SISTER (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 4)

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SISTER (ALTON RHODE MYSTERIES Book 4) Page 7

by Lawrence de Maria


  “You mean the Verrazano Bridge?”

  “What are you, some kind of politically correct asshole? I know your name ends in a vowel but I also know you’re not Italian. Besides, it’s just a phrase. I ain’t prejudiced. I saw 42, the Jackie Robinson flick. Liked it, too. So don’t get high and mighty on me. Where was I?”

  “Staten Island after the bridge.”

  “Yeah. Well, after it opened, a lot of farmland and oceanfront property that wasn’t worth diddley squat before suddenly took off. Big pieces of property. A lot of old-time families cashed in. They owned restaurants on the water, or pieces of the old airport and the drive-in mid-Island, all before your time probably, and they got small fortunes for them. I mean, had they held on they would have gotten even bigger fortunes, of course, but they did OK. Most of them were cheap squareheads, so they thought they were rich. I never could figure out why Staten Island had so many Northern Europeans, but they were hard-working, I’ll say that. Anyway, we got a lot of business from that. You know, families falling out over the windfalls, divorces, somebody dies and the money has to be split up. Typical human bullshit.”

  He was revving up. I think I saw where it was all going.

  “Large escrow accounts,” I said.

  “Huge. A goddamn gold mine.”

  “And Harry dipped.”

  “Dipped? He used a steam shovel. After he split, I found out that there was hardly anything left in the accounts. He billed so many hours he would have had to start working for some of those people before Henry Hudson sailed into the Narrows. What he didn’t bill, he siphoned off to dummy corporations, you know, for title research and other crap.”

  “How much are we talking about.”

  “Almost $3 million, spread out over about 20 clients.”

  “I have to ask, Sam. What was your involvement?”

  Rosenberg sat back and put his hands behind his head. He smiled.

  “You probably won’t believe this, but at one point I was pretty wet behind the ears. Me and Harry weren’t partners, thank God, but I trusted him. I saw just enough money to think everything was on the up and up. He snowed the clients and he snowed me.”

  “They must have come after you.”

  “They tried. ‘The Jew lawyer must have been behind it.’ But it was pretty obvious I hadn’t done anything but be stupid. Harry’s fingerprints were all over the clients’ funds. Besides, he ran, and I stayed behind. I didn’t have much of a bank account.” He paused and gave me a look. “Like now. The clients got new lawyers but didn’t have all that much money to pay them, so you know how that goes.”

  “But they could recover the money, couldn’t they?”

  “Sure. Theoretically. If they found Harry. But most of the clients were kind of down on lawyers by that time. Can’t say I blame them. They knew their legal fees would eat up anything they recovered.”

  “But it was still a crime.”

  “Yeah, So is jaywalking. When was the last time a lawyer on Staten Island got indicted for bilking his clients?”

  “So, he got away with it.”

  “A crying shame. All that money and I hardly saw a dime.”

  CHAPTER 11 - BETA

  I got up early Saturday morning, packed and headed to Massachusetts. I didn’t know how long I’d be gone, so I probably took too many clothes. But that’s the beauty of traveling in one’s car. You don’t have to pay extra baggage fees. I also put an extra gun and ammunition in a lock box in my trunk. I never know how many bullets to pack, so I erred on the side of World War III.

  The drive to Worcester brought back memories not related to the case at hand. When I was nine, my parents rented a place called Red Rock Farm just outside Sturbridge for two weeks in the summer. It was a real farm and I hadn’t gone 20 feet from our station wagon when I stepped in cow flop. In additions to a small herd of bovines, which regularly broke out of their ancient corral and wandered down the road, there were also chickens and ducks, a small stream with little darting trout and 10 acres of wooded wonderland.

  We went to Old Sturbridge Village, which was set up to recreate a rural New England town of the 1830s. People walked around the meetinghouses, school, country store, working gristmills and the like in period costumes. There was even another working farm, although I managed to avoid stepping in anything. I remembered being fascinated by how basic life was early in the 19th Century. I thought I had been roughing it because Red Rock Farm didn’t have air-conditioning! We ate regularly at the nearby Publick House, where I discovered Indian pudding topped with vanilla ice cream. I had a wonderful time.

  I drove around now but wasn’t able to find Red Rock Farm. I thought about asking someone but decided against that. The farm had probably been turned into a housing development full of McMansions. But the Publick House was still standing as it has, according to the plaque next to the front entrance, since 1771. The property was a lot grander than I remembered. There was now a conference center attached to the original building, and what looked like a motel was just down the path.

  I had timed my drive to hit Sturbridge at lunchtime, with my fingers crossed, hoping that Ebenezer's Tavern was still operating in the Publick House. It was, and didn’t look much different than I recalled. I went in happy, but knowing that I’d be melancholy coming out. That’s a certainty when memories involving parents are involved. Most of the tables were occupied with parents and children. The melancholy index spiked.

  Even the Tavern menu looked much the same, although I didn’t remember anything called an “Ebenezer Burger.” It didn’t matter. I ordered a half bottle of Bordeaux and an open-faced turkey sandwich with all the trimmings. Except for the wine, that was the meal I ordered every time we went to the Publick House, lunch or dinner. My eyes naturally drifted to the bottom of the menu, where the desserts were listed. My luck held.

  “There’s no chance you will run out of Indian pudding, is there,” I asked the waitress, who looked like she could be Mrs. Ebenezer. “This place is pretty busy.”

  “No chance, sonny,” she said indulgently. “But I’ll put some aside for you anyway. And we have plenty of vanilla ice cream.”

  An hour later I left for Worcester, 20 miles away, pleasantly full. And melancholy

  The melancholy didn’t last long. My cell phone buzzed. It was Cormac Levine.

  “You wanted to know if there were any murders similar to the one in Worcester?”

  “Yeah. You dig up any?’

  “Interesting phrasing. I can give you a definite maybe.”

  I waited.

  “I checked with the one of those new databases they started with all this terrorist bullshit so that various jurisdictions, local and Federal, would be on the same page. I won’t bore you with its name or its acronym, which has more letters than I have piles. It’s not public anyway. A friend of a friend got me into it. It’s in butter , whatever that means.”

  “It’s beta.” I spelled it out. “That means it’s in a testing phase.”

  “Beta, butter, who gives a rat’s ass. Anyway, there were a ton of stabbing deaths over the last few years. Most involve domestic disputes, of course, with kitchen knives and the like. Murders of passion or convenience. Some gang killings, of course. And a couple of maniacs who were quickly caught. Makes you think the Government should regulate kitchen utensils. But I was even able to narrow it down to stabbing deaths roughly similar to the one that killed the nun. You know, single thrust to the heart with a very sharp, presumably thin blade. Believe it or not, there were dozens. Gotta figure some pros or mob guys still know how to use a stiletto. And a shiv is the weapon of choice in prison, so a lot of cons probably came out with graduate degrees in knifing people. But the killings were all over the country and many of the victims seemed to have it coming to them. But there were four, including Worcester, that involved religious persons.”

  “All nuns?”

  “No. I wish.” There was a pause, then a bitter laugh. “I can’t believe I said that. What I mean
…. never mind. But this is where it gets dicey. Two nuns, a priest and a brother, you know, one of those guys who belongs to a religious order but is not ordained. Didn’t you get taught by them?”

  “Yes. Xaverian Brothers. Xaverian High School in Brooklyn. Four stabbing murders, Mac? Religious. That hasn’t raised any red flags?”

  “You would think somebody would notice, wouldn’t you. And maybe somebody will once this system gets out of that phase you say it’s in. Probably if they were all nuns, or priests, or whatever, someone might have spotted it. But they weren’t and the murders were spread across the country, over a year. Would you believe California, Colorado, Illinois and Massachusetts? Most serial killers stick to one time zone, at least. And the ages of the victims are all over the lot. That also goes against the serial killer grain. I hate to say it, but they could be random, including your girlfriend.”

  I pulled over to the side of the road and fished in my glove box for a pad and pen.

  “Give me what you have.”

  “Emilio Salazar, 55, pastor of Puertas del Cielo, Gates of Heaven, Roman Catholic Church in Windsor, California, was found dead April 17 of last year next to a stream where he liked to fish. Jeanette LeFebvre, 19, a cloistered nun belonging to the Contemplative Sisters of Fatima in Lafayette, one of Denver’s suburbs, was killed on August 5 in a field adjacent to her convent. Brother Alfred Variale was 88 and living in a retirement home in the Prospect Heights section of Chicago. He was found on December 8th sitting in his wheelchair in his room in front of a TV watching a Bears game.”

  “No one saw him killed?”

  “They thought he just nodded off. It was a Bears game, after all. Put anyone to sleep. You know nursing homes. Anyone can walk in, most of the time. Our guy probably could have killed a half dozen before anyone noticed. He didn’t use a gun, remember. The staff would have heard that, if not the residents.”

  “Jesus Christ. And the one in Denver was only 19? And what was a cloistered sister doing in the field?”

  “Apparently the nuns maintain a small garden to raise vegetables and the like. Actually, LeFebvre was called a postulant, that’s a nun in training. It was her day to tend the tomatoes, or something. Postulants probably got all the dirty jobs. And she was training to be a ‘nun,’ not a ‘sister.’ Sisters can work in the community, usually as teachers. Nuns, on the other hand, are usually cloistered. I figure a Papist like you should know that.”

  I just loved being lectured on Catholicism by a Jewish detective who hadn’t seen the inside of a synagogue since his own bar mitzvah.

  “So,” I said, “the first killing was about 13 months ago, in California. Then three more, including Ronnie, spaced about four months apart. Could it be a serial killer moving east?”

  “Where’s his next victim, Iceland?”

  “Anything stick out?”

  “Well, except for the first one, which was on a Wednesday, all the murders were on a Friday, Saturday or Sunday.”

  “So?”

  “So, serial killers have to start somewhere. In many cases, their first is close to home. Let’s assume the first killing was a hometown job. Then the next three might indicate he was traveling on or near weekends.”

  I thought about that. It was thin gruel, but I filed it away.

  “That’s it?”

  “Hey, what do you want? You know anyone else who would come up with something like that? So, what are you gonna do?”

  “I’m on my way to see those cops in Worcester. But something tells me I’ll be on a plane soon. Can you email me what you have. I’ll want to share it with the cops up here.”

  “If they already checked that angle, they’ll be pissed you questioned their competency. If they haven’t they’ll be pissed and embarrassed. Where do you want me to send the bail money?”

  “I’ll work my usual charm on them.”

  “In that case, where do you want me to send the flowers?”

  “I’m guessing they never even heard about that new database. They might even be grateful I’m sharing.”

  “Oh, so you intend to ‘beta’ them up.”

  “That’s terrible, Mac.”

  “How about ‘beta late than never’?’

  “Please, you’re killing me.”

  “You’re just mad because I said it before you did.” He wasn’t near finished. “Beta me than you?”

  I hung up when he spouted a line from Gunga Din.

  CHAPTER 12 - WORCESTER

  “What makes you think that you’ll have any more success than we will?”

  Broderson looked at me as he poured himself another mug of coffee. Mine was cradled in my hands. We were sitting at his desk in the Worcester Police Headquarters on Lincoln Square. As municipal buildings went, it wasn’t a bad looking edifice. But the coffee set a new standard for squad room java.

  “Do you have any unsolved homicides in which coffee was involved?”

  He laughed as Huntley came over from his own desk and perched on Broderson’s.

  “What are you after, Rhode,” he said.

  “I thought maybe we could work the Frost case together.” It was hard for me to imagine Ronnie as Sister Veronica. “Now I’m in your ballpark. I don’t want to step on any toes.”

  “Just because you gave us a couple of drinks in your office don’t mean we’re gonna bend over and touch our ankles.”

  “It was good bourbon. But I see your point. How about if I let you in on something? I know you checked out if there were any similar crimes, but I just stumbled on to something the Feds don’t want anyone to know about yet.”

  I had rehearsed that phrasing several times. Even if they hadn’t checked for similar crimes, they wouldn’t admit it now. And any mention of the Feds holding back information from local cops would anger them. I was gambling that they weren’t privy to the new database.

  “What do you have?”

  I told them about the similar crimes. When I mentioned the beta program they exchanged glances.

  “What’s that thing called,” Broderson asked.

  I told them. I had to spell the initials out twice before they got it right. Huntley wrote it down and said, “Feds suck.”

  They hadn’t known about it.

  “Your pal must be pretty wired in,” Broderson said.

  “Actually, he was pretty wired out for a while.”

  I explained about how I saved Mac’s career by lying when he was accused of throwing a child molester off a balcony, and how he was later dumped from the D.A.’s Squad after an election until wiser heads prevailed. They were stories that I knew wouldn’t hurt me with these cops. All cops hate child molesters and politicians.

  “Bottom line, he has a lot of friends. I bet you guys know someone, maybe in Boston, who can get you access to that database in the future.”

  “Yeah,” Huntley said. “I went to B.C. with a guy who works organized crime with the Feds. I’ll make a call.”

  “In the meantime,” I said, “I’ll give you everything I have on those murders.”

  “OK, Rhode, you are proving useful,” Broderson said. “We checked for similar crimes and are still waiting to hear back. You saved us some time. We’ll make some calls. But your friend may be right. Could be four separate homicides.”

  “Thinking that way doesn’t give me anyplace new to go. I’m not here just to rehash everything you guys have done. This is just where I’m starting. So, I want everything you have on your murder. The whole file. And if I annoy anyone by nosing around, I want you to get the word out that I’m one of the good guys. I want to be able to tell people that you have my back. That will save me a lot of time. And aggravation.”

  “We appreciate your help, pal, but that’s asking a lot.”

  “Are you guys flying to California or those other places?”

  Broderson snorted

  “Yeah, right, on our budget?”

  “Well, I am. And I’ll give you anything I find out.”

  “You must be independ
ently wealthy,” Huntley said.

  “No. Just independent. I told you before, this is personal. Come on, what do have to lose? I can be a royal pain in the ass around here. Instead, I’m offering to do some legwork. Expensive legwork.”

  “And you don’t have a client,” he said. “Nobody is paying you.”

  “I do some of my best work unpaid. I seem to have a lot of practice.”

  “One of the cops on Staten Island told us an interesting rumor about you,” Broderson said. “You really find someone in Witness Protection?”

  “Feds suck,” I said, smiling.

  The two detectives looked at each other. Broderson, the senior man, nodded. Huntley slid open a drawer and came out with a file.

  “There are no crime scene or autopsy photos in this,” he said. “I can get them if you want.”

  I stared at him.

  “He doesn’t want to see that shit, Dick,” Broderson said.

  He was right.

  ***

  Broderson and Huntley let me use an empty interrogation room to study the file and told me where the copy machine was. They had been thorough in their investigation, interviewing dozens of people who knew Sister Veronica, either personally or professionally. None were likely suspects, although I knew that didn’t mean anything. As far as they were concerned, everyone in Worcester past the sixth grade was a suspect.

  I read all the statements and cop notes, making some of my own on my iPhone. I also copied some names, addresses and phone numbers. I didn’t need the copy machine; my cell phone camera was just fine. I hadn’t expected to learn anything from the file, which could have been labeled “Brick Wall.” The detectives had pulled in known sex offenders, even though Ronnie’s murder didn’t seem to be a sex crime. They had even interviewed a man who had written a nasty letter to the principal because his daughter had received a “lousy grade” in “Boolean Algebra.” The grade in question was a B+, a mark I would have killed to get in high school, in any subject. Since the daughter was now in Harvard, the father was not considered a suspect. There had never been any allegations of abuse, sexual or otherwise, brought against Sister Veronica or any of the staff at Ave Maria, which didn’t surprise me. But the very fact that Broderson and Huntley delved into the possibility said a lot about the current moral climate and the Catholic Church.

 

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