke was sniffing down the right path, Slate wasn’t leaving any breadcrumbs to follow.

  City Hall was pretty busy and chaotic as Duke arrived, through the front doors this time. It was the second time Duke had been there in as many days, but this time without the cloak-and-dagger routine. Mrs. Swanson had yet to come out to the public, and it seemed there was nobody at the head of the table for the moment. Duke knew it had to be a political nightmare, and Lenny down at The Post was having a field day creating a public shitstorm. “Anything to make a nickel,” Duke thought to himself as he walked through the lobby.

  He passed the various offices as he made his way to the stairs. The Office of Public Records and Deeds caught his eye, as he saw a burly, sweaty individual manning the front desk. He gave a nod as he walked by, but garnered nothing more than a dirty look. Duke made his way up the stairs to the second floor where Leo’s office was.

  “I’m here to see Mr. Scagnetti, please,” Duke said to the receptionist. The smell of pomade and aftershave filled the air, and he heard whispers of interns talking about the previous night’s adventures around the water cooler. The nostalgia hit Duke pretty hard for a second. This building meant something to him, and he remembered receiving his detective badge on the front steps. The crowd was nowhere near as large as his ceremony the other day, but it certainly meant more to Duke.

  “Mr. Scagnetti never came to work this morning,” the blue-eyed bombshell said.

  “That doesn’t seem like Leo,” Duke said, trying to put off the vibe that he and Leo were friends.

  “No, it’s not. Matter of fact he missed an important budget meeting. We’ve been trying to get hold of him all morning. Hey, aren’t you…”

  Duke cut her off, “Duke, Duke Dempsey. Who might you be?” he asked as he proceeded to sit on her desk, giving his most charming smile.

  A smile and red cheeks instantly emerged from the young receptionist. “Cindy Prince.”

  “Miss Cindy, that is a beautiful name,” Duke said as he fiddled with his hat. He then leaned in closer and whispered, “Now, I don’t want to get you in any hot water, but have you noticed anything fishy going on with Leo lately?”

  “Are you on a big case?”

  “I can’t say, doll. You know the whole confidentiality thing. Let’s just say that you would be helping Leo just as much as me.”

  “Now that you mention it, the police were talking to him yesterday.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to remember the joe that met with him, would ya? I know they all look the same in that uniform.”

  “Yes, it was the police commissioner. The conversation got very loud, and Leo seemed down in the dumps the rest of the day.”

  “Commissioner Derflinger?” Duke didn’t expect that name to be thrown into the mix. “Did you hear what they were yelling about?”

  “No, but when Commissioner Derflinger was leaving, he did say something peculiar for just arguing,” Cindy said as she was starting to bat her eyes at Duke.

  “Really? What did he say?”

  “He said something to the effect of, ‘You’ve been a great service to this city, and you should be proud of your accomplishments.’ It just seemed a really strange way to end an argument.”

  “Strange indeed, Miss Cindy. You’ve been a real peach, and this information will be most helpful. Do you think you could help me with a few more things?”

  Duke proceeded to flirt with the receptionist, and finagled the home address of Leo Scagnetti from her. She slid her number along with it, hoping Duke would use them both soon, but he had no intention of leading her on any further. Duke was a master in the art of persuasion but since he’d found his heart in Mary, flirting with a pretty skirt had become strictly business.

  He was about to leave when something struck him. He knew it would be taking a chance, but he was running out of time and needed some more information fast. “One more thing, Miss Cindy,” Duke said, as he took out the deed from Swanson’s office. “Just from talking to you, I can tell you take public service very seriously. This here is a vital piece of evidence, and I need to know where the address for this piece of property is. You think you can hunt that information down for me this morning?” Duke asked as he gave his most charming smile.

  “I can get that information down at the deeds office. Is this top secret?”

  “Very. When you get the info, can you call my office? If I’m not there, just pass the information to my secretary.” Duke took out his business card and wrote the lot number from the deed on the back. He slyly slid it over to the gushy Miss Cindy, and gave her one last wink.

  The meeting with Miss Cindy Prince ended up being a home run for Duke. He was curious why the commissioner was doing the grunt work of a detective, and what he could have said to rustle the feathers of the late mayor’s right-hand man.

  As important as the answer to that question was, Duke was more concerned with the whereabouts of Leo Scagnetti. Duke was hoping maybe Leo had skipped town or just wasn’t feeling well, but something in his gut told him it was a lot more sinister. Duke looked down at the address and knew he had to get there fast, and a call to Johnny would have to wait.

  Chapter 19 – Blood on Bee St.

  Duke tore down the streets, leaving a streak of rubber and smoke in his wake. The old Ford Roadster wasn’t just a looker, the 221 Flathead V-8 could outrun almost anything on the road. According to Miss Cindy, Leo lived in a flat over on Bee Street not far from the mill. It was on the other side of town, but Duke’s ability to weave in and out of traffic made it a fairly short commute.

  The Roadster came to screeching halt just in front of the old two-story home. It was a classic Charleston home, with double porches and coral paint which made it stick out like a sore thumb. It had two palm trees on each side of the house, and the landscaping alone gave Duke the impression that whoever owned the building had some serious dough.

  He noticed right away that it had been turned into some sort of boarding house, due to the multiple doors on the second-floor veranda which led to individual apartments. Duke looked down at the note and saw that Leo was in number four, which he could see from the street was upstairs. Some brand new steps that the owner had put in were built on the right side of the house leading up to the second-floor veranda, so the residents on the top floor had their private entrances.

  Duke headed up the stairs and knocked on Leo’s door. Nobody answered. Duke could hear the sounds of a record continuously skipping coming from a record player inside, and knocked louder, but still there was no answer. He drew his Colt from his holster and turned the knob as he made his entrance into the flat.

  The place was in shambles. Every book that had once been on the shelves was on the floor, drawers were pulled from the dressers and were upside down, every cabinet was open, and every cushion was pulled out. Either Leo’d had one hell of a party, or somebody was looking for something.

  Duke made his way past the mess in the living room and headed to what appeared to be the bedroom area. As he entered the room, he cursed his gut for being right again.

  On the bed, Leo Scagnetti lay face down with blood soaked sheets around his head. It was an ugly scene, but one getting all too familiar in the Holy City. The sheets were still somewhat wet, giving Duke the impression Scagnetti had been killed only a few hours earlier. There appeared to be only one gunshot wound to the back of the head. “Execution style,” Duke said to himself.

  Duke glanced over at a pill
ow that was lying near the body and instantly saw that it had a bullet hole with feathers protruding from it. The killer had used it as a makeshift silencer during the execution. Duke didn’t want to give Slate any more ammo, and decided not to disturb the body too much. He did notice a lack of bruising on Leo’s knuckles, and no noticeable wounds aside from the bullet hole.

  Duke walked back to the living room and eyed the phone lying on the floor. “The boys in blue can wait five more minutes,” he said to himself as he took a look around the joint. He was pretty sure the killer had picked the place clean, but he wanted to be sure. He highly doubted the ledger had ever made it into the possession of Scagnetti, but he looked for anything to tie Leo to Bertucci or the assassination.

  Duke looked high and low, but came up with bubkis on finding anything. The killer had made Duke’s search fairly easy, considering everything Leo owned was pretty much lying on the floor. Duke took one last glance around and decided it was time to call it in.

  He picked up the black Bell rotary phone and placed the receiver back in place. As he picked it up again to call Charleston PD, he noticed a piece of paper taped to the side with ‘Mom’ and a number. A brief moment of sorrow came over Duke, knowing Mrs. Scagnetti wasn’t ever going to be surprised by her little Leo’s voice again.

  His moment of sorrow was interrupted when something in his memory triggered. Duke’s eyes got big, and a smile crept over his face. His first call was to the desk sergeant at the precinct. Duke knew if he left his name he would have to stay and answer questions, but time wasn’t a luxury he could afford. He called it in using a made-up name and left the scene to Charleston’s finest.

  Duke booked it back to his office, where he re-assessed the stuff he’d plucked from Swanson’s safe. He breezed past the documents and focused on the appointment book. The boys downtown said Duke had a photographic memory, but he just thought he was more observant than most. It was all about the details, and the details in this case were finally starting to add up.

  Duke made a call to an old friend he’d once worked with, and gave him the low down on his situation. It was a favor he never thought he would need, but if things played out as he thought, he was going to need a lot more help than the city of Charleston had to offer. He wasn’t sure who he could trust, and an outside ally seemed like the smart play if push came to shove.

  He grabbed the encyclopedia he had on his shelf and placed it on his desk. The layer of dust on the cover made Duke laugh, as this was only the second time he’d opened it up since he’d gotten the set. He turned right to the page he was looking for and quickly sifted down until he saw what he needed.

  His next call was to confirm the little piece of evidence he’d picked up from searching Leo’s apartment. He didn’t need much more verification than hearing the greeting on the other end, but he still dug a little further, just to ensure he wasn’t pulling a bone. Duke hadn’t gotten much, but he’d gotten enough. Unfortunately, the more he pushed, the more reluctant they were to give out any more information. Duke knew he’d squeezed all the juice he could out of it, but he had one more call to make.

  “Johnny.”

  “What’ve ya got, kid?”

  “Leo got iced, and I’m guessing it was my pal from last night,” Duke said as he took out a smoke.

  “It looks like the whole precinct responded. This place is a ghost town.”

  “They didn’t put you on it?” Duke asked surprised.

  “I guess Slate has other plans for me. Speaking of Slate, he’s got a file on you as thick as ‘War and Peace.’ I’m not sure if he’s looking to pin you up, but I wouldn’t trust him,” Johnny said.

  “At this point, I’m not sure who we can trust. We’ve got to keep this hush-hush.”

  “Yeah, I think you’re right. This whole thing stinks and I can’t tell the garbage from the garbage men anymore,” Stampkin said as he rubbed his forehead.

  Margo busted into Duke’s office as he was talking to Johnny. She hadn’t knocked since she’d started working there, and she wasn’t about to start.

  “What is it, Margo?”

  “Miss Prince just called with information you were waiting for. She wanted to talk to you personally, but I told her you were talking to your fiancé,” Margo said, as she gave Duke the side-eye and threw a piece of paper on his desk.

  Duke looked down at the paper and smiled, “I knew it.”

  “Knew what?” Johnny asked through the phone.

  “I need you to meet me where Isabella was killed.”

  “On Sullivan’s? Why the hell are we going out there?” Stampkin asked.

  “Because I think I’ve got a bead on where she hid the ledger.”

  Chapter 20 – The Dune

  Duke had to make a quick pit stop at the station before he made his way to the scene. He was finally getting somewhere, but something still bothered him.

  “You just missed your boyfriend,” the grumpy desk sergeant said to Duke as he entered.

  “Stampkin already take off?”

  “With a shotgun in hand.”

  “Slate up in his office?” Duke asked.

  “Nah, he went out on a call. You want to leave a message?”

  Duke figured Slate was out at the Leo Scagnetti scene, but wanted to confirm he wasn’t in the office.

  “It can wait. Boy’s room still down the hall?” Duke asked as he walked past the sergeant.

  When the sergeant turned his attention back to his paperwork, Duke detoured up the stairs to Slate’s office. He didn’t think Johnny had missed anything, but he had his own business with Slate that he needed to take care of.

  He looked around the organized desk and just grinned to himself. “Wound tighter than a girdle on a minister’s wife,” he whispered to himself as he eyeballed what he was looking for.

  He found the dossier Johnny had told him about and started to skim through the pages. He wasn’t sure what Slate’s game was, but Duke wasn’t about to take the fall on a bum rap.

  After a few minutes reading the juicy parts, he placed the folder back and grabbed the green pad that was sitting on the top of the desk. He jotted something down and purposely left the pad out of place. He even knocked over the holder of pencils and pens, scattering them all over the desk, while he laughed to himself as he exited the office.

  Johnny pulled up to Duke’s Roadster that was parked on the side of the road. Duke was on one of the dunes, looking down the beach and smoking a Lucky. The mid-afternoon sun was out, and the wind had picked up. Duke’s beige suit jacket flapped in the wind as he studied the scene.

  “So what’ve you got?” Stampkin yelled from below the dune, as the wind howled, drowning out his words.

  Duke looked down at Stampkin and motioned for him to join him atop the dune.

  “You said you know where the ledger is?” Stampkin asked as he came up beside Duke.

  Duke pointed to the surf where the life had been choked from Isabella just a few days prior. “She didn’t ask for this, and she sure as hell didn’t deserve this. She was just an innocent girl who was engulfed by this evil. It sought out her and her family, dragged them in, and spit them out.”

  “You’ve been in this game long enough to know that collateral damage comes in all forms. Bertucci and men like him care about one thing, money. She was in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Detective Stampkin said, trying to get Duke focused on the task at hand and off the emotional ledge it seemed he was walking on.

  “There will always be people like Bertucci. It’s when the people who are counted on by the innocent decide to join the evil ones that the scales tip in the wrong direction. Where do the innocent turn? That badge you carry is more than metal, it’s a beacon of light that people can run to when things get dark.”

  Stampkin looked down at the badge hanging from his jacket pocket and took a brief pause. “There’s not a man I know that deserves to wear this badge more than you, and it kills me they took it from you. It kills me that this city has f
allen as far as it has, but sometimes the lines get blurred, and even cops get sucked in and spit out. Duke, even the worst cop has done more for this city than most of the citizens in it. They may not always walk a straight line, but they took an oath to put their lives on the line to protect this city. We just need to take out the dirty laundry and get this thing back on track.”

  “That go for Jackson too?”

  “Jackson was no cop. He was a hired hitman wearing a uniform. I’m talking about real cops that are trying to navigate their way through a flawed system.”

  A half-smile came over Duke’s face. “Maybe you’re right, partner.” Duke took a big drag from his smoke before burying it in the sand with his shoe.

  “So, where are we going, anyway?”

  Duke handed over the deed he’d snatched from Mayor Swanson’s safe.

  “Swanson’s home?” Stampkin asked, dumbfounded.

  “Something always bothered me about the deed.” Duke kept looking out over the surf as Johnny researched the document for something he might have missed the first time he’d looked at it. “Why would Swanson have the deed to a new property in a hidden safe?”

  “I’m not sure what you’re swinging at, partner. You said you found this with other personal items. Maybe he just kept all that stuff in his private safe,” Johnny said.

  “It was with a few personal items, but you’re still not asking the right question.”

  “Did you look up this lot number?” Stampkin asked.

  Charleston deeds didn’t have property addresses on them. Instead, they had official lot numbers on them with the size and dimensions of the property. Duke’s hunch had been confirmed with Miss Prince’s findings at City Hall.

  “Look at the date on that sale. Why does a newly sworn-in mayor need a new house?” Duke asked.

  “He wanted a bigger house?” Stampkin asked, still not following.

  “There is no house bigger than the Mayor’s Mansion,” a new voice said from the bottom of the dune.